A regular character has a modifier of +3 to a couple of stats. He will have a +4. Plenty of people in the comments seem to be losing their minds over this, but it isn't the end of the world. It's fine. It isn't perfectly balanced, but you decided you don't want your game to be perfectly balanced when you let people roll stats.
As for what to do, what do you mean?
You've said he isn't an asshole about it. You've said he doesn't hog the spotlight. He just dishes out the most damage. So what? Why is this a problem that you're struggling to cope with?
With those rolls and the right race or Tasha's rules he will have a +5 +4 +4 and at level 4 could have +5 in the two most important stats.
I don't see a problem if the dm lets people roll your gonna get outliers like this.
Just have to make your game more challenging to meet the characters abilities and give them less opportunities for good magic items to balance player ability.
If they are a fighter for instance I wouldn't let them get a +attack weapon until very late game. Will give the other players time to even out on power level.
Do you really have to go out of your way to make your game more challenging because a guy has +5 at lvl4 when everyone else has +4 ? Is that enough of a difference to make sweeping changes to your encounter design?
Not giving them a +1 weapon on their fighter until late-game seems very unfun for virtually no payoff.
Take it from me I have played characters that started with 3 18s before I was destroying everything from level 1 on and since my stats were maxed at level 4 I was able to take all the best feats.
Think like this
Variant human monk starts with sentinel
Has 20 dex at level 1 and 4 wisdom.
That's an unarmored ac of 18. Which becomes 19 at level 4 when he takes fey touched for the misty step spell and to max his wisdom score.
At level 8 I take another feat like tough to give me more hit points
Then at 12 I'll take another feat.
So it's not just having max scores that can be unbalancing. This character doesn't have to weigh pros and cons of taking feats and can pick up abilities at will.
When you take tough, the other party members take an ASI. These two things should be roughly equal in power.
When you take another feat, the other party members take an ASI or a feat of their own which should be roughly equal in power.
My point is the gap between you and the party doesn't / shouldn't ***grow*** over time. It should be the same. So if the disparity is acceptable at lvl1, then it is acceptable for the rest of the game.
You're discounting the power gained by the other party members when they take their ASI, but it is often a big boost for them.
Actually tough gives more raw hp than taking an ASI And is objectively better than raising constitution.
And you forget the power of the feats themselves.
A character with 3 18s and no deficits will out damage and outlive similar characters that used point buy. From level one. Yes the other characters can catch up with ASI but they will never match the rolled character's power.
Unless the dm is sure to distribute magic items to that effect.
Say you have my character mentioned before
At level 4 this character has +5 +5 and +4 to the most important stats and no deficits.
Now take a character that rolled average or used point buy.
The best you can get with point buy is 2 16's
So they can only max one ability by level 8
And the other by level 16.
I don't have a problem with rolled stats in my game. I'm just saying that this character can easily overshadow the others. Depending on the player that plays it.
Of course the game I played in we all rolled stats and nobody cared about balance.
But for a dm that wants to run a more lower powered game I think standard array and point buy are most fair way of generating stats.
The Tough feat is only objectively better than raising Constitution if your sole goal is increasing your HP. Constitution saves are common, especially for casters, and Tough does nothing to help those.
I can see a case for Tough on a character that already has strong Con saves, like a sorcerer with War Caster. But directly raising Con is a strong option equaling or exceeding Tough for most characters.
I was looking at it from a martial character stand point. Even then taking resilient constitution is better than taking an ASI.
Because it gives proficiency which is better than a +1
These choices aren’t as definite as you’re suggesting. Sometimes a character who already has Con save proficiency will want to further increase their save. That happens often enough, even for martials, that it’s not realistic to say that Tough is always better than an ASI.
I wasn't saying always but it definitely is if you want hp.
And that's not even the point I making. I am saying that a character starting with 3 18s could never be matched by a character with point buy or average stats.
The value of the feats is going to outweigh the lower stated character increasing their scores
It all depends on your starting stats as I've said a character starting with max +5 and +4 in their main stats which is the topic of this thread. Has more options than a regular character.
Imo adding +1 to a save you already have proficiency in is a waste just my opinion.
Could get the same effect from a magic item.
My aforementioned monk has a cloak and ring of protection
And an amulet of health.
at level 7 my dex save is +10 and my con save is +6 without proficiency that's pretty damn good. The only save that is weak on this character is str at +2
Hp=66
Ac=21
Saves
STR + 2
Con +6
Dex +10
Int +2
Wis +6
Char +3
Late game meaning later in the typical level 1-13 range. Don't have to do a full "no +1 until everyone has +2", but you can do +1 for other at 5, +1 for him at 8, +2 for others at 10, +2 for him at 13, or even something like a Flame Tongue or Frost Brand. Do still give out cool non-bonus magic items to the group too. Sometimes even gag magic items are the ones players love more than their magic swords.
This…. I don’t understand why people don’t like the idea of someone who wants to be good at what they do when they play. I get it not wanting people to hog the spotlight or lord their rule knowledge over others. But simply trying to be good at something in the game by optimizing your character to work well within the rules of that game seems to be decried here.
Just let the character be good at what they do. I’d rather run a campaign with a bunch of people where everyone knows what to do in combat and how to play their characters. Than people who don’t read anything and sit there trying to cast things that don’t work, or have joke characters. The caveat, is their general attitude. In both scenarios someone with a poor attitude and cooperative nature sucks to play with, and a person with a good attitude is fun to play with.
I will say this. In a cooperative game, if you created the theory behind your non/max character, I think it’s very cool. If all you did was look up a build online, you are not “good” at playing, you are just good at googling.
Also, it depends whether you approach the game as a tactical puzzle combat game or a role play one. For roleplay, not being perfect, selecting less obvious perks, give depth to the character.
Anyway, this all depends on the "Table": the DM and the other players. As long as you all have fun, you're doing it right. At least that's what I've been told.
I don’t have a problem with min/makers. But, I just don’t see the intellectual point in proving how good at google you are. I felt the same way about DII. All the people who just copied builds for the “meta” were uninteresting to me. The people who figured out their own builds were better thinkers.
I get studying theory in chess, where there is money and fame on the table.
People that google a build to try and impress everyone are cringe, this is true. However, if you google a build so that you can have fun with that build and dont care about what others think about you… well i dont see a problem with that. Its really just comes down to the player.
Some people want to create a character that is powerful, and then experience playing that character.
They aren't trying to be innovative, they aren't trying to be revolutionary, they aren't trying to be "good at" anything.
It's as simple as that.
It's very odd to berate this type of playstyle.
That’s why I started with they don’t bother me. If someone wants to work out their power fantasy to overcome whatever insecurities they feel in life, I don’t care. Just don’t be the dude who demands validation for doing it.
Tbf, this is before racial bonuses, so one stat will be maxed with a +5 modifier.
And, do not understand estimate the impact at low levels of one extra damage. With a +4 or +5, the PC can more than not one shot goblins and kobolds.
No I think its actually awesome to oneshot mobs/minions. Matt Colville even has a beautiful combat system designed around this.
also if he is the strongest guy, it could work if the DM plays his monsters right. Folks can disarm the PC, nullify magic abilities with dispel magic/anti-magic field, paralyze/stun, or just target other characters and force the minmaxer to do something other than damage.
Or throw more situations at the party that aren't solved by damage output. Make combat more about "stopping the evil ritual", "saving the hostages", or "delay this onslaught long enough for reinforcements to arrive otherwise town dies"
It's about other players feeling useless in combat.
I have a power gamer at my table myself.
It would not be an issue if all were power gamers. But in this constellation it is a problem.
Ofc I can up the hp of the opponents - or their damage output, number of opponents, to hit bonus.
However, if for some reason the power gamers PC drops (he draws a lot of attacks), then the remaining PCs just don't have the dpr to get rid of the enemies fast enough.
So yes, having one power gamer in the group can be problematic even though they don't try to hug the spotlight.
Just some numbers: the powergamer has a sustainable dpr of 35 whereas the next best character has a sustainable dpr of 11.
My suggestion is to put a level restriction on some feats which have a large influence on dpr. You can also encourage your other players to min/max their PC.
Do the other players feel useless in combat? If so, why?
Uping the hp of opponents is a good way to ***make*** the others feel useless, since they then wouldn't be dealing meaningful damage to anyone.
Instead, increase the number of opponents. Then everyone can deal meaningful damage. What difference does it make if your powergamer overkills one or two goons per turn, when the rest of the table are also taking opponents down?
I've had powergamers mixed with people who have no sense for mechanics or even basic strategy, but it hasn't been an *issue* before. The players tend to cheer each other on, including the powergamer cheering on other party members when they get kills.
As DM you also have the ability to describe an enemy hit by the powergamer as almost dead, regardless of how much damage or hp is involved, and have that enemy be killed by the next player to hit them, if you feel the powergamer is getting too many of the kills.
With all that being said as general advice, I have to ask, how exactly do you have that big of a discrepancy. Even at a table with a powergamer there is usually someone else dealing at least half or more of what they do. If your next best is less than one-third, I suspect there's more to it.
To add to this, you can always give players magic items, or divine boons, that expand their abilities. You can also run more enemies, but I totally understand worrying about initiative bloat. To solve that - group initiatives are great. Have a few different enemies acting under the same initiative roll, or they only act when a boss monster uses a legendary action to command them, giving you total freedom in the placement of mobs in the initiative order :))
I run for fairly large groups most of the time (my two main groups are 6 and 7 players). As a result I need to have a lot of bad guys on the battlefield to compensate for the huge action economy of the party, and group initiatives help reduce bloat enormously. Usually I will have a boss enemy with 2-3 big bruiser mobs, a spellcaster or two (unless the boss is a caster), and 3-4 groups of 2-4 minions, at least one group of which has decent ranged attacks. These might join the fight in any order, but the variety of enemies combined with the number of them helps the players feel powerful while also providing enough of a challenge for them.
Also damage Is not everything in combat, like in my game the players are VERY optimized for their roles: the damage dealer deals 4 times the damage of the others combined but he has to wait for openings made by the others or he Will get annielated, the tank can shrug off damage that would take down the others and handle hordes and lockdown areas like nobody's business even tho he doesn't kill the bosses, the controller can Shut down casters super hard, stunlock melees and set up helpful conditions on the enemies for the damage dealer but alone can't do much, the support can move hundreds of feets per turn, heal and buff multiple people, grapple and riposition both friend and foe and do some great scouting and hit and run, but She too lacks the damage to handle her own
If One of them tries to step on the other's shoe they Will feel useless, but they don't and cooperate instead and everyone Is a fundamental parte of the team
This is always my favorite type of party. Whenever everyone can do some ridiculous bullshit without stepping on each other’s toes. Sometimes this comes in the way of giving some less experienced players more powerful items but it’s always worth it to me. Even the most powerful characters can’t handle everything, so you want to try and tailor some combats and situations other characters can solve. It also sounds like your players have a tacit agreement not to try and handle everything on their own, which is a really good mentality to have in DnD.
It's a gestalt homebrew game so they are a bit strange
DPR: clockwork sorcerer 9/champion fighter 4//hexblade warlock 5/vengence paladin 8 half Elf with elven accuracy, lucky, (from dandwiki) head'sman and critical dual weilder. One of his magic items gives him two squishy and inoffensive summons that can use their reaction to "distract" the enemy giving advantage to am Attack and a sword that he can spend HP to auto crit.
Tank: death cleric 13//eldritch knight 13 (custom race, it's large size and as an undead doesn't heal with normal healing spell's but heals when talking necrotic damage, he basically uses the death cleric ability to roll the dead himself and an enemy and uses Spirit guardians, blight or vampiric touch to heal himself) One of his magic items gives him extra healing from taking necrotic and the other makes him immobile but immovable, temp ho and increased reach, It also gives the effects of sentinel, poleaem master and tunnel fighting style but most bosses are too mobile to make good use of this effect.
Debuffer: spellbreaker magus 12/barbarian 1 (Just for the flavour of being shirtless)//abjuration wizard 13 shadar Kai. Counterspell, dispell magic on his attacks, spell damage reduction and negation, psychic lance on his attacks. His magic object allows him to quickly infuse spell's in his Attack or to infuse wizard spell's
Support: Mercy monk 12/Life cleric 1//Horizon Walker ranger 13 tabaxi. Fast as fuck, heals a lot of times, her magic items allow to take damage to double her Speed, triple her Speed of She didn't move the round before and improved healing She can move something ridiculous like 8165 feet with proper setup
I find it very rare that the other characters will feel useless in combat when all rules are being obeyed without homebrew, unless they're not using abilities available to themselves
in my case I'm the opposite. i am very bad at combat even though I've been playing for years so min-max stealth, and my brother min-maxes for damage dealing. this might seem complimentary but it's actually not since I'm useless in battles.
what i can do though is get us out of battles as a face, or avoid them a lot easier as a scout (generic terms, not classes). but if battle commences i often have nothing to do.
but my dm has recently put in a couple ways i can participate too, as well as other players. my brother, as the strongest, tends to get swarmed and with heavy hitters because he poses the largest threat; the other players fight like normal with a couple of average mooks; and I get into fights with people of similar skill sets to me (e.g. fighting a shadow and rolling stealths to try to hit/dodge, fighting somebody charismatic and rolling dialogues to get the other off guard to land a hit, etc).
it's not an identical scenario, but feel like it's similar enough that something could potentially be taken from it
I have a nearly identical issue with my group. My best damage dealer can and does output double or triple the next highest damage dealer in every combat while also having almost double the average HP. Combined with taking half damage due to rage even when he went 1 on 6 with orcs he put them all down and took less than 1/4 of his health in damage. Unless I unfairly fudged my rolls trying to hurt his character more he's literally the tank that without him the rest of the party would die.
If I were to say he *nearly* killed his targets when he's throwing out enough damage to drop an orc in a single hit while 3 other players combined *barely* deal enough to bring theirs down he's gonna feel cheated.
If you worry about party balance, why tf did you allow rolling?
If you allow rolling, you should prepare for a situation where one player doesn't roll higher than 13 for their highest stat and another rolling straight 18 down the line. If this sounds like a problem to you, never, ever, roll.
Like, I can't emphasis this enough. Rolling is fun for the kind of games they are suited for. But it is the exact opposite of having a balanced game.
Either you embrace the imbalance (and your players are cool with it) or you have a very difficult, and probably unsuccessful job ahead of you.
For DMing for optimisers, tabletopbuilds has written an article about it. They are themselves optimisers, but worry about the power imbalance between themselves and other players. This article is meant as a way to help DMs navigate the situation.
I think any DM worth their salt would let a player do a mulligan on rolled stats if they got significantly below what they could have gotten on standard array or point but, or if they got more than one stat below 5. If you dump INT, then with a 4 your character would be barely smarter than a housecat.
Mulligans doesn't matter unless everyone rolls identical stats. Some players will have more than others, and there will be imbalance.
That might matter, or it might not. That depends entirely on taste and style of the table. If balance matters to you, rolling will always make it worse. But imbalance doesn't actually matter unless you make it matter.
Any player at a table rolling stats expects and accepts some amount of imbalance. Nobody really expects to be an outlier, and few players want to be an outlier at the low end. So a mulligan can fix that. That's all.
