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MinMaxing is not the root of all evil.
But if you have one character that is really min-maxed and optimal in the same party with another character who is not optimal at all, it could make the DM's job very hard, or even impossible.
If everyone is close to the same level of optimization/min-maxing then the DM can throw encounters at the party that are appropriate for everyone. If not, then a monster that's easy for Min Max the Unstoppable Fighter will be instant death to Unmax the Non-optimized Fighter.
Optimization is not evil at all.
See stormwind fallacy, et al.
The game is not balanced for low magic and tends to disadvantage martial characters even more than casters unless you houserule spells like crazy.
That being said, the math behind the game tends to break down around the margins. It simply isn't robust enough to support hyper-optimized PCs without tossing out the CR system completely and generating your own customized monsters and NPCs.
The game arguably works best around the middle where characters are less than fully optimized but also avoid any sort of obviously sub-optimal builds. This is doubly true in groups where you have a mix of optimizers and casual players.
Not currently playing right now, but as both a player and a DM, I find that min-maxing is seriously annoying. When I was a player, we had a min-maxer playing a psionicst. He would blow the crap out of everything, including us sometimes. So as a player, I find that min-maxers force me to play things that I have to play in order to keep up, let alone contribute, as opposed to things I actually want to play. As a DM, I find that it is usually only one or two players that min-max, making it hard for me to provide them with a challenge, without destroying the rest of the party.
First, define min-maxing. Is it making optimal choices to make your character effective at his chosen vocation? If you're playing a wizard and you put your highest ability score into Intelligence and your lowest into Strength are you min-maxing? Is picking the power attack feat for your fighter rather than skill focus (basket weaving) min-maxing? Honestly, I'm never sure what's meant when one says "min-maxing" or "power-gaming". If given the choice, I'd rather play an effective character than not. Is that bad/wrong?
First, define min-maxing. Is it making optimal choices to make your character effective at his chosen vocation? If you're playing a wizard and you put your highest ability score into Intelligence and your lowest into Strength are you min-maxing? Is picking the power attack feat for your fighter rather than skill focus (basket weaving) min-maxing? Honestly, I'm never sure what's meant when one says "min-maxing" or "power-gaming". If given the choice, I'd rather play an effective character than not. Is that bad?
Power gaming and Min maxing is , by common opinion, going beyond effective to the point to where you can solo CR+3 encounters.
Power gaming and Min maxing is , by common opinion, going beyond effective to the point to where you can solo CR+3 encounters.
So it's purely a measure of combat prowess? What about those who optimize their characters for maximum healing potential or social interaction supremacy? That's all good?
IMHO, more or less. Social interaction supremacy, while useful, will never be game breaking, and usually only one person specializes in it anyways, you don't have to worry about killing the other players in social interaction. And as for healing, by power gaming definition, it is suboptimal, it is more effective to kill the enemies faster than keep the party alive longer.
sorry, I asumed it was a generic term, my bad.when I say min-maxxing I mean a player who uses the point system to generate a character who is specialized to his class, for example, my last wizards starting ability scores with a 20 point buy were S-7 D-17 C-12 I-17 w-7 CH-7
when someone says "Optimizing" I tend to assume that they mean going through all the splat books and finding all the broken feats Ect. to make his character uber, guess we all have our foibles :)
WC
I would deem your player unplayable, IMO.
In my experience character optimization rarely presents that much of a problem. The real issue arises when the players have a better handle on tactics than the GM.
If played well, there should be no way it is possible for any character to solo a CR+3 encounter, barring huge amounts of luck.
From what I have seen, Gm's who have trouble challenging their party do so because they aren't playing their encounters to the fullest.
In my experience character optimization rarely presents that much of a problem. The real issue arises when the players have a better handle on tactics than the GM.
If played well, there should be no way it is possible for any character to solo a CR+3 encounter, barring huge amounts of luck.
From what I have seen, Gm's who have trouble challenging their party do so because they aren't playing their encounters to the fullest.
No it's possible but it does depend on a LOT of factors. IE I am playing a skeletal champion and dealing with a fey creature with a lot of mind-effecting abilites. I -might- be able to solo a CR+3 encounter, now that does get into the issue of does the CR of the monster need to be flexable based on party composition i will admit.
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when I say min-maxxing I mean a player who uses the point system to generate a character who is specialized to his class, for example, my last wizards starting ability scores with a 20 point buy were S-7 D-17 C-12 I-17 w-7 CH-7
That is indeed the literal meaning. To minimize some attributes so that you can maximize others, creating a lopsided character who is likely to be unreasonably good at one task, but utterly hopeless at tasks outside of its narrow focus.
