How Do I Prevent These Two Players From Dominating The Group Without Arbitrary Gimping Them?

Hobgoblin archer Superstitious Witch-Hunter barbarians.

;-P

...it hits a nerve when I see posts saying help me punish these guys for not being a horrible at the game as the people around them...

I understand your feelings. But as I understand it, the fun of Pathfinder is overcoming challenges. If a GM presents encounters that have absolutely no challenge, where's the fun? All the tactical advice you've seen so far is an effort to give the GM a lot of different options, to be used at different times, so that the two players who you regard as "better" are occasionally thrown a curveball that compels them to work for their victory, and the three that you say "suck" do not decide to leave the table (or the entire hobby) out of an understandable dislike of being told "you suck".

In the OP he said the oracle domminates with spells and out of combat with very high diplomacy and cha. In other words are very well designed character with abilities to help with anything the party is doing.

So a one trick pony (High charisma) is a well designed character? Punishing players for optimizing is not a good way to DM, I agree, but I don't believe most people here advocate that approach.

First of all disallow diamond spray, it's a 3.5 spell.

This 1000 times. No 3.5 material in PF except on a case by case basis. I know it is backwards compatible, but not everything fits in.

edit:How is he dropping their dex down to 0?

Yeah your right i just know how much i get P****d off when you get an unbalanced group
I mean i know some players get there kicks by makeing the most powerful character they can, while others just like to have a silly character that are fun to play or characters with a background thats longer than the campaign history.
I mean it's just horses for cources i think the best thing to do is make sure that in every game there is a chance for everyone to shine find a few things that the other characters are good at then arange a couple of little encounters around that so they dont feel like they are just there as extras in the game.
or a large encounter where everyone needs to work togeather to win

I do. Dont try to nerf players for creating good character because the rest of your group sucks

As much as I hate to agree with anyone that comes off as this much of a D*** in his posts, in this case sadly I have to.

I really hate it when I am told, or see others giving the advice "They made good well rounded characters? And you say they even get into roleplaying situations AS WELL as being great in combat??!?!?!" "The hell you say?!?" "They must be stoped!! The monsters"

Seriously, it's not like they are rocking AM, the Heavens Oracle isn't useing any odd rules. he took one good revalation, pumped his main stat and put a few skill points in a good place.

My advice is to tell the other players to either up their game or shut the hell up.

If someone makes a sub-par character for fun, thats cool and all but that is also not my fault.

Which diamond spray spell are we talking about here? The one on the d20pfsrd.com? It's not much different from fireball except that the target has to be a lot closer (only a 20 ft range) so that shouldn't be a game breaker.

As far as ray of exhaustion (don't forget the Fort save for fatigue instead of exhaustion) and diamond spray, at 5th level, the most he's going to have (most likely) are 2 3rd level spells. Hit the group with another couple of encounters during the day and he doesn't have them available to him. If he's got a lot of utility spells, great. He won't be dominating in combat.

If the undead get to be a problem, sic the Pharasman inquisition on him. The church of Pharasma is sure to take a dim view of necromancers running around with undead creations. Paladins of Iomedae and Sarenrae are likely to be trouble too.

As far as the oracle goes, either you're pretty generous on points, he rolled well, or he has something he has dumped. Don't be afraid to go for his weaknesses.

The oracle's color spray may be pretty good now, but it will decline in effectiveness as the PCs level up. Granted, he'll probably have other tricks up his sleeve then, but that one comes with an expiration date.

People have mentioned hitting them from range. Most of the spells you've mentioned are short range, not even the calculated range but finite and absolutely short. Melee support close.

There's not much you're going to be able to do about the two players being better or cleverer players aside from giving the other 3 players more opportunities tailored just for them - elements from their background that drive the main campaign story arc or are the main hooks for the adventures. That might help them feel more ownership of the campaign. If they're particularly passive about pursuing this, then there's not that much you can do. Perhaps you should mention that to them when they complain.

