Player power differences

[A_Dinosaur]

So I have had a problem for a while now with differences in power level/optimization/whatever the heck you want to call it in my 13th level party. I am the DM and this may turn into a rant. You have been warned.

The main issue is between three different characters and their respective players. The problem player, lets call him Jack, is a power gamer. At the very least he is a power gamer by our groups standards. In the campaign he is playing a word casting sorcerer who carefully chooses his spells and feats so he can string together a bunch of spells to get the DC up as high as possible. He usually winds using paralyze humanoid or crush will as the crux of the spell, but he will throw blizzard on top to make use of his elemental focus (cold). If that doesn't work he can just summon a bunch of dire tigers to do his bidding. Or ankylosaurs and their ridiculous stun tails.

The second player, lets call her Jill, is a rogue/fighter/barbarian who thought it would be hilarious to make a character who uses improvised weapons. And honestly, before Jack joined the group, it was working fine. The group was having fun despite the gap between Jill and the other players. Of the six of us Jill has been playing the second longest but her characters are none the less usually the worst/most useless. And that is fine, its been that way for ages and its not changing anytime soon. Getting back to the original point, her character is fun, talks with and makes friends with a lot of the npcs, and is relatively useless in a fight.

The third player, lets call him John, really, really wants to be a power gamer. He would definitely make a super charged character if his current one dies. But his character is fairly integral to the story and has been with the party since they were level 1 more than a real life year ago. Unfortunately that is part of the problem. I have a very strict policy when I DM, players may only use material from the books that I own in paper format. No pdfs, no SRD, only books I own. This makes it worlds easier on me to make the game based around their characters because I can easily reference the books while prepping. Now when we started the campaign, John wanted to make a gish. So he picked the witch class from APG because it looked nifty and picked up a level of fighter when they got enough XP, then started working his merry way towards Eldritch Knight.

Now last Xmas the players (being the wonderful people that they are) all pitched in and gave me the shiny new Ultimate Magic book. Which contained the Magus class. Sometime that spring Jack joined the group and decided to play a magus. Being the optimizer that he is magus blew John's gish character out of the water. John was already starting to get a little frustrated that his build wasn't working quite as planned, but this really hurt I think. Anyway since then Jack lost the magus to a nastier than-intended-by-me trap, and created his sorcerer, which if anything was worse.

Now I am faced with the problem of making encounters where Jack's character is challenged enough not to squish them in one round, and do not annihilate Jill in one round. All the while making sure the enemies are simple enough so John doesn't start flipping through the rule books correcting my every mistake because he is bored and his character is completely overshadowed while Jack is present. Heck if it wasn't for the other four players being there from early on and actually being invested in the story, they probably would be clamouring for a different system that Jack wasn't intimately familiar with.

I don't know what to do now. I've talked to Jack about toning it down, I've talked to Jill about toning it up (ha.), I've talked to John about the constantly rulebook diving for any advantage he can get in combat. It is frustrating and worse yet, not working. I just want to tell a cool story with my friends as the main characters, but each session is starting to crawl by as the levels get higher, and the power gap is getting larger. I have never had to fudge dice rolls prior to this, but when the party stumbles into a troglodyte death squad of casters, beatsticks, and a couple of huge magitech mechs, and two of the boring beatsticks are the only ones to make their saves (nat 20)... I don't want to throw away two hours of statting out wizards, equipping melee brutes, and having fun making neat big monsters that one wouldn't find in the bestiary because Jack is optimized. Screw that!

Guh... well it felt good to write it all out at least. What would you do about this playgrounders? I had to pause the campaign and start up a temporary pirate game because I was getting too frusturated. And guess what? Jack made a Ice Tomb/Slumber based witch, stupid freakin' save or lose... why cant everyone just play fighters... Anyway, if all goes according to plan we are back to the original game in two weeks, and I gotta figure out something by then.

[Forrestfire]

There is always playing the enemies to their intelligence. If the players are high enough level, I'd say it's extremely likely that some of the enemies might know their tricks. Sorcerer takes stuff down with paralysis and ice magic? What do you know, the next major boss opens the fight with "I've been expecting you" and counterspells his blizzard. Or maybe the enemies were buffed beforehand.

If spellcasters on the enemy team are high enough level, have them use scrying and divinations. Have them lay ambushes, set up buffs, and prepare for the fight, etc.

