Things that are "So OP!"

[Triskavanski]

I've got a DM who has rather "creative" interpretations of rules. As a result he often starts claiming things are very OP. Then there is a second person who has some similar ideas on what is OP.

Their current one is Hybrid classes, and because the playtest at first say "You can't multiclass these" The GM goes off that ruling, choosing to ignore the updated because Being a rogue and a slayer is OP. Mind you he has a DMPC who has somewhere around 30 int, and the assassination talent.

But for some reason adding rogue to that would make it very OP, particularly because they'll be adding Rogue via Variant multi-classing and were like "At level 20 I'll have 11d6 sneak attack! So OP!" Like losing half his feats would make him more op than he was because of the 4d6 he'd gain from rogue levels.

The Shear amount of not understanding the rules here hurts my head. Because if he thinks 4d6 sneak attack is OP, he shouldn't use it with Slayer to begin with. Rather Vivisectionist Alchemist to give him 14d6 by level 20. Or he could easily get 4d6 through that one feat that adds 1d6 onto your sneak attack, and you only have to spend 4 out of 5 feats.

[ATHATH]

What exactly do you want us to do here, exactly?

[Buufreak]

Folks, it's time for another episode of spot the problem! Today's contestant is in a campaign where (not so) massive damage is deemed over powered, but the DM gets to run a high level with deus ex machina abilities without a fuss! Can you spot the problem?

On a serious note, this is a huge issue on the DM part. Him not understanding that damage isn't an issue but being a bigoted d-bag is will be step one to a cure. You can handle this in 3 main ways. 1, talk to him and explain it in a level headed manner. B, roll a god wizard and completely ruin his campaign (not my recommended choice, but others will). Or III, walk away. As the saying goes, no gaming is better than bad gaming.

[Karl Aegis]

Being level 20 is "So OP!". Too OP, to be frank.

[NOhara24]

I've got a DM who has rather "creative" interpretations of rules. As a result he often starts claiming things are very OP. Then there is a second person who has some similar ideas on what is OP.

Their current one is Hybrid classes, and because the playtest at first say "You can't multiclass these" The GM goes off that ruling, choosing to ignore the updated because Being a rogue and a slayer is OP. Mind you he has a DMPC who has somewhere around 30 int, and the assassination talent.

But for some reason adding rogue to that would make it very OP, particularly because they'll be adding Rogue via Variant multi-classing and were like "At level 20 I'll have 11d6 sneak attack! So OP!" Like losing half his feats would make him more op than he was because of the 4d6 he'd gain from rogue levels.

The Shear amount of not understanding the rules here hurts my head. Because if he thinks 4d6 sneak attack is OP, he shouldn't use it with Slayer to begin with. Rather Vivisectionist Alchemist to give him 14d6 by level 20. Or he could easily get 4d6 through that one feat that adds 1d6 onto your sneak attack, and you only have to spend 4 out of 5 feats.

Sounds like your DM is either woefully inexperienced, or just outright sucks. I wouldn't play with this guy.

[Elricaltovilla]

Being level 20 is "So OP!". Too OP, to be frank.

Being level 1 is OP. Why can my wizard swing around a quarterstaff all day long without his arms getting tired when I can barely hit 150 yards on my golf swing? :smalltongue:

[Gildedragon]

Monks: ALL good saves, Wis to AC, multiple attacks from level 1!!! And they don't need to buy armor or weapompoms*!!1!1!

*it started as an honest typo and then I thought of weaponized cheerleading accessories


ETA:
On your DM.
Maybe swap the seat with them?
DMPCs are, in my personal experience, a sign the DM wants to play a more... Well player role. It might not be the case. But I noticed when I started getting fed up of DMing my solution for a party's lack of <role> was adding an DMPC following them around instead of loot, or a party-contolled NPC.

[flappeercraft]

No you know what is sooo OP? Monks, these guys can run so friking fast and punch you a lot and deal good damage. That and they have 3/4 BAB as a melee combatant class which is so good. Oh and to make it better they need to make a full attack to make extra attacks at a penalty while having extra movement speed from move actions. Also these guys have a SoD that can be used a whole 1/week and affects only a couple of types of creatures. Most op thing ever. Nerf and ban them before someone finds this out and stops using suckish wizards and uses a monk that can Quiver palm Cthulu and goes full Chuck Norris.

[ATHATH]

Warlocks. For some reason, at-will magical abilities scare many DMs.

Tome of Battle classes. Because letting martials have "weeaboo fightan magic"/nice things that aren't "I hit him with a stick X times and deal Y damage" is soooo terrible.

[Gildedragon]

Warlocks. For some reason, at-will magical abilities scare many DMs.

