Manifesto of the powergamer (rant), part I

[abri]

Yes, I am a powergamer and I am not alone
Yes, when I create a character I expect him to survive. I expect him to have the abilities to survive (otherwise how would he have survived before?). Not not dominate the world and be able to defeat any monster without a sweat, just be able to survive...
I design my characters by first making a rough estimate of the stats and abilities I want to play, then write a 2-3 pages background. THEN I come back to his stats to reflect the background I have written and add a little more background. Of course he is going to be efficient: if he made it to L1 wizard or fighter (or whatever...) he is different from your average peasant, he has seen some adventures and survived.
When I design a spellcaster, I give him the spells he needed to go through the hardship I described in his background: if he made it then he knew the trick.

Yes efficient character are realistic: how can one be trained as an adventuring mage without learning the minimum skills to survive down there? As a real life comparaison: you don't make it out of engineering school without the skill for at least one job.

I am fed up, when players who just don't bother to take the time to think about their PC abilities, cry "powergamer" at the top of their lung when someone use what I can only see as clever strategy.
Yes the rules allows a L1 wizard to have an AC of 23 if needed. Yes a L1 fighter can inflict over 14 points of damage average per turn...
Honnestly an adventurer is supposed to be someone out of the ordinary, someone who can rise against the challenges. Stories are made of heroes that survived against the odds: this is how I play my character. I expect to be injured, I see death as a possibility, but my characters won't die before I've tried every tricks and strategy I can think of.

And as a DM that's what I expect from my players: team work and efficient strategy, because that's what they'll be facing.
Yes a group of gobelins can kill a L10 parties.
The same way a cleverly played group can take on "invincible foes".
Part II of the rant, powergamer and powerless-gamer in a group.
Coming soon

Ps: As you can tell English is not my main language.

 

[Crothian]

The main thing in miy mind the denotes a Powergamer is the reasons behind the descions and how you play the character. I'm biased towards role players, but that doesn't mean a role player cannot be a powergamer. So, as long as you role play I could care less. As a DM I can powergame, too, so blanace is kept.

 

[Painfully]

Before the flames get too hot, let's remember that "to each their own," and all that.

I don't think anybody wants to get into this "classic" argument again.

 

[LostSoul]

Of course he is going to be efficient: if he made it to L1 wizard or fighter (or whatever...) he is different from your average peasant, he has seen some adventures and survived.

The way I look at 1st level, the character has been honing his skills for those first 15 or so years, and hasn't seen any adventure. Just grow'ed up real good and lucky (or special) enough to get the proper training to take a real man's class.

 

[jgbrowning]

course about 1/3rd the populace is a PC class... Don't see how being a PC class is that special anymore.

joe b.

 

[Sammael99]

Well, abri, I woulnd't call what you describe exactly powergaming.

To me, powergaming is character optimisation at the detriment of anything else in the game. It's when the combination of cool spells you can cast is more important than who your character is, what he does, the plot, the gameworld, etc.

What you describe is survivalism. Fair enough. I've noted three trends in character development :

Survivalism is the optimisation of the character for survival against anything.

Specialisation is the optimisation of the character towards one character aspect or activity (which may or may not help survival)

Flavour is an attempt at realism through allocation of character power to non-vital statistics.

The mix between the three usually depends on the game played and the player. I have no objection to any of them as long as my players realise that the most important aspect is who they are, what the do, and how they interact with the gameworld.

In other words, a player who spends his sessions leafing through the PHB to know which feat he'll pick at the next level annoys me muchly. If he does it between games, I'm happy.

However I do dislike both extremes of the spectrum between character optimisation and character flavour. The optimisation extreme, in my mind, is rule bending, ie. twisting the spirit of the rules, spells, feats, whatever, to achieve something that they weren't meant to do. That, to me, is playing MtG, not role-playing. The other extreme is the character that's so unusual, role-playing wise, that he is unplayable and contributes nothing to the party...

