DMing a Gestalt Campaign: seeking suggestions

[Fiery Diamond]

Hey all. I'm planning to DM a gestalt campaign soon (I'll have either 3 or 4 players, I'm not sure yet. I've done a gestalt with 2 players, but it didn't last long because players were otherwise committed. This is my first full-party gestalt campaign.) and I was wondering if my fellow forumites had any advice or suggestions on what should/should not be done differently than running a non-gestalt campaign.

I am limiting the gestalt combinations that are available to the players to a number of thematic combos. I'm allowing the following gestalt combos (I have no idea which ones players will pick):

Ftr/Bbn [aka Berserker]
Ftr/Pal [aka Paladin]
Clr/Pal [aka Holy Knight]
Ftr/Clr [aka Cleric]
Brd/Rog [aka Artist]
Sor/Rog [aka Nimble Mage]
Drd/Rgr [aka Naturalist] (no non-metal restriction)
Rgr/Rog [aka Hunter]
Sor/Pal [aka Arcane Knight]
Drd/Clr [aka Sage] (yes non-metal restriction, possibly limiting wildshape)
Brd/Bbn [aka Dirgist]
Drd/Bbn [aka Nature's Wrath]
Ftr/Rgr [aka Slayer]
Sor/Ftr [aka Fighting Mage]

And also allowing "improved" versions of two classes in place of gestalt:

Superior Bard [aka Musician] (as normal, but double spells/day and 1.5x spells known)
Superior Sorcerer [aka Sorcerer] (as normal, but 1.5x spells/day and double spells known)

The following classes are not allowed for setting reasons:

Wizard (only NPC class)
Monk (doesn't exist in the setting)

So, ideas for what to do/not to do differently from a "normal" campaign?

edit: This is core and homebrew only.

[PinkysBrain]

Ftr/Bbn [aka Berserker]
Trash, underperformer who you will have to shower with magic items.

Ftr/Pal [aka Paladin]
Trash, underperformer who you will have to shower with magic items.

Clr/Pal [aka Holy Knight]
Pretty good

Ftr/Clr [aka Cleric]
Will make the trash melee look incredibly bad.

Brd/Rog [aka Artist]
Pretty good, but for smart players

Sor/Rog [aka Nimble Mage]
Pretty good

Drd/Rgr [aka Naturalist] (no non-metal restriction)
Will make the trash melee look incredibly bad

Rgr/Rog [aka Hunter]
Might be okay with non core spells, otherwise a bit meh

Sor/Pal [aka Arcane Knight]
Pretty good

Drd/Clr [aka Sage] (yes non-metal restriction, possibly limiting wildshape)
Will make the trash melee look incredibly bad

Brd/Bbn [aka Dirgist]
Trash

Drd/Bbn [aka Nature's Wrath]
Pretty good, but should rarely rage ... and will still make the trash melee look incredibly bad

Ftr/Rgr [aka Slayer]
Might be okay with non core spells, trash otherwise

Sor/Ftr [aka Fighting Mage]
Pretty good

That's a rather wide power spread in characters you allow ... you can make up the difference with freebies such as cohorts, free templates, monty haul loot and all the other things DMs pull out of the hat to make everyone keep up with the casters ... but in gestalt you really shouldn't have too. Everybody is supposed to be good in gestalt, which means everyone should have some magic in gestalt.

[Fiery Diamond]

[Sarcasm] Thanks for your extremely helpful advice! [/Sarcasm]

Seriously, that was only to give an idea of what kinds of gestalt potential there was, not for you to make judgments on what I'd decided to allow. Besides, I'm DMing with people who are fairly new to D&D. I'm not DMing for munchkins or minmaxers or forumites. I am perfectly capable of running a campaign where the Cleric, Sorcerer, and Rogue all have great opportunity to shine and enjoy themselves in a regular campaign. I have never had issues with people trying to or even accidentally breaking the game.

In other words, if you don't have something constructive and in response to the actual question asked, then don't say anything. The paragraph at the end is the only relevant part of your post.

