Why can't you powergame and roleplay?

[Dorizzit]

Exactly the same as the title. The general thought seems to be that you can't powergame and roleplay an interesting character at the same time. Why?

[Emperor Demonking]

I don't think anyone still thinks that.

[Armads]

You can. I don't have the link to the stormwind fallacy now, but it basically addresses this question.

[Dorizzit]

Ah, that's good.

[nerulean]

You can. The observation was initially based on the fact that there are a lot of people who choose to do either one or the other. For example...

Often, someone who has a clear concept of a character in mind will take feats that they think suit the character, even if they're mechanically not very good or just don't synergise well with each other. When I started playing D&D, I gave my first level fighter toughness. It's a bad feat, but at that point I didn't know it, and the fact that this character was tough and sturdy and could take a punch was absolutely fundamental to his persona. This is roleplaying at the expense of stats.

If all I wanted to do was make a character who was kickass awesome, I could have made a spiked chain fighter, which wouldn't have suited the idea of the character at all, but who cares, he's awesome! This is powergaming at the expense of roleplaying.

Now, if I was going to make the very same character I started with, I definitely wouldn't take toughness, but nor would I give him a spiked chain. I'd choose a powerful set of statistics that nevertheless suited the concept of what the character should be like, perhaps something along the shock trooper line. Most of the people who like D&D enough to discuss it on forums are pretty much at the same stage of roleplay/rollplay balance.

[Arakune]

You can, but you can't munchkin and roleplay by definition.

To be fair, most of the powergaming level are still reasonable though some PrCs combinations seens quite strange...

[Dorizzit]

Oh, well, munchkining is a completely different thing altogether. Munchkin = bad.

[Emperor Demonking]

Yeah isn't munchkin= cheat, wheras powergamers are powerful within the rules.

[bluish_wolf]

I thought it was because, in order to powergame, you have to pick certain feats and whatnot which may not align with the idea of your character. Actually, if you want to roleplay, you essentially have to make up your own class and whatnot, since you may not see your character as exactly the same as the book.

Actually, when you consider it, powerplaying assumes the rules are going to be static, while roleplay assumes that the rules are secondary and can change at any moment for dramatic flair or whatnot.

So, it's not that you can't roleplay and powerplay, but do you really need to powerplay when roleplaying is the focus?

[Emperor Demonking]

Not true, you could build it the other way, build then fluff.

[bluish_wolf]

Don't most people come up with a character concept first, then try to make it work with the rules? Or just ask the DM to let you sidestep them?

[Saph]

Exactly the same as the title. The general thought seems to be that you can't powergame and roleplay an interesting character at the same time. Why?

Mainly, the people who think that are the ones who are extreme roleplayers or extreme powergamers.

Extreme roleplayers don't really pay attention to the mechanics of their characters. They're only interested in what fits the feel of the character and what makes sense to them IC. So they look at powergamers and decry them for being munchkins. The problem is that their lack of interest in effectiveness often means that their characters end up being mechanically so weak that they have to be carried by the rest of the party, which is very frustrating for the other players who sooner or later are going to need their help. No-one wants to die because their teammate was useless.

Extreme powergamers suffer from the opposite problem - they view character creation as an exercise in making the most powerful build possible, and they find it tiresome to have to justify anything IC. Usually their build ends up requiring so many mutually contradictory elements that it's pretty much impossible to make any kind of coherent personality out of it other than 'I want to be really awesome'. These players tend to run and point at the Stormwind Fallacy when called out, but it's a bit of a con - while it's true that not all powergamers are bad roleplayers, it's also true that many are.

Most players are neither of these types. They want an effective character, but they want a memorable one with personality as well. For these players there isn't much of a conflict, since they work at both.

- Saph

[Winterwind]

In a thread about two months ago tainsouvra made a very enlightening post on this subject. I think it explains the popularity of the (false) belief that powergaming and roleplaying are mutually exclusive very well, so I'll just let it speak for itself:

[...]Someone who is an unskilled roleplayer but a skilled powergamer, who comes to a roleplayer group, will stand out for his lack of the relevant skill. Someone who is a skilled roleplayer and a skilled powergamer, who comes to a roleplayer group, will not stand out because he has the relevant skill. Thus, the only powergamers that stand out in roleplaying groups are the ones that are also poor roleplayers. This causes the group to make the obvious connection--whenever they can notice that someone is a powergamer, it's because they're a poor roleplayer. Human generalizations being what they are, this causes "powergamer" and "poor roleplayer" to become synonymous within that group--despite the reality being that not only are they unrelated, but proof of that lack of relation is actually present in the group. I quote this to emphasize my earlier statement. Someone who is good at both will be seen by a roleplayer as a fellow roleplayer--but I submit to you that he would be seen by a powergamer as a fellow powergamer for exactly the same reason. This is due to the way humans generalize and build group identities, rather than any inherent attribute of these two skill/interest sets. [...]