And maybe talk to Jack again. Maybe you can have him rebuild the character a bit to have less-effective spells, or use less tricks to make his spells good, etc. Maybe ask him to focus on the blasting with blizzard spells, or take buffs for Jill instead of summoning tigers and debuffing the enemies, etc.

John's rulebook diving I see as less of an issue unless he's trying to correct monster and NPC stats, which are definitely allowed to be different, and should be assumed as such.

[Frosty]

There is nothing wrong with what John is trying to do. If your player is getting frustrated that what he's trying to do isn't working, you should work with him to *make* it work, possibly letting him rebuild his character. Remember, it's all about the fun, and if rebuilding let's him have more fun, do it, especially he can keep the character itself so that the story doesn't have to change.

You need to gather all of your players together and talk to them about the campaign's tone and expectations. If low-OP is where you want it to be, then tell Jack he should rebuild. Even if not low-OP< Jack can focus his sorcerer on buffing instead, and his powerful buffs means he's contributing, but it'll be John or Jill who gets to roll the +30 attack roll and *also* feel cool.

[Ortesk]

What is Jack? A powerbuilder, an optimizer or a munchkin? If hes powerbuilding, he does it for the challenge mainly. If hes an optimizer, he wants to be as good as he can without giving an inch, but usually is open to helping a dm make encounters for the groups sake. If hes a munchkin, burn him with fire

In my group, Im Jack, we have a John and we have half a dozen Jills. I made a grappler who was very good at his job, so good at it at level 10 he held down a pit fiend and literally made him eat dirt as the party watched, mad i had to save them. Even though the DM fed me the BBEG on my terms, in the only way i could win at all, I was the bad guy. So i went to the group and DM and said simply, freedom of movement means i cant grapple people. Thats what you and Jack need to do. Ask him his weakness, if hes a powerbuilder he knows what it is. Explain you will exploit it so Jill can be the star. Have an enemy mage who knows that the group has two mages, and walk in with a BSF who has AMF on him. This guy, build him small enough jill will crush him, but let him rough Jack up some and jack has to cry for jill to get him off him. She saves the guy who is been outpacing everyone, as John is the knight in shining armor beating on the mage. Jack is the one being carried that night, group leaves with a newfound respect of eachother

[Madwand99]

Talk to the players. Tell them the problem you are having making balanced encounters. Tell Jack he has to tone it down (Frosty's suggestions were good) and the other PCs have to tone it up. Allow -- and insist on -- rebuilds for each PC, to either make them stronger or weaker as appropriate. Simply say that you will not allow the campaign to continue until you are satisfied that each PC can contribute equally. Put the onus on the players to have balanced PCs if they want to continue to play, and help them make their new builds.

Unfortunately, Pathfinder, like D&D 3.5 before it, suffers from balance problems between different classes and especially between different players with different experience with optimization. For situations like this, it simply requires a GM who understands the problems and enforces balance between PCs. It's a fault of the system, but it can be corrected with active GM intervention.

[aeauseth]

As a DM, I've run across the power discrepancy issue often. The trick is to catch the problem early, but you are now at level 13 and I can see why your ranting...

The first thing to do is to limit your power gamer. Avoid the nerf bat, but don't allow him to take anymore overpowered feats. Just because the feat is in the book, doesn't mean you as a DM have to allow it.

I find it best to increase the lower powered players. For those multi-classed characters, put out a custom magic item that has synergy with their classes. Make a foe use the item, so the character can see how it works and "want it" as treasure. For Jill you might consider a magic rapier that adds her barbarian levels to her sneak attack ability (practiced rogue?).

I've also found that by making the battles BIGGer you can reduce some of the dependency on a single character. For example have a level 13 boss, two level 11 lieutenants, and a dozen level 5 warriors. Use the leadership feat as a guide for these large battles. Jack will likely focus on the BBEG, but can't possibly take on the whole encounter by himself. This allows everyone to contribute.

You can also build encounters to use skills (balance, swim, jump, traps, etc) that Jack doesn't have. Construct encounters to Jill's strengths. Jill has lots of friends, you could role play with that to have her friends help or give insight into the plot, offer identify perks, custom item creation (just for Jill), etc.

[Ortesk]

As a DM, I've run across the power discrepancy issue often. The trick is to catch the problem early, but you are now at level 13 and I can see why your ranting...

