Barbarian issues.

[Doomboy911]

So I'm the Dm who does his best to come up with good encounters things that will challenge the party or scare them. The issue is the warforged barbarian is the strongest of the party as is to be expected, but when it comes to a battle he simply won't play along. When I give them something to run from (like to try and keep them in a village to do a plot so they can level up a little)like a tarrasque the level two barbarian decides to fight it while everyone flees. It wasn't until everyone left that he decided to play along. Also when I make a monstrous humanoid (a giant bug man) he decides to talk to it and try and befriend it. Okay talking things out I can understand that it's reasonable but not when the creature simply wants you dead. At one point the guy playing the barbarian played as the Dm making some spectacle plot while beefing up monsters so we can't kill them only follow his story he has this big mystical moment where a bunch of epic infernal spiders who are intelligent have some ritual that will destroy the world but at the last second two of the spiders (one being evil and one being good) blast all the others and fuse together and asks the party members their purpose in life. We each give an answer the guy who used to be the Dm playing as the barbarian was given an answer as to what the barbarian would say and the spider decided he was worthy and forever became his friend with wicked abilities like a massive fireball and changing his size to a small spider. He claimed that he simply wanted to use it for fast travel and that he'd only use it for that. I suppose that's fine but the moment came where the party almost finished a crawl and got outside where some driders appeared with intent to eat them and make silverware out of the warforged. Easy fight for them they could handle them and take the fancy artifact. Barbarian should be all for this I tell them roll initiative but he wants to roll for diplomacy, why? So he can talk his way out of it. They repeat they just want to eat them and repeating that they're evil it's what they do but since they won't negotiate he gets mad and tells his spider to grow to full size to intimidate them. They say they're not afraid but they'll let them go if they let the driders take the spider. I figure I can kill two birds with one stone; no more spider no more drider. No the barbarian can't let his spider go so he tells the big spider to nuke them. At this point I can't stand it knowing it'll wipe out my driders and say they're willing to trade their lives for food. They do some survive checks to round up some food and feed the driders. You can see the dilenma I'm in so how would you handle this. The barbarian is my friend so saying he's not allow is out and he won't take kindly to killing the spider off. Things have gotten to the point where I have to toughen simple things like a cell walls up just so his adamantine sword doesn't cut through it.

[linebackeru]

TL;DR. What grade are you in?

Sounds like immaturity on the barbarian's part. Nothing to do about that in-game.

[Welknair]

Wow. First off, it appears as if you rotate who's DM, am I correct? Second, why in the world did you guys let him do that to his character? That's quite unfair and unbalanced. Perhaps you and the rest of your group should have an intervention and say that he is not the focus of the entire game-world. Lastly, if a player does something incredibly stupid you can kill them. It's one of the few times you can without your players all getting mad. If he's a level 2 barbarian staring down a Tarrasque, have it step on him.

[MeeposFire]

Just a request-use paragraphs. One giant solid block of text is hard to read.

[Zeofar]

N...N...N...No.. Sorry... Just no...

You don't throw a Tarrasque at level two characters, especially to keep them somewhere. That's just railroading and it doesn't make sense. None.

I can't comment on the "giant bug man" since there really isn't enough information on that.

Why is the Barbarian playing as DM and his character in the same campaign with (apparently) permission to do anything he wants?

Why are you attached to these driders ("wipe out my driders") when you already planned that the fight would be easy? I can see the frustration that the fight is even easier ("Hey Spidey go boom-boom haha dead") with an overpowered pet, but why just not say that the bizarre sidequest with him DM'ing never happened? Don't kill the spider off; tell him that its overpowered, that he can't have it, and remove it, or let him keep it with its ridiculous abilities removed.

Why is he in a cell with a sword? Wouldn't weapons be the first thing you take off a prisoner?

I have to say, there is a lot of give-and-take on the weird scale here and I'm not sure what to think of it.

[Barbin]

I got to the 5th line, then my eyes started physically hurting. Please use paragraphs next time.

[Doc Roc]

In the words of my mentor:

Reduce him to ash.

It bears mention that my mentor's advice was really quite rarely relevant, and even more seldom helpful. Also, what do you mean the barbarian is strongest, as expected?

