Min/Max explination
- Thread starter Laurel
- Start date
Ferret
Explorer
This probably isn't as accurate as it could be but I'l give it a go. A min/maxer is someone who maximises their good points and minimises their bad points so they can win easier. Such as a Min/Maxed sorcerer would choose all the most damaging spells, max out their Charisma and put the low points in things like Strength.
BiggusGeekus
That's Latin for "cool"
Sure.
Min/Max means emphasizing your strengths at the expense of weakness that don't really matter. Roleplay is never a conideration.
Let's say you have a barbarian. Barbrians only use Charisma for the Intimidate skill. So you put your lowest attribute in Charisma and your highest in Strength. That's a very common min/max that isn't a big deal, but some of them can get pretty wild. For example, later on, you decide your barbrian's armor class is too low. So you take a level of fighter for the armor proficiencies and then go back to being a barbarian. I'm sure other people can provide you with other examples.
Personally, I don't feel that min/maxing is so bad. These are decisions that the player can make for his character and you want the players making as many decisions as possible. If I found out that my players were pouring over the books for hours on end trying to get the most efficient/powerful/whatever character, I'd be in a pretty good mood. After all, I can always make the encounters a little harder!
Happy gaming!
Min/Max means emphasizing your strengths at the expense of weakness that don't really matter. Roleplay is never a conideration.
Let's say you have a barbarian. Barbrians only use Charisma for the Intimidate skill. So you put your lowest attribute in Charisma and your highest in Strength. That's a very common min/max that isn't a big deal, but some of them can get pretty wild. For example, later on, you decide your barbrian's armor class is too low. So you take a level of fighter for the armor proficiencies and then go back to being a barbarian. I'm sure other people can provide you with other examples.
Personally, I don't feel that min/maxing is so bad. These are decisions that the player can make for his character and you want the players making as many decisions as possible. If I found out that my players were pouring over the books for hours on end trying to get the most efficient/powerful/whatever character, I'd be in a pretty good mood. After all, I can always make the encounters a little harder!
Happy gaming!
BiggusGeekus
That's Latin for "cool"
Well the terms don't have exact definitions. I'm sure some people think min/maxing is "worse" than powergaming and others think powergaming is "worse" than min/maxing.
d12
First Post
One semi-egregious example of min-maxing I've seen is a player who was trying to get his elf to qualify for the Arcane Archer prestige class. Instead of just taking one level in wizard, he took the level in diviner. Why? One more True Strike spell per day. Now there's nothing "wrong" with that - it is perfectly legal, but the player was just trying to squueze everyone ounce of powery goodness out of his character.
Pielorinho
Iron Fist of Pelor
I tend to thinko f it as manipulating the numbers as a primary focus of the character.
Imagine two people playing a monk.
Person one develops a monastic tradition and chooses apprpriate feats. to the tradition. They figure out their stats in order to make themselves good at the two or three thematically-tied focuses of their school.
Person two decides they want to be really good at stunning blows. They search through four different sourcebooks to find four different feats that either increase the DCs of stunning blows, or give extra funky powers to their stunning blows. They find two items in two different sourcebooks that combined increase the stunning blow DC. In the end, their character can't do much of interest besides the stunning blow, but their stunning blows have a DC in the high twenties or low thirties and paralyze opponents for several rounds, making each attack they perform successfully an almost unstoppable deathblow.
The latter player is doing unacceptable minmaxing, from my perspective; the first one isn't.
Daniel
Imagine two people playing a monk.
Person one develops a monastic tradition and chooses apprpriate feats. to the tradition. They figure out their stats in order to make themselves good at the two or three thematically-tied focuses of their school.
Person two decides they want to be really good at stunning blows. They search through four different sourcebooks to find four different feats that either increase the DCs of stunning blows, or give extra funky powers to their stunning blows. They find two items in two different sourcebooks that combined increase the stunning blow DC. In the end, their character can't do much of interest besides the stunning blow, but their stunning blows have a DC in the high twenties or low thirties and paralyze opponents for several rounds, making each attack they perform successfully an almost unstoppable deathblow.
The latter player is doing unacceptable minmaxing, from my perspective; the first one isn't.
Daniel
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