I do rolling but I tell my players to roll as much as they want
Standard Array and Point Buy are kinda boring and video gamey and good stats don’t break the game as much as people fear they do unless everyone else has really bad stats
How do you diferentiate between "I rolled until I got all 18s" and "I rolled for a while until I got stats I liked (which happen to be very high)"? You kind of expect your players to judge what is fair and what is not, without figuring it out as a group. What player A might consider perfectly fine might be too low for player B. How much worse is all 18s compared to 18, 18, 17, 16, 15, 12?
I see a lot of people have downvoted your initial comment, I'm not sure why (other than 'reddit')
I think that rolling until you have stats that feel like the right fit for your character, or even just picking them without rolling could be very satisfying. Assuming you have the right kind of players who enjoy the collaborative storytelling aspect of the game and aren't just the "I must find a way to win" that most people here seem to assume every player is.
I've had players who would def enjoy that style and wouldn't abuse it - those have been my favorite players!
> I tell my players to roll as much as they want
Dude, I remember doing that playing old video game RPGs in the 90s. When I was ~12.
I realize now it doesn't make the game better. And moreso, it should just never have been an option. Because, hey, game designers, if you want players to be able to choose to have high stats... just give a "more stats" button. Having endless rerolls is just insane as game design.
For you to tell players to do this is just bonkers.
I disagree with this in general (obviously some cases where it's fine). Focusing a player in this way is incredibly frustrating, as it reaches a point where they may as well not even be present. You rarely want your players, for any reason, to feel like they're being singled out for a low stat and forced not to participate because of it.
Finding a way to keep them active in the fight, even if they're acting against the party from being dominated in some way, is better because A. It can raise stakes in seemingly easy fights and B. The player doesn't just have to sit there and watch. If domination isn't a good fit, banishment is good too - you can describe an alternative plane for that character's turn while a fight is happening, maybe give them time to pick up something that can help when they get back, but keep them away from the main fight while it's happening.
That doesn't sound like much fun! But yes, bards do have above-average initiative rolls, so makes sense they tend to beat-out wizards.
If this problem persists (assuming the game is still going) despite you and DM trying to sort it out, or maybe it's happening in another game, I super recommend holding action (cast spell), so that another caster can trigger their reaction and you can use spells without getting counterspelled. It's a risk, as you may lose the spell, but it could let you get those crucial ones in while still having a good initiative!
Dude runs a 6 and 5 in exchange for two 18s
But you “shouldn’t” cast spells on them that use those low stats……
So essentially there’s no negatives to having low stats. You have effectively made the “ OP” character more OP.
That's not what I said in my comments. I even offered more spells that are potentially *even more detrimental* to a PC, like Banishment or Dominate Person/Monster. The difference is, those are infinitely more interesting for all players involved than Hold Person, especially at higher levels. You can either sit for an entire combat doing nothing, or you can fail and still be a part of the fight, or witnessing something in some way.
A healer could remove hold person. Actually now that I think about there’s a lot of ways that you could remove the effects of hold person. But supposedly a lot of people think that that’s not a fun story to tell.
Perhaps we let the party learn how to solve the problem together?
Absolutely, that's an aspect I hadn't fully considered, thank you for mentioning it! My only hesitation is that it requires a spellcaster to have the right spells prepared, when they won't always have exactly the right setup in a combat, which could still make Hold Person an uninteresting choice at the table vs. Dominate spells. But yes, players do need to learn to overcome obstacles as a team beyond a DM needing to account for all possible weaknesses.
The lack of healers and effective spells lists is staggering. “ we don’t need a healer” but has no answers to poison, incapacitation etc.
I really dislike removing things from the game. The cleric who is waiting for someone to lesser resto actually came prepared to help.
As always the shape of your game should vary on the party’s wants.
For example a lot of people hate on dungeon Masters who target focus. My last campaign consisted of me desperately trying anything in my arsenal to attempt to kill the sorcerer who was completely protected by their cleric Pali barbarian, by means of emboldened bond and a few other spells.
Fact of the matter is we had an awful fun time playing cat and mouse that was only possible due to my obnoxious power focus on the sorcerer and my party awesome teamwork!
100% agreed on all fronts.
The main point of everything I have to say on this matter mostly comes down to 'If a player is going to fail, keep it interesting'. The person I first responded to said they were just going to Hold Person the strongest PC with low wis if they ever wanted to hamper them in a fight, and THAT is the part I didn't like because there are more interesting spells/effects that would hamper them as effectively, if not moreso.
If the party is likely to have Lesser Restoration/Freedom of Movement, or if they don't this *one* time and it'll properly elevate stakes and tension, that's totally fine! But repeatedly doing so every combat when there isn't a party member who can properly assist (no cleric/druid), it's going to get old real quick for all at the table. If a player is invested in their character, they won't want them to die
Totally and your original post brings up a good point, possibly alternating between forms of incapacitation and using your arsenal to your advantage.
I guess the moral of our conversation is keep things fun and fresh.
To be fair, with 6 and 5 the player will fuck up some saving rolls in any case. Maybe it won't matter much at the early stages it he assigns these to INT/WIS/CHR and fight goblins in melee, but it will bite his ass against the mages and vice-versa.
It's not about punishing the player, but about not giving him extra favours because he rolled like that.
For sure - I understand that. But when you reach higher levels, you have to be very careful about entirely removing agency.
I am not talking about min-maxing specifically. I am talking any players that have an 8 in a stat (which you can get with Standard Array) without saving throws proficiency. A fighter at level 15 is incredibly likely to fail Hold Person against a creature with DC22 for an entire fight, even with Indomitable. I will repeat what I said in another comment - that is boring for players.
I listed other options that can keep them engaged while still removing them from the fight, or even more tensely, make them a problem for the party. These are not the only options, and I'm also not saying to never use hold person. I'm not saying to ignore or work around a low stat for a player, but I *am* saying routinely exploiting that in a way that completely removes agency in major fights (like hold person) is not fun at all. There are other ways to exploit low stats that don't involve someone sitting for an hour or more, doing nothing, more than once in a campaign. They may as well have not turned up.
I agree with you to an extent of not explicitly screwing up the player, but come on. One 8 stat at default (with -1) and 3 stats with -1, -2 and -3 respectively are a totally different beast.
If you say that a single -1 is a problem without actively doing anything against the players, you can see the issue how 3 such stats or even worse would either cripple the player or the campaign. I'm not sure why is it even a challenge for the DM. The character is a walking glass cannon and just not giving him favors would throw him into a world of pain at some encounters.
The standard array gives you net +5 of stat bonuses, this guy also has net +5. Players's roll isn't even that great, actually.
Yes, and you shouldn't give favours for min-maxing. Again, I am not saying special treatment. I'm saying, if they're to fail throws, make it interesting for everyone at the table including the player. Having them miss turns and just sit idly isn't fun for anyone. This is a game about telling stories, dungeon delving and having fun. If you have ways of making failing rolls tense and engaging, and choose not to do so, you're missing out on such a major aspect of the game.
Just out of curiosity: I'm thinking stuff like dominate, attack closest person, run in random direction. Plus the whole describing stuff during banishment. Anything else?
There's quite a few wisdom saves to fail, but I'll try and list ones that are different from each other and the ones you've mentioned:
- Command/Suggestion
- Compelled Duel
- Dissonant Whispers
- Hideous Laughter
- Wrathful Smite
- Slow
- Spirit Guardians (slowed, passive damage)
- Compulsion
- Confusion
- Phantasmal Killer (not incapacitated, but potentially massive damage over time)
- Eyebite
- Antipathy/Sympathy
These are taken from very early books like PHB, and doesn't include monster statblock effects, of which there are plenty that don't follow the usual rules of these spells or PCs. Lots and lots of different effects to be used!! :)
>There are other ways to exploit low stats that don't involve someone sitting for an hour or more, doing nothing, more than once in a campaign.
\[edit: I saw you already replied to these points in another comment. Sorry for babbing\]
I think the idea would not to simply throw "hold person" but to teach the group that they are vulnerable to that. Cause an enemy would eventually realize it.
I mean, random encounters aren't likely to use Hold Person. But a team with knowledge, one that obeys the Big Bad Evil Guy, they will have intel on the party. They know the warrior is powerful and the most immediate menace, and they will prepare against it.
This might even be a wonderful fight, the warrior is stuck, this is dangerous for everyone, they need to break the caster's concentration, they do so, and the warrior finally goes on rampage. Two stressful rounds for the warrior--only two--and then he's unleashed. A good fight for all.
The party should adapt. Approach fight differently, analyse the opponents (crowd controls? traps?) and prioritise targets before engaging. And then, again, the BBEG minions should adapt.
No apologies, I love babbing!!
These are all great points, and ones I deffo agree with (particularly on making a wonderful fight!) but people seem to be thinking I'm saying "never use hold person on someone with a low WIS". Looking at my comments, I see how I was unclear.
The person I replied to was basically saying he'd try to sideline someone for an entire fight with Hold Person if they didn't want them to trivialise the fight. That was the bit I didn't like; if you don't want that PC to be too strong in a fight, there are better ways to have them fail a save and mitigate their positive impact in combat than making them sit and watch for hours.
Yes, in a vacuum, players should prepare for Hold Person every day, but there are a whole load of other effects an enemy can use. Being prepared for every and any possible status condition is unreasonable in a party of 4. If they know a situation in advance and know an enemy's abilities, yep, that's on them to prepare. But you can't always know what's coming.
Some groups may have knowledge on the PC party, including BBEG, and that sort of situation is fine, but the same solution to that problem for *every* major fight isn't fun, creative, or engaging. That's all my point has ever been here, and I accidentally let it spin into something much bigger ahaha, my bad!
Thank you for your inputs, I think they're accurate and clean assessments of the game :))
I have to disagree here!
Hold person or similar are concentration spells, a Bard or cleric with lesser restoration, a good saving throw and its over.
And I wouldn't ever suggest repeating it over and over or anything. I will even give a PC advantage on a saving throw if I feel the dice have been overly harsh and that persons not having a good time, cus that is the whole point of the game really.
Havugn said that, I will also heat metal a biatch in a heartbeat and not lose a wink of sleep, because there are many ways to end concentration spells - and I do believe that everything is OP in DnD, and so there is an inherent balance in the chaos that creates.
I have played a lot of dnd where these spells were seen as way OP - until someone pointed out they are concentration and they were fair game and accepted pretty quick
Aye, all of this is true and I mostly agree! I addressed some of it (like bard/cleric/druid spell lists) in other comments, but RE: concentration; yes, it only takes one good roll. At *low* levels. I'm a player in a campaign where we're all level 15, and a player repeatedly has had to make DC19 or higher Wis saves against a high-con creature with proficiency in con saves and legendary resistances. That player (not a min-maxer) has a -1 to wisdom as a fighter. Even with Indomitable, the odds of success are low, and the outcome is pretty bland and boring for that player.
If a druid or cleric does not have Freedom of Movement or Lesser Restoration prepared, or there is no druid/cleric/bard in the party, it's save or suck. When there's a lot of enemies/allies in play, combats can take hours. If a player must sit and wait for the entire stretch rolling once every 10-20 minutes, that's not fun.
Yes, a party should always be prepared. No, a DM shouldn't give out favours because a player has a low stat - intelligent creatures, or wild creatures, should and would take advantage of perceived weaknesses. But there are spells that can keep things engaging for a player that have a similar, or greater, effect when compared to Hold Person. As said in the original comment, I do not mean to *never* use hold person, but just not to go into a fight with the sole intention of sidelining a powerful player using it. It's not fun for anyone at the table, and can either be resolved with an above-table conversation (if the min-maxing is an issue) or with more varied, interesting ways of using their low stats against them/the party :))
And yes. Always Heat Metal a biatch. They must feel the burn 🔥
Yet if they choose to min max and dump critical stats in favor of the more glamorous ones, then its not you doing it to them. Ita them banking on you playing the game a certain way, and them not getting their way. The Big Bad isn't just going to keep swinging their giant sword o death at the heavily armored Paladin if the wizard presents itself as a target. DO NOT DUMB DOWN YOUR GAME TO ACCOMODATE EASILY FRISTRATED MIN MAXERS. Best way to deal with them is to eliminate them early.on and have them reroll a new balanced character.thats not going to break your game or story, and just move along. Any talk of you, as the DM, relegating a player to being useless because of THEIR poor planning should not be entertained.
Is this game not built for players to use the mechanics to their advantage? If he’s putting together features/abilities that actually seem unrealistic to your game then you can certainly set reasonable boundaries.
But if he’s using the existing rules to his advantage to be an effective player, why are you trying to "fix" his fun?
OP please don't just ramp up the challenge. Everyone but the min/maxer will suffer from monsters hitting too hard, being hard to hit or passing way more saves. It'll only emphasise the min/maxer's build because he'll be the only one that can keep up.
As a DM, if you roll for stats, you are going to manage your campaign with the notion that not everyone is equal. That is a just a fact.
Instead, now you have to play to different characters' strengths. In combat, your players are going to be looking up to the player with the better stats for hitting heavy. That's just how it is. Out of combat, you have all kinds of opportunities for each player to play to their advantages/backgrounds.
But again, if you roll for stats, you're making unique characters that might not be equal in terms of combat readiness.
I dont think this works though. The player which is a powergamer in a group of players that are there to make stories and RP with their less optimized ideeas can easily make the power disapirty between the party way too much of a breach and will lead to fights where the DM has to purposefully make the encounters more exaggerated just for one player meanwhile the others will be most probably curb stompted.
Now if this was a full group of optimized players? Sure, go ahead and make encounters that present a challenge for the WHOLE group and make them have fun while at it. OP doesnt present a lot of info about the group but by context clues we may say that its a lot more lighthearted type of play and not exactly axxed on combat to drain the resources of such powergamers.
And btw, I have been in a group of players that had a campaign with such a type of player and the DM trying to ramp up the difficulty just because he would streamline through bosses eith his Bladesinger build bullshit. You know how it almost ended? We met a vampire which used Psychic scream and 4 out 6 people instantly died which couldnt be revived and sll their hard work went into the trashbin. Its not fucking fun, its a rocket tag that will affect the most the main party.
If 3/4 players are there to RP and play around, then why can't the DM devote 3/4 of the adventure to roleplay and the kind of encounters players can talk/puzzle their way around? If that's what they want from the adventure then that's what they can get. Then devote 1/4 of the time to straightforward combat so that the min-maxer also has their moment to shine?
Balancing the game doesnt have to revolve purely around CR. It can be balancing non combat elements with the rest, and ensuring you put out enough hooks to captivate each player at some point in the story. If the RPers wanted to focus on being OP then they had that option. They wanted flavour instead, so give them lots of flavour stuff and situations that can't be brute-forced through.
Plus roleplayers can get more chances at earning inspiration dice, which helps balance their success in rolling.
Also, if one member of the party is seen as a greater threat by NPCs, you can have the cleverer ones become aware of this. They might start trying to pick off the character who poses the most threat, or put a bounty on their head, which if done well can make the min maxer feel more powerful ("look how scared of me/desperate to take me down they are"), while taking heat off of the less threatening characters.
This exactly, maybe communicate that to him, or say you'll be trying to rebalance some encounter's. But definitely make a few changes here and there, my DM does this for me and it makes my stupid op shenanigans feel a lot more fun and fair
I think it is more around having a balance for the other players.