[Doomboy911]

N...N...N...No.. Sorry... Just no...

You don't throw a Tarrasque at level two characters, especially to keep them somewhere. That's just railroading and it doesn't make sense. None.

I can't comment on the "giant bug man" since there really isn't enough information on that.

Why is the Barbarian playing as DM and his character in the same campaign with (apparently) permission to do anything he wants?

Why are you attached to these driders ("wipe out my driders") when you already planned that the fight would be easy? I can see the frustration that the fight is even easier ("Hey Spidey go boom-boom haha dead") with an overpowered pet, but why just not say that the bizarre sidequest with him DM'ing never happened? Don't kill the spider off; tell him that its overpowered, that he can't have it, and remove it, or let him keep it with its ridiculous abilities removed.

Why is he in a cell with a sword? Wouldn't weapons be the first thing you take off a prisoner?

I have to say, there is a lot of give-and-take on the weird scale here and I'm not sure what to think of it.

Excuse me for not being as clear as I could have been. First the Tarrasque appeared as a simple reason for him to head back to the village for one short adventure. Second the prison escape came from him heading into a prison to break his friend out and thus he had a sword to do it.

Third I didn't want him using his epic spider against the driders because if I don't give him experience points for it he'll only fight him I twist his arm until he fights and if I dish out experience he'll settle all his problems that way.Also he had his barbarian still in play while he Dm'd because without him we'd be far too weak.(Our first encounter ever we only survived because he could heal).

Finally the bug man was my attempt at homebrewing something nasty within reason. I made him a giant bug to elicit a kind of fear that he was something to avoid.

One of the issues the group has is a hiearchy of power. The barbarian is the strongest and shouldn't be messed with, the only way to get him to do something is to convince him it's in his best interest. We'd do things without him but chances of survival are slim. Most things they take on he proves he's strongest by taking it down in a few hits like killing the fire elemental in one blow.

Also due to a mistake on our part they have a great deal of money from robbing a bank. So the barbarian became stronger by purchasing a magic sword an intelligent item that along with most of his character could mop the floor with the other members of the team. He's simply a powerhouse character dragging underlings around.

[slaydemons]

Hmm this guy sounds to me like a godmodder wanting to have infinte comsic power and kill everything and feel like the protaganist simply have a guy with the spell calm and calm wands when he tries to rage ingame he uses the calm rod or spell no longer raging

Spoiler

Show

Calm Emotions
Enchantment (Compulsion) [Mind-Affecting]
Level: Brd 2, Clr 2, Law 2
Components: V, S, DF
Casting Time: 1 standard action
Range: Medium (100 ft. + 10 ft./level)
Area: Creatures in a 20-ft.-radius spread
Duration: Concentration, up to 1 round/level (D)
Saving Throw: Will negates
Spell Resistance: Yes

This spell calms agitated creatures. You have no control over the affected creatures, but calm emotions can stop raging creatures from fighting or joyous ones from reveling. Creatures so affected cannot take violent actions (although they can defend themselves) or do anything destructive. Any aggressive action against or damage dealt to a calmed creature immediately breaks the spell on all calmed creatures.

This spell automatically suppresses (but does not dispel) any morale bonuses granted by spells such as bless, good hope, and rage, as well as negating a bard’s ability to inspire courage or a barbarian’s rage ability. It also suppresses any fear effects and removes the confused condition from all targets. While the spell lasts, a suppressed spell or effect has no effect. When the calm emotions spell ends, the original spell or effect takes hold of the creature again, provided that its duration has not expired in the meantime.

Edit:might not be the best idea but if he likes magic items very much give him the cursed magic item that changed alignments making him no longer a barbarian and having the spider no longer follow him and he looses almost everything and he fears going back to his previous alignment

[Crossblade]

So why didn't the Tarrasque kill the level 2 barbarian in round one?

[mobdrazhar]

it sounds as though you (and maybe the other players, still not sure on that) are not having fun in this game.

talk to him outside of the game and explain that to him and exactly why you're not having fun.

