Inspiration
Inspiration is a way to reward you for playing your character in a way that's true to his or her personality traits, ideals, bonds, or flaws. By using inspiration, you can draw on your personality trait of compassion for the poor and downtrodden to give you an edge with the Beggar Prince. Or inspiration can let you use your flaw to seek knowledge at your own peril to push past the effects of a trap protecting ancient ruins.
DM Given Inspiration
Your DM can choose to give you inspiration for a variety of reasons. Typically, DMs award it when you portray your character in a compelling way or go the extra mile when roleplaying. You either have inspiration or you don't-you can't stockpile multiple "inspirations" for later use.
Player Invoked Advantage
You can invoke advantage for your character on rolls when your character's personality trait, ideal, bond, or flaw is relevant in the story and your character is not incapacitated. Once one of characteristics have been invoked to give yourself advantage, it is marked and cannot be used again until it gets unmarked. When one of your characteristics is invoked to grant yourself disadvantage, you can choose to unmark one characteristic of your choice. At the start of a new session, all characteristics are unmarked.
Examples
Since player characteristics are descriptive and can be almost anything, these examples are just examples.
Honest: Invoked to grant advantage on persuade check when telling the truth OR invoked to grant disadvantage when attempting a deception check
Curious: Invoked to grant advantage on stealth check to sneak into a mysterious cult hideout OR invoked to grant disadvantage to overcome a magical pull to an item or area
Greedy: Invoked to grant advantage on dexterity save to avoid a trap treasure chest OR invoked to grant disadvantage on a religion check
Arrogant: Invoked to grant advantage on persuade check when trying to convince someone of your great deeds OR invoked to grant disadvantage when attacking an enemy
Deathwish: Invoked to grant advantage when putting yourself in danger when attacking OR invoked to grant disadvantage on a save to dodge a falling bolder trap
Additional Options
- Allow characters to change their characteristics as their character evolves, changes, and responds to story elements.
- The DM may prevent some characteristics from being invoked in situations they deem unsatisfactory. A majority vote from the players may override this.