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I'm looking to start up an adventure path that i'm pretty sure one of my group has read cover to cover, and would know how to optimize his character to the point that everyone else is practically useless in the campaign. He's a notorious power gamer in our group who always tries to break the campaign, however when he DMs he gets mad when we have optimized characters.
I'm looking for a good way to give everyone equal spotlight in this campaign, because in our group we have a representation of all 4 major types of gamers in the group: The Hack n Slasher, the Intellectual, the Power Gamer, and the role player/actor.
I was thinking of pregenerating the characters for them, at least stat/class wise, but letting the players flesh out their personalities, and making all the characters PFS legal even though this isnt going to be a PFS game. My friend the intellectual, who also has a problem with our power game suggested just having everyone make their characters the first session and to supervise it, though i'm sure that even with having them make the characters there, our in house power gamer will still make the "ultimate X" character and over shadow everyone else so they feel left out.
I know its extra work to make all the characters and randomly assign them in the first game, but it can allow everyone to be on equal footing to begin with instead of having one super optimized character as well as suboptimal and bad characters.
My other option is not inviting this one guy to the game, however he is still a good role player and is fun to have in the party even when he's overshadowing everyone else.
The campaign i'm looking to run is Skull and Shackles, which fits our group because even when we play a standard "heroic fantasy" campaign, our groups tend to turn to piracy and chaos... always lol. With my luck though, the party will end up being super heroic instead of pirates lol.
So TLDR Which is a better choice: Generating characters the first meeting, or pregenerating the characters for the group?
I'm looking to start up an adventure path that i'm pretty sure one of my group has read cover to cover, and would know how to optimize his character to the point that everyone else is practically useless in the campaign. He's a notorious power gamer in our group who always tries to break the campaign, however when he DMs he gets mad when we have optimized characters.
I'm looking for a good way to give everyone equal spotlight in this campaign, because in our group we have a representation of all 4 major types of gamers in the group: The Hack n Slasher, the Intellectual, the Power Gamer, and the role player/actor.
I was thinking of pregenerating the characters for them, at least stat/class wise, but letting the players flesh out their personalities, and making all the characters PFS legal even though this isnt going to be a PFS game. My friend the intellectual, who also has a problem with our power game suggested just having everyone make their characters the first session and to supervise it, though i'm sure that even with having them make the characters there, our in house power gamer will still make the "ultimate X" character and over shadow everyone else so they feel left out.
I know its extra work to make all the characters and randomly assign them in the first game, but it can allow everyone to be on equal footing to begin with instead of having one super optimized character as well as suboptimal and bad characters.
My other option is not inviting this one guy to the game, however he is still a good role player and is fun to have in the party even when he's overshadowing everyone else.
The campaign i'm looking to run is Skull and Shackles, which fits our group because even when we play a standard "heroic fantasy" campaign, our groups tend to turn to piracy and chaos... always lol. With my luck though, the party will end up being super heroic instead of pirates lol.
So TLDR Which is a better choice: Generating characters the first meeting, or pregenerating the characters for the group?
I say you should supervise the character generation, and put in specific guidelines and rules for the players to follow; I would also suggest a Stat Point Pool of about 14-18, so that if a character is going to have an 18-20 primary stat, (s)he will be lacking in the other areas.
Another good idea is to restrict the level of magic (that is, in terms of relevancy to the characters, and availability) in the campaign, make it more rare and harder to come by. Magic is very powerful, and if grown out of proportion it can upset the balance between characters greatly.
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I would suggest option #3: All of the players may create their own characters, but they have to be PFS-legal, standard 15-point builds. And you get the character sheets a week before the first game so you can approve them.
My experience with pre-generated characters is that no matter how hard you try, your players don't "bond" with them as well as they do characters they build themselves, and the roleplaying portion of the game suffers. Especially in a game with a power gamer, you want roleplaying to take center stage; the less you focus on combat, the less the campaign is "all about him".
