Power Gaming: the result of leveling power driven design

Paul Farquhar said:

It has been suggested that progression, or the lack of it, is the main reason why D&D was more successful than those other systems.

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One aspect of character progression, which has been unfairly maligned by those who don't understand it, is that new characters should start at level one. When characters progress visibly through play, and death means losing all of that progress, players will become even more invested in their own characters. Player investment in their characters is one of the most important aspects of an RPG, so this is generally beneficial to the game as a whole.

Ever since 3E or so, there has been a type of player which is obsessed with power and optimization, such that they don't care if they die because they relish the opportunity of bringing in a new character that is freshly-optimized for their current level. They don't care about the character, as much as they care about what that character can do mechanically. Requiring new characters to come in at level one is usually sufficient incentive to prevent them from meaningless sacrifices in the name of power.

I'm pretty sure that kind of player has been there all along: look at all the kits in 2nd edition!

As the saying goes, for those of you who like this kind of thing, this is the kind of thing you like.

I don't have any of that kind of player in either of my games, so I don't see it as a problem.

Paul Farquhar said:

I'm pretty sure that kind of player has been there all along: look at all the kits in 2nd edition!

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Possibly, but I'm not sure they would have gotten much out of it, except a new chance to roll the dice. As broken as some of the kits may have been, there's not much that a level 1 bladesinger could do to compare against a level 10 fighter with loads of magical gear.

Third edition presented a major shift because of its expected-wealth-by-level guidelines, and the opportunity to make new choices at every level. Players had a lot more control over their advancement, where previously it was all up to the DM and random chance.

ClaytonCross said:

I read this twice thinking "... well its just black and white on my screen no different then yours" ...then I went oh, he means my overly wordy and complicated writing style to try to make my point clearer but that just makes it a wall of words no one wants to read kind of "color"... If I am correct and that is the case just know that I have a problem ... my father AND mother have the same problem and even being aware of it I find making it short and concise is EXTREMELY difficult for me. So thank you for managing to read it enough to understand... and I am sorry you had to read it all and pick out what I meant... Also feel sorry for my fellow players because I write the way I talk, lol. Fortunately do to nerviness and trying to find my forward I don't tend to be as bad GMing.

... Might have done it again. lol

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Nope.

On my screen, it's black on black. Or, very dark grey on black anyway. In any case, you've somehow added color to your first post that on my screen anyway, makes it unreadable unless I highlight all the text.

Hussar said:

Nope.

On my screen, it's black on black. Or, very dark grey on black anyway. In any case, you've somehow added color to your first post that on my screen anyway, makes it unreadable unless I highlight all the text.

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Ok then. I have not idea. All I see is black on white. CapnZapp said their is something to the code there. I reposted it through "Paste with Plan Text" button but I am not sure if that fixed it. It might have only effected text and not the background but I switched to code view and see the veranda and not the back ground color code so it "should" be fixed. If you get a minute, check and let me know.

Saelorn said:

Possibly, but I'm not sure they would have gotten much out of it, except a new chance to roll the dice. As broken as some of the kits may have been, there's not much that a level 1 bladesinger could do to compare against a level 10 fighter with loads of magical gear.

Third edition presented a major shift because of its expected-wealth-by-level guidelines, and the opportunity to make new choices at every level. Players had a lot more control over their advancement, where previously it was all up to the DM and random chance.

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I see your point and I don't see an issue with it but I would say unless they swallowed the fighter whole or something the group would likely hand the fighters magic gear to his replacement as much as they can. On top of that with the exponential XP design, your level 1 traveling with a level 10 party pulling the same XP will be level 8 after the first mission ... if they don't get caught in a dead loop.

I would also, say that we use story point leveling and XP hybrid, so we track XP and once we have a enough to level we have to get to safe haven and rest before we can actually level. We also all level at the same xp rate to make it easy on our GM. So we could not do that per our GM. I do understand power gamers not investing for this reason but at the same time every session I play a character I invest more into them and after 10 levels losing a character sucks no matter what. "to me" I can see it both ways. I am just not sure it matters as long as the table is having fun.

