A thought, and perhaps a challenge to the playerbase
-
At the end of the day, it's only loot and levels, which aren't important at all in the big picture. Obviously you're in the wrong mindset for these sorts of DM events* snip *
- boggle * Then why have levels at all? Or loot? Just make everyone 1st level, with standard built in gear. No need for an inventory system, less lag on the server ! Like it or not, advancing your character in levels, and acquiring better gear is a key factor in Dungeons and Dragons. A core structure to the game.
I went into each DM event with the right mindset. I wanted to have an enjoyable evening. Most nights, that was accomplished. The DMs do great work on making things exciting most of the time.
It appears there are folks here that have missed the point of playing this game. A lesson i learned 30 years ago when i started playing D&D. At the end of the day, as long as the players around you had fun, it was a success. Nothing else matters enough to stress over.
-
- sometimes you might want to take the rogue level for (DUM DUM DUMMM) diplomatic skills.
No you don't.
I've never seen Bluff, Intimidate, Persuade roll used if not to obtain a bit more gold at the end of the quests.
I'm sad to see you see things this (purely mechanical) way. Skills, along with stats, are supposed to be roleplayed. Sure, some skills have more mechanical use than others, but hey, so does stats no? (what is wisdom and charisma to a fighter? Duh.)
Social skills can allow a person with medicore charisma to convince others of his point of view, be it true or not. A person without social skills and low charisma who still pretend to be a smooth talker is not playing his stats, and that is so greatly frowned upon. So why should we also not roleplay our skills?
I usually take one or two social skills to justify (if only for myself and the DM team) the ability my character has to persuade people or lie convincingly. True: rolling a bluff-check in a RP situation is a dead give-away that your character is lying OOCly(and very few are professional enough to not metagame that knowledge), so I guess very few people would do that. Persuade checks can be made, but who calls the DC? Discussions on this IG ruin immersion for me, so personally, I think you should take the skills you want, social or not, and play them.This is a bit off topic, yes, but I try to point out how multiclassing can bring new aspects to your character based on his personality and experiences. Not only mechanically, but also RP-wise. Also how non-mechanical skills have value if you're into "gimping" yourself a bit.
-
We were defending Eveningstar during the attack on the Black, with around 7-10 folks, most in the 4-7 range, with a few higher , myself included, a 9th Wiz. Problem was, we only had 2 liners, and they both fell the first or second wave of 5 + waves.. each with nearly a dozen lizardmen, with spell casters, and many elites, etc, mixed with trolls and greater trolls. The only reason we held on at all, we were reduced to kiting , using buildings to block Lines of sight , even some luring, and the expendature of at the least ten thousand gold in wands and items. Point being.. your typical adventurers that you want to see in game would have died 1st wave to that mess, and more than likely, we would have too, if it wasnt for some questionable use of mechanics in a heavy lag environment.
While I agree some DM events lately have been overpowering, that one was not and it's unfair to imply it was. The only reason it was so hard was because the Red Harts took all the frontliners with them to the Gorge. This was a tactical error IC on the part of characters in charge of the operation and we paid for it pretty lightly considering most of us survived the battle. The DMs even had Rumtum's golem come out and help us for the second part.
-
…I went into each DM event with the right mindset...
Well, it's either one of two things; The DM's fostered many experience that for you were in the end less fun than they could have been, but is that because a DM can sometimes wind up griefing players with horrendous torrents of spawns, or is it simply because you're not in the right mindset?
It's obviously the latter!
-
And, another note, Argenta, about the use of consumables. If you aren't using them, why have them at all? I was at that fight in Eveningstar, I was the level four wizard who spent two hours mostly running away from orcs, and I too ended up in the fugue. Thats the game we play, things are tough and the death penealty is extreme. Those are also the battles that make the most epic stories for your character to have lived through. Low levels, tough fights, and deaths meaning more then just respawning and loosing 100 exp are all part of what the core of CoA is, and always has been. I understand its not for everyone, but I couldnt play this game any other way.
-
…I went into each DM event with the right mindset...
Well, it's either one of two things; The DM's fostered many experience that for you were in the end less fun than they could have been, but is that because a DM can sometimes wind up griefing players with horrendous torrents of spawns, or is it simply because you're not in the right mindset?
It's obviously the latter!