Also as DM why did you let him get an intellegent weapon? As DM you can say that there were none available for him to purchase. Remember that you have control over what is available in any given ecconomy.

[Doomboy911]

They had the advantage of the Tarrasque going last spreading out being a great distance away causing it to charge after one than changing it's mind to go after another. It started chasing after the barbarian but with no need to breath rushed into the water causing the Tarrasque to rush after the rogue who hid and going for the artificer and the druid but by than the barbarian dragged the boat back and they ditched the whole place.

[Doomboy911]

it sounds as though you (and maybe the other players, still not sure on that) are not having fun in this game.

talk to him outside of the game and explain that to him and exactly why you're not having fun.

Also as DM why did you let him get an intellegent weapon? As DM you can say that there were none available for him to purchase. Remember that you have control over what is available in any given ecconomy.

Actually he wanted a simple sword to be able to cast fireball and I figured making an intelligent item (a very righteous sword who wishes to be wielded by a knight) with a high ego score so when the barbarian goes against I can simply try to take over his mind and making him play along for a bit.

Someone provided me with the idea of humiliating him with some measely not something powerful I have the idea of him going against a kobold and pixie and with luck be able to drop them quickly than leave.

[linebackeru]

*trying to decide whether to give actual advice or to comment on the Monster of Legend being used as an assassin against a Level 2 party...did the village survive the attack?*

Ok, here goes: it seems like you often want the PCs to run away from encounters. Many players assume that the DM is balancing the encounters such that the PCs should be able to handle them.

If you really want the players to learn to run away, then give them an encounter with something innocuous-looking. This creature should actually be very tough, though, and with an intelligence high enough to be played smartly.

If the barbarian is obviously the biggest threat in the party, this enemy will target him.

By the way: if the Barbarian is the most dangerous character, what is the composition of the rest of the group?

[Doomboy911]

Well the Tarrasque was down in a hole about to come out and they decided leaping over the whole was easier than staying in the village. The party consists of a warforged barbarian, a human druid, a changeling rogue, a cleric halfing, a human wizard, and a human artificer. Without the barbarian they can't really stand a chance against anything around they're CR as of right now they're level five but since they're about to go against a bunch of animated objects a carcass crab and an aboleth they're going to level up soon.

[Eiko]

Firstly, I find it hilarious that the barbarian is outperforming the druid. The wizard I can understand as levels are low enough that casting hasn't become omgwtgbbq yet, but the druid's animal companion should be just as (if not more) combat capable than the barbarian is.

Also, beware the murder crab, that thing is far too powerful for its CR, think about whether your party can actually deal with it realisticly.

[Starbuck_II]

I don't like walls of text, let me spade this out.

So I'm the Dm who does his best to come up with good encounters things that will challenge the party or scare them. The issue is the warforged barbarian is the strongest of the party as is to be expected, but when it comes to a battle he simply won't play along.

When I give them something to run from (like to try and keep them in a village to do a plot so they can level up a little)like a tarrasque the level two barbarian decides to fight it while everyone flees. It wasn't until everyone left that he decided to play along.

Also when I make a monstrous humanoid (a giant bug man) he decides to talk to it and try and befriend it. Okay talking things out I can understand that it's reasonable but not when the creature simply wants you dead.

At one point the guy playing the barbarian played as the Dm making some spectacle plot while beefing up monsters so we can't kill them only follow his story he has this big mystical moment where a bunch of epic infernal spiders who are intelligent have some ritual that will destroy the world but at the last second two of the spiders (one being evil and one being good) blast all the others and fuse together and asks the party members their purpose in life.

We each give an answer the guy who used to be the Dm playing as the barbarian was given an answer as to what the barbarian would say and the spider decided he was worthy and forever became his friend with wicked abilities like a massive fireball and changing his size to a small spider. He claimed that he simply wanted to use it for fast travel and that he'd only use it for that.

I suppose that's fine but the moment came where the party almost finished a crawl and got outside where some driders appeared with intent to eat them and make silverware out of the warforged. Easy fight for them they could handle them and take the fancy artifact. Barbarian should be all for this I tell them roll initiative but he wants to roll for diplomacy, why? So he can talk his way out of it.

