How important is it to be "optimized"?

[NecroDancer]

Could a group work if none of them were optimized? Is it possible to play d&d 3.5 and have fun if everyone isn't trying to go all the way powerwise? For example could a full class fighter, sorcerer with dragon disciple levels, and a Druid or cleric that isn't CoDzilla play through a module and enjoy it? Or is d&is 3.5 built so only a fully optimized character can survive?

[ryu]

Could a group work if none of them were optimized? Is it possible to play d&d 3.5 and have fun if everyone isn't trying to go all the way powerwise? For example could a full class fighter, sorcerer with dragon disciple levels, and a Druid or cleric that isn't CoDzilla play through a module and enjoy it? Or is d&is 3.5 built so only a fully optimized character can survive?

Standard 3.5 is built in such a way that in most modules it's legitimately hard not to succeed. By that I mean you have to actively shun any sort power, versatility, or group synergy while building. That is not the same as not optimizing mind you. That's putting active effort into sucking.

[Zsaber0]

Playing most adventures unoptimized I often find way more fun than being able to steamroll. it is not important to be optimized.

[SirNibbles]

You can have a ton of fun without optimisation. However, you should try to aim for a similar level of optimisation/power within the party.

If you have three people playing high-op T1s and you decide to go for a low-op Fighter, you're not going to be able to contribute much, and it's going to be a nightmare for the DM to create challenges that don't destroy you and still challenge the optimised members.

[Telonius]

It depends entirely on the group. It's absolutely possible to play an unoptimized game and have a whole lot of fun. All of the optimization stuff is just a tool; it's what the system can do. Same way with the tier system, and half of the rest of the system imbalance critiques. It can give DMs and players an idea of what power imbalances can happen. Some of them happen semi-accidentally (Monk and Druid playing in the same team on their first adventure); optimization can let you know how bad it can get, and give you a few ideas of how to avoid or fix the issue.

[Pex]

You don't need to be the top most in everything for whatever it is your character wants to do, but you do need competence. The math of the game matters. Being too low in your relevant numbers will hurt your party more than whatever fun you have playing the concept.

[Sam K]

The original playtesting of D&D 3.x was EXTREMELY unoptimized. So most content for 3.x is based on a fairly low degree of optimization, and as such, the game is perfectly fine to play without putting much effort into making the numbers work for you. I think this is one of the reasons why D&D 3.x still remains fairly popular: it can be played at such a wide spectrum of power, from struggling underdogs to reality-breaking demigods, and ALL OF THEM CAN BE FUN!

The level of optimization you need is essentially that you need to realize that some stats are more important for some roles than other stats are: if you're a primary caster, you really need to have your main casting above average, because you won't be able to cast any spells without it (then again, if you want to play Rincewind and not know any spells as a wizard, you can). But as long as you understand that, just about every concept is workable, no matter how sub optimized it is.

The DM needs to understand the level of challenge (s)he is setting for the party, no matter what level of optimization you're playing at. This gets extra important at low levels of optimization: if the DM sets the challenge too low for a high OP party the only conequence is that they breeze through a couple of encounters, and then the DM can adjust the challenge level. But putting a low-optimized party up against certain monsters can become very messy. If DMing for a low op party, exercise caution. Too many total party kills can discourage anyone (or turn them into a high-optimizer...)

[emeraldstreak]

It's vital to be optimized, not for power, but for your character concept. You want your character to be this and that: well, get the mechanics to back it up.

[RoboEmperor]

Playing most adventures unoptimized I often find way more fun than being able to steamroll. it is not important to be optimized.

I find this hard to believe. When I'm standing around, hitting nothing, doing no damage, constantly almost dying or actually dying, and being completely unessential to the party, I find it very frustrating. No matter how much fun you are having in the RP aspect, getting killed always kills your mood.


It's vital to be optimized, not for power, but for your character concept. You want your character to be this and that: well, get the mechanics to back it up.

This, optimize what you want to do to the max. Don't optimize just for power unless that's what you want.

[Florian]

Could a group work if none of them were optimized? Is it possible to play d&d 3.5 and have fun if everyone isn't trying to go all the way powerwise? For example could a full class fighter, sorcerer with dragon disciple levels, and a Druid or cleric that isn't CoDzilla play through a module and enjoy it? Or is d&is 3.5 built so only a fully optimized character can survive?

