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View Full Version : Is there a way to get someone to power-up their character?



WarKitty
2010-09-19, 10:21 AM
Inspired by another thread on this board.

I was thinking back to my last campaign. The problem was that we had one character (fighter/barbarian gestalt) that was simply badly built. When confronted with CR-appropriate encounters, he couldn't hit them unless he rolled a 20. Took Toughness for as many of his feat choices as he could. Needless to say he started feeling useless. I thought about dropping appropriate loot, but with a party with 3 heavy hitters that's kind of difficult.

Tyndmyr
2010-09-19, 10:27 AM
The first thing you should do when someone looks at toughness is to suggest improved toughness. Even a non-optimizer will see that it's clearly better.

Gotta start em off small, can't take em straight to the deep end of the pool all at once.

Typically, new characters are also given build advice by one or more experienced players. Had a warmage join my party last night. He hadn't played much before, and it's not a top tier class, but he immediately started out with a ridiculous amount of spellpoints and 9d6 fireballs in E6, and a +9 unbuffed to ranged touch attacks. He's a blaster, sure, since that's what he wanted, but he's good at it.

ArcanistSupreme
2010-09-19, 10:30 AM
Maybe allow feat retraining as per PHB II?

Psyx
2010-09-19, 10:37 AM
Maybe don't use those whacky gestalt rules in games with players who only have a basis rules knowledge?

Or sit in and help them gen.

WarKitty
2010-09-19, 10:47 AM
Maybe don't use those whacky gestalt rules in games with players who only have a basis rules knowledge?

Or sit in and help them gen.

Gestalt's not that bad here, considering we had a no multi-classing rule. I was basically handing him a sheet that said "you have fighter skill points and bonus feats, but you get a d12 hit die and rage." And he had our more experienced fighter sitting over his shoulder offering good feat choices. That and he wasn't any less experienced than most of the rest of our group, who did fine.


Maybe allow feat retraining as per PHB II?

I did.

Pika...
2010-09-19, 11:09 AM
I have to ask, are they level appropriate or group appropriate?

I had an issue, well two actually, very similar.

In one there was a group of powergamers who kept telling me to "make a better character". I ended up doubting myself and the game became miserable.

In the second we had a great group for years, then one player was invited from the previously mentioned group. Suddenly he won every encounter single-handedly and people started to get bored. At one point they got mad at ME for not participating in encounters and saying "What? I will take part in the next one the DM has to throw at us when Jordon wastes his 'big shots'".


Basically, a sole rolepalyer is not meant for a powergamer group, and a sole powergamer is not meant for a roleplaying group.

JaxGaret
2010-09-19, 11:48 AM
First of all, the character would be a lot more powerful if it were a gestalt between Barbarian and Feat Rogue (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/variantCharacterClasses.htm#rogue). Basically, it would be the same character, but with much better skills, a lot more class features, and a good Reflex save.

Secondly, if the guy took Toughness, let alone taking Toughness multiple times, you failed in your role as assistants in helping him create his character. Failed miserably.

Yuki Akuma
2010-09-19, 12:01 PM
...Who would take Toughness if they have d12 hit dice?

...Oh wait I remember someone who did that. That was an annoying argument. -_-

Dark_Juggernaut
2010-09-19, 12:47 PM
Have a lvl 15 wizard appear, whisk him away, and chaos shuffle(pair of 8th lvl fiend folio spells) his feats around to end up with better feats. I don't know why he'd do it off hand but if you can't think of a plot reasoning for it, I'm sure we can help there to.

Frankly though, I don't see how he's missing so much...a single classed Barb USUALLY doesn't have feats that improve his hit chance (maybe reckless rage, but that's +1 tops). Make sure he has a lvl appropriate strength item, a +1 weapon with another +1 per 4 lvls, and he shouldn't need friggin 20s to hit.

It SOUNDS like someone dropped the ball somewhere...I mean even without all that, unless he's at 16 without a magical weapon AT ALL he should still have a chance to hit on an 18. The AC of the things you're having him fight sounds to high. A sub-optimal average melee should be able to hit average enemies of his CR 50% of the time, really high AC stuff around 25-30% of the time, and huge easy to hit stuff 75% of the time(if not 100%).

Either your enemies are way to hard to hit or someone added up his attack bonus wrong...maybe he's not raging, I dunno.