As far as all this goes, you've got 2 types of players - Min-maxers and non-minmaxers. Ideally, the min-maxers should tone things down since they make up a minority of the group. Telling them in no uncertain terms to do so isn't being arbitrary. It's getting group members on the same footing. Dominating players can be trouble if the rest of the group is too passive. That would be true with 4e as well because they'd have probably distributed their standard array more effectively and would be milking the rituals for every advantage they could find. Push the other characters to perform at a higher level and talk to the other two characters about leaving niches for other PCs to shine.

Just play Munchkin until they decide to work as a team.

This is all about people who aren't willing to support each others' fun and recognise that this is a Co-operative roleplaying game.

If I ended up with players who weren't willing to support each other I would try to find better friends.

Everyone in your group is failing to be supportive of other peoples' fun: how awful!

Sounds like the problem is less with the system and the characters and more with the Players using those characters.

Is TPKing a party bad GMing? Yeah maybe depending on the circumstances. But I tell you what - letting the Players run rough shod all over you could be considered bad GMing as well.

Obviously the best solution isn't going to be found in game for this one - you need to sit down with ALL of your players and work it out. Call out the B1tchers for being B1thcy.

I'd be inclined to start over and have the optimizers play the Rogue and let the non-optimal players be the full casters - my money is on the optimizers being able to get more out of the rogue in order to be on the same level as the non-optimized full caster.

Yes , I am abrasive about this topic. I am so because I dont believe that a player that takes the time to design a character that can perform well in and out of combat should be told they need to tone it down because the guy next to them made a character by throwing darts at a board with concepts/level/feats on it and ended up a melee wizard with skill focus: cooking and a club.

Edit - If you are looking to challenge them then I would use a caster with imp counterspell or fighters/inquist with antaginize.

I've been in this exact situation with a group before... here's what I did:

"Hey guys, I'm getting kind of bummed out about our gaming because [explain how I personally am losing enjoyment of the game because of specific behaviors that are happening and the looks of disappointment I get to see on the faces of the non-dominating players' faces], and if we can't fix this, and quick, I am just going to stop running this game."

That's what it took - the idea that if they didn't start helping to make the group as a whole run like a well-oiled-machine and help to make each player, myself included, enjoy the game to the fullest possible degree that they would not get to play the game they enjoy at all.

I'm in the "apply better tactics" camp. Color spray is a 15' cone. Two trolls standing 20' apart will force him to choose one to hit, and then the other can step up and clobber him. And nothing is much scarier at low levels than a troll that's drunk a fire resist potion...

Similarly, three goblins with spears, with another 5 that are 40' back with slings, spread out in an arc. No way to hit many of them at once.

Also, multiple encounters per day heavily favor melee classes. Take the choice of when to rest away from the players, either by trapping them in a dungeon or by giving them a quest with a time limit ("You have to reach the king in three days, or all is lost. It's a two-day ride under good circumstances. There's roving bands of invaders between here and there. Good luck.").

There's no reason to penalize the optimized players, and if they're not going to listen if talked to, then there's no point in doing so. Just change things up so that their strengths are downplayed, without throwing things that are clearly designed to be immune to them.

Right talk to the two players, ask them to tone it down. Next, as Leo 1924 sez- get rid of Diamond spray it’s not PF.

More skill encounters for the rogue. Tough traps, etc.

Hand out a cool magic weapon to the Ranger and the Cavalier.

Note that a oracle and a wizard are tier 1, the rest are no more than tier 3. This is part of the system, like it or not. The only way you could really do this is not let the two better players play any full spellcaster. So, when they DO need to bring in a new PC tell them ”Hey, Dave, Bob, I’d rather you two not run a tier 1 PC this time, give the others a chance”.

But that’s for the future. For now, other than getting rid of that one spell, don’t nerf them, boost the other guys. Have the party do a quest for a weaponsmith who gives them cool weapons, and neat armor in rewards. Let us say the ranger, cavalier and rogue can all use longswords- then a matched set of 5 +1 longswords, each linked to the PC so they can’t lose them (or sell them, heh, heh), with an extra +2 vs whatever foe that the weaponsmith thinks they are going to be facing. Cool, eh? But way more cool for the melee guys.

