Taking 20 Podcast - Ep 273 - Flaws

Episode Date: April 5, 2026

Want to make your characters better?  Consider adding flaws to your character.  What kinds of flaws are there and how do you add them  in a way that’s not disruptive to the game?  Give this episode a listen and find out.   #rpg #ttrpg #dnd #pathfinder #gmtips #playertips #tabletop #flaws Resources: Buy Me a Coffee! - ko-fi.com/taking20podcast www.taking20podcast.com  Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/taking20podcast  Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/taking20podcast  Bluesky - https://bsky.app/profile/taking20podcast.bsky.social 

This week on the Taking 20 podcast. Character agency is a critical factor of tabletop gaming and a GM imposing a permanent stat penalty or lingering disability without player buy-in can lead to friction and maybe a player versus DM mentality from the player side. Thank you for listening to the Taking 20 podcast, episode 273, talking about character flaws, both mechanical and flavor filled. In honor for Easter, I want to thank this week's sponsor, Rabbits. The Easter Bunny has to work hard to stay in shape. I mean, he has to do a lot of

egg sursize. Do you have any topics you'd like to hear me discuss or questions you like me to answer or maybe issues that I can help your group with? If so, please send them to me on the socials. The links are in the description, by the way, or email me, feedback at taking20podcast.com, or you can message me on my coffee, K-O-F-F-I-com slash taking-20 podcast. flaws can help your character stand out, be believable, be more interesting, but should you include them with your character? Obviously from my opening statement, I'm going to argue yes, but there's some caveats, and let's explore this idea. Now, there are multiple ways we can characterize character flaws. Characterize character flaws. Good writing, Jeremy. Mechanical flaws are those that are quantifiable, definable, definable, and

game terms, meaning they directly impact the game mechanics in some way. These flaws can affect die rolls, or depending on the situation, may even prevent a character from making a role at all. So, for a concrete example, imagine your character has a phobia of heights. Common phobia, by the way, a lot of people have it, myself included. Most game systems have a skill check or saving throw to keep you from falling off a ledge or a ladder or out a window. A common way this flaw could be used mechanically

would be a penalty to this acrobatic skill check or reflex save or climb check or whatever would be appropriate in your game system of choice. Maybe my cleric, who hates Heights, takes a minus one penalty to the reflex check to catch a ledge and avoid falling. The imposition of penalties, such as a negative modifier to attack rolls,

saving throws, or other vital checks, those explicit rules-based drawbacks are mechanical penalties based on flaws. They are immediate measurable consequences within a game system. These mechanical flaws are often integrated into the character's creation. While you're making a character, you can choose a flaw to justify a reduction in a character's ability scores, like a penalty to strength because the character is measurably weaker, or penalty to wisdom means they're less perceptive from the outset of that character.

but it doesn't have to necessarily be a penalty to be an ability score to manifest as a flaw. A mechanical flaw could also manifest as a tangible resource penalty, like reduction in starting gold, which forces your character to begin the adventure with fewer or lower quality assets, maybe weaker weapons, less ammunition, fewer consumables. This ensures that the flaw is a rules-defined part of your character's profile. Some game systems have mechanics for flaws. For example, Pathfinder remaster has an optional flaw system.

In 2E, for example, you can take any number of attribute flaws that you want when you're creating your character. One change, though, is that, like, 1E and 2E pre-remaster allowed you to take bonuses to offset the flaws that you take. Well, that's gone in the remastered version since 2023. Meanwhile, in D&D, the 2024 rules, or 5.5E for us garage, Gagnards do not have an optional mechanical flaw system. That's different than the original 5E, by the way, which had the ability to take penalties in one attribute to get a bonus in another. Those mechanical flaws in 5E and Pathfinder pre-remaster were a lot of times were used by