D&D is based on the lowest optimization level possible. As long as the basic roles are covered, you´re good to go and it will be an enjoyable experience.

[Grod_The_Giant]

You can have a ton of fun without optimisation. However, you should try to aim for a similar level of optimisation/power within the party.

If you have three people playing high-op T1s and you decide to go for a low-op Fighter, you're not going to be able to contribute much, and it's going to be a nightmare for the DM to create challenges that don't destroy you and still challenge the optimised members.
This. It's very important to optimize your character to the same level as the rest of the group; what that level is, not so much. As long as everyone is on the same page power-wise, the DM can easily adjust challenges to match.

[Zsaber0]

I find this hard to believe. When I'm standing around, hitting nothing, doing no damage, constantly almost dying or actually dying, and being completely unessential to the party, I find it very frustrating. No matter how much fun you are having in the RP aspect, getting killed always kills your mood.

I think you're confusing what I mean by "unoptimized" with "a fighter with no strength modifier, using a 2 handed weapon and power attacking every round." I more mean that it's perfectly fine to take bow feats and two-weapon fighting feats together, rather than just being an uber charger.

[RoboEmperor]

I think you're confusing what I mean by "unoptimized" with "a fighter with no strength modifier, using a 2 handed weapon and power attacking every round." I more mean that it's perfectly fine to take bow feats and two-weapon fighting feats together, rather than just being an uber charger.

Yeah I was confusing what you meant. Still though, getting a -4 to hit because of cover was too frustrating for me to play with a heavy crossbow. I had to optimize it with precise shot, rapid shot and rapid reload along with quick loading on my crossbow before I was no longer frustrated. Adding in splitting to my heavy crossbow is what made me happy.

[Zsaber0]

Yeah I was confusing what you meant. Still though, getting a -4 to hit because of cover was too frustrating for me to play with a heavy crossbow. I had to optimize it with precise shot, rapid shot and rapid reload along with quick loading on my crossbow before I was no longer frustrated. Adding in splitting to my heavy crossbow is what made me happy.

I guess each person has their own interpretation of what Optimizing means. Just taking feats that reduce penalties and allow you too full attack with a subpar weapon is not optimizing in my mind.

[Arael666]

Being optimized or not, in itself, is rarely an issue. What really creates problems and disrupt games is being optimized when the rest of he group is not or being unoptimized when the rest of the group is, someone is will be felling useless and/or redundant while someone else will be feeling powerfull, usefull and/or heroic.

[Afgncaap5]

I find this hard to believe. When I'm standing around, hitting nothing, doing no damage, constantly almost dying or actually dying, and being completely unessential to the party, I find it very frustrating. No matter how much fun you are having in the RP aspect, getting killed always kills your mood.

To be fair, I feel like this is different than being unoptimized. The point is well taken, of course, and if you don't do anything effective for two out of the three rounds a combat lasts it can be a drain (especially if you're at a table where it takes ten minutes to go through a round) but that feels like a different category of issue than optimization vs/ unoptimization.

[Gruftzwerg]

Imho we need to differ between character optimization and group optimization.

Cause if you ignore both, it can cause problems. e.g. a party full of melee characters without access to any magic/heal trying to fight flying enemies.

On the same basis you can assume that a bigger party can have lower optimized characters but still have an easy time.
While a 2 man duo needs to be much more aware of the intent what the other player will be playing/building into. Otherwise they may get problems on higher lvls.
And last point of optimization which is also very important is Action Economy. Making the right decisions and don't wasting actions can be the difference between life and death, especially in small groups.

[Baby Gary]

It is not important at all to be optimized if you have a halfway decent DM

However it is very important that the party is all on a similar level of optimization, you core monk can do just fine with other low OP party members, but when you add the Planer Shepherd or the God wizard then that monk gets overshadowed.

[Troacctid]

It's more important to be optimized in this edition than it is in 4e or 5e. 3.5 has a lot more trap options that you can fall into if you try to paint by numbers.

[Darth Ultron]

It is not important at all.

You don't have to have an optimized character to have fun. In fact, every often, optimized characters are not fun to play.

