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Message: <blockquote data-quote="NaturalZero" data-source="post: 8399858" data-attributes="member: 55705">People always come to these kind of discussions with loaded definitions of "optimizer" that vary from everyone else in the discussion. You'll have 10 people arguing past each other from 10 different versions of "optimization."I cut my teeth on 3.5 when it came out and it was designed out of the gate with "timmy" choices and optimal choices. It was a powergamer's game, by design. Optimization could completely skew a campaign because one character could literally do 100x the damage of another character of the same level, while having better AC, spells, et al. I loved creating gods, but I eventually grew tired of tables where PCs in the same party were essentially Superman along side of Aunt May. Extreme optimization differential hurts the game.That said, in my 20 years of experience and countless groups, I would say that optimizers are generally at least as invested in roleplay and world-building as non-optimizers. They put effort into optimization because they care about the game and the character, and the fact that they're invested in the game and character means they're more likely to write a long background or have a plot hook than a casual player. When i get someone who's an optimizer at my table, I know that I'm more likely to have someone that's invested in the game at large and be a collaborator.</blockquote>