WarKitty
2010-09-19, 01:20 PM
First of all, the character would be a lot more powerful if it were a gestalt between Barbarian and Feat Rogue (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/variantCharacterClasses.htm#rogue). Basically, it would be the same character, but with much better skills, a lot more class features, and a good Reflex save.

Secondly, if the guy took Toughness, let alone taking Toughness multiple times, you failed in your role as assistants in helping him create his character. Failed miserably.

Well he was told "feats make your character. Toughness is a bad feat. Please let us give you suggestions for better feats." And said no.


Have a lvl 15 wizard appear, whisk him away, and chaos shuffle(pair of 8th lvl fiend folio spells) his feats around to end up with better feats. I don't know why he'd do it off hand but if you can't think of a plot reasoning for it, I'm sure we can help there to.

Frankly though, I don't see how he's missing so much...a single classed Barb USUALLY doesn't have feats that improve his hit chance (maybe reckless rage, but that's +1 tops). Make sure he has a lvl appropriate strength item, a +1 weapon with another +1 per 4 lvls, and he shouldn't need friggin 20s to hit.

It SOUNDS like someone dropped the ball somewhere...I mean even without all that, unless he's at 16 without a magical weapon AT ALL he should still have a chance to hit on an 18. The AC of the things you're having him fight sounds to high. A sub-optimal average melee should be able to hit average enemies of his CR 50% of the time, really high AC stuff around 25-30% of the time, and huge easy to hit stuff 75% of the time(if not 100%).

Either your enemies are way to hard to hit or someone added up his attack bonus wrong...maybe he's not raging, I dunno.

He has left the group now (moved away). I was just wondering - for all the people who complain about powergaming, what would they do in this situation. The encounters are appropriate for the group at least. My other two fighter-types are hitting fairly often, with them both being TWF types. He's playing two-handed axe and not hitting.

I just don't get it. My other players weren't exactly munchkins, and they loved roleplaying and were good at it. He just didn't seem to want to be bothered with optimization at all.

pffh
2010-09-19, 06:37 PM
I would show him the ToB classes. Much harder to screw them up.

Chipp Zanuff
2010-09-19, 07:09 PM
Scream really loud in an angry pose for three episodes?

Yuki Akuma
2010-09-19, 07:14 PM
I would show him the ToB classes. Much harder to screw them up.

You could still, say, take Toughness for every feat as a Warblade.

Tyndmyr
2010-09-19, 07:30 PM
Maybe don't use those whacky gestalt rules in games with players who only have a basis rules knowledge?

Or sit in and help them gen.

Yeah, I don't generally bother with gestalt unless all the players have a solid familiarity. It's not a tough addition if you know the system, but if you dont...it can be awkward.

Be aware that some people aren't fond of math and comparisons. Trying to demonstrate that X is a bad feat to them is...difficult. Now, if they don't complain about their char, no problem. If they complain, and are willing to accept advice, also no problem. If they refuse to accept advice, and are angry that they suck, the irony should be pointed out to them. It's completely their fault at that point.

Glimbur
2010-09-19, 07:36 PM
You could still, say, take Toughness for every feat as a Warblade.

You're much better off than a fighter//barbarian who has toughness as every feat.

Now, if they simply don't use maneuvers in combat... that's the only way I can think of to really screw up a single classed ToB character.

Tengu_temp
2010-09-19, 07:50 PM
Well he was told "feats make your character. Toughness is a bad feat. Please let us give you suggestions for better feats." And said no.

If someone is feeling inadequate because of his subpar build, and in response you let him rebuild and ask if he wants suggestions, and he rejects all this help, then sucks to be him. You can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink.

fryplink
2010-09-19, 07:54 PM
You're much better off than a fighter//barbarian who has toughness as every feat.

Now, if they simply don't use maneuvers in combat... that's the only way I can think of to really screw up a single classed ToB character.

It would still probably be stronger than a single class figher (yay d12 hp)

HunterOfJello
2010-09-19, 08:08 PM
Kill the character, make a new one.

You failed at helping your friend make a good character. Throw away the trash and help him properly this time.

firemagehao
2010-09-19, 08:12 PM
You could kill the PC, then throw in a NPC Cleric who is resurrection happy, and use Heroes of Horror's suggestion that not all resurrections could summon the correct soul, and the soul that now inhabits the body is good at fighting.

Dr.Epic
2010-09-19, 08:14 PM
Inspired by another thread on this board.

