I have a friend who wants to make a Human Paladin, that was born Mute and uses sign language to communicate... from a RP perspective I love the character design and background that the character has made... but from a gaming perspective im unsure the best way to implement Verbal component of her spells.. pretty much EVERY Paladin spell has a verbal component. I'm not DMing this game, so am looking for advice to get the DM to allow it
I tossed the idea of cross classing into sorcerer to her to get sorcerer points, but she thinks it will muddy up the character design and I whole heartily agree.
I also suggested her taking a home brew fighting style similar to blind fighting.. but then that does take away from her original build as well
Give them a free feat: Metamagic Adept. But tweak it so that they only get Subtle Spell and no other metamagic. Instead of using Sorcery Points, have the number of uses based off Proficiency Bonus.
Play it off as the character developing heightened spell casting ability due to their disability.
easy, just play solely off flavor. For all intents and purposes, they can "mechanically" speak. Flavor it as the verbal components being the fine movements of their lips, regardless of their voice. If they were affected by the silence spell, flavor it as them being unable to move their lips. Whatever!
A mute character cannot cast verbal spells and would need to select spells without such component if he's a spellcaster. Trying to find a work around solution to it kind of defeat the purpuse of experiencing a mute character. I'd say let the player embrace the challenge instead, it will make it more memorable if its character must cope with limitations in a significant way.
Being mute does not necessarily mean they cannot still make some sounds. In many experiences I have encountered with people who are mute, they find and manage some form of auditory queueing useful. Nasal cavities can hum, tongues click, lips can still whistle, cheeks bloat and contract for pops and suction, etc. etc. Even sharp inhalation/exhalation create their own noise. Careful breathing is sometimes enough to project and mimic things like laughter.
Mute does not mean completely silent!
Combined with some...new form of specialty language akin to Thieves' Cant or something, which could quantify and replace portions of somatic components, there are plenty of additionally relative ways one could potentially, at minimum, mimick sounds for verbal components. A deeper delve into why or how the PC became mute is in order, however, so the player and troupe can determine how flavorful, or not, the toon can be until some form of drawback is in order.
What if instead of a vocal component, you make some other kind of noise. Like you have to clap, or stomp your foot or ring a bell. Something where you are making noise, so you’re not getting subtle spell for free. Or maybe find something that works thematically with your oath.
I'd advice against playing a mute character since you'll lose so many aspects of the game. Since you won't be able to use non-verbal communication queue in the same way you can IRL you're going to miss out on a lot of things. I've tried playing mute characters everyone once in a while and it just gets boring. Falling back to the whole "I'll just write down what I say" method defeats the point of a mute character.
That said, if you decide on playing a mute character I'd go with StylesStriker's suggestion of just making other sounds.
Honestly I feel paladin Has more rights to work around this than other classes. They have a connection to a Diety so their thoughts and prayers could be the verbal components as they reach out to a god.
I would just have that be the verbal component but have the silence spell silence the internal voice too.
Honestly I feel paladin Has more rights to work around this than other classes. They have a connection to a fiery so their thoughts and prayers could be the verbal components as they reach out to a god.
It still requires them to actually vocalize their prayer to their "fiery", though.
Honestly I feel paladin Has more rights to work around this than other classes. They have a connection to a fiery so their thoughts and prayers could be the verbal components as they reach out to a god.
It still requires them to actually vocalize their prayer to their "fiery", though.
My man, auto correct is a thing. No need for the passive aggressiveness. A dm is also well within their right to tweak that depending on character provided the mechanical effects are the same.
Sorry for the slow response.. but thanks for the feedback
So my friend ended taking Thelonelymagi's advice with a Metamagic equivalent to her Prof Bonus... she's going to be stuck using a lot of Paladin Divine Smite ability (as this doesn't have verbal), but will still have some limited use for spell casting each day. It's not like Paladins have a lot spells per day regardless, and she really wanted to keep the idea of being Mute and her connection to her faith as unique.
I played a shadow sorcerer 2 / undead warlock 7 in a one-shot recently, named Silence. She unknowingly told secrets about here village to a group of very bad people/creatures when she was young, and they decimated the town and all the people. She vowed to never let that happen again.
So, she rarely RARELY ever speaks. She uses the Message Cantrip a lot, to speak directly at someone without the threat of anyone overhearing. And, some form of rudimentary sign language. For the verbal aspects of casting, my DM allowed her to make various grunts, squeals, screeches, howls, and screams, etc, just so she can do that without actually talking. And, her patron was a Banshee, so... it fits thematically. I'm sure the same rules of Dispell Magic and Counterspell would have applied, willingly.