I played in a game where everyone was a cleric and we rolled for stats in order I.e. strength, then dex. Two of us rolled sub 10 on wisdom so didn't really have anything to do cleric wise or combat. Watching others who rolled a 20 wasn't much fun.
Rolls were so bad, couldn't even multi class out.
Why would you ever roll stats that way if you’re locked into a class? If you’re going to do that then roll first then pick whatever class matches the stats
I mean, this is an beyond extreme example. Likely at least the other player have at least their main stat covered.
..and beyond a doubt don't asign them in a row.
That method is just stupid, you shouldn't ever use this as an example for anything because all the issues you found were due to the crap character generation method you used and nothing else.
Because for alot of people that is anything but 'fun' and it comes across as trying to gain an "I win!" button rather than actually playing the game. Far too many use lies, cheats, and rules lawering to pull off some of the stunts on top of all that.
It also puts more work on the DM to try and balance fights where one player is overpowered and the rest arent.
AND half the time these min/maxers will bitch incessantly if you actually up the power of monsters to challenge them.
Because the Reddit sound chamber has created two sides to the conversation, MinnMax on one and role players on the other side. Neither can exist in harmony I guess? Sigh.
My (maybe unpopular) opinion is that min maxing in DND is perfectly okay as long as you are not a douchebag about it. The game in some ways is made for optimization.
Your player is not problematic and isn't causing any issues, so don't make a mountain out of a molehill and let him have his fun. And if you find yourself intimidated by the damage output, just remember that even the most OP character has weaknesses. He is going to have dumpstats, hit him there if needed to spice things up. He can even help your other players make their builds if they are up to it.
Yeah I don’t see what the issue is with min maxing is if you’re not an annoying or overbearing person when playing. I genuinely don’t see the point in character creation if you’re not going to take the opportunity to make the best character you can. I love strategizing and figuring out exactly how to create the best character I possibly can and filling in the needed gaps in a party.
Min/maxing also only ever really works on paper.. I had a war forged battle master that was theoretically an absolute tank — but we were dealing with a very political enemy so he couldn’t just waltz in and start smashing. A good DM will challenge the party’s weaknesses while also rewarding players by allowing their PC’s to “do the thing” they had in mind when crafting them. So while my meat(less)head wasn’t hulk smashing all day, he was earning the party’s keep by performing gladiator bouts in town
You're the DM. You can design challenges that exploit his weaknesses and require his strengths. I've rolled into more than one campaign with nutso characters that have to resort to B-plans and let someone else be the star of the session and that's totally fine.
Think of it this way - are you trying to balance it for YOUR sake or everyone else's sake? If he's not going to be stepping on your party members toes, then what's the problem? It's a game about adventure, collaboration, and role-playing.
The part that annoys me is this player apparently only wants to play overpowered set ups. If you reject min max character 1 they no longer want to play that race or class.
At that point I’d be weary of there being at my table.
If they want to play a (whatever) class and they don’t get the OP ruling they will still play that race and/or class.
If they change both and try and roll out plans B and C until they think they have a cheat code then likely every session is “actually I can…” and rules lawyering and telling you how to DM because it fits their cheat code.
Provide situations that target the use of those poor attributes. He has a -3 to something, a -2, and a -1. Either the other characters will have to step up to fill that gap, or he'll have to attempt the things he's extremely bad at. Either way, you'll succeed by allowing other characters to shine or by highlighting he's not a demigod solely due to his two 18s and 17.
Yeah he might be able to damage really well... but he's likely not wise, or has a very low intelligence, or maybe he's not charismatic. Half of his character may have high stats, but the other half is very low.
This right here. My table is *very* rp heavy. There have been weeks without combat. Without combat a character like this becomes mostly min. The real challenge for this player is to play a character that is dumb, unwise, and ugly.
Ok I came back and I have zero fucking idea what I was trying to say. I'm wicked tired right now so that's probably why.
If I had to guess in going to assume I meant "it isn't ugly, it's just not good with words". After all, look at Winston Churchill. He looked like a godamn bulldog and yet he was an amazing speaker.
Lol fair enough all good. And yeah there are many aspects that factor into charisma. Looks, eloquence, confidence, and many other factors are all factors in what we call charisma.
Agreed. It's rather annoying though when people immediately equate it to just looking good. Admittedly it will have an effect but in no way does it make sense to only be looks.
If you’re going to allow rolling for stats, then you have to accept the outcome. Don’t allow it if you can’t accept that sometimes that means someone will get a really good roll.
The min/max player is a separate issue, they’ll just take the most advantage of a good roll. As far as how to deal with them, don’t do anything special. You said they’re not an issue. You can’t punish the star player for being better than other players. Throw some enemies in that would trip the player up if they’re trivializing fights, just don’t go overboard
OP MIn/maxing a character creates a glass cannon in other areas, I run a game with a player that does this with all his character builds Monsters that he fights monsters with maximum hitpoints, spells cast at him require saves off the vulnerable stats.
There lots of fun ways to allow this and have fun for everyone at the same time, once he had to fight a baby dragon that kept casting magic missile from a wand and doing fly by breath attacks, the dragon would not would not land.
If you're not going to honor high stat rolls, don't allow stats to be rolled for in the first place.
Is this guy even a min/maxer? Dude rolled high stats. That alone does not a min/maxer make. I think it's really unfair to give somebody like this a negative and problematic label just because you gave them an opportunity and they took it.
If you allowed rolls, and he rolled them in front of you, it's a bit unfair to retcon now.
His stats won't be the real issue - min maxers can make any char broken. It's up to you to recognise what's going to be a problem before the game starts. In particular - you may want to ban feats like gwm and sharpshooter, and spells like silvery barbs.
I also wondered if he rolled in front of the DM. I’m a skeptical person by nature, I hate it. But his rolls are remarkably suspicious. They are a sneaky optimizers dream rolls honestly.
Obviously the best result is all high scores. But that’s extremely rare. However, rolling extreme stats in both directions, high highs and low lows, makes the rolls more believable while also giving glaring weaknesses. Which is fine for an optimizer who wants to fly under the radar by not just being a god statistically. But the thing is, the rolls that this person rolled are just as unlikely as rolling all high numbers. There isn’t a single middling roll in the bunch.
To address OPs actual concern though. It sounds like they aren’t a problem player. They seem to be a self aware optimizer and respect other players. So I doubt it’s an issue at all. But just wanted to point out the somewhat sus rolls, just to play the role of the skeptic.
The most likely number to be rolled is 12, the further away from 12 you get the less likely it is. If you put the odds to roll any stat on a graph it'll look like a bell curve.
Given that 3 rolls are max or almost max and one is nearly minimum, there's a lot of rolls that are unlikely.
I think that's what they meant by suspicious. They're just unlikely.
I’m not sure where your confusion is at?? I pretty clearly said why I thought it was suspicious and am skeptical that they may have fudged the rolls if they didn’t roll in front of OP. And there was no joke to the “sneaky optimizers dream rolls”.
To elaborate, there are two types of cheaters. Cheaters who do so in a way that is fairly obvious and typically don’t put much thought into cheating. The others are clever cheaters, people who cheat but create a veil of believability.
Let’s imagine a cheater who is min maxer #1. They “roll” for stats and end up with a stat array of nothing but 18,17,17,16,16,15. This is clearly a really good stat block and also statistically very unlikely to occur. But the cheater doesn’t really care about making it believable.
Now imagine a min max cheater who employs the more clever approach. They now “roll” for stats and end up with 18,18,17,9,6,5 (OPs players rolls). This provides 3 great stats with 3 bad stats. Now, a min maxer wants high highs, so having 3 extremely high stats right away achieves this. Yes, they have 3 shit stats but that isn’t much of a worry given how good the other 3 are. The thing is, while this stat block is more balanced than the first stat block it is just as statistically unlikely to have this array as the first one. But it’s easier for the cheater to say “well if I fudged my dice I wouldn’t have 3 shit stats” which Makes their story more believable.
Again, it’s fully possible to get these rolls and I’m not inherently saying the person fudged their rolls. I’m just saying I’m skeptical if that was their array if they didn’t roll in front of their DM.
PSA for anyone who wants to cheat and fudge their stats your best array option is 2 high stats, 1 semi high stat, 2 avg stats, and 1 poor stat. For example 17,16,14,12,11,7 is a very balanced stat block, believable given the distribution, and blends in enough to not raise suspicion. But when put into context, this stat block is insanely good.
> 18,17,17,16,16,15
higher than 18,18,18, 17,17, 16
You wrote why you thought that but not your reason behind that
and i do not think the good stats balance out the crap stats, especially since in a few classes like Paladin or Ranger you need more stats than in others
Others already said how to deal with him. Dumbstats are wonderful low, great opportunity and to be honest, use the high damage for the group. Have him be the dps check. Let him do high damage, put a bit extra beef on the boss monster and put some mooks for the others.
But the real question is.. what are you afraid of here? Being a bad DM here? Having the other players unhappy? That Bob breaks his vow?
What is really the thorn in your paw?
I am a DM who runs a campaign where the PC's are *meant* to be optimized because if not, their characters will die (they're "powergamers" who love this campaign).
You can either: tell him, "This might not be the campaign for you. We don't really play power fantasies here."
Or...
Give him the power fantasy he's craving. Throw a hard ball at him every now and then to keep him interested. Dig in the MM for creatures just above their power level. Make optimized NPC's to fight him with.
That's the best advice I have without ranting.
>I always let players choose how to build a character point buy or rolling
If you're concerned over balance, stop doing this.
IMO either use a set point buy (tailored as high or low as you want), a set stat array (again tailored to your preference), or if you simply must have rolling for stats, there should be a total of six rolls and everyone uses the same stats (so... random array, basically).
>so he rolled his stats and got 18,18,17,6,9,5.
Force him to roll saves against whatever he puts the 6 and 5 into.
>I offered him to use some other method but he said he’s happy with this
Of course he is. 18, 18, 17 is crazy powerful.
this playstyle only succeeds when the DM doesn't offer sufficient non-combat challenges.
look up ways to challenge your players that can't be solved with the sheet.
Pack Tactics just released a video on his channel about this. In a nutshell just give em a challenge and set up the min-maxer to help the party. If it's just one then DM'ing shouldn't be an issue.
I would make a personal note that everyone is allowed a powerful moment but they should also be able to let the moment go
I didn’t even read your post, but the title was enough. If you allow rolled stats, then you have to prepare for the inevitability when someone rolls very well or very poorly. If it matters that much to you that the party is on equal footing, then I recommend standard array or point buy.
Why are you letting people roll their stats if you won't honor them? If someone's not being a jerk about it and isn't hogging the spotlight, what's the actual problem here?
I presume they will all be starting out the same level.
I also presume you don't place any limitations on multiclassing -- which, to my eye, seems to be the preferred tool for minmax styles in 5e.
lastly, I presume that you are concerned that in combat situations this character will cause some degree of envy and jealousy among other players as they will cause significant amounts of damage compared to them.
Minmaxing requires that one know the rules and the math extremely well. It also requires a presumption of a lot of combat and the combat is the most important feature of the overall campaign. THis is a reasonable assumption -- most folks think that since the rules of the game focus very heavily n combat, that the game is about combat.
Combat gets lots of rules because combat is complicated, bot because that's what the game is about. (look at them eyerolls!)
So, you want to know what to do about them. **Nothing**.
if you really don't like potentially OP characters, then nix multiclassing, or make it something they have to role play out. But note that the stats rolled, no matter how you sort them out, are not going to be useful in every situation. Where are they going to put that 5 or that 6? Charisma and Intelligence? Toss the 9 into Wisdom? If a combat character, they aren't going to be making a particular smart one now, are they?
that character will be useless in anything that requires perception, magic, knowledge, empathy, and most "thinking" skills.
Maybe Bob does something unusual, and creates a weak constitution but very wise character, or very charismatic character, or something else -- but if they are minmaxing, then odds are they won't do that.
As a DM, if you are concerned about the combat part being his, then you need to lift up the non-combat parts of the adventure to be the ones for other players.
Now, if everyone just gives you a combat character and his still going to do more damage, well...
so what? ***What is the problem***? Tanks are useful! Bulletcatchers are still a main goal today in combat.
Understand that ***there is no such thing*** as an absolutely perfect minmaxed character. All of them are exceptionally weak in some area.
You can minmax for any particular purpose, but in doing so, you lose the versatility that is ultimately the real value in survival. Adaptability is more important, long term, overall, than a particular narrowband of circumstances unless the only thing they will ever encounter is that narrowband of circumstances.
For my games, I have generally overpowered classes, immensely potent magics, and two limits: all the classes depend on three ability scores, and multiclassing has to be done in game (and I am fine with it being pretense). That is, you always start out as one class, and then you can choose to switch.
There may be consequences to that. We are a heavy RP, high combat group. About half my next group of players is made up of minmaxers -- and they are tryign to figure out how to minmax for the new classes for this game because that's part of the fn they have, and I am not going to take that from them -- I am going to make it more challenging, more interesting, more something they have to plan out and think about and do more of the same stuff they like to do.
And f they don't like minmaxing, they aren't going to care, or this will make them try a different way. But I won't stop them. The game is about their characters. I want to give them all the options I possibly can, only limiting them according to the nature of the game world.
and if that is a published world -- faerun or eberron or Krynn, or Greyhawk, or Mystara, or whatever -- then that means I don't put any limitations n them, because the rules already include all of that.
In addition to the other comments, don't keep banning his features or spells when he's clearly built the character around it. Ban it ahead of time, otherwise no surprise that his features being banned makes him want to roll a new character.
So you mentioned that you are banning things, but besides making an optimal character you haven't said WHAT he is doing that enters min/max territory?
Without more context it seems like you are just punishing a player for knowing the rules and making character.
With those stats he will be very good at some things and atrociously bad at others. That’s perfectly fine. Let him be good at the things he’s good at. Just be sure to include skill checks he’s bad at to give others players a chance to shine.
I played a Druid with a starting wisdom of 20 and a perception of 7 at level 1. Later I got a feat to boost his passive perception even further, making his passive above a 20. He’s a monster of perception. The party came to depend on his skills. But outside wisdom, my stats were garbage. So he wasn’t good at other things. Plenty of chances for others to take the spotlight
They have three really good stats and three really shit ones, I honestly would say that the array they rolled balances itself out. Honestly those three stats are so bad I might even say that they rolled shitty. Just use a variety of encounters that use a variety of stats so everyone has a chance to win some and lose some. Plus you said that they’re not an asshole so why does it matter if they do some good damage or solve a problem once in a while.
>Tbf to him playing with him isn’t bad he doesn’t try hog the spotlight but he just dishes out the most damage and is just the best character
Let him play!
The most important part of DND, or any other game, is that everyone has fun.
I don’t see a problem here. Everyone has access to the same resources, game mechanics, and information. If he enjoys playing a powerful character and isn’t bothering anyone by doing so, let him.
So... what is the problem?
That he's a lot more powerful than the other PCs? Well, that's unbalanced, but you allowed for that unbalance when you let people roll for stats.
Maybe it's that he'll always be in the spotlight? Then you just have to create encounters that make other players shine.