The two players in question aren't doing anything game breaking really. If the lower level casters were really able to outshine the melee characters in the lower level then this isn't even an optimization problem, the melee guys are just bad.

I think I'm with the people saying "don't penalize the two players who apparently know what they're doing, just because the other three are less than competent."

I noticed a point made, that lets me know the one playing the ranger is a lost cause-- insists on creating/playing his concept exactly as he conceives it to be, whether it fits or not, whether it's effective or not-- then cries because he's built a lousy character (mind you, I'm all in favor of creating a good personality/background/etc for your character and playing it-- but there is nothing wrong with making your character effective too). If he's going to keep building characters like that, tell him to shut up and stop whining about something that's his own fault-- if he doesn't like it, 4 players and a GM is a good gaming group-- you don't need him (may sound harsh, but it's better than letting a bad player that you've had to keep kicking out of other games figuratively poison yet another campaign).

I noticed another point, wherein the other two players who are crying, are all too happy to step all over everyone else at the table if/when they have more potent characters who are outshining the others. Makes me lose any sympathy I might have had for them now that they are in the situation they appear to have been so gleeful at inflicting on others.

All of them need an attitude adjustment evidently-- but when the GM admits he doesn't see anything that the two good players are doing wrong or that he wouldn't do himself otherwise, it's the complaining of the other three that really appears to be the problem-- it really seems to me like it's the attitude of the three whiners that needs to be fixed first. Then, let the two players who might actually take advantage of the opportunity rebuild their characters from the ground up to be more effective (help them with that, or have the two good players help them, since they apparently need it). And then let them know that it's up to them to play their characters well, rather than asking that the other two people at the table be penalized for knowing what they're doing.

The one thing I'd think I would ask of the two leading players in the game, is to stand back and let the others take the lead some of the time... if the others start failing, they can always jump in and save them from themselves.

As a first time pathfinder DM, you shouldn't allow anything outside of the main rule set until you're familiar with official rules first.

Tell your players to stick to the official paizo prd and not to use the d20psrd prd site at all. The later includes all sorts of 3rd party and non-official source material that might mislead players into thinking its all official cause its all on one site. You should not have allowed that Diamond Spray.

Your problems with color spray (like Sleep) should go away once the monster HD increase sufficiently, and if the enemies are reasonably spread out, even that shouldn't be a huge issue.
And don't forget to add in the -4 penalties for firing into melee for ranged touch attacks and another -4 (for soft cover) if there is an interposing person, friendly or otherwise.
Hell, just get them grappled, then pinned. Caster CMDs usualy sucks.

If he's a one trick pony, and the opponents know about it, let them be prepared to Counterspell them, or prepare readied actions for them to start casting. Forewarned ... forearmed, and all that.

And you shouldn't be worried about actually enforcing the social ramifications of necromancy in a campaign. That's part and parcel with the profession. Its certainly not 'picking' on the player for his character choice. He chose to play it, you need to properly rp the world around that choice.

And don't forget to read up on things like the ride skill and concentration checks and the like. Casting from horseback is not free.

And there are alot of subtle rule changes from 3.5 to pathfinder that if not used/noticed can lead to issues (like the difficulty of actually casting defensively in pathfinder, or how much more potentially difficult it is to Tumble (acrobatics) through threatened areas now. Or the fact some spells like enlarge person and silence are a full round casting time now.)

There are Lots of low HD constructs out there.
Hell, a bunch of animated objects would do.
(Did the ravid ever get converted from 3.5 to pathfinder? Its random animate object ability could make for all sorts of them wandering about causing havoc.)

A few animated ropes/rugs/tapestries grappling casters, some animated hat stands and chaise lounges beating on the melees, maybe an animated table charging around, et al. Could make for a memorably fun fight... =)

Thanks for the advice guys. I am going to try and steer the story in a direction to allow for larger battle fields so archers and other ranged enemies can be more effective. Currently most of the action takes place two city-states and the dungeons surrounding them. The outdoor sections are typically two and from but we have had one bounty hunter adventure that was entirely outdoors that the Cavalier and Ranger did very well in. I'll will also go through with letting them rebuild if they want, which two of them are willing to.