Even if it were the former, this is still in effect;
@Mr.:
The DMs are the only real arbiters of what "legitimate" means.
-
While I agree some DM events lately have been overpowering
I love you mittens, but I can't agree with this either. The only thing I have seen plot wise that have been overpowered is the orcs of the hullack. These orcs are the largest gathering of orcs ever seen in faerun, and could easily run over the city without breaking a sweat. Luckily, they want to take out Thunderholme instead ( a bunch of npcs). Want to save the dwarves? Well, brute force obviously isn't gonna work.
Sorry If I gave to much info plot wise in a ooc forum, but since they announced all of this over the sending system, I'm pretty sure its safe to talk about.
-
Diagnosis, i dont know if i knew you in game, but you seem to be under the very very old school label of what a DM is. Back in the old days, when we all were first learning the game, it was ' cool ' to be the one in charge, the one to smack everyone down, and overrule anything you like because you didnt care for it. And then you started being left out of games and such, when folks got tired of it. When you grew up, and realized that the DM wasnt supposed to be reading you a story that he had written already complete with the ending in print, he was just there to help YOU weave a tale as you walked thru events occuring in his world, and his only job that night, was to insure all had a great time, the real purpose of running the game came to light.
Like it or not, as a DM you are responsible for other peoples enjoyment of a game, and the real people in control of your actions, are the players. You serve their needs faithfully, within reason of course, to insure they have a fun time. Its a thankless, hard, long hours job, but any great , longstanding DM knows the reward of player appreciation bears the sweetest fruit.
-
On the topic of pure classes being more worthwhile than cross classes, I guess it sounds like most agree it depends on how the character is played to illustrate the class choices? You'll never be able to -prove- someone is a powerbuild unless you're on a DM client anyway (save for a few).
A note on the social and non-combat skills is to know their limits; I see some people who use Lore to basically act like they have FRwiki.com on their bracer iPad.
As an aside, the Eveningstar defense succeeded because of 1 character with Improved Expertise; I still say it's totally overpowered for this setting. My rogue was a secondary tank/flanker and everyone else on ranged attack for the most part, the golem just sped up the damage output.
While I know what it's like to miss an important fight in the Fugue, the often-frustrating d20 system is something we all have to get used to. You can always roll a 1, or an orc rolls a 20 and even at lvl 6 you get 1-hitted to the Fugue. In a big event, when this sort of bad turn happens for players, it comes to where a DM would have to strike a balance between the enjoyment of the dead and the IC sense of the entire thing. Many people would probably find it disruptive to have "take 2" of an event because it went badly for some but isn't yet lost from an IC point of view.
-
Wanna be a fighter with dual wielding whips
Impossible!
Mechanically can't be done!
If Indiana Jones couldn't do it, than neither can you! -
-
Wanna be a fighter with dual wielding whips
Impossible!
Mechanically can't be done!
If Indiana Jones couldn't do it, than neither can you!It can, with the use of hakpaks!
False, a client and serverside override will be sufficient. No hak required.
Overly powerful builds are annoying as hell.
They suck the fun out of events by either making them to easy or unballance them by requiring spawns that kill everyone but them.
If I see a powerbuild I'll either avoid them or ask them to leave my event for the sanity of everyone involved.
Please give your statement a bit of thought again, or at least elaborate.
What is a powerbuild to you? Do you really ask a player who has roleplayed his character and his stats to a degree that is required or above and beyond that to leave whatever event you plan just because you happen to disagree with his build?
What is a powerbuild to you? Where does it start and end? 16 STR and 14 CON?
This is a very fine line and honestly a very dangerous statement you made, chastising players to play gimped builds on purpose just to satisfy some unwritten rule that is hard to define.
Here are some sickeningly powerful builds, would they be excluded from your events if they were played appropriately?
Pure Barbarian, 16 STR, Improved Disarm, 2H weapon
Pure Barbarian in general
Pure Fighter, Power Attack & Expertise, any weapon
Fighter 5 / Rogue 3 with high reflex save & tumble
Pure Wizard 7+
Pure Sorcerer 6+
Pure Cleric
Pure Bard
Bard/Fighter 1
Bard/Fighter
Pure Rogue, 2H weapon
Pure Monk
Monk/Sorcerer
Pure Fighter, again
Ranger/BarbarianAlso, all the small races, and dwarves, and possibly humans.