ClaytonCross said:

Ok then. I have not idea. All I see is black on white. CapnZapp said their is something to the code there. I reposted it through "Paste with Plan Text" button but I am not sure if that fixed it. It might have only effected text and not the background but I switched to code view and see the veranda and not the back ground color code so it "should" be fixed. If you get a minute, check and let me know.

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Yup, that did it. Cheers.

Fun is the bottom line. Some people are always going to find their fun by building the highest DPS character possible. And that's fine, let them enjoy themselves!

The danger comes from people who see it as a problem, and try to change the system to "fix" it.

Hiya!
[MENTION=6880599]ClaytonCross[/MENTION], I'm going to have to say...no? I've played a LOT of RPG's over the years. Most of the longer ones tend to be Fantasy, followed by Gamma World (3rd Edition; I would have said 'Apocalyptic', but honestly, the only real Apocalyptic we play consistently...at least up until about a year ago...was 3rd edition Gamma World), then Super-Heroes. Everything else falls after that. Of the Fantasy, a LOT of it has been either 1e/Hackmaster, BECMI/DarkDungeons (https://darkdungeonsblog.wordpress.com/), Powers & Perils (www.powersandperils.com), or Dominion Rules (www.dominionrules.org).

Anyway, I've been trying to think back to almost 40 years of DM'ing some form of "D&D" and I think I can honestly say, only my first 5 to 10 years of DM'ing was 'stuff' a common motivator. After about a decade I sort of hit my stride/style for DM'ing and I think I've remained fairly consistent over the decades...with only a slight mellowing on the whole 'detailed rules' side of it all (old age and all that I guess! ).

Talking specifically about the last 15 to 20 years, I can tell you that my Players main "goal" and driving force behind their PC's is "Try not to die!". I'm what is termed, nowadays at least, a "Killer DM". My players also call me 'stingy on the side of treasure'. I attest affirmative to both those things. The highest level PC anyone has had in my 5e campaign(s) was: 7th level Goliath Barbarian, 5th level Tiefling Bard, 4th level Human Thief, 4th level Human Druid. After that, it's a handful of 3rds, about twice that in 2nd, and twice that again in 1st level characters. This is over about 4 years I guess? Whenever the Starter Set came out.

My point is...no, IME. If you present a game where other things simply ARE more important (survival; and that usually goes hand in hand with cautious play, development of NPC ties, and story-goals a Player develops based not on 'stuff to acquire'), then "getting tougher" is a nice sideline bonus. In my campaigns saving a town, country or entire world is simply not dependant on "level" or "power". My campaign (and DM'ing style) is most definitely an "outlier" of the modern RPG expectation of play. I get that. It's cool with me and my group.

^_^

Paul L. Ming

AmerginLiath said:

I’m not entirely certain what levels have to do with this, besides the OP having bad experience with D&D (or with a particular DM) that he hasn’t had with points-based-advancement systems. As others note, the “problem” he’s describing would only be exacerbated there.

That’s because this isn’t about power-gaming as traditionally understood. The question at hand seems to be about characters over-specializing in particular skill sets and the DM then adjusting tactics so as specifically deny those characters the benefit for which they’ve spent resources. If a player spends skill and feat slots on being the best scout, it’s simply fair in terms of PC-DM social contract that the DM allow that character to scout things that another character wouldn’t (rather than create roadblocks that make those abilities ineffectual).

There’s a place in gaming for specialists (just as, per the comments on Legolas, there’s a place in fiction for specialists — but remember that he was adventuring alongside the generalist Aragorn), but that doesn’t make each one a “power-gamer” (just as the optimizer conceit that all characters need to be specialists is likewise incorrect). But the premise here — at least as presented — strikes me less to be about that specialization (the OP speaks well of points-based systems where such min-maxing is far more potent) than how a DM can manipulate the campaign to make irrelevant a character’s resource allocations (and how, in a level-based game, where there are fewer but larger allocation points, that has more visible effect).

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And, at least with bounded accuracy, it is somewhat mitigated in 5e. I ran a 3e party where the druid did nothing but specialize in Spot and Listen, to the extent that he would routinely walk around (with spells up helping him with a +50 to both skills. It was impossible to stealth the party when he was in it. I didn't bother to try to counter it. I simply acknowledged that he invested a lot of resources into that specialization and rewarded him accordingly.