min-maxers to game the system a little bit. Hey, no shade being thrown here. I did the same thing with some of my characters back in the day. Now, I know this advice has primarily been for players, but for my GMs out there, remember, these mechanical flaws should not be unilaterally decreed by the DM. Character agency is a critical factor of tabletop gaming and a GM imposing a permanent stat penalty or lingering disability without player buy-in can lead to friction and maybe a player versus DM mentality from the player side. Even mechanical flaws should be discussed and should

be collaborated on from the very beginning. But Jeremy, I'm the DM and I think that a flaw would make sense for this character because of a lot of damage or negative event in their backstory. Okay, good. Talk to the player about it. Instead of decreeing that this mechanical flaw exists for this character, present it as a narrative opportunity. When the character takes a massive hit or suffers a traumatic failure, frame the potential flaw as a choice, ask the player, hey, that was a brutal wound caused by that devil, would your character walk away like a permanent scar or maybe a new phobia from it? This invites the player to co-author their characters' flaws,

maybe even their downfall, making a mechanical penalty of a badge of honor rather than a punishment decreed by the DM. But unless the system mandates a flaw, such as the Wounds System and Call of Cthulhu, if a player isn't interested in adding a mechanical flaw, you really shouldn't push it or force it on the character. So, in short, DM's only a person.

mechanical flaws if the player agrees that it fits their character story and the player agrees to the flaw to begin with. But Jeremy, I'm the GM and I think that flaws would be really cool in the game and I want to include them. Oh, I get it. No, no, it sounds awesome. We all have ideas that sound really cool. If you really want to include flaws and want to try to get your players to agree to it, you'll need to think about what you can give the player in character to offset those negatives? Are you going to make future encounters easier because the PCs are weaker? Are you going to give the PC something like additional inspiration or hero points or luck points to overcome this flaw? Giving the PC something to help overcome this weakness can make for a great story, but again, only if

the players all want to do this. Unless you're playing a high-lethality horror game like Call of Cthulhu, plan to provide the PC a clear path maybe to healing or correcting the flaw. even if that path might be difficult to traverse. It might involve a specific quest, a high-level spell, significant period of downtime, or maybe finding some very powerful NPC who can handle this for them. Call of Cthulhu, for example, has the sanity mechanic which can be recovered

with long-term recuperation and convalescence. Speaking of which, by the way, over the past week or two, I have really thrown myself head first into learning and playing Seventh Edition Call of Cthulhu. I'm going to do an episode dedicated to that game system in the near future, so let me know if you have any feedback or thoughts about that. Now let's go to the other end of the spectrum from mechanical flaws.

Remember, mechanical flaws had numerical effects on die rolls. Another way flaws can be expressed in a game would be ones that are purely for flavor purposes. Flavor that I'll call them, it sounds like a rapper from the 80s rap group, a public enemy, but that's neither here nor there. flavor flaws do not affect the die rolls. Maybe they don't even have a direct rule associated with them, but they might drive role play opportunities for that character

and fun moments around the table. So the fact that your bard has a serious fear of dogs doesn't mean that it gets automatically a penalty to attack roles against dogs, but maybe the dogs are often the antagonists of the songs that they play, or maybe you describe their attacks against wolves as more desperate, less controlled than they usually are. Maybe in the middle of the fight they climb on top of the table, or maybe even just when a stray dog wanders into the tavern.

Flavor flaws don't affect the character sheet. They affect the story, the narrative, how you roleplay that character. Instead of a minus two to hit canines, it becomes a character-defining moment where the party gets to support a friend panicking at the mastiff that the local farmer brought with them to the tavern, or maybe scramble to save a friend who's surrounded, by fire that they're absolutely terrified of.

Flavor flaws create fun moments in the story where the character is given an opportunity to stand out a bit. There are a million human fighters out there, but how many of them are pathological exaggerators where every story they tell is just a touch incorrect and makes them look a little better than they actually are? Or how many human fighters scratch their arms gently when they see insects, remembering getting stung by multiple bees

when they were a kid. These little touches of roleplay can help your characters stand out at the table and be more memorable both to you and to other players. Whether mechanical or flavorful, what kinds of flaws are there for you to cue from? Well, honestly, sky's the limit here, and I'm going to break it down into a few categories.