[Myou]

I advise against limiting the clase used, there's really no need, especially if the players aren't optimisers. You're just taking out the fun of making your own combinations. (And excluding a lot of classes/combos.)

That aside, make encounters 1 or 2 cr higher (or treat them a 1-2 levels higher) and give a few extra encounters a day.

[Stycotl]

i actually agree with both of them. i don't think that pinky's evaluation was invalid at all; if you dismiss his/her opinion out of hand like that, you are gearing yourself up to miss out on some good points.

i don't really see any need to create gestalt archetypes that the players have to fit into. even if they are brand spanking newbies, part of the fun of the game is to dream up a concept and then put it together. it helps players take ownership of the game and decide to make it work.

further, even in a normal game, melee purists are always overshadowed by casters. some of your gestalt templates are very unbalanced–even more so than the normal, nongestalt game–simply because of the fact that they get to take two classes. anyone that takes two melee classes instead of at least one full caster class is going to be ridiculously underpowered compared to the others.

that is still an issue that we can accept and deal with here–in order to play the game at any level you have to learn to deal with it. but when you prepackage them into unbalanced templates, it seems like you are setting yourself up for a headache.

you asked for "advice or suggestions." no one has been harsh or overly critical. you don't have to agree, but to just dismiss it without a second thought shows that you really aren't looking for advice and suggestions after all.

[Elfin]

you asked for "advice or suggestions." no one has been harsh or overly critical. you don't have to agree, but to just dismiss it without a second thought shows that you really aren't looking for advice and suggestions after all.

Agreed. That seemed pretty uncalled for.

On topic: For my part I'd say that if you're playing with non-optimizers, there's no need to be overtly worried. I'd advise, as suggested above, that you don't restrict the combos available to your players; they'll probably enjoy the fun of making their own. Other than that, though, just increase the number of encounters power day by 50% or so, and you should be fine.

[quick_comment]

The balance of the classes is way out of whack.

Superior sorcerer and sorcerer/paladin are probably the most powerful, and then at the other end you have fighter/barbarian, which is barely more capable than a regular fighter.

[sonofzeal]

[Sarcasm] Thanks for your extremely helpful advice! [/Sarcasm]

Dude had a point - some of your options were crazy-good (Druid + full-BAB), while others were hardly better than a non-gestalt character (Fighter + full-BAB). You should really watch out for that. We're not talking about "characters that break the game", we're talking about "characters that will massively outperform their kin with little to no effort". That's bad, and if I were you I'd be setting up my options to reduce that.


Also, why is Monk banned? It's a horrible class by itself, but is very useful for Gestalt. Anyway, here's some more options...

Ftr/Rog (Thug)
Ftr/Mnk (Samurai; I'd let Weapon Focus add the weapon in question to the Monk Weapon list for the purpose of Flurry and whatnot. No houserule necessary for armor, it's already a viable choice either way)
Bbn/Mnk (Feral for chaotic, Tiger Form for lawful; nix alignment restrictions)
Rgr/Mnk (Shaman)


I'd also like to mix in some occasional classes outside of core, watching out for simplicity and usefulness. It always pays to encourage a little openmindedness in players, and non-Core stuff is usually more balanced anyway.


Warlock
Wlk/Mnk (Demon Form)
Wlk/Ftr (Helligan)
Wlk/Sor (Infernomancer)
Wlk/Rog (Corrupter)


Factotum (limit Font of Inspiration feat to three times max)
Fac/Mnk (Monkey Form; recommend Carmendine Monk feat)
Fac/Ftr (Tactician)
Fac/Sor (Dalliant; Dilettante also works, and matches the class feature)
Fac/Rog (Shadow)

Swashbuckler
Swa/Rog (Ne'erdowell; ban Daring Outlaw feat)
Swa/Mnk (Cobra Form; recommend Carmendine Monk feat)
Swa/Fac (Acrobat)
Swa/Ftr (Duelist; this one's particularly weak though, might want to give Int-to-AC as a bonus)

[quick_comment]

Speak of gestalt, has anyone ever run a campaign where you can only access one side at a time, and switching sets of abilities as a swift or move action?

