D&D 5E Are powergamers a problem and do you allow them to play in your games?

[Jacob Lewis]

Power gamers are disrupting your games so you're not letting them play with you anymore? Great! Sounds like you figured everything out.

So what do you need from us? If you haven't gotten it in dozen or more pages of responses, I can guarantee you're not going to get it in a hundred more.

 

[Ancalagon]

Power gamers are disrupting your games so you're not letting them play with you anymore? Great! Sounds like you figured everything out.

So what do you need from us? If you haven't gotten it in dozen or more pages of responses, I can guarantee you're not going to get it in a hundred more.

Oh no, you need at least 200, 300 posts before the real gems of wisdom emerge!

 

[jasper]

I think I will allow powergamers in my group. But I am replacing their Duracell with Dollar tree batteries.

 

[Oofta]

Power gamers are disrupting your games so you're not letting them play with you anymore? Great! Sounds like you figured everything out.

So what do you need from us? If you haven't gotten it in dozen or more pages of responses, I can guarantee you're not going to get it in a hundred more.

We've (well I've) already fallen into the flame-bait trap. Say something controversial, never ever give any specifics, conflate people that build effective characters with people that are disruptive to the game and Voila! the pointless time-wasting thread of the week!

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

If you're looking for a fantasy skirmish wargame that doesn't have a great potential for powergaming, then 4E isn't the droid you're looking for.
Coming from someone who spent most of 3.5 and 4E hanging out on the WotC CharOp boards, in 5E your "blowing the system wide open" isn't nearly as big a deal as it was in 3.5 or even 4E... Look at the threads on this forum - there are only a handful of things (more specifically, ways of using those things in combination with others under specific circumstances) that are ever discussed as being "broken", and none of them are anywhere near the level of something you'd find in 4E, nevermind 3.5.
Being that there are so few options, even the moderately squeaky wheels tend to be perceived as squeaking just that much louder.

If you think powergaming/system mastery is a major issue in 5E, I have to wonder if you've ever looked at the CharOp forums of the older editions and seen what "blowing the system wide open" really looks like. In 5E, the disparity between "optimal" characters and un-optimized ones is negligible unless you're looking at it under a very powerful microscope - there just aren't that many things you can "optimize" since there just aren't that many elements to 5E. It's designed to encourage playing a single-class character who takes ABIs in preference to all but a handful of feats, and both multi-classing and feats are optional systems to begin with.
4E is a hell of a lot crunchier than 5E, and even after all the ridiculous nerfs it suffered there's still more opportunity to optimize any one class in that game than all the classes in all of 5E.
Not to mention, most of the optimization choices in 4E directly affect that tactical skirmish-game aspect you were looking at the game for.
If a 5E character being able to roll an extra damage die or two or getting an extra attack during combat offends your sensibilities, any 4E character built with even a moderate eye towards combat efficiency will make you cry...

I'm fine with power gaming if the system works with it. I'm not sure you understood my meaning either. IME what other people call powergaming is a player who is good at the game and how to maximize the system, I don't have a problem with that. The 5e problem isn't powergaming, its an easy mode D&D model that falls apart quickly when you get skilled players playing it or you go outsides its bounds slightly. But then again power gaming isn't an issue for me. So that is why I'm tossing around the idea of 4e rather than 5e for a combat focused game with a lot of crunch.

Offense my sensibilities? make me cry?

 

[Satyrn]

In 3.5 it was certainly an issue with high level casters. Somewhere after level 12 or so, casters (both wizards and clerics) could obliterate any encounter, at least every once in a while.

On the other hand, this is a discussion about 5E and I haven't seen it in this edition. Sure, once in a blue moon the wizard will pull that Meteor Storm out of his pocket, but what about the other 4-7 encounters that day?

I'll ask again. What build is it that so trivializes your encounters? If you give some specifics, any specifics at all, even a crumb of a something specific maybe I'd have more sympathy.

On the other hand I've only been playing/DMing since the 70s so maybe I missed something.

My moon druid feels, like, way overpowered right now. I optimized him like crazy - put his high stats into Wisdom and Constitution, dressed him in the best armor possible, and chose the absolute best beasts for wildshape. And now I'm crushing it in battle . . .

. . . spamming the wand of lightning bolt the DM handed out.

 

[WarpedAcorn]

Mmmmm no. If you've been playing D&D long enough, and running it, you will know that sometimes you can have one character that makes everything trivial to the point where it's pointless for the others to even do anything. Also, what ends up happening is the DM has to buff the enemies so much that they end up usually "one shotting" the others. Please don't try and pass this crap off about the others no being optimized enough. Experience is a wonderful thing.

As someone who has DM'd the majority of the games I've been a part of since the early 90's, I haven't really experienced this. I have seen players make some highly specialized characters that do exceedingly well under certain conditions, but I've never run into a player that makes it pointless for anyone to do anything else.

I remember one player in 3.0 Living Greyhawk who was a "Cavalier" (Paladin with all the Mounted Combat Feats). He could do incredible damage, move like the wind, and was near impossible to hit...on his horse. I have a Barbarian who has so much health and does so much damage that he is harder to kill than the Eldritch Knight rocking 27 AC with Shield spell...and both have found themselves on the south side of Will Saves. Then there was the guy who played an 70-year old Cleric (bonus to mental stats) who was pure Support and powergamed to be the best Support character ever (and he definitely was)...and lacked in the physical department for it.

My point is that I have never encountered an instance of a Powergamer "ruining" a game at my table. Do I feel its ruining the suspense when my monsters can't hit a group full of people with high AC? Absolutely. But I also notice the player grin when I ask if a 24 will hit. He can have that...then next round I hit him with a Hold Person. There is always something a DM can do to challenge his players. If a powergamer has mastery over combat, then throw in situations that require a skillmonkey, or a riddle for the players, or player specific story arcs to shine the light on people you think are getting marginalized.

The only issue I've ever had are with a few players who cheated their dice rolls. But as for powergamers who exploit the rules to make the best character they can, I've never had an issue.

 

[Jester David]

I do find power gaming to be problematic, because it requires me to adjust the power levels of encounters to account for a single player. I have to rebalance the game, which is doubly problematic if running a pre-published adventure. Plus, that one character outshines the rest of the party, making everyone else feel like the sidekick.

The latter element is the big detriment, as it's taking fun away from characters when they don't feel challenged in a combat, or don't get a turn because the power gamer killed the boss too quickly. Because one player wants to "win", so they'e selfishly hogging the spotlight.

While power gaming is often detached from roleplaying, it does drive characters to pick fights. Optimising for combat means you're really good at that one thing: you have a toolbox full of hammers. So every problem looks like a nail. The player is pushed to start fights or look for aggressive solutions so they can try out their newest combat trick or show off their abilities.

 

[transtemporal]

5e has very few outright game breaking combinations. I've had a few optimisers, but never a powergamer as you define it.

Same. I had a few in 3e but not in 5e.

Personally I don't mind if a player comes up with a tough rules-legal build. I figure I've always got the option of banning it. I've never done that though.

 

[transtemporal]

Do I feel its ruining the suspense when my monsters can't hit a group full of people with high AC? Absolutely. But I also notice the player grin when I ask if a 24 will hit. He can have that...then next round I hit him with a Hold Person. There is always something a DM can do to challenge his players.

EXACTLY!

DnD isn't an adversarial game but sometimes I'll ham up an attack that I know will miss just so the player can have the satisfaction of the miss. If they built their character to have high AC, then you have to give them that. Sure you can ruin their fun by having monsters with +18 attack but that's a bit mean-spirited I think.