But I'm going to be perfectly honest, these are arbitrary. You can slice this flawed pie any number of ways. First off, let's talk phobias. I've used lots of examples already. in this episode. Heights and spiders and dogs, but it could be anything, really. Snakes, the color yellow, uh, minotars flying. Wait, I just thought about this. Imagine a wizard who has the fly spell, but is terrified to fly. In a situation where he has to cast a spell to get somewhere,

camera cuts to a far off shot of this little gnome-shaped outline against the moon, soaring from one side of a ravine to another, screaming his little head off the entire time, desperate. trying to hold onto his hat. He gets to the other side and just hugs the ground for a good six seconds before getting up, hands shaking, breath trembling, and saying, never fucking make me do that ever again. Phobias are great flaws for characters to have, but so are good traits taken too far.

It's great for a character be confident in themselves, but it could be a flaw if it's taken too far and they're arrogant. Maybe they're wise with money, good character trait, but they take that too far and they become cheap or greedy. They're careful. Okay, good idea, but someone could become overly cautious, scared of doing anything new or different, and possibly missing golden opportunities in the game. Some of my favorite flaws to roleplay, by the way, are defensive in nature. Not, by the way, defensive as in wearing too much armor or anything like that,

but something bad happened in this character's past, and they're determined not to let that happen again. or avoid the cause of this past trauma whenever possible. Suppose your character was abandoned as a child, whether through family tragedy or their parents just left for some reason. Because of that, they fear abandonment, crave togetherness. They don't like to go off on their own and they always stay close by others, maybe even insisting they march in the middle of the party instead of out front.

Or the character flaw could be based in anger or hatred or maybe even racism. My cleric that I'm playing right now fought in the crusades in the world wound on Galerian. There was a plainer rift to the abyss and demons poured through by the thousands, maybe even millions. There were five crusades to try to close the rift to varying degrees of success, and this is the central theme of, by the way, the wrath of the righteous adventure path and Pathfinder. My character's an elf, and she fought in the world wound for the better part of a decade. She saw young humans and elves and dwarves and every other ancestry show up. up with shiny shields and naive confidence in their eyes because they were sure they're going to be

the ones to save the world, only to fall or be horribly maimed at the hands of a demonic horde. She absolutely cannot stand demons in any form and actually worships a deity who believes in the protection of innocent from unnecessary harm. Or maybe your character worked in a pig farm and they were trampled once when the pigs got scared, so they have a hatred of every everything pig-related. The animals themselves, any food made from pig, maybe even an entire race of pig people in your world. It wasn't the pig people's fault that the pigs trampled this character, but they're lumped in with the animals all the same. Maybe your character had an experience where they were tempted by devils or their family was carried off by demons.

Because of that, they despise teaflings, simply due to the reminder of the past event. So one flaw you could consider is a distrust or maybe even a hatred of particular groups of people. A particular ancestry, nationality, maybe even gender. First thing, though, make sure you discuss this with your fellow players and DM before you break racism out at the table. I mean, even if they are okay with it, I'd recommend keeping it kind of toned down. A muttered comment about dwarves is fine, but going out and killing innocent dwarves because your character hates them probably isn't. Maybe your character distrust human males because of a past event or azimars because they represent in a religion they cannot stand. Racism or any ism, genderism, speciesism can be a wonderful flaw to roleplay,

but only if the people around the gaming table agree that it won't make them uncomfortable. The last type of flaw I'm going to mention would be something like compulsions or addictions. The character could have a substance abuse problem and be an alcoholic, a drug addict, or something similar. This could be easily mechanical or flavorful in the game, depending on how you wanted to run it. In Critical Role's Mighty Nine, for example, not the goblin, pretty obviously addicted to alcohol. She uses it as a defense mechanism for some of the trauma in her past. Or it could be an addiction to something like gambling. If you've seen Guy Ritchie's Sherlock Holmes movies with Robert Downey Jr. and Jude Law,

Watson was at least intimated to have a bit of a gambling problem. Maybe another character is they're addicted to food and they're glutton. They overeat. Or maybe they're addicted to trying to get the best deal and they're compelled to try to haggle every time they buy stuff in town. Now, you may be asking, why should your character have flaws at all?

