Campaign with Gestalt AND Non-Gestalt PCs... How to best balance?


Advice


So I have a campaign design where PC's are gestalted by having two people fused together in a horrid eldritch curse.

There will be Gestalts, and non-gestalts, because not everyone will be affected by the curse. This being said, because it is a curse, the Gestalts will be a bit bewitched, and one of these forms will be a different starting level than the non-gestalt PC's.

I want to figure out how to balance it enough so that there are benefits and drawbacks from choosing either option, and I thought the biggest would be the level difference. Also, defining the 'CR' of a Gestalt PC would be very helpful in determining good encounter allowances for the game.

I will probably also mete out several free bonuses to both options, moreso the non-gestalts, and the gestalts will again have other incurred effects of the curse than just the level difference.

But I want both options to offer different things and be fun.

At the end of the day, the baseline question looks like:
Gestalt PC lvl X = 'Normal' PC lvl (?)

I'm looking for more of a best-fit answer here than a definitive one, so rough ideas are extremely viable.

Thanks team.


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My opinion... don't do this. The power level of Gestalt vary WILDLY from build to build. Party balance is almost completely impossible. I suggest all or nothing.


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Josh-o-Lantern wrote:
My opinion... don't do this. The power level of Gestalt vary WILDLY from build to build. Party balance is almost completely impossible. I suggest all or nothing.

I agree with this. It's impossible to come up with any formula for how much of a benefit being gestalt is due to the extreme variance. Gestalt reminds me of Mythic in that it is something that can let a mediocre character builder make their poor build good and something that lets the good builders make the DM cry. God help you if you have a great min maxer.

I run a gestalt game and I've seen combos that are less effective than someone just running a single class and I've seen level 10s able to rip through mid 20s CR encounters. I've seen some s$$%. You can't quantify it.


3.5 gestalt rules suggest CR+1 or +2 depending on monster's reliance on saving throws. That being said, mixing gestalt and non-gestalt in a party is a bad idea, as is having half of party affected by a terrible eldritch curse. Either make gestalt monsters a campaign theme, or make all players play said monsters.


So it's all or nothing? Alrighty then.


Stupid idea: everyone must gestalt, BUT the combined tiers every level must add up to 6. So if one of your levels is Wizard(1), the other has to be an NPC class(5).


I had a similar idea, but the tier system was not in my mind. I was just going to have them roll above 13 to be able to have both sides of their gestalt be PC classes....

Whatever

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