They repeat they just want to eat them and repeating that they're evil it's what they do but since they won't negotiate he gets mad and tells his spider to grow to full size to intimidate them. They say they're not afraid but they'll let them go if they let the driders take the spider. I figure I can kill two birds with one stone; no more spider no more drider.

No the barbarian can't let his spider go so he tells the big spider to nuke them. At this point I can't stand it knowing it'll wipe out my driders and say they're willing to trade their lives for food. They do some survive checks to round up some food and feed the driders.

You can see the dilenma I'm in so how would you handle this. The barbarian is my friend so saying he's not allow is out and he won't take kindly to killing the spider off. Things have gotten to the point where I have to toughen simple things like a cell walls up just so his adamantine sword doesn't cut through it.

So you dislike that Barbarian wans to parley when you want him to kill and he kills stuff when you want him to run?

[Combat Reflexes]

Simple solution: if you don't like that guy playing DM and the Warforged at the same time, ditch the warforged and tell him that he has to make his encounters easier. That's what DMs do: unoptimized party, unoptimized monsters.

That person playing the warforged barbarian is what we call here a ''Power speler'' - someone that thinks they're playing D&D in God Mode: he hoards all spotlight time and steals away the other player's shine.
As I see it, your players aren't very emancipated: they just sit and watch while mr. über robot gets all the fun. At the end of your session, ask everyone if they had fun today. If they did, great. If they didn't, nerf the warforged and his spider pet > he killed the driders? The Divine Spider Something is mad at him and smites the expanding spider.

p.s. PLEASE don't use the big T to scare low-level players. It's almost sacrilegious

[Hyfigh]

I guess I'm the only one here who doesn't care about the T. If you used it railroad so that the campaign stays on the course you wanted - as it doesn't sound like you want a sand-box, but want the sand-box feel - I don't see the issue.

The problem it seems you're imposing is that the Barbarian isn't 1) role-playing his character very well and 2) is over-powered due to items/perks that have been granted. I feel that problem 1 is partly being caused by problem 2. If you take away all his shiney toys (level two with a magic sword that can fireball and a spider familiar-type-thing that can do the same?), this shouldn't be much of an issue anymore.

It's not much surprise that a level two melee character with a magic item likely well outside of his WBL is going to outshine the party by leaps and bounds. You want to balance that? Take that crap away and knock him back down to a power-level equal to the rest of the party. As already been mentioned: the druid's animal companion alone should be showing this barbarian who's boss.

[Jornophelanthas]

You are the DM. Act like one.

- Being the DM means that you decide what the players encounter. If the PCs are level 5, and they can't handle an encounter at CR 5, then give them an easier encounter. On the other hand, if an encounter at CR 5 is too easy for them, make it harder. Challenge Ratings are guidelines. That means you don't have to follow them to the letter.

- Being the DM means that you can control what magical items players can find or buy. Don't want them to get an intelligent magical sword? Don't give it to them. You thought it would work in some way for you, but it doesn't? Then take it away. Have a thief steal the sword. Have the barbarian encounter a powerful knight (several levels higher than the PCs) who claims the sword is a family heirloom, and challenges the barbarian for it if he doesn't hand it over.
Don't like the magical spider? Make it go away. Perhaps it gets bored dealing with puny mortals. Perhaps it gets destroyed by the evil wizard you want the players to fight next month. Perhaps it falls in love with Lolth the Spider Goddess and gets eaten by her. You decide.

- Being the DM means that you get to play the enemies. If it is very clear that the barbarian is the most powerful member of the group (i.e. it kills a fire elemental with one blow), have the other enemies realize this, and let them all attack the barbarian with their most powerful abilities at once. You don't need to kill him (unless the dice happen to fall that way), but at least give him a sense that his character is not invulnerable.

- Being the DM means dealing with unexpected things your players do. A player decides to fight a Tarrasque? Fine, let the Tarrasque fight back and kill him. A player decides to negotiate with a hostile bug-creature that only wants to eat him? Fine, so the bug-thing doesn't talk back and attacks him in mid-sentence. (Make it a surprise round if you're especially cruel.)
Also, if a player has a brilliant idea that you didn't think of, make the idea work (if they can make any appropriate checks). The players try to negotiate with the powerful evil dragon you only want them to run away from, offering to serve it in exchange for their lives? Maybe that's something the dragon might actually go for. You can turn this to your advantage by making the dragon into a scheming enemy, who uses the players to further its own ends. These things have great story potential.

