barsoomcore
Unattainable Ideal
My lack of DMing skill has killed more campaigns than any rule. Seriously.
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Has anything ever broken your game?
- Thread starter Pants
- Start date
iwatt
First Post
I broke a 3.0 game with the standard melee cleric (strength/War domains). But it was partly the DMs fault who not only encouraged, but even required me to buff myself fully for our party to even come close to surviving. Every monster had incredibly high SR (nixing the evoker) was either undead, construct or an elemental (nixing both the rogue and the TWF gladiator), and had incredibly high DR (nixing the Archer ranger). Coupled with high AC, it was only after the cleric buffed up for about 8 rounds that we could even come close to hitting it.
It actually became ridiculous after we were fighting these uber golems who had to touch these gems and were restored to full hitpoints. We beat a hasty retreat, and replanned our strategy: Me and the Gladiator would tank up and take on a golem each while the others destroyed the gems. Of course the gems were nigh indestructable unless hit by my sword with GMW (3.0 Damage reduction). So we switch tactics again. We'll bull rush the golems into a cornerand take them out the brute way....That's when we discovered that these golems had enough ranks in tumble to not only avoid AoOs when oving through threatened areas, but they even could pass through an occupied square
. That little tidbit cost us two party deaths. The worse part is the DM told us he hadn't made up the monster but had found him in some 3rd party splatbook.
After that it was always: "buff the cleric and send him in". That got old in a hurry. I tried avoiding it since I was clearly hogging all the spotlight, but my co-players encouraged it since it was the only way we'd ever survive.
It actually became ridiculous after we were fighting these uber golems who had to touch these gems and were restored to full hitpoints. We beat a hasty retreat, and replanned our strategy: Me and the Gladiator would tank up and take on a golem each while the others destroyed the gems. Of course the gems were nigh indestructable unless hit by my sword with GMW (3.0 Damage reduction). So we switch tactics again. We'll bull rush the golems into a cornerand take them out the brute way....That's when we discovered that these golems had enough ranks in tumble to not only avoid AoOs when oving through threatened areas, but they even could pass through an occupied square
. That little tidbit cost us two party deaths. The worse part is the DM told us he hadn't made up the monster but had found him in some 3rd party splatbook.After that it was always: "buff the cleric and send him in". That got old in a hurry. I tried avoiding it since I was clearly hogging all the spotlight, but my co-players encouraged it since it was the only way we'd ever survive.
VirgilCaine
First Post
iwatt said:
Golems with Tumble sounds like the DM, not the cleric.
painandgreed
First Post
We're playing a Savage Species game and our DM is really a having trouble with the Incubbus' Clairaudience, Clairvoyance, Detect Thoughts, and Suggestion at will. The energy drain at will doesn't really bother her that much but the teleport and ethereal jaunt are already and he'll get those at will next level.
I unintentionally broke a 3E game I ran a few years back. The players were complaining that there weren't any worthwhile feats, so I introduced a feat from Star Wars d20: Heroic Surge -- this gives the PC an extra standard action, once per day for every 4 character levels (so, a 13th level PC can do it 4 times).
The arcane spellcasters in the party jumped all over this (and, for that matter, Haste, which was busted in 3E, as someone else has already pointed out). It became not uncommon for the two arcanists to pop off a total of 4 big-damage spells at the beginning of a combat, and that would pretty much finish off the bad guys. Made it hard for me to write, and it also ticked off the non-spellcasters, since Heroic Surge was good for them, but not *that* good.
The arcane spellcasters in the party jumped all over this (and, for that matter, Haste, which was busted in 3E, as someone else has already pointed out). It became not uncommon for the two arcanists to pop off a total of 4 big-damage spells at the beginning of a combat, and that would pretty much finish off the bad guys. Made it hard for me to write, and it also ticked off the non-spellcasters, since Heroic Surge was good for them, but not *that* good.
The only thing that ever threatened to break one of my campaigns was a Bronze Dragon cohort, but it was really my fault.
The player who asked for the dragon was not to well versed in the rules, and I didn't keep a close enough eye on what level the new cohort turned out to be. The result was a cohort that was by far the most combat effective front-line fighter the party had. It was a little frustrating until I approached the group and they all agreed that the dragon was too powerful as a cohort.
My solution was to treat the Bronze as a full party member, who got full XP and was counted as such when I calculated ECL/CR for encounters. That did the trick. The player got to keep her Dragon and I got some semblance of game balance back.
The player who asked for the dragon was not to well versed in the rules, and I didn't keep a close enough eye on what level the new cohort turned out to be. The result was a cohort that was by far the most combat effective front-line fighter the party had. It was a little frustrating until I approached the group and they all agreed that the dragon was too powerful as a cohort.
My solution was to treat the Bronze as a full party member, who got full XP and was counted as such when I calculated ECL/CR for encounters. That did the trick. The player got to keep her Dragon and I got some semblance of game balance back.
iwatt
First Post
VirgilCaine said:
Actually, I did get something good out of the game. I learnt how to abuse and milk every little ruling in order to survive. As a tactical wargame it was pretty fullfilling, since every combat was extremely difficult, so you ahd to put all you had into the game.
What I found was broken was allowing a melee cleric the chance to fully buff up before each combat.
As a personale note, this experience also taught me what not to do as a DM myself...
I always know I could demolish the party if I "wanted" to. But that's not the point in my games.
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