D&D 5E Need help dealing with two bard campaign

[BeaniBum]

Ok, so I'm running a fairly standard dnd campaign. Small town lots of problems etc.. but the thing I need help with is the players. My two pcs are bard one a jester and one a lore college. The jester at level three has a 20 char and receives a +28 bonus to his persuasion skill which is ridiculous (or is that just me?). Along with high stats they have also taken feats that destroy any chance of having a tense rp segment in campaign (you know with the bard either using the diplomat feat to charm the person or the other bard rolling a 44min persuasion...) So if anyone could let me know how the best way to deal with this is that would be great!


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[Tales and Chronicles]

There's no way a lvl 3 bard could have +28 to social checsks. Have a look at how Expertise, jack-of-all-trades and the new UA feats interact: you do not multiply it by 2 every time, only once.

 

[BeaniBum]

I'll take a look it does seem high but still has w do you deal with pcs like that


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[akr71]

There's no way a lvl 3 bard could have +28 to social checsks. Have a look at how Expertise, jack-of-all-trades and the new UA feats interact: you do not multiply it by 2 every time, only once.

What Feats and how did they get them at level 3?

Yeah, Jack-of-all-Trades does not stack with Expertise - it only applies to skill you are not proficient with. So, to get Cha 20 at level 3, the character must have rolled an 18 and chosen half-elf, tiefling or variant human (+1Cha, Feat that gives an additional +1) as race. Even with Expertise on Persuasion skill, the math doesn't work...
+5 (Charisma bonus) + 2x (+2) = +9

Pretty sweet, but not a campaign killer...rolling 10 or less on a hard DC means they don't succeed.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

My best guess is that you're accidentally adding the full Charisma score of 20, rather than the Charisma modifier of +5.

That aside, you're also using feats, which are known to completely wreck the balance of the game. You also seem to be using Unearthed Arcana material, which is both insufficiently tested and intentionally overpowered in order to draw interest and testing.

That aside, the way you challenge a specialist is to take them outside of their comfort zone. If both PCs are incredibly charismatic, and can talk their way out of anything, then your hostile NPCs should lock them in a room with some zombies instead of sending easily-persuaded mercenaries.

 

[Mercule]

Yeah. I can't come up with anything close to that at 3rd level. Heck, I can barely figure out how to get it that high at 20th level (20 Char (+5) + Expertise (+12) + misc magic/feats (+5) + Bardic Inspiration (+6 average) = 28). Even assuming I'm missing quite a bit, I think including Bardic Inspiration in the bonus is a pretty generous cushion.

Someone please correct me, but I don't think there's any way to get your proficiency bonus multiplied by more than x2. Expertise (and any similar trick) also only multiply your proficiency bonus (+2 at 3rd level), not the entire bonus. Just a couple of potential missing limitations.

 

[iserith]

Ok, so I'm running a fairly standard dnd campaign. Small town lots of problems etc.. but the thing I need help with is the players. My two pcs are bard one a jester and one a lore college. The jester at level three has a 20 char and receives a +28 bonus to his persuasion skill which is ridiculous (or is that just me?). Along with high stats they have also taken feats that destroy any chance of having a tense rp segment in campaign (you know with the bard either using the diplomat feat to charm the person or the other bard rolling a 44min persuasion...) So if anyone could let me know how the best way to deal with this is that would be great!

It doesn't sound like that bonus is possible in the rules as others have said.

It also sounds like the players are choosing to make ability checks. The DM is the one who decides that. So if you don't think their approach to a goal is successful, then it isn't, no roll. Players only roll when the DM says so and that's when the DM determines there's an uncertain outcome. Otherwise, they just succeed or fail outright.

 

[CydKnight]

Charisma bonuses aside, sit them both down together with you for a conversation and have everyone (including you) lay all expectations out. Discuss potential clashes and setting aside spotlight time for each character. If there is conflict in the expectations you may need to suggest rolling up completely new and different characters in a worst case scenario. If you do, I would have both create a new character so it doesn't look like you are showing favoritism.

 

[Soul Stigma]

It sounds to me like you're very new to DMing and either your players new to D&D 5E or are taking you for a ride because you're new.

How do they have such high stats that it bears mentioning? Have you given them feats that they shouldn't have right now? Did they create their players at the table or did they bring them to the table already generated?

Sorry for all the questions, but there seems to be more to the issue than spotlight.




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[TheNoremac42]

Yeah... I really hope that's a typo. The highest a stat can possibly go on a creature is 30, and I'm pretty sure that was a demon prince. Even if you were somehow able to get a 30 score on a character through a combination of items and feats, you would need to be passed lvl 20 in order to get the +18 added to your +10 CHA bonus.