And just because you supervise the generation doesn't mean he won't power game. That option is going to be an endless font of frustration as he says, "Can I tweak this? Can I take that instead of this?"
Forcing PFS-legal will eliminate a lot of his power gaming. "No, you can't do that because it's not PFS-legal" cannot be argued or finagled. I've also found that forcing core races and classes helps enormously. Whenever I'm starting a campaign, the first warning sign that I'm facing a power gamer is the good old, "I know it's not in the core rulebook, but can I play an (insert unheard-of race here) (insert APG class here)?" I hear a multitude of people whine that the core races and classes are 'too boring' and 'they've played them all'. But if you're worried that one player is so rules-savvy that he's going to choose a race and class that completely unbalances the campaign, it might be time to go old school.
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You could change some parts of the campaign around, instead of randomly generating characters. Just my 2 coppers.
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Our group has had a few power gamers as well, though none quite intese about it as yours sounds like. Typically, my response is to reduce the power level a tiny bit by running a elite array with a bonus point added at 2nd lvl or a 15 pt buy.
The main fix though is story based. Obviously this requires agreement that the players will cooperate at least minimally with the GM, ie-not try to break the game. For instance, if the power gaming individual is playing a barbarian, part of his backstory is that he has been chosen to protect the intellectual/roleplaying player's character from harm. If the power gamer chafes at this charge, add that to the story as well. He is required by tribal law to protect her until they reach the stones of Aku-La or some such other marker in the game. In this way, you are refocusing the spotlight stealing tendencies of the power gamer back towards the group.
To be clear, I like power gamers, they add flavor and make the game fun. Gamers who trample on other peoples fun to hog all the glory and face time, I don't like. The general tendency is that these often go together to some degree. IMHO, the key is to re-direct the energy of the power gamer towards the group and away from being a solo Superman.
@the OP: your power gamer is a problem not because he power games, but because he "tries to break the game" and has read your adventure. My advice is change the adventure a LOT so it is fairly unrecognizable in a lot of ways, move traps, change cursed items, change who is friendly and who is a secret enemy and you are going to do okay. If you can't do all these, run a 1st Adventure then intersperse modules, homebrew adventures, etc in the middle. If you were running Kingmaker, it is easy to create a completely different adventure that reading the book would be useless for instance.
TL; DR - Its not the power gaming, its the spotlight hogging and trying to break the game. Don't give him the luxury of running an adventure he knows, change a lot of it up. If he squawks, call him on it.
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I wouldn't run a campaign for a player who had read it.
some examples of this guys power gaming: Carried around a small potted plant, would start every combat by throwing it towards the enemy, then cast entangle to root everything, then throw alchemist's fire in order to catch the plants on fire and burn everything to the ground. his stats are usually 18-20 in the primary stat of his class, 16-17 in whatever secondary he has, and 6-8 in everything else. His feats/traits/flaws he would choose would be the best min/max he could do for it, as well as min/max his skill choices. One game he built a silver tongued bard that at level 2 had something like a +20 to diplomacy and bluff specifically so he could trick or coerce NPCs into somehow killing themselves.
He mainly powergames in the "do everything to ruin how the encounters play out" way. He's the kind of player that would use a Locate City bomb because it is legal and breaks the game.
I'm honestly thinking of just not inviting him because when i had talked about my interest in running Skull and Shackles he immediately went on a long rant about how it is by far the "worst possible adventure path ever" mainly because of the Ship to Ship combat discussed in the player's guide.
And to running an adventure path he hasn't read, I would have to homebrew everything from scratch since he reads every single adventure path from any system so he can figure out the optimum character for it. If anyone here has seen Dorkness Rising, the guy who plays the monk personifies this particular gamer. He plays to win, not for the story of the campaign.
Sounds like someone I would not want to play with. I don't see a problem with someone having read the adventure unless they were memorizing it. If they could also play dumb then it would be fine. This person seems to enjoy playing with the group but wants to always beat the module in the most dramatic fashion he can it seems.
