Balanced & Optimised or Not?

[Kzach]

Do you encourage or enforce balanced and optimised groups or do you just let the group make whatever characters and classes and roles they want, however they want?

I realised something whilst discussing in other threads that I've become somewhat draconian on this issue. It bugs me if a group isn't balanced or if someone isn't fulfilling their role well.

This, however, seems to go against the grain of the 'roleplayers'. I don't mean that in a derogatory sense, it's just that I tend to view roleplaying as just one part of a holistic whole, which includes character and group optimisation, not as the be all and end all.

Have you found that balanced groups fair better than unbalanced ones? Have you found that not optimising your characters has hurt the party or that it just doesn't matter?

I tend to see 4e as being a fairly well-tuned machine. Deviating either side of the course has compound effects, rather than just minimal bumps. This strongly reminds me of my time spent playing World of Warcraft.

And that's from where I get this attitude. Getting to an instance only to find your tank is specced MS and has DPS gear on, or finding your priest is shadow and has zero mana regen or spirit gear, or finding your rogue is lolstep maces, or your hunter has no idea how to trap, etc. is really annoying.

People invest their time and energy and resources into playing a game that involves other people. To me, everyone at the table should consider everyone else's needs, and not just their own. In other words, don't turn up to an instance with Gorehowl, expecting to tank.

 

[Jack99]

If you bring enough DPS, you do not need a healer..

 

[Nail]

Have you found that balanced groups fair better than unbalanced ones? Have you found that not optimising your characters has hurt the party or that it just doesn't matter?

I've been watching the blog of a gamer who's party refuses to be "balanced" => they like ranged attacks, apparently.

They've been trying KotS....and they've been getting pasted.

 

[Arbitrary]

The main difference is that in Dungeons and Dragons you have a referee who has the job of making sure things are challenging and appropriate. Party configuration shouldn't dictate the quality of the game and the difficulty of encounters. What is supposed to do that is the teamwork of the players, their ability to solve problems, and the luck of their rolls.

If you are really worried about party composition and character role than when you are starting the campaign have a civil discussion with everyone at the table briefly explains their character concept and what they intend to add to the party. There is room for some crossover between roles and some interesting combinations of classes, powers, and paths that you are losing out on if there is pressure to play the traditionally accepted optimized builds of each class.

 

[kaomera]

Do you encourage or enforce balanced and optimised groups or do you just let the group make whatever characters and classes and roles they want, however they want?

This has to be a group consensus, and I think it can work either way. Just not so much if you have a bunch of differing expectations in the same group. So, in a sense you need to optimize the players before you start thinking about the characters.

I absolutely let other players make whatever characters they want. I have never seen forcefully pushing a player towards a more (or even less) optimized (or whatever) build work out well. If we just can't make our expectations meet in a useful way, then we need to not be playing in the same group.

Personally I like to think that I'm in the middle-of-the-road on this issue; I don't like over-optimized characters, or players who can't talk / think about anything but optimization. But on the other hand I also don't like it when a player has a character that can't really do anything useful, just because they where being a spazz during character creation (especially if they seem to think that they really where optimizing their character).

 

[Arbitrary]

My 20 Int Warlord is not a spazz decision!

 

[That One Guy]

When I DM, I encourage players to play whatever they want. I'll adjust the difficulty/encounters to generally be a challenge for them. In harder fights I might exploit their weaknesses, but generally I try to soften it up a little bit. Of course, I'm also into letting the dice fall where they may, so if they get taken down in a softer fight... they should've run away or something.

As a player, I always try to figure out someone I would want to play and who will help out the group the best. If the story teller does not say, "Don't worry, play what you want." ...then I'll even more likely try to balance the group.

 

[Victim]

I think there's a significant tolerance for unbalanced groups, as long as the party is willing to make some adjustments. Both of our parties are 4 man teams without access to one role.

Group 1 has been playing longer is about to reach level 6. We have a tactical warlord, a fighter, a paladin, and a warlock, so there's no controller. So naturally swarms, large groups of enemies, and minion gangs seem like big problems, right?

Well, our fighter has Passing and Sweeping for her encounter powers, Rain of Steel as a daily, along with a Life Stealing weapon. Plus the duh choice of Cleave. So that gives her considerable multi target ability. And killing weakened foes or minions gives her Temp HP, so she can better weather the attacks of remaining foes.

Our warlock is infernal, so even if the number of enemies floods our defenders, she's tough enough to survive. Heck, sometimes that crazy tiefling wants to get hit because she has temp HP and wants more Hellish Rebuke damage. Also, Firey Bolt is nice, especially since Push and Slide powers help to set up a better placement.

My warlord has lightning weapon to help clear out crowds of minions. Commander's Strike also helps to establish marks on more enemies to better control lots of regular enemies.

Our paladin doesn't have anything to help clear out minions, IIRC. However, he is fairly self sufficient.

So our party generally has enough tricks to clear out minions as long as they aren't spread out too much (which greatly reduces the wizard's ability to deal with them). Our biggest trouble is swarms, since most of our Area subsitutes don't trigger their vulnerability.

Group 2 has an Inspiring Warlord, hybrid Cleric, brutal rogue, and a wizard. Both of our leaders have been upgrading their armor/shield proficiencies, so they're pretty tough. And the extra healing helps to make up for damage that goes to other characters because of the lack of defending marks. Also, the rogue uses more Riposte Strike to deter attacks while the wizard uses a staff - at least for now.

 

[Mouseferatu]

I would never, as either a DM or a player, try to "enforce" any sort of balance among the roles. Ever. I'll make them aware that they're potentially impeding themselves, to make sure they're okay with it, but that's it.

4E is not so fragile that it's going to fall apart if the group isn't perfectly composed. Yes, they'll probably have some troubles that a "proper" group wouldn't, but that's their decision. As the DM, I'll tweak some of the encounters to account for the group's composition, since that's obviously what people wanted to play. I won't cater to it completely, but I'll keep it in mind.

And if it still turns out to be an issue? It's a self-correcting problem. If the party is too weak to function, eventually one or more characters will die and be replaced by someone more effective. But until/unless that happens, so be it.

 

[James McMurray]

Play the character you want to play. Luckily for almost me every option in 4E has appeal, so finding something that wasn't a mirror of someone's else's character hasn't been a problem. At one point I did play a second warlord, but he was inspiring and I was tactical. We both still died to some wraiths in Rivenroar, despite the beefiness of two buff focused leaders. Not choosing to fill the defender role definitely hurt the party. We remade, witht he other player making a defender and me making another (almost identical) tactical warlord.