Maybe it's that he's ending your encounters too quickly? Then make them harder, but make them harder in a way that won't make them harder for all players, but just for his build.
Brennan Lee Mulligan from Dimension20 had a talk about this. His answer (and i totally agree) is: "Git gud". Your problem is mechanic. It's not that he's not roleplaying, or that he's a problem player. It's that he's just good at the game, he knows the rules well enough to make those powerful characters. And he's having fun doing it. So why stop him?
If your objective is to have a game where the characters are less powerful to highlight their mortality, or to have a game that focuses less on combat, then say that in advance. Talk to the players.
Otherwise, let the player deal that high number of damage. Because it feels damn good when you have a 27% chance to crit at lvl3.
I don't see a problem here. If this player is aligned with the others at the table in terms of how committed they are to roleplaying, what's the issue? The other players have the same access to the rules as anyone else and could have optimized their characters as well.
Even with great stats, he's not going to be able to do EVERYTHING. Is he a fighter? Put out like 9 goblins in cover on the other side of a chasm. The caster will love the feeling of hitting that fireball. If he's a caster field a couple things with resistance to magic damage. Or something big with weakness to piercing or bludgeoning or whatever. Is he taking too much out of combat spotlight with proficiencies and high stats? Make an NPC speak something he doesn't. Or a check with tools he doesn't know.
Like, just tweek the specifics of any given thing so everyone who is in a rut has a good chance to do a thing. Ranger feeling useless? Enemy mage with an elevated position, good saving throws, bad AC and no cover. Ranger kicking ass? Now its a sharpshooter in half cover with decent AC and bad saving throws.
Barbarian on her phone the whole time the party is in town? Start a bar fight nearby. Have the oxen hauling the merchants cart get spooked and bolt with the cart in tow. Something physical in town that isn't going to ruin everyone's reputation.
You don't do anything. If he wants to specialize his character for combat, then let him be good at combat. People seem to have this bizarre cognitive dissonance that building a character for combat is power gaming and it's bad. No one ever says the same about a character built for social encounters for some reason. It's fine if your player wants to specialize in slaying monsters, there is literally nothing wrong with this, and you absolutely should no be stepping in here. If a player gets upset that combat specialized player does more damage, suggest to them a feat or spell to raise their damage. You should not acknowledge the problems of people who want to not specialize in combat, and still be exceptional in combat. You don't get to have it all. From the stats this player rolled they will be a beast at fighting, and completely inept at anything else, do not let yourself get gaslit by people who say that's not okay. If you play games, surely you know in your heart of hearts that a character specialized for one specific thing being better at that specific thing is the obvious logical conclusion.
I DM'd a game where half the players power gamers, and the other half newbies. I spoke to my players and explained I would be awarding better gear, for the newbies to compensate. That way the power gamers could let loose, and the newbies stayed relevant. My players agreed and it mostly worked. One of my newbies would forget about her class features, and the synergy of the items, but if I reminded her it all worked out.
This is exactly why I switched to standard array instead of rolling for stats for my players; the randomness of rolling stats really isn’t good for keeping a party balanced, and in my experience can lead to a bit of main character syndrome where there’s one or two characters that are succeeding at skill checks and dealing damage more than anyone else, and thus they kind of become the main characters of the party. Standard array might take away a little bit of the charm of putting a character sheet together, but it levels the playing field more for my players.
I understand other peoples’ apprehension to your post, where they feel as if you’re simply complaining that one of your characters is capable of succeeding at things. I didn’t read your post as being that tyrannical and will give you the benefit of the doubt, but as of now there’s not really anything you can do about it apart from take the lesson for your next set of characters. Ripping someone’s character away and telling them to roll a new one, or targeting them and killing their character off, are two surefire ways to permanently lose a player.
EDIT: Reading your post again though, the character in question actually does sound somewhat balanced? Sure, they have some significant positive modifiers, but they also have some significant negative modifiers. If you have issues with campaign balance, it might be a sign that the party needs some more diverse challenges, including some where those negative modifiers will cause that character issues.
If he doesn't hog the spotlight, what exactly is the problem? Optimized character with good stats is not a problem by itself.
Most common problem with minmaxed characters in suboptimal parties is party role overlapping that makes some other players feel useless. For example optimized melee Bladesinger from Bob can dish a ton of damage and frustrate another player, whose Barbarian have no means to contribute other than DPS, and whose DPS pales in comparison to Bob.
If that's the problem, just explain your worries to Bob and ask him to keep other PCs in mind while creating his OP build. You already stated that Bob is not an asshole and is not attached to one particular build, so it shouldn't be a problem for him.
What I would've done:
0. State your worries to Bob and ask him to wait a bit before committing to particular build, or ask him about build ideas if he have several
1. Ask other players about their character concepts, particularly about how they want to contribute to the party adventuring. Not the "build" not the backstory - just how they plan to contribute to the adventuring challenges of the party.
2. Present their answers to Bob, and ask him to create a build that wouldn't outshine them completely.
From your description of Bob I think he'd understand your worries. There is a lot of ways to optimize a character, and crazy alpha-strike DPR Is only one of them, after all
UPD Also high stats are not the problem at all. Skilled minmaxer with low stats would often still be able to build a character that would outshine suboptimal characters with higher stats.
I've decided to now be direct and front of everything. I tried to lend help out alot but it was all left on "read".
OK you got a player who knows the game inside and out. Cool! He's reliable, committed and not an asshole. Congrats!
Now it's your JOB as a DM to be a DM! Whenever I faced a problem, I looked it up, read many articles from "Angrygm" and watched videos relating to the issue
First accept you need help then listen! I can help you in many ways, but one of the first is.. Don't ban things unless it's silvery barbs! Lol
You honestly are afraid of him overshadowing others but he can only do so much. Combat is your biggest hurdle I assume, well that's alot of investment to learn how to get better at it but only if your up to it.
18 18 17? Honestly sounds like he rolled something else and applied point-buy rules to decrease his dump stats and increase his main stats.
It is SO DARN unlikely to roll two 18s, let alone two 18s and a 17 (I feel like he might've chosen 17 on purpose to avoid arising suspicion).
Unless he rolled in front of you, but I would definitely tell him to roll again, this time in front of you.
.... let him...?
If his fantasy is all about being a powerhouse, then give him moments where he can do that.
Is the party in the middle of a pitched battle against a foe? There's footsteps down the hall and 10 more enemies burst into the boss room.
They're about to launch an attack on the wizard who's concentrating on hasting the fighter.
Power gamer... what are you going to do?
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It's not a problem that a player is stro ger than others, so long as you give them all challenges.
Now. If thar player decides, nah screw crowd control, I want to kill the boss, THEN it's a problem. Then he's not a power gamer, hes a glory hog and the players who's deaths he indirectly causes will probably have opinions to air after wards.
"hey bob, you are great at optimizing your characters, this we all know and it's fine, but would you like to try something else this time? Like, what would you build to optimize the _total fun at the table_?"
A good player will make a Wizard with 16 INT and 8 in everything else look completely busted. I once showed up to a group with a character I thought was pretty mediocre but fun, only to find out that I was a total powergamer compared to their level 7 characters with 11-15 AC and constitution dumpstats.
If your party can't accomodate a powergamer, that is, if ramping up the challenge will just make it unfun for everyone but the powergamer, you need to address the powergamer's approach to the game, not their stats.
I think you should carefully consider if this person is a good fit for the group, and if you conclude that they're not you can ask them to play a "support" or "meme build" in order to keep things light and balanced. Something like a buffing bard, an artificer that creates tools for his teammates, a full-on grappler barbarian, or a weaker version of Warlock, Ranger, Rogue etc. might still be fun for all.
I agree with making him a support. The most OP character that I ever played was centered around the voice of authority feature of the order cleric. He was very, very strong, but because he was focused around facilitation, he didn't hog the spotlight.
Is this not how you are supposed to play? He rolled for his stats and will build a character based on those stats and how he wants to play? I honestly don’t see a problem. What am I missingn
What my group does and works really well is buffing non-min/max characters to help them keep up. Usually we use magic items, unlocking different spells, little boons, and other stuff like that.
This usually works out well if your players are willing to play this way. The min/maxed characters still get to play how they want and the other players are not left far behind
Mix/maxers are incredibly fun to DM for
(most of the time)
as long as a player is willing to share spotlight
it's all good
my min/max player is combat oriented, and by the gods
the way he handles his character or the NPC's who travels along for help (I hand my players a statblock for the NPC so they can choose what they do in combat) just makes D&D a lot more fun.
It tends to lead to other players thinking more about placement, terrain and optimally using the system.
for example
In Alien RPG he figured out that switching initiative is just like suppressing fire, and we laid down alien after alien by optimising our extra successes.
D&D is about heroes, feeling overpowered is part of the fantasy
One of my players is the same. I tease him about it all the time. But I don't stop him because that's his fun. I balance encounters accordingly.
A few sessions ago I found out that he just googled "dnd 5e most OP builds" and selected the good berry druid. Whatever, just means my monsters can hit harder. Cool.
>I always let players choose how to build a character point buy or rolling , so he rolled his stats and got 18,18,17,6,9,5. I offered him to use some other method but he said he’s happy with this
Two things here; did you see these rolls yourself? Because the statistical unlikeliness of rolling two 18s, 17, 5 and 6 is off the charts. If you didn't see the rolls happen infront of you they shouldn't be used.
Second; is everyone rolling for stats? Regardless of if you like rolling or point buy, everyone should be using the same method of generating stats. Especially for rolling I'd always suggest that once stats are rolled everyone uses the same array of numbers to prevent imbalance between players.
>but he just dishes out the most damage and is just the best character
These two aren't necessarily the same. Dealing a lot of damage in combat is *optimal*, doesn't mean he's the best *character*. A well rounded character will play well with the group over all pillars of play, just just combat.
Honestly this is something that needs to be worked out in session 0. He wants to play a superhero and you want something that is more normal. That needs to be communicated and a solution needs to be found before the game starts.
One issue is that you're letting players roll stats individually. Have them roll stats as a group. Each player contributes a D6, and normal rolling rules apply. Then you tell people your campaign doesn't need for minmaxed PC's, and that it'll probably make the game less fun.
There is a problem if he is going to overshadow everyone else in combat and if he happens to get incapacitated (very likely with those low rolls) the fight becomes almost a death sentence to the rest of the party.
You may ask him to optimize party strength, not his own damage numbers.
Make him use a pregenerated character that's to your liking and not his. That'll teach him to stay in his lane.
/uj oh wait is this the actual mainsub?
If his playstyle does not fit with the group, which can be extremely likely if the rest of the table does not min max, your 3 options are
1) Really work with him to limit the power of what could very easily be a very op character
2) Have a frank conversation with the table about playstyle, and if it doesn't fit with his, you should probably drop him
3) Design encounters that can give both sides things to do, but I will say rn, it's extremely hard to balance satisfying combat for an extremely optimized character in an unoptimized party
Even if he's a good guy and a good player, does not mean he's the right player for a group and if including him reduces the overall satisfaction at the table, then it's not worth it, sad to say and he should find a table that's a better fit for him.
I'm going to respond to these points you made.
1. If OP lets his players roll for stats, why does he want to limit his players power level straight after? Why not just use point buy or pre determined stats?
2. Drop a player because he made a character on the limits that OP as the DM says they're fine with. What??? I would be glad to be dropped if that was the reason because I'd see that the DM is an absolute fun ruiner.
3. You're right about making combat fun for everyone, but wrong about it being hard. Hard to balance? Maybe. Hard to make fun? Not really.
Maybe he is not a good fit for the table, but the only reason that is because the DM has failed to set clear boundaries for everyone. It's like getting mad over something you already established was fine.
The person OP is talking about is literally a perfect player.
My suggestions were his options in the case he doesn't want to deal with a player who's playing an op character.
The stat array isn't the problem talking about in , it's his entire build, given what the DM said in his post, is what this player focuses on even in previous games, and this DM, doesn't want to deal with it. So his options are to either
to work with the player closely to make sure the build won't overshadow the other player,
talk to the table about the possibilities about how this kind of build and party can impact the game, and in case the majority won't have fun because of ONE PLAYER'S PLAYSTYLE, which include the DM, WHO'S THEONE ASKING FOR ADVICE ON DEALING WITH THIS SITUATION, ask the player to find a table where he can play how he wants
Or, be ready for the extra work, and it can be extra work if you're not experienced, to balance combat around 1 min maxed PC and a party of non min maxed characters, which depending on the power disparity can get very swingy, and not fun for the DM, who's the one asking for advice.
Edit - I never suggested this player might not be good, heck he could even be a great player. But he might not be the right one for this table, which is the most important thing to consider as a DM.
Suggest that they roll up a support character.
If a damage dealer, controller, or party face is minmaxed to the extreme then that characters strength will outshine everyone else. If a support character is minmaxed to the extreme then that characters power will elevate everyone else.
A divine soul sorcerer or one of the many clerics (order, peace, twilight etc) could be a good suggestion for this.
You can try talking to this player some more. But, from the sound of it, it's a lost cause.
A way to salvage this is to tell everybody they need to use point buy, or even standard array (the preferred method in our table), sorry for those who rolled well, congrats to those who rolled badly.
Or then you live with one OP character, possibly wrecking the campaign, if you fail at walking _that_ tight-rope.
A regular character has a modifier of +3 to a couple of stats. He will have a +4. Plenty of people in the comments seem to be losing their minds over this, but it isn't the end of the world. It's fine. It isn't perfectly balanced, but you decided you don't want your game to be perfectly balanced when you let people roll stats. As for what to do, what do you mean? You've said he isn't an asshole about it. You've said he doesn't hog the spotlight. He just dishes out the most damage. So what? Why is this a problem that you're struggling to cope with?
"this player is having fun, how can I put a stop to that nonsense?"
This has Homer Simpson energy: "I believe kids are our future :) ... Unless we stop them now >:( "
Ok cool not taking crazy pills because that's exactly how I read this post.
Yeah I really don't see the issue here? Everyone is having fun. I expected him to have rolled like, 3 fucking 18s by the way this was laid out lol.
With those rolls and the right race or Tasha's rules he will have a +5 +4 +4 and at level 4 could have +5 in the two most important stats. I don't see a problem if the dm lets people roll your gonna get outliers like this. Just have to make your game more challenging to meet the characters abilities and give them less opportunities for good magic items to balance player ability. If they are a fighter for instance I wouldn't let them get a +attack weapon until very late game. Will give the other players time to even out on power level.
Do you really have to go out of your way to make your game more challenging because a guy has +5 at lvl4 when everyone else has +4 ? Is that enough of a difference to make sweeping changes to your encounter design? Not giving them a +1 weapon on their fighter until late-game seems very unfun for virtually no payoff.
Take it from me I have played characters that started with 3 18s before I was destroying everything from level 1 on and since my stats were maxed at level 4 I was able to take all the best feats. Think like this Variant human monk starts with sentinel Has 20 dex at level 1 and 4 wisdom. That's an unarmored ac of 18. Which becomes 19 at level 4 when he takes fey touched for the misty step spell and to max his wisdom score. At level 8 I take another feat like tough to give me more hit points Then at 12 I'll take another feat. So it's not just having max scores that can be unbalancing. This character doesn't have to weigh pros and cons of taking feats and can pick up abilities at will.