These are all incredibly powerful, especially if they start with 16 in their main stat and keep their INT and WIS above 10 (so as to powerbuild themselves towards not having to die out of stupidity). If they really want to cheat, they give themselves 12 INT or/and WIS and/or CHA and become almost unstoppable. Some even shamelessly go for 14's in some social stats.
I just feel like your statement precludes a TON of character concepts.
-
Please give your statement a bit of thought again, or at least elaborate.
I would define a powerbuild as any combination of classes, feats and skills that are taken for the specific purpose of having a character that is abnormally strong, gifted in PvP or defeated in combat to the point where normal monsters designed for someone of their level/the party they are involved with are not a challenge.
This forces us, as DMs, to either resign to a lame event where the task is breezed through with little effort, or adjust with monsters too difficult for the non-powerbuilt characters.
Do you really ask a player who has roleplayed his character and his stats to a degree that is required or above and beyond that to leave whatever event you plan just because you happen to disagree with his build?
Yes and No.
I do ask players I believe would unballance events to leave events, not because I "disagree with their builds" but because it detracts from the entertainment of others involved by forcing me into the above scenario of either killing everyone but the powerbuild or handing an unearned reward to someone on a silver plater.
I don't "disagree" with any builds. If you want to play a min max'd halfling/half orc barbarian/fighter/bard who's taken bard levels for the song, wands and tumbles around in their fullplate and tower shield than I wont stop you. Especially if you somehow manage to "roleplay his character above and beyond" (I can't imagine anyone being able to roleplay gaining +2 AC from tumble while wielding a towershield and fullplate).
Feel free to quest until you're level 15.
But if your level 15 powerbuild tries getting involved in one of my events/plots I'll kindly ask you to leave so the event remains fun for everyone involved. If anyone with a powerbuild would like to be involved in one of my events or plots I'd welcome them to create a new character who isn't a bizarre and unrealistic combination of classes, skills and feats and they can join the fun.
I'm not saying that you need to play gimped builds. People who play powerbuilds for mechanical reasons are VERY easy to pick out. It may be loosely defined, but even an idiot can figure out who's chosing their feats, classes and skills for nonsensical or made up IG reasons to become mechanically powerful.
-
Ah right. Thanks for correcting me!
-
This thread is so derailed I think it needs to be renamed.
-
I will continue the derailment. I've been looking over the thread and actually feel the urge to comment on a few things; a rare thing, I am a long time player, yet my postcount is low.
Stands on his soapbox
I understand the frustration the dm team must have with powerbuilds unbalancing their events. My solution: Kill them early. Certainly any NPC or army of NPCs is going to notice who is the most "powerful" PC on the battlefield. Simply have the NPC monsters single out the powerbuilds and stomp on them, then rebalance the monsters to contend with everyone else. Yes, the powerbuild players will complain of this suggestion. On the other hand, I imagine the idea of killing all the "badass" powerbuilds at the start of an event brings warm fuzzy feelings to 90% of the server as they contemplate the idea.
Yes, this suggestion is only a jest… I think.
TOO21,
Perin Swampleaf, (retired)
Ron Smith (dead)
Snog (dead)
463 half-orc fighters (dead) -
You don't fight a powerbuild on his field (i.e. with spawn). DMs can easily push the "death" button, am I right or wrong?
Kill it with Rolls on the abilities he neglects (Bluff, Persuade, Appraise) and with RP…
-
You don't fight a powerbuild on his field (i.e. with spawn). DMs can easily push the "death" button, am I right or wrong?
Kill it with Rolls on the abilities he neglects (Bluff, Persuade, Appraise) and with RP…
This way encourages a powerbuilder player to consider his build in a carrot and stick approach.
-
You don't fight a powerbuild on his field (i.e. with spawn). DMs can easily push the "death" button, am I right or wrong?
Kill it with Rolls on the abilities he neglects (Bluff, Persuade, Appraise) and with RP…
This way encourages a powerbuilder player to consider his build in a carrot and stick approach.
Why do you folks always add so much work on DM plate? I think even they are enjoying like us running events and getting immersed rather than watch powerbuild players and teaching em a lesson..I am nearing 300 post so have to say something :)