I don't like it, and really am not comfortable with any attribute below 10, for my own play, since it's boring to be the dude with a 7 Int or 7 Cha during the parts of the game that deal with puzzle-solving or social interaction, but it's not as if the concept hasn't been around since Elric of Melnibone (who dumped Str and Con, and then used a magic item to compensate).
Such characters tend to become glass cannons. Against CR appropriate challenges, they might find that their spells are unbeatable, or that their weapon attacks do amazing one-hit, one-kill damage, but when the GM introduces a situation that requires social interaction, or intelligence checks to solve a riddle, or strength checks to pull free of that tanglefoot bag, or whatever, they utterly fall down.
Ideally, if the GM doesn't want to deal with that, it should be addressed out of game, during character generation. Make a blanket rule, 'no stat below 9, and no more than one below 10' or something, or just deal with it on a case-by-case basis.
There will be the inevitable temptation to deal with it 'in-game,' by hitting the Str 7, Int 20 elven wizard with a tanglefoot bag or ray of enfeeblement, or hitting the Int 7, Str 20 1/2 orc barbarian with some sort of int-damaging toxin, curse or spell, but that sort of thing just turns the game into 'us against them,' GM vs. player confrontation, and is frustrating for both sides. Similarly, deliberatly adding three sessions worth of social interaction and puzzle-solving when you've got a party that has dumped Charisma isn't 'challenging,' it's just adversarial. As GM, you know what characters they built, and therefore you know they didn't sit down at the table to play 'puzzle-solving' or 'political intrigue.' In any event, when the game becomes 'GM vs. players,' nobody wins, even if the GM says 'rocks fall, everybody dies,' because nobody is having fun.
IMO, these sorts of things are always better solved out of game, by players and GMs talking things out and agreeing to avoid making characters that are unbalanced in this manner.
I'm not being sarcastic either, it is just my play style. I dislike playing characters that are substantially sub par in so many ways. 7 str= barely able to lift/climb/etc. as a mage, you eventually get ways around that provided you can use magic. 7 Wis= no common sense, no intuition, and no focus. 7 Cha= small animals would bark at you and children would cry and flee. Personally, I often have an 8 in one stat, and make the most of role playing it. It would be a nightmare trying to role play 3 7s like that, esp. 2 in mental stats.
Hi All :)
I'm just wondering what the average take is on min-maxing.
At our table one of our GM's seems to feel that it's cheating, but when I ask him why he's so opposed he never comes up with any real answer.
My last fighter in his game finished at 16th lvl with a +2 weapon.Our second GM doesn't seem too opposed but punishes players for min-maxing by making magic Items unavailable, your barbarian has a 24 strength at 12th lvl? how much good does it do him if he only has a +2 weapon?
so what's your take? also, just for fun, note whether your a player or GM.
wc
First you would have to define what you mean by min-maxing.
That term along with powergaming and munchkining often get mixed up depending on who you talk to.
First, define min-maxing. Is it making optimal choices to make your character effective at his chosen vocation? If you're playing a wizard and you put your highest ability score into Intelligence and your lowest into Strength are you min-maxing? Is picking the power attack feat for your fighter rather than skill focus (basket weaving) min-maxing? Honestly, I'm never sure what's meant when one says "min-maxing" or "power-gaming". If given the choice, I'd rather play an effective character than not. Is that bad?Power gaming and Min maxing is , by common opinion, going beyond effective to the point to where you can solo CR+3 encounters.sorry, I asumed it was a generic term, my bad.
when I say min-maxxing I mean a player who uses the point system to generate a character who is specialized to his class, for example, my last wizards starting ability scores with a 20 point buy were S-7 D-17 C-12 I-17 w-7 CH-7
when someone says "Optimizing" I tend to assume that they mean going through all the splat books and finding all the broken feats Ect. to make his character uber, guess we all have our foibles :)
WC
I have no problem with that, but I would warn you of any potential downfalls of it as a DM. You may be pushed into a situation where you have to speak, and I typically like to use Shadows. Now in another GM's games it might not be an issue at all.
In my opinion, min-maxing and powergaming is only really a problem for the DM if only some of the party is doing it. If everyone is min-maxing, then I just need to up the challenges. Likewise if noone is min-maxing, I'll reduce the challenges. But when half the party is min-maxing and half the party is not, then it becomes a real problem to create encounters that challenge the min-maxers without slaughtering those who don't min-max.