Tome of Battle classes. Because letting martials have "weeaboo fightan magic"/nice things that aren't "I hit him with a stick X times and deal Y damage" is soooo terrible.

Fighters! They get so many feats, they can even get ToB feats!

[Karl Aegis]

Being level 1 is OP. Why can my wizard swing around a quarterstaff all day long without his arms getting tired when I can barely hit 150 yards on my golf swing? :smalltongue:

These are the same wizards that can sit down for a week and craft several million clubs, right?

[ATHATH]

These are the same wizards that can sit down for a week and craft several million clubs, right?
Actually, they can do it in no time at all, so they can do it anytime, anywhere (provided that they can take actions).

[martixy]

Warlocks. For some reason, at-will magical abilities scare many DMs.

Tome of Battle classes. Because letting martials have "weeaboo fightan magic"/nice things that aren't "I hit him with a stick X times and deal Y damage" is soooo terrible.

"Well, duhdoy, when did you last see anyone, even a highly trained samurai walk on water or springboard from dainty branches? Thought so!"

"But... wizards can already do it by L3 with levitate."

"Of course. That's what that spell does."

Whoosh.

[Deeds]

My opinion on "OP" things in D&D has changed over the years. Psionics and ToB were initially the most powerful, cheesy, and munchkiny things a player could bring to the table. Good times. For the record, I still don't like psionics but that's because I don't like the flavor and I'm too lazy to look at their two books.

Warlocks. For some reason, at-will magical abilities scare many DMs.
Warlocks are still a little scary to me. After playing core and learning the basics of 3.5 classes, seeing the Warlock in action was unnerving. "An arcane class with unlimited uses of arcane abilities?! Wow that's broken!" As a player, I've seen a few encounters/traps solved by unlimited use of Eldritch Blast, flight, and yelling at things.

To me, I'd rather see a typical caster on the other side of the table. Despite tier dominance, it's a little easier to take away their toys than Warlocks.

[CIDE]

Things I've found in my own experience that too many DM's found over powered in the same vein as the above:

Warlock, DFA, etc. Essentially all of the classes out there that get at-will unlimited use ANYTHING throughout the day. People place too much value on this. Which, if you're playing in the classic sword-and-board, blaster wizard, healbot cleric, and sneak attacking rogue an intelligently played Warlock can be problematic. Even then I wouldn't call it OP; just a good alternative.

The other one already brought up that I'm seconding at ToB. These terrify so many DM's and to this day I don't fully understand why. They don't even usually cite the all day use of abilities. But I've had DM's literally tell me that a single Swordsage (in their eyes the strongest of the ToB classes) could take an entire 4 man party of core classes of equal level. I've been told exactly that.

The other one thst stands out is psionics. Anything psionics. It's all OP and nothing a Wizard can do can ever hope to catch up to anyone using psionics. I can at least understand why someone may think Psionics are OP, though. They do have a few nice tricks and if you don't fully understand the rules you can get away with some rules breaking nukes.

Now, the most interesting one someone already brought up but as a joke. Only I've heard it too many times from people that were totally serious. I'm talking about the Monk. I've known DM's that actively nerf them because the have "too many good things". Even worse is when they outright ban Vow of Poverty Monks because OMFGBROKEN!

The only thing I'm left with is that they just didn't read this stuff. Otherwise I just don't know.

[TheIronGolem]

It's not that they don't read. It's more that it's very easy to fall into the trap of being impressed by Big Numbers and forgetting the context of how those numbers are applied. 10d6 of Sneak Attack sounds grossly powerful...if you forget that it's only about 35 damage on the average and it's easy to avoid or be immune to at that level. Vow of Poverty looks overpowered because it gives you a ton of things that look great in a vacuum, and it's easy to forget just how much flexibility you're sacrificing by giving up magic items.

[CIDE]

It's not that they don't read. It's more that it's very easy to fall into the trap of being impressed by Big Numbers and forgetting the context of how those numbers are applied. 10d6 of Sneak Attack sounds grossly powerful...if you forget that it's only about 35 damage on the average and it's easy to avoid or be immune to at that level. Vow of Poverty looks overpowered because it gives you a ton of things that look great in a vacuum, and it's easy to forget just how much flexibility you're sacrificing by giving up magic items.

The one thing I completely forgot about in regards to Vow of Poverty is that one of several DM's I met that are against it was horrible about giving out loot. He was also against item crafting and would hinder it if he could (such as no down time). So, in a way Vow of Poverty wasn't such a bad deal in his campaigns. I think what that particular DM disliked the most was that he couldn't actively control the flow of growth of it like they could the loot. That, of course, doesn't explain the other DM's.

