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Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
How to balance combat when 2 characters are average and one is extremely overpowered?
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<blockquote data-quote="Tony Vargas" data-source="post: 7023248" data-attributes="member: 996"><p>Classic problem. Not that difficult to solve. The question is the approach you want to take. You have several options. Of course, first and most briefly, you could do the responsible grown-up thing and talk to the problem player and have him exercise some restraint. If you want to take a mechanical approach, you can ban or nerf the broken bits of his build to bring it in line - it's a bit like the old 'closing the barn door after the L'borean Riding Snakes have slithered out - but sometimes it works without too many hard feelings. The optimizer feels like he's demonstrated his chops and counts you 'needing to nerf him' as a victory. OK, sometimes it doesn't work out, and he just whines and 'pouts. Or, you can really embrace the DM Empowerment and let him have it. OK, so you let a player put out a lot of DPR, but monsters can absorb a lot of DPR, too, in a lot of different ways. Immunity to non-magical weapons. Resistance to piercing (it's not like there are a lot of bludgeoning and slashing options with a crossbow). Resistance to weapon attacks (swarms, for instance). It doesn't have to be every combat, but it can quickly become every meaningful combat, especially if you start just hand-waving combats where the build works. "OK, you shoot 'em all down, no point rolling through it all."</p><p></p><p>Then there's non-combat, depending on what the players are like, he may or may not continue to hog the spotlight during interactions. While a Rogue is a great skill-monkey, it still doesn't cover all skills, and you could turn the storyline and challenges towards his blind-spots and give the devout Cleric & Paladin more time in the sun.</p><p></p><p> It doesn't always hurt to be obvious. <img src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7" class="smilie smilie--sprite smilie--sprite2" alt=";)" title="Wink ;)" loading="lazy" data-shortname=";)" /></p><p></p><p>Deliberately targeting the guy murdering your buddies from behind the tenuous cover of a pair of allies is certainly something many enemies would deliberately do, and do as hard as they possibly could.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Tony Vargas, post: 7023248, member: 996"] Classic problem. Not that difficult to solve. The question is the approach you want to take. You have several options. Of course, first and most briefly, you could do the responsible grown-up thing and talk to the problem player and have him exercise some restraint. If you want to take a mechanical approach, you can ban or nerf the broken bits of his build to bring it in line - it's a bit like the old 'closing the barn door after the L'borean Riding Snakes have slithered out - but sometimes it works without too many hard feelings. The optimizer feels like he's demonstrated his chops and counts you 'needing to nerf him' as a victory. OK, sometimes it doesn't work out, and he just whines and 'pouts. Or, you can really embrace the DM Empowerment and let him have it. OK, so you let a player put out a lot of DPR, but monsters can absorb a lot of DPR, too, in a lot of different ways. Immunity to non-magical weapons. Resistance to piercing (it's not like there are a lot of bludgeoning and slashing options with a crossbow). Resistance to weapon attacks (swarms, for instance). It doesn't have to be every combat, but it can quickly become every meaningful combat, especially if you start just hand-waving combats where the build works. "OK, you shoot 'em all down, no point rolling through it all." Then there's non-combat, depending on what the players are like, he may or may not continue to hog the spotlight during interactions. While a Rogue is a great skill-monkey, it still doesn't cover all skills, and you could turn the storyline and challenges towards his blind-spots and give the devout Cleric & Paladin more time in the sun. It doesn't always hurt to be obvious. ;) Deliberately targeting the guy murdering your buddies from behind the tenuous cover of a pair of allies is certainly something many enemies would deliberately do, and do as hard as they possibly could. [/QUOTE]
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Community
General Tabletop Discussion
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How to balance combat when 2 characters are average and one is extremely overpowered?
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