I have to say my vote is to not include him.
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I'm honestly thinking of just not inviting him because when i had talked about my interest in running Skull and Shackles he immediately went on a long rant about how it is by far the "worst possible adventure path ever" mainly because of the Ship to Ship combat discussed in the player's guide.
So don't invite him. It sounds like he doesn't want to play anyway. In fact, tell him that if he's going to read the adventures, he can't play unless he's the GM and puts up with the same stuff you have to from him.
I'm looking to start up an adventure path that i'm pretty sure one of my group has read cover to cover...who always tries to break the campaign...do everything to ruin how the encounters play out...breaks the game...he reads every single adventure path from any system so he can figure out the optimum character for it...
Haha! I'm with Winter_Born; tell him to GTFO.
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Carried around a small potted plant, would start every combat by throwing it towards the enemy, then cast entangle to root everything, then throw alchemist's fire in order to catch the plants on fire and burn everything to the ground.
That's not powergaming. That's playing smart.
It is power gaming when he specifically manipulates the rules in his favor to make him significantly more powerful than the average hero, or even major boss monsters. In order to deal with him as a player, three of us who have DMed him had to make monsters that were nigh impossible to beat with normal tactics just so that the BBEG didn't fall to cheese tactics.
And with my thing about him min/maxing his skills i'm talking about getting to the point where he would have a +20 in a skill (not talking in pathfinder specifically, we just migrated to pathfinder recently. It is perfectly possible to have insanely high skill modifiers in 3.5, i had a beguiler who had a +20 bluff at level 2, used mainly for feints for her surprise casting ability.) and to the bluff/coerce the enemy to kill themselves, i mean he would bluff against an extremely high DC to where he could convince someone that the trap they just passed was completely safe because the rogue "disabled" it, or get them to the point of being friendly through diplomacy and convince them to do something extremely dangerous that seemed innocuous to kill them. IE "Read this peice of paper my friend, I can't seem to translate it" and the paper is one which had "I prepared Explosive Runes" and of course had explosive runes cast upon it.
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He's read the adventure....
He makes the game less fun for other players and the DM....
He ruins encounters....
When he DMs he gets annoyed with players who do anything vaguely like what he does when he plays....
Sounds like he is a complete tool.
So why are you playing with him now, let alone considering having him in your next campaign?
I'm going to have to go with everyone else on this. I've been gaming for 22 years and I've never encountered anyone this aggressively competitive and immature (though I have friends who have some horror stories). There's no excuse for this level of douchebaggery.
If he feels the need to "win" this badly he has bigger issues that need to be dealt with out-of-game. Unfortunately, he's trying to resolve them through in-game self-therapy which ruins the fun for everyone else. Drop him and move on.
Edit: I'm willing to ignore his "cheesy" tactics and even his aggressive optimizing for the sake of argument. It's everything else for which there is no excuse.
Please understand I am not trying to be argumentative, however I would like to establish what exactly you define as power gaming.
If you could would you please take a look at the following character and respond with how it would be viewed at your table.
The character is created with a 15 point buy and has approximately 190 gp remaining to buy additional gear.
Male Human Barbarian 1
CN Medium Humanoid (Human)
Init +1; Senses Perception +5
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DEFENSE
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AC 17, touch 11, flat-footed 16. . (+6 armor, +1 Dex)
hp 13 (1d12+1)
Fort +3, Ref +1, Will +2
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OFFENSE
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Spd 30 ft.