You may still be right, though. For at least some of the issues people find OP.

[Telonius]

Things I've found in my own experience that too many DM's found over powered in the same vein as the above:

Warlock, DFA, etc. Essentially all of the classes out there that get at-will unlimited use ANYTHING throughout the day. People place too much value on this. Which, if you're playing in the classic sword-and-board, blaster wizard, healbot cleric, and sneak attacking rogue an intelligently played Warlock can be problematic. Even then I wouldn't call it OP; just a good alternative.

The other one already brought up that I'm seconding at ToB. These terrify so many DM's and to this day I don't fully understand why. They don't even usually cite the all day use of abilities. But I've had DM's literally tell me that a single Swordsage (in their eyes the strongest of the ToB classes) could take an entire 4 man party of core classes of equal level. I've been told exactly that.

The other one thst stands out is psionics. Anything psionics. It's all OP and nothing a Wizard can do can ever hope to catch up to anyone using psionics. I can at least understand why someone may think Psionics are OP, though. They do have a few nice tricks and if you don't fully understand the rules you can get away with some rules breaking nukes.

Now, the most interesting one someone already brought up but as a joke. Only I've heard it too many times from people that were totally serious. I'm talking about the Monk. I've known DM's that actively nerf them because the have "too many good things". Even worse is when they outright ban Vow of Poverty Monks because OMFGBROKEN!

The only thing I'm left with is that they just didn't read this stuff. Otherwise I just don't know.

I think there's a common thread running through all of those cases (except maybe Psionics, which is something of a separate issue): "no" buttons. Saving throw? Nope, got a Diamond Mind maneuver for that, or I have all good saves as a Monk. Half-orc barbarian raging at me? No problem, my Warlock is flying and/or invisible. Charging bruiser? Setting Sun counter, or my bonus speed means he'll never catch me.

Yes, I know, a well-played caster has all of them and more. But the first time a DM has that kind of a curveball thrown at them, it can leave an impression. Spellcasters might have more and better "no" buttons, but it's easier to see them on a Warlock, a Swordsage, or even a Monk. If you're in the mindset of "increase the numbers and it'll be okay," which is a trap many beginning DMs fall into, your usual tactics fail. It doesn't matter how many HP that barbarian has, if the Warlock keeps plinking away at him from Fell Flight he's eventually going to go down. Countering and challenging them (in a way that doesn't seem specifically targeting their character) requires a bit more finesse and creativity as a DM.

[Triskavanski]

Fighters! They get so many feats, they can even get ToB feats!

Actually, he has said a few times that fighters were OP too because they can take so many feats.


Mind you like I said he has "creative" interpretations of rules too. Most of which I do tend to shatter with research and such.

Our group consists of The GM, a Newbie, The 'roleplayer', myself, and the quiet one. The GM and Roleplayer are the two that find multiclassing "So OP" with a hybrid class and a base class. The fact that paizo was going to ban them from multiclassing, I think got them stuck in the mindset of that hybrids + base = OP. When really there is little to no reason why they shouldn't. I'm pretty sure they wouldn't ban someone multiclassing as a fighter or wizard when they play magus, just simply because it doesn't have that hybrid class tag.

[Vaz]

Play an Ardent and just spank the Action Economy like a naughty avocado

[Fizban]

I'm surprised everyone's so certain of what's going on, as I can barely decipher the OP. From what I can, it sounds like the DM shouldn't be running Pathfinder at all, since Pathfinder is all about giving people more than the original 3.x classes while the DM thinks sneak attack is actually a main class feature instead of an add-on.

[Blu]

Actually, he has said a few times that fighters were OP too because they can take so many feats.

How much experience do your DM as? Because saying Fighter is OP is clearly someone who never played D&D past the first 4 levels...
Fighters can only stand up to wizards around these levels, and if not optimizing a lvl 3 wiz is argueably less competent than our also not optimized fighter.

[kuhaica]

As a DM who plays with a group that dont know how to optimize anything. ToB is insane. It doesn't require optimization and a player with limited knowledge can deal damage far greater then anyone else. I think thats why many DMs fear ToB. However. Thats only low levels, high levels we all know where the Op is at. Those darned Druids and tere shape shifting

[Vaz]

By High levels, you mean level 5-6, right?

[TotallyNotEvil]

As a DM who plays with a group that dont know how to optimize anything. ToB is insane. It doesn't require optimization and a player with limited knowledge can deal damage far greater then anyone else. I think thats why many DMs fear ToB. However. Thats only low levels, high levels we all know where the Op is at. Those darned Druids and tere shape shifting

... Huh? Like, besides the very first few levels, where most of your damage is coming from your weapon's dice (if then), they don't really do anything that stupendous in terms of damage.