[Gruftzwerg]

It's more important to be optimized in this edition than it is in 4e or 5e. 3.5 has a lot more trap options that you can fall into if you try to paint by numbers.

reminds me of the : Hellcat! What the Hell?? (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?498768-Hellcat!-What-the-hell) thread we had here a while ago.

Yeah there are hidden traps. Sure you can have DM fiat/help to get around, but do you really want the DM to intervene each time the group fails, over and over again? I guess not. And having only easy low lvl enemies to bash ain't that much fun on the long run imho. So, sooner or later the difficulty will increase and you'll step over one of the enemies with TPK potential. Or the lack of stealth/lockpicking/magic can increase the difficulty of an encounter immense.

Especially when playing modules it is recommend to stick to base team setups for unexperienced players. Otherwise they can run into situations where they have problems to solve the situation and progress.

[RoboEmperor]

I guess each person has their own interpretation of what Optimizing means. Just taking feats that reduce penalties and allow you too full attack with a subpar weapon is not optimizing in my mind.

I'm optimizing heavy crossbows to the max. Researching everything related to crossbows and picking the best options. Sure the end result is something subpar because I chose to optimize something subpar, but still this is optimizing.

My definition of not optimizing is no research, and picking what looks fun/cool with no regard for power. Heavy Crossbow users will drop dead if they do this which is why I say optimization is mandatory, especially if you choose to main subpar stuff.

So that's been my motto in d&d ever since. Optimize what you want to do to the MAX, not what's OP.

[Baby Gary]

So that's been my motto in d&d ever since. Optimize what you want to do to the MAX, not what's OP.

Honestly I really like that, I might sig it, not sure yet but if I want to can I?

I will still make this my D&D motto because it just makes so much sense (unlike me)

[RoboEmperor]

Honestly I really like that, I might sig it, not sure yet but if I want to can I?

I will still make this my D&D motto because it just makes so much sense (unlike me)

Go ahead, I'd be honored if you did :)

[emeraldstreak]

I guess each person has their own interpretation of what Optimizing means. Just taking feats that reduce penalties and allow you too full attack with a subpar weapon is not optimizing in my mind.

Actually, one can optimize for a character to be especially bad at something - or even everything.

Optimizing is the process of using the system resources in the most efficient way to achieve your goal.

[Pugwampy]

Depends on DM and his game style .

I give noobies one good optimal feat and then i play pretty optimized monsters and goons with double hp in an effort to coax them into opening up books and looking for the good stuff.

Aww heck they could just google what they want .

I always have an escape route for them if they cannot handle the pressure.

[Eldariel]

System mastery is never a bad thing in 3.5. It enables you to calibrate your character to fit whatever the party is, and match the others' level. Equal power level is very, very convenient for the DM and opens up the game a lot. It also enhances the DM's ability to run things other than calibrated encounters like sandbox-style games and even games allowing full PvP. Thus, there's no need to master all the rules but a basic idea of where the various classes and characters stand is very, very useful. You can start without it and you can play without it. But I posit that as long as players are willing to work with each other and the DM, games are enhanced by system mastery.

However, that can also mean optimizing towards Tier 4-5 or even 6 in games that call for it - responsible playing and system mastery should never result in going all-out unless everyone is doing it and that's the level the campaign operates on. FWIW I find such campaigns (high Tier 1 on higher levels, the edge of PO) are amazing to play but they require a lot from all the participants, particularly the DM. And I'd never want to just play those; variety is the spice of life. Some non-magic ToB games, some high OP, some Commoner-only farmer's dayjob games, some high Tier 3 and some lower Tier 1, I enjoy all of those to various degrees and I find the various experiences making each other more enjoyable as mastery grows.

But again, basic game with little mastery was how most of us probably started - it starts breaking down eventually but not all people notice or mind. For us it took until teens until we noticed things just starting to fall apart party cohesion-wise and the Fighter-types becoming glorified magic item carriers and being less efficient than the casters even with lion's share of the party treasure. Had we started with flat T3 with basic book access (ToB, Spell Compendium, MiC, PHBII), we would've probably been able to go much further with everyone contributing as everyone gets nice things. Of course, none of those books existed back then.