[sonofzeal]

Speak of gestalt, has anyone ever run a campaign where you can only access one side at a time, and switching sets of abilities as a swift or move action?

No, but it sounds like an odd idea. You'd basically have to keep two character sheets, yes? What would be the in-game justification for this?

[Fiery Diamond]

no one has been harsh or overly critical.

Maybe I'm just overly sensitive (I've been told that before), but the word "trash" is certainly harsh. Saying anything is "trash" is overly critical. Even saying that having a monk in an all-casting group is trash is uncalled for.

That said, I did overreact. For that I apologize.

[sonofzeal]

Maybe I'm just overly sensitive (I've been told that before), but the word "trash" is certainly harsh. Saying anything is "trash" is overly critical. Even saying that having a monk in an all-casting group is trash is uncalled for.

That said, I did overreact. For that I apologize.

Eh, it was rather untactful of him. I mean, it's not your fault some combinations are "trash", it's a problem of the game designers not balancing their system very well. Still, choosing that option for your limited list implies that you approve of it, and having Ftr/Bbn sitting next to Drd/Clr is... dubious at best. He had a point, but he was rather aggressive in pointing it out, and I might have taken offence as well.

Anyway, what do you think of the options I laid out? Was that what you were looking for?

[Wings of Peace]

I think you're worrying too much by limiting character class combinations. Requiring they have an in character explanation for what they're classing as would certainly not hurt rp but mechanically you just need to think of Gestalt as the character's going super Saiyan. Once Goku went Super Saiyan the story line didn't end, sure he was the most powerful person in the universe for a few minutes. But then all of a sudden the universe got stronger.

The same can be done in your universe. You can just increase the level of power possessed by npcs or you could use the player's higher levels of power as the chance to press them into more epic adventures at an earlier level and still survive. It's entirely up to you. I personally would favor stronger foes to drastically increasing the number of foes though mind you. Even if the players are Super Saiyan they still only get one turn each for the most part which makes a huge difference in combat.

[OutlawJT]

Ftr/Bbn [aka Berserker]
Trash, underperformer who you will have to shower with magic items.

You've never played a barbarian before, have you? A barbarian built right (really easy to do with all those fighter feats) can put to shame damage-wise in melee all those other combinations you said made this combo look like trash (except the drd/bbn combo because wild shape plus rage for the win). You should research what you're talking about before calling it trash. Oh, and you don't need all that much magic item wise to rack up the massive damage either. You just have to build it the right way.

[quick_comment]

No, but it sounds like an odd idea. You'd basically have to keep two character sheets, yes? What would be the in-game justification for this?

There could be plenty of ways to do this. Warforged with modular power crystals. Divine interference (ie, the team of mundane characters can call on Pelor to transform them into clerics or favored souls or something). It could be something only accessible when you are low on HP (so when the fighter is being beaten, he starts drawing on the forbidden techniques of his school and becomes a warblade). It could be a simple Im wielding a sword/Im holding my magic staff thing.

[DragoonWraith]

You've never played a barbarian before, have you? A barbarian built right (really easy to do with all those fighter feats) can put to shame damage-wise in melee all those other combinations you said made this combo look like trash (except the drd/bbn combo because wild shape plus rage for the win). You should research what you're talking about before calling it trash. Oh, and you don't need all that much magic item wise to rack up the massive damage either. You just have to build it the right way.

A. Damage is not that important. So your point is... somewhat pointless.

B. This is gestalt. The combination of Fighter and Barbarian offers very little compared to just straight Barbarian. Since it's only moderately more powerful than just a single-class Barbarian, it's trash compared to almost any other gestalt (sorry, OP, I know you already took offense to that designation, but honestly, it is and that's not your fault, it's 3.5's), especially any that are full-BAB//full-casting.

[woodenbandman]

A Barbarian will outdamage things, but in gestalt if you don't have a lot of support that will allow you to continually charge (and a good DM will discourage uberchargers that do hundreds of damage per swing with any number of tricks like pit traps, difficult terrain, mooks in the way, flying baddies, fatigue, exhaustion, nausea, dazing, stunning, entangling, or slowing) you will die to pieces when an enemy looks at you and says "make a will save," unless you shore up your will save by spending 4 feats to do so (protip: It's a good idea.)