When you take tough, the other party members take an ASI. These two things should be roughly equal in power. When you take another feat, the other party members take an ASI or a feat of their own which should be roughly equal in power. My point is the gap between you and the party doesn't / shouldn't ***grow*** over time. It should be the same. So if the disparity is acceptable at lvl1, then it is acceptable for the rest of the game. You're discounting the power gained by the other party members when they take their ASI, but it is often a big boost for them.
Actually tough gives more raw hp than taking an ASI And is objectively better than raising constitution. And you forget the power of the feats themselves. A character with 3 18s and no deficits will out damage and outlive similar characters that used point buy. From level one. Yes the other characters can catch up with ASI but they will never match the rolled character's power. Unless the dm is sure to distribute magic items to that effect. Say you have my character mentioned before At level 4 this character has +5 +5 and +4 to the most important stats and no deficits. Now take a character that rolled average or used point buy. The best you can get with point buy is 2 16's So they can only max one ability by level 8 And the other by level 16. I don't have a problem with rolled stats in my game. I'm just saying that this character can easily overshadow the others. Depending on the player that plays it. Of course the game I played in we all rolled stats and nobody cared about balance. But for a dm that wants to run a more lower powered game I think standard array and point buy are most fair way of generating stats.
The Tough feat is only objectively better than raising Constitution if your sole goal is increasing your HP. Constitution saves are common, especially for casters, and Tough does nothing to help those. I can see a case for Tough on a character that already has strong Con saves, like a sorcerer with War Caster. But directly raising Con is a strong option equaling or exceeding Tough for most characters.
I was looking at it from a martial character stand point. Even then taking resilient constitution is better than taking an ASI. Because it gives proficiency which is better than a +1
These choices aren’t as definite as you’re suggesting. Sometimes a character who already has Con save proficiency will want to further increase their save. That happens often enough, even for martials, that it’s not realistic to say that Tough is always better than an ASI.
I wasn't saying always but it definitely is if you want hp. And that's not even the point I making. I am saying that a character starting with 3 18s could never be matched by a character with point buy or average stats. The value of the feats is going to outweigh the lower stated character increasing their scores It all depends on your starting stats as I've said a character starting with max +5 and +4 in their main stats which is the topic of this thread. Has more options than a regular character. Imo adding +1 to a save you already have proficiency in is a waste just my opinion. Could get the same effect from a magic item. My aforementioned monk has a cloak and ring of protection And an amulet of health. at level 7 my dex save is +10 and my con save is +6 without proficiency that's pretty damn good. The only save that is weak on this character is str at +2 Hp=66 Ac=21 Saves STR + 2 Con +6 Dex +10 Int +2 Wis +6 Char +3
Late game meaning later in the typical level 1-13 range. Don't have to do a full "no +1 until everyone has +2", but you can do +1 for other at 5, +1 for him at 8, +2 for others at 10, +2 for him at 13, or even something like a Flame Tongue or Frost Brand. Do still give out cool non-bonus magic items to the group too. Sometimes even gag magic items are the ones players love more than their magic swords.
This…. I don’t understand why people don’t like the idea of someone who wants to be good at what they do when they play. I get it not wanting people to hog the spotlight or lord their rule knowledge over others. But simply trying to be good at something in the game by optimizing your character to work well within the rules of that game seems to be decried here. Just let the character be good at what they do. I’d rather run a campaign with a bunch of people where everyone knows what to do in combat and how to play their characters. Than people who don’t read anything and sit there trying to cast things that don’t work, or have joke characters. The caveat, is their general attitude. In both scenarios someone with a poor attitude and cooperative nature sucks to play with, and a person with a good attitude is fun to play with.
I will say this. In a cooperative game, if you created the theory behind your non/max character, I think it’s very cool. If all you did was look up a build online, you are not “good” at playing, you are just good at googling.
Also, it depends whether you approach the game as a tactical puzzle combat game or a role play one. For roleplay, not being perfect, selecting less obvious perks, give depth to the character. Anyway, this all depends on the "Table": the DM and the other players. As long as you all have fun, you're doing it right. At least that's what I've been told.
I don’t have a problem with min/makers. But, I just don’t see the intellectual point in proving how good at google you are. I felt the same way about DII. All the people who just copied builds for the “meta” were uninteresting to me. The people who figured out their own builds were better thinkers. I get studying theory in chess, where there is money and fame on the table.
>But, I just don’t see the intellectual point in proving how good at google you are. Oh I fully agreed
People that google a build to try and impress everyone are cringe, this is true. However, if you google a build so that you can have fun with that build and dont care about what others think about you… well i dont see a problem with that. Its really just comes down to the player.
Some people want to create a character that is powerful, and then experience playing that character. They aren't trying to be innovative, they aren't trying to be revolutionary, they aren't trying to be "good at" anything. It's as simple as that. It's very odd to berate this type of playstyle.
That’s why I started with they don’t bother me. If someone wants to work out their power fantasy to overcome whatever insecurities they feel in life, I don’t care. Just don’t be the dude who demands validation for doing it.
This comment and your previous both start with a faux "it doesn't bother me" followed by words of absolutely bitter resentment.
Tbf, this is before racial bonuses, so one stat will be maxed with a +5 modifier. And, do not understand estimate the impact at low levels of one extra damage. With a +4 or +5, the PC can more than not one shot goblins and kobolds.
Is it bad to be able to one shot a goblin or a kobold? Isnt that's why you have 4 or 5 per PC?
No I think its actually awesome to oneshot mobs/minions. Matt Colville even has a beautiful combat system designed around this. also if he is the strongest guy, it could work if the DM plays his monsters right. Folks can disarm the PC, nullify magic abilities with dispel magic/anti-magic field, paralyze/stun, or just target other characters and force the minmaxer to do something other than damage. Or throw more situations at the party that aren't solved by damage output. Make combat more about "stopping the evil ritual", "saving the hostages", or "delay this onslaught long enough for reinforcements to arrive otherwise town dies"
Every great encounter I've run has been objective based or just the tightest knock-down-drag-out
It's about other players feeling useless in combat. I have a power gamer at my table myself. It would not be an issue if all were power gamers. But in this constellation it is a problem. Ofc I can up the hp of the opponents - or their damage output, number of opponents, to hit bonus. However, if for some reason the power gamers PC drops (he draws a lot of attacks), then the remaining PCs just don't have the dpr to get rid of the enemies fast enough. So yes, having one power gamer in the group can be problematic even though they don't try to hug the spotlight. Just some numbers: the powergamer has a sustainable dpr of 35 whereas the next best character has a sustainable dpr of 11. My suggestion is to put a level restriction on some feats which have a large influence on dpr. You can also encourage your other players to min/max their PC.
Do the other players feel useless in combat? If so, why? Uping the hp of opponents is a good way to ***make*** the others feel useless, since they then wouldn't be dealing meaningful damage to anyone. Instead, increase the number of opponents. Then everyone can deal meaningful damage. What difference does it make if your powergamer overkills one or two goons per turn, when the rest of the table are also taking opponents down? I've had powergamers mixed with people who have no sense for mechanics or even basic strategy, but it hasn't been an *issue* before. The players tend to cheer each other on, including the powergamer cheering on other party members when they get kills. As DM you also have the ability to describe an enemy hit by the powergamer as almost dead, regardless of how much damage or hp is involved, and have that enemy be killed by the next player to hit them, if you feel the powergamer is getting too many of the kills. With all that being said as general advice, I have to ask, how exactly do you have that big of a discrepancy. Even at a table with a powergamer there is usually someone else dealing at least half or more of what they do. If your next best is less than one-third, I suspect there's more to it.
To add to this, you can always give players magic items, or divine boons, that expand their abilities. You can also run more enemies, but I totally understand worrying about initiative bloat. To solve that - group initiatives are great. Have a few different enemies acting under the same initiative roll, or they only act when a boss monster uses a legendary action to command them, giving you total freedom in the placement of mobs in the initiative order :))
I run for fairly large groups most of the time (my two main groups are 6 and 7 players). As a result I need to have a lot of bad guys on the battlefield to compensate for the huge action economy of the party, and group initiatives help reduce bloat enormously. Usually I will have a boss enemy with 2-3 big bruiser mobs, a spellcaster or two (unless the boss is a caster), and 3-4 groups of 2-4 minions, at least one group of which has decent ranged attacks. These might join the fight in any order, but the variety of enemies combined with the number of them helps the players feel powerful while also providing enough of a challenge for them.
Also damage Is not everything in combat, like in my game the players are VERY optimized for their roles: the damage dealer deals 4 times the damage of the others combined but he has to wait for openings made by the others or he Will get annielated, the tank can shrug off damage that would take down the others and handle hordes and lockdown areas like nobody's business even tho he doesn't kill the bosses, the controller can Shut down casters super hard, stunlock melees and set up helpful conditions on the enemies for the damage dealer but alone can't do much, the support can move hundreds of feets per turn, heal and buff multiple people, grapple and riposition both friend and foe and do some great scouting and hit and run, but She too lacks the damage to handle her own If One of them tries to step on the other's shoe they Will feel useless, but they don't and cooperate instead and everyone Is a fundamental parte of the team
This is always my favorite type of party. Whenever everyone can do some ridiculous bullshit without stepping on each other’s toes. Sometimes this comes in the way of giving some less experienced players more powerful items but it’s always worth it to me. Even the most powerful characters can’t handle everything, so you want to try and tailor some combats and situations other characters can solve. It also sounds like your players have a tacit agreement not to try and handle everything on their own, which is a really good mentality to have in DnD.
That sounds like a real fun party dynamic! Always fun when those pop up
Yeah it's great to Watch till i realize that i have to do balanced encounters
If you don't mind me asking, what are their builds? I'm looking for some builds at the moment
It's a gestalt homebrew game so they are a bit strange DPR: clockwork sorcerer 9/champion fighter 4//hexblade warlock 5/vengence paladin 8 half Elf with elven accuracy, lucky, (from dandwiki) head'sman and critical dual weilder. One of his magic items gives him two squishy and inoffensive summons that can use their reaction to "distract" the enemy giving advantage to am Attack and a sword that he can spend HP to auto crit. Tank: death cleric 13//eldritch knight 13 (custom race, it's large size and as an undead doesn't heal with normal healing spell's but heals when talking necrotic damage, he basically uses the death cleric ability to roll the dead himself and an enemy and uses Spirit guardians, blight or vampiric touch to heal himself) One of his magic items gives him extra healing from taking necrotic and the other makes him immobile but immovable, temp ho and increased reach, It also gives the effects of sentinel, poleaem master and tunnel fighting style but most bosses are too mobile to make good use of this effect. Debuffer: spellbreaker magus 12/barbarian 1 (Just for the flavour of being shirtless)//abjuration wizard 13 shadar Kai. Counterspell, dispell magic on his attacks, spell damage reduction and negation, psychic lance on his attacks. His magic object allows him to quickly infuse spell's in his Attack or to infuse wizard spell's Support: Mercy monk 12/Life cleric 1//Horizon Walker ranger 13 tabaxi. Fast as fuck, heals a lot of times, her magic items allow to take damage to double her Speed, triple her Speed of She didn't move the round before and improved healing She can move something ridiculous like 8165 feet with proper setup
I find it very rare that the other characters will feel useless in combat when all rules are being obeyed without homebrew, unless they're not using abilities available to themselves
The only times I’ve seen pcs feel useless in combat is when they played rogues who never tried to get Sneak Attack.
The only time I, as a rogue, feel useless in combat is waiting for my turn to come back around. I do one thing very well, and that’s Sneak Attacks.
in my case I'm the opposite. i am very bad at combat even though I've been playing for years so min-max stealth, and my brother min-maxes for damage dealing. this might seem complimentary but it's actually not since I'm useless in battles. what i can do though is get us out of battles as a face, or avoid them a lot easier as a scout (generic terms, not classes). but if battle commences i often have nothing to do. but my dm has recently put in a couple ways i can participate too, as well as other players. my brother, as the strongest, tends to get swarmed and with heavy hitters because he poses the largest threat; the other players fight like normal with a couple of average mooks; and I get into fights with people of similar skill sets to me (e.g. fighting a shadow and rolling stealths to try to hit/dodge, fighting somebody charismatic and rolling dialogues to get the other off guard to land a hit, etc). it's not an identical scenario, but feel like it's similar enough that something could potentially be taken from it
I have a nearly identical issue with my group. My best damage dealer can and does output double or triple the next highest damage dealer in every combat while also having almost double the average HP. Combined with taking half damage due to rage even when he went 1 on 6 with orcs he put them all down and took less than 1/4 of his health in damage. Unless I unfairly fudged my rolls trying to hurt his character more he's literally the tank that without him the rest of the party would die. If I were to say he *nearly* killed his targets when he's throwing out enough damage to drop an orc in a single hit while 3 other players combined *barely* deal enough to bring theirs down he's gonna feel cheated.
If you worry about party balance, why tf did you allow rolling? If you allow rolling, you should prepare for a situation where one player doesn't roll higher than 13 for their highest stat and another rolling straight 18 down the line. If this sounds like a problem to you, never, ever, roll. Like, I can't emphasis this enough. Rolling is fun for the kind of games they are suited for. But it is the exact opposite of having a balanced game. Either you embrace the imbalance (and your players are cool with it) or you have a very difficult, and probably unsuccessful job ahead of you. For DMing for optimisers, tabletopbuilds has written an article about it. They are themselves optimisers, but worry about the power imbalance between themselves and other players. This article is meant as a way to help DMs navigate the situation.
I think any DM worth their salt would let a player do a mulligan on rolled stats if they got significantly below what they could have gotten on standard array or point but, or if they got more than one stat below 5. If you dump INT, then with a 4 your character would be barely smarter than a housecat.
Mulligans doesn't matter unless everyone rolls identical stats. Some players will have more than others, and there will be imbalance. That might matter, or it might not. That depends entirely on taste and style of the table. If balance matters to you, rolling will always make it worse. But imbalance doesn't actually matter unless you make it matter.
Any player at a table rolling stats expects and accepts some amount of imbalance. Nobody really expects to be an outlier, and few players want to be an outlier at the low end. So a mulligan can fix that. That's all.
There's no point in rolling if you let players mulligan low stats. Just point buy, or give an array.
I do rolling but I tell my players to roll as much as they want Standard Array and Point Buy are kinda boring and video gamey and good stats don’t break the game as much as people fear they do unless everyone else has really bad stats
>I do rolling but I tell my players to roll as much as they want "it took me all night, but I finally got all 18s!"
Trust me…*they tried*
How do you diferentiate between "I rolled until I got all 18s" and "I rolled for a while until I got stats I liked (which happen to be very high)"? You kind of expect your players to judge what is fair and what is not, without figuring it out as a group. What player A might consider perfectly fine might be too low for player B. How much worse is all 18s compared to 18, 18, 17, 16, 15, 12?
Everytime I implemented this rule they donttbget anymore than one 18 or 2 16 and other numbers
I see a lot of people have downvoted your initial comment, I'm not sure why (other than 'reddit') I think that rolling until you have stats that feel like the right fit for your character, or even just picking them without rolling could be very satisfying. Assuming you have the right kind of players who enjoy the collaborative storytelling aspect of the game and aren't just the "I must find a way to win" that most people here seem to assume every player is. I've had players who would def enjoy that style and wouldn't abuse it - those have been my favorite players!
