Crazy strong fighter (archer) on lvl 12 - Homebrew rules!

[Hardy911]

Hey Folks,

one of my players came up with a character concept that is insanely strong in my eyes. He plays an elven archer that is a lvl 12 fighter. So far so good, nothing out of the ordinary. We're playing with a list of additional feats from the humble bundle package which has some nice material in it. I definitely missed the 3.5 feats and that pdf I got has 150 feats which partly come from old version and have been conversed into 5e.

Concerning Character Building:

One of those feats is Rapid shot = bonus action gives you another ranged attack and Manyshot = you make a ranged attack, you make another ranged attack --> we limited to one extra attack/attack action (otherwise you'd get an infinite amount of attacks) and Weapon Specialization that gives you +2 damage on one weapon.

So all in all, the fighter can do 10 attacks/short rest (using action surge) on lvl 12. That is quite ****ing nuts and I find it hard to accept, because a wizard would run out of spells while the archer just keeps firing with a potential 1d8 + 8/attack? Holy Molly...


Concerning Magic Items:

Further, he has an Oathbow, so all attacks against a sworn enemy get 3d6 extra damage. Nice. That makes 1d8 +4 dex + 2 archery + 2 weapon specialization + 3d6. Let's just say the young shadow dragon lived for less than 6 seconds after combat started.

Now how did he get this? Well this is now as homebrewn as it gets. What we did was the following: We got the Sane Magic Items prices and decided to move away from the rarity/tiers of the game system. We averaged out average gold cost for the items given in the table and decided to give each player 20k cash (playing with the 3.5 Eberron setting, we want it high magic), since the prices in the sane magic items list are based on their effect on the game. Now I have that crazy Archer with a gazillion attacks using features and oh I almost forgot - the Paladin has AC 25 (+1 full plate, +1 shield + 1 ring + 1 cloak, gg)

Any thoughts on this? Does it also feel imbalanced to you guys? I'm considering ****ing the Archer over with invisibility attacks and the Paladin will get some AoE damage, since his dex is ****. But still...

[Hardy911]

One thing that I just realized is: Bounded Accuracy. The Paladin is gamebreaking. Yay

But seriously is there any way to use a lot of magic items within the limits of bounded accuracy? What is the fun of DnD when you don't get good items :(

[Helldin87]

Sounds like you just need to adjust the CR of your encounters a bit more? Its hard to balance players feeling badass because lets face it the combo you allowed to form is BADASS. Are all the players at your table the same way? Is everyone min maxed? Perhaps encounters that would be suicidal/deadly if fought but have a social solution are in order?

Also you can reduce the archer's efficiency by forcing him into 5ft range so he has disadvantage on his attacks. Enemies can also try disarming tactics (how badass is he WITHOUT that bow)

The paladin is a tough one (haha dad jokes). High AC is high AC no matter how you (try to) slice it. Spells that attack his stats are your best bet. I assume he dumped INT (because hes a pally and thats what they do) so try for spells that force an INT save? Phantasmal Force can result in some hilarious falls and other gags. Enemies abound from XGtE takes that super-high AC and makes it a liability (he gets to save again when hes hit by an attack)

Just thoughts. Most PCs have a weakness. If they get too good at one thing then throw down the thing they are not so good at. Don't do it to be mean, but maybe just open their eyes that not everything needs to be solved by turning it into a pincushion.

Good Luck!

[Hardy911]

Sounds like you just need to adjust the CR of your encounters a bit more? Its hard to balance players feeling badass because lets face it the combo you allowed to form is BADASS. Are all the players at your table the same way? Is everyone min maxed? Perhaps encounters that would be suicidal/deadly if fought but have a social solution are in order?

Also you can reduce the archer's efficiency by forcing him into 5ft range so he has disadvantage on his attacks. Enemies can also try disarming tactics (how badass is he WITHOUT that bow)

The paladin is a tough one (haha dad jokes). High AC is high AC no matter how you (try to) slice it. Spells that attack his stats are your best bet. I assume he dumped INT (because hes a pally and thats what they do) so try for spells that force an INT save? Phantasmal Force can result in some hilarious falls and other gags. Enemies abound from XGtE takes that super-high AC and makes it a liability (he gets to save again when hes hit by an attack)

Just thoughts. Most PCs have a weakness. If they get too good at one thing then throw down the thing they are not so good at. Don't do it to be mean, but maybe just open their eyes that not everything needs to be solved by turning it into a pincushion.

Good Luck!