Also this is a comparison that is subjective and relative to the combinations with spells and ridiculous abilities. A druid/barbarian is wayyyyyyyy stronger than a fighter/barbarian. In fact, I'd bet on straight druid vs Fighter//barbarian every time. And the druid would be 5 levels lower, and I would still bet the druid.

[sonofzeal]

A. Damage is not that important. So your point is... somewhat pointless.

B. This is gestalt. The combination of Fighter and Barbarian offers very little compared to just straight Barbarian. Since it's only moderately more powerful than just a single-class Barbarian, it's trash compared to almost any other gestalt (sorry, OP, I know you already took offense to that designation, but honestly, it is and that's not your fault, it's 3.5's), especially any that are full-BAB//full-casting.

A) Damage is fine. I mean, yeah, a Wizard has better things to do, but it's just fine for a Barbarian/Fighter. Don't underrate damage; it's usually more reliable than SoL effects, and a good Barbarian can kill most things in a couple rounds anyway. The difficulty is getting your sword into them in the first place, but that's a different issue.

b) Entirely agreed. It's not that it's bad, just that it's pretty useless relative to what Gestalt is supposed to be.

[quick_comment]

Barbarian/Martial Rogue Variant is better in every single way. It has the same feats, but a better reflex save and better skill points.

[DragoonWraith]

A) Damage is fine. I mean, yeah, a Wizard has better things to do, but it's just fine for a Barbarian/Fighter. Don't underrate damage; it's usually more reliable than SoL effects, and a good Barbarian can kill most things in a couple rounds anyway. The difficulty is getting your sword into them in the first place, but that's a different issue.

Yes, well, mostly what I meant is that having very high levels of damage is pointless. There are seriously diminishing returns on damage - if you invest in it too much, you're looking at being unable to reach things, which is what I was getting at. Sure, Barbarians have great damage, but that's not enough. Less damage but better ability to attack competently against a wider variety of enemies is much superior.

[OutlawJT]

A. Damage is not that important. So your point is... somewhat pointless.

B. This is gestalt. The combination of Fighter and Barbarian offers very little compared to just straight Barbarian. Since it's only moderately more powerful than just a single-class Barbarian, it's trash compared to almost any other gestalt (sorry, OP, I know you already took offense to that designation, but honestly, it is and that's not your fault, it's 3.5's), especially any that are full-BAB//full-casting.

Are you kidding me? A barbarian can gain a veritable ton of benefit from all those fighter feats. Between Complete Warrior and PHB2 alone all those fighter feats are going to make the bbn/ftr a lot more useful and powerful. Just because the combination isn't uber-munchkin enough to maximize the BAB and save bonuses between the two classes doesn't make the combination trash in the slightest!

And since when is damage not that important? I agree a number of spells which focus more on effects than damage are slightly more important but damage ALWAYS matters. When your bbn/ftr is doing enough damage to call for a massive damage save every time it hits I'd say that's pretty important. When it can one shot just about anything that's not a dragon, I'd say that's pretty important.

A gestalt combination doesn't have to be power-gaming maximized to be very powerful, very useful, and very viable by comparison to the combo's you say aren't trash!!

[OutlawJT]

Barbarian/Martial Rogue Variant is better in every single way. It has the same feats, but a better reflex save and better skill points.

This I would agree to completely but the OP didn't list the martial rogue as an option for gestalt.

[OutlawJT]

Yes, well, mostly what I meant is that having very high levels of damage is pointless. There are seriously diminishing returns on damage - if you invest in it too much, you're looking at being unable to reach things, which is what I was getting at. Sure, Barbarians have great damage, but that's not enough. Less damage but better ability to attack competently against a wider variety of enemies is much superior.

Where do you think half those fighter feats are going? Bbn/ftr not only has all the damage but can work it's way to being able to competently attack against that wider variety of enemies you're talking about.