In short, you're the DM. Use the things you have at your disposal. And make sure everyone has an equal amount of fun. You included.

[Doomboy911]

Firstly, I find it hilarious that the barbarian is outperforming the druid. The wizard I can understand as levels are low enough that casting hasn't become omgwtgbbq yet, but the druid's animal companion should be just as (if not more) combat capable than the barbarian is.

Also, beware the murder crab, that thing is far too powerful for its CR, think about whether your party can actually deal with it realisticly.

What makes the Carcass crab so deadly?

[linebackeru]

The crab has a good grapple score and the ability to drag people into the water and drown them, if I remember correctly.

[Eiko]

crazy grapple score (+18 I believe) to start the grapple and can use both bite and claw attacks without penalty in a grapple. Combined with super AC, melee dies. Hard.

[Hyfigh]

Is it That Damn Crab that we're talking about, or another? If it is indeed this: it's CR 3, but quite possibly one of the nastiest CR 3's out there.

[Greenish]

- Being the DM means that you can control what magical items players can find or buy. Don't want them to get an intelligent magical sword? Don't give it to them. You thought it would work in some way for you, but it doesn't? Then take it away. Have a thief steal the sword. Have the barbarian encounter a powerful knight (several levels higher than the PCs) who claims the sword is a family heirloom, and challenges the barbarian for it if he doesn't hand it over.
Don't like the magical spider? Make it go away. Perhaps it gets bored dealing with puny mortals. Perhaps it gets destroyed by the evil wizard you want the players to fight next month. Perhaps it falls in love with Lolth the Spider Goddess and gets eaten by her. You decide.

I agree that the player should be made to lose these toys (they're ridiculous!), but I feel it'd be better to first explain out-of-character how these things were making the game less fun for other players, and figure out with the player how to get rid of them.

[HunterOfJello]

The Barbarian sounds like he's playing his character as he deems fit, which is perfectly fine in my eyes. A character with low mental stats is likely to try diplomacy at the wrong times and fighting at the wrong times.

However, if you're going to rotate DMs for the same campaign, then you need to set up agreed upon rules about that week's DM giving their own character extra powers, abilities, items and followers. Giving yourself a Spider just because you can would be a very annoying problem for a DMPC. To do that with a PC is completely unacceptable.

[big teej]

for those taking issue with "the barbarian is the most powerful"

from what I've read so far (not the whole thread yet, I'm working on it)

it seems to me that this group is just starting out

as someone who has played a barbarian (with really good stats) in a party just starting out

they can indeed, utterly dominate the game. regardless of composition*

that is all I have to offer for now.
this will likely be edited after I finish reading.


*provided there are no casters, in my experience new groups avoid these as well.


party is not low level, my post is obsolete.

in a sense.

that barbarian of mine continues to dominate anything a DM throws at it. but I digress.

[Doomboy911]

http://eberronunlimited.wikidot.com/carcass-crab This is the crab. With it's abilities it shouldn't be a challenge for the barbarian it has poison and can drag them underwarter but the warforged is poison proof and has no need to breath.

[linebackeru]

If a level 5 barbarian can solo a CR 8 creature, he must be pretty well-optimized.

[Jornophelanthas]

http://eberronunlimited.wikidot.com/carcass-crab This is the crab. With it's abilities it shouldn't be a challenge for the barbarian it has poison and can drag them underwarter but the warforged is poison proof and has no need to breath.

If you don't like it that the barbarian is more powerful than the rest of the group, and you want to challenge the barbarian, why do you let them fight a monster that is deadly to everyone except the barbarian?

Why don't you let them fight something with spells or abilities that require Will saves? For example, if the barbarian is trying to negotiate with something you want him to fight, let them cast Touch of Idiocy or Tasha's Hideous Laughter on him. Outside of rage, his Will save will probably not be all that impressive.