[NerfTW]

What I've always wondered is why people say you can't plan out a character's level progression and roleplay.

Because in real life you never learn one skill so that you can learn a different skill later on. Nope. Never.

There is absolutely no career that requires foundation training before advanced.

Hang on, I think I overdid the sarcasm a little.

You know what people who don't plan ahead wind up as? Liberal Arts majors.

And Ash Ketchum.

[random11]

You can, but you can't munchkin and roleplay by definition.

I guess it's kind of a noobish question, but what's the difference between power play and munchkin?

[PirateMonk]

I guess it's kind of a noobish question, but what's the difference between power play and munchkin?

There's no clear boundary, but in general, munchkins cheat more.

[Riffington]

I guess it's kind of a noobish question, but what's the difference between power play and munchkin?

A roleplayer is someone who says "that troll is strong and crafty. If I am to defeat him I will need the power of flame".
A power player is someone who says "I picked shocking for my greatsword instead of flaming, since everyone's immune to fire. Still, I power attack the troll for 4".
A munchkin is someone who says "That troll is worth 2000 experience points".

[Toulash]

I think you can be a powergame to some degree and roleplay. What Irks some people is that powergamers sometimes do *not* roleplay or introduce hideous combinations into the game.

They will pick an obscure race, class and attribute combo maxing for DPS and then not roleplay their intelligence or cha of 8. (you should literally probably be pissing someone off almost everytime you speak) Instead, they pretend the 8 does not exist.

Another thing that bothers a roleplayer about a powergamer is that they oten get pissed when there is not enough combat. If there is not one fight per session a powergamer tends to get antsy. Solving a puzzle, figuring out a dungeon, meeting the king are all lost on many powergamers who simply want to cut the next orcs head off.

Another clash between roleplayers and powergamers is encounter level. It usually gets thrown out of whack. If I make a half dragon warrior and my buddy plays an elf bard, the encounters often designed to challenge the half dragon warrior will vaporize the bard. So in essence the roleplayer is forced to build his character to be combat heavy whether he wants to or not.

[Riffington]

There's no clear boundary, but in general, munchkins cheat more.

Just to be clear, munchkins are likely to cheat and to steal your dice, because they are often jerks. The defining characteristic is that they're playing the game for a power-trip at the expense of the other players/DM, in a game that wasn't designed for it*.

They typically believe that they are both a good powergamer and a good roleplayer.

A good test is: will he give the other players their time in the spotlight? Or is the game really all about him.

[Kurald Galain]

I guess it's kind of a noobish question, but what's the difference between power play and munchkin?

"Power player" is a mostly-neutral description, whereas "munchkin" is an insult. The following is a stereotypical description that's only mildly exaggerated.

A power player will try and find the optimum combination of races, classes, feats et cetera, balancing his strengths against his drawbacks. They tend to consider this a challenge, and are very well aware of how the rules work and tend to play it straight rather than take advantage of loopholes. An argument with a power player is quickly resolved by taking out the rulebook in question.

A munchkin will find the races, classes, et cetera with the most pluses, and conveniently forget to bring the piece of paper (or obscure rulebook that preferably nobody else in the group has) with the drawbacks on them, and "forget" that a certain spell has a $5000 material component. They tend to not want the challenge of making a character, but instead download a good build from the internet; and take advantage of any and all loopholes they can find, claiming "that's how the rules work". An argument with a munchkin is not really resolved until the munchkin gets his way.

[Emperor Demonking]

A roleplayer is someone who metagames.
A power player is someone who doesn't metagame and makes incharacter desciscions.
A munchkin is someone who says who knows the rules.

That's an interesting was of looking at it.

A powergamer keeps in the rules (Game rules and common decency) a munchkin doesn't.

[NerfTW]

A roleplayer is someone who says "that troll is strong and crafty. If I am to defeat him I will need the power of flame".
A power player is someone who says "I picked shocking for my greatsword instead of flaming, since everyone's immune to fire. Still, I power attack the troll for 4".
A munchkin is someone who says "That troll is worth 2000 experience points".

