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Message: <blockquote data-quote="SolidSnake" data-source="post: 2161653" data-attributes="member: 102">Before I begin with the problem, let me start with the backstory to this dilemma...Many years ago I began a very long and exciting campaign with three good friends.  Over the course of a few years, one of the friends had to move away and thus we had to fill the void somehow.  Of the remaining players, one agreed to take on the role of that player's PC to alleviate the headache I would get from running two NPCs for the party.  I was running RttToEE and the three of them were getting the hang of the rules and how to more effectively work together; the composition was as follows:Priest of Pelor (PC)Psion (PC)Paladin (PC that moved)Fighter (NPC)Everything was going alright, but like anything in life...things change.  The player that was involved with both PCs began to take a more active role in the game: researching rules, considering the intrigue of the storyline more effectively, and challenging himself with roleplaying opportunities.  The other PC was content to live session by session and see what happened.  Well, last weekend, the player that was playing the priest and the paladin seemed to utterly dominate the session.  He had used both characters so effectively to support one another that he crushed the opposition.  Meanwhile, the psion sat on the sidelines and I could tell that he was unhappy.This; to me, seemed like the culmination of many sessions of frustration on the part of the Psion-player.  Everytime this other PC would think of a multitude of ideas, he would have free reign to follow up on them through the medium of two PCs...making it much easier to accomplish his goals.  You can see where this is headed already I'm sure.  For every ONE action, the guy playing two characters would get TWO.  I want to make something clear, I don't blame anyone at all here...the fourth character was necessary at the time and someone needed to do it.  BUT now, I think there is some frustration on the part of the other PC.  My objective is to ensure that everyone has a good time and if that isn't happening I think I have failed.The problem is that the Psion-player has not really become rules savy and does not work as effectively with the other player as my NPC does; consequently, I think his potential is stiffled.  He is capable of so much (as are all 13th level characters), but really doesn't play him that way.  For instance, the guy had "Invisibility Purge" as one of his powers and was relying on a "Mindlink" setup between himself and the Paladin who had been buffed with "True Seeing" to fight an invisible, flying, lightining bolt hurling drow wizard.  It was only until many rounds into combat did he even think to use it.  The whole time he was getting inaccurate coordinates from the Paladin and guestimating where to hurl his "Energy Ball."  Both me and the other player were a little shocked when he revealed this little fact to us.Now this guy isn't a loser, he is a really good friend and an excellent roleplayer who has yet to fully make the transition to 3.x.  This lag is allowing the other player more of the spotlight and creating a bit of resentment (I think) in the group.  I talked to the other player about all this and he seems to think that my theory makes sense.  I offered a solution to the problem: remove the Paladin character from the game (using a good plot creation device), so that everyone would have an equal share of "face time."  Needless to say that the other player agreed that it made the most logical sense, but felt that he had invested alot of time into the character to see him go so easily.  So we began to discuss the most time-expediant way of removing the Paladin from the game and came to the conclusion that in high level campaigns (if you want to have everything make sense in game) it is extremely difficult to take players out without either failing miserably or killing everyone in the process.  I've mulling this over for days now.  I want everyone to have fun, but I don't think it is fair for one player's poor understanding of the game to cheat another's out of a very developed character.  I'm at a complete loss...please help!<img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /></blockquote>

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