I was thinking back to my last campaign. The problem was that we had one character (fighter/barbarian gestalt) that was simply badly built. When confronted with CR-appropriate encounters, he couldn't hit them unless he rolled a 20. Took Toughness for as many of his feat choices as he could. Needless to say he started feeling useless. I thought about dropping appropriate loot, but with a party with 3 heavy hitters that's kind of difficult.

Wow! How do you make a fighter/barb gestalt that doesn't slaughter everything? Toughness as every feat? Really? I only use that feat on NPCs I don't want killing all the PCs. Yeah, tell them to ditch the 3 HP upgrades. Weapon focus, weapon specialization, greater of the two former, extended rage, extra rage, monkey grip. All those are good, but the three every barbarian and fighter built like a tank should have are power attack, cleave, great cleave.

JoshuaZ
2010-09-19, 08:22 PM
Yeah, I don't generally bother with gestalt unless all the players have a solid familiarity. It's not a tough addition if you know the system, but if you dont...it can be awkward.

Be aware that some people aren't fond of math and comparisons. Trying to demonstrate that X is a bad feat to them is...difficult. Now, if they don't complain about their char, no problem. If they complain, and are willing to accept advice, also no problem. If they refuse to accept advice, and are angry that they suck, the irony should be pointed out to them. It's completely their fault at that point.

I agree. If you gave the guy advice and he didn't listen at all this is his own fault. If someone at that point wants to engage in retraining or start a new character that might be ok. But if they won't there's not much you can do to help them out. If you absolutely need to help them out in a situation like this I suppose they could conveniently find a powerful magical artifact that only worked when someone was raging. But you shouldn't need to do that.

Yuki Akuma
2010-09-19, 08:23 PM
It would still probably be stronger than a single class figher (yay d12 hp)

Well, yeah. But not really stronger than a single-class Barbarian, which is the problem.

JaxGaret
2010-09-19, 08:28 PM
the three every barbarian and fighter built like a tank should have are power attack, cleave, great cleave.

Great Cleave is kind of sort of a trap, actually - because ~95% of the time you won't have more than 2 combatants within reach, and mook cleanup is generally someone else's job - Cleave though can be useful enough to be worth it.

Also, you spelled "power attack, shock trooper, leap attack" wrong. :smallsmile:

fryplink
2010-09-19, 08:44 PM
Well, yeah. But not really stronger than a single-class Barbarian, which is the problem.

yea, i thought about mentioning him, but decided that a maneuver-free warblade would get destroyed against a barbarian.

herrhauptmann
2010-09-19, 09:15 PM
I just don't get it. My other players weren't exactly munchkins, and they loved roleplaying and were good at it. He just didn't seem to want to be bothered with optimization at all.

It does seem like a bit of mystery, but a question about him and the party.
1)Was he someone who joined in solely for D&D, or already a member of your circle of friends?
2)How was the advice phrased? Particularly if he wasn't already a friend of yours.

For instance, if he sat down at character creation having never met any of you, and the optimizers in the group started in on him with "You shouldn't take toughness and weapon focus, take power attack, ranks in jump, and leap attack." I'd say it's the groups own fault that he ignored their advice, wellmeaning though it may have been. Being correct doesn't excuse being rude.

Not that I'm saying that's what your group did, it's just something I've seen in games where the players have vastly different experiences/expectations.

WarKitty
2010-09-19, 09:21 PM
It does seem like a bit of mystery, but a question about him and the party.
1)Was he someone who joined in solely for D&D, or already a member of your circle of friends?
2)How was the advice phrased? Particularly if he wasn't already a friend of yours.

For instance, if he sat down at character creation having never met any of you, and the optimizers in the group started in on him with "You shouldn't take toughness and weapon focus, take power attack, ranks in jump, and leap attack." I'd say it's the groups own fault that he ignored their advice, wellmeaning though it may have been. Being correct doesn't excuse being rude.

Not that I'm saying that's what your group did, it's just something I've seen in games where the players have vastly different experiences/expectations.

He already knew all of us quite well. His girlfriend is our best player. I think it was something like "feats really are the central part of this class, if you don't want feats maybe something else would be better, or we can help you find feats."

Emmerask
2010-09-19, 09:32 PM
Inspired by another thread on this board.

I was thinking back to my last campaign. The problem was that we had one character (fighter/barbarian gestalt) that was simply badly built. When confronted with CR-appropriate encounters, he couldn't hit them unless he rolled a 20. Took Toughness for as many of his feat choices as he could. Needless to say he started feeling useless. I thought about dropping appropriate loot, but with a party with 3 heavy hitters that's kind of difficult.