Good news is, you don't need to have any. It's a game. And most of the RPGs we play are power fantasy, so it might not be fun for you to play a character with a flaw of some sort. If you aren't interested in having flaws, don't. But if it sounds fun, flaws make for great roleplay,

portraying fears and compulsions or bigotry can make characters believable. We all in this real world have flaws. It might make sense for your character to have some too. It might make them memorable. It might give you something to latch on to when you're role-playing them. Flaws can create narrative tension and opportunities for heroism in the game. Your fighters terrified of fire but rushes into a burning building to save the gnomes that are trapped in there. flaws can also introduce opportunities for tragedy,

maybe because flaws lead to a character or even an NPC succumbing to temptation, relapsing into old habits with destructive acts and people. GMs can use this character flaw leading to a relapse as a powerful part of a story when an NPC does it. That being said, my beloved players out there, there are good flaws and there are bad flaws when you're role-playing. Good flaws create drama and tension and challenges to, to overcome as part of your character's heroic journey. They reveal your character's past and problems,

but if you take flaws too far, they can become an annoyance, a disruption around the table as your character doesn't contribute to the story or participate in roleplay because they have a fear of fucking water. Flaws that when you roleplay them cause discomfort, frustration, or an unfun game for others

are not good choices, and you need to discuss your character's flaws around the table during session zero. A character with a flaw of I always steal my fellow teammates is a one-way recipe to get kicked out of the group because that is annoying as shit. If you want your character to have flaws that aren't disruptive, they come in three very broad categories. Social or role-play flaws, internal flaws, and physical flaws. Social and role-play flaws primarily affect how a character interacts with other people,

like a cleric who harbors hate, but will still heal a party member. A character who habitually exaggerates or embellishes a story or a character who is overly confident. This category also covers a character that maybe they believe they're more attractive than they actually are, or more social than they actually are. Internal flaws are centered around the character's fears and biases that influence their approach to solving problems. These flaws could be adhering to a code of honor to the point that it becomes a problem, or being overly cautious, or maybe even downright racism. These flaws can inhibit direct decisive action or maybe even their flaws that they're too soft-hearted,

meaning the character is easily swayed by an emotional appeal. Finally, physical flaws are any trait that manifests in the game world with a specific drawback or compulsion, like a phobia, a vice, a scar, a weakness of some sort. For my GMs out there, though, consider including PC flaws in your adventure and adding some to your NPCs. Smart Big Bads, by the way, will use PC flaws against them, and that makes for great story beats. The fighter is scared of golems and the Big Bad learns that? Well, maybe there just happens to be two golems guarding the Big Bad's anti-chamber in the last dungeon. Today I talked about character flaws, both mechanical and flavorful. GMs get player consent

before imposing mechanical flaws on their characters. And players, consider adding a social, internal or physical flaw to your character to make them stand out, give them something to overcome, and I bet if you do, you all would have fun doing it. Thank you so much for listening. I'd like to get your feedback, social media, or email, feedback at taking20podcast.com. Please send me a message and let me know your thoughts on the episode.

Tune in next time where I'm going to talk about backstories. Should your character have one? And if so, how long do they need to be? But before I go, I want to thank this week's sponsor, Rabbits. friend of mine put all of his rabbits in a row. He called it his hair line. This has been episode 273 talking about character flaws. My name is Jeremy Shelley, and I hope that your next game is your best game. The Taking 20 podcast is Copyright 2026 by Jeremy Shelley. The opinions or views expressed by guests are their own, and do not necessarily reflect those of the host. References

to game system content are copyright their respective publishers.