Player powergaming: mea culpa

[jmucchiello]

I just wanted to confess ...

But why are you feeling guilty in the first place? Other people rolling their eyes should have no effect on you playing the game as written. Hold your head up high and say you are gaming. Not powergaming, not munchkining. Just gaming.

Frankly Pal2/SorX is a bit weak in my view. The benefit to saving throws and hit points is at the cost of a whole spell level. Now instead of getting the best spell levels 1 level behind the wizard and cleric, you get them 3 levels behind. Practiced Spellcaster does not make up for that loss.

 

[Trainz]

You utter powergamer! How could you!

My Paladin2/Sorcerer8 has only a +4 Cloak of Charisma, because before CA there were no non-cloak magic items of resistance. I had to make do with what I found, and what my DM allowed my to buy/order/create.

I did briefly take one level of Spellsword though, but as my character was kicked out of Heironeous' knighhood after his Sorcerous power manifested, at least *I* had a good RP-reason for taking it.

Sigh, since the Red Dragon killed him, he's back to just a Pal2/Sor8 again.

Did you create him as a Pal2/Sor8, or go through the low levels as well?

Well, the feat Draconic Heritage must be taken at 1st level by a Sorceror, so I did Sorc 1, Pal 1, Pal 2, Sorc 2 to 8. I created him as a Pal2/Sor8 though, because it's a replacement for my previous 11th level Sorc that died recently. I decided that my new character won't get shafted with low saves.

As for the cloak... it is possible to merge items, but it is costly. I just put all I had into a +6 Cha/+5 res cloak. I didn't care at all for AC, wanting to be out of melee when possible, and rationalising that even if I did get into melee, there was little I could do to avoid being hit anyways.

So insted of being hit 75% of the time, I get hit 95% of the time, but make my saves about 90% of the time.

 

[Impeesa]

Pfft. I dipped into Paladin (of Freedom, from UA) to boost saves.... with my Frenzied Berserker build. He had a boosted charisma to take advantage of Leadership, and to get DR 3/- out of a one-level dip into Anointed Knight. That third level of Paladin also netted me immunity to compulsion effects - never have your raging monster sleeped or dominated again. On a side note, stacking Rage, Fury, and Frenzy is fun.

That is cheese.

--Impeesa--

 

[Trainz]

But why are you feeling guilty in the first place? Other people rolling their eyes should have no effect on you playing the game as written. Hold your head up high and say you are gaming. Not powergaming, not munchkining. Just gaming.

Thanks bro.

Frankly Pal2/SorX is a bit weak in my view. The benefit to saving throws and hit points is at the cost of a whole spell level. Now instead of getting the best spell levels 1 level behind the wizard and cleric, you get them 3 levels behind. Practiced Spellcaster does not make up for that loss.

That was a tough call indeed. But in the end, I just NEEDED to insure my bases in the campaign I'm currently playing. The challenges (and ST DC's) will just go on getting tougher (and more lethal), and too often I was out of combat after only the 1st or 2nd round. The other players have got to be able to rely on that arcane support.

 

[spectre72]

What about a high level Janni Monk who has sworn a Vow of Poverty??

I am not one to raise the "BROKEN" flag, but VOP is the one thing that I think is pure CHEESE....

I can fly, plane shift, kick your butt, I have a better AC than the fighter in my underwear, and did I mention I can fly....

I made the character for a specific game, but immediately descided to ban VOP from my regular game.

Scott

 

[Stormborn]

See I was expecting you to say you took Spellsword, but not exactly the right build for it. I don't think you are powergamin either. Anytime you have a in-game/story reason for something I think its roleplaying not powergaming.

(Now if you want to powergame consider the Leadership feat. You should be able to get a great cohort. A nice Griffen mount perhaps. And isn't there a feat in Eberron or something that let's you go back to the Paladin class?)

 

[Saeviomagy]

Well I'm glad. I can now play this character while standing straight.

Still, there's GOT to be some peeps here that want to confess. Go ahead, we won't judge you. You will feel sooooo much better after.

Well, I think when I was a kid, I wanted to munchkin out my character, but I didn't know how.

Now that I know how, I usually don't want to. Although if I could find a DM and other players who were at a similar level to me, I might.

I do regularly create things in RPG systems that are more than a little insane, but I never play them. Some of you may know of the hulking hurler for instance.

Generally, even if you DO create something insane, it's more fun to regulate it's power to match the campaign than to go all-out. I'd really like to play a hulking hurler for instance, but I'd play it just to throw whatever happened to be lying around, rather than going for the thousands-of-d6 ball-of-iron that the build uses. The idea of an adventurer that picks up the furniture (or small buildings, or wagons, or whatever) and flings it at his opponents sounds fun.

 

[Halivar]

I am not one to raise the "BROKEN" flag, but VOP is the one thing that I think is pure CHEESE....

No. VoP is cheese if you take an LA +1 or greater and use ECL instead of HD + class levels to determine VoP abilities. Yeah, that's powergaming.

Nothing like building a level 2 monk weretiger with VoP. Strength of 36 is hard to beat.

 

[Fieari]

I don't know. I had a VoP monk in the campaign previous to the one I'm running now, and I promiced myself never to allow it ever again. He fufilled the key rule for determining whether something is overpowered: He overshadowed the rest of the party, lorded it over them, and they definitely felt in his shadow. Furthermore, it meant more work for me as the DM. Instead of assuming the players are equal to each other, seeing what they can do and giving them challenges and rewards based on thier personal characters, I have to look up charts to see how much equipment they should be getting awarded and when in order to keep up with a class that grows based on these charts.

It was just too much. The stat and AC boosts alone were harsh, but the exalted feats REALLY pushed things over the edge.

It didn't help that the player was a jerk either. I'm glad he in particular is not in my new group.