The Min/Maxer's Book of Sacred Truths

[_flint_]

So, in your time playing, what are some laws to character optimizing that are just never broken(such as "fighter is only worth 2 levels" or "if you're going to take a rogue level, take it at level 1")? I think it would be good to get a list going.

I'll start:

1) Thou shall not play a monk
2) Thou shall always age kobolds to venerable
3) Thou shall not take more than 2 levels of fighter
4) If thou does take a rogue level, it shall be at 1st level
5) Thou shall not stray from the path of full casting

[Dusk Eclipse]

Dude you are missing the "real" commandments of Optimization instituted by Caelic


Caelic's "The Ten Commandments of Optimization"

I. Thou shalt not give up caster levels.

II. Wieldest thou thy two-handed weapon with alacrity; but two weapons shalt thou not wield, excepting that thou hast a source of bonus damage such as Sneak Attack.

III. Doubt not the power of the Druid, for he is mighty.

IV. Avoid ye the temptation of Gauntlets of True Strike, for they shall lead thee astray down the Path of Non-Rule Cheese.

V. Thou shalt not give up caster levels. Verily, this Commandment is like unto the first; but of such magnitude that it bore mentioning twice.

VI. Makest thou no build with an odd number of fighter levels, for such things are not pleasing to the Spirits of Optimization.

VII. The Rules of 3.5 are paramount; invoke not the rules of 3.0 if a newer version be available.

VIII. When beseeching the Bretheren of Optimization, come thou not empty handed, lest they smite thee; rather, bringest thou thine own build, that they may offer suggestions and guidance.

IX. Invoke not "common sense," for it is not common.

X. Thou shalt call no build "The Ultimate X" unless his name be Pun-Pun, or thou shalt see thine "Ultimate" build topped by the Bretheren within five minutes of posting.


And the more "serious" version



The Ten Commandments of Practical Optimization

1. Not everything needs to be stated explicitly in the rules; some things just are.
A human doesn't have a hundred and fifty-seven arms, even though the rules don't explicitly say that he doesn't. A character doesn't continue running around after he dies, even though the rules don't explicitly list any negative effects for death. If the designers spelled out every single thing explicitly...even the glaringly obvious...the core rulebooks would be larger than the Encyclopedia Brittannica, and would likely cost as much as a Ferrari.

2. "The rules don't say I can't!" is not practical optimization.
The second commandment is like unto the first. There are many things that the rules don't explicitly say you can't do. The rules don't explicitly say you can't do the "I'm a Little Teapot" dance and instantly heal back to full starting hit points as a result. The rules don't explicitly say your first level character can't have a titanium-reinforced skeleton and cybernetic weaponry. This is because the rules are structured in such a way as to tell you what you can do--not what you can't. An underlying assumption is that, apart from common-sense actions which anyone can perform, the system will tell you if a given character has a given ability.

3. RAW is a myth.
This is one of the dirty little secrets of the board. The Most Holy RAW is invoked continuously by those who want to give their arguments the veneer of officiality. The problem is, RAW is generally applied not as "The Rules as Written," but rather as "The Rules As I Interpret Them And You Can't Prove I'm Wrong, Nyeah." The RAITAYCPIWN. Not quite as catchy an acronym, granted, but that's what it boils down to. This game cannot be played without interpretation and the judicious application of common sense. Try to play the game strictly and exclusively by the rules as written, and you have an unplayable game. Using "RAW" as a defense is similarly meaningless--particularly when your defense rests on interpretation. If you're going to claim that your build is RAW, you'd better be able to make sure that the rules specifically uphold your claim...not simply that they're sort of vague and COULD be interpreted in such a way as to not FORBID your claim.
This becomes particularly important when your claim is especially controversial. Yes, builds should adhere to the rules as written. Yes, any exceptions to that should be noted. But the RAW as some sort of entity unto itself, capable of rendering a build immune to criticism, is not a useful construction, and causes more problems than it solves.

4. Common sense is not a bad thing.
The rules were designed to be read with common sense. Yes, common sense will vary from person to person, but there has to be some basic level at which we agree on core assumptions, or the game is meaningless. If we have one interpretation of the rules where two levels of a prestige class give you infinite caster level, and another interpretation where two levels of that same prestige class give you two caster levels, then common sense tells us that the latter interpretation is the correct one. If a character reaches negative ten hit points and dies, common sense tells us that he doesn't spring back to his feet and continue fighting unimpeded.