Melee Masterwork Nodachi +7 (1d10+7/18-20/x2)
Power attacking Masterwork Nodachi +7 (1d10+10/18-20/x2)
Power attacking and Raging Masterwork Nodachi +9 (1d10+13/18-20/x2)
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STATISTICS
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Str 20, Dex 12, Con 12, Int 7, Wis 12, Cha 7
Base Atk +1; CMB +6; CMD 17
Feats Furious Focus, Power Attack -1/+2
Traits Indomitable Faith, Rich Parents
Skills Acrobatics -2, Climb +6, Escape Artist -2, Fly -2, Intimidate +2, Perception +5, Ride -2, Stealth -2, Survival +5, Swim +2
Languages Common
SQ Fast Movement +10 (Ex), Rage (5 rounds/day) (Ex)
Combat Gear Masterwork Breastplate, Masterwork Nodachi;
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SPECIAL ABILITIES
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Fast Movement +10 (Ex) +10 feet to speed, unless heavily loaded.
Furious Focus If you are wielding a weapon in two hands, ignore the penalty for your first attack of each turn.
Power Attack -1/+2 You can subtract from your attack roll to add to your damage.
Rage (5 rounds/day) (Ex) +4 Str, +4 Con, +2 to Will saves, -2 to AC when enraged.
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I'm honestly thinking of just not inviting him because when i had talked about my interest in running Skull and Shackles he immediately went on a long rant about how it is by far the "worst possible adventure path ever" mainly because of the Ship to Ship combat discussed in the player's guide.
This provides the perfect excuse not to invite him (well, in addition to the munchkin-ism and reading the AP ahead of time).
The whole purpose of all this is have to fun. The key question to ask yourself is if inviting this person will diminish the fun the other players and yourself are going to have.
@Covent I don't know what to consider a power gamer most times as I have a few friends who maximize the occasional character but makes fun to play with ones as well. The character you submitted would not be allowed in a game I ran (other than something that has strict rules like PFS). I end up gunning for such characters. I had to deal with those types when I started playing D&D and have hated them since.
Try a 15 or 20 point-buy system and limiting the basement score (as suggested above) to 10. It's a game, and games have rules, and the GM is the rules-giver, after all.
Then the character creation is still in the players' hands.
Tasking yourself with character creation is a lot of work, and players want their own guy or gal in the story. There is no solid rule on "How to Roll up a PC", so if you toss in a limited array of numbers, it might check your power-gamer into a more realistic role.
And if he rails against it, remind him that stat-boosting magic items will become available, assuming the town they are in meets the price-point for it. Or the character can go questing for it.
He might even enjoy such a challenge.
(@ The Block Knight- nice threads!)
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Quote:
Carried around a small potted plant, would start every combat by throwing it towards the enemy, then cast entangle to root everything, then throw alchemist's fire in order to catch the plants on fire and burn everything to the ground.
That's not powergaming. That's playing smart.It is power gaming when he specifically manipulates the rules in his favor to make him significantly more powerful than the average hero, or even major boss monsters. In order to deal with him as a player, three of us who have DMed him had to make monsters that were nigh impossible to beat with normal tactics just so that the BBEG didn't fall to cheese tactics.
And with my thing about him min/maxing his skills i'm talking about getting to the point where he would have a +20 in a skill (not talking in pathfinder specifically, we just migrated to pathfinder recently. It is perfectly possible to have insanely high skill modifiers in 3.5, i had a beguiler who had a +20 bluff at level 2, used mainly for feints for her surprise casting ability.) and to the bluff/coerce the enemy to kill themselves, i mean he would bluff against an extremely high DC to where he could convince someone that the trap they just passed was completely safe because the rogue "disabled" it, or get them to the point of being friendly through diplomacy and convince them to do something extremely dangerous that seemed innocuous to kill them. IE "Read this peice of paper my friend, I can't seem to translate it" and the paper is one which had "I prepared Explosive Runes" and of course had explosive runes cast upon it.
This isn't "manipulating" the rules, it's following the rules. The potted plant thing is cheesy but it makes sense. Let's say you're a druid; you are powerful in a natural setting; but your life has led you to having to spend some time away from nature; are you going to say "well, eff it. I guess I just won't be able to defeat any of my enemies!" Or are you going to figure out a way around that. The potted plant thing is a little cheesy, but it's creative. Where the hell is he getting this unlimited supply of potted plants? Home Depot? Where's he carrying them? Bag of holding? No air for the plants.
