Better Player #4: How Much to Roleplay?

I've recently come across a near-perfect answer to the pesky question of how much a player should roleplay their character. That is, should the PC be considered as nothing more than a playing piece to be used to 'win' the game, should the PC basically be you in a fantasy universe, or should your PC be a whole other person with their own motivations, personality, and quirks?

The answer I came across is pretty simple: as much as you want.

That is, if you want to go full immersion, you should go for it. If you want to treat your character as just an extension as yourself, that's fine too.

There is one caveat to that, however, and it is this: don't be a jerk. If your character is an anti-social jerk who alienates everyone else in the group, that's on you - "I'm just playing my character" isn't a valid defence, because you chose to play that character rather than a myriad of others. (Likewise, if your character is resolutely determined not to get involved in adventures, that's your call - but it's not my responsibility to involve your character in events. Your choices are two-fold: play your character differently (or a different character), or don't play.)

And, yeah, there's a corollary to that: it can be a bit depressing for the DM to see players choose a non-human race for their character based purely on game stats, and then play that character as just a soulless playing piece to 'win' the game, but that's the player's prerogative. It's their character to roleplay as much, or as little, as they want. If it really bothers the DM, maybe the answer is to ban the use of non-human races... which may in turn lead to players choosing not to play.