PC spinning out of control

[Bauglir]

Hey guys, some great advice here. It's appreciated.

Sorry I haven't been posting for the last few days - I've been ill (still am somewhat).

Hey Kweezil. You hit on an important point for me there. It's important to me to come up with a solution that isn't too adversarial. The player in question isn't deliberately trying to sabotage the game, and as others here have pointed out his tactics aren't terribly exploitative. I don't feel it's the right solution to 'punish' him for simply playing his class effectively..

More thoughts when thinking hurts less..

 

[Man in the Funny Hat]

The first problem was that he nigh untouchable, mostly due to improved invisibility and fly effects which he would maintain near constantly.

Communication. First, congratulate the player on his tactical skill. Second, tell him that it's a problem for you and WHY it's a problem for you. This is not just YOUR problem - it is a problem for the other players as well - because...

Encounters were nigh impossible to balance. Nothing could challenge this guy without first grinding up the rest of the party (and even if that were to happen he would just fly off invisibly).

And that should really enable you to have the other players bring pressure to bear that will be far more effective than you trying to fight this one PC with everyone else just being collateral damage.

The end result was a lot of dead PCs. Whose gear inflated party wealth hugely as new characters were made. And most of that wealth ended up in one place. At one point I think he had over 150,000GP worth of equipment..

If PC's are building up wealth just by looting dead PC's then obviously you need to shut off all other sources of additional wealth - money and magic from encounters needs to dry up entirely until the PC's wealth and equipment values are back in line. When one PC winds up with 2 1/2 times the amount of money and equipment he should have then it seems apparant to me that your problem is not just one PC. Other circumstances are fueling the distortion you're seeing with this one character. Whatever you decide you need to talk with your players to decide how you're going to handle it.

One thing occurs to me - your job as DM is NOT to try to "defeat" this one PC; it isn't to make the entire game all about challenging this one character. If he has tactics that are working well - even exceptionally well - then it isn't your duty to PREVENT it from ever succeeding again. LET him use his tactics successfully. It's by over-focusing your attention on him that you're actually tearing your game apart. The conventional wisdom says that anything he summons into the fight was already taken into consideration as just part of what a character of his level can do. If he gets out of EVERY encounter completely unscathed SO BE IT. There is a wonderful phrase that I have tried to take to heart and you should too - IT IS NOT A CRIME FOR A PC TO BE GOOD AT SOMETHING.

Your response to the character really should have been to simply let him do what he was doing and kept running the game normally. Your response now should be to explain the situation from your point of view to all your players and probably to come up with a different way for them to handle the disposition of dead PC equipment. They'll probably cooperate after you explain to them that the alternative is for you to decide FOR them how you're going to offset the imbalanced levels of money/equipment they're getting from their dead comrades. But then if you stop killing all the other PC's in an unnecessary attempt to bring down just ONE of them the problem should pretty much solve itself.

 

[SBMC]

I had a problem in a recent game with a sorcerer. (levels 9-11ish)

The first problem was that he nigh untouchable, mostly due to improved invisibility and fly effects which he would maintain near constantly. (This was much easier in 3e where the durations were longer, and even a duration of 1m/level on improved invis could last through multiple encounters in a dungeon).

His tactic was usually to set up some distance from the combat, often around a corner and summon creatures to fight.

.. Which led to the second (and the biggest) problem. Encounters were nigh impossible to balance. Nothing could challenge this guy without first grinding up the rest of the party (and even if that were to happen he would just fly off invisibly). The end result was a lot of dead PCs. Whose gear inflated party wealth hugely as new characters were made. And most of that wealth ended up in one place. At one point I think he had over 150,000GP worth of equipment..

A common piece of advice I've seen on this board to balance spellcasters is to ensure more encounters per day. However short of blatant railroading, I cannot control when the PCs choose to rest, especially once they gain access to teleport.

Does anyone have any advice as to how a character like this can be controlled, to keep the game fun for everyone?

I think many of us have had this problem in the past – with a PC that used tactics or had equipment that unbalanced the game; but unbalanced it not only against opponents but the other PC’s as well.

His tactic was usually to set up some distance from the combat, often around a corner and summon creatures to fight.

.. Which led to the second (and the biggest) problem. Encounters were nigh impossible to balance. Nothing could challenge this guy without first grinding up the rest of the party (and even if that were to happen he would just fly off invisibly). The end result was a lot of dead PCs.

However in this case don’t the other PC’s get a bit ticked about this guy hanging back? I mean he can’t be casting rays, area effects, buff spells or anything else whilst hiding around a corner? Sorcerers do have some melee ability. For a caster to attack at long range is fine (given the d4’s involved) but around a corner? Sure he summons the monsters but then is he considered having done his part by the others?