I don't understand being against optimizing your abilities. If you're an NBA player, should you practice baseball, or should you be the best basketball player you can be? Maybe become a more well rounded ballplayer, but there's no logical reason to become a great chess player. By the same token, if you're a hero, trying to save the world, why aren't you going to be as good as you can at it?
Being upset about high primary stats and low unimportant stats? Again, it's like saying "dammit, Kobe Bryant, why do you focus so much on shooting and dribbling! You can't play the piano at all!" If his character is stupid, or unlikable, or weak, or unhealthy, or clumsy, or whatever, it is its own hindrance. Or it should be, or it's a shortcoming of the DM.
Now on the other hand, if he's read the AP, (and he's using that knowledge to his character's advantage, which isn't necessarily the case), or if anything he's doing is hampering the fun of the group, he should be told that, and if he won't change the behavior, he should be asked to leave the group. No matter what my or anyone else's opinions are of his tactics, the bottom line is the game is there for everyone's enjoyment, not his alone.
TL;DR: none of the stuff you've described in and of itself is a problem necessarily; the problem is this dude doesn't care about anyone other than him having fun. And therefore he should go play a single player game.
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The main problem with this thread is you started by talking about a power gamer, which is a big touchy word around here. If you had said a player who cheated to gain an edge in the game by reading the adventure and was knowingly a major aggravation to the GM (aka a jerk), you would be receiving better advice and less static by people defending the right to be a power gamer.
1) If a player says an AP is going to suck, for sure don't invite him to play in it. Do you really want to listen to constant complaints and pointing out unfun things and then having the same person say constantly "I told you". Only if you are a masochist or they have your family hostage.
2) This is my own personal belief, based on being a GM for a very long time and knowing how much blood, sweat, and tears a good GM puts in to his game to make sure the players can all enjoy themselves. NEVER let a player rules lawyer or interpret for you rules that restrict the fun of you or the other players. So what if it is heavy handed GMing to say "No, it doesnt work like that" or "Sorry that won't work because I say so". If you are an experienced GM, you trust that you know what will make the group happy better than one player with no overview of what is really going on( aka clueless). If you are inexperienced, I highly recommend you get experienced before you try to tackle players like this one who may be a higher CR rating than you.
No one wants to be a jerk, but based on this exact thing happening at my table three times, either you rain on his parade or he is going to rain on everyone elses. He can either get with the program and cooperate with the game at YOUR (you and the rest of the players) table or he can find another game. Otherwise, not only will you have a not-fun time, you may find other players you really like gaming with moving on as well.
I wish you luck with your dilemma. I can tell you firsthand it is easy to say "kick him out" and much harder to do in person without feeling bad. All I can say is that if you take a stand, your regrets later on will be fewer and your relief will be greater, however it turns out.
To the OP:
I just do not understand why any game group allows a dweeb like you discribe to play in the first place. For myself, I play for the fun of the game and the fun of being with my friends. Why ruin either by bringing a person who is toxic to the game?
Dump the guy and have fun with the other players who seem to want to play well.
Trick I would use is start talking to the guy that you instead bought a different module, say module "X". Tell him you think your going to have it take a heavy undead/demon/draconic(whatever is opposite of your selected module) arc instead of the normal monster selection. You have everyone make characters, he will make his based upon module X with a specific focus to kill a certain type of monster. Then you pull out skulls and shackles after characters are made with monsters of the opposite persuaion and ruin his day completely.
To all the people who say kick him out, i have to agree with Redcelt, the reason its hard to drop him is that we've all been playing together for about 6 years, and its one of those comfortable groups. Its difficult to find players out here especially on the days that we can actually get together.
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Unless you're somehow committed to this guy, just don't invite him back.
