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Message: <blockquote data-quote="hawkeyefan" data-source="post: 6866009" data-attributes="member: 6785785">Absolutely. I have been in games like those, and they can be a blast. Nothing wrong with that style at all, really, except it makes for a poor example to use in discussions of game balance. Ignoring as in dismissing. Sure, you may have been aware of everything that's been mentioned by others in the thread. But you also routinely dismiss these ideas. You label them as not your style, or that they shouldn't be necessary. It seems a bit strange to dismiss these points and then ask why no one is willing to acknowledge that the game's baseline math is flawed. I think that most folks would say that the math is not perfect...and there are probably a few glaring errors in design that highlight this fact. But I also think that many here think that, overall, the math works. They are looking at your descriptions of encounters and how easily they are overcome by your party, and they are more concerned about other areas than the math. I think the issue is that others are finding a somewhat different experience. My own group is 8-9 level, and their capability has certainly jumped up over the last level or so. I can understand what you're saying in that regard. They are finding encounters easier in general, although I can still challenge them pretty easily. Now, my players are not optimizers to the extreme that yours are. They generally have a character concept in mind and then create that as best they can with the rules. So not every single choice is about the impact it will have on combat. Race seems to be the biggest difference here based on your descriptions...my players do not automatically pick a race so they can see in the dark and so on. Having said that, these are long time players, and they know how to make effective characters and an effective party. The group they've made is very capable. There are 5 PCs in total. They have a few magic items, mostly utility items and a decent cache of potions. When it comes to armor and weapons...the fighter has +1 armor and a +1 sword, the rogue has a +1 short sword, and that's it. Oh and the monk has a ring of protection +1.All of that stuff is doled out at the DM discretion. That's controllable. And I would say that the level of treasure and magic gear can have a huge impact on the game. Especially when you start to incorporate all kinds of home brew aspects like double concentration and intelligent weapons that get actual combat turns and the like. Now, I know that you said that campaign is a bad example because you're going for an over the top heroic feel...but it kind of implies that at least some of this power scale issue may be at play in any game you run. I think the demon lords may be the only thing that can challenge that group at this point. And, if that group was hunting them down, it might actually be enough for Demogorgon, Orcus, and Graz'zt to set aside their differences this one time. These characters are epic style characters at level 9.The math is flawed. There are ways to address this. Controlling the number of encounters and availability for rest, as the original exercise stated. Adding creatures or adding environmental concerns, or even adjusting a creature a bit. These are options, and they've been mentioned. None of them will solve all the problems, though....there's always going to be times when the game just breaks down a bit.I think the core issue, though, is that the default game is at a volume of 5 on the dial. So if the players are also at volume 5, then things are balanced, and the system works as described. The more those volumes differ, the more one side winds up drowning the other out. You have to adjust things to bring them back in balance. Your players have the volume dialed up to 8 with their optimization. And then you cranked it up to 11 by breaking the mechanics of the game with all kinds of options. Yet the game out of the box is at volume 5.</blockquote>

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