[Hackulator]

As has been stated, optimization level only matters in terms of relative optimization within the party AND the level of optimization your DM puts into his adventures. I play just as many unoptimized characters as optimized ones, and I have equal fun playing both.

[ngilop]

The board and real life are different.

In real life, being null-optimized can get you wherever you need to be in terms of fun both from a gameplay and roleplay perspective.

Ive played games where the guy is in Int focused ( in that Int was his highest score) warrior that focused on charisma based skills. while his cha was 11 or 10 and about a third of his feats were Toughness.

Ive played a game where everybody was a caster because 'spells win'

Had fun in both of them

The boards are a different beast altogether, 1) not being a full caster with caster level = character level means you have a worthless character. and that's really about the only thing you need to worry about in terms of this board. Just look at the amny times somebody asks for assistance on this board and get the responses of 'play a wizard, rawr ruby knight vindicator, hoooyeah triple nines or go home.'


the game(3rd ed) was based around the fighter/barbarian standing there damage sppongeing, the wizard throwing magic missiles and fireballs and the rare group buff like haste, the cleric heal spamming the poor pincushion of a melee guy, and the rogue flanking for sneak attack and disarming traps. IF you have a group that can do those 4 roles you should be able to successfully complete any published adventure.

[Eldariel]

The boards are a different beast altogether, 1) not being a full caster with caster level = character level means you have a worthless character. and that's really about the only thing you need to worry about in terms of this board. Just look at the amny times somebody asks for assistance on this board and get the responses of 'play a wizard, rawr ruby knight vindicator, hoooyeah triple nines or go home.'

I'm terribly sorry, but that's quite disingenuous. People give advice for power when people ask for power, but when people specify the power level of the party or the needs of the party, many advisors are more than willing to and capable of accommodating those wishes and can give sound advice and novel ideas for how to do that. Optimization isn't just about making the best X or Y - it's about maximizing your tools for realising whichever character concepts you desire at any given power level appropriate for the game you wish to play in.


the game(3rd ed) was based around the fighter/barbarian standing there damage sppongeing, the wizard throwing magic missiles and fireballs and the rare group buff like haste, the cleric heal spamming the poor pincushion of a melee guy, and the rogue flanking for sneak attack and disarming traps. IF you have a group that can do those 4 roles you should be able to successfully complete any published adventure.

It might be more fair to talk about playtesting than the game, since the game is a vast, complex system way beyond what the designers foresaw - it essentially become something entirely different than what it was designed to be, a supermodular system capable of realising a vast array of options and power levels at the cost of incredible inner complexity. Playtest parties were along those lines of "warrior/thief/magic-user/priest" due to the designers' AD&D background and blindness at the effects of their changes to the system, but the game itself - yes, "sneak", "damage dealer", "frontliner", "controller/taxi/utility" and "buffer" roughly exist as roles with any number of ways to cover each (it's quite possible for a single character to do it all, and most classes cover multiple nichés naturally).

[Hackulator]

I'm terribly sorry, but that's quite disingenuous. People give advice for power when people ask for power, but when people specify the power level of the party or the needs of the party, many advisors are more than willing to and capable of accommodating those wishes and can give sound advice and novel ideas for how to do that. Optimization isn't just about making the best X or Y - it's about maximizing your tools for realising whichever character concepts you desire at any given power level appropriate for the game you wish to play in.

I'M terribly sorry, but he was 100% right.

Every time someone posts asking advice on a character concept that's not something super powerful, people immediately tell them what they wanted to do isn't optimized and they should do something else. I've had threads where I said in the OP and multiple times in responses that I understood the character wasn't fully optimized but I liked the idea of it, and I was STILL getting mostly responses telling me how I needed to do something else because it wasn't optimal.

[Eldariel]

I'M terribly sorry, but he was 100% right.

Every time someone posts asking advice on a character concept that's not something super powerful, people immediately tell them what they wanted to do isn't optimized and they should do something else. I've had threads where I said in the OP and multiple times in responses that I understood the character wasn't fully optimized but I liked the idea of it, and I was STILL getting mostly responses telling me how I needed to do something else because it wasn't optimal.