I know what you're talking about and the group is pretty much overall a high power group. Doing the math, I end up with a deadly encounter of a hangmans tree CR8 and 12 Minotaur Skeletons fpr 5 players of lvl 12 to be deadly. Seriously enough, the enounter was very hard with 3 players down to 20 HPs and the rogue at least severely wounded. The cleric was almost eaten by the tree, which would have easily killed the group in the long run (story-based, the need the cleric real bad). I also figured that I will focus the paladin with aoe damage and will try to take out the archer with disarm (GREAT idea) and will make monsters strongerin general.
My issue is that many of the things I allow mess up the bounded accuracy so I am considering cranking up AC and att bon by 2 to even out things. I understand that 5e is not supposed to be an arms race but that's what we as a group want to have. So why not make monsters tougher based on tier of the game?

[Corran]

We're playing with a list of additional feats from the humble bundle package which has some nice material in it.
[snip]
Does it also feel imbalanced to you guys? I'm considering ****ing the Archer over with invisibility attacks and the Paladin will get some AoE damage, since his dex is ****. But still...
Yeah, this feat is wildly imbalanced when you compare it with published stuff (heck, even when you compare it with UA stuff). But is it imbalanced compared to rest of the homebrew stuff you are allowing? That we don't know. So nerfing the archer specifically might actually be a bad idea, at least as far as balance between classes and pc's goes.

[Rolero]

No ofense, but you reap what you sow.

IMO D&D 5e has done a pretty good job balancing the game and the combat system. Of course, there are still powerful builds and a lot of cheese out there, but without breaking the game (most of the times).

The problem with added homebrew material is that it generally throws balance out the window. The combo you describe is broken alright. Forget action surge, having 5 shots per round without expending any resource is too powerful. So, of course, any big baddy you put before him is goint to die a lot in seconds.

If you are looking for advise on how to make a challenge for this guy (not counting the rest of his party) the only way —as some already said— is to make every encounter deadly, or look for enemies that come with specific defenses against them.

[Rukelnikov]

If you are allowing a lot of Homebrew, no PHB+1, handing out a lot of magic items... Yeah, PCs will be far more powerful than the system was built for. A relatively simple solution, is to add proficiency to AC to every creature in the MM. I did it in a similar scenario and it made encounters much more even.

[Helldin87]

I know what you're talking about and the group is pretty much overall a high power group. Doing the math, I end up with a deadly encounter of a hangmans tree CR8 and 12 Minotaur Skeletons fpr 5 players of lvl 12 to be deadly. Seriously enough, the enounter was very hard with 3 players down to 20 HPs and the rogue at least severely wounded. The cleric was almost eaten by the tree, which would have easily killed the group in the long run (story-based, the need the cleric real bad). I also figured that I will focus the paladin with aoe damage and will try to take out the archer with disarm (GREAT idea) and will make monsters strongerin general.
My issue is that many of the things I allow mess up the bounded accuracy so I am considering cranking up AC and att bon by 2 to even out things. I understand that 5e is not supposed to be an arms race but that's what we as a group want to have. So why not make monsters tougher based on tier of the game?

I think what I and others have said is that in this case it is not a mechanical flaw in 5e (lots of those abound in other places) but it's a direct consequence of allowing what is effectively homebrew and a surplus of magical items. Meddling to fix meddling is always a choice (increasing opponent AC is one example of this). Alternatively you could find an expedient way to end the campaign and do something new. Understand and learn from what could be described as a mistake in balancing and disallow some of that extra content in the future. Keeping it to official content with rules like PHB+1 will decrease your headaches. If you allow lots of stuff expect lots of complications.

[Malifice]

One thing that I just realized is: Bounded Accuracy. The Paladin is gamebreaking. Yay

But seriously is there any way to use a lot of magic items within the limits of bounded accuracy? What is the fun of DnD when you don't get good items :(

Yeah; allow items from a fixed list.

You're allowing a while lot of homebrew **** and magic mart and wondering why things are going nuts.

You're the DM. You seem to he happy to allow this stuff in, yet unhappy with the consequences.

So why are you letting it in?

[Avonar]

I mean this stuff doesn't happen by accident. The paladin especially, you have to allow all those items to be found and purchased, so the 25AC is directly your fault as the DM.

If you don't like how powerful some or all of the characters have become, then talk to the players about reducing power level. That's the best way to do it outside of just nerfing the character out of the blue.

For homebrew, I recommend always getting the players to clear the homebrew things they are using with you.