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I have a friend who wants to make a Human Paladin, that was born Mute and uses sign language to communicate... from a RP perspective I love the character design and background that the character has made... but from a gaming perspective im unsure the best way to implement Verbal component of her spells.. pretty much EVERY Paladin spell has a verbal component. I'm not DMing this game, so am looking for advice to get the DM to allow it
I tossed the idea of cross classing into sorcerer to her to get sorcerer points, but she thinks it will muddy up the character design and I whole heartily agree.
I also suggested her taking a home brew fighting style similar to blind fighting.. but then that does take away from her original build as well
Any other suggestions?
Give them a free feat: Metamagic Adept. But tweak it so that they only get Subtle Spell and no other metamagic. Instead of using Sorcery Points, have the number of uses based off Proficiency Bonus.
Play it off as the character developing heightened spell casting ability due to their disability.
easy, just play solely off flavor. For all intents and purposes, they can "mechanically" speak. Flavor it as the verbal components being the fine movements of their lips, regardless of their voice. If they were affected by the silence spell, flavor it as them being unable to move their lips. Whatever!
A mute character cannot cast verbal spells and would need to select spells without such component if he's a spellcaster. Trying to find a work around solution to it kind of defeat the purpuse of experiencing a mute character. I'd say let the player embrace the challenge instead, it will make it more memorable if its character must cope with limitations in a significant way.
Being mute does not necessarily mean they cannot still make some sounds. In many experiences I have encountered with people who are mute, they find and manage some form of auditory queueing useful. Nasal cavities can hum, tongues click, lips can still whistle, cheeks bloat and contract for pops and suction, etc. etc. Even sharp inhalation/exhalation create their own noise. Careful breathing is sometimes enough to project and mimic things like laughter.
Mute does not mean completely silent!
Combined with some...new form of specialty language akin to Thieves' Cant or something, which could quantify and replace portions of somatic components, there are plenty of additionally relative ways one could potentially, at minimum, mimick sounds for verbal components. A deeper delve into why or how the PC became mute is in order, however, so the player and troupe can determine how flavorful, or not, the toon can be until some form of drawback is in order.
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What if instead of a vocal component, you make some other kind of noise. Like you have to clap, or stomp your foot or ring a bell. Something where you are making noise, so you’re not getting subtle spell for free. Or maybe find something that works thematically with your oath.
I'd advice against playing a mute character since you'll lose so many aspects of the game. Since you won't be able to use non-verbal communication queue in the same way you can IRL you're going to miss out on a lot of things. I've tried playing mute characters everyone once in a while and it just gets boring. Falling back to the whole "I'll just write down what I say" method defeats the point of a mute character.
That said, if you decide on playing a mute character I'd go with StylesStriker's suggestion of just making other sounds.
Honestly I feel paladin Has more rights to work around this than other classes. They have a connection to a Diety so their thoughts and prayers could be the verbal components as they reach out to a god.
I would just have that be the verbal component but have the silence spell silence the internal voice too.
It still requires them to actually vocalize their prayer to their "fiery", though.
My man, auto correct is a thing. No need for the passive aggressiveness. A dm is also well within their right to tweak that depending on character provided the mechanical effects are the same.
Sorry for the slow response.. but thanks for the feedback
So my friend ended taking Thelonelymagi's advice with a Metamagic equivalent to her Prof Bonus... she's going to be stuck using a lot of Paladin Divine Smite ability (as this doesn't have verbal), but will still have some limited use for spell casting each day. It's not like Paladins have a lot spells per day regardless, and she really wanted to keep the idea of being Mute and her connection to her faith as unique.
Thanks for the advice
I played a shadow sorcerer 2 / undead warlock 7 in a one-shot recently, named Silence. She unknowingly told secrets about here village to a group of very bad people/creatures when she was young, and they decimated the town and all the people. She vowed to never let that happen again.
So, she rarely RARELY ever speaks. She uses the Message Cantrip a lot, to speak directly at someone without the threat of anyone overhearing. And, some form of rudimentary sign language. For the verbal aspects of casting, my DM allowed her to make various grunts, squeals, screeches, howls, and screams, etc, just so she can do that without actually talking. And, her patron was a Banshee, so... it fits thematically.
I'm sure the same rules of Dispell Magic and Counterspell would have applied, willingly.