I know from experience that players like that aren't happy unless they're allowed to do their cheese at 100% capacity. Any attempts to minimize his disruptiveness or otherwise control him will end up with both of you.
There's nothing wrong with how he plays the game. He should just play it his way elsewhere.
It is one that the group might be comfortable and your decision at the end. The problem with that is you came here asking for advice and described a character that manipulates the game his way. If you are ok with it then don't kick him. I lived without a group for over a decade. If I lose my current one then it could be another decade.
I would pick that over playing with someone who trivializes the game I am getting to play every time we sit down. I understand min/max and how it works. I also know that I get tired of playing with it as why am I there? What do I contribute when this person solves everything?
To all the people who say kick him out, i have to agree with Redcelt, the reason its hard to drop him is that we've all been playing together for about 6 years, and its one of those comfortable groups. Its difficult to find players out here especially on the days that we can actually get together.
I can respect this, but I would not make the same choice. Regardless of how hard it is to find a group or a player, if I am unhappy then the game was not worth it. You made ti sound as if he was a real issue. If he is not, then play on and let him slide. If he is a real issue then do what is best for the whole group.
Since it appears you're stuck with him a few suggestions, some of which have been brought up.
1. No stat dumping. That will take the edge off the super specialization.
2. Read that AP closely knowing he'll be doing the same, then retailer a few encounters. You might catch him prepared for the encounter that was, and not that is.
3. Talk to this guy on the side before every session. Don't let him steal the show, and let him know it.
Based on the description of this player, no amount of limitations on his character is going to change the fact that he will make life difficult for you as GM of this AP.
If he's determined to use OOC knowledge (having read the AP) to solve any mysteries and ruin the fun for the other players, then he'll be able to do that even as a commoner cursed to always stay at level 1.
On the other hand, if the player is able to separate that OOC knowledge from his IC knowledge, then those character limitations are probably a good idea.
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Please understand I am not trying to be argumentative, however I would like to establish what exactly you define as power gaming.
If you could would you please take a look at the following character and respond with how it would be viewed at your table.
The character is created with a 15 point buy and has approximately 190 gp remaining to buy additional gear.
** spoiler omitted **
That character would be fine at my table, apart from the nodaichi which would be a constant source of (mostly irrational) irritation so would have to be swapped for a falchion (for a whole -0.5 average damage) or something.
On the other hand, my table tends to have fairly optimised wizards and clerics, so nobody is going to be too bothered about a nice barbarian build.
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The character is created with a 15 point buy and has approximately 190 gp remaining to buy additional gear.
** spoiler omitted **
As is? Nope, I wouldn't at least. First and foremost the character doesn't even have a name. Small thing really, but it goes to show that the focus of the character isn't role playing but mechanics. Second, the Rich Parents trait on a barbarian is questionable, especially on a character with so little background as to not even have a name. Third you're assuming the GM is allowing Eastern Weapons into his game or that the region that would treat the Nodachi as a martial and not exotic weapon speak or use Common. Fourth you don't even have a religion listed yet have the Indomitable Faith trait. Two drop stats too.
I'd let you play it though (after you wrote up a plausible character background and came up with a NAME) since theres nothing against the rules in that build. You'd be better off playing a less strong character to avoid the bull's eye I'd have painted on your character though.
It is power gaming when he specifically manipulates the rules in his favor to make him significantly more powerful than the average hero, or even major boss monsters.That's not powergaming.
Uhhhh....
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I'd let you play it though (after you wrote up a plausible character background and came up with a NAME) since theres nothing against the rules in that build. You'd be better off playing a less strong character to avoid the bull's eye I'd have painted on your character though.
I'm confused. There's loads about that character that you don't like, but you'd let him play it? On the understanding that you are going to do your best to kill the character, possibly in an unfair manner?
Hopefully I am misunderstanding you here.
