Humanophile
First Post
The problem with munchkins/powerplayers/rollplayers (and there is a subtle difference among them) is that it's hard to tell how bad a player you're getting just from a look at the character sheet, and we've all seen the real goons (the ones I reserve the term "munchkin" for) destroy fun for anyone who isn't playing to counteract them.
Players can want power for many reasons. They can want to be Lestat instead of Luis, King Arthur instead of Art the cobbler. And you'd be surprised how many of the "pure roleplayers" want to be as combat capable as the munchkins, they just want the extra points for noncombat skills so they can say "see, I spend points on noncombat abilities! I'm not a munchkin!" And if the whole group wants to be epic heroes, more power to them. It's just that most of them want to be somewhat capable when they enter play, so they minmax in preparation for when they are high level and they want to take down dragons maybe one or two CR above them, singlehandedly. If everyone's OK with that, even the dramatists in the group, that's fine. And there's nothing stopping you from roleplaying a highly compotent character well.
Than there are the players who want to play the best at a single field, which is usually something combat based. Again, this is not necessarily a bad thing, so long as the player keeps in mind that nobody is that focused. Survivalists and trained-from-birth ninjas can be all well and fine and playable, but be sure to add in some survival or stealth skills instead of just shootin' or katana.
And finally, there's the loonies/goons/true munchkins. They're the ones who want Killing Things or Controlling Things at as high a rating as they can have, and they use their ability to threaten/kill/control to get whatever they want. They're not content just to be powerful, they have to be more powerful than anyone else, otherwise they don't have leverage to control them. These are the players who cheat, threaten/attack/kill other characters who disagree with them or refuse to buckle under, and often harass/abuse other PC's just for the thrill of it. These are the players who should be treated with all due contempt.
Now the problems are twofold. First, any halfway compotent munchkin will sprinkle a few points in background skills to avoid suspicion, and in case they're needed. So just from seeing the character sheet, how will you know if the super martial artist or concept wizard is in the hands of someone who can play them as a focused, compotent member of the team, or if the character will delight only in bossing everyone else around and sucking fun out of the group. But since worthwhile players are more likely to have stable home games and reasonable social skills, the average person who seeks games, who will want to whip out and obsess about their character, or sometimes even who makes the powerplaying point clear, is most likely to be a bad player. Ergo, most people will have every right to be leery of a minmaxed/more powerful than normal character. (Granted, anyone with something like an artifact at first level is a clear red flag, but there is wiggle room. How obscene is an 18 to your sensibilities?) Some DM's/groups veer a little too close to the side of caution.
And second, since pretty much every player starts out with powerplayed adventurers, there is something to be said about the phase after that, where you want to be something different than a basic stereotype, be it a player stereotype or a character stereotype. Granted, most of those become once-removed stereotypes, but I do think it is a vital part of growth in roleplaying ability to move beyond Conan and Merlin go out, kill some orcs, and kick some ass. (Which, fun as it may be, gets horribly dull when overdone.)
Players can want power for many reasons. They can want to be Lestat instead of Luis, King Arthur instead of Art the cobbler. And you'd be surprised how many of the "pure roleplayers" want to be as combat capable as the munchkins, they just want the extra points for noncombat skills so they can say "see, I spend points on noncombat abilities! I'm not a munchkin!" And if the whole group wants to be epic heroes, more power to them. It's just that most of them want to be somewhat capable when they enter play, so they minmax in preparation for when they are high level and they want to take down dragons maybe one or two CR above them, singlehandedly. If everyone's OK with that, even the dramatists in the group, that's fine. And there's nothing stopping you from roleplaying a highly compotent character well.
Than there are the players who want to play the best at a single field, which is usually something combat based. Again, this is not necessarily a bad thing, so long as the player keeps in mind that nobody is that focused. Survivalists and trained-from-birth ninjas can be all well and fine and playable, but be sure to add in some survival or stealth skills instead of just shootin' or katana.
And finally, there's the loonies/goons/true munchkins. They're the ones who want Killing Things or Controlling Things at as high a rating as they can have, and they use their ability to threaten/kill/control to get whatever they want. They're not content just to be powerful, they have to be more powerful than anyone else, otherwise they don't have leverage to control them. These are the players who cheat, threaten/attack/kill other characters who disagree with them or refuse to buckle under, and often harass/abuse other PC's just for the thrill of it. These are the players who should be treated with all due contempt.
Now the problems are twofold. First, any halfway compotent munchkin will sprinkle a few points in background skills to avoid suspicion, and in case they're needed. So just from seeing the character sheet, how will you know if the super martial artist or concept wizard is in the hands of someone who can play them as a focused, compotent member of the team, or if the character will delight only in bossing everyone else around and sucking fun out of the group. But since worthwhile players are more likely to have stable home games and reasonable social skills, the average person who seeks games, who will want to whip out and obsess about their character, or sometimes even who makes the powerplaying point clear, is most likely to be a bad player. Ergo, most people will have every right to be leery of a minmaxed/more powerful than normal character. (Granted, anyone with something like an artifact at first level is a clear red flag, but there is wiggle room. How obscene is an 18 to your sensibilities?) Some DM's/groups veer a little too close to the side of caution.
And second, since pretty much every player starts out with powerplayed adventurers, there is something to be said about the phase after that, where you want to be something different than a basic stereotype, be it a player stereotype or a character stereotype. Granted, most of those become once-removed stereotypes, but I do think it is a vital part of growth in roleplaying ability to move beyond Conan and Merlin go out, kill some orcs, and kick some ass. (Which, fun as it may be, gets horribly dull when overdone.)
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