[Kaiyanwang]

Fighter // Barbarian makes the barbarian finish off the charge feat chain at level 8. If this seem trash, means that people are not able to combine feat chains. Period. And the whole "fighter suxx" thing seems to suggest this.

I've to admit that since the game is core only, the fighter will bring LESS, but a + 5/ 10% to hit ADDED to the rage, or taking core grapple feats quickly (high strenght score) will bring additional maneuvers.

If the player feel limited, try to "expand" core with SRD. Knocking people down while raging should be fun and in character.

OP: my advice are: don't limit player choice UNLESS the combo is way too powerful or does not makes sense in your campaign. In that case, talk friendly with the player and try to reach an agreement, maybe refluffing if needed.

Make the CR count 1 less like suggested in UA, but watch out: they suggest to lessen the CR of the save or suck creatures by 2, because they expect that people will find combos to raise at max their save. Ignore the rule of "less of 2" the party don't optimize in this way (keep the "less of 1" of course).

Don't expect your players will finish their spell so often. It's doable, but does not happen frequently.

Try the effective power of the party by attempts: the first encounters of the first levels, use more weaker enemies to see how they react.

If other comes in my mind, I will post it later.

[OutlawJT]

I did not see that the OP had edited it to say core/homebrew only. That greatly reduces the point of playing the bbn/ftr gestalt. It's still worth it for the early levels but eventually they'd want to branch out of fighter into something else (ranger or druid most likely).

As to a DM suggestion for dealing with a gestalt party..... One idea an old group of mine used; instead of changing the encounters at all from the way you'd run against a non-gestalt party just maximize the hit points of all your monsters. I have to say that with the exception of a couple of encounters that little trick worked to keep an entire 17 level campaign fairly balanced and appropriately challenging.

[Kaiyanwang]

As to a DM suggestion for dealing with a gestalt party..... One idea an old group of mine used; instead of changing the encounters at all from the way you'd run against a non-gestalt party just maximize the hit points of all your monsters. I have to say that with the exception of a couple of encounters that little trick worked to keep an entire 17 level campaign fairly balanced and appropriately challenging.

Interesting.

With mine, I managed to increase slightly the number of monsters, exspecially mixing 1-2 big and mean, and a bunch of weak, focusing not so much on durability (see above) but on their weak side: action economy (this is a problem of the "few but big" too, so little one help).

[Everyman]

As someone who ran a gestalt campaign for over a year, I can say there are some challenges that you'll need to address. I'll try and not bog you down with too much text though...

A) New players.
How new are we talking about? If these are still green the system, you might want to think twice about introducing gestalt to the game. Mostly this stems from being unable to gauge whether a given encounter or challenge is within their ability to take on. For example, a Pal/Cleric, due to a wonderful mix of saves, good HD, perfect BAB, bonuses to saves, AND full casting is able to challenge beasties a good CR one or two higher than what is normally expected. Conversely, that Fighter/Barb is pretty much in the same tier he started in, since he has so many overlapping features. Don't be surprised if one player gets a little frustrated that his combination doesn't have the same "umph" as another, then said character fails because he thought he could keep up with uber-character at a given challenge. I've seen this happen, and it can make for some tension between players. Speaking of which, that leads me to Point B.

B) Class Combinations.
It's good that you're trying to set up combinations for the players. It makes things easy for the newbies, and sets the expectations your players will use in gauging what kind of NPCs they'll encounter. However, you might want to think about your combinations a bit (this was touched by Pinky and everyone else). In gestalt, the most effective combinations use what I call dynamic and passive classes. Dynamic classes are those with abilities that require an active choice by the player, such as casting classes, barbarians (rage) or paladins (smite). Passive classes have abilities that work automatically (no actions needed), such as rogue (sneak attack) or ranger (favored enemy). Also, good combinations do not overlap with one another. The reason that the Barb/Fighter is so weak in comparison is that very little is gained by combining them. From the fighter's standpoint, he gains two extra skills (neither class is exactly skill intensive), a slightly large HD, and rage/DR. That's pretty much it. The Paladin/Cleric is much better. From the cleric's standpoint, he gets a better HD, full BAB, a bonus to his saving throws, smite, a mount, extra healing IN ADDITION to the features of a tier one class. By all means, keep you combinations, but you might consider giving those with overlapping features (like your Barb/Fighter) something a bit extra (increase the DR and number of rages per day, for example). I'll attach my list of dynamic and passive classes at then end, for your own reference.