Someone might, but not everybody. Basically every thread I've seen has advice all across the board, and the more the OP is capable of specifying the power level, the party and the concept they're aiming for, the better advice they receive. It's not a hivemind - individuals approach things differently and without a specified power level to aim for in the thread, it's hard to get a good grip of what the OP might be looking for and some people default to "has to be able to hold its own against monsters of its CR", some default to "top tier PO" while some give advice based on what they like. I'd say if people get advice too high or low up the power curve, the burden lies more on the posters asking for advice than the advisors though certainly nobody is perfect and there are probably many posters who often overdo the powerlevel of their advice. At least I tend to just list the interesting options that occur to me and warn about the ones that are potentially problematic or too strong (though sometimes I don't have enough time to be comprehensive).

[ngilop]

Someone might, but not everybody. Basically every thread I've seen has advice all across the board, and the more the OP is capable of specifying the power level, the party and the concept they're aiming for, the better advice they receive. It's not a hivemind - individuals approach things differently and without a specified power level to aim for in the thread, it's hard to get a good grip of what the OP might be looking for and some people default to "has to be able to hold its own against monsters of its CR", some default to "top tier PO" while some give advice based on what they like. I'd say if people get advice too high or low up the power curve, the burden lies more on the posters asking for advice than the advisors though certainly nobody is perfect and there are probably many posters who often overdo the powerlevel of their advice. At least I tend to just list the interesting options that occur to me and warn about the ones that are potentially problematic or too strong (though sometimes I don't have enough time to be comprehensive).

Except... Not..?

Case in point.

A while ago I asked for help on a side of a gestalt build for an updated Ogre character of mine.

it was originally a 2nd ed Ogre fighter but I managed to get accepted into a monstrous gestalt game of 8th level. I came here to these very forums and very specifically asked what I should have as my other side on my gestalt character.

What was the the majority of the first set of responses?
'don't be an ogre' you can look through here on these forums on every single 'advice/character help' thread on these forums and while there are helpful people on this site who give wonderful and insightful ideas and assistance. The majority are jerks, who basically boil down to just insulting you, your idea, your build, and other sort of things.

[Eldariel]

Except... Not..?

Case in point.

A while ago I asked for help on a side of a gestalt build for an updated Ogre character of mine.

it was originally a 2nd ed Ogre fighter but I managed to get accepted into a monstrous gestalt game of 8th level. I came here to these very forums and very specifically asked what I should have as my other side on my gestalt character.

What was the the majority of the first set of responses? you can look through here on these forums on every single 'advice/character help' thread on these forums and while there are helpful people on this site who give wonderful and insightful ideas and assistance. The majority are jerks, who basically boil down to just insulting you, your idea, your build, and other sort of things.

I'm terribly sorry you've had negative experiences here and people here are certainly a contentious bunch each with their own biases but from what I've seen, that doesn't seem to be how the majority of the threads conclude, nor the experience the majority of the posters have. Many people seem quite satisfied with the advice and information they're getting and there are surprisingly few vocal critics or detractors in these compared to basically every other D&D forum on the internet, so I can only conclude that this forum seems to do a rather decent job of catering to many peoples' needs and at least one person tends to show up and offer the desired advice. And really, isn't that the most important part - that the seeker finds what they are looking for? To that end, I find the people here with their varying views and proficiencies tend to offer a rather good array of suggestions to most kinds of threads, even if occasionally everyone tumbles on their face and ends up giving advice contrary to the OP's wishes (if it helps you at all, I'd expect most such people are likely to do it with the best of intentions - few people indeed are actively malicious, and if those do exist, they are easily ignored).

Really, people post here for information. Thus the posters giving advice are there to principally provide information the OP looks for. I think people posting lots of different ideas and even ones past what the OP might have wanted serves that well - the OP is free to ignore the unhelpful ones or the ideas that don't interest him but perhaps some OPs might find new ideas they hadn't considered and that's most likely the rationale behind posting outside the given guidelines since it's hard to know how married the OP is to given things and for example, how much particular race or class names matter to them (some people don't mind refluffing everything possible while others are very particular about the behind-the-scenes names matching the in-game names). For what it's worth, I think it's better the broad, wrong advice be given and ignored than that it be not given and someone misses out on an idea because the poster didn't dare post it in fear of the OP not liking it. Ultimately such issues tend to come down to misunderstandings IME.

