Not Everyone is Interested in Powergaming [merged]

[hong]

I don't know of anyone who argued that it was minimally competent, though it's possible I missed a post somewhere in reading this thread. If you're referring to my statement, it's that in the context of character optimization, DMM is middle-of-the-road. Not super-powerful. Not unbelievably broken. Not "the sky is falling."

Of course, the context of the WotC CharOp board may or may not be relevant to how the game is actually played by the vast majority of people in the real world.

DMs who must ban things should ban optimized hulking hurlers who pulverize planets, iaijutsu masters that deal a gift shop full of d6s, and mounted charge builds that deal thousands of damage while retaining 100+AC. Not DMM.

Or they could ban all of them.

 

[3catcircus]

Ah yes, the Wallow in the Lovely Filth campaign setting. Also known as a "Pinkeye" game, where your character can die from a scratch from a rusty nail.

I have a friend - a good friend, actually - who loves to run this sort of game. He truly believes, without a trace of irony, that everyone in his campaign world should be afraid of a group of peasants with pitchforks.

With good reason. A determined, organized *mob* of people with pitchforks was the death of many a charlatan or tyrannical burgomeister back in the day. Just because they are pitchforks doesn't mean they can kill any less than a sword or gun. Heck, look at the recent case in Iraq where a group of villagers stoned a 17-yr old girl to death, or all of the lynchings of black people in the US South that occurred in the last century.

Sounds like, rather than a "Wallow in the Lovely Filth" situation, it is more like a "Fairly close to what happened in the real world on occasion" situation.

 

[eyebeams]

The issue is about what game traits signify to the character. We all know what hit points represent in the narrative, because it says so quite clearly in the books. But metamagic? Certain feats? Optimized or not, some players prefer that they remain purely game artifacts, and some want them to represent some kind of training or story-significant talent. And when a build focuses on one and not the other, there's going to be a difference in values.

When 3.0 came out, one of the major paradigm shifts for players I know was with the fighter class. The old fighter had abilities so basic that they could signify a tough peasant with a rusty sword out to do some good: your basic starting hero. But to many of my friends, the 3.0 fighter really looks like more of a formally trained martial arts expert because of the number and type of feats available. Adding to the confusion was the fact that the books included the warrior, who really fits the "stout peasant" better, if you associate him/her with having very basic game traits.

(Sometimes I wonder if there shouldn't be a "superbasic" warrior class for new players, with d12 HD and starting bonuses to ability scores and saves, but with no bonus feats or other special abilities of any kind. Hm -- maybe there's a product there . . .)

When you get into very complex optimized builds, you have to work backwards to justify the story origin of their game traits. This doesn't even come up in many build discussions. So if people really want to bridge the gap between roleplaying and builds, they should tell the *stories* of these builds. Why does this character have divine metamagic where another one doesn't, for example?

 

[shurai]

Oh, fun, now I get to defend myself out of context.

Yes; I said that in a character optimization thread, and subsequently warned people not to take it out of context. As others have stated, DMM is a universally known trick amongst character optimizers. Thus I stand by my statement that "everyone (who matters for the purposes of the original thread) who isn't a novice (at character optimization) knows and uses it, barring DM forbiddance."

Umbran is right, I'm not after you personally. I'm after an attitude which I think is harmful to the hobby.

That thread shows what I mean. It wasn't really about optimizing a character in the usual powergaming way. It was about kelson, a self-described beginner, in a roleplaying group new to crunch-heavy dungeon-crawling. He did say "maximize healing" and "use any book," it's true.

But maximized healing in this case needed to be balanced against other factors. People who aren't used to crunchy play have more fun with simplicity and clarity rather than complexity and optimization, most of the time. Beginning groups are more likely to be disrupted by powergamed characters, I'd guess.

This is the point: Not everyone wants powergaming, and I would put this group into that category.

Moritheil, lots of people made powergaming suggestions in that thread. I don't think kelson's needs were served by any of them, and said so. I happened to be talking to you at the time, and you suggested a new thread, so here we are.

I think we agree, basically, in that we both want kelson to have fun paying an effective character. The real discussion is how to achieve that: I'm arguing that a plain-jane level 13 cleric is good enough for the context of relative beginners in their first high-crunch dungeon crawl.

 

[blargney the second]

I did a little googlefu and found the origin of the Stormwind Fallacy. It's now on the second page of an archived thread on the WotC boards.
-blarg

 

[Grimstaff]

Stormwind Fallacy: The fallacy that optimizing precludes good roleplaying or that being intentionally deficient signifies good roleplaying.

The problem with the stormwind "fallacy" is that it attempts to prove a point against generalizations with yet another generalization.

The real point is, can a character justify optimization of feat chains and skill synergies through role playing to the point that it does not appear to be obvious power-gaming? And if said selections have to be justified to begin with, isn't that taking away from "pure" role-playing?