The first thing to do is to limit your power gamer. Avoid the nerf bat, but don't allow him to take anymore overpowered feats. Just because the feat is in the book, doesn't mean you as a DM have to allow it.

I find it best to increase the lower powered players. For those multi-classed characters, put out a custom magic item that has synergy with their classes. Make a foe use the item, so the character can see how it works and "want it" as treasure. For Jill you might consider a magic rapier that adds her barbarian levels to her sneak attack ability (practiced rogue?).

I've also found that by making the battles BIGGer you can reduce some of the dependency on a single character. For example have a level 13 boss, two level 11 lieutenants, and a dozen level 5 warriors. Use the leadership feat as a guide for these large battles. Jack will likely focus on the BBEG, but can't possibly take on the whole encounter by himself. This allows everyone to contribute.

You can also build encounters to use skills (balance, swim, jump, traps, etc) that Jack doesn't have. Construct encounters to Jill's strengths. Jill has lots of friends, you could role play with that to have her friends help or give insight into the plot, offer identify perks, custom item creation (just for Jill), etc.

Depends on Jacks spells and build whether he can solo the encounter or not. And spells can replace the rogue in out of combat troubles. The real question is just how good is jack

[A_Dinosaur]

Yeah, what everyone is saying is right on the mark. I have to disign the encounters more carefully and talk to the players. I have talked to the group and they understand I'm having troubles meeting the demands of the game. I'm just finding the growing pains of putting a bunch of effort into encounters (like the one I first described) and having them get completely steamrolled because it feels unfair for me to give an enemy both mindblank and freedom of movement. Eventually I will get the hang of this. (he says four years in)

Thank you for all the suggestions. Some of them I have tried already. The Jill from my post became a half dragon though ancient magics, and stole a pair of vorpal scissors from the three fates which I put there to kinda stack with her focus on improvised weapons. And the John in question if a freakin' Christmas tree of nifty utility stuff both from the books and things I have made up. In the temporary pirate game where Jack made a save or loose witch the first encounter was with a bunch of shadows which he basically couldn't effect, but the rest of the party had a grand old time. The entire party is sick of constructs because most of them have a hard time breaking past the damage reduction/immunity to magic.

Anyway, talking like reasonable adults will probably save the day again. Hope it works this time :smalltongue:

Edit:
It's also worth noting that Jack frequently says he has been holding back. And he has been asking other members of the group about how to build a character that wont break me. Silly Jack, your weakest character so far has blown one of the niftiest encounters I've ever made away in three (kinda weird) rounds.

[aeauseth]

It's also worth noting that Jack frequently says he has been holding back. And he has been asking other members of the group about how to build a character that wont break me.

I also play in a campaign where I'm the best player, have the best Tier 1 class (Wizard), and it is heavily optimized (Conjurer - Master Specialist). With a mass charm monster, I can throw together my own party and solo most encounters (if I wanted to). Instead I hold back (possibly like Jack does). I use spells like haste to make the rest of the party better. I use control spells (grease, tentacles, fogs, webs) to limit damage to the party and give us the advantage, I'm still a key component to the party makeup, I just don't do ALL the damage. You might suggest to Jack to take on more of a buff/control role to make the overall party better.

[A_Dinosaur]

In a manner of speaking he already is. Its not him that does most of the KILLING per say. Thats usually uhh.... we shall call her Jane to keep with theme. She is playing a nifty sword and pistol gunslinger of crazy damage. But it feels like the enemies at least put up a fight against her. With Jack the are frozen in place or his fanatical servants by round two. Its just frusturating to still put work into making interesting bad guys to see them made so... so comically useless. Its one thing to crush will an enemy, make him put all his gear in a pile, then jump into the lake, but do you have to do it to everyone?

Anyway that's just griping on a frustrated DM's part.

Oh man if I told Jack to cut loose and make a supercharged character? He would probably come to the table with something truly game wrecking...

[Red Fel]

I would advise you to look into the Tier System as an illustration of versatility, and define your campaign by optimization levels. In other words, pick an optimization level - say, Tiers 3-5 - and explain to your players that you'd appreciate them all staying within that range.

That's not to say that classes from Tiers 1 and 2 would be excluded, but rather players using, for instance a Wizard, should try to design their characters with Tier 3 in mind (e.g. make themselves good at a few particular tricks, or exceptionally good at one trick) rather than optimizing the entire class. Basically, give an illustration of how the high-op players (like Jack) can lower their optimization slightly while still excelling at something.