I should note that the Wizard has been spending a lot of his money on scrolls, he may only have so many spells per day but his spells known list is pretty damn large, he knows 12 level 3 spells already (partially my fault for having them fight a wizard, he decoded the spell books and almost doubled his list in one go).

So far they have been fighting a lot of Humanoids because they have been involved in a lot of political missions, as many a dungeons and in the field mission combined. Its one of the reasons I find it difficult to shoe horn in so many enemies immune to their spells.

TBH though this campaign feels like a disaster waiting to happen if it isn't already. I am not really enjoying DMing it drama aside, PF looks fun to play but the Burden on the DM is higher than every other game I've played besides 3.5.

I am not really enjoying DMing it drama aside, PF looks fun to play but the Burden on the DM is higher than every other game I've played besides 3.5.

I find it harder GMing for mage the awakening than PF myself.

Read the mounted combat rules.

If the gnome is riding a war pony, then (a) is he making his Ride checks to control the mount in battle? Not very difficult, but if he fails all he can do is control the thing; and (b) if the mount moves, is he making his concentration checks to cast at all? And some enemy really ought to target the mount.

The counter to short-range spells is enemies with long-range arrow fire, or firing through arrowslits, or using sight-blocking methods.

Read the mounted combat rules.

If the gnome is riding a war pony, then (a) is he making his Ride checks to control the mount in battle? Not very difficult, but if he fails all he can do is control the thing; and (b) if the mount moves, is he making his concentration checks to cast at all? And some enemy really ought to target the mount.

I have been using the mounted combat rules correctly. The character is question was built from the ground up to be good at what they do.

One thing I have to say overall though is that I do not want to increase encounters per day. I know the game is balanced around it but it really does not fit with the story most of the time and if combat was not going as quickly as it was it will take to long to actually get through an adventure. One of the reason I prefer DMing 4e is we can actually get through 4 encounters a session if we need to, with Pathfinder combat takes almost twice as long even if its ends on turn 4.

Maybe you should sit the other players aside and HELP them learn how to build a character?

One option is to build some mechanically-stronger, thematically similar versions of the weaker PCs and have the players run them for a session. Make it part of the story: tell the players they are running the PCs' ancestors (or whatever floats your boat). This would also be an opportunity to give your players more background on your campaign.

The results should be similar to taking a sports car for a test drive. Even the grumpy ranger player will be hard pressed to deny the appeal of running a higher octane character.

After that, give the players the opportunity to rebuild their own PCs along similar lines (the PCs gain rare insights from the experience). Your optimizers could even help you build the new builds.

Best case: you level the playing field a bit. Worse case: players continue as normal.

Don't penalize them for being cleaver. Make sure you are enforcing all the rules that are in play. It is easy to let thing slide unknowingly. Lots of people have given you options to deal with the combat options. For the RP problems it might be time to force the spotlight to move. Does the rogue have different known languages than the gnome? If so throw in important NPC's that can't speak to the gnome but can speak to the rogue.

Split the party. Give the other players compelling side quests. Give the rogue some underworld contacts that he has a meeting with on the "down low." The cavalier has all sorts of obligations to his order/position that can be exploited to give him RP time.

I also find it telling that the OP did not want to GM Pathfinder originally, but was apparently shoehorned into doing so. If you aren't happy GMing the system, don't. Tell them that you want to GM GURPS or 4e or AD&D, whatever system you like. They can either play that system or one of them can GM Pathfinder and let you play a character.

So far they have been fighting a lot of Humanoids because they have been involved in a lot of political missions, as many a dungeons and in the field mission combined. Its one of the reasons I find it difficult to shoe horn in so many enemies immune to their spells.

Fair enough. One of the nice things about humanoids is - they level too and can invest in better will saves (to make those cheap shots from the color spray less likely to succeed). They can also usually adapt pretty well to the PCs and attack with differentiated units - some geared for range, some close up, some for buffing support, etc.

TBH though this campaign feels like a disaster waiting to happen if it isn't already. I am not really enjoying DMing it drama aside, PF looks fun to play but the Burden on the DM is higher than every other game I've played besides 3.5.

