Build Optimization--Unfair? Nonsensical? Unrealistic?

[EndgamerAzari]

I've been playing D&D for a few years now, and there's something I've noticed: no matter how good or bad the DM, no matter how plotless or in-depth the campaign, no matter who else is playing.... my characters are always the weakest, deal the least damage and hit the least, have the worst saves, have no useful class abilities, and are borderline useless. I know I've whined about this before in the "Help me kill my party!" thread, but something dawned on me last night:

Build optimization. It makes no sense from an in-game perspective. I know that the characters would obviously strive to better themselves at what they do best, but when does it get ridiculous? It's borderline powergaming! When the DM has to throw monsters of a challenge rating of nearly ten higher than your actually average party level, is it going too far? I know there's a thread going on about whether the Tome of Battle is overpowered, and I don't want this thread to turn into that (despite being the only one who owns the book among my friends, I have yet to create a character from it). But I know people who plan all twenty levels of their characters out before they even start playing! Where's the fun--or sense-- in that? Despite the fact that these characters wouldn't be able to adapt to the campaign, they seem to do quite well in viciously overshadowing anything I put together.

Maybe it's just poor planning on my part, or just poor taste in classes. But does anyone see this as a genuine threat to the whole point of the game?

[Tokiko Mima]

It's just a different style of playing. Frankly, the way Feats and class abilities build on each other, unless you plan ahead you'll always end up fairly suboptimal. Maybe that's what you're experiencing?

In any case, you have to accept that some players will plan what they want their characters to be before they start, and other players will not. The ones that plan ahead usually have a much more narrow focus, and do better because they have already adapted their character to fill your campaign. The ones that don't plan ahead generally have a broader focus and thus are not as powerful in the specific scenarios you prevent.

Example: I'm running a Ravenloft campaign. One character I'll get from a player that plans ahead will be a cleric of Pelor, the other will be a rogue. They're both useful classes, but the cleric is going to be a lot more useful because he/she is well suited to a campaign full of undead. The rogue is a great class overall, but isn't as effective on crit-immune monsters.

The point here is that players choices drive this: The planner didn't really need to be a cleric, but decided that this based on your choice of setting. The non-planner picked what he liked to play, and accepts that this might cause him difficulty. In fact, the non-planner might even enjoy this.

The only way to counter this is to force players to create a build path before they even start, and that's not really fair to either playstyle. What works best for me, as someone that enjoy planning out a build for a character, is offering help to players in creating their characters, and dropping as many suggestions as possible, steering people away from sub-optimal classes/variants when possible, and recommending something more suited to what the player wants to play.

[HidaTsuzua]

Build optimization can make sense in game. Many training regimes have a steady progression of what you learn being built on what you did before. It can get kind of messed up with "and then I took a level in passive way monk!" But that can depend on SFX and in game justification. Also with most optimized builds, the level of multiclassing all over the place tends to be low (outside of obvious dips like Fighter or Paladin). Honestly, this is going to be a side effect of class based system (since you have make artifical cut offs all over the place). It only gets to bad levels when the classes themselves aren't built well (Fighter and Paladin).

There is the issue of limited flexibility in the campaign. This isn't a problem because how do you adopt to a campaign? I mean if you discover psionics, taking levels in psion isn't going to help. The only adaptation you could do is if you suddenly discover that you're in a dragon heavy world or undead world or whatever. And all that means is that you either are horribly messed up (a sneak attack TWF rogue in the undead heavy campaign) or extremely happy (the super undead turn build cleric in the same campaign). Since most campaigns aren't that extremely, you can figure out your builds ahead of time. If you don't want this problem, I'll suggest using a point buy system and set it so that most points you'll get are from XP not character creation (Hero is especially good for this).

[Rachel Lorelei]

I can't think of any optimized character (there are a few actually -broken- ones, I suppose) that would make the DM use monsters of a CR equal to the party's level +10.

[TheLogman]

Well, it seems to me that you have 4 simple options:

1. Try very hard to get your fellow players to stop playing optimised characters for once, the DM is only throwing tougher monsters at them because they are optimizing! Get them to hark back to the days when Wizards NEEDED fighters to protect them, Rouges were a necessity unless you wanted death as a shish-ka-bob, and you made characters to have fun, not have tons of numbers.

2. Get the DM to try more puzzle-based stuff, things that involve brain thinking, and no matter how insanely powered the rest of the party, this puzzle has only 1 answer, and you can contribute as much as or more than the rest of the party.

3. Find another group. It seems you want a little more Roleplay, and less Crunch, at least to the point where you can play a straight anything and still be useful. Or, play something on the forums.