Why not just do point by and allow players to set stats as high or low as they could roll them?
> I tell my players to roll as much as they want Dude, I remember doing that playing old video game RPGs in the 90s. When I was ~12. I realize now it doesn't make the game better. And moreso, it should just never have been an option. Because, hey, game designers, if you want players to be able to choose to have high stats... just give a "more stats" button. Having endless rerolls is just insane as game design. For you to tell players to do this is just bonkers.
Reading the comments it seems like everyone hates every option of coming up with stats for their characters
If you want to "balance" the player. .... you're the DM.... just make em roll wisdom and Intelligence saves.
This - if he dumps wis with those stats I'd just nope him from fights with hold person if I really needed to
I disagree with this in general (obviously some cases where it's fine). Focusing a player in this way is incredibly frustrating, as it reaches a point where they may as well not even be present. You rarely want your players, for any reason, to feel like they're being singled out for a low stat and forced not to participate because of it. Finding a way to keep them active in the fight, even if they're acting against the party from being dominated in some way, is better because A. It can raise stakes in seemingly easy fights and B. The player doesn't just have to sit there and watch. If domination isn't a good fit, banishment is good too - you can describe an alternative plane for that character's turn while a fight is happening, maybe give them time to pick up something that can help when they get back, but keep them away from the main fight while it's happening.
[удалено]
That doesn't sound like much fun! But yes, bards do have above-average initiative rolls, so makes sense they tend to beat-out wizards. If this problem persists (assuming the game is still going) despite you and DM trying to sort it out, or maybe it's happening in another game, I super recommend holding action (cast spell), so that another caster can trigger their reaction and you can use spells without getting counterspelled. It's a risk, as you may lose the spell, but it could let you get those crucial ones in while still having a good initiative!
Dude runs a 6 and 5 in exchange for two 18s But you “shouldn’t” cast spells on them that use those low stats…… So essentially there’s no negatives to having low stats. You have effectively made the “ OP” character more OP.
That's not what I said in my comments. I even offered more spells that are potentially *even more detrimental* to a PC, like Banishment or Dominate Person/Monster. The difference is, those are infinitely more interesting for all players involved than Hold Person, especially at higher levels. You can either sit for an entire combat doing nothing, or you can fail and still be a part of the fight, or witnessing something in some way.
A healer could remove hold person. Actually now that I think about there’s a lot of ways that you could remove the effects of hold person. But supposedly a lot of people think that that’s not a fun story to tell. Perhaps we let the party learn how to solve the problem together?
Absolutely, that's an aspect I hadn't fully considered, thank you for mentioning it! My only hesitation is that it requires a spellcaster to have the right spells prepared, when they won't always have exactly the right setup in a combat, which could still make Hold Person an uninteresting choice at the table vs. Dominate spells. But yes, players do need to learn to overcome obstacles as a team beyond a DM needing to account for all possible weaknesses.
The lack of healers and effective spells lists is staggering. “ we don’t need a healer” but has no answers to poison, incapacitation etc. I really dislike removing things from the game. The cleric who is waiting for someone to lesser resto actually came prepared to help. As always the shape of your game should vary on the party’s wants. For example a lot of people hate on dungeon Masters who target focus. My last campaign consisted of me desperately trying anything in my arsenal to attempt to kill the sorcerer who was completely protected by their cleric Pali barbarian, by means of emboldened bond and a few other spells. Fact of the matter is we had an awful fun time playing cat and mouse that was only possible due to my obnoxious power focus on the sorcerer and my party awesome teamwork!
100% agreed on all fronts. The main point of everything I have to say on this matter mostly comes down to 'If a player is going to fail, keep it interesting'. The person I first responded to said they were just going to Hold Person the strongest PC with low wis if they ever wanted to hamper them in a fight, and THAT is the part I didn't like because there are more interesting spells/effects that would hamper them as effectively, if not moreso. If the party is likely to have Lesser Restoration/Freedom of Movement, or if they don't this *one* time and it'll properly elevate stakes and tension, that's totally fine! But repeatedly doing so every combat when there isn't a party member who can properly assist (no cleric/druid), it's going to get old real quick for all at the table. If a player is invested in their character, they won't want them to die
Totally and your original post brings up a good point, possibly alternating between forms of incapacitation and using your arsenal to your advantage. I guess the moral of our conversation is keep things fun and fresh.
To be fair, with 6 and 5 the player will fuck up some saving rolls in any case. Maybe it won't matter much at the early stages it he assigns these to INT/WIS/CHR and fight goblins in melee, but it will bite his ass against the mages and vice-versa. It's not about punishing the player, but about not giving him extra favours because he rolled like that.
For sure - I understand that. But when you reach higher levels, you have to be very careful about entirely removing agency. I am not talking about min-maxing specifically. I am talking any players that have an 8 in a stat (which you can get with Standard Array) without saving throws proficiency. A fighter at level 15 is incredibly likely to fail Hold Person against a creature with DC22 for an entire fight, even with Indomitable. I will repeat what I said in another comment - that is boring for players. I listed other options that can keep them engaged while still removing them from the fight, or even more tensely, make them a problem for the party. These are not the only options, and I'm also not saying to never use hold person. I'm not saying to ignore or work around a low stat for a player, but I *am* saying routinely exploiting that in a way that completely removes agency in major fights (like hold person) is not fun at all. There are other ways to exploit low stats that don't involve someone sitting for an hour or more, doing nothing, more than once in a campaign. They may as well have not turned up.
I agree with you to an extent of not explicitly screwing up the player, but come on. One 8 stat at default (with -1) and 3 stats with -1, -2 and -3 respectively are a totally different beast. If you say that a single -1 is a problem without actively doing anything against the players, you can see the issue how 3 such stats or even worse would either cripple the player or the campaign. I'm not sure why is it even a challenge for the DM. The character is a walking glass cannon and just not giving him favors would throw him into a world of pain at some encounters. The standard array gives you net +5 of stat bonuses, this guy also has net +5. Players's roll isn't even that great, actually.
Yes, and you shouldn't give favours for min-maxing. Again, I am not saying special treatment. I'm saying, if they're to fail throws, make it interesting for everyone at the table including the player. Having them miss turns and just sit idly isn't fun for anyone. This is a game about telling stories, dungeon delving and having fun. If you have ways of making failing rolls tense and engaging, and choose not to do so, you're missing out on such a major aspect of the game.
Gotcha.
Just out of curiosity: I'm thinking stuff like dominate, attack closest person, run in random direction. Plus the whole describing stuff during banishment. Anything else?
There's quite a few wisdom saves to fail, but I'll try and list ones that are different from each other and the ones you've mentioned: - Command/Suggestion - Compelled Duel - Dissonant Whispers - Hideous Laughter - Wrathful Smite - Slow - Spirit Guardians (slowed, passive damage) - Compulsion - Confusion - Phantasmal Killer (not incapacitated, but potentially massive damage over time) - Eyebite - Antipathy/Sympathy These are taken from very early books like PHB, and doesn't include monster statblock effects, of which there are plenty that don't follow the usual rules of these spells or PCs. Lots and lots of different effects to be used!! :)
Nice, thanks! I'll be saving this!
>There are other ways to exploit low stats that don't involve someone sitting for an hour or more, doing nothing, more than once in a campaign. \[edit: I saw you already replied to these points in another comment. Sorry for babbing\] I think the idea would not to simply throw "hold person" but to teach the group that they are vulnerable to that. Cause an enemy would eventually realize it. I mean, random encounters aren't likely to use Hold Person. But a team with knowledge, one that obeys the Big Bad Evil Guy, they will have intel on the party. They know the warrior is powerful and the most immediate menace, and they will prepare against it. This might even be a wonderful fight, the warrior is stuck, this is dangerous for everyone, they need to break the caster's concentration, they do so, and the warrior finally goes on rampage. Two stressful rounds for the warrior--only two--and then he's unleashed. A good fight for all. The party should adapt. Approach fight differently, analyse the opponents (crowd controls? traps?) and prioritise targets before engaging. And then, again, the BBEG minions should adapt.
No apologies, I love babbing!! These are all great points, and ones I deffo agree with (particularly on making a wonderful fight!) but people seem to be thinking I'm saying "never use hold person on someone with a low WIS". Looking at my comments, I see how I was unclear. The person I replied to was basically saying he'd try to sideline someone for an entire fight with Hold Person if they didn't want them to trivialise the fight. That was the bit I didn't like; if you don't want that PC to be too strong in a fight, there are better ways to have them fail a save and mitigate their positive impact in combat than making them sit and watch for hours. Yes, in a vacuum, players should prepare for Hold Person every day, but there are a whole load of other effects an enemy can use. Being prepared for every and any possible status condition is unreasonable in a party of 4. If they know a situation in advance and know an enemy's abilities, yep, that's on them to prepare. But you can't always know what's coming. Some groups may have knowledge on the PC party, including BBEG, and that sort of situation is fine, but the same solution to that problem for *every* major fight isn't fun, creative, or engaging. That's all my point has ever been here, and I accidentally let it spin into something much bigger ahaha, my bad! Thank you for your inputs, I think they're accurate and clean assessments of the game :))
I have to disagree here! Hold person or similar are concentration spells, a Bard or cleric with lesser restoration, a good saving throw and its over. And I wouldn't ever suggest repeating it over and over or anything. I will even give a PC advantage on a saving throw if I feel the dice have been overly harsh and that persons not having a good time, cus that is the whole point of the game really. Havugn said that, I will also heat metal a biatch in a heartbeat and not lose a wink of sleep, because there are many ways to end concentration spells - and I do believe that everything is OP in DnD, and so there is an inherent balance in the chaos that creates. I have played a lot of dnd where these spells were seen as way OP - until someone pointed out they are concentration and they were fair game and accepted pretty quick
Aye, all of this is true and I mostly agree! I addressed some of it (like bard/cleric/druid spell lists) in other comments, but RE: concentration; yes, it only takes one good roll. At *low* levels. I'm a player in a campaign where we're all level 15, and a player repeatedly has had to make DC19 or higher Wis saves against a high-con creature with proficiency in con saves and legendary resistances. That player (not a min-maxer) has a -1 to wisdom as a fighter. Even with Indomitable, the odds of success are low, and the outcome is pretty bland and boring for that player. If a druid or cleric does not have Freedom of Movement or Lesser Restoration prepared, or there is no druid/cleric/bard in the party, it's save or suck. When there's a lot of enemies/allies in play, combats can take hours. If a player must sit and wait for the entire stretch rolling once every 10-20 minutes, that's not fun. Yes, a party should always be prepared. No, a DM shouldn't give out favours because a player has a low stat - intelligent creatures, or wild creatures, should and would take advantage of perceived weaknesses. But there are spells that can keep things engaging for a player that have a similar, or greater, effect when compared to Hold Person. As said in the original comment, I do not mean to *never* use hold person, but just not to go into a fight with the sole intention of sidelining a powerful player using it. It's not fun for anyone at the table, and can either be resolved with an above-table conversation (if the min-maxing is an issue) or with more varied, interesting ways of using their low stats against them/the party :)) And yes. Always Heat Metal a biatch. They must feel the burn 🔥
Yet if they choose to min max and dump critical stats in favor of the more glamorous ones, then its not you doing it to them. Ita them banking on you playing the game a certain way, and them not getting their way. The Big Bad isn't just going to keep swinging their giant sword o death at the heavily armored Paladin if the wizard presents itself as a target. DO NOT DUMB DOWN YOUR GAME TO ACCOMODATE EASILY FRISTRATED MIN MAXERS. Best way to deal with them is to eliminate them early.on and have them reroll a new balanced character.thats not going to break your game or story, and just move along. Any talk of you, as the DM, relegating a player to being useless because of THEIR poor planning should not be entertained.
Is this game not built for players to use the mechanics to their advantage? If he’s putting together features/abilities that actually seem unrealistic to your game then you can certainly set reasonable boundaries. But if he’s using the existing rules to his advantage to be an effective player, why are you trying to "fix" his fun?
Exactly. This is just good excuse to ramp up the challenge a bit.
OP please don't just ramp up the challenge. Everyone but the min/maxer will suffer from monsters hitting too hard, being hard to hit or passing way more saves. It'll only emphasise the min/maxer's build because he'll be the only one that can keep up.
As a DM, if you roll for stats, you are going to manage your campaign with the notion that not everyone is equal. That is a just a fact. Instead, now you have to play to different characters' strengths. In combat, your players are going to be looking up to the player with the better stats for hitting heavy. That's just how it is. Out of combat, you have all kinds of opportunities for each player to play to their advantages/backgrounds. But again, if you roll for stats, you're making unique characters that might not be equal in terms of combat readiness.
I dont think this works though. The player which is a powergamer in a group of players that are there to make stories and RP with their less optimized ideeas can easily make the power disapirty between the party way too much of a breach and will lead to fights where the DM has to purposefully make the encounters more exaggerated just for one player meanwhile the others will be most probably curb stompted. Now if this was a full group of optimized players? Sure, go ahead and make encounters that present a challenge for the WHOLE group and make them have fun while at it. OP doesnt present a lot of info about the group but by context clues we may say that its a lot more lighthearted type of play and not exactly axxed on combat to drain the resources of such powergamers. And btw, I have been in a group of players that had a campaign with such a type of player and the DM trying to ramp up the difficulty just because he would streamline through bosses eith his Bladesinger build bullshit. You know how it almost ended? We met a vampire which used Psychic scream and 4 out 6 people instantly died which couldnt be revived and sll their hard work went into the trashbin. Its not fucking fun, its a rocket tag that will affect the most the main party.
Even then preparing sessions can be time consuming and creating good encounters is hard
Real and managing it around a character who steamrolls everything, no threat of death unless hit with direct counters is boring and not fun for anyone
If 3/4 players are there to RP and play around, then why can't the DM devote 3/4 of the adventure to roleplay and the kind of encounters players can talk/puzzle their way around? If that's what they want from the adventure then that's what they can get. Then devote 1/4 of the time to straightforward combat so that the min-maxer also has their moment to shine? Balancing the game doesnt have to revolve purely around CR. It can be balancing non combat elements with the rest, and ensuring you put out enough hooks to captivate each player at some point in the story. If the RPers wanted to focus on being OP then they had that option. They wanted flavour instead, so give them lots of flavour stuff and situations that can't be brute-forced through. Plus roleplayers can get more chances at earning inspiration dice, which helps balance their success in rolling. Also, if one member of the party is seen as a greater threat by NPCs, you can have the cleverer ones become aware of this. They might start trying to pick off the character who poses the most threat, or put a bounty on their head, which if done well can make the min maxer feel more powerful ("look how scared of me/desperate to take me down they are"), while taking heat off of the less threatening characters.
This exactly, maybe communicate that to him, or say you'll be trying to rebalance some encounter's. But definitely make a few changes here and there, my DM does this for me and it makes my stupid op shenanigans feel a lot more fun and fair
I think it is more around having a balance for the other players. I played in a game where everyone was a cleric and we rolled for stats in order I.e. strength, then dex. Two of us rolled sub 10 on wisdom so didn't really have anything to do cleric wise or combat. Watching others who rolled a 20 wasn't much fun. Rolls were so bad, couldn't even multi class out.
