D&D 5E BREAKING 5th Edition!

[GameOgre]

I love players who try to min max their way into world domination!

"I rolled all 18's and video taped it on my phone" see six lopping copies of the player rolling a 18.

I want to play a Warlock Paladin Barbarian or insert outlandish multiclassing here.

Whatever it is I'm all for it! After all some of my best npc/monsters were created to deal with stuff like that.

You see a Kobold charging at you as he flings his giant hammer at you! The Kobold seems to be covered all in Black plate and his helm has what looks to be miniature Tarrasque horns attached to it like a Viking helm! My god, it does indeed look like Bloodslap the infamous kobold warlord, what is your AC? oh and you hear a thunderclap as the hammer strikes you!


On the other hand....if they win it usually comes with a epic story!

 

[Umbran]

Hey guys, I'm pretty sure OP is joking with the whole antagonistic thing. Why not give him the benefit of the doubt and assume he's asking a fun hypothetical question about power gaming instead of literally asking us how to wreck his DM's game?

The hypothetical question of, "What's the best way to twist a DM's arm to get them to rule the way you want them to?" is not a fun hypothetical about power gaming, at least in my world.

You want a fun, hypothetical answer? $1000 is the best way to twist the DM's arm. Pay the DM huge amounts of filthy lucre to get your way. It is the best way because, at least then, you're not abusing someone who's supposed to be your friend. You're just bribing them.

 

[Cernor]

The only "hack" you need is to persuade your DM to let you get to level 30: Once you do that, you can true polymorph yourself into Tiamat, and then it's game over for the multiverse!

 

[Riley37]

I want to know what "hacks" I can use to make my DM cry!

Raw chopped onions.

Sabotage their romantic relationships.

If you have absolutely no mercy: publicly reveal them as a DM who welcomes abusive bullies at their gaming table. Oh, the shame! Sooner or later, all the other players will quit, and then the GM, leaving you with TOTAL DOMINATION!

Then hack a chess game so that all your pawns start as queens. You win again!

 

[Dausuul]

It's very simple: Convince your DM to take a break and let you run for a while.

Now you are omnipotent.

 

[aramis erak]

Push for Epic boons before level 20.

That's about the only "Game Breaker" I can see, and even that's breaking the RAW on Epic Boons...

 

[txshusker]

What happened to senses of humor?

I haven't gone high in levels as player or DM yet, but the game appears to be pretty even keeled. DMs giving lots of magic items but not doing anything extra to monsters in combat could hurt, but i don't see how it would break anything. And it's a decision of the DM, so I would assume he'd be prepared for it. Even max stats at 1st level only overbalance combat for a short while. Max abilities don't overbalance the Roleplaying... like I thought it could in 4e. No multi buffering from a single source keeps extra +s out of combat. I think even people who are leery of multi-classing or feats are assuming too much as those are decision that take away power from a class in other areas, so those decisions even balance out builds.

Even the PHB has semi-vague rule descriptions, which could leave some interpretation up to the DM/table.

If you want to make him cry, I suppose you could tweet Crawford at WotC for a ruling on everything you don't agree with or that isn't in a character's favor.

All in all, the breaking seems to be on the DM. I don't see, yet, what a player could do to get a huge upper hand in combat.

 

[Werebat]

> 7.) Watch the DM use Tiamat from the back of Rise of Tiamat to crush your pitiful attempt at min-maxing before kicking you out of his game, you cheating SOB.

But will the DM be breaking the rules regarding encounter difficulty by PC level? We powergamers take the rules very seriously, you know!

 

[pemerton]

Even if you got what you want. Y'know what, fine, you win D&D, congrats on your huge number, so big and manly, your math is the largest, so immense that one would be a fool to question your numerical virility. Your skill at making a number in a game about magical elfs get bigger and bigger is clearly unassailable. You are the reigning champion of system mastery and you've also made playing with you such an annoying chore that it's wrecked the game.

I mean, what is the point of the game for you?

A lot of people play D&D to win. It is the default approach espoused by Gygax in his DMG, by Moldvay in his Basic rulebook, and is familiar to the wider contemporary community through playing computer games.

What the limits on permissible tactics are is a matter of preference, but gaming the GM is itself pretty tried-and-true in the D&D community, and part-and-parcel of a "rulings not rules" philosophy. My players make sure to build PCs who are capable against undead and demons because they know that those are my overall favourite monster types. That's a type of gaming of the GM, and it does the game no harm at all - in fact it improves it, by ensuring a degree of "fit" between protagonists and antagonists.

I agree with those who say that the OP was somewhat tongue-in-cheek. But the question of what range of rulings for various key rules are plausible, and what effect they have on the power of various PCs (and their players) in what circumstances is a completely sensible one. There is a recent thread on surprise, for instance, which canvasses various interpretations of the surprise rules and shows that those different interpretations will make potentially big differences to game play.

 

[Derren]

Its apparently too early for this thread as most people are still in the "Thou shall not find faults in the new edition" phase.

As it was said, suprise can be very powerful and there are reports that crossbow master is very good as are the -5/+10 feats which easily leads the party to be able to fight enemies outside of the encounter guidelines.

While not breaking but definately useful is having Guidance up constantly.