Powerplayers

[Mummolus]

Background
This background is from the scales of war campaign - if you aren't running that he shouldn't have it - if you are running SoW, then all the Eberron material should be excluded.

"Born Under a Bad Sign" and "Auspicious Birth" are both vague enough and mechanically useful enough that a lot of DM's will allow them, SoW or not. Nothing unreasonable about that.

Items
Feytouched armour (Manual of the Planes - allow this?)

Why would MoP be banned any more than Player Handbook: Tiefling or Psionic Power? It's not a campaign setting, the items therein aren't specific to anything.

 

[Reffy]

We played as lv1/2 characters before, but player C wants to be a high level, at least lv14, so he can use a paragon path. If I explain to him that the wise men on Enworld recommed we should do a lv1/2 campaign, he will complain...which is why people suggested to find a different D&D group for him.

Player B is experienced though, playing since 3.0E. He also suggested we should play a lv1/2 campaign, to see development in characters.

And the background; Born under a bad sign; is a special setting background? I just told him that he could use it...Ah the hell with it, he can use it. I've already got some artillery focus fire encounters planned for him. Not too much, but enough to make it hard for him.
It has to be challenging, not overpowering. (Unless it's some sort of special/scripted scene where the party has to lose.)

Oh, people asked me what the other player characters were:

Right now, they have:

*Hybrid controller (wizard/psion. As in the first post.)

*Goliath Warden (from player B. A very good character, lotsa HP. Player C complained that the warden class is overpowered.)

*Half-ling monk (from player A. An average character.)

They recently played without a leader, because they don't want to play as a leader.

EDIT: [MENTION=82425]BobTheNob[/MENTION]: I'm doing the same thing. I'm concerned about player A though, he likes to make 'fun' characters, that match his crazy ideas. Where can I look for good monk builds? I already have the encounters changed, more artillery/lurkers, to make it challenging for everyone.

 

[Fridayknight]

Why would MoP be banned any more than Player Handbook: Tiefling or Psionic Power? It's not a campaign setting, the items therein aren't specific to anything.

Technically it is campaign specific - there are minor adjustments to include it in either FR or EB campaigns (e.g. Chernogarr is replaced by Banehold) and it is understood to be in the style of a points of light game.

On the wider affairs: I agree totally with Bob < this was what I meant in my first post but in non-waffle language. I think that if I created a character at this level it would be much worse, so I can't really speak against powergaming per se - it is taken by some that the stats can be separated from the character to an extent that you may read 1+ to attack and a power called 'twin strike' but all it actually means is that you can add some more modifiers to dice to better 'play' your character and to have a ruled and balanced damage example.

FK


PS good monk builds (as with any other charop the best place to start is outside the front door): http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75882/25065021/No_Paper_Tigers!!!!:_The_Monk_Handbook

 

[sigfile]

We played as lv1/2 characters before, but player C wants to be a high level, at least lv14, so he can use a paragon path. If I explain to him that the wise men on Enworld recommed we should do a lv1/2 campaign, he will complain...which is why people suggested to find a different D&D group for him.

He also didn't like it when you banned half his character. Assuming he continues to play, he's going to continue to find good combos; will you continue to ban half the game elements this player chooses?

Point is, the concern really isn't with this player. He's unhappy no matter what you do. If you start over (and start low), everyone can learn about and level up their characters naturally. Net effect - you're more comfortable with the campaign, players A and B are more comfortable with their characters and whatever player C brings to the table, and player C isn't getting singled out for being the one guy at the table that studied the material and did some basic optimization.

 

[mudlock]

What books did players A and B look in when making their characters?

If they only had PH1-3, while C is picking feats out of HotF* and dozens of other sources (or the character builder) then, yeah, C is going to come out looking a little ahead; some of the newer feats are quite good when compared to the older stuff. If A and B have access to the same stuff, but just don't have the interest to wade through 3,000 feats for the gems, that could explain it too.

Also, what books are YOU using? Paragon is where the weakness of MM1 and MM2 monsters start to become apparent. That could be contributing to your problems. The fix is to get MM3 or MV. (Or are you using published adventures? Those are something of a let-down, challenge wise, as well.)

Finally, your claim that C called the warden "overpowered" is a flashing warning sign; they're not, but they are certainly better at defense than any controller could be. It sounds like what C really means by "overpowered" is "better at something than my character is". Part of the design goal of 4e is to encourage teamwork; that's why roles exist, to wall-off the duties of combat so that every character (and player) gets to shine. C has made a rather high-damage controller with some good "get out of jail" escape ability, but even a crappy warden will do a better job of standing toe-to-toe with the enemy and refusing to yield. If he's not comfortable with that, if he's trying to build a single lone-wolf perfect-at-everything character, and he gets upset when that illusion gets fractured, than your problem isn't mechanical.

 

[Neonchameleon]

We played as lv1/2 characters before, but player C wants to be a high level, at least lv14, so he can use a paragon path. If I explain to him that the wise men on Enworld recommed we should do a lv1/2 campaign, he will complain...which is why people suggested to find a different D&D group for him.