I have yet to come up with a proper solution for that issue.
Prevalence of dump stats among point buy characters is mainly a result of cost-benefit analysis on the part of the player. Basically the expected cost of dumping a stat like Charisma is less than the potential benefit of boosting 1-2 stats to the racial maximum.
That's mainly because the game is built around group interactions with encounters and 4+ specialists are mechanically better than 4+ generalists in terms of success rate.
If you can sacrifice in one area in order to be much better in your specialty it makes sense to dump stats especially if doing so doesn't compromise your character's basic competency level too much.
People don't like this because such characters fail the smell test but rather than modify the point buy schedule to limit or eliminate the bonus build points associated with dump stats they typically engage in all sorts of punitive actions against the "gimped" character, even when the game rewards that sort of gimping. Now personally, I think that a bunch of 7s on a stat-line makes for a poor character but unless you change the rules there really isn't a ton of mechanical reasons not to engage in this sort of 'min-maxing'.
I'm not being sarcastic either, it is just my play style. I dislike playing characters that are substantially sub par in so many ways. 7 str= barely able to lift/climb/etc. as a mage, you eventually get ways around that provided you can use magic. 7 Wis= no common sense, no intuition, and no focus. 7 Cha= small animals would bark at you and children would cry and flee. Personally, I often have an 8 in one stat, and make the most of role playing it. It would be a nightmare trying to role play 3 7s like that, esp. 2 in mental stats.I can't argue with any of your points, but I don't see how any of them make the character unplayable, Ant Haul is a first lvl spell, einstien walked around with his shoes untied witch can lead to tripping and hurting yourself, richard nixon was a complete jerk, both were rather succesful though.
these are the kind of answers that I get from our GM, no real answer at all.
wc
Richard nixon was a jerk, but he was intelligent and reasonably fit. He would have 1 maybe 2 below 10 stats. besides that, I would say he still had at least an average cha, he was president after all.
Einstein was brilliant, possessed common sense, and was inspiring. he might have had one subpar stat, but not 3.If you want real tangible answers as to why one shouldn't power game, think of the other players who have to make choices they otherwise wouldn't in order to keep up, and think of the DM who must now recalculate encounters to provide you with a challenge while trying to avoid killing the other characters and angering the players. In the end, one could say the real reason is common courtesy.
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Min-maxing is not the root of all Evil. I am in a group with a unarmed/grapple fighter (Fail), a 17 charisma cavalier in studded leather (fail), a rogue I designed (epic!) and my Oracle. The rogue and my oracle over min-maxed pretty well. Yet, we are not ruining the game. The fighters poor roleplaying, bad table manners and poor character combat tactics are making the game borderline bareable. My oracle and rogue buddy don't try to dominate the battlefield, we play to make the group viable. Our game has no negative effect from min-maxing. If anything we are enabling the others to not worry about combat and be bad players on their own!
Smurf!
Our second GM doesn't seem too opposed but punishes players for min-maxing by making magic Items unavailable, your barbarian has a 24 strength at 12th lvl? how much good does it do him if he only has a +2 weapon?
That's a good example of douchbaggery.
A better example of a 'min/max' broken character from the real world is not Nixon or Einstein.
Instead, think Stephen Hawking, who has STR 3, DEX 3, CON 7, INT 24, WIS 20, CHA 16. He's an excellent researcher and scientist. But a lousy triathelete. Note I'm not making fun of him, just pointing out the extreme end of the spectrum. I think he's a great scientist.
Someone with a 7/7/7/12/18/18 stat array has much more in common with Stephen Hawking than Richard Nixon.
Our second GM doesn't seem too opposed but punishes players for min-maxing by making magic Items unavailable, your barbarian has a 24 strength at 12th lvl? how much good does it do him if he only has a +2 weapon?That's a good example of douchbaggery.
I agree. I wonder what he does if the barbarian starts to craft his own weapons. Does he make the barbarian auto-fail? What if the bad guy has a +3 weapon? What if another party member gives the barbarian a +3 weapon because that character is moving up to a +4 weapon.
Richard nixon was a jerk, but he was intelligent and reasonably fit. He would have 1 maybe 2 below 10 stats. besides that, I would say he still had at least an average cha, he was president after all.
Einstein was brilliant, possessed common sense, and was inspiring. he might have had one subpar stat, but not 3.