Another thing to consider is making encounters smarter. Others have mentioned smart encounters. The classic example is Tucker's kobolds (http://www.tuckerskobolds.com/). With a smart encounter, raw power and optimization become irrelevant - it becomes a game of strategy. Jack's mad skills and John's book-diving won't help them against an enemy who is prepared for all of their tricks; by contrast, Jill's focus on unusual and fun skills, or her ability to establish a rapport with NPCs, may be exactly what the doctor ordered.

Finally, delve into each character's backstory. D&D isn't just about combat and crunch; remind the players that they are epic heroes. Nothing distracts someone from feeling underpowered quite like the spotlight. So find a juicy hook or two from each character's background, and give everyone a chance to feel central to the plot. You mention how vital John's character is to the story - has he felt that lately? Or has he been feeling more like you're simply paying lip service to his importance while letting Jack shine? Telling a player his character is central to the story without periodically doing something to show it is like calling an ox a bull - he's grateful for the honor, but he'd rather have what's rightfully his.

Between giving concrete examples of how to streamline everyone into a single level of optimization, changing encounters to be more reliant on tactics than on dice rolls, and making the players feel like their characters matter to the story, I think you'll be well on your way to overcoming these differences in power.

[Segev]

My first piece of advice is to allow John to rebuild his character as a Magus. If I understand your post correctly, John would like to play one, but it wasn't an option. It is better at what John wants to be doing than his current build is. Let him rebuild. Keep the character and backstory, and either house-rule in some custom spells/abilities that are signature to the current build, or ignore the man behind the curtain and pretend retroactively that this is how he's always been. Or, possibly, have an in-game event actually ALTER the character in this fashion. I don't know the plot, so I can't make a solid suggestion, but it does sometimes happen in fiction that a character's entire build and methods changes due to a plot development.


Secondly, if Jack isn't somehow hostile to you as a person, talk to him about using buff spells, particularly on Jill. Greater Magic Weapon would go a long way with her, I think. Bull's Strength or even Bear's Endurance might help, too, if she doesn't have the +4 items already.

You described Jack's character as stringing together effects to pump up his save DCs; I pictured his combat rounds involving multiple rounds of "set-up" spells followed by a "finisher" from that description, but later you mentioned he's wiping things in one round. What's he doing?

Also, you can bump up DCs and only screw over mages. That could be one way to go. Give the bad guys a spellcaster who has Superior Resistance in his repertoir. +6 resistance bonus to all saves is nothing to shake a stick at, and it won't inhibit the fighter-types in the slightest.

Many save/lose spells have ways of being flat-out immune to them, too. Undead would probably really mess with Jack's mojo.

[A_Dinosaur]

Ah yes the other thing my players fear. Kobolds. Yes I use tactics cleverly where I can, especially with enemies having compatible abilities, but it never seems like enough. Though Tuckers Kobolds are a wonderful inspiration.

The tier system is a guideline that I very much fear becoming a noose that the brace of powergamers feel strangled by. Jack already chafes against the Books-I-Own rule. So the suggestion is appreciated, I think will be avoided.

One more shield I will put up is that I do not mind John and Jack's rulebook diving, but it slows the session down to a crawl, and feels more like a numbers puzzle than a game. And this delay leaves room for our last unmentioned player: Jake, to start talking anime/internet memes with Jill which eventually draws in Jack and annoys Jane and distracts John from his original rule book dive. It's just a hassle that is survivable, but I'd rather not exist.

[aeauseth]

Consider a stone giant (CR9). Two is an EL11, four is an EL12, eight is an EL13. You seem to have a strong party so sixteen is an EL14. Crazy right?

They favor hilly areas and prefer to throw rocks (+11 isn't great but should do). Put each on a pillar shaped rock with a 10x10 flat top (DC15/20 climb) check to get to the top. This way the party will have difficulty reaching them, let alone attacking in melee. If they do get within range then the +17 melee attack will likely give them trouble. Pick environment and skills that favor the enemy, and are a determent to the party.

Jack can control several of them, but sixteen is likely too much. Since each giant has the same stats, you (as the DM) shouldn't be too overwhelmed. My favorite tactic is to use a vinyl mat and write the damage next to each giant. Have one of the players keep track of the damage if you like to speed things up.

