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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Halivar" data-source="post: 3565486" data-attributes="member: 9327">Disclaimer: OP is my DM, and I am a power-gaming offender. Ravilah, I figured it'd be okay to browse the thread because we'd had a discussion on managing power levels in the party a couple days ago. My comments here are not directed at you, but as a response to some of the topics discussed here.As my contribution to the group discussion, I'll state that I, as a player, am not looking for a cakewalk. The problem of escalating PC-to-monster power levels is somewhat paradoxical. On the one hand, there must be a significant challenge; fighting with a handful of hit-points is where things are just starting to get really exciting. On the other hand, no player likes to feel useless. The perfect combination, from a player's perspective, is extreme coolness in a PC's ability and extreme danger in the encounters. In order to be a hero (in the literary epic sense), you need both great power and a great enough obstacle that you need every bit of it to prevail.In response to some previous suggestions: to artificially "nerf" a PC to increase the relative danger of the encounter is probably the easiest solution, but removes a sense of heroism and greatness from the character (assuming a standard high fantasy heroes & monsters campaign). Conversely, to present an artificially weak encounter to pander to players' ego is also, ironically, pretty emasculating.SO, assuming the goal is to present a challenging encounter suitable for power-gaming characters, I have a few thoughts from a player's perspective:1) The monsters in the MM are not optimized the same way an NPC is. IMXP NPC's are much more challenging than MM entires because the DM is more at liberty to custom-craft it, and the possibility of meta-gaming the encounter is limited, if not eliminated. Another possibility is to roll for monster stats instead of taking the base-line 10 for everything. I don't know what the CR adjustment is for elite monsters, though.2) If a group of creatures is too easy, adding more of the same creature to the fight is a more manageable way to escalate the encounter than adding higher-CR creatures. This also has the side benefit of allowing the PC's to strut their stuff against a horde (fun for players) while still slowly whittling away the PC's resources (challenging for players; convenient for DM). A too-high CR creature brought in to "manage" a party has an increased likelihood of killing someone outright in the first round (save-or-die monsters, I'm looking at you), and nothing is less heroic or more un-fun than dying during a surprise round (ah, fond memories of bodaks).3) Party power-level management tools like level-drain and rust monsters are both infuriating (for players) and cliché. Using plot-points to remove equipment and powers from the players is fun and motivating ("I want my stuff back!"). They also give players a possible plot-hook to follow. Plots are good.4) Did I mention NPC's?Just my $0.02.</blockquote>

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