[Gruftzwerg]

Except... Not..?

Case in point.

A while ago I asked for help on a side of a gestalt build for an updated Ogre character of mine.

it was originally a 2nd ed Ogre fighter but I managed to get accepted into a monstrous gestalt game of 8th level. I came here to these very forums and very specifically asked what I should have as my other side on my gestalt character.

What was the the majority of the first set of responses? you can look through here on these forums on every single 'advice/character help' thread on these forums and while there are helpful people on this site who give wonderful and insightful ideas and assistance. The majority are jerks, who basically boil down to just insulting you, your idea, your build, and other sort of things.

Imho people overreact on this topic. Cause asking for help doesn't always work out the way, the one asking for help intended. Human communication is always suboptimal. I worked as client advisor for private and even for business customers. I sold DSL internet connections as it was new and almost noone had any clue how internet works.
So you get customer that want something but don't have the slightest clue. They lack the right info to make the right decisions. And sometimes you have to tell your customer, while he want "this", he needs "that" because "this", while looking good, doesn't fit your needs/expectations. Guiding a customer to the right decision can be really hard and sometimes painful. You need to convince your customer while not behaving arrogant and trying to not look like an aggressive salesman.
Similar things happens in most forums when people ask for help. But here, everybody is responding and not just professional client advisors doing their job. So you have to predict much more useless/wrong responses. And sometimes people try to give related information about similar stuff that could be or not of further interest.

And I don't get why people get upset if not every response to their thread ain't 100% useful. Instead of being glad of the free*bumb on the main page and the effort the other to write their opinion, they get pissed.
Further in times of TL;DR (too long; didn't read) where we are flooded with daily infos 24/7, it's just natural the people skip text here and there. So, sometimes responses can become ugly because someone didn't read the entire thing. We are all short in time and such things just has to happen from time to time.

[Darth Ultron]

What was the the majority of the first set of responses? you can look through here on these forums on every single 'advice/character help' thread on these forums and while there are helpful people on this site who give wonderful and insightful ideas and assistance. The majority are jerks, who basically boil down to just insulting you, your idea, your build, and other sort of things.

Well, um, welcome to reality?

Even more so: Welcome to the Internet.

Really, this has always been true. And not just online.

In life you need to grow a thick skin...and online it needs to be three times as thick.

[ngilop]

Well, um, welcome to reality?

Even more so: Welcome to the Internet.

Really, this has always been true. And not just online.

In life you need to grow a thick skin...and online it needs to be three times as thick.


You wholly and utterly missed the point. Its not about myself having thick skin. My entire point was that for the most part on this forum, and as you pointed out and totally like.. reinforced my argument., was people here are going to just be mean and do whatever they want whenever they want with absolutely no regards to what you might want, even if you give a very detailed list of exactly what you are looking for.

I do not understand your attack on my supposed 'inability to develop a thick skin' but its what I expect from the majority of this forum. You might not think I have a thick skin, but after death threats, harassment, and other such nonsense, I am still on this board and still active I do my best to help others and participate in discussion, and ain't nothing anybody has ever done on this site ever made me want to quit, might have made me saddened a great deal and perplexed at how much hate some of these forum member have on somebody who does not optimize, but I would like to think I have a thick skin, at least.. thick enough.

[lord_khaine]

You wholly and utterly missed the point. Its not about myself having thick skin. My entire point was that for the most part on this forum, and as you pointed out and totally like.. reinforced my argument., was people here are going to just be mean and do whatever they want whenever they want with absolutely no regards to what you might want, even if you give a very detailed list of exactly what you are looking for.

I do not understand your attack on my supposed 'inability to develop a thick skin' but its what I expect from the majority of this forum. You might not think I have a thick skin, but after death threats, harassment, and other such nonsense, I am still on this board and still active I do my best to help others and participate in discussion, and ain't nothing anybody has ever done on this site ever made me want to quit, might have made me saddened a great deal and perplexed at how much hate some of these forum member have on somebody who does not optimize, but I would like to think I have a thick skin, at least.. thick enough.

I do think you are the one who missed the point actually, because the lack of a thick skin does not seem like a suposed inability. But more like a fact.
Yes people are going to tell you to your face if the build you propose is inefficient compared to the standardof optimisation they play with. That is how it is in general. If you want feedback on things then you also need to be able to handle the risk of being told your build is bad.