If a Fighter//Barbarian canīt hit things reliably in most battles due to ac it is because of:
-Ability scores suck
-Equipment is not level appropriate
-Monsters are unbalanced selfmade ones with optimized AC

Feat choice should have nothing to do with it. Feats give a fighter a modest amount of battlefield control or increase his damage output, atm I canīt think of any worthwhile feat that increases toHit

/edit Maybe if all three points are not true he did his math wrong and didnīt add str etc to his attack rolls?

JoshuaZ
2010-09-19, 09:35 PM
If a Fighter//Barbarian canīt hit things reliably in most battles due to ac it is because of:
-Ability scores suck
-Equipment is not level appropriate
-Monsters are unbalanced selfmade ones with optimized AC

Feat choice should have nothing to do with it. Feats give a fighter a modest amount of battlefield control or increase his damage output, atm I canīt think of any worthwhile feat that increases toHit

Well, if you are playing with two weapons that matters a fair bit. Also, Weapon Specialization and its companion don't do much but they do matter. If you include all three you've got a total of +10 at most, yes?

WarKitty
2010-09-19, 09:37 PM
I'm not quite sure *what* he did to be honest. I just know he never seemed to hit anything, while our ranger with a longbow could hit 75% of the time, and our TWF fighter could hit 90% of the time. He would always forget to send me his sheet.

Emmerask
2010-09-19, 09:43 PM
Well, if you are playing with two weapons that matters a fair bit. Also, Weapon Specialization and its companion don't do much but they do matter. If you include all three you've got a total of +10 at most, yes?

Yes if you use two weapons then two weapon fighting would help I give you that ^^

But weapon specialization does only increase your damage roll by +2 (afaik) which is pretty pointless at the time you can get the feat.

Dr.Epic
2010-09-19, 09:58 PM
Great Cleave is kind of sort of a trap, actually - because ~95% of the time you won't have more than 2 combatants within reach, and mook cleanup is generally someone else's job - Cleave though can be useful enough to be worth it.

Yeah, but with all the bonus feats of a fighter what else you gonna spend it on?

Chipp Zanuff
2010-09-19, 10:17 PM
Yeah, but with all the bonus feats of a fighter what else you gonna spend it on?

Useful things from other splatbooks. Or just don't take fighter to 20.

Ozreth
2010-09-20, 02:07 AM
I would just let him change whatever he needs to change to make the game fun again.

Psyx
2010-09-20, 04:03 AM
"Yeah, I don't generally bother with gestalt unless all the players have a solid familiarity. It's not a tough addition if you know the system, but if you dont...it can be awkward."


I don't actually see that they add anything to the game, except for widening the gap between the people who like reading rules, and the people that don't. I don't know a single GM that allows their use.

VirOath
2010-09-20, 04:06 AM
Have a lvl 15 wizard appear, whisk him away, and chaos shuffle(pair of 8th lvl fiend folio spells) his feats around to end up with better feats. I don't know why he'd do it off hand but if you can't think of a plot reasoning for it, I'm sure we can help there to.


Actually, this is a neat idea, only do half of the Chaos Shuffle. Talk with your player about this first, but bring up the 'cool stuff' that would be given to him by his character being turned into a test subject of a crazy old coot.

742
2010-09-20, 04:22 AM
If someone is feeling inadequate because of his subpar build, and in response you let him rebuild and ask if he wants suggestions, and he rejects all this help, then sucks to be him. You can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink.

technically true but IV hydration works as long as you dont mind stabbing the horse. "this is your character" "you leveled up, this is your character with the new level, remember you can ___ now."

WarKitty
2010-09-20, 08:12 AM
"Yeah, I don't generally bother with gestalt unless all the players have a solid familiarity. It's not a tough addition if you know the system, but if you dont...it can be awkward."


I don't actually see that they add anything to the game, except for widening the gap between the people who like reading rules, and the people that don't. I don't know a single GM that allows their use.

The players aren't actually having to do any of the work on the gestalt part. I put together a complete class sheet that looks exactly like what you'd find in the PHB and gave it to him. The new class just happens to combine the best aspects of the fighter and barbarian. It shouldn't be any harder than playing a straight fighter.

Psyx
2010-09-20, 08:20 AM
Does it add any depth to the game, though?