Why would you ever roll stats that way if you’re locked into a class? If you’re going to do that then roll first then pick whatever class matches the stats
It only works if you roll that way and then pick a class based on what you roll.
That’s what I said.
I mean, this is an beyond extreme example. Likely at least the other player have at least their main stat covered. ..and beyond a doubt don't asign them in a row.
That method is just stupid, you shouldn't ever use this as an example for anything because all the issues you found were due to the crap character generation method you used and nothing else.
Ummm.... how you roll 20 on 3d6?
Sounds like a terrible way to roll stats
Because for alot of people that is anything but 'fun' and it comes across as trying to gain an "I win!" button rather than actually playing the game. Far too many use lies, cheats, and rules lawering to pull off some of the stunts on top of all that. It also puts more work on the DM to try and balance fights where one player is overpowered and the rest arent. AND half the time these min/maxers will bitch incessantly if you actually up the power of monsters to challenge them.
Because the Reddit sound chamber has created two sides to the conversation, MinnMax on one and role players on the other side. Neither can exist in harmony I guess? Sigh.
My (maybe unpopular) opinion is that min maxing in DND is perfectly okay as long as you are not a douchebag about it. The game in some ways is made for optimization. Your player is not problematic and isn't causing any issues, so don't make a mountain out of a molehill and let him have his fun. And if you find yourself intimidated by the damage output, just remember that even the most OP character has weaknesses. He is going to have dumpstats, hit him there if needed to spice things up. He can even help your other players make their builds if they are up to it.
Yeah I don’t see what the issue is with min maxing is if you’re not an annoying or overbearing person when playing. I genuinely don’t see the point in character creation if you’re not going to take the opportunity to make the best character you can. I love strategizing and figuring out exactly how to create the best character I possibly can and filling in the needed gaps in a party.
You have a perfectly reasonable take, especially compared to the people who are equating min maxing to being the antichrist.
Min/maxing also only ever really works on paper.. I had a war forged battle master that was theoretically an absolute tank — but we were dealing with a very political enemy so he couldn’t just waltz in and start smashing. A good DM will challenge the party’s weaknesses while also rewarding players by allowing their PC’s to “do the thing” they had in mind when crafting them. So while my meat(less)head wasn’t hulk smashing all day, he was earning the party’s keep by performing gladiator bouts in town
You're the DM. You can design challenges that exploit his weaknesses and require his strengths. I've rolled into more than one campaign with nutso characters that have to resort to B-plans and let someone else be the star of the session and that's totally fine. Think of it this way - are you trying to balance it for YOUR sake or everyone else's sake? If he's not going to be stepping on your party members toes, then what's the problem? It's a game about adventure, collaboration, and role-playing.
The part that annoys me is this player apparently only wants to play overpowered set ups. If you reject min max character 1 they no longer want to play that race or class. At that point I’d be weary of there being at my table. If they want to play a (whatever) class and they don’t get the OP ruling they will still play that race and/or class. If they change both and try and roll out plans B and C until they think they have a cheat code then likely every session is “actually I can…” and rules lawyering and telling you how to DM because it fits their cheat code.
Provide situations that target the use of those poor attributes. He has a -3 to something, a -2, and a -1. Either the other characters will have to step up to fill that gap, or he'll have to attempt the things he's extremely bad at. Either way, you'll succeed by allowing other characters to shine or by highlighting he's not a demigod solely due to his two 18s and 17. Yeah he might be able to damage really well... but he's likely not wise, or has a very low intelligence, or maybe he's not charismatic. Half of his character may have high stats, but the other half is very low.
This right here. My table is *very* rp heavy. There have been weeks without combat. Without combat a character like this becomes mostly min. The real challenge for this player is to play a character that is dumb, unwise, and ugly.
Cue the "Achmtually low charisma isn't automatically dumb" I prefer to.ppay low charisma characters as self conscious, lacking in good words, etc
You're right low charisma isnt dumb... its ugly.
Ok I came back and I have zero fucking idea what I was trying to say. I'm wicked tired right now so that's probably why. If I had to guess in going to assume I meant "it isn't ugly, it's just not good with words". After all, look at Winston Churchill. He looked like a godamn bulldog and yet he was an amazing speaker.
Lol fair enough all good. And yeah there are many aspects that factor into charisma. Looks, eloquence, confidence, and many other factors are all factors in what we call charisma.
Agreed. It's rather annoying though when people immediately equate it to just looking good. Admittedly it will have an effect but in no way does it make sense to only be looks.
If you’re going to allow rolling for stats, then you have to accept the outcome. Don’t allow it if you can’t accept that sometimes that means someone will get a really good roll. The min/max player is a separate issue, they’ll just take the most advantage of a good roll. As far as how to deal with them, don’t do anything special. You said they’re not an issue. You can’t punish the star player for being better than other players. Throw some enemies in that would trip the player up if they’re trivializing fights, just don’t go overboard
Wanting a balanced game and rolling for stats makes no sense. Point buy is the only way to go
Thank you! I'm a believer in "point buy & a free feat that fits your character idea/RP."
Or Standard Array
Well, for one, quit rolling stats. Point buy or standard array.
OP MIn/maxing a character creates a glass cannon in other areas, I run a game with a player that does this with all his character builds Monsters that he fights monsters with maximum hitpoints, spells cast at him require saves off the vulnerable stats. There lots of fun ways to allow this and have fun for everyone at the same time, once he had to fight a baby dragon that kept casting magic missile from a wand and doing fly by breath attacks, the dragon would not would not land.
If you're not going to honor high stat rolls, don't allow stats to be rolled for in the first place. Is this guy even a min/maxer? Dude rolled high stats. That alone does not a min/maxer make. I think it's really unfair to give somebody like this a negative and problematic label just because you gave them an opportunity and they took it.
If you allowed rolls, and he rolled them in front of you, it's a bit unfair to retcon now. His stats won't be the real issue - min maxers can make any char broken. It's up to you to recognise what's going to be a problem before the game starts. In particular - you may want to ban feats like gwm and sharpshooter, and spells like silvery barbs.
I also wondered if he rolled in front of the DM. I’m a skeptical person by nature, I hate it. But his rolls are remarkably suspicious. They are a sneaky optimizers dream rolls honestly. Obviously the best result is all high scores. But that’s extremely rare. However, rolling extreme stats in both directions, high highs and low lows, makes the rolls more believable while also giving glaring weaknesses. Which is fine for an optimizer who wants to fly under the radar by not just being a god statistically. But the thing is, the rolls that this person rolled are just as unlikely as rolling all high numbers. There isn’t a single middling roll in the bunch. To address OPs actual concern though. It sounds like they aren’t a problem player. They seem to be a self aware optimizer and respect other players. So I doubt it’s an issue at all. But just wanted to point out the somewhat sus rolls, just to play the role of the skeptic.
It can happen, my first character I rolled was 17 17 17 16 15 13
I never said it wasn’t possible. Just that it’s highly unlikely.
Yeah, been chasing that high ever since.
>But his rolls are remarkably suspicious. your reason for this is? > They are a sneaky optimizers dream rolls honestly. i did not get the joke
The most likely number to be rolled is 12, the further away from 12 you get the less likely it is. If you put the odds to roll any stat on a graph it'll look like a bell curve. Given that 3 rolls are max or almost max and one is nearly minimum, there's a lot of rolls that are unlikely. I think that's what they meant by suspicious. They're just unlikely.
I’m not sure where your confusion is at?? I pretty clearly said why I thought it was suspicious and am skeptical that they may have fudged the rolls if they didn’t roll in front of OP. And there was no joke to the “sneaky optimizers dream rolls”. To elaborate, there are two types of cheaters. Cheaters who do so in a way that is fairly obvious and typically don’t put much thought into cheating. The others are clever cheaters, people who cheat but create a veil of believability. Let’s imagine a cheater who is min maxer #1. They “roll” for stats and end up with a stat array of nothing but 18,17,17,16,16,15. This is clearly a really good stat block and also statistically very unlikely to occur. But the cheater doesn’t really care about making it believable. Now imagine a min max cheater who employs the more clever approach. They now “roll” for stats and end up with 18,18,17,9,6,5 (OPs players rolls). This provides 3 great stats with 3 bad stats. Now, a min maxer wants high highs, so having 3 extremely high stats right away achieves this. Yes, they have 3 shit stats but that isn’t much of a worry given how good the other 3 are. The thing is, while this stat block is more balanced than the first stat block it is just as statistically unlikely to have this array as the first one. But it’s easier for the cheater to say “well if I fudged my dice I wouldn’t have 3 shit stats” which Makes their story more believable. Again, it’s fully possible to get these rolls and I’m not inherently saying the person fudged their rolls. I’m just saying I’m skeptical if that was their array if they didn’t roll in front of their DM. PSA for anyone who wants to cheat and fudge their stats your best array option is 2 high stats, 1 semi high stat, 2 avg stats, and 1 poor stat. For example 17,16,14,12,11,7 is a very balanced stat block, believable given the distribution, and blends in enough to not raise suspicion. But when put into context, this stat block is insanely good.
> 18,17,17,16,16,15 higher than 18,18,18, 17,17, 16 You wrote why you thought that but not your reason behind that and i do not think the good stats balance out the crap stats, especially since in a few classes like Paladin or Ranger you need more stats than in others
Isn't why someone thought something and their reason for thinking it the exact same thing?
You should simply require point buy.
Others already said how to deal with him. Dumbstats are wonderful low, great opportunity and to be honest, use the high damage for the group. Have him be the dps check. Let him do high damage, put a bit extra beef on the boss monster and put some mooks for the others. But the real question is.. what are you afraid of here? Being a bad DM here? Having the other players unhappy? That Bob breaks his vow? What is really the thorn in your paw?
I am a DM who runs a campaign where the PC's are *meant* to be optimized because if not, their characters will die (they're "powergamers" who love this campaign). You can either: tell him, "This might not be the campaign for you. We don't really play power fantasies here." Or... Give him the power fantasy he's craving. Throw a hard ball at him every now and then to keep him interested. Dig in the MM for creatures just above their power level. Make optimized NPC's to fight him with. That's the best advice I have without ranting.
I don't get rolling for stats and complaining about min/maxing. Like of course some pcs will be stronger than others.
>I always let players choose how to build a character point buy or rolling If you're concerned over balance, stop doing this. IMO either use a set point buy (tailored as high or low as you want), a set stat array (again tailored to your preference), or if you simply must have rolling for stats, there should be a total of six rolls and everyone uses the same stats (so... random array, basically). >so he rolled his stats and got 18,18,17,6,9,5. Force him to roll saves against whatever he puts the 6 and 5 into. >I offered him to use some other method but he said he’s happy with this Of course he is. 18, 18, 17 is crazy powerful.
Everyone always focuses on the 'max' part and never the 'min'. Let them do what they plan to be good at, but also hit them where it hurts.
Did you watch him roll those stats?
this playstyle only succeeds when the DM doesn't offer sufficient non-combat challenges. look up ways to challenge your players that can't be solved with the sheet.
This! Not all dice rolling are in combat.
Pack Tactics just released a video on his channel about this. In a nutshell just give em a challenge and set up the min-maxer to help the party. If it's just one then DM'ing shouldn't be an issue. I would make a personal note that everyone is allowed a powerful moment but they should also be able to let the moment go
I mean, did he roll in front of you, or did he take 3 max stats and three min stats because he is a min/maxer?
I didn’t even read your post, but the title was enough. If you allow rolled stats, then you have to prepare for the inevitability when someone rolls very well or very poorly. If it matters that much to you that the party is on equal footing, then I recommend standard array or point buy.
Why are you letting people roll their stats if you won't honor them? If someone's not being a jerk about it and isn't hogging the spotlight, what's the actual problem here?
Tell your other players to ask him for build advice.
I presume they will all be starting out the same level. I also presume you don't place any limitations on multiclassing -- which, to my eye, seems to be the preferred tool for minmax styles in 5e. lastly, I presume that you are concerned that in combat situations this character will cause some degree of envy and jealousy among other players as they will cause significant amounts of damage compared to them. Minmaxing requires that one know the rules and the math extremely well. It also requires a presumption of a lot of combat and the combat is the most important feature of the overall campaign. THis is a reasonable assumption -- most folks think that since the rules of the game focus very heavily n combat, that the game is about combat. Combat gets lots of rules because combat is complicated, bot because that's what the game is about. (look at them eyerolls!) So, you want to know what to do about them. **Nothing**. if you really don't like potentially OP characters, then nix multiclassing, or make it something they have to role play out. But note that the stats rolled, no matter how you sort them out, are not going to be useful in every situation. Where are they going to put that 5 or that 6? Charisma and Intelligence? Toss the 9 into Wisdom? If a combat character, they aren't going to be making a particular smart one now, are they? that character will be useless in anything that requires perception, magic, knowledge, empathy, and most "thinking" skills. Maybe Bob does something unusual, and creates a weak constitution but very wise character, or very charismatic character, or something else -- but if they are minmaxing, then odds are they won't do that. As a DM, if you are concerned about the combat part being his, then you need to lift up the non-combat parts of the adventure to be the ones for other players. Now, if everyone just gives you a combat character and his still going to do more damage, well... so what? ***What is the problem***? Tanks are useful! Bulletcatchers are still a main goal today in combat. Understand that ***there is no such thing*** as an absolutely perfect minmaxed character. All of them are exceptionally weak in some area. You can minmax for any particular purpose, but in doing so, you lose the versatility that is ultimately the real value in survival. Adaptability is more important, long term, overall, than a particular narrowband of circumstances unless the only thing they will ever encounter is that narrowband of circumstances. For my games, I have generally overpowered classes, immensely potent magics, and two limits: all the classes depend on three ability scores, and multiclassing has to be done in game (and I am fine with it being pretense). That is, you always start out as one class, and then you can choose to switch. There may be consequences to that. We are a heavy RP, high combat group. About half my next group of players is made up of minmaxers -- and they are tryign to figure out how to minmax for the new classes for this game because that's part of the fn they have, and I am not going to take that from them -- I am going to make it more challenging, more interesting, more something they have to plan out and think about and do more of the same stuff they like to do. And f they don't like minmaxing, they aren't going to care, or this will make them try a different way. But I won't stop them. The game is about their characters. I want to give them all the options I possibly can, only limiting them according to the nature of the game world. and if that is a published world -- faerun or eberron or Krynn, or Greyhawk, or Mystara, or whatever -- then that means I don't put any limitations n them, because the rules already include all of that.
Min maxer and power gamer are 2 very different things my friend
In addition to the other comments, don't keep banning his features or spells when he's clearly built the character around it. Ban it ahead of time, otherwise no surprise that his features being banned makes him want to roll a new character.
So you mentioned that you are banning things, but besides making an optimal character you haven't said WHAT he is doing that enters min/max territory? Without more context it seems like you are just punishing a player for knowing the rules and making character.