But it seems the fear of Sneak Attack is very popular, I have a DM who doesn't let the rogue use SA when the foe is flatfooted, he requires to be some shenanigans involved, "there has to be a Sneak part to it".

No ****ing wonder we literally forgot about our rogue's turns, he was utterly inconsequential. We were level 14-16.

The same guy, on why he didn't allow Tome of Battle, "Dude, you can flank by yourself!".

My wealth by level 16 was 10-20k, if that, most of it from a +4 Int headband.

And then, he goes on how the BBEG was perfectly reasonable with his lowest save being mid-20s. Then a point out a Balor's +22 Fort. He didn't relent.

It was almost hilarious, if it weren't sad, BBEG had something like +25~28 to hit on his fourth iterative, with a crit range of 13-20 or 11-20, dealing one negative level and 50 damage per hit, double on crit. Resist 30 to all energies, slew of immunities, SR, the works. Most of it un-dispelable, due to divine-blessing hax.

I'm preparing like half a dozen Split Enervations from now on. Only thing that managed to stick, my "ace in the hole" went unused, a split enervation boosted to a DC of 35-36. And the BBEG had to roll a 8 or so to save. Aka, the only thing I had a nontrivial chance of landing.

We got 1600 GP and 1000 XP from killing the guy.

TL;DR, DMs that don't understand the rules can be a pain. Narrative might make it worth it, tho.

Most glaring flaw I've ever seen, is how the GM doesn't understand that, while he has the power of cherry picking his NPC's builds and even Homebrew, he shouldn't flat-out ignore the system. Each creatur type has certain saves and BAB and skills and features for a reason. Wealth is measured per level for a reason.

When brewing, I find that "average monster stats" chart tremendously helpful.

[Triskavanski]

How much experience do your DM as? Because saying Fighter is OP is clearly someone who never played D&D past the first 4 levels...
Fighters can only stand up to wizards around these levels, and if not optimizing a lvl 3 wiz is argueably less competent than our also not optimized fighter.

I don't know. He says he's done a lot of gaming and stuff, but yeah. While I know the rules and the like, what I lack is the ability to really run a whole campaign. I do better thinking outside the box than trying to make the box to think in.

Course I'm showing him just how good magic can be, as I'm playing a Skald who cheats magic stuff with that spell kenning. Thorny entanglement against a large army of mooks in the middle of a forest stopped a massive amount of enemies dead in their tracks.

[Florian]

Sounds like a gm with an AD&D background.

[Inevitability]

Play an Ardent and just spank the Action Economy like a naughty avocado.

Could I sig this?

[kuhaica]

... Huh? Like, besides the very first few levels, where most of your damage is coming from your weapon's dice (if then), they don't really do anything that stupendous in terms of damage.

In a proper game. I agree whole hardly. But when you have a group that plays mpre about making something cool rather then effective, well you can see how well a ToB is. And with only a support bard. A low level ToB out classes everything present. And in my few games with other DMs they can't handle the implications of ToB because Martial or Mundan classes shouldn't be able to do that. Even though by late game ToB is nearly worthless. Things like Shadow Blade and Diamond Mind are still decent but easily countered.

But as to you saying people find Sneak Attack damahe Op. Why? That's like the Rouges ultimate and even then is nothing compared to a caster.

[Florian]

But as to you saying people find Sneak Attack damahe Op. Why? That's like the Rouges ultimate and even then is nothing compared to a caster.

Think about it this way: When you only see a monster as a bunch of hp that have the be ground down, then the only thing that matters is raw damage. So, a character with "at will" damage dice equal to a fireball must be op, right? Color Spray? Worthless, deals no damage...

[TheTeaMustFlow]

... Huh? Like, besides the very first few levels, where most of your damage is coming from your weapon's dice (if then), they don't really do anything that stupendous in terms of damage.

Thing is, they do have a fairly high optimisation floor, and they're so clearly superior to previous martial classes. If they're in a group with a fighter or monk - or a poorly played wizard - they will probably overshadow them. There's a common impression that 3.5 got more and more unbalanced as more splatbooks came out. For the most part it's wrong - the most unbalanced sourcebooks released are the Player's Handbook, Dungeon Master's Guide, and Monster Manual - but the impression exists nonetheless.

[SirNibbles]

Being level 20 is "So OP!". Too OP, to be frank.

It really is though. The idea of being able to take out entire armies in a single round is a bit overpowered.

[TheTeaMustFlow]

It really is though. The idea of being able to take out entire armies in a single round is a bit overpowered.