I fail to see how stating the weakness of his weapon against an enemy in simple terms is "not roleplaying". Not everyone needs to be annoyingly verbose to role-play. Why on earth wouldn't a fighter say "My greatsword is embewed with electricity, not flame, but I can still hurt him the old fashioned way."?

And why wouldn't he look at what he's probably facing before picking a weapon? If I know I'm likely to be facing a bunch of ice giants, I'm going to load up on fire weapons, just like if a swat team were going into a building, they'd load up on shotguns and close range guns and not sniper rifles.

[VeisuItaTyhjyys]

I'd also like to note that the idea that people who kill very, very, very powerful creatures and constantly risk their lives as a career are probably going to want to be better at it. I mean, call me crazy, but I'd damn sure not go up against a Dragon, personally, unless I was optimized so far I could be damn sure I wouldn't die, and even then, had a clone in the oven. I mean, an Initiate of the Seven Veils is cheezy, and whatnot, but I really think "not getting killed" is more important to most characters than "being on about an equal level with those around me, so I can be killed with them." Paladins, Barbarians, and some such characters wouldn't be this way, so much, but they're also much harder to optimize and much less powerful when optimized.
The only way to powergame a wizard, really, is to be paranoid and generally cowardly. The only RP reason to powergame a wizard is to be paranoid and generally cowardly.

[KIDS]

Of course you can powergame and roleplay; while I can't prove that they are positively corellated (i.e. that a good roleplayer is also more capable of assembling a finely synergized character), the proof for there not being any negative corellation is easy to find all around.

[Emperor Demonking]

My least favorite part of this sort of thing are those that actually play the herb sellers or near to that.

Everyone use herb sellers as part of your posts whe you can, lets make a phrase.

[The Mormegil]

I think you can be a powergame to some degree and roleplay. What Irks some people is that powergamers sometimes do *not* roleplay or introduce hideous combinations into the game.

They will pick an obscure race, class and attribute combo maxing for DPS and then not roleplay their intelligence or cha of 8. (you should literally probably be pissing someone off almost everytime you speak) Instead, they pretend the 8 does not exist.

Another thing that bothers a roleplayer about a powergamer is that they oten get pissed when there is not enough combat. If there is not one fight per session a powergamer tends to get antsy. Solving a puzzle, figuring out a dungeon, meeting the king are all lost on many powergamers who simply want to cut the next orcs head off.

Another clash between roleplayers and powergamers is encounter level. It usually gets thrown out of whack. If I make a half dragon warrior and my buddy plays an elf bard, the encounters often designed to challenge the half dragon warrior will vaporize the bard. So in essence the roleplayer is forced to build his character to be combat heavy whether he wants to or not.

I agree totally with you. Nevertheless, I have to say roleplay could be helped by power play, in some way. If my party decides that they aren't going to be wizards because wizards are broken, not to play diplomacers because diplomacy is broken, not to play power attackers because power attackers are broken, not to play DnD because it is broken, I (the DM) will end up having them all blocked in a "cell" of incapacity, where they cannot find informations, cannot interact wth important people etc. even roleplayers will be disappointed. I mean, good, we roleplayed well each character up until this very moment, now go and defeat the dragon. YOU DIED? But it was a CR 3! Oh, you all have prepeared Detect Thoughts because it was in character? COME ON!

If my party decides, instead, to min max each character, they'll one-shoot the CR23 dragon, but they will even have Detect Thoughts ready for when they are needed... And divination spells to ask information about the plot, and teleportation spells to complete sidequests, and the Diplomacy needed to beg the king for money, and the Bluff needed to get out of jail etc.

[Riffington]

I fail to see how stating the weakness of his weapon against an enemy in simple terms is "not roleplaying".

It isn't. You just misunderstood me. To clarify, you can do both.

The essence of being a roleplayer is that you are doing what makes sense given what your character knows. In this case, bringing fire if your character knows that trolls must be defeated with flame.

The essence of being a powergamer is knowing many rules, and using them for maximum efficiency. In this case, knowing exactly how many points to put into your power attack. This may be compatible with roleplaying if you do this appropriately. For example, a fighter who's faced trolls before probably does know how best to use his power attack (how many points to assign). However, if the character hasn't faced trolls before, but the player knows how many HP a troll has, then using this knowlege is being a powergamer at the expense of roleplaying.

The essence of being a munchkin is that your fun is more important than anyone else's. This need not involve cheating, but it very well may.

[Fixer]

I have always been a believer in illustration.