5. Intent matters.
I know, I know..."Blasphemy! No man may know the intent of the Most Holy Designers!" Except that, in some cases, we can. In some cases, the intent is glaringly, painfully obvious. In other cases, the intent has been clarified by various WotC sources, such as CustServ. It makes sense to take these sources at their word, people. They work with the folks who design the game, they have access to them. If a conflict comes up, then it can be resolved, but I can't help but notice that for all the talk about how CustServ never gives the same answer twice, they've been remarkably consistent of late. It's one thing to say "This rule is vaguely worded, and we don't know the intent." It's another thing to say, "The rule is vaguely worded, and therefore I can ignore the intent." The first is sensible caution; the second is rules lawyering. When an ambiguity has been clarified, that should be the end of it.

6. Mistakes happen.
Everybody's human. You're human; I'm human; the folks at WotC are human. Sometimes, humans make mistakes. That shouldn't be seen as an opportunity to break the game. Take the Vigilante from Complete Adventurer, for instance. Anyone out there seriously believe that his rather abrupt jump from 1 third level spell at level 6 to 20 at level 7 is NOT a mistake? There are two ways to deal with a mistake like this: a sensible way, and a silly way. The sensible way: "Hmm. There's a column for fourth level spells with no numbers in it, and a column for third level with numbers that can't be right in it. Clearly, this was a typesetting error, and the second digit in the third level spells column is supposed to be in the fourth level spells column." The silly way: "Rules are rules! The rulebook says 20 third level spells at seventh level! If you do it any other way, you're houseruling! I'm gonna make some GREAT builds based on this rule!" Basing a build on an obvious mistake isn't optimizing; it's silly.

7. Simple Is Good.
There are a LOT of WotC sourcebooks out there. I did a rough estimate on the value of my collection just of hardcover rulebooks; it cost more than my car. Not everyone has that kind of cash to spend on this hobby. Not only that--a lot of people simply don't have the time to commit several thousand pages of rules, hundreds upon hundreds of prestige classes, and thousands of feats to memory. So: builds which are simple are good. There's nothing WRONG with a build that incorporates eight different prestige classes from seven different sources, and then tosses in feats from five more...but that build is going to be useful only to the people who have those sources, whereas the Druid 20 build that doesn't go outside of Core is useful to everybody. Sometimes, simplicity is worth more than raw power.

8. Tricking the DM is Bad.
We see a lot of "Help me trick my DM!" or "Help me make my DM cry!" requests on these boards. We see builds that are designed to look innocuous while at the same time being devastating to campaign balance. The idea is to lull the DM into allowing the character, then unleash its full power. Bad idea. Bad, BAD idea. At all times, two things should be borne in mind about the DM. One: he's in charge. If you try to trick him, he's totally within his rights to toss your character or YOU out of the game. Two: he's your friend. Trying to deceive your friends is bad. Be honest with your DM about what you want to do. If he says "No," deal with it. That's part of a DM's job. If you don't think he's going to say "Yes" to something, then trying to sneak it into the game on the sly is a sure way to make him mad.

9. Respect the parameters of the request.
This used to be a given, but people have been backsliding a lot lately. Someone comes on and says, "Hey, I'd like to play a Bard 4/Cleric 4. Can anyone help me optimize this? He immediately gets responses which boil down to, "Only an idiot would play that! You should be playing Pun-Pun, he's MUCH more powerful!" Sometimes they're more nicely phrased than this, other times they're not. The point is: people aren't offering him suggestions on how to make his character of choice better. They're telling him that he's "wrong" for playing that character, and that he should be playing a different character. The same goes for threads in which the poster explains the DM's house rules and restrictions at the beginning of the thread. More often than not, if these restrictions amount to more than "No infinite power at first level," someone will respond with the oh-so-helpful suggestion "Your DM sucks. Quit his game and never talk to him again."
I only wish that were hyperbole. It's word-for-word from a thread a while back. Optimization is about working within the rules to greatest effect. ANYONE can optimize in an environment with no restrictions. It takes skill to optimize where options are limited. Threads like these should be seen as an opportunity to demonstrate that skill...not belittle the poster or the DM.