It's powerful. That's not the same thing.

[Morphic tide]

Pathfinder Witch gishes. They look very strong due to Witches having a lot of low-level gish supporting spells scattered around. A Witch/Gunslinger can change their gun into any cheaper gun in existence! But it has to be non-magical. I mean, the same spell lets you turn any alchemical item into another alchemical item of the same or lower price...

Witches also have the ability to make +1 daggers and then improve those daggers(or any weapon, really) by +1 per four CL, making them difficult to keep locked down when they have the ability to use it well. The arcane healing is also fairly good, and they get Summon Monster to make their own flankers.

But this is nothing compared to the level of stuff a Witch can pump out as a pure caster. They have one of the most broken spell chains in the game, after all. They have Save-or-Sucks worth mentioning at level 10 as 1st level spells. They have save-or-suck at-wills. And save-or-suck support. Hexes are far more valuable than being able to fight in melee, especially because they can just use Summon Monster to make melees for them.

The biggest barrier for things looking OP to newbie DMs is how obvious it is. Tome of Battle's optimization floor and directness of capacity make it look far more powerful than the save-or-suck arsenal of Wizards and the shapeshifting of Druids. Psionics looks OP because you can use your highest level powers as much as you want and their individual powers scale with the PP you put in them.

[Elkad]

B, roll a god wizard and completely ruin his campaign (not my recommended choice, but others will).

Don't forget that half the point of God Wizard is nobody is supposed to notice you are "ruining" things.
Done correctly, the DM just thinks he has no idea how to balance encounters, or that he needs to nerf the melee guys even more.
It's never the Wizard's fault.

[The_Jette]

I once had a DM who ruled that the 5th Edition version of Identify was OP. This is the same guy who thought that my 3.5 Monk was OP because I passed 90% of my saving throws and used my mobility to my advantage instead of just running up to a monster and punching it until it died, or I did. Same guy had my character killed by locking him into a force bubble with a magic werewolf so that I couldn't move around, and got confused when I died. I was level 8 at this time taking on an advanced to CR 10 spell-wolf (as we called them) solo as a human monk. And, yes, I know the CR of the enemy because I looked at his notes after the game and plugged the numbers into a CR rater. This was a while ago so I don't remember which one I used, but I do remember the CR was 8.

[Jay R]

Play the game that the DM is running. It does no good to get upset that it isn't a different game..

One useful tool is to copy the DMPC. [If those options aren't available to PCs, then insist that he call him an NPC, not a DMPC.]

[Rerednaw]

I've got a DM who has rather "creative" interpretations of rules. As a result he often starts claiming things are very OP. Then there is a second person who has some similar ideas on what is OP.

Their current one is Hybrid classes, and because the playtest at first say "You can't multiclass these" The GM goes off that ruling, choosing to ignore the updated because Being a rogue and a slayer is OP. Mind you he has a DMPC who has somewhere around 30 int, and the assassination talent.

But for some reason adding rogue to that would make it very OP, particularly because they'll be adding Rogue via Variant multi-classing and were like "At level 20 I'll have 11d6 sneak attack! So OP!" Like losing half his feats would make him more op than he was because of the 4d6 he'd gain from rogue levels.

The Shear amount of not understanding the rules here hurts my head. Because if he thinks 4d6 sneak attack is OP, he shouldn't use it with Slayer to begin with. Rather Vivisectionist Alchemist to give him 14d6 by level 20. Or he could easily get 4d6 through that one feat that adds 1d6 onto your sneak attack, and you only have to spend 4 out of 5 feats.

Um no.
Frankly I'd invite the DM here and have him create a thread titled "Here is my campaign style and what's going on, suggestions to improve please?"
"What should I keep doing?
"What should I change?"
"What should I stop?"

To continue: If your DM thinks core monks, fighters, ToB is OP quite frankly there is a wealth of knowledge that this community would be quite willing to share, as well as alternative viewpoints with examples.

If 4d6 sneak attack is OP that's what Rogue 7th? How about oh...3 attacks at 12d6...with a non-martial? Or for that matter 2 levels earlier, same damage, but with better to hit?

Assuming this is 3.5. With Pathfinder there are ways to go for broke was well.

Oh heck stick to core and spam Save or Die spells like Color Spray. Or even Glitterdust+Heighten spell with a Sorcerer. Encounter-ending/crippling several times a day.

But ranting aside, seriously just have a simple adult talk. Or run a campaign the way you like, set an example of your expectations...all else fails...walk away. There are so many online virtual tables you could work with. Unless you have to have that tabletop experience. Ask around, try meetups, they are usually around.