To me, this portion is a player issue at the moment. They need to police their own in-character and out-of-character. If they come to you or you see it is not being resolved then step in. If they don’t mind a member hanging back and thus holding back in an encounter; then it is so; the sorcerer will never die and they all will time after time.

For example; we ran into this problem with a rouge; he was fine for a while; doing his part but after almost dying once – he would scout but that was it; when it hit the fan he would hang back; even as other PC’s were getting smacked around and dying – not joining in the fray. First we all (all the other players) told him how unfair this is and that he needs to get out there and do it with the rest of us; taking the risk just like everyone else. That failed so in character – my PC warned him (with the OK of the other players and backing of their PC’s) – out of character the rest of us would only give him a ¼ share of the treasure; and refused to allow him to claim any items.

Well he died by my sword (with the in and out of character blessing of the other players and PC’s) after yet another encounter where another PC died. We used the rouge’s gear to pay for the raising.

Another tactic might be to use more monsters rather than a few more powerful ones. Such as Kobalds; coming from EVERYWHERE; like a swarm of insects (close up even a Kobald can take out an arcane caster in melee). Plus make the environment unfriendly to flying; like say a 7 foot ceiling. Make that Sorcerer get into it – as they come around the corner he is in by the dozens! Give them reach weapons to – so that Sorcerer is getting double attacked (24 times I think it would be) while surrounded! He can’t fly away; he can’t move away; he can’t cast without provoking 24 AoO’s! Give them all the Mage Slayer feat from CA!

The Fighters and martial types just hack away gleefully (Cleave and Great Cleave are wondrous in these situations) nearly free of risk except for that roll of 20 (little or no experience at these levels but fun just to swim through one’s enemies hacking away with impunity is fun!). Those Kobalds might have a sorcerer of their own; with a device that casts invisibility purge 3 times a day or something.

Another thought - Use golems – many golems. Golems that come from all over the place.

Ya see the key might be to not have a corner for him to hide behind – or perhaps having one of those very nasty traps so well hidden it is almost impossible to detect - that sort of gets sprung magically if an arcane caster comes in the room. Or have badguys following them and close doors and lock them behind the party.

Whose gear inflated party wealth hugely as new characters were made. And most of that wealth ended up in one place. At one point I think he had over 150,000GP worth of equipment.

There are ways to avoid this; in dungeons there may be swarms of creatures that watch the battle waiting for a chance to grab up the spoils of another’s battle – fast ones as well; that might run in and snag that ring, wand, sword or whatever and run away so quickly the PC can’t do a thing. Make it 12 of them… I don’t know what monster to use for this: but I am sure there is one somewhere.

Someone above mentioned relatives; would not someone’s relative come looking for their inheritance? Family heirloom? Perhaps that relative is a higher level caster as well or a noble with a contingent

A common piece of advice I've seen on this board to balance spellcasters is to ensure more encounters per day. However short of blatant railroading, I cannot control when the PCs choose to rest, especially once they gain access to teleport.

But how many times per day can one teleport? How many people? If they keep teleporting out of the dungeon to rest then ensure that the monsters that are smart – act smart. Powerful enemies are entering their lairs; and have left now but may come back soon perhaps it is time to move on – leave tonight (with their treasure) whilst they won’t be seen doing so – so the next day when the PC’s return; they find nothing. Or ally with others and set lots of traps and set up stronger defenses.

Encounters - Perhaps not more encounters – but encounters that effect casting directly such as Golems above. Other Arcane Casters; powerful divine casters, dragons (any creatures with blind sense or blind sight). mind flayers, oozes, etc. If a lich were someplace his priority would be a caster.
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Just like in real life – everything has a consequence; good or bad. You make a bad choice then sooner or later ya pay for it. Did this PC anger anyone; anyone at all? Perhaps some low level guy who was 1st level 10 years ago but now has risen to greatness and is seeking revenge! Trust me; I have had to deal with this! (as a PC)

 

[Lord Wyrm]

You could always throw a Beholder in the mix.
"Oh you like to fly around invisibly do you, sorry I've got my eye on you." (Heh heh, I thought it was funny )
Then when he goes down the beholder just happened to disintegrate his ill gotten gains. If he gets ressurrected he's more in line wealth-wise and now realizes he better have a backup plan.

 

[Li Shenron]

First, what do you mean "how can this guy be controlled"?. I suppose you want to challenge him more, but not necessarily kill him. I don't get why the others are not having fun, is it because they're envy of him never getting killed? That doesn't sound very well, all he's doing is properly using his abilities to survive. If he's saving himself by not contributing enough to the fights, then you shouldn't give him full Xp, but if he contributes as much as everyone else, except that he doesn't get killed, he's just playing well. Maybe it's the other players who aren't playing well enough.

