Char-op Box

[Dice4Hire]

1/ The smallest unit of battle in 3e (and earlier) was the PC. You could plan your dude in isolation, and you lived or died mostly on your own merits. In 4e, the smallest unit of battle is the party. You live and die based on party synergy, not on the strength of your PC's build in isolation.

I'm not sure I agree with this. If you look at most insanely optimized characters, they have holes you can drive a truck thorough, mostly in the area of regaining hit points. 3E was also designed aroun the party, an those 200 dpr machines didnot have much ability otehr than being 200dpr machines.

 

[Nifft]

I'm not sure I agree with this. If you look at most insanely optimized characters, they have holes you can drive a truck thorough, mostly in the area of regaining hit points. 3E was also designed aroun the party, an those 200 dpr machines didnot have much ability otehr than being 200dpr machines.

Really? The strongest cheese-tier PCs I recall were usually Clerics or Druids.

The King of Smack was a vampiric self-healer.

Pun-Pun could heal himself, too...

Which ones do you mean?

Cheers, -- N

 

[Stuntman]

My experience with 4E is that you don't need to have a highly optimised character in order for your character to perform adequately. That extra bit of optimisation that you can do is only noticeable by those who are really into optimising. Personally, I would tend to notice any +1 that I could have gotten with a slightly different build. It actually does bug me a bit sometimes when I see others with clearly suboptimal characters. However, seeing how they perform in a real situation, I don't see any great drop off in performance compared to a highly optimised character.

I think that optimisers tend to have a much higher standard for what is considered adequate compared to non-optimisers. When looking at theoretical situations and all bonuses, an optimiser can spot unoptimised discrepancies which appear really glaring. A non-optimiser may understand that if they built it a different way, they may get an extra +1 here or there. However, when it comes down to actually playing, I think the non-optimiser will notice bad die rolls more so that perhaps one fewer damage here or there.

 

[Nytmare]

In fourth edition, optimization isn't as much of an 'I win' button as it was in 3rd.

Very true! Thank you.

 

[N0Man]

I've heard a lot of people I know explaining that they think the ONLY reasonable way to build a character follows this suit.

1. Find a race you want to play.
2. Find a class which has its secondary and primary stats line up with your races bonuses.
3. Ability scores at 1st level should be something like: 20, 16, 11, 10, 10, 8
3. If you are a weapon class, take weapon prof first.
4. Take expertise and "necessary" feats like painful oath before any skill or RP related feats.

I sometimes toy with optimized builds, but I also liked fun roleplay concepts. Sometimes, I like to build something that can do both. Usually, it's not about optimization but rather doing something fun or interesting mechanically.

However, when I do build a character that is either "optimized" (or interesting), I'm looking for synergy of powers, feats, and other features and how I can use them creatively or thematically.

I'm more often starting by browsing feats and powers for a fun concept than starting with race and class. I then work back to think about which classes and races would be effective and/or fun for this, and then think about how the rest of the character can fit in to support the theme.

This limits the amount of character choices substantially, and eliminates a lot of RP options for those who want them.

If you approach it the way that you have, then you are correct. However, there are many other ways of approaching it. I've designed characters that are definitely out of the ordinary, but still have some very interesting mechanics. They weren't built with anything like the process you described, but they still have some great synergies and are quite powerful in some situations.

Now my question is this. Is this something that has been created by the community in its "optimization furor" (this is my personal opinion). Or is it a product of WOTC and thus a design flaw.

It's completely community based and always has been. I don't believe that WotC assumes that much optimization, and it's still largely going to be driven by the DM.

In very combat driven campaigns optimized combat builds will pull ahead a lot more than a campaign by a DM that likes to use traps, skill challenges, and roleplay solutions.

 

[Mengu]

I'm a fan of coming up with a concept, and then building it in the most effective way possible. The concept itself need not be optimized per se. So if you're not playing a half-elf daggermaster with twin strike, you're not necessarily "doing it wrong".

The stats really don't have to line up all that well either. One primary or secondary stat that lines up is often good enough. If none line up, that can be a bit more problematic, but there might be another way to realize the concept. For instance you want to play a halfling warrior from the wild plains who lugs around the biggest sword his people have ever seen a halfling carry, and carves big chunks out of his enemies. Well, sounds like you might want to be a barbarian or great weapon fighter, but a quick examination might show that you would likely do better as an assassin, rogue, or monk.

