Well congrats on your game. Its always great to provide your group with a good story and game.
However, D&D 3.5 allows characters to become very powerful. For a roleplayer it is about gaming but for a lot of people its about what you are experiencing with your friend: power.
Also, dont count on the fact that just because it is an official D&D book that everything is balanced. Truly, it seems that every new supplement that comes out tries to out do the last. Just look at the Eberron campaign setting if you want to see overpowered.
Well...good luck with your dilemma. Try to keep working with him and, in the end, just enjoy the game.
One session in and you've already stumbled onto every DMs worst nightmare...you, my friend, have a Munchkin.
As was already said, the fact that it is in a published book does not mean that it was playtested thoroughly or is balanced. That's why there are errata pages (check the Wizards site). The powergamer is my group was gung-ho to be a Citadel Elite...until the errata for that book came out and reined in the class, now he's going in a completely different direction. Sadly, it's not unique to Eberron - check out the Vow of Poverty in Exalted deeds or the new thorn in my side: the dragonborn from Races of the Dragon.
The key is to say up front what you will and won't allow. The classes in the Player's Handbook and the prestige classes from the DMs guide are all pretty well put together. I'd be hesitant to allow the other books until you get a firm grasp of the rules and can effectively gauge them for yourself. That said, most of the stuff from the "Races" and "Complete" books are fine.
Dee, I think you could just tell your buddy (who probably wants a spirit shaman) that you want to stick to the core books as you have already told him and the group at large. Tell him if you go back on it now you'll probably get other people wanting to do the same defeating the whole purpose of keeping your life simple. There's nothing wrong with sticking to the three basic books if you want too.
Also if you are attempting to eliminate any possible twinkiness on the part of your pal or others I would suggest adding a few more role-playing encounters (some friendly, some neatral, and some hostile) to your game. This works for most twinks except the "twink bard" with Diplomacy +40. For this special sort of build I suggest keeping the role-playing encounters, but take extra special note of the PC's words and actions (never just let them make the check) and then apply those as circumstance modifiers to the Diplomacy check.
That should show 'em.
GGG
And maybe an arcane caster would be a plus in the group, tell him to play a sorcerer or a wizard.
Don't let him go outside the rules, you said PHB classes, keep it.
The PH clearly states, in regards to crocodiles, "the DM MAY add the following creatures to the druid's list of options". So the first thing you should have done was simply say that a crocodile was not available ("sorry, the lake is too sulphorous").
You won't fix a munchkin by letting him play something else. He'll just munchkin-ize that. And don't bend on the rules. As you noted, it's not fair for everyone else. If you open yourself up to new books, the munchkin will really be turned loose.
You need him to understand the game world you want to run - a city campaign with a bit of realism. Explain that walking around town with a crocodile isn't really approriate. If he doesn't get it, a patrol of city guard show up and kill the darn thing.
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Dee, I think you could just tell your buddy (who probably wants a spirit shaman) that you want to stick to the core books as you have already told him and the group at large. Tell him if you go back on it now you'll probably get other people wanting to do the same defeating the whole purpose of keeping your life simple. There's nothing wrong with sticking to the three basic books if you want too.
Also if you are attempting to eliminate any possible twinkiness on the part of your pal or others I would suggest adding a few more role-playing encounters (some friendly, some neatral, and some hostile) to your game. This works for most twinks except the "twink bard" with Diplomacy +40. For this special sort of build I suggest keeping the role-playing encounters, but take extra special note of the PC's words and actions (never just let them make the check) and then apply those as circumstance modifiers to the Diplomacy check.
That should show 'em.
GGG
On a side note, The Giant in the Playground website(order of the stick) has a write-up on diplomacy that almost totally fixes the diplomacy skill. I will be using it in my homebrew setting coming up soon.
Back on Point: YOU are the DM, experience doesn't matter, many DMs just plan don't like most of the options from sources outside of the 3 core books (PHB, DMG, & MM). Set limits and stick with it. You want a spirit companion, have a real one first, if it gets killed add a ghost template to it and viola' instant spirit companion. If you use the corebooks and think outside the box, you can do almost anything you can think of.IMO
FH
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I am running a FR variant of Shackled City as well, and in my group of seven players, I have two that could be considered power-gamers.
One plans his characters to perfection, and is currently playing a Human Evoker / Red Wizard.
The other spends a great deal of effort building powerful, effective characters, and is currently playing a half-dragon Ranger / Fighter / Dervish with a variant feat of Outsider Wings to give him flight, 14 ranks in tumble, a tail scythe, and two blessed +1 scimitars, combined with improved critical giving him automatic criticals if he rolls a 15 or better to hit -- you get the idea.
When I first started running 3.X, characters like this scared the willies out of me. Now, I take it in stride -- uber-characters like this are not only possible, they are likely. However, not all your players are likely to be as effective with their character builds as others.
Try to come up with challenges that can't be immediately solved by your uber-characters. Don't DM antagonistically, just give them a variety of challenges, such as diplomatic issues, political intrigue, incorporeal creatures, critters with high DR, situations with many many targets, or the like.
Secondly, if you can learn from your players and build a better villain, do so. I took Ike Iverson and rebuilt him for our campaign to be a more effective villain for my particular players at the same CR - he's posted at http://www.darkmoongallery.com/npc/details.php?id=33, if you want to look.
Lastly, don't let your players steamroll you. I've allowed pretty much everything in the WOTC books, but I find many of the 3rd party books unbalanced. Read everything carefully, and if you aren't sure about whether something might have a negative impact on your game, ask for opinions (such as on this board, or over on ENWorld), or disallow it.