C) Multiclassing
Since these players are new, I'll be frank...DO. NOT. ALLOW. MULTICLASSING. Make that clear in the beginning. The more multiclassing is done, the harder it becomes to track who can do what, with X save and Y class feature. Its an unholy mess, and there is no real attention given in the official rules on how to handle multiclassing anyway.

D) Races
Keep it simple: No LA races for a group with new players. LA was not designed with gestalt in mind, and many choices that might be balanced in normal player (vampires come to mind) can be overwhelming in gestalt play. Again, LA isn't given any attention in the SRD.

E) Encounters.
Your players are going to be tough. Much tougher than CRs would suggest. Don't send singular enemies at them. The party will tear them apart. Instead, enemies need to be in groups. If that doesn't happen, then singular enemies need max HP. Traps should be considered a CR lower than normal. You'll need a little trial-and-error to get things right with your group.

F) Treasure.
Since the double-class features should (in theory) cover many weaknesses, don't worry about increasing WBL. Give'em the normal amount of gold, and let them choose what abilities they wish to support with equipment.

ATTACHMENT
*Highly Dynamic Classes: Bard, Cleric, Druid (use shapeshift variant from PHB2 if possible), Sorcerer, Wizard (of course, this is NPC-only in your setting, so no worries)

*Slightly Dynamic Classes: Barbarian (does not play well with the dynamic classes, since rage doesn't mix well), Paladin, Monk (Oddly, monks work very well in gestalt, though they are not in your setting now)

*Slightly Passive Classes: Ranger (though they do get some dynamic choices with their limited spells)

*Highly Passive Classes: Rogue, Fighter

[Myrmex]

A. Damage is not that important. So your point is... somewhat pointless.

Pinky's criticism was all in the supposed guise of comparing a bunch of melee to other melee at how good they are at melee, but it looked surprisingly more like caster-fap.

In terms of melee, cleric//druid & barbarian//fighter are awfully close in damage potential. Cleric//druid just gets a lot more of things not related to melee that makes them good. Assuming no DMM:Persist in play, doubling up your spells just means you can hulk out for 4 fights instead of 2. Twice as many spells doesn't mean 2x the actions. So while Mr. Imabear is busy casting his spells, Dr. Rage has just killed 3 dudes. The real power for cleric//druid that barb//ftr can't match are the battlefield control spells & utility spells/effects like freedom of movement or turning into a giant eagle.

[DragoonWraith]

Are you kidding me? A barbarian can gain a veritable ton of benefit from all those fighter feats. Between Complete Warrior and PHB2 alone all those fighter feats are going to make the bbn/ftr a lot more useful and powerful. Just because the combination isn't uber-munchkin enough to maximize the BAB and save bonuses between the two classes doesn't make the combination trash in the slightest!

And since when is damage not that important? I agree a number of spells which focus more on effects than damage are slightly more important but damage ALWAYS matters. When your bbn/ftr is doing enough damage to call for a massive damage save every time it hits I'd say that's pretty important. When it can one shot just about anything that's not a dragon, I'd say that's pretty important.

A gestalt combination doesn't have to be power-gaming maximized to be very powerful, very useful, and very viable by comparison to the combo's you say aren't trash!!

You're taking this very personally. I apologize if I've offended you, but I'm frankly bewildered by your response.

[PinkysBrain]

barbarian//fighter are awfully close in damage potential.

I'd throw it to the Barbarian//Fighter with some decent buffing, or when the cleric isn't buffed, although he will need polymorph once huge wildshape kicks in (combines nicely with righteous might).

That's not really the point though ... being able to get close at all at the same time when you can do SNA+Animal Growth AND throw around AoE damage AND SoS/SoD AND AND is what makes the melee cry. "Oh you have a trick too? How cute, wait a sec ... hey now I can do it too, how very special".