Saying "My concept is a gnome earth warden with high dexterity and a club and that's what I'm going to play" is not a character concept or roleplaying decision. It is an obstinate decision to be a frustrating party member.

I think 4th edition is designed so we can enjoy party synergy to its fullest in combat. So a character that doesn't play well can be prone to frequent death, or worse, hinder other players' (and DM's) fun factor.

So while optimization to the degree of abuse should not be the goal, optimization within the concept is likely to enhance the quality of time spent during combat. And there is nothing wrong with optimizing outside combat either. A party coordinating to cover every skill, with few overlaps on key skills is always a good idea. A general group focus on a skill such as Stealth can also be beneficial. A character who is more at home in the wilderness, a character who is more at home in the bustle of a city, a character who is more in touch with the deities and magic, and a character who understands the difficulties of lords and feels at home in the presence of nobles can make a nice, well rounded party outside of combat.

A ranger might find himself training in Thievery at 2nd or 4th level, if there is no one else in the party to take on that role. Many optimizers would say this is not an optimal choice, you should pick up greatbow, weapon focus, expertise, lethal hunter, etc. And many "role players" would say Thievery is not in my character's concept, I never stole anything, I won't pick it up. My personal view, figure out a way to make it work for your concept. Perhaps you've had enough of all the gauntlets you had to run through and traps that kept frying you, and during your nature and dungeoneering training, you pay a little extra attention to how to disarm traps and the like without triggering them. In similar vein, if a greatweapon fighter realizes he is the only one in a party without stealth, he might decide to drop plate mail, and train stealth. These are not so much conceptual choices (or even necessarily optimized choices for the sand box), but choices that will enhance a party's efficiency in a given campaign.

I think concept goes beyond any game mechanic. If you see your sorcerer as a quiet wallflower, you don't give him an 8 charisma. The system does not support this. You give him a 16-18 as expected, maybe train in Intimidate, and explain your charisma as a fearsome aura, exuding from him as he walks into the interrogation room and stands in the back corner with flickers of dark energy around him, while the sly halfling does all the talking.

Yet another example I have heard is someone who wants to play a brutish human rogue, who was once a bandit, likes to use axes and wears chainmail. Again, a rogue with handaxe proficiency that never gets sneak attack, is not what the rogue is meant to be. Just pick up maybe two hand axes, and play a tempest fighter with a background that gives you a suitable skill training to be a bandit, and you're set.

Concept != game mechanics. The two live in alternate universes, where the player and DM's job is to link those universes. With this understanding, every character can be optimized to do something useful for the party while mostly remaining within the character concept.

 

[Colmarr]

I'm a fan of coming up with a concept, and then building it in the most effective way possible. The concept itself need not be optimized per se. So if you're not playing a half-elf daggermaster with twin strike, you're not necessarily "doing it wrong".

I concur.

 

[KarinsDad]

1/ The smallest unit of battle in 3e (and earlier) was the PC. You could plan your dude in isolation, and you lived or died mostly on your own merits. In 4e, the smallest unit of battle is the party. You live and die based on party synergy, not on the strength of your PC's build in isolation.

I'm not sure I buy into this.

The reason is that there are a lot of PBP games where different people come together after they have each made a build.

It really doesn't matter which defender or which leader the group has, as long as they have a leader. If I optimize my Striker to strike, I expect any Leader to heal me on occasion and any Defender to be out in front defending.

So specific party combinations will be more powerful as a group, but I can still live or die based on my own PC's optimization as long as the rest of the group is at least adequate.

 

[Delgar]

What I found in 3rd edition was that so many people spent so much time pre-planning and optimizing their character, that optimizing actually became the game not the game itself (this was especially bad in living greyhawk). But when you pre-plan out your entire character path you really limit yourself in a natural and evolved growth throughout a campaign.

Now with 4th edtiion there is definately optimization to eek out every last bonus, choosing only a race that has bonuses to your primary and secondary abilties, but I find that it's a lot harder to make a REALLY sub optimal character (not impossible, but definately harder).

Ultimately everyone has a different way of having fun. For me I'd rather run a game with interesting characters, with interesting stories and interesting choices.

 

[OakwoodDM]

as long as the rest of the group is at least adequate.

And this is the point that was being made. In 4e, you need the rest of the group to be adequate, no matter how optimised you are. In 3e, it was poosible to optimise to the point where the rest of the group were irrelevant.