4E DM's Surprised By Players?

[Terramotus]

Well, we've got 1/2 a new group, since our old one sort of imploded in the wake of 4E. But I've definitely noticed that a well-played Cleric is frickin AWESOME. And he honestly steals the show more than anyone else, because he's been the lynchpin to winning encounters we thought we were losing. I had no idea Clerics could be that cool.

One thing that's fascinating is my Wife, our DM. In the past she loved d20 Modern to death, but she actually gave up on a 3.5E game she was running simply because our power-gaming natures expanded beyond her ability to cope as a DM and still run the kind of games she wanted. By the time our party of a Wizard, Druid, and Bo9S throwing monster hit 9th level, we were practically unstoppable. The final straw for her was when we entirely circumvented the prepared defenses of a caster naga 8 levels higher than us and owned him without getting touched through summoned grapplers. He was supposed to knock us down a peg.

In 4E, though, she's become almost a killer DM, throwing encounter after encounter at us that makes us look at leach other and wonder how the hell we're going to get out of this one. I think we've skirted the edge of TPK at least once every session. And I LOVE it. As an acknowledged Power Gamer, I'm thrilled to actually have real challenges that I can throw everything I've got at.

In 3.5E, I often felt like I was figuring out how many limbs to tie behind my back so as not to overpower a sane DM. Now I get to bust out with whatever I can think of, since monsters are so easy to use. It is kind of funny, though... I almost feel like I've got a phantom limb, where my ability to totally demolish encounters through an optimized build has been amputated. When things start looking grim, my first thought is that it's time to go nova... but I'm already using everything I've got!

 

[williamhm]

well our group has only had a couple of easy battles, but even so our fighter almost got dropped. We were supposed to take this mob boss alive, and we had just found his office, our rogue was the only one in the room and was talking to buy the rest of us time to get there. Our warforged fighter tries to break through the flimsy wall to catch the guy by surprised, and winds up in a closet with three skeletons, ouch. So while trying to outmanouver the enemy he was outmanouvered.

 

[Gothmog]

...The build-monkeys, still cocky after having been the "alphas" for so long, haven't quite come to terms with their rapidly diminishing social status. In fact, I don't think they've quite realized that their time has come to an end.

It'll be interesting to see how this plays out over the next couple of games. Frankly, I'm surprised at how bad the BM's are at tactics. I had assumed that they would be as good at that sort of thing as they were at twinking their characters. Apparently, being able to memorize rules doesn't mean you're also good at applying them in dynamic situations.

Yep, I've noticed this trend as well. One guy in my group used to be a big twink powergamer, and would come up with completely overpowered character builds that made us all roll our eyes and smack him with our books. His characters dominated the 3.x games we played so such a degree that we asked him to nerf his characters so other people could have fun too. He always wanted to showboat and be the center of attention due to his overpowered characters.

Now, under 4e, he's suddenly slipped down the totem pole, and its driving him nuts. He's HORRIBE at tactics- he's used to throwing his big guns and twinked out builds at whatever moves and blowing it away like in 3e...but that doesn't work in 4e. Now he's actually having to WORK WITH THE PARTY instead of running off on his own or hogging all the glory. He is very good at math and anlytical thinking, but he can't think on the fly to save his life. He's not a bad guy and is quite funny, but it is amusing to see him realize how disruptive and how much of a d**k he could be before. He's still kind of a rules lawyer, but its not so much of a big deal now that rules mastery is a minor part of the game compared to tactics and teamwork.

 

[Vyvyan Basterd]

The player I am most surprised about with our switch to 4E is our powergamer. I thought I might encounter some of the same problems others have mentioned above, but then he shocked me. He has devoted the extra time he would have spent twinking his character and put more effort into his character backgorund and roleplaying. I know, powergaming an roleplaying/character development are not mutually exclusive, but that was never his strong suit.

 

[Grimstaff]

great thread!

 

[OchreJelly]

My players never cease to surprise me as evidenced by this

My group is pretty crunch orientated, with some build monkeys. I had concerns of build monkeys 'losing what is fun to them' but the shift to tactical play 'fun' has been pretty smooth. They are really starting to gel as a team. They are even seeing the power of skills and are investing in skill-boosting utility powers.