D&D 5E My powergamer players wants to be a bard.

[Sacrosanct]

It certainly isn't cheating to try to make a powerful character. I think it is exploitation to try to look for loopholes intentionally. And to be honest, I don't think exploiting is any better than cheating, FWIW.

YMMV of course.

*edit* Elf witch beat me to it.

 

[Mistwell]

Oh look, trying not to be brutally murdered and eaten by horrible monsters is now cheating.

That's not what was said though, it is instead your own strawman. Everyone is trying to avoid death in the game.

 

[rollcrit]

ok guys, lets not take my reply out of context here. i 100% do not think power playing is cheating. this thread has gotten a little de-railed. I really regret using the term cheating. I really should have used different wordding.

 

[Sacrosanct]

Oh look, trying not to be brutally murdered and eaten by horrible monsters is now cheating.

Not sure how you interpreted this:

"That is funny, I have a similar "always looking for loophole" players. This player is one of my better friends, so I just usually let her go about her shenanigans. It is so strange people try to cheat at D&D. Its such a non competitive game."

to mean the same as anyone who tries "not to be brutally murdered and eaten by horrible monsters." I don't think I've met a single player who didn't try to avoid being killed and eaten, and the overwhelming number of them also didn't look for loopholes to game the system.

I guess I'm saying I can't see the correlation between what he/she said, and what you said.

 

[Sacrosanct]

ok guys, lets not take my reply out of context here. i 100% do not think power playing is cheating. this thread has gotten a little de-railed. I really regret using the term cheating. I really should have used different wordding.

Nah, you're good. You clarified your position and it makes perfect sense. I don't think you meant to call all optimizers cheaters.

 

[rollcrit]

lol, tough crowd here!

hugs to all. hugs to all.

 

[Grimstaff]

ok guys, lets not take my reply out of context here. i 100% do not think power playing is cheating. this thread has gotten a little de-railed. I really regret using the term cheating. I really should have used different wordding.

Lol don't apologize - exploiting loopholes IS cheating - just because the atm "accidentally" gave you an extra $20 doesn't mean keeping it isn't theft.

A little metagaming is natural, but too much is really breaking the social contract at the table. Personally I avoid the type of player that is always looking to find that perfect way to stack the deck and "break the game" - its insulting to the other players and the dm. If a player's willing to push things to give themselves an unfair advantage over the other players and/or adventure, my advice is this: even the most optimized character is not going to be able to withstand one or more of these things: a pit filled with carrion crawlers, a pack of shadows, or a dome-shaped wall of force filled with cloudkill.

Hey, that's all in the rules, so perfectly fair right?

 

[Agamon]

lol, tough crowd here!

hugs to all. hugs to all.

It takes a bit, but the crowd becomes a lot less tough once you know who to ignore.

 

[ZombieRoboNinja]

I really like that bards are a "power" class now, because IMHO it actually goes quite well with how the class can be roleplayed: they're a jack of all trades, always looking for a trick or shortcut that keeps them a step ahead of the competition.

Like, a cleric learns Contagion because his god wants him to spread disease or something. A bard learns it because he heard it's really effective in taking down powerful enemies quickly.

 

[rollcrit]

All this Bard talk really makes me want to dust off my old 80286 PC and throw those Bards Tale disks in there.