4. When in Rome... Maybe you can dip your toes into the pot of Optimization, just a little, just enough to be useful again. Probably not desirable, but is always an option.

[asqwasqw]

It really depends on the rest of the players. Some people consider build optomization a fun challenge. If all the players in the party are like that, the DM just bumps up the combat level of the monsters abit (or alot). Others do not optomize at all, either because they do not want to, or they do not know how (I'm gonna take point blank shot, cleave, weapon focus, dodge, toughness. I'm gonna own! ). The DM then bumps the level of the monsters down. They can still have fun. It is only a threat when you have powergamers and weak characters together. Otherwise, the game is still fun. There are many different ways to play the game, and optomizing your character is one of them.

Couple of solutions:

Talk it out. Ask the powergamers to make their characters a bit weaker.

Make stronger characters. There are a lot of people on this Board who can make a killer character of almost any class.

Ignore it. So what if your useless in combat? Be a better roleplayer. Show them how you play the game!

Premade characters. Have the DM make premade characters, all you need to do is make a background. Solves all combat issues, but may not be fun.

Edit: Ninja-ed by 5 people?? ... I am a slow typer .

[Dhavaer]

Edit: Ninja-ed by 5 people?? ... I am a slow typer .

Obviously, you should have taken the Creative feat to get a +2 on Craft (writing).

[bigbaddragon]

Don't worry about your character being the weakest in the group, just play the game for the love of it.

As for the powergaming, there will always be people which like making badass characters more than roleplaying (or simply they do not know how to roleplay or what that even means). Hack, I'm really surprised that my party wizard haven't yet taken level of barbarian to get pounce

[Fishies]

Get them to hark back to the days when Wizards NEEDED fighters to protect them, Rouges were a necessity unless you wanted death as a shish-ka-bob

Surely you mean ROGUE?

[TheOOB]

Keep in mind that D&D is a game, not a story, a certain amount of optimization by all players is necessary to be able to play the game well and contribute to the group. Also keep in mind that in D&D you are role playing epic heroes, so you need a certain amount of power to justify it.

A good DM will take measures to limit the powers of their players. Some feats, races, classes, PrCs, spells, magic items, ability combos, ect are just too powerful and should not be allowed. That said dont force your characters to be weak, there is nothing wrong with wanting to have a powerful character, assuming the character arn't completely broken (divine metamagic presitant divine might polymorph cheese I'm looking at you), I'd worry more about the weaker party members then the stronger ones.

[Curmudgeon]

Characters are "optimized" for particular types of encounters. A spiked chain tripping machine is going to be excess baggage when half the scenario involves getting through traps. Any DM who reacts to "optimized" characters by throwing exactly the same sort of encounter at them with a higher CR is playing to the characters' strengths. A DM should craft scenarios that will challenge PCs where they're weak. Pit swarms against the two-handed sword wielder. Send constructs against magic users, and slather the iron golem in clay just to keep them guessing. If your healer used Divine Metamagic to crank up their spellcasting, send lots of undead to make them regret spending their turn attempts. If you've got sneak attack specialists, hit them with plants and oozes.

After repeated encounters that target their weak points, your "optimized" characters may decide that they need to generalize a bit more the next time they level up.

[Skjaldbakka]

Characters are "optimized" for particular types of encounters. A spiked chain tripping machine is going to be excess baggage when half the scenario involves getting through traps. Any DM who reacts to "optimized" characters by throwing exactly the same sort of encounter at them with a higher CR is playing to the characters' strengths. A DM should craft scenarios that will challenge PCs where they're weak. Pit swarms against the two-handed sword wielder. Send constructs against magic users, and slather the iron golem in clay just to keep them guessing. If your healer used Divine Metamagic to crank up their spellcasting, send lots of undead to make them regret spending their turn attempts. If you've got sneak attack specialists, hit them with plants and oozes.

After repeated encounters that target their weak points, your "optimized" characters may decide that they need to generalize a bit more the next time they level up.

Yeah, just be careful not to overdo that. There should be just as many encounters that play to the party's strengths as to thier weaknesses.

[Beleriphon]

Talk it out. Ask the powergamers to make their characters a bit weaker.

Why?

Make stronger characters. There are a lot of people on this Board who can make a killer character of almost any class.

The simplest answer that does nothing to prevent your enjoyment of the game. A mechanically useful character does make you a bad roleplayer.

Ignore it. So what if your useless in combat? Be a better roleplayer. Show them how you play the game!

Never the twain shall meet those that understand and can use the rules and those that want to have a meaningful in character experience? You can do both thank you very much.