I take it you haven't played a superhero game that has broad options for character development then. One major difference with those games is the built in expectation (completely with helpful recommendations) that the GM will be involved in character generation, approving this, telling a player to tone down that. I think it would be helpful if PF put more emphasis on that for creating PCs in D&D, working them into the campaign, and the relative power level of the party.

Yes , I am abrasive about this topic. I am so because I dont believe that a player that takes the time to design a character that can perform well in and out of combat should be told they need to tone it down because the guy next to them made a character by throwing darts at a board with concepts/level/feats on it and ended up a melee wizard with skill focus: cooking and a club.

Allow me to point you at a valuable axiom (best known from Star Trek but with philosophical underpinnings much older) - the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. If you've got 3 players in the group throwing darts at the board and just you with a concentrated focus, guess who needs to adjust his expectations and style for that game?

The first three things you can do to address this is:

1) Up the Encounters per Day
2) Up the Encounters per Day
3) Up the Encounters per Day

There cute, little low lever casters are in for a world of hurt on the 3rd, 4th and 5th encounters for a day. Yeah, they might whine and complain about being useless once they are out of spells but that's a "their problem" not a "your problem".

I am currently playing a wizard and I horde my spells like a college student hordes cheap beer. Don't use it till you need it.

Better to fall asleep with spells than to die because you did not have what you needed.

TBH though this campaign feels like a disaster waiting to happen if it isn't already. I am not really enjoying DMing it drama aside, PF looks fun to play but the Burden on the DM is higher than every other game I've played besides 3.5.

Instead of scrapping Pathfinder altogether, here are some options for the future:

1) Next campaign, grab the Beginner Box and run some scenarios with that. Let the party get up to level 5. This will keep everyone on a relatively even field and give you a chance to work with the Pathfinder rules under better circumstances. The players that are working to improve their game will have a better chance without feeling overshadowed.

2) When you are ready to run a full campaign, run an adventure path or create your own adventure path with a series of unrelated modules that you tie together with one long story arc. I have found that premade adventures can often keep some of the power gamers in check and give the rest of the party a chance to shine because the adventures are written for a more general group instead of being tailor made. This means that the party is more likely to run into a wider variety of encounters making one-trick ponies less effective.

3) Stick only to Pathfinder material for a while. This includes avoiding some of the better written 3rd party stuff. Make sure you are more comfortable with the system before bringing in more options.

Pathfinder isn't as complicated to run as it at first seems. When you are fighting the group while trying to learn the system, it makes the system look harder. The reality is that the problem is the group. This can be fixed.

I have two players that came from a very permissive GM. They were used to 30+ point buy and free reign of the Bestiary at the table. They were used to metagaming and didn't have to follow the WBL and could bring in 3rd party stuff without the GM looking it over.

That changed once they joined my group. We've been gaming for 2 years now and they have continued to game with their previous groups. They have been working diligently to have their old groups try to be more like mine. They have realized that being challenged is much more fun than just coming over to roll dice for a few hours.

I assume this is the diamond spray being discussed?

Diamond Spray

Source Pathfinder #24 60
School evocation [earth]; Level sorcerer/wizard 3
Casting
Casting Time 1 standard action
Components V, S, M (a lump of coal)
Effect
Range 20 ft.
Area cone-shaped burst
Duration instantaneous
Saving Throw Reflex half; Spell Resistance yes
Description

A cone of tiny, sparkling slivers as hard and sharp as filed diamonds springs from your outstretched fingers at tremendous speed. Any creature in the area of the torrent takes 1d6 points of slashing damage per caster level (maximum 10d6). These magical slivers are treated as adamantine and cold iron for the purpose of overcoming damage reduction. In addition, this spell bypasses up to 1 point of an object’s hardness per 2 caster levels (maximum 10).

You don't want to increase the encounters per day? How many encounters typically happen for the party?

"Your problems with color spray (like Sleep) should go away once the monster HD increase sufficiently, and if the enemies are reasonably spread out, even that shouldn't be a huge issue.
And don't forget to add in the -4 penalties for firing into melee for ranged touch attacks and another -4 (for soft cover) if there is an interposing person, friendly or otherwise.
Hell, just get them grappled, then pinned. Caster CMDs usualy sucks."