10. If something seems too good to be true, it probably is.
I remember bounding onto the boards many moons ago, shortly after the first release of the Persistent Spell feat, to declare that I had discovered (ta da!) the UNBEATABLE COMBO. Since Time Stop was a Personal effect spell, it could be Persisted! (Oooh, aaah!) I couldn't imagine why nobody had thought of this before. Of course, as it turned out, LOTS of people had thought of this before. Within about five minutes, I was directed to a ruling that said, "You can't do it." I was disappointed, sure...but I accepted it and moved on. There are a LOT of folks here with a lot of knowledge of the rules. Some of 'em are a little scary. They love nothing better than to go over a new rulebook with a fine-toothed comb looking for hidden gems. Sometimes, a genuinely overlooked concept will turn up. The recent builds using Sanctum Spell are a good example. The feat's been around for a while, but nobody really looked at what could be done with it.
More often, though, if a seeming "rules loophole" is being ignored by the boards, it's because it's been hashed out in the past and found not to work. Perhaps there's something elsewhere in the rules that nullifies it; perhaps there was a clarification. Very occasionally, there's simply a board-wide agreement that the rule is wrong...as with the recent FAQ claiming that Polymorph allowed the use of templated forms. If it turns out that your discovery falls into this category, the best thing to do is accept it and move on. Maybe the next one won't.


Having said that monk is a superb level 2 dip and some arguments can be made for up to a 6 level dip.

[Flickerdart]

Fighter's useful for 4 levels in edge cases (or 6 if you're dungeoncrashing), Monk is likewise worth at least two levels, caster levels can be lost if the return is great enough, venerable kobolds are only useful if you have a feat to spare on Dragonwrought, and Rogue levels are useful at other points in your progression as well (such as getting that Sneak Attack for Unseen Seer without compromising your spells per day in the very early levels when they are absolutely crucial).

[_flint_]

Oh darn, looks like someone beat me to the punch. Well, as long as it exists, i'm happy

[Kazyan]

A lot of us don't follow the 10 commandments of PO around here, though.

[AttilaTheGeek]

Dude you are missing the "real" commandments of Optimization instituted by Caelic

These are fantastic. The fourth commandment is clearly the most important...or it is the first?

[Dusk Eclipse]

A lot of us don't follow the 10 commandments of PO around here, though.

which set? I personally follow the second one much closer than the first-


These are fantastic. The fourth commandment is clearly the most important...or it is the first?

The first one is definitely the most important

[docnessuno]

Notice that the second set is named "The Ten Commandments of Practical Optimization" and it's meant to apply to builds that could/will see play. Some of those guidelines are not used in Theoretial optimization.

[Story]

Funny how everyone seems to ignore them whenever Rainbow Servant comes up.

[Dusk Eclipse]

How so? Text-trumps table and unless you are using early entry you get the cleric list at level 18

[Kazyan]

which set? I personally follow the second one much closer than the first-

Second set. #9 is the one that gets ignored most often. No ToB = several paragraphs of complaining instead of cracking open Complete Warrior.

[Bang]

How so? Text-trumps table and unless you are using early entry you get the cleric list at level 18

If this is a joke, it's subtle.

If it's not, it hits points 4,6 and 10 on Caelic's second list: there was either a lazy copypasta error in the spells description or a series of accidental mistypes on the chart that happened to match a consistent pattern with class features.

One of those seems more likely to be a mistake, which taps point 6 to support Caelic's point 4.
And it's probably not reasonable to expect the PrC to be designed to make a wizard into a better cleric than the cleric, even leaving the full list spontaneous casters out of it, so there's point 10.

Maybe full-casting Rainbow Servants are RAW, but their justifications are implausible enough to be a pretty sleazy case to make at a game table.

[docnessuno]

If this is a joke, it's subtle.

If it's not, it hits points 4,6 and 10 on Caelic's second list: there was either a lazy copypasta error in the spells description or a series of accidental mistypes on the chart that happened to match a consistent pattern with class features.