I've also done HUGE battles where the minions only have 10 HP, so they are one shot kills. Minions can use tanglefoots or alchemist flasks to present at least some challenge. I just assume they are 1 hit creatures so I don't keep track of HP. If you throw 20 minions at a single character, one is bound to roll a 20. I just start rolling and estimate some of the foes. This makes the game run relatively smooth, and presents a challenge to the party. Adding role playing elements (like protecting an NPC) can add additional flavor.

I've had DM's that put us in a dungeon with black (anti-magic) walls, ughh that sucked. But gave the non-spellcasters a chance to shine.

[Magesmiley]

I usually DM. But when I play I tend to be like Jack. To keep some harmony with the other players, who don't optimize like I do, I usually set myself a challenge to do something odd or use a suboptimal base to start from. Either a weaker class to start from, or trying to do something with a class that it doesn't usually do well.

Or I set myself some sort of rigrous RP code that I will always follow, even if I know it will cause some suboptimal play. A good RP code that the character follows can be a lot of fun, even if it gets your character into trouble now and then.

[Segev]

One more shield I will put up is that I do not mind John and Jack's rulebook diving, but it slows the session down to a crawl, and feels more like a numbers puzzle than a game. And this delay leaves room for our last unmentioned player: Jake, to start talking anime/internet memes with Jill which eventually draws in Jack and annoys Jane and distracts John from his original rule book dive. It's just a hassle that is survivable, but I'd rather not exist.
(emphasis mine)

Then set aside time for rulebook-diving at the end of the session, so they can plan for the next one. Or at the beginning, as they plan. But when the game's running, institute a rule that ONLY you are allowed to look up rules, and that you will make judgment calls at the table which can be reviewed later if questions come up. Your ruling might stand for the one time, and be revised for future precedent when rule-book diving happens. But no digging through books at the table.

A less strict form of this would be to institute a rule that, while somebody is rulebook-diving, the game progresses without them. Their characters fade into the background unless they have them act, and they WILL miss their turns in combat and the like. The game will not wait on them. Thus, it will not be slowed down.

[A_Dinosaur]

heheh Sixteen stone giants is ELC 14. That is crazy.

I will ask John if he wants to rebuild his character, much as I hate powercreep its probably the best way to make the game fun for him. I also loved the couple of really largescale battles I've had where midlevel adventurers are crashing through what are effectively one-shot-kill mooks. Its made for some satisfying battles.

Anyway I should probably actually get to either my term paper or prepping for the upcoming session. Thank you all for the advice and suggestions, and especially for your civility. Continue in my absence if you wish, I'll certainly be back to check where this has gone.

[Frosty]

One way to help with book-diving is to let the other people do the book-diving while one person is doing his turn. That way no time is wasted. This does assume that the other people have at least some degree of system mastery of course. Jack can help John with that I'm sure.

[Feralventas]

I've dealt with this as a player and as a DM in the past months of gaming. As a DM when a player voiced a concern or discontent with their character being clearly under-performing compared to party average, I'll usually offer either a build-restructure or character replacement so as to bring them up to par with the other players. The characters in question were a fighter-type build which had gotten 5 ability scores going toward AC and 3 going toward damage, resulting in a character so MAD that it fulfilled it's role effectively but was being out-performed by the T1 and T2 based characters, and (surprise surprise) another fighter type build in a lower level game which wasn't getting as many opportunities to put his equally optimized build together.

For the first, the player traded out for a psion and things went well enough from there. For the 2nd, we haven't gone back to that game yet, but I've added a few tricks to their repertoire to bring the character up in the world.

That said, not all players Want to learn enough about the system in-depth to take advantage of it effectively, which then makes it difficult to empower players to match the char-op minded folks. With a Fighter/Cleric/Rogue/Wizard group, offering to give the Fighter and Rogue access to Warblade and Swordsage maneuvers as initiators of their character level doesn't help if they'd rather not make their characters more complicated.

On the other hand, asking players to tone down their builds is often difficult likewise when they're "already holding back." In cases like these, it might be necessary to look up errata and details on the build systems they're using, make sure that it's all on the level first. Usually this is the case, as most rules-lawyers pride themselves on acting within the rules, but in recent past of one of the above games, I allowed a couple of players access to the Irresistible Spell metamagic feat, thinking that since they were going for Blaster builds it wouldn't be a big deal. Then a large number of spells that fit their theme were put to use, but were applying unexpected debuffs, control aspects and the like, which would have allowed saves were it not for the Irresistible aspect. Upon inspection, the Errata for the feat granted a +10 to the DC instead of removing the save entirely. This made them potent sure, but not unstoppable.