Also any friendlies in the Area of Effect should be susceptible to Color Spray. If he is firing it with a clear line of sight, then any enemies beyond the paltry 15 foot range should be able to make a move action next round to come in and beat him.

Diamond spray looks OP for 3rd level. Does the same damage as Dragon's breath with a 20 foot cone instead of 30. Would also affect any allies in the cone.

There has been 3 instances of encounters ending on turn 2 because helpless creatures with Dex 0 can't pass Reflex Saves worth a damn due to a Colour Spray + Diamond Spray combo.

There's no way they're getting to 0 Dex.

Multiple castings of ray of exhaustion don't cause your Dexterity to drop further. You can't be more exhausted than exhausted. I assume you're rolling a fortitude save versus ray of exhaustion? Also, penalties to Dex typically can't cause an ability score to drop below 0.

Diamond spray doesn't look THAT bad if it's that incarnation. 5d6 slashing damage (means that it's effected by DR) and a save for half? Whatever, it's a fireball cone. Unless there's some other way worse diamond spray, that's only 17.5 average damage in a cone.

And I'd like to reiterate monks. High saves, they'll get into melee so that'll make your other players happy, they're relatively easy to hit, and you can make them grapplin' fools.

Also, more encounters per day. 4-5, some of them requiring RP or tricky puzzle solving, and some of them to just waste spells.

Tagion wrote:

Yes , I am abrasive about this topic. I am so because I dont believe that a player that takes the time to design a character that can perform well in and out of combat should be told they need to tone it down because the guy next to them made a character by throwing darts at a board with concepts/level/feats on it and ended up a melee wizard with skill focus: cooking and a club.

Allow me to point you at a valuable axiom (best known from Star Trek but with philosophical underpinnings much older) - the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. If you've got 3 players in the group throwing darts at the board and just you with a concentrated focus, guess who needs to adjust his expectations and style for that game?

Well send sir. I see your point.

Everyone keeps saying increase encounters per day and if that is really the best way to solve the problem I would rather not DM Pathfinder. I have no interest in running that combat heavy a campaign, that much combat will just bog down the speed at which the plot advance.

If you don't run more the spellcasters will pull even more ahead of the melee. How many do you typically have per day?

Help the other players improve their characters instead of nerfing these two. I swear I run into this problem often; I am a veteran, and due to moving I often find myself in groups with people of little experience, and I hate having to pull punches because the others are totally inept at creating useful characters. Having a weak character does not make you a role-player any more than having a strong one make you a munchkin.

Everyone keeps saying increase encounters per day and if that is really the best way to solve the problem I would rather not DM Pathfinder. I have no interest in running that combat heavy a campaign, that much combat will just bog down the speed at which the plot advance.

There is no helping it, the game assumes at least 4 encounters per day.

*especially the fighters

If you don't run more the spellcasters will pull even more ahead of the melee. How many do you typically have per day?

Anywhere from 0 to 6, it's entirely dependant on what wont break suspension of disbelief in whatever situation the party is in. During overland travel its less than once per day. In a dungeon usually 2 or 3. In the middle of a base that belongs to intelligent Humanoids they are attacked until the defence breaks or the party flees which could be anywhere from 3 large to 7 smaller encounters worth.

Random encournters are fun. Make them do more per a day, plot advances the same.
Just limit rests.
For example:
they have to get to the next twon by nightfall instead of 4 days, have those 4 encounters in that one day, and have all the plot in that one day.
It might take more sessions.
(ie they might not to recharge there spelsl for a few sessions..)
Makes them think twice.

Also random ecnounters when they sleep, so they cant recover spells :)

Random encournters are fun. Make them do more per a day, plot advances the same....It might take more sessions.

Its the more sessions that are the issue, not the in game time. We don't get to actually sit down and play often enough to be that frivolous with our time. We can all get the same day free a little less than once every other week.

