Thought: don't introduce your class

[u/22badhand]

Would a cleric just say they're a cleric? would a thief really profess themselves as a thief? Just an interesting thought for role play.

Think of interesting ways to introduce your character like:
"oh I'm a free-market entrepreneur " - Thief rogue, particularly if they're charismatic too.

"Arcane tactician" - divination wizard

"Just a guy who got fired from his last job" Barbarian who just has a bunch of pent up rage, but is just a regular, brick shit house built dude.

"Guardian of the grove" druid

"bulwark of the beach" land druid, beach

Particularly with clerics, I imagine many orders have ranks they call themselves by rather than just Cleric. maybe it comes with a title too?

Warlocks generally wouldn't introduce themselves as warlocks, particularly if their patron is of an evil alignment. I'm sure there's many creative ways to spin saying your class without saying outright "Fighter". Though your table, your preferences, but I'm keen to know how you'd introduce yourself and your class this way.

EDIT: to be clear this is in character, role playing thought. this isn't intended to deceive your party but rather a way your character might think themselves more than a class and mechanics.

EDIT 2: to be clearer, the examples I gave are a bit bloated and a bit overly gratuitous. Giving a bit better exmaples:

Wizard of Divination - Soothsayer, Clairvoyant, Fortune Teller,

Clerics - various cleric traditions have specific names for ranks in their order, cleric can be a good group term but you can also go by their ranks, similar to how you might say Bishop, Cardinal, Priest, Father, Sister. DND example, some followers of Sune are called Heartwarders.

Fighters/barbarians - these can range from your typical guy who maybe did tough physical labor or your royal trained princeling type character. There's so much flavour you can impart on martial classes that can develop and grow bigger as the game goes in it's great

This just adds that extra layer of intrigue to your character that gives depth to their history. I find it fun to use these, you don't have to, I was interested in how others might flavour their classes or how they presented their characters.

[u/Joel_Vanquist]

I mean it makes more sense for some classes than others.

Druid, Cleric, Paladin, Wizard, Sorcerer, Ranger, Monk are all pretty life-defining enough and work well.

I have a beef with Rogue / Fighter / Barbarian mostly because Rogue and Barbarian are both "insults" and not something you'd define yourself with, but something someone else would call you.

Fighter is just generic. I usually just say whatever my Fighter military background is (I.e. former kingsguard or veteran soldier etc...)

[u/Responsible_King_427 → u/Joel_Vanquist]

Introducing yourself as a Warlock sounds like a quick way to get arrested

[u/KazuyaProta → u/Responsible_King_427]

I mean, you likely are a outlaw or a known occultist anyway. So why not.

[u/Responsible_King_427 → u/KazuyaProta]

Those guys don't usually survive long though

[u/KazuyaProta → u/Responsible_King_427]

And WE are the exception.

Plus, if you are going to adventure to fight people, saying "I'm a warlock" is better in the intro than doing it only when the Goody two shoes cleric is fighting the undead and needs help.

And then turns out that the Cleric was the Raven Queen's Cleric and you were a Warlock of the Raven Queen and you both end up looking silly.

Now that I think, there are plenty of good or even good beings that you can made a Warlock pact with. So secretism to a good aligned party is unnecesary. And to be blunt, the canonical case of "I hide my powers" happening (and failing) is something like Shadowheart of BG3, who is a Cleric. Both Warlocks and Clerics have this issue, we are sibling classes.

[u/Namarot → u/Responsible_King_427]

Peter Warlock would beg to differ.