I'm personally not keen on being handed pre-made 'stuffz' by the GM. It feels like not only is the GM writing 'his' part of the game, but he's writing 'my' half too. I start to feel like a bit-part player, rather than a leading actor. It separates me a little from 'my' character, and makes the character -and hence the game- less of an personal investment, and thus less interesting. I'd check with your players to see if they feel this way.

WarKitty
2010-09-20, 08:30 AM
Does it add any depth to the game, though?

I'm personally not keen on being handed pre-made 'stuffz' by the GM. It feels like not only is the GM writing 'his' part of the game, but he's writing 'my' half too. I start to feel like a bit-part player, rather than a leading actor. It separates me a little from 'my' character, and makes the character -and hence the game- less of an personal investment, and thus less interesting. I'd check with your players to see if they feel this way.

They are allowed to modify sheets if they choose. The gestalt was put in on the melee classes to power them up so they could reasonably compete with the mages.

Psyx
2010-09-20, 08:37 AM
That's not what I meant. I understand what you are doing and why completely. But being handed a template by a GM as a character does decrease the level of personal investment in that character.

WarKitty
2010-09-20, 08:47 AM
That's not what I meant. I understand what you are doing and why completely. But being handed a template by a GM as a character does decrease the level of personal investment in that character.

I'm confused I guess. I thought of it as basically "we are using these base classes instead of the ones in the book." It's not really any different from being handed a book full of templates. We didn't have a lot of the non-core stuff anyways, so it's not like they could have chosen ToB characters or something.

Telonius
2010-09-20, 08:53 AM
Well he was told "feats make your character. Toughness is a bad feat. Please let us give you suggestions for better feats." And said no.



He has left the group now (moved away). I was just wondering - for all the people who complain about powergaming, what would they do in this situation. The encounters are appropriate for the group at least. My other two fighter-types are hitting fairly often, with them both being TWF types. He's playing two-handed axe and not hitting.

I just don't get it. My other players weren't exactly munchkins, and they loved roleplaying and were good at it. He just didn't seem to want to be bothered with optimization at all.

There are dozens of reasons it could be. Maybe the game really wasn't what he expected. Maybe one of his friends was bugging him to join, and he went just to get him to stop being annoying. Maybe he really just didn't understand the game. The best way of finding this out is asking him why he built the character like that.

WarKitty
2010-09-20, 08:57 AM
To be fair, I have a strong suspicion the real reason is "I don't actually care about the game but my girlfriend loves it." I dunno - his character ended up really annoying everyone else, just being dead weight that would mess things up.

Tyndmyr
2010-09-20, 09:02 AM
"Yeah, I don't generally bother with gestalt unless all the players have a solid familiarity. It's not a tough addition if you know the system, but if you dont...it can be awkward."


I don't actually see that they add anything to the game, except for widening the gap between the people who like reading rules, and the people that don't. I don't know a single GM that allows their use.

It's a useful option for making small parties more diverse. Personally, I prefer allowing each player to run two chars instead, but many players dislike that.

Edit: And yeah, there's no real solution for someone who just doesn't want to play. You can try to get him interested and what not, but for some people, roleplaying just isn't for them.

Psyx
2010-09-20, 09:48 AM
I'm confused I guess. I thought of it as basically "we are using these base classes instead of the ones in the book." It's not really any different from being handed a book full of templates. We didn't have a lot of the non-core stuff anyways, so it's not like they could have chosen ToB characters or something.

Of course you are, because you understand why you did it. That's not transparent to others, though. What seemed to you a reasonable thing can be seen by others as something completely different.

If you said at any point 'I've done this for you' or 'we're using my classes for this', you are stamping your authority and ownership on their character, and it may always seem a cameo to them. GMs enforcing their own character templates on players can sometimes come across in completely the wrong way to players.

As said though: Some people are only at games because of partners or because of the pizzas.

Telonius
2010-09-20, 09:56 AM
To be fair, I have a strong suspicion the real reason is "I don't actually care about the game but my girlfriend loves it." I dunno - his character ended up really annoying everyone else, just being dead weight that would mess things up.

That actually makes it a little easier, if you catch it early and he's not a total idiot. Explain it to him in these terms: Two people are playing basketball. One of them is getting his butt handed to him - can't dribble, can't shoot, can't keep the ball from being stolen, and can't understand why it isn't third down yet. Now imagine that guy's girlfriend is there watching the game. Do you really want to be that guy?