I'm with just about everyone else. Start between level 1 and 3 (2 has the huge advantage of giving everyone a utility power, and 3 gives the second encounter power - which keeps things more interesting). Higher than that and new players will be drowning in options - and it will be even worse for the DM. Work up to the higher levels and the game will run much more smoothly.

Rather than link to Monk builds, the Character Optimisation board handbooks should give you all classes. (Monks get a wire-fu utility power that allows them to fly a little at level 2 if they like). Oh, and wardens aren't overpowered. They are just almost indestructible. It's what they do - and one of the goals of 4th is that every class is the best there is at what they do (there are a couple of cases where this isn't so, but only the Seeker and the original Assassin come to mind).

 

[bargle0]

There are some inconsistencies:

Powers
7 are wizard, 3 Psion and I don't know where 'Thunder Ether' is from.
From a variety of sources including PHB, PHB3, Essentials, Red Box, Dragon & AP.

I assumed he meant Thunder Tether, which is a lv. 13 Psion power.

 

[Squire James]

There's plenty of ideas that look good on paper but in play turn out to be not so good in play. You don't need to go crazy with the lurkers and artillery... just because the wizard/psion can escape from being surrounded doesn't mean he doesn't get bloodied in one round by groups of tough guys surrounding him! The warden can get away with that kind of stuff... the "squishy controller" might not!

 

[Ramius613]

After reading the OP, 'Scrub' sounds a lot like myself. If it weren't for the part about a 4 page background, and continuous interaction with NPCs, I'd tell you to tell him to get on board, or GTFO. However, I think that there might be an underlying issue(s).

First, and I'm speculating here, are your combat encounters really long and drawn out( ie take 1+ hrs, and use a ton of resources?) If they are, it could be that he is bored with combat. I'm basing this on a couple of things. First, you have two players that don't see the need to optimize (and that's a fine attitude to have), however, this leads to longer combats, and thus more rounds of at-will attacks. This is just the nature of the 4e beast. As a result, 'Scrub' is trying to find ways to keep himself interested in combat, while also trying to find ways to make them go by quicker, which leads to "overpowered" builds.

I would suggest gathering info on your players. I'd suggest individually, either through email, or one on one conversation. State that the reason for you, the DM, doing this is to improve the quality and everyone's enjoyment of the game. Find out their feelings about the different aspects of the game (ask for specific examples). What do they like/dislike, where do they think aspects could be improved? What can you do to help improve their enjoyment of the game for them. Also, find out how much time they spend on their character outside the game (I'd bet that scrub spends the most).
Once you have that information from them, you can layout a plan to change things. This could include a number of things. Changing up the mix of encounter difficulty, Have more rp opportunities, etc.

In return for the changes you're going to try to make, ask them for some changes as well. Make suggestions on player behaviors that you would like to see changed. Examples include, asking scrub to reign in SOME of the overpowered aspects of his Character (he already knows that its powerful, but not the best it could be, have him tune it back more), have the group try to improve their tactics, and speed in which they handle their turns(not sure if this is a problem or not), etc.

I hope this helps.

Ramius

PS. Your players sounds a lot like myself my roommate, and my roommate across the hall. When I took over DMing, I changed the focus on our game to have more roleplaying elements, a more informed storyline, and more varied combats. We all enjoyed these changes, and had a more satisfying experience.

 

[Reffy]

I will post the build of the Warden today, after I get back home.
Basically he has a lot of HP, more than the controller. Which is why C stated: "Warden has more HP/defences than my controller. Warden is overpowered."

And which is why we stated: "Don't compare controllers with defenders."
But he doesn't listen very well.

About my adventures; I write my own. I started with pre-made adventures on the wizard site, but now I do it by myself.

I use Adventure Tools on wizard site to select the monsters. DMG 4e and PHB 4e edition. I haven't seen any other books than those. Which one should I buy as well?

About asking what the players like in a game; I've asked that and they think I'm good as a DM...the only issue might be that player A doesn't spend a lot of time optimizing his character, B doesn't like how C plays and C doesn't like the 'lesser' characters of player A.

Starting a low lv campaign would be the best. Player A recently wanted to play as a monk. It's very hard for him to find out what's good for a monk, since he never played as one. Right now his monk is decent, but C is complaining that the monk is weak or that monks are weak. Hopefully, the guides that you gave me, will help him optimize his character.

A question: "The wizard/psion is using dreamform, a conjuration. What can and can't he do with that form?"

According to the discription of the power, he can see and feel through his dreamform, as if he was there. So can he pickup items with that form? Can he make arcana checks? Is there a distance limit in how far he can move his form? Because with that last part, C is standing outside the area of battle.

In his dreamform, he also triggers traps. So he loses only 1 power point, but then they use a full rest and regain all his powerpoints, making my traps useless. Do you regain powerpoints after a short rest?
Sometimes, the traps also sounds as an alarm, that makes the monsters in the next room full-alert. But I can't do that all the time. Any thoughts on this one?