Pathfinder 1E Your experiences with broken Pathfinder characters? (edit: more accurately, w/1 avg PF character when the rest of the party is meh)

[Blackbrrd]

Good lord, AC 20 + level is "good"? Okay, see, this is where I want to flip out and stab D&D in the face.

I want to play D&D to be a big guy in full plate with a shield, or a nimble guy in leather, or maybe a kung fu guy who dodges because he's all zen and stuff.

I don't play D&D because I want to buy items that give me +1 deflection, +1 natural armor, +1 enhancement armor, +1 enhancement shield, +1 luck, and boosts to my Dex. That stuff really REALLY bores me, especially as a GM because a ruleset that requires those items just causes me to spend pointless time picking out gear of appropriate value in order for an enemy to be a decent challenge.

I definitely don't want to have to include giants, nets, and NPCs with dispel magic in my 'fantasy spy mission' adventure, simply because one PC is not threatened by mortals. I was running 4e before, and got fed up with the way it let players stack tons of debuff effects on prominent enemies, so we switched to PF, and now it's the math that's beating me up.

I really think I'd rather just convert to a system where my intuition about how challenging something should be in a 'Hollywood physics' world is matched by the system. John McClane survives Die Hard because he's a scrappy hero, not because he was kitted up like a magic Christmas tree.

. . .

I may be somewhat emotional as I'm writing this.

It's a bit amusing that you are complaining about this, as 3e which Pathfinder is based on had the exact same bonuses. I do find it weird you never ran into the same thing there. 4e does a better job at making the character building a bit more intuitive, but the scaling was in my eyes to steep, so if you are a couple of levels to high or low you miss to easily or get hit too often.

Anyway, my way of handling this in 3e/3.5 was to either limit the amount of books or just mention that I didn't want over-the-top characters in one direction or the other. It's an easier way of handling complex systems like 3.x or Pathfinder instead of working with the math. I think it's important to remember it's a pen-and-paper rpg, not a crpg. You can actually come to an agreement with your players about what kind of game you are running.

... My current 4e character is a Wizard. He could potentially have lots of status effect powers, but I mostly went with high damage powers instead. Nothing is as boring as an encounter that just goes on and on because the bad guys have been neutralized and the PCs are all low-damage survivalists.

Anyway, my preferences are quite similar to yours, I don't want to be bogged down with game mechanics when I am running a game. I want to focus on creating fun adventures and combats.

 

[Savage Wombat]

I remember one fight where a PC making himself untouchable was useful - he was delaying the monsters in a bottleneck while the rest of the PCs bugged out. Since he had the movement to get away as well, it worked quite well. But in most circumstances spending two actions becoming hard to hurt mostly just diverts pain onto the rest of the group.

 

[Herobizkit]

Bottom line, D&D's a team game. If players are building characters as solo artists, they're going to play like solo artists. And to be fair, this is warranted - it's one player per character, so of course a player will want to make that character "the best" it can be. But "the best" is so subjective to each player...

I can see the frustration with the monk in question. The DM's options are:
a) Attack the monk with grossly high-powered monsters who can hit her AC;
b) ignore the monk entirely, which is great for the monk as she is also an archer;
c) try and shut down all of her defenses, which is a shtick that gets old fast;
d) harry her with tons of weak but annyoing monsters.
d2) ... like Tucker's Kobolds. *evil grin*

If her apparent OP character is getting on the DM's nerves, The DM needs to step back, take a breath, and figure out why this wrecks his fun. This isn't a "fault" issue, as others have stated, it is merely a difference of expectation between playstyles... and there is a middle ground, somewhere.

... Somewhere. ^_^

 

[airwalkrr]

I generally limit my players to core rules only and require my prior approval before allowing anything else into the game. If one player is clearly dominating the game then that player doesn't get to add all kinds of new other sourcebooks into their build. But if one player is obviously deficient, I will allow that player to add extra sourcebook material until I feel that player is on a more even footing. Naturally, this means I rarely allow spellcasters to add to their arsenal. I allow very few additional spells beyond the core rules (my usual answer to such requests is for the character to research the spell if the player wants it so badly, with no guarantee of success). But I am much more permissive with things like fighter builds, and I have little problem with allowing such characters to take feats or other rules options (like dragonmark feats) which mimic spells.

This doesn't really help deal with problems after the fact, but I clearly state to all players at the beginning of the campaign that I reserve the right to nerf (or destroy a la sunder, disintegrate, etc.) anything that I feel is unbalancing to the game. Gary Gygax told a story of how his son, Ernie, was once lucky enough to find two incredibly awesome swords on his character, Erac's Cousin. I believe they were both vorpal swords. Anyway, at one point, Gary and Rob Kuntz decided that the dual-wielding vorpal Erac's Cousin was just a mistake and lured him into the clutches of a demon who stole or destroyed the swords somehow. It actually made perfect sense in-character. Erac's Cousin had attracted too much attention to himself and made a powerful enemy by virtue of this attention, an enemy who wanted the power of the vorpal blades for himself. Sometimes singling out one party member for such a "correction" makes sense both in-character and out-of-character. If the player can't handle it, then the player really isn't all that mature in my opinion and perhaps the player doesn't belong in the game. And yes, I have kicked players out before because they weren't able to deal with kind of situation in an adult manner. Everyone at the table usually agrees it is for the better. The game is much more fun if everyone at the table is given a chance to shine from time to time instead of having the game dominated by one or two players.