Be honest with your players, and tell them to give you plenty of warning if they want to introduce something strange and new into the game, so you have time to think it over. If you are really unsure, tell them you will allow it (such as a base class or a custom magic item) on an experimental basis for one or two sessions, and if you think it's overshadowing the other PCs, you will have to ask him to remove it.
Hopefully this advice is useful...
I'm the same. I tend to just take it in stride. If someone min-maxes a character they are very, very, very likely to find themselves in situations where their weakness (because there always is a weakness) gets amplified.
For example currently in the party I am running through SCAP one of the characters is an Orc barbarian/fighter with 24 str. He also has a reach weapon (gusiarme?). Anyway he has something like +10 to damage and to-hit. He generally trivilises most combats.
But Drakthar was a real problem for him. As are anything that can gang up on him or will based attacks. Dont let characters trivilise the game for your other players. Thats my most important rule since the same party has a gnome rogue with 8 str and who is more role-play type. Make sure everyone contributes and the other players see the min-maxer has a weakness. Otherwise you will either get resentment or a whole party of min-maxers.
So my question is...do I assume that this kind of character is going to be ok (in balance with the other members of the party who are a cleric, monk, barbarian and rogue), or do I try and convince him to do something else? I just hate power play! If I should guide him into a different class, does anyone have recommendations on which one, and how I should convince him?
We're playing another session this Tuesday, so hoping to resolve this issue soon. Any help would be welcome! :)
Howdy!
I would strongly recommend only allowing stuff from the 3 core rulebooks. These rules are well balanced and still provide a lot of options for your players. By limiting yourself to the core books, you can concentrate more on the aspects of the game you like (the story and roleplaying) and less time on figuring out if feat X or prestige class Y is too powerful.
If the player complains about the limits, explain to him that you're new to this DMing thing (if he didn't already know) and that you want to get a good understanding of the core rules before you tackle other options. Let him know that as you get more experienced, you'll consider other books but until then these are the only rules you're using.
Don't let yourself get rushed into being "experienced," either. Take your time and when you feel ready, expand their options. If it's not until you've finished the SCAP, fine. If it's never, that's fine, too. You're the DM and you need to work with your players to find what works best for the group, but in the end it is your game. If you're not having fun, neither will the players.
If you do decide to incorporate other books, I wouldn't just accept ANYTHING outside the core rulebooks without first looking it over. I don't have the Races books, but some of the stuff in the Complete series is a bit twinked. The Leap Attack feat and the Initiate of the Sevenfold Veil prestige class come to mind as things to avoid. As others have noted, each book ups the power scale, so even WotC stuff is suspect.
If you're interested in getting a better understanding of the rules, I'd suggest getting involved in an organized play campaign, like Living Greyhawk. There are other organized play campaigns, but LG is the largest and it will probably be the easiest to get into a game. It is also the closest I know of to "core" D&D. (While LG uses the Complete and Races books in addition to the core rule books, you don't need to buy a "campaign book." Other campaigns like Living Arcanis, Dave Arneson's Blackmoor, and Mark of Heroes have proprietary sourcebooks for campaign background and the basics like races, etc.)
Even if you're not interested or don't have the time for more gaming, you can check out their campaign rules and they might help you decided what you want to do with your own campaign.
Here's a link to the LG website: http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=lg/welcome
Good luck and enjoy!
Dont let characters trivilise the game for your other players. Thats my most important rule since the same party has a gnome rogue with 8 str and who is more role-play type. Make sure everyone contributes and the other players see the min-maxer has a weakness. Otherwise you will either get resentment or a whole party of min-maxers.
I couldn't have said it better myself. Every player deserves a chance to shine.
I like my combats challenging and very occasionally deadly. This can be difficult to achieve if you have one uber-combat cheese monkey with the rest of the group OK or worse in combat. Making it challenging for the UCCM makes it deadly for the rest of the group, while making it challenging for the rest of the group makes it a cake walk for the UCCM. It's something I still struggle with in my home campaign.
Hi all,
I'm a newb DM running SC. I've already run one session, and it was awesome, I got heaps of compliments from the guys playing, so that was encouraging. One thing that is bothering me, however, is that I have one player who likes to play the most powerful thing possible. Now, I might be weird, but I think D&D is more about playing something...I dunno, kind of realistic, and it's not about being the "best". It's about everyone having a part to play.
Anyway, I limited my players to selecting the basic classes out of the PHB (cleric, rogue, paladin etc.) to make it easier for me (rules-wise) and he opted to go for a druid (despite my warnings about druids in cities/dungeons) and get this...got a crocodile as an animal familiar. Ok, so I let him have that, if he could roleplay it. Which he couldn't (i.e. you do not have a croc following you around the city in broad daylight, people would freak). So I'm making him change his character. Now he wants to play another druid, but one with a spirit thingy (I forget what it's actually called). Instead of having an animal companion, he sort of has a spirit inside of him. I read the stats and stuff, and it still sounds kind of overpowered, butttt...it is published in an official D&D book...so that means they thought about balance right?
So my question is...do I assume that this kind of character is going to be ok (in balance with the other members of the party who are a cleric, monk, barbarian and rogue), or do I try and convince him to do something else? I just hate power play! If I should guide him into a different class, does anyone have recommendations on which one, and how I should convince him?
We're playing another session this Tuesday, so hoping to resolve this issue soon. Any help would be welcome! :)
So far you have reacted well. Do not let your game be destroyed by Power Gamers. The best way to handle the situation is to restrict the options, which you already did wisely and finally to talk to the player in question about his playing style. Just tell him that you like to focus more on good role-playing and less on Min/Maxing characters and power gaming.
In my campaigns I award extra XP for good roleplaying. This is even suggested in the DMG. I usually give away 50-100 XP per session. And tell your players about it, so that they see that you award good playing style.