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Coming in late, but I wanted to add one other option when you have a power-gamer: Have him offer to help, or actually design, the other PCs. We've got a couple of rules challenged players in our group and a couple of optimizers. The rules challenged players usually describe what they want and the optimizers put something together for them. The prior AP we played, one rules challenged guy's fighter/monk build grossly out-damaged the powergamer's own Magus build, and the other rules-challenged guy's Oracle of Flame was awesome. Also, in our group, if someone wants to build their own character, that's fine, they can just have the optimizers critique it if they want and make their own changes/decisions. Everyone ends up with good to awesome characters and no one feels like a dud.
This only works if you have optimizers who are mature enough to actually help the other players. Unfortunately, this probably wouldn't work with the guy described by the OP. I wouldn't put it past him to deliberately gimp the other PCs to make sure he shines.
Also, I just want to say there's optimization and their's being a pinhead. Making an awesome character isn't the real problem, it's trying to break the game and step on the other players that's the problem.
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I am guessing you as a group have tried talking to him and explaining to him how what he is doing is ruining the fun for everyone else to the point of the game not being enjoyable? Not saying talking to him and laying it all out will change him but it might.
If that doesn't change him then nothing will and he would obviously be someone not to game with. If everyone else says he is ruining their fun and he keeps doing it. That means he doesn't care about anyone but himself, which means he will always be a problem. Personally I would rather have a short group and have fun than that.
I don't understand this discussion. The guy has read the adventure path, and therefore knows the plot. That kills everything for everyone. Either force him to DM, or don't invite him to the game. Be upfront and tell him that he can't play if he has this prior knowledge.
If he claims he hasn't read the AP, and you believe him, then do what others have said. Do something different with the character generation. Maybe try the "standard array" from 4th edition, with ability scores of 16, 14, 13, 12, 11, 10. He'd then get his character with an 18 in his primary stat, but only a 14 in his secondary. Or try the dice pool method. This might force him to play something outside his comfort zone. We did this for Crimson Throne and ended up with a paladin with an 18 Int and 13 Cha. Certainly not optimal.
Also, disallow non-core. Maybe core races, and then options in the APG, but no other books.
Force him to play his low ability scores. If he has a low Cha, punish him for it. People don't like him or ignore him, he has to pay higher prices from merchants, etc. If he has a low Int and tries to metagame, call him out on it for lack of roleplaying. Award bonus exp to the other players for roleplaying, so that they end up a level higher than he is, balancing the group better.
In the Entangle option you mentioned with the potted plant, all it takes is a couple of encounters with enemy druids or high level rangers casting Entangle first, using his own plant against him to the detriment of the party. If a character uses the same tactics over and over against to devastating effect, enemies are gonna get wise to it. They'll adopt counter tactics, or even use those same tactics against the party. If one character is causing all the damage, they'll know to target that character's weaknesses, and all characters have them. Keep killing off his powerful characters, he'll start making characters that don't stick out as much.
Maybe some players enjoy playing what I consider broken characters. I think these players need to stick to video game RPGs, where other people's enjoyment isn't also at stake.
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@meibolite
could you talk him into playing a support character?
I found that "powergamers" can be great in groups when they are playing the guy who buffs the rest of the party. Because of him everybody would be performing waaaay better. :-)
Maybe a cleric evangelist or something like that? :D
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I'd let you play it though (after you wrote up a plausible character background and came up with a NAME) since theres nothing against the rules in that build. You'd be better off playing a less strong character to avoid the bull's eye I'd have painted on your character though.I'm confused. There's loads about that character that you don't like, but you'd let him play it? On the understanding that you are going to do your best to kill the character, possibly in an unfair manner?
Hopefully I am misunderstanding you here.
Of course. I don't like barbarians in general since they tend to be the "kick down the door before even seeing if it was locked" types. That doesn't mean that I'd stop someone from playing one. Some people really like that play style... and I really like replacing the doors with mimics for those who do. If you're the DM you don't get to play the characters that you'd want to play, the players do. And yes, if player's going to min-max, why shouldn't I do the same thing? Not necessarily kill the character outright but play to his weaknesses (like give your Int 7, Cha 7 barbarian a life or death situation where he has to figure out a puzzle or the answer to a riddle or a powerful NPC with a vital clue that needs convincing to part with).