For instance, from a powergaming perspective, my 3rd level bard should really take dodge to help out with his woeful AC. But as a "character", why would he have any concept of "AC" and not take Skill Focus: Perform instead, so he will be a better Bard? So maybe, as a player, I justify my power-gaming feat choice with something like "well, my Bard has learned through the last few adventures how better to get out of harm's way, and this is more important to him right now than being a better Bard." But am I role=playing, or justifying power-gaming?

This is the conundrum.

 

[moritheil]

Umbran is right, I'm not after you personally. I'm after an attitude which I think is harmful to the hobby.

I really think that that would have been clearest if you had just started talking about the issue in the abstract rather than opening with my quotes.

That said, your concern is valid. I happen to think that the attitude that people should never optimize their numbers and that doing so is somehow illegitimate is harmful to the hobby. Generally I find that players optimize because they don't want a huge discrepancy between their RP aims and their actual character capabilities, or because they don't want to have to worry about the numbers during actual play. They don't want to play a "gifted healer" who is actually lousy at healing, or a "veteran warrior" who can't take a hit.

The more people avoid optimization, the bigger the discrepancy between character concepts and actual abilities - and the more it matters that they roll well at some critical time, and the more it sucks when they roll poorly. The combination of needing to do well and having to worry about things you have no control over does not strike me as particularly fun.

That thread shows what I mean. It wasn't really about optimizing a character in the usual powergaming way.

Actually, it was a perfectly typical example. He just wanted to have fun, and to do that he wanted to go in with better numbers so he wouldn't hold the group back.

It was about kelson, a self-described beginner, in a roleplaying group new to crunch-heavy dungeon-crawling. He did say "maximize healing" and "use any book," it's true.

But maximized healing in this case needed to be balanced against other factors. People who aren't used to crunchy play have more fun with simplicity and clarity rather than complexity and optimization, most of the time. Beginning groups are more likely to be disrupted by powergamed characters, I'd guess.

And I said that the DMM build was perhaps a bit too complex.

FWIW, I don't agree at all with your idea of "beginning groups" and "disruption" due to powergaming. IME, most of the disruption in DnD groups comes from theatrics, showmanship, and abusive personalities, not people who simply happen to have higher numbers on a sheet than the rest of the group. There are certain characteristics that cause players to grate on other players. Those are the real problem.

Moritheil, lots of people made powergaming suggestions in that thread. I don't think kelson's needs were served by any of them, and said so. I happened to be talking to you at the time, and you suggested a new thread, so here we are.

I also said so. But I note that that got lost in the overall rush to condemn powergaming.

I don't have a problem with the fact that you made a different thread; in fact I am glad. I was annoyed by the fact that rather than discuss the issue, you put my name up first, and we're in General this time, not Rules. It's a different crowd and there are different assumptions.

I think we agree, basically, in that we both want kelson to have fun paying an effective character. The real discussion is how to achieve that: I'm arguing that a plain-jane level 13 cleric is good enough for the context of relative beginners in their first high-crunch dungeon crawl.

I never said it wasn't good enough; my initial purpose was to respond to some people whose knee-jerk response was that DMM was broken by any standard by pointing out that they often have no reasonable frame of reference.

 

[Nonlethal Force]

Okay, I also object to the Stormwind Fallacy. I much prefer punnet (sp?) squares. Ah, good old biology class. It was great until we got to the much more interestign sciences like chemistry and physics. But, I digress.

I present the ...

Nonlethal Force Square of Gameplay​

           Optimizer  Non-Optimizer
        |------------|------------|
        |            |            |
Good RP |      1     |      3     |
        |            |            |
        |------------|------------|
        |            |            |
Bad RP  |      2     |      4     |
        |            |            |
        |------------|------------|

As you can see, this diagram illustrates that it is actually quite possible to have four categories of players:

1. Good RPers who are excellent optimizers as well

2. Bad RPers who are excellent optimizers

3. Good RPers who are horrible optimizers

4. Bad RPers who also can't optimize to save their life.



Of course, I make no claim to the percentages. If I had to guess, the general public would probably fall like this:

1 = 15%
2 = 25%
3 = 50%
4 = 10%

But this is purely a guess, not a scientific analysis. My expectation about ENWorld posters is that they would not reflect the general averages of the people who sit at the gaming table.

 

[blargney the second]

Then you agree with the Stormwind Fallacy. He was merely pointing out that 1 and 4 exist, in addition to the fairly obvious 2 and 3.

 

[Storm Raven]

Of course, I make no claim to the percentages. If I had to guess, the general public would probably fall like this:

1 = 15%
2 = 25%
3 = 50%
4 = 10%

But this is purely a guess, not a scientific analysis. My expectation about ENWorld posters is that they would not reflect the general averages of the people who sit at the gaming table.

In my experience, the percentages work out more like this:

1: 30%
2: 10%
3: 10%
4: 50%