[Eldariel]

You wholly and utterly missed the point. Its not about myself having thick skin. My entire point was that for the most part on this forum, and as you pointed out and totally like.. reinforced my argument., was people here are going to just be mean and do whatever they want whenever they want with absolutely no regards to what you might want, even if you give a very detailed list of exactly what you are looking for.

I think in most cases it's a failure in communication. There are many, many tacit background assumptions in each poster's posts and it's very hard for posters to build common ground occasionally. For example, if somebody tacitly completely rejects the idea of refluffing and requires that classes are in-game constructs as opposed to metagame constructs, most people are going to give advice not suitable for that person because they have different tacit background assumptions and thus they lack common ground for discussion.

Other common issues include:

Different assumptions about the target power level, which is further exacerbated by the whole system lacking a functional, clear, numeric scale; Tier-system + Level is the closest we have but it's completely rejected by some people and it's only suited for a very broad categorization anyways. And more about versatility than raw power anyways.
Different understanding about basic rules, or unmentioned houserules changing the whole scenario, or something of the sort. This is really quite the broad category and it makes all the difference.
Different assumptions about campaign styles. It's very different to play in a sandbox than an adventure path and it's very, very different to play with passive event-based game world and with active world with non-player parties making an impact simultaneously. Sometimes this is something the DM doesn't even inform the players of beforehand and even if they do, the players might not pass the information on.

That's off the top of my head, but the point is, it's hard to come to a good synthesis from very different background assumptions, and everyone needs a lot of tacit assumptions to make any kind of efficient communication possible.

[Nifft]

You can have a ton of fun without optimisation. However, you should try to aim for a similar level of optimisation/power within the party.

If you have three people playing high-op T1s and you decide to go for a low-op Fighter, you're not going to be able to contribute much, and it's going to be a nightmare for the DM to create challenges that don't destroy you and still challenge the optimised members.


This. It's very important to optimize your character to the same level as the rest of the group; what that level is, not so much. As long as everyone is on the same page power-wise, the DM can easily adjust challenges to match.

I agree with these two posts.

The most optimal level of optimization is more about matching the rest of your party, and also a bit about meeting the expectations of your DM.

There's also your own personal fun as a player -- if your idea of fun is taking something "weak" and optimizing it into something strong, that might be very cool, so long as you're not taking fun away from other party members, nor making your DM cry tears of salty blood.

[ExLibrisMortis]

The large variety of character building options available in D&D 3.5 (and Pathfinder), the large power/flavour/mechanical difference between options, plus the tradition of increasing the number of options with each splatbook, suggests to me that the game is--at least partly--intended to be about choosing the "right" build options ("optimization"), however those may be defined.

Looking at it from that angle, it's important to be "optimizing", because if you have no interest in picking and choosing build options, D&D and PF are going to have a lot of ballast for you, in terms of options-you're-not-looking-at-anyway, but also in terms of effort-to-get-a-character-with-interesting-mechanics-(AKA "not a WF/WS fighter")-and-a-useful-role-in-the-world (AKA "not a WF/WS fighter").

[Alcore]

Could a group work if none of them were optimized? Is it possible to play d&d 3.5 and have fun if everyone isn't trying to go all the way powerwise? For example could a full class fighter, sorcerer with dragon disciple levels, and a Druid or cleric that isn't CoDzilla play through a module and enjoy it? Or is d&is 3.5 built so only a fully optimized character can survive?

1. Yes
2. Yes
3. Yes
4. No

1 is no if DM thinks 'yes', 3 is no if anyone says 'no'. The main problem with D&D is a matter of expectations. For some level 5 is a beginner who has finally grasped basic swordsmanship, for others a level 5 is the hero of the land/kingdom who's exploits will be told for generations. The underoptimized will annoy the overpowered and vice versa.


The DM is the one making the game so four is a trick question; if you leave it to random tables it will vary from a nice walk in a forest to a meatgrinder. On the other hand if the DM uses D&D as a toolbox for his game it should be tailored to the party or the believable world. Margin of error happens. On the other hand a DM can make no better herogrinder if desired.