One of those seems more likely to be a mistake, which taps point 6 to support Caelic's point 4.
And it's probably not reasonable to expect the PrC to be designed to make a wizard into a better cleric than the cleric, even leaving the full list spontaneous casters out of it, so there's point 10.

Maybe full-casting Rainbow Servants are RAW, but their justifications are implausible enough to be a pretty sleazy case to make at a game table.

The problem is that other printings of the book seem to suggest that the Text (full casting) was RAI hand have the table adjusted acordingly.
The real point of RS is that the class was not written with "full-list-known" casters in mind. The capstone was supposed to give sorcerers an expanded choice of spell known, not to add bring a T3 class to T0 status.

[Douglas]

The problem is that other printings of the book seem to suggest that the Text (full casting) was RAI hand have the table adjusted acordingly.
Those other printings are all, as far as I know, translations into other languages, and the translation staff may have simply implemented the "text over table" policy without bothering to ask.

[Darth Stabber]

Second set. #9 is the one that gets ignored most often. No ToB = several paragraphs of complaining instead of cracking open Complete Warrior.

Which leads to several paragraphs about how CWar helps a little, but still leaves melee as either one trick ponies or incompetent.

[Larkas]

Those other printings are all, as far as I know, translations into other languages, and the translation staff may have simply implemented the "text over table" policy without bothering to ask.

Hmmm. It would be easier for them to simply copy the table. Believe me, the Portuguese translation team is lazy as hell, for them to change something like this, the order must have come from WotC. Not that WotC's editing team couldn't have simply adopted that policy when pre editing the texts for outsourcing, but it implies an intent closer to the authors'.

EDIT: I don't mean to imply that THIS IS THE WAY TO INTERPRET IT!!!11!1 I just wanted to point out that, regardless of the authors' original intent, it seems that WotC preferred to enforce the "text over table" policy than issuing errata, and that the lack of errata fixing this doesn't seem to be simply an omission from WotC, but rather a real choice from them.

[Kazyan]

Which leads to several paragraphs about how CWar helps a little, but still leaves melee as either one trick ponies or incompetent.

Which leads to several paragraphs of trying to get back on topic, a half-attempt at a Master Thrower build that's the been done to death, which quickly gets drowned out by the Nice Things debate that eclipses the original thread.

[Story]

If this is a joke, it's subtle.

If it's not, it hits points 4,6 and 10 on Caelic's second list: there was either a lazy copypasta error in the spells description or a series of accidental mistypes on the chart that happened to match a consistent pattern with class features.

One of those seems more likely to be a mistake, which taps point 6 to support Caelic's point 4.
And it's probably not reasonable to expect the PrC to be designed to make a wizard into a better cleric than the cleric, even leaving the full list spontaneous casters out of it, so there's point 10.

Maybe full-casting Rainbow Servants are RAW, but their justifications are implausible enough to be a pretty sleazy case to make at a game table.

Further evidence is that it is listed as a "moderate" spellcasting Prc at the beginning of the chapter. In order to believe that it's full progression, you need to believe that the editors somehow made separate mistakes in multiple places in the book. It may be RAW but there's no way in Bator that it's PO.

[Kelb_Panthera]

You have to realize that there were 6 people involved with the overall substantive content of CD, three of whom were the actual designers. It's not at all difficult to imagine that the person who drew up the table that shows rainbow servant as a moderate caster isn't the one who designed the class. That person may have simply been scanning the class tables as they compiled that list and put rainbow servant as a moderate caster because of the table. That possible error does not speak to intent at all, IMO.

If you're not a list caster, the rainbow servant capstone only expands the choices you have for adding to your spells known. A sorcerer will only be able to pick up a handful of cleric spells and a wizard gets exactly 2 without spending gold on more (or other resources on expanding the number of free spells he gets at level up.), substantially more gold than if he were adding more arcane spells since he'd have to purchase or help create a scroll.

The designers' intent for Rainbow Servant is entirely unclear. Choosing the table over the text is definitely against RAW and, in this case, RAI is too nebulous to be meaningful. If, however, the DN, WM, or Beguiler are available in your game, choosing the table may be a good houserule to keep the rainbow warsnake from making the cleric cry.

The sage and custserv are -not- authoritative sources on intent. Only the designer responsible for the ambiguous rule can make a clear statement of intent that should be given any serious weight.