Hack 'n' slash can be fun by it's one of many dimensions of a good roleplaying game and it's no fun at all if your barbarian cuisinart isn't challenged by it.
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I would prefer not to play with this person. I mean, reading the adventure ahead of time is just a showstopper. It's not so much optimizing against the encounters, it's the whole idea of spoiling the plot.
I'm moderately okay with powergaming. If people dumpstat, they'll be in trouble later because I will also be targeting those stats; enjoy the monster that has Wisdom damage poison.
The Entangle story is suspicious. I don't think a single potted plant is really enough plants to enable Entangle. There's a difference between picking strong powers/feats, and bending the rules.
Reading an adventure isn't powergaming, it's cheating, IMO, if it's done intentionally like this. If the player was checking out the adventure to see if he wanted to GM it himself, that would've been a different story; but then I expect the player to be sportsmanlike and play a fairly clueless PC who won't use OOC knowledge. It'd be awkward for the player because he'll actually play dumber than if he didn't have OOC knowledge.
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But you say you're not really willing to ditch this player. So change the encounters. Preferably, change the plot too, so he can't leverage OOC knowledge.
Ideally, make such changes that whatever metagaming he did makes things worse than if he'd built a normal character. If he anticipated undead, use plants. If he came with mind control, use undead. If he dumped Wis/Will, because the adventure uses only dumb brutes, use mind-controlling enemies that Charm him into investing in their get rich quick scheme.
Use random encounters, or add encounters he's not expecting. That way his cheated resource allocation doesn't work out.
IMPORTANT: change NPC secrets. He won't be able to blackmail them with OOC knowledge. The bodies aren't buried where he was expecting them. Traps are in a different location and do a different energy type.
If he's counting on a specific magic item, knowing it's part of the treasure in the adventure, change it to something else. You don't get to plan your build that way. Also, some treasure (particularly some of the treasure you can only find by using metagame knowledge) is cursed.
Even more annoying: put in some extra treasure where he's not expecting it.
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Even while I'm writing all that it just feels way too adversarial. I just can't see myself enjoying GMing with someone who forces me to GM like that. Just tell the player he's disqualified himself by reading the AP.
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...After reading the spell Entangle I have to say that the spell doesn't work that way and is partially DM enabling.
I think we had another guy in here claiming something similar...his player used Shocking Grasp on a lake to kill like 10 skeletons, and Mage Hand to untie a saddle while someone was riding it to make them fall.
Thats not how the spell works and the GM needs to step in and squash that thinking. Its creative but its rule breaking and munchkinning.
Have you considered just talking to him?
Tell him that you'd like him at the table but his habit of trying to break as many encounters as possible is really grating for the GM and other players. If he still wants to play after that have him work with the GM to build his character and/or ask that he try his hand in a support role (say as a bard or cleric).
You could change some parts of the campaign around, instead of randomly generating characters. Just my 2 coppers.
this!
Don't stick people with characters they won't be able to buy into just because of one douche nozzle.
Change things up in the adventure. Move treasures and monsters around. Swap rooms, change the basic premise and/or BBG.
You are the GM, you have control over his character. If he's taking combinations you are not comfortable with then, don't let him. if he's using meta-gaming knowledge then change things enough so that it will hurt him rather than help.
We JUST had a guy in our game who decided to search the Privvy of a castle cause he knew that's where the treasure was (I don't know why they chose that spot...) but it felt pretty forced. he had run the adventure as the GM only a month before so... It took some of the fun out of the game.
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Every min-maxed character has weaknesses. Usually big glaring ones.
Just make sure to include encounters that exploit that weakness.
Usually low Will saves.