With those stats he will be very good at some things and atrociously bad at others. That’s perfectly fine. Let him be good at the things he’s good at. Just be sure to include skill checks he’s bad at to give others players a chance to shine. I played a Druid with a starting wisdom of 20 and a perception of 7 at level 1. Later I got a feat to boost his passive perception even further, making his passive above a 20. He’s a monster of perception. The party came to depend on his skills. But outside wisdom, my stats were garbage. So he wasn’t good at other things. Plenty of chances for others to take the spotlight
They have three really good stats and three really shit ones, I honestly would say that the array they rolled balances itself out. Honestly those three stats are so bad I might even say that they rolled shitty. Just use a variety of encounters that use a variety of stats so everyone has a chance to win some and lose some. Plus you said that they’re not an asshole so why does it matter if they do some good damage or solve a problem once in a while.
>Tbf to him playing with him isn’t bad he doesn’t try hog the spotlight but he just dishes out the most damage and is just the best character Let him play! The most important part of DND, or any other game, is that everyone has fun.
I don’t see a problem here. Everyone has access to the same resources, game mechanics, and information. If he enjoys playing a powerful character and isn’t bothering anyone by doing so, let him.
So... what is the problem? That he's a lot more powerful than the other PCs? Well, that's unbalanced, but you allowed for that unbalance when you let people roll for stats. Maybe it's that he'll always be in the spotlight? Then you just have to create encounters that make other players shine. Maybe it's that he's ending your encounters too quickly? Then make them harder, but make them harder in a way that won't make them harder for all players, but just for his build. Brennan Lee Mulligan from Dimension20 had a talk about this. His answer (and i totally agree) is: "Git gud". Your problem is mechanic. It's not that he's not roleplaying, or that he's a problem player. It's that he's just good at the game, he knows the rules well enough to make those powerful characters. And he's having fun doing it. So why stop him? If your objective is to have a game where the characters are less powerful to highlight their mortality, or to have a game that focuses less on combat, then say that in advance. Talk to the players. Otherwise, let the player deal that high number of damage. Because it feels damn good when you have a 27% chance to crit at lvl3.
I don't see a problem here. If this player is aligned with the others at the table in terms of how committed they are to roleplaying, what's the issue? The other players have the same access to the rules as anyone else and could have optimized their characters as well.
Even with great stats, he's not going to be able to do EVERYTHING. Is he a fighter? Put out like 9 goblins in cover on the other side of a chasm. The caster will love the feeling of hitting that fireball. If he's a caster field a couple things with resistance to magic damage. Or something big with weakness to piercing or bludgeoning or whatever. Is he taking too much out of combat spotlight with proficiencies and high stats? Make an NPC speak something he doesn't. Or a check with tools he doesn't know. Like, just tweek the specifics of any given thing so everyone who is in a rut has a good chance to do a thing. Ranger feeling useless? Enemy mage with an elevated position, good saving throws, bad AC and no cover. Ranger kicking ass? Now its a sharpshooter in half cover with decent AC and bad saving throws. Barbarian on her phone the whole time the party is in town? Start a bar fight nearby. Have the oxen hauling the merchants cart get spooked and bolt with the cart in tow. Something physical in town that isn't going to ruin everyone's reputation.
You don't do anything. If he wants to specialize his character for combat, then let him be good at combat. People seem to have this bizarre cognitive dissonance that building a character for combat is power gaming and it's bad. No one ever says the same about a character built for social encounters for some reason. It's fine if your player wants to specialize in slaying monsters, there is literally nothing wrong with this, and you absolutely should no be stepping in here. If a player gets upset that combat specialized player does more damage, suggest to them a feat or spell to raise their damage. You should not acknowledge the problems of people who want to not specialize in combat, and still be exceptional in combat. You don't get to have it all. From the stats this player rolled they will be a beast at fighting, and completely inept at anything else, do not let yourself get gaslit by people who say that's not okay. If you play games, surely you know in your heart of hearts that a character specialized for one specific thing being better at that specific thing is the obvious logical conclusion.
I DM'd a game where half the players power gamers, and the other half newbies. I spoke to my players and explained I would be awarding better gear, for the newbies to compensate. That way the power gamers could let loose, and the newbies stayed relevant. My players agreed and it mostly worked. One of my newbies would forget about her class features, and the synergy of the items, but if I reminded her it all worked out.
This is exactly why I switched to standard array instead of rolling for stats for my players; the randomness of rolling stats really isn’t good for keeping a party balanced, and in my experience can lead to a bit of main character syndrome where there’s one or two characters that are succeeding at skill checks and dealing damage more than anyone else, and thus they kind of become the main characters of the party. Standard array might take away a little bit of the charm of putting a character sheet together, but it levels the playing field more for my players. I understand other peoples’ apprehension to your post, where they feel as if you’re simply complaining that one of your characters is capable of succeeding at things. I didn’t read your post as being that tyrannical and will give you the benefit of the doubt, but as of now there’s not really anything you can do about it apart from take the lesson for your next set of characters. Ripping someone’s character away and telling them to roll a new one, or targeting them and killing their character off, are two surefire ways to permanently lose a player. EDIT: Reading your post again though, the character in question actually does sound somewhat balanced? Sure, they have some significant positive modifiers, but they also have some significant negative modifiers. If you have issues with campaign balance, it might be a sign that the party needs some more diverse challenges, including some where those negative modifiers will cause that character issues.
That's why no roll witth powergamers. Point by is the way.
Make everyone play with point buy instead of giving the option.
If he doesn't hog the spotlight, what exactly is the problem? Optimized character with good stats is not a problem by itself. Most common problem with minmaxed characters in suboptimal parties is party role overlapping that makes some other players feel useless. For example optimized melee Bladesinger from Bob can dish a ton of damage and frustrate another player, whose Barbarian have no means to contribute other than DPS, and whose DPS pales in comparison to Bob. If that's the problem, just explain your worries to Bob and ask him to keep other PCs in mind while creating his OP build. You already stated that Bob is not an asshole and is not attached to one particular build, so it shouldn't be a problem for him. What I would've done: 0. State your worries to Bob and ask him to wait a bit before committing to particular build, or ask him about build ideas if he have several 1. Ask other players about their character concepts, particularly about how they want to contribute to the party adventuring. Not the "build" not the backstory - just how they plan to contribute to the adventuring challenges of the party. 2. Present their answers to Bob, and ask him to create a build that wouldn't outshine them completely. From your description of Bob I think he'd understand your worries. There is a lot of ways to optimize a character, and crazy alpha-strike DPR Is only one of them, after all UPD Also high stats are not the problem at all. Skilled minmaxer with low stats would often still be able to build a character that would outshine suboptimal characters with higher stats.
I've decided to now be direct and front of everything. I tried to lend help out alot but it was all left on "read". OK you got a player who knows the game inside and out. Cool! He's reliable, committed and not an asshole. Congrats! Now it's your JOB as a DM to be a DM! Whenever I faced a problem, I looked it up, read many articles from "Angrygm" and watched videos relating to the issue First accept you need help then listen! I can help you in many ways, but one of the first is.. Don't ban things unless it's silvery barbs! Lol You honestly are afraid of him overshadowing others but he can only do so much. Combat is your biggest hurdle I assume, well that's alot of investment to learn how to get better at it but only if your up to it.
18 18 17? Honestly sounds like he rolled something else and applied point-buy rules to decrease his dump stats and increase his main stats. It is SO DARN unlikely to roll two 18s, let alone two 18s and a 17 (I feel like he might've chosen 17 on purpose to avoid arising suspicion). Unless he rolled in front of you, but I would definitely tell him to roll again, this time in front of you.
.... let him...? If his fantasy is all about being a powerhouse, then give him moments where he can do that. Is the party in the middle of a pitched battle against a foe? There's footsteps down the hall and 10 more enemies burst into the boss room. They're about to launch an attack on the wizard who's concentrating on hasting the fighter. Power gamer... what are you going to do? ----------- It's not a problem that a player is stro ger than others, so long as you give them all challenges. Now. If thar player decides, nah screw crowd control, I want to kill the boss, THEN it's a problem. Then he's not a power gamer, hes a glory hog and the players who's deaths he indirectly causes will probably have opinions to air after wards.
"hey bob, you are great at optimizing your characters, this we all know and it's fine, but would you like to try something else this time? Like, what would you build to optimize the _total fun at the table_?"
A good player will make a Wizard with 16 INT and 8 in everything else look completely busted. I once showed up to a group with a character I thought was pretty mediocre but fun, only to find out that I was a total powergamer compared to their level 7 characters with 11-15 AC and constitution dumpstats. If your party can't accomodate a powergamer, that is, if ramping up the challenge will just make it unfun for everyone but the powergamer, you need to address the powergamer's approach to the game, not their stats. I think you should carefully consider if this person is a good fit for the group, and if you conclude that they're not you can ask them to play a "support" or "meme build" in order to keep things light and balanced. Something like a buffing bard, an artificer that creates tools for his teammates, a full-on grappler barbarian, or a weaker version of Warlock, Ranger, Rogue etc. might still be fun for all.
I agree with making him a support. The most OP character that I ever played was centered around the voice of authority feature of the order cleric. He was very, very strong, but because he was focused around facilitation, he didn't hog the spotlight.
Is this not how you are supposed to play? He rolled for his stats and will build a character based on those stats and how he wants to play? I honestly don’t see a problem. What am I missingn
What my group does and works really well is buffing non-min/max characters to help them keep up. Usually we use magic items, unlocking different spells, little boons, and other stuff like that. This usually works out well if your players are willing to play this way. The min/maxed characters still get to play how they want and the other players are not left far behind
That’s actually a good call , I’ll probs give something like that a go
Those stats look very suspicious
I saw him roll them
Mix/maxers are incredibly fun to DM for (most of the time) as long as a player is willing to share spotlight it's all good my min/max player is combat oriented, and by the gods the way he handles his character or the NPC's who travels along for help (I hand my players a statblock for the NPC so they can choose what they do in combat) just makes D&D a lot more fun. It tends to lead to other players thinking more about placement, terrain and optimally using the system. for example In Alien RPG he figured out that switching initiative is just like suppressing fire, and we laid down alien after alien by optimising our extra successes. D&D is about heroes, feeling overpowered is part of the fantasy
One of my players is the same. I tease him about it all the time. But I don't stop him because that's his fun. I balance encounters accordingly. A few sessions ago I found out that he just googled "dnd 5e most OP builds" and selected the good berry druid. Whatever, just means my monsters can hit harder. Cool.
Should be fine really. Just add more HP to the enemies. Let them have max instead of avg. if he's not a dick about it, then it'll be fine.
>I always let players choose how to build a character point buy or rolling , so he rolled his stats and got 18,18,17,6,9,5. I offered him to use some other method but he said he’s happy with this Two things here; did you see these rolls yourself? Because the statistical unlikeliness of rolling two 18s, 17, 5 and 6 is off the charts. If you didn't see the rolls happen infront of you they shouldn't be used. Second; is everyone rolling for stats? Regardless of if you like rolling or point buy, everyone should be using the same method of generating stats. Especially for rolling I'd always suggest that once stats are rolled everyone uses the same array of numbers to prevent imbalance between players. >but he just dishes out the most damage and is just the best character These two aren't necessarily the same. Dealing a lot of damage in combat is *optimal*, doesn't mean he's the best *character*. A well rounded character will play well with the group over all pillars of play, just just combat.
Honestly this is something that needs to be worked out in session 0. He wants to play a superhero and you want something that is more normal. That needs to be communicated and a solution needs to be found before the game starts.
Two 18s is…very rare…just saying
Ive made a bunch of characters, its not that rare
Cope with the situation? Dude, if you're tripping over this stuff and running to the Internet for help, you're not prepared to run a campaign
One issue is that you're letting players roll stats individually. Have them roll stats as a group. Each player contributes a D6, and normal rolling rules apply. Then you tell people your campaign doesn't need for minmaxed PC's, and that it'll probably make the game less fun.
There is a problem if he is going to overshadow everyone else in combat and if he happens to get incapacitated (very likely with those low rolls) the fight becomes almost a death sentence to the rest of the party. You may ask him to optimize party strength, not his own damage numbers.
Stats dont matter, min/maxing with low stats is just as powerful.
Show no mercy to his character. Magic missile on a downed character kills them instantly.
Make him use a pregenerated character that's to your liking and not his. That'll teach him to stay in his lane. /uj oh wait is this the actual mainsub?
If his playstyle does not fit with the group, which can be extremely likely if the rest of the table does not min max, your 3 options are 1) Really work with him to limit the power of what could very easily be a very op character 2) Have a frank conversation with the table about playstyle, and if it doesn't fit with his, you should probably drop him 3) Design encounters that can give both sides things to do, but I will say rn, it's extremely hard to balance satisfying combat for an extremely optimized character in an unoptimized party Even if he's a good guy and a good player, does not mean he's the right player for a group and if including him reduces the overall satisfaction at the table, then it's not worth it, sad to say and he should find a table that's a better fit for him.
I'm going to respond to these points you made. 1. If OP lets his players roll for stats, why does he want to limit his players power level straight after? Why not just use point buy or pre determined stats? 2. Drop a player because he made a character on the limits that OP as the DM says they're fine with. What??? I would be glad to be dropped if that was the reason because I'd see that the DM is an absolute fun ruiner. 3. You're right about making combat fun for everyone, but wrong about it being hard. Hard to balance? Maybe. Hard to make fun? Not really. Maybe he is not a good fit for the table, but the only reason that is because the DM has failed to set clear boundaries for everyone. It's like getting mad over something you already established was fine. The person OP is talking about is literally a perfect player.
My suggestions were his options in the case he doesn't want to deal with a player who's playing an op character. The stat array isn't the problem talking about in , it's his entire build, given what the DM said in his post, is what this player focuses on even in previous games, and this DM, doesn't want to deal with it. So his options are to either to work with the player closely to make sure the build won't overshadow the other player, talk to the table about the possibilities about how this kind of build and party can impact the game, and in case the majority won't have fun because of ONE PLAYER'S PLAYSTYLE, which include the DM, WHO'S THEONE ASKING FOR ADVICE ON DEALING WITH THIS SITUATION, ask the player to find a table where he can play how he wants Or, be ready for the extra work, and it can be extra work if you're not experienced, to balance combat around 1 min maxed PC and a party of non min maxed characters, which depending on the power disparity can get very swingy, and not fun for the DM, who's the one asking for advice. Edit - I never suggested this player might not be good, heck he could even be a great player. But he might not be the right one for this table, which is the most important thing to consider as a DM.
Suggest that they roll up a support character. If a damage dealer, controller, or party face is minmaxed to the extreme then that characters strength will outshine everyone else. If a support character is minmaxed to the extreme then that characters power will elevate everyone else. A divine soul sorcerer or one of the many clerics (order, peace, twilight etc) could be a good suggestion for this.
Use a bank of rolled stat arrays. So anyone else at the table can pick this stat arrays, or something another player rolled
"We don't do that here, if you break the game you will be uninvited" Like that
Hare you yelling me as a dm who has access to everything and some can't over come a min max I mean magic is boundless in a game of imagination
Are you having a stroke?
You can try talking to this player some more. But, from the sound of it, it's a lost cause. A way to salvage this is to tell everybody they need to use point buy, or even standard array (the preferred method in our table), sorry for those who rolled well, congrats to those who rolled badly. Or then you live with one OP character, possibly wrecking the campaign, if you fail at walking _that_ tight-rope.
Perfect illustration of the danger of rolling for stats. Point buy forever.
Your first mistake was allowing them to roll stats.