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<blockquote data-quote="Zappo" data-source="post: 1435358" data-attributes="member: 633">Min-maxing by itself isn't wrong... the only time when you are &quot;playing wrong&quot; is when you are not having fun. Problem is, lots of people don't have fun doing min-maxing. Second problem is, if one player in the party is doing serious min-maxing and the rest aren't, he is going to have a substantially more powerful character, leading to intra-party inbalance.&nbsp;&nbsp;Now, if the entire party is stronger (or weaker) than what their level suggests, it's not a problem. The DM can tailor the encounters appropriately. However, if there is intra-party inbalance, making encounters that are challenging for everyone without being lethal to some becomes progressively more difficult.&nbsp;&nbsp;This means that in the same party you can't have a 100% min-maxed character and a lame cleric. Well, you can, but it won't work as well as a balanced party. This is the first cause of annoyance at min-maxing.&nbsp;&nbsp;The second cause of annoyance at min-maxing is that beyond a certain point it does hurt the roleplaying. A lot. There is nothing wrong in making an effective character - actually, I guess that a real adventurer would make sure to be as likely to survive as he can. Beyond this stage, however, lies the point where you are no longer &quot;making effective characters&quot;. It is the point where you are exploiting bugs in the rules, using combos that the designers obviously didn't think of, and making a thing that can't be really called a character because it doesn't make any sense in the game world. It is the point where you no longer care to justify your choices in setting terms. And precisely because it doesn't make sense in the game world, it kills suspension of disbelief for everyone in the party. Unless everyone is playing wargame-style, the rest of the group is going to be annoyed.&nbsp;&nbsp;Notice that the previous consideration has no relation to whether the &quot;character&quot; is too powerful or not. It doesn't matter; what's irritating is that the player is clearly trying to play a glorified Monopoli game.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Zappo, post: 1435358, member: 633"] Min-maxing by itself isn't wrong... the only time when you are "playing wrong" is when you are not having fun. Problem is, lots of people don't have fun doing min-maxing. Second problem is, if one player in the party is doing serious min-maxing and the rest aren't, he is going to have a substantially more powerful character, leading to intra-party inbalance. Now, if the entire party is stronger (or weaker) than what their level suggests, it's not a problem. The DM can tailor the encounters appropriately. However, if there is intra-party inbalance, making encounters that are challenging for everyone without being lethal to some becomes progressively more difficult. This means that in the same party you can't have a 100% min-maxed character and a lame cleric. Well, you can, but it won't work as well as a balanced party. This is the first cause of annoyance at min-maxing. The second cause of annoyance at min-maxing is that beyond a certain point it [i]does[/i] hurt the roleplaying. A lot. There is nothing wrong in making an effective character - actually, I guess that a real adventurer would make sure to be as likely to survive as he can. Beyond this stage, however, lies the point where you are no longer "making effective characters". It is the point where you are exploiting bugs in the rules, using combos that the designers obviously didn't think of, and making a [i]thing[/i] that can't be really called a character because it doesn't make any sense in the game world. It is the point where you no longer care to justify your choices in setting terms. And precisely because it doesn't make sense in the game world, it kills suspension of disbelief for everyone in the party. Unless everyone is playing wargame-style, the rest of the group is going to be annoyed. Notice that the previous consideration has no relation to whether the "character" is too powerful or not. It doesn't matter; what's irritating is that the player is clearly trying to play a glorified Monopoli game. [/QUOTE]

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