Help the other players improve their characters instead of nerfing these two. I swear I run into this problem often; I am a veteran, and due to moving I often find myself in groups with people of little experience, and I hate having to pull punches because the others are totally inept at creating useful characters. Having a weak character does not make you a role-player any more than having a strong one make you a munchkin.

Why are people always trying to shoehorn everything under the so-called Stormwind Fallacy? No one said that 'having a weaker character made them a better roleplayer', but you seem to be inferring that the only 'useful' character is one built to your exacting standards.

The sheer number of entry-level characters running around with color spray and color spray alone has caused an interesting effect in my Golarion, for example. Natural selection. Most average-intelligence humanoids can see that surviving that opening onslaught is the difference between living and dying, and their leaders (ie, those with levels/feats) have been known to specially train their combatants to sucker a wizard into blowing it via Step Up (stand 15' apart, character casts Color Spray, both humanoids use an immediate to move just outside the cone). It'll only take once for them to learn that 'charge the enemy, Color Spray will deal with them' isn't exactly the best idea.

First, the oracle (and sounds like wizard character) are NOT balanced.

Here is the deal:
Full casters in Pathfinder (and previous D&D editions) are very easy to over-power. Maxed out primary stat + Save-or-Suck spells= God Wizard, CoDzilla, or whatever you want to call it.
Here is how to fix it:
Limit starting stats to 17 (after racial adjustments) and limit the players ability to acquire stat boosting items. Keep control over wealth, magic items and crafting time.
Sit down with your players and tell them not to specialize in action-denial character builds.

That will fix most of the problems.

Keep in mind that the Advanced Players Guide, (and even the core rules) need to be tweaked to work for your play style. I personally would not allow a heavens oracle in my game, nor would I allow a Summoner, or the witches slumber hex ability. I also would be very hesitant to allow various spells and feats from odd sources. The more sources you allow, the more broken stuff min-maxers will find. This is especially true for casters!
Finally, no matter what limits you set for the rules, sometimes you have to just talk to the players and explain that you don't want to run a min-maxed arms race, or superhero and his side-kicks group. Everyone has to be allowed to have fun, or the game gets called off.

PS- This advice also applies to the GM. If you don't want your players to do it to you, don't do it to them. I can also give you all kinds of advice about screwing your players with monk grimlocks who ready to disrupt the caster, but it won't be fun for anyone in the long run.

PPS- While the rules do say that 4-5 encounters per day is a baseline, it isn't a rule. An encounter can be a role-playing event, a trap, a weather event, or any other kind of non combat encounter.

Everyone keeps saying increase encounters per day and if that is really the best way to solve the problem I would rather not DM Pathfinder. I have no interest in running that combat heavy a campaign, that much combat will just bog down the speed at which the plot advance.

Who says they have to be combat? Traps, hazards, role playing, anything that causes them to use a wider variety of resources would help.

Mergy wrote:

If you don't run more the spellcasters will pull even more ahead of the melee. How many do you typically have per day?

Anywhere from 0 to 6, it's entirely dependant on what wont break suspension of disbelief in whatever situation the party is in. During overland travel its less than once per day. In a dungeon usually 2 or 3. In the middle of a base that belongs to intelligent Humanoids they are attacked until the defence breaks or the party flees which could be anywhere from 3 large to 7 smaller encounters worth.

Have you tried multiple waves within a given encoutner, as opposed to multiple successive encoutners?

It's all one fight, but fought in stages, mitigating their AOE by separating the enemy by time rather than by area distance. Likewise denying them the action economy of healing during breaks between encoutners, and adding to the complexity of the spell economy problem for the more advanced players, while at the same time giving more of a role to the less dominent players. If they use their spell tricks, they'll not have them for second wave of which appears on the 3rd round, or the 3rd which appears on the 5th. If they hold back, the other PCs have the spotlight while they do.

People have suggested more mooks/minions. Imagine a rush of goblins, for example. That appears to be the whole encounter, until the barghest sends in the next wave - specifically trying to draw out their most powerful spells before having to reveal himself. Outdoors and unintelligent opponents, this can be the young preditors attacking before the old Alpha emerges.

After a few of these, the PCs should start to question every encounter, and should start holding back 'the big guns' even when it's not actually necessary, relying on the other PCs to shoulder the burden, thereby giving them the spotlight.