And really optimization isn't a huge issue. Your character doesn't know what feats or attack bonus he might have. He doesn't know how high is Diplomacy check is going to be if you roll a 7. D&D's RP aspect is about the end result, not so much what feats and skills you as a player have selected to reach that end result.

[TheOOB]

For the record, character power level has very little to do with roleplaying.

Power Gamer != Poor Role Player, conversly, Good Role Play != Weak Character. In fact, that opposite is true more often then not. Lets face it, it's bad role playing to take a fighter who has an 8 con and spends their feats on monkey grip, oversized two weapon fighting, and skill focus. Your characters are adventures, they kill demons and loot dragon treasure for a living, its a dangerous job, weak adventurers die, end of story.

[brian c]

Don't worry about your character being the weakest in the group, just play the game for the love of it.

As for the powergaming, there will always be people which like making badass characters more than roleplaying (or simply they do not know how to roleplay or what that even means). Hack, I'm really surprised that my party wizard haven't yet taken level of barbarian to get pounce

Don't be silly, a wizard would never lose a caster level

[SilverClawShift]

Keep in mind that D&D is a game, not a story, a certain amount of optimization by all players is necessary to be able to play the game well and contribute to the group.

Never the twain shall meet those that understand and can use the rules and those that want to have a meaningful in character experience? You can do both thank you very much.

What they said, which I think is illustrated really well in the DM of the Rings comic: http://www.shamusyoung.com/twentysidedtale/?p=850

You rolled a one on your diplomacy check? Don't be mad that you rolled a 1, roleplay it! Go down swinging! Never let the DM take you alive.

"You're surrounded by armed warriors on horseback. They could currently destroy your party by sneezing. Roll a diplomacy check. annnnnd, you rolled a 1."

*sigh* Allright. "Tell me your name horse-f*****"

Erm. Anyway. The point is, there's no reason you can't apply your roleplaying AFTER the game mechanics have been laid down. In fact, that's why the game mechanics exist. They give you a framework to throw your character into, so you don't have to act blind. If you just wanted pure roleplaying, why bother with paper and dice at all? Why not just sit around in a group and write a story together.
(hey, that actually sounds like it'd be kind of fun. Everyone adopts a character or two, one person lays down a storyline framework, and keeps notes of what happens, and then someone types it all up as half decent literature).

Also remember that you don't even HAVE to play off your class as a solid profession. If your sorcerer would be more powerful with a few dice of sneak attack for whatever reason, you can still consider yourself a sorcerer in the game. You can still introduce yourself as a spellcaster and refer to other weilders of the arcane as your peers.
You don't have to introduce yourself as "A Powerful Arch-mage! (with three levels of rogue)". You can just introduce yourself as an archmage, and roleplay those few rogue levels you took as a raw tendency to step lightly and blindside people with a sneak-attack ray of frost.

[Gefangnis]

I always tell my players at the start to come up with something interesting that defines their character to other players (by the way, this is great advice for any character concept). More often than not, this comes out as a disability - an obese ninja, or an OCD rogue. This not only helps roleplaying tremendously, but it slows down powergamers. It gives them a point to focus on that's not necessarily a certain combat build. It can be, though, which is the beauty of focusing a character - powergamers still get their, well, power, but instead of detracting from roleplaying, it adds to it. As a DM, I'm happy to make deals with players during the creation process that help them focus their character, even if it makes them more powerful.

[Kizara]

Why not just sit around in a group and write a story together.
(hey, that actually sounds like it'd be kind of fun. Everyone adopts a character or two, one person lays down a storyline framework, and keeps notes of what happens, and then someone types it all up as half decent literature).

This is called Dragonlance. "Half-decent" would be a generous statement imo.

[Vva70]

Build optimization. It makes no sense from an in-game perspective.

I agree. However, I would also say that the reason that it makes no in-game sense is because the term "build" has no in-game meaning. A character doesn't know his own level. He doesn't know what feats he has, or where his skill points lie. Oh, he probably could tell you some of the results of these factors. A wizard certainly knows what the most powerful spells he can cast are. A fighter with combat expertise knows that he has an above-average ability to fight defensively at the cost of his offense. A rogue with lots of points in bluff probably realizes that he's a smooth-talker. But those are observable consequences of the character builds, not the builds themselves.

The line between what is in-game and out-of-game can be pretty fuzzy in places, I'll admit. And often, there are multiple different (yet valid) opinions on where the line should fall in a given area. But I think that in most cases, it's safe to say that the following terms are out-of-game: class; level (class level and character level specifically, not things like spell level or caster level); feat; skill. A character is going to define himself by what he does, not by what is on his character sheet.