All the realm in between is fair game in my games, as long as everyone has fun and I do too !

 

[Zappo]

Abri, I'd sooo wish more players were powergamer in the sense you described! 2-3 pages of background and actually bothering to make the stats match it? That's fairly good roleplaying in my book.

Unfortunately, what I call powergamers tend not to know the meaning of 'background' (and not understanding it after having been explained twice) and actually try their best to give their characters the power to dominate the world and defeat any monster without a sweat.

edit: with all due respect to powergamers, of course. *grin*

 

[mkletch]

Our group has had several discussions about "what exactly is roleplaying", and we've never come up with a solid answer. Some felt that having a background, personality and some quaint, unique sayings were it. Others thought that you must make in-character decisions based on that personality. Other felt that simply sitting at the table playing the game was roleplaying.

That said, your definition of powergaming depends heavily on how you define roleplaying in general. Powergaming is, by any definition, an version of roleplaying that is outside the norm (that you have defined).

Originally posted by Sammael99
However I do dislike both extremes of the spectrum between character optimisation and character flavour. The optimisation extreme, in my mind, is rule bending, ie. twisting the spirit of the rules, spells, feats, whatever, to achieve something that they weren't meant to do. That, to me, is playing MtG, not role-playing. The other extreme is the character that's so unusual, role-playing wise, that he is unplayable and contributes nothing to the party...

As an aside, I find extreme roleplayers to be far more frustrating than powergamers. There have been exceptions (powergamers with the social skills of a rock), but in general, the character that contributes nothing is worth nothing, except to the player that is violently supportive of their little 'project'.

Abri's survivalist character is no problem to me. In fact, playing anything less wastes the other players' time (unless you have a whole group of extreme roleplayers with one-legged dancing barbarians with 20 ranks in Intuit Direction because it is a useful real-world skill). Sorry if that's offensive to some; I admit it is not PC. But it is a game with a story, not a story sans game.

-Fletch

 

[Thanee]

Absolute agreement with Sammael99 and Zappo.

There is nothing wrong with a little powergaming (if you define it as having a look towards game mechanics to build an effective character).

Well, there is nothing wrong with any form of powergaming, actually, but that's not the point.

You know how the game works and how your stats and abilities will affect gameplay? Fine! Make use of it! Use it to support your character concept!

Keeping an eye on the effectiveness of your character while likewise keeping an eye on the actual character, the background, how your choices reflect the background and how the background reflects the choices you made, is a very good compromise between "roleplaying" and "powergaming".

What's the point of a really well played character, if the stats cannot live up to the background and whenever it comes to dice rolling to decide something, the character will fail to be what he is meant to. Is that the better way? Surely not.

To me powergaming (the negative term) starts, when character background is totally neglected, weird class and feat combinations are chosen purely for effectiveness and it therefore becomes pretty much impossible to describe the character except using game mechanical terms. It's when the game degenerates into Diablo-esque action sequences. Still there is nothing wrong with this kind of gaming, altho it's not my way (except on the computer that is), if people have fun this way, let them!

Bye
Thanee

 

[Fenes 2]

I think it is important to define the pwoer level of any campaign when judging if a player is a powergamer. If the majority of the players are playing PCs that are not minmaxed (which is vastly different from the one legged dancing barbarian mentioned) and the DM has his foes adjusted for their power level, then the player that built a minmaxed combat machine with the material from a dozen splatbooks may be a powergamer.

Another measure is intent. If a player wants the most powerful PC (however he may define it) in a party, odds are he is a powergamer. If he just wants the best swordfighter in the party, or the sneakiest rogue, or the most charming duelist odds are he is just a specializing player.

In my book, anyone who tries to build a PC that is vastly more powerful than the standard in a campaign is a powergamer, as is anyone trying to "beat the DM" by always choosing the "best" gear skills and feats, no matter how ridiculous they look together.