To me it seems that one problem eventually might be that his tactics are repetitive hence boring, in which case ask yourself if your encounters are repetitive as well, if you could use some variations to challenge him more.
Fly isn't always a good options for example if you're fighting underground or indoor, or if there are flying monsters or NPCs, or just when there are ranged attackers. I doubt that all your fights are in wide spaces and against melee monsters, but check it out if this could be one reason.
Invisbility is much harder to counter, but what can I say... if he's casting Imp Inv all the time it means that it's the good tactic to do. Given that the majority of people claim Sorcerers underpowered, it cannot be gamebreaking.
BTW, why not suggesting that he casts the same spells on someone else as well? The party will be more protected, and his spells would run out more quickly.

The other issue is that this player is probably over-defensive. Again I don't know what to say, no one wants to die, so why should he? There are however many opportunities to locate an encounter in a way that the Sorcerer can't simply stay far or escape: ambushes, enclosed spaces, more opponents coming from different directions...

The end result was a lot of dead PCs. Whose gear inflated party wealth hugely as new characters were made. And most of that wealth ended up in one place. At one point I think he had over 150,000GP worth of equipment..

If the PCs recycle dead comrades' gear, why do you keep giving new PC their own gear? From now on, try ruling that new PCs come without gear and have to use the previous dead ones' equipment. The wealth-by-level guideline is really good: if the PCs are beyond the wealth they should be, give no more valuable treasure until their level is raised to be appropriate with the current wealth.

A common piece of advice I've seen on this board to balance spellcasters is to ensure more encounters per day. However short of blatant railroading, I cannot control when the PCs choose to rest, especially once they gain access to teleport.

How is more encounters a blatant railroading? Is it really so difficult to concentrate battles in a shorter time? What about using several low-level encounters (not immediately recognizable as such)? This typically leads casters to waste a few spells, without wasting the warriors' resources (i.e. hit points).

A sorcerer cannot regain spells more than once per day, if they are "fast-forwarding" to the next morning only to let him regain spells, then something must be thought to make time more relevant, so that if they do something for 2 hours and then only wait for resting, the rest of day is wasted. I know it's not easy to come up with time constratints, but it's not impossible.

 

[cmanos]

Scry and whatnot? Hell, we usually sell stuff before we go rest at the inn. Sure, the person's family can scry to find out where the item(s) are, but unless they do so RIGHT AS the PC is killed, all they'll detect is a merchant/black market dealer.

So you have a member of the dead character's family investigate. They go to the merchant and "persuade" him to reveal who sold their family heirloom to them. Them the family member goes bloodhound/justicar on the group.

 

[jasper]

I have house rule where new pcs do NOT follow the wealth guide lines if the party has excess loot. I did way back in 1e when some players would kill and loot the new pcs just because they were tick at the player.

 

[Mystery Man]

If he really becomes a problem, just Disjoin him and his toys.

Or if it's possible create a true seeing, flying, disjunction living spell...or two.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

The problem is that you're running RttToEE, which means "dungeon crawl". A lot of fighting will go on in dungeons.

Frankly, I hate the unenforcable "four encounters per day" stuff. I've never seen a group allow that.

I had a problem in a recent game with a sorcerer. (levels 9-11ish)

The first problem was that he nigh untouchable, mostly due to improved invisibility and fly effects which he would maintain near constantly. (This was much easier in 3e where the durations were longer, and even a duration of 1m/level on improved invis could last through multiple encounters in a dungeon).

I've always felt Greater Invisibility was pretty broken. My mage character doesn't use it.

His tactic was usually to set up some distance from the combat, often around a corner and summon creatures to fight.

I used a similar tactic, although I never cast more than one summon spell, to keep combat from grinding down. My DM is tactically inexperienced when it comes to killing spellcasters, as well. (He's the only DM I know who runs fighter-type NPCs better than mage-types.)

You have to mix up the pre-written encounters to take this into account. Don't bother trying to "scry" or "scout" the party, as it won't work. (I see that advice all the time, as if nobody in the party has Spot.) Instead, use a group with a spellcaster, and have that spellcaster tell his compatriots how to kill other spellcasters. (Ahead of combat, of course.)

Now attack from two directions, like ... around the corner! The mage won't be moving much if he's summoning stuff, and feel free to use a potion of see invisibility. I take it your mage isn't smart enough to use nondetection as well to foil this easy tactic?

Or, failing that, use a couple of wizards with see invisible and baleful polymorph or other nasty save-or-suffer spells. (Do not use feeblemind! It's obvious, and almost useless against a wide variety of creatures. Do use enervation if you don't think it's broken. It's bad against fighters but murder against mages.)

If he dies, the problem is solved... but I doubt that's going to happen. (Besides, killing PCs is bad DMing.) But you have to admit it would be convenient.

More seriously, once you've smacked him down, start distributing potions of see invisibility among the bad guys. Those things are really cheap.