Realistically however, "Holding back" can also be done in ways that don't involve T1 and T2 character options and classes. Consider requesting the player to limit themselves to less potent classes so that they can stretch their improvisation and mundane skill knowledge instead of spell-combos all the time. Limiting character options to maintain a balance is a little difficult to justify when imposing them only on one person. You can try applying debuffs and bonuses by class instead; I'm trying this out in an online game I'll soon be running. Classes with 9th level spells get 20 point buy and progress slowly in xp, classes with 4th to 6th level spells get 25 point buy and progress moderately, and classes with no spells or very slow 1st to 3rd level progression (over 20 levels, not front-loaded) get 30 point buy and progress in xp quickly.

That last option only works if most of the players are on the same level of play, however; at that point the 9th level casting characters will need to know how to get their character concept to work effectively even at low levels to effectively match the Fighters or Rogues who have 1 or 2 HD in advance of them.

Really, discourse and discussion among the players, with folks keeping in mind that everyone's goals are to have fun and participate in a collaborative story, will be your best bet. Good Luck.

[Ortesk]

heheh Sixteen stone giants is ELC 14. That is crazy.

I will ask John if he wants to rebuild his character, much as I hate powercreep its probably the best way to make the game fun for him. I also loved the couple of really largescale battles I've had where midlevel adventurers are crashing through what are effectively one-shot-kill mooks. Its made for some satisfying battles.

Anyway I should probably actually get to either my term paper or prepping for the upcoming session. Thank you all for the advice and suggestions, and especially for your civility. Continue in my absence if you wish, I'll certainly be back to check where this has gone.

How many fights do you do a day? if one fight, your tailoring to the sorceror, the grenade. Do 4 a day, your see his awesomeness slowly wane, then if he hasnt budgeted well, BBEG will be hell on him as he says, well umm i cast scorching ray

[jedipotter]

How does this rule book diving work? You just sit there and let them look for a rule? You might want to add a simple house rule like ''no books at the table'' or ''no looking up stuff, other then your character's abilities, feats, spells, etc.''

Now I'm a big anti-teir guy, and don't fall for all that hype. Wizards and such only ruin games as DM's let them. But I never have a problem with power levels in the game, even with Blunderfoot(who has 3's in all his abilities) and Sehzar(the typical optimized wizard) in the same group.

It is so easy to tone down a spellcaster or other character that is too powerful. But few want to take the steps.

Some easy ones:

1.Spell Resistance: Use more monsters and foes with this. And unless his build is all anti SR, it will effect him. Look at the Mighty Template, for example.

2.Buff Saves: Add more to them saves. At level 13 most foes should have magic items to 'up' saves. And look for feats and templates for this.monsters.

3.Other monsters. Most monster books have like 100 of them, so just avoid 'orc' and turn to the 'J' monsters and toss some Jyoti at them.

[TuggyNE]

OP, you've done a commendable job so far compensating for this problem in the simpler ways available. Kudos. I wish I had better advice for the really tough stuff, but some of the posts so far look promising.


Consider a stone giant (CR9). Two is an EL11, four is an EL12, eight is an EL13. You seem to have a strong party so sixteen is an EL14. Crazy right?

Math is a wee bit off here. Every doubling is a +2 EL, not +1, so eight would be EL 15, and sixteen would be EL 17. Of course, since the party is strong and larger than standard, eight might work OK; sixteen is more of a boss fight difficulty, though.

[OldTrees1]

The rules you are using do not support Jill's concept as well as they support Jack's concept. (Partially because of Jack's rulebook diving but not entirely) As the DM you have the unique ability to change the rules/add content such that Jill's concept is better supported.

1)
I would start by making improvised weapons more useful. A Ladder now grants Improved Grab, a Mug can deliver a liquid in addition to the normal attack, a Rake triggers an Intimidate check (see #2).

2)
Second I would ask Jill to make some skill checks/ability checks during combat based upon her talents. Find a way to incorporate successful skill checks as additional bonuses beyond the normal results.

3)
Finally talk with Jill to craft new feats that allow Jill to continue to build off this improvised weapon concept. (Beware taxing Jill's action economy to heavily though. Triggered rewards [Improved Trip] are better on average than mutually exclusive Activated rewards [Stunning fist])