D&D 5E PC Exceptionalism

[uzirath]

Have more interactions and/or combats against lower CR creatures.

This. In a recent session of my GURPS Dungeon Fantasy campaign (similar enough to D&D for the purposes of this discussion), the PCs came back to town after a successful adventure against vicious winter fae, dinosaurs, a wraith, and other nastiness. The party was powerful. In town, they got sucked into a scenario involving some teenage children of NPCs that the party was close to. There were interactions with lots of different kids, an investigation of clues, and a final showdown with a gang of teen bullies. The PCs were extremely overpowered when compared with their foes, yet the conflict required some delicacy to resolve—they couldn't just massacre the mean kids. The players loved it. One of the reasons they gave was that they got to "show off" their abilities more than usual.

 

[Umbran]

Have more interactions and/or combats against lower CR creatures.

Yeah - violate the precept of the OP - do not make it so the PCs only generally have contact with the powerful. Let hem have contact with people who don't have power more.

 

[ph0rk]

The existence of Captain Marvel doesn't make Daredevil unexceptional.

You don't need to be the most powerful thing in your universe in order to be special or to have amazing stories.

You do if you are sitting at the same table with Captain Marvel every week.

 

[Democratus]

You do if you are sitting at the same table with Captain Marvel every week.

No, you really don't.

Not unless you have such a burning inferiority complex that you can't imagine an amazing story with anyone else at the table having a character more powerful than yours. And that's just sad.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

@Democratus

You could have made your point without the rather inflammatory phrase, “burning inferiority complex”, it would seem. Going forward, try not to make your commentary so confrontational, please.

 

[ph0rk]

If the power imbalance between characters in the same campaigns
is as great as that between Captain Marvel and Daredevil, it is natural for the player of the Daredevil to get bored as their contributions to many challenges are negligible. Further, it takes a great deal of work on the part of the DM to make special stories for the Daredevil character not seem patronizing.

It would be better if such a power disparity wasn't possible between player characters.

 

[dave2008]

So here's my question to the board. In a world filled with exceptional people -- where you're mostly interacting with other powerful beings -- what can a GM or other players do to help one another remember that their characters actually are special? How do you maintain that basic power fantasy when it seems the whole world is already in your league?

Well, the simple solution for me is that the world is more mundane and the PC are exceptional. In our current setting / campaign the PCs are 15th level and they are unique. The highest lvl NPC caster outside the PC Wizard is a 12th lvl Cleric. Most NPCs don't get beyond 5th level, and a only a handful make it to 10th (I literally mean 5-6 NPCs in the whole known world).

Now, if you want a similar effect in world with more prevalent high level NPCs, just have the PCs go against lower level monsters and NPCs primarily. It also makes a difference that the PCs are usually in a group and high level NPCs are solo.

 

[DemoMonkey]

When I read the interaction in the link, I read it as the other player as their character saying “Yeah yeah,” interrupts my fellow tiefling. “I can cast thaumaturgy too. Big whoop.”

Which to me is a 100% appropriate in-game interaction between PCs. "Don't try to intimidate ME buddy, I share a Tiny Hut with you and I know your tricks!"

It is rare - and not particularly important - for a PC to be exceptional to the other PCs. If you want to make them (and their player) feel special, they need to interact with the mundanes more.

Let them absolutely roll a street gang who has the temerity to cross them. Throw circumstance appropriate challenge 1/2 encounters at them when they are Level 6. Don't have the world around them always keep pace with them, so that they never seem awesome.

 

[Krachek]

It’s a question of play style.
If you want to have special PC, you build a world where only the PC has access to PHB classes, feats, subclasses.
At best another monk in your world is the Martial artist showed in the Volo’s guide.

 

[Stalker0]

You do if you are sitting at the same table with Captain Marvel every week.

Or lets take it a step further, Superman.

Now a character can always have their side plots and personal goals, there is always a way to make things interesting. But if we are talking about the main plot....power imbalance can absolutely skew the spotlight towards a single character if unchecked. I used to love the Justice League cartoons, and there are lot of fun fights where the whole league is beating up the bad guys. But....realistically if only superman was present....the result would be exactly the same. It would take maybe a few more seconds to finish the job. The rest of the league could literally just grab a chair and hang out, and the result would be 100% the exact same.

Only in those rare cases where someone throws out the red sun or kryptonite is another leaguer really necessary, or if the plot is such that multiple leaguers are needed at the same time (and normally this requires you to nerf super speed to make it plausible).

This actually happened in a 3.5 game I played it. My friend played a dread necromancer, and "won the game". His army of undead was superior to everything the rest of us had, and he could heal them at-will. Every enemy we killed just added to his collection, the strongest the monster we faced, the better the undead he got. Eventually one player just flat out said in game "I think my character would just quit at this moment, I honestly don't think I matter to the campaign". And in that game....he was right.

Now I don't think most games get to the level, and I think 5e's balance is such that's its very difficult to get to that level of imbalance, but yeah if that imbalance occurs....it does suck to be the guy next to superman narratively speaking.