If you want real tangible answers as to why one shouldn't power game, think of the other players who have to make choices they otherwise wouldn't in order to keep up, and think of the DM who must now recalculate encounters to provide you with a challenge while trying to avoid killing the other characters and angering the players. In the end, one could say the real reason is common courtesy.who's power gaming? the discussion is min-maxing, my point is that a character who min-maxes takes some penalties to get some advantages, your point seems to be that you find min-maxxing distasteful.
witch makes the character personally offensive to you, not unplayable.
again, another non answer.
wc
I view min maxing as the highest form of power gaming, (My view/ opinion). Table top rpgs are group activities, if just one or two people make min maxed(power gamed) characters, it begins to strain things at the table, some players get annoyed or even quite, the DM, who must already do a lot of work has to put in that much more effort. Therefore, I think that common courtesy is an excellent answer to why one should not power game(Min max), you are ruining the game for others, but I guess this is where are opinions differ, and if you cannot except an answer like that, I guess there is no answer for your question.
I agree. I wonder what he does if the barbarian starts to craft his own weapons. Does he make the barbarian auto-fail? What if the bad guy has a +3 weapon? What if another party member gives the barbarian a +3 weapon because that character is moving up to a +4 weapon.Our second GM doesn't seem too opposed but punishes players for min-maxing by making magic Items unavailable, your barbarian has a 24 strength at 12th lvl? how much good does it do him if he only has a +2 weapon?That's a good example of douchbaggery.nope, he just refuses to give you the necessary time to craft the weapon.
"If you take the time to craft that the world will end and you'll fail in your quest".
wc
EDIT: sorry pet peave of mine, missed the rest of the post.
a +3 long sword isn't much good to a barb who has 2 or 3 feats invested in the falchion for instance, and if the bad guy has a +3 falchion it's either large, small or changed to another weapon so the player can't use it.
Does he similarly limit casters with high main stats or is this d-baggery limited to the goons with the audacity to have high strength?
Min-maxing the root of all evil? No. The root of a lot of inter-party disharmony and stress for the GM trying to manage the game? Yes.
Min-maxing is fine and dandy if you're the type of player who won't set out to overshadow other players for whom min-maxing is not their style. If you don't play well with non-mix-maxing styles, however, then I think it's a problem for the other players and the GM.
Personally, I don't mind a bit of min-maxing. But I expect the player doing it to work well with the more casual players at the table. If he doesn't, I'll tell him to rein it in. I also make sure that the shortcomings PCs build into their characters become involved in the game. Dump your Wisdom stat? Fair warning - there are enchantment magics in the game. Dump your Charisma? I do use interpersonal skill rolls no matter how eloquent the player is in their diplomacy. And so on...
I agree. I wonder what he does if the barbarian starts to craft his own weapons. Does he make the barbarian auto-fail? What if the bad guy has a +3 weapon? What if another party member gives the barbarian a +3 weapon because that character is moving up to a +4 weapon.Our second GM doesn't seem too opposed but punishes players for min-maxing by making magic Items unavailable, your barbarian has a 24 strength at 12th lvl? how much good does it do him if he only has a +2 weapon?That's a good example of douchbaggery.nope, he just refuses to give you the necessary time to craft the weapon.
"If you take the time to craft that the world will end and you'll fail in your quest".
wc
EDIT: sorry pet peave of mine, missed the rest of the post.
a +3 long sword isn't much good to a barb who has 2 or 3 feats invested in the falchion for instance, and if the bad guy has a +3 falchion it's either large, small or changed to another weapon so the player can't use it.
Unless he can force me to adventure for 16 hours I would use 8 hours of downtime, and take the +5 crafting at double speed. I might even skip a night of sleep every now and again. Being fatigued is only a -2 IIRC. Polymorph any object should take care of the wrong weapon issue. I am sure if I buy the scroll my wizard buddy will help me out.
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Does he similarly limit casters with high main stats or is this d-baggery limited to the goons with the audacity to have high strength?definitely, several times I've burned feats on crafting skills and not been allowed to use them.
wc
Not been allowed to craft?
Is this due to a legitimate reason, such as lack of time during event based adventures or lack of materials at hand due to lower than average wealth? In which case you should still be able to craft, albeit at a slower pace...
Or were you simply told your character doesn't? Which would be shenanigans of the highest calibur.
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Does he similarly limit casters with high main stats or is this d-baggery limited to the goons with the audacity to have high strength?definitely, several times I've burned feats on crafting skills and not been allowed to use them.
wc
I guess he has a cap on certain things in his games, and a though shall not pass sign next to it. I don't think I could play for this guy, with all his metagame rulings.