[EndgamerAzari]

Make stronger characters. There are a lot of people on this Board who can make a killer character of almost any class.

Much easier said than done, I'm afraid, my friend.

[Dhavaer]

Much easier said than done, I'm afraid, my friend.

You only need to say it. Just say what class, race, level, etc and we'll figure out how to give it a taste of Real Ultimate Powah!!1!!oneleven.

[HidaTsuzua]

Much easier said than done, I'm afraid, my friend.

I would suggest the Character Optimization board found on the Wizard's website. People will often post "X guides/handbooks." Typically they'll list feats/skills/PrC that go well with that class and have sample builds. I've found then quite useful as a reference for character creation. You don't have to follow much less agree with their advice, but they should at least point you to the right direction. You can use the sticked library link or google to find a guide to a class. Here are some samples.

Beguiler
Dervish
Paladin

[EndgamerAzari]

Hm.... my character IS a dervish....

[Callix]

Nothing wrong with dervishes. Grab Two-weapon Rend and hit each target twice. Bonus dice galore. Try picking up Tempest (you already have the prereq's to qualify and TWF) for more TWF goodness. The ability to move and full attack, coupled with the extra speed, makes Tempest a powerful melee combatant, especially with extra damage sources. Snare Elusive Target if you want to avoid being crushed when in melee with THWers. Take your pick. I'm something of an admirer of the Ftr4/Bbn1/Dervish10/Tempest5 build. A lot of optimisers aren't, but I am.

[warmachine]

Adventurers explore places full of deadly monsters and oppose powerful people. They have to be good at what they do or they're dead and they know it. Thus, it makes in-game sense for characters to be optimised.

I optimize myself but I like writing backstories and customize around that. Of the options to customize a PC, feats and skills, feats are far too valuable for roleplay flavour. That leaves skills. One of my favourite characters is an ex-mercenary Fighter with high Craft (Painting). I had great fun making snarky comments about the local decor and painting wonderous events and brutal slayings. When the party rescued a noblewoman from slavers, he only asked for his paintings in her gallery.

Go ahead and optimize but choose a Craft or Profession skill and base the personality around that.

[Kurald Galain]

But I know people who plan all twenty levels of their characters out before they even start playing!

Yes. The way D&D3 is written, if you want to take a presclass you consider "cool" at level seven, you have to start planning this from level one, because otherwise you won't have the necessary feats or skills or whatnot. If you want to be a powerful cleric later on, you must start with a near-optimal wisdom score because otherwise you won't be able to cast fifth-level spells. And so forth. The system is full of mutually exclusive "tech tree" choices.

If you don't like this, you should seriously look into playing a different system. In fact no other system I'm familiar with has anything remotely resembling this problem. Try Whitewolf, or D&D 2nd edition, or GURPS, or TORG.

[arnoldrew]

I would suggest the Character Optimization board found on the Wizard's website. People will often post "X guides/handbooks." Typically they'll list feats/skills/PrC that go well with that class and have sample builds. I've found then quite useful as a reference for character creation. You don't have to follow much less agree with their advice, but they should at least point you to the right direction. You can use the sticked library link or google to find a guide to a class. Here are some samples.

Beguiler
Dervish
Paladin

Sorry if this seems off-topic, but can anyone tell me why I simply cannot access the WoTC message boards? I've never been able to, and I'm reminded of it every time someone puts up a link to them.

[Kurald Galain]

Sorry if this seems off-topic, but can anyone tell me why I simply cannot access the WoTC message boards? I've never been able to, and I'm reminded of it every time someone puts up a link to them.

That's odd. Perhaps some overzealous parental guard software? Perhaps a browser hijack? (if so, download Ad-Aware and scan your PC) Perhaps your browser has java disabled and the WOTC boards require that?

[Dhavaer]

That's odd. Perhaps some overzealous parental guard software? Perhaps a browser hijack? (if so, download Ad-Aware and scan your PC) Perhaps your browser has java disabled and the WOTC boards require that?

I don't think it's Java, I have a Java blocker and the Wizards boards don't worry it.

[Tormsskull]

OP:

If the game focuses on mostly combat it only makes sense to make a character that is powerful in combat. My guess is that your group is like 90% combat 10% roleplay from what you are saying. So if you want to be in a more roleplay oriented group, you'll probably have to look for a different group.

As for your current group, ask the DM if you can remake your character because you are so much weaker than everyone else. Then post on the board what the other characters are, and I'm sure someone on here will make your a "build" that will be able to keep up with the other characters.