Whose gear inflated party wealth hugely as new characters were made. And most of that wealth ended up in one place. At one point I think he had over 150,000GP worth of equipment..

Since no one is being raised from the dead, this sounds like killing him would be very convenient But that's not really allowed.

Does anyone have any advice as to how a character like this can be controlled, to keep the game fun for everyone?

Alter your campaign - set time dependent goals that can't be teleported to, as the players don't know exactly where the goal is.

Don't forget to pre-emptively strike against tactics such as ethereal travel. (Eventually your players will figure this out. Find some interesting and nasty looking ethereal monsters - make up a template if you have to - and station them at vulnerable points in the Ethereal Plane. Smart BBEGs will have thought of that ahead of time, so it's not cheating.) Think of other such tactics and strike at them, too.

I wanted to address this point. How do I stop a PC taking other PCs' gear? That's entirely in the control of the surviving PCs. And it's pretty hard to make a case for NOT gathering equipment to help you survive in a dungeon full of dangerous monsters.

The DnD designers assumed death was infrequent. Say the gear stops functioning - now you've got some magical armor and some pretty looking rings. Well, that's what I'd do, but I'm sick of the overuse of magic items to begin with...

How did he carry it all? Or where did he keep it? It sounds very tempting for thieves.

Unless the thieves are clairvoyant, they can't know the value of his stuff.

However in this case don’t the other PC’s get a bit ticked about this guy hanging back? I mean he can’t be casting rays, area effects, buff spells or anything else whilst hiding around a corner?

I'm a cowardly, selfish mage in my Eberron games, and this tactic doesn't seem to harm the party. (The elven warrior even congratulated me on my tactics out of game. Well, obviously he isn't an elf in real life.)

The mage in questino summons while hanging around a corner. I tend to use save-or-suffer spells like glitterdust and only use direct damage if there's space to do so - which is rare. The rogue grins so much anytime I blind someone that he, at least, isn't going to complain about my tactics. So no, I'm not seeing why other PCs would get ticked.

PS I don't buff other PCs.

Sorcerers do have some melee ability.

This is a joke, right?

Sure he summons the monsters but then is he considered having done his part by the others?

If he's summoning something virtually every round, the answer would be yes. Frankly, summons take up a lot of time (they give the sorcerer many actions). I think the other PCs would be upset if he summons more monsters, as that takes away from their time. Besides, once you gain some levels, the summons start to get powerful, and make a big contribution to the battle. And finally, you can't expect the sorcerer to want to run out of spells until an obvious BBEG battle crops us. The other PCs have to know that, at some point, the sorcerer will need to have some saved up spells to save their lives.

Another thought - Use golems – many golems. Golems that come from all over the place.

I don't know this sorcerer, but I do know golems do not scare my wizard. I prepare spells that don't allow SR as a matter of course, giving me the ability to handle creatures with SR and golems ... and O's resilient sphere is useful all the time, anyway.

Besides, isn't that a cure that's worse than the disease? It'll be obvious to the sorc player what's going on, and it screws any rogue and cleric PCs as well.

Ya see the key might be to not have a corner for him to hide behind – or perhaps having one of those very nasty traps so well hidden it is almost impossible to detect - that sort of gets sprung magically if an arcane caster comes in the room.

This is much better advice. The trap that activates if an arcane caster walks into the room is kind of cheesy - change it to activate when an arcane spell is cast in the room. That's a bit more fair and cleaves closer to the rules. But don't overuse that.

The corner trick is harder to do, as the DM doesn't get to make his own terrain in this campaign, but locking doors sounds like it will work.

The other issue is that this player is probably over-defensive. Again I don't know what to say, no one wants to die, so why should he? There are however many opportunities to locate an encounter in a way that the Sorcerer can't simply stay far or escape: ambushes, enclosed spaces, more opponents coming from different directions...

Same here. I can empathise with this player because I'm the same way. I also know how to screw myself in these situations, however. I've even told some of these secrets to my DM and I did get chopped up by a warforged barbarian once. (I still too hardly any damage.)

How is more encounters a blatant railroading? Is it really so difficult to concentrate battles in a shorter time?

Yes, over a short time or even over the whole day. Or perhaps I should say (as a former DM) that it's hard to come up with four interesting and compelling encounters in a day.

One of the reasons I switched to running D20 Modern is that I don't have to do four encounters per day. Yay!

What about using several low-level encounters (not immediately recognizable as such)? This typically leads casters to waste a few spells, without wasting the warriors' resources (i.e. hit points).

Use kobolds. Give them a few rogues and sorcerers. I think that might work for Bauglir. It didn't really work for me, however.

 

[drothgery]

If the PCs are 11th level, what's up with dead PCs not being raised and taking their stuff back? What kind of cheap 11th-level character in a standard D&D world doesn't pay for a raise dead?