Roleplayer: "Alas, poor Alec. His uncle, Lord Longname, will be most distressed of his demise. I believe we should take a few moments to pay respects."
Munchkin: "I loot his corpse while everone's not looking."
Powergamer: "I am not closing my eyes. Do I see what munchkin's up to?"
DM: "Yeah, you are standing right over the corpse so it isn't hard to notice.."
Munchkin: *rolls* "I got a 41 for a hide check."
Powergamer: "How'd you get a 41? You are a 1st level character."
Munchkin: "I am a tiny sized gnome giving me a +8 to Hide checks. I also took the Stealthy feat and Skill Focus: Hide giving me a total of +21 to hide checks."
Powergamer: "How do you have two feats as a 1st level non-human character?"
Munchkin: "My race is from the Web Gnomes Handbook. Instead of being able to talk to animals or have illusionary skills we get a bonus feat."
DM: "Did you bring a copy?"
Munchkin: "I emailed you the link. Didn't you get it?"
DM: "No, I guess not."
Roleplayer: "I finish paying my respects and being to wrap the body respectfully in order to return it to Lord Longname. Really, DM, couldn't you think of a better name than that?"
DM: "I didn't think you'd ask for it. I just made that up."
Munchkin: "Before he wrapped the body, what did I get?"
Powergamer: "You didn't get anything. I was watching the body."
Munchkin: "Did you roll a spot check?"
Powergamer: "No, I was WATCHING THE BODY."
Munchkin: "Then you weren't watching me, which means unless you beat my spot check I get to check the body."
Powergamer: "But I was WATCHING THE BODY!"
DM: "Munchkin, do you have some way of somehow distracting Powergamer's attention?"
Munchkin: "I could use my bluff. I have a +12 in it."
Powergamer: "How did you... you know what, nevermind. I don't care. I attack the gnome."
Roleplayer: "Friends! Please! Respect the dead! Let us just return him to Lord Longname and beg forgiveness for not returning his nephew alive."
Munchkin: "I get a 23 for initiative. Beat that!"

[Emperor Demonking]

Toulash: The bard is probably stronger than the fighter or around equal.

Pretty colours.

Exactly.
The munchkin is sad, roleplayers are envious and powergamers don't rhyme.

[The Mormegil]

I have always been a believer in illustration.

Roleplayer: "Alas, poor Alec. His uncle, Lord Longname, will be most distressed of his demise. I believe we should take a few moments to pay respects."
Munchkin: "I loot his corpse while everone's not looking."
Powergamer: "I am not closing my eyes. Do I see what munchkin's up to?"
DM: "Yeah, you are standing right over the corpse so it isn't hard to notice.."
Munchkin: *rolls* "I got a 41 for a hide check."
Powergamer: "How'd you get a 41? You are a 1st level character."
Munchkin: "I am a tiny sized gnome giving me a +8 to Hide checks. I also took the Stealthy feat and Skill Focus: Hide giving me a total of +21 to hide checks."
Powergamer: "How do you have two feats as a 1st level non-human character?"
Munchkin: "My race is from the Web Gnomes Handbook. Instead of being able to talk to animals or have illusionary skills we get a bonus feat."
DM: "Did you bring a copy?"
Munchkin: "I emailed you the link. Didn't you get it?"
DM: "No, I guess not."
Roleplayer: "I finish paying my respects and being to wrap the body respectfully in order to return it to Lord Longname. Really, DM, couldn't you think of a better name than that?"
DM: "I didn't think you'd ask for it. I just made that up."
Munchkin: "Before he wrapped the body, what did I get?"
Powergamer: "You didn't get anything. I was watching the body."
Munchkin: "Did you roll a spot check?"
Powergamer: "No, I was WATCHING THE BODY."
Munchkin: "Then you weren't watching me, which means unless you beat my spot check I get to check the body."
Powergamer: "But I was WATCHING THE BODY!"
DM: "Munchkin, do you have some way of somehow distracting Powergamer's attention?"
Munchkin: "I could use my bluff. I have a +12 in it."
Powergamer: "How did you... you know what, nevermind. I don't care. I attack the gnome."
Roleplayer: "Friends! Please! Respect the dead! Let us just return him to Lord Longname and beg forgiveness for not returning his nephew alive."
Munchkin: "I get a 23 for initiative. Beat that!"

I bet he got a natural 20 on initiative too. Anyway, while I was readng I mentally classified my party memers... Not a very nice group, really... The only roleplayer is so extreme he absolutely REFUSES to make something viable. For instance, a Con 10 character...