For the RP issues. Have you considered forcing the party to separate? Have time issues that demand two RP challenges be handeled at once. The Oracle can handle his with no trouble, do that first, leaving the spotlight with the rogue while he accomplishes his.

Why does everyone seem to think that the obsessively min-maxed characters are "doing it right?" The whole point of the game is not to steamroll every possible situation but to work as a team to defeat actual threats.

If every scene in the Lord of the Rings trilogy was just Gandalf waving a staff and then all the enemies are dead, that would be boring and repetitive.

We have an Carrion Crown campaign running at the moment in which I (unfortunately) allowed a player to use a third party race - the half-ogre. Since then, the game has become known as "Crunch Kills Things."

A discrepancy in party power results in less fun for everyone except the "all-star" characters. Either convince those players to help the others tweak, or design some encounters that let the other roles take the spotlight for a while.

What makes you think they are obsessively min-maxed? It could be an issue of optimized characters with some that are not optimized*, which is different than min-maxed. If that is the case you help the lesser optimized characters on their builds. It helps them with character creation, and it makes the GM's jobs easier.

*That is what I think it is, and after reading your post again I see that we agree, helping the lesser optimized players is a good idea.

Sounds like you are ignoring the trifecta of caster lockdown moves.

Range: Color spray has a 15' range (diamond Spray is only 20') so either be 40' outside it to start the fight and get into melee as quick as possible. He can't reach you with the spell until you charge, He tries to cast, it provokes and you pound him to paste with your greatsword/axe. OR just fill him full of arrows at 40 ft (outside of his range to move + cast). They will have a horrible AC and next to no Hit Points so it shouldn't take more then a round.

Senses: Neither of these characters can cast on anything they can't see and neither has darkvision. Hit em with a greater darkness/silence stone trick and charge em, they are useless inside of it and when they try to run AoO's all around.

Encounters per day: Casters rule the 15 minute workday so don't do that. Hit em with 4 encounters a day (Wandering Monster charts where created for a reason) and watch them start panicking since they have crap for spells per day.

Stop playing by their rules and make them play by yours.

I endorse this heartily. Additionally, send a wizard at them with monk minions. Cast silence on the monks before pummeling the mages.

These are all methods to keep the mages in check.

But the biggest one: "Make sure they face at least 3 encounters per day."

Mages are quite broken if they dont have to manage their resources. Not so much if they do.

And maybe you can think of some ways to make the Cavalier, Ranger, and Rogue more cool? Allow them to make some character changes to be more effective? Point them in the direction of some optimization threads?

Make the Rogue into a Ninja. Give the cavalier an archetype that trades the horse away (Houndmaster from last year's RPG superstar is my favorite) if youre not in a wilderness campaign. As for the Ranger: I'm not sure what the problem is, Rangers are generally pretty good.

One thing I have to say overall though is that I do not want to increase encounters per day. I know the game is balanced around it but it really does not fit with the story most of the time and if combat was not going as quickly as it was it will take to long to actually get through an adventure. One of the reason I prefer DMing 4e is we can actually get through 4 encounters a session if we need to, with Pathfinder combat takes almost twice as long even if its ends on turn 4.

You don't have to honestly. I run games where it's weeks between encounters. You just have to adjust for the difference. A couple of suggestions :

1) Maximize the HP of the enemies.
2) Use multiple lower level enemies, not one big bad. Turn the action economy in your favor.
3) Play the enemies as smart, have them use hit and run tactics, or target the same player character (at random) every other round, to keep the PCs on their toes.
4) Switch it up, DO increase the encounters on occasion, so the players never know if they're going to need to save resources or not.

Example, last game in my friday night game, the PCs were defending an embassy against duerger attackers. The duerger used a ballista to blow out the shutters on a window on the southeast corner, then invade an upstairs window on the west middle side and attacked in two groups. Then, after they got beaten back, the real attack force attacked an hour later (the first force was hired gutter trash). The PCs had blown a lot of resources on the first attack, and struggled with the second, because they didn't husband their resources.