So that's how I handle it.

 

[Feeroper]

Your experiences with broken Pathfinder characters?

I personally think this would be a matter of talking in out as a group. Every edition has its issues for better or worse and this is one of the issues with 3.X/PF. It's not seen as an issue for everyone, it can differ from group to group, so I would just take the time to talk it out with the group and go from there.

I see some posts saying that the DM needs to remove his ego from it, but remember, the game is supposed to be fun for everyone, including the DM.

 

[knottyprof]

I see some posts saying that the DM needs to remove his ego from it, but remember, the game is supposed to be fun for everyone, including the DM.

2nded.


It also depends on whether or not the group wants to play a roll playing game or a role playing game. As a DM and player I want to create or partake of something that is at least reminescent of an actual storyline where everyone has goals and inspirations (including NPCs). However, if the group is more about just killing things and gaining stuff then the DM needs to take that into account. However, even in such a situation the DM has a right to make it challenging so encounters are just cake walks.

 

[Tequila Sunrise]

I'm fine with superhero play. I just don't want getting there to be so non-intuitive.

I totally sympathize with your sentiment, my friend.

It's one of the many reasons I now DM 4e. Whatever glitches it has are vastly outweighed by the non-intuitive morass of quirky system mastery of 3.x, and relatively easy to fix.

 

[ggeilman]

I generally limit my players to core rules only and require my prior approval before allowing anything else into the game. If one player is clearly dominating the game then that player doesn't get to add all kinds of new other sourcebooks into their build. But if one player is obviously deficient, I will allow that player to add extra sourcebook material until I feel that player is on a more even footing. Naturally, this means I rarely allow spellcasters to add to their arsenal. I allow very few additional spells beyond the core rules (my usual answer to such requests is for the character to research the spell if the player wants it so badly, with no guarantee of success). But I am much more permissive with things like fighter builds, and I have little problem with allowing such characters to take feats or other rules options (like dragonmark feats) which mimic spells.

This doesn't really help deal with problems after the fact, but I clearly state to all players at the beginning of the campaign that I reserve the right to nerf (or destroy a la sunder, disintegrate, etc.) anything that I feel is unbalancing to the game. Gary Gygax told a story of how his son, Ernie, was once lucky enough to find two incredibly awesome swords on his character, Erac's Cousin. I believe they were both vorpal swords. Anyway, at one point, Gary and Rob Kuntz decided that the dual-wielding vorpal Erac's Cousin was just a mistake and lured him into the clutches of a demon who stole or destroyed the swords somehow. It actually made perfect sense in-character. Erac's Cousin had attracted too much attention to himself and made a powerful enemy by virtue of this attention, an enemy who wanted the power of the vorpal blades for himself. Sometimes singling out one party member for such a "correction" makes sense both in-character and out-of-character. If the player can't handle it, then the player really isn't all that mature in my opinion and perhaps the player doesn't belong in the game. And yes, I have kicked players out before because they weren't able to deal with kind of situation in an adult manner. Everyone at the table usually agrees it is for the better. The game is much more fun if everyone at the table is given a chance to shine from time to time instead of having the game dominated by one or two players.

So that's how I handle it.

Your gaming philosophy sounds close to ours and as it appears you live close to us, it is a surprise we have not met.

 

[airwalkrr]

Your gaming philosophy sounds close to ours and as it appears you live close to us, it is a surprise we have not met.

We may have communicated before. When I first moved to San Antonio I got in touch with the Southern Dragons, but as I recall there was no space at the time.

 

[Starfox]

Not to rain on ggeilman's and airwalkrr's parade, just reporting a different opinion. I feel the player character is very much the player's affair, and the DM should keep hands off as far as possible. Of course, if there is a balance issue that becomes serious, something might have to be done, but arbitrarily taking away something that is an important part of a character's concept is not legit.

I have had a few characters defined by single extraordinary traits - one that rode a unicorn. This character was a "unicorn rder" first, everything else second. This was very central to her concept (this was a female paladin), and when the unicorn was KIA the DM did not like the idea of me retiring the character. The situation was a bit aggravated by some additional circumstances - the event that caused the death was a bit fishy, and we had hero points to save the lives of our characters, but I was not allowed to use one to save my mount even tough I explained it was a character-ending event.

For me, this was method acting - the character completely lost her motivation and would spend the year until she could get a new companion in atoning for the lost one (this was in 3.0). There was no clear reason to stay on the adventure except party loyalty, no "divine mission" that I could discern. As the rest of the party would not wait for her to return, this effectively took her out of the campaign. The DM felt I was escaping my duties as a paladin and did not want me to reroll as a new character - something about our original characters having a special fate that a replacement character would not have. In the end I quit that game. For me this was method acting, for the DM it apparently came across as whining.

Now I could see that a unicorn mount had its problems, particularly the dual "lance" charge it made possible and the effectiveness of a large creature with reach being able to trip retreating foes without giving them any chance to retaliate (against a retreat action, the trip happening as a AoO when they left the reach square), but I'd much rather had the unicorn nerfed a bit than completely taken out of the game like that.