"Oh you want to craft? Well now the enemy has suddenly sped up the construction of the "end the world device" so now you don't have time to do anything except rush to the finish line."
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Does he similarly limit casters with high main stats or is this d-baggery limited to the goons with the audacity to have high strength?definitely, several times I've burned feats on crafting skills and not been allowed to use them.
wc
Not been allowed to craft?
Is this due to a legitimate reason, such as lack of time during event based adventures or lack of materials at hand due to lower than average wealth? In which case you should still be able to craft, albeit at a slower pace...
Or were you simply told your character doesn't? Which would be shenanigans of the highest calibur.
From an earlier WC post-->"If you take the time to craft that the world will end and you'll fail in your quest".
From an earlier WC post-->"If you take the time to craft that the world will end and you'll fail in your quest".[
Does he similarly limit casters with high main stats or is this d-baggery limited to the goons with the audacity to have high strength?definitely, several times I've burned feats on crafting skills and not been allowed to use them.
wc
Not been allowed to craft?
Is this due to a legitimate reason, such as lack of time during event based adventures or lack of materials at hand due to lower than average wealth? In which case you should still be able to craft, albeit at a slower pace...
Or were you simply told your character doesn't? Which would be shenanigans of the highest calibur.
Missed that when skimming the thread.
Unless the PC's are driven hard every hour of the day save for sleep you should still be able to craft throughout the day at a slower pace, representing work done while on lunch breaks, winding down before rest, et cetera. A denial of the ability to craft, without flat out removing it as an option from the game and informing everyone before is, as per above, SHENAN's!
...the conversation goes something like this:
Barb: can I buy a +4 str belt?
GM: what's you str?
Barb: 24.
GM: noThief: can I buy a +4 dex belt?
GM: what's your Dex?
Thief: 18
GM:sure...
How is this handled at the magic shop in game? Seems like that is something that would break immersion faster than those giant blue "don't go here walls" in Assassin's Creed.
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Does he similarly limit casters with high main stats or is this d-baggery limited to the goons with the audacity to have high strength?definitely, several times I've burned feats on crafting skills and not been allowed to use them.
wc
Not been allowed to craft?
Is this due to a legitimate reason, such as lack of time during event based adventures or lack of materials at hand due to lower than average wealth?
Or were you simply told your character doesn't? Which would be shenanigans of the highest calibur.
well the way it seems to work is that you can ask to buy pretty much anything and the GM decides if you can have it, so take + skills for instance, the conversation goes something like this:
Barb: can I buy a +4 str belt?
GM: what's you str?
Barb: 24.
GM: noThief: can I buy a +4 dex belt?
GM: what's your Dex?
Thief: 18
GM:sureso when I took crafting feats to get around this is when time suddenly became "Of the Essence" so to speak
Now I DO appreciate that high scores can make the GM's job difficult, but I also appreciate that this is easy to balance with the corresponding low scores, the character dumped charisma? well then all the bandits are going to attack the jerk, or the town guard are going to lay a beating on him, teach him some respect.
dumped wisdom? well, bet the rest of the party wished his strength was lower after that charm person spell, or "Anybody seen the fighter"? "Not since that wizard cast maze on him"
Dumped Str? ray of enfeeblement is what? second lvl?
the list goes on.
wc
That would ruin my immersion in a world. I understand that game can't be completely realistic, but your ability to buy an item based on how strong you are just makes not sense to me. I understand that this is a game, but I don't want it to be treated like a game, if that makes any sense.
How is this handled at the magic shop in game? Seems like that is something that would break immersion faster than those giant blue "don't go here walls" in Assassin's Creed....the conversation goes something like this:
Barb: can I buy a +4 str belt?
GM: what's you str?
Barb: 24.
GM: noThief: can I buy a +4 dex belt?
GM: what's your Dex?
Thief: 18
GM:sure...we don't role play shopping as it tends to take up so much time and then the players not shopping start talking about hockey or work and then the game dies till we get back to it, I think the assumption is that character went shopping and was or wasn't able to find what he wanted based on whether or not the GM feels he should have it.
well, I'm glad to see that some folks agree with me at least, I was beginning to think I was just being a whiner.
wc
Not to turn your game into player vs DM, because that is bound to end badly, but...next time you go shopping, have the lowest STR character purchase a belt of STR, have the lowest INT character purchase a headband of INT, and so on. Then...everyone trade. It'll only work once.