Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 Boontaker Jan 30, 2015 7:14:18	My group was very anti Next until I got ahold of the starter kit and we started playing.  Now i'm getting really positive feedback from everyone about the game except for one comment I keep getting from one player.  Now this player AFAIK has never DMd so he still has the mindset that PCs are always the Best of the Best top of the line model min max machines.  He enjoys 5th edition but is skeptical about converting from pathfinder to 5th because he says his 5th ed characters don't feel spectacular.  He says even if you put some effort in to being really good at something your only marginally better than everyone else.  I don't completely agree with his point of veiw but I can understand what he is saying.  Has anyone else encountered thoughts like this?  Whats a good way to make the players feel like they are "special snowflakes".
#2 Novama Jan 30, 2015 7:35:13	I'm combatting this issue as well. In a game of make believe, the best characters seem to be the ones that think out of the box and tip situations in their favor more often than not through creative thinking. Because 5e tries to curb your ability to stack stats into rediculousness, the player is right in feeling slightly better (but only in comparison to other systems with higher level caps and multi-classing not capped at total character level).    I've personally taken the approach of showing my players what their characters can be like. I make characters on par with theirs for npc uses or just for kicks. I use them in creative ways to illustrate how it doesn't take high stats to seem 'super'. Some get it, while others are still holding out, but it's generally understood that creativity and clever thinking can make a character greater than their stats. Another thing I did was I helped one character make a special entrance. His character was on a roof top above a fight going on in the room below. He was able to swing down and in a window, surprise the enemy from behind, and outright kill the closest monster to him in the same turn. System and creativity worked together to shape a feat that you would only see in action hero movies. The player felt good. Folks thought it was cool. Aiding the characters in setting up scenarios like that may help them achieve the extroardinary concept they are going for.   As I said, I'm still trying to find the right answer to this one though.
#3 akr71 Jan 30, 2015 7:35:59	I'm finding the opposite.  Granted I haven't played since the late 80's (2nd/3rd ed).  The racial, class and background really offer the opportunity for a unique character, especially if you leverage the three toghether, you are pretty special at level 1.  I find that the classes have been built for combat and the characters have been dealing some pretty hefty damage and taking barely a scratch.  So much so that I am tweaking the scenario to make it tougher.   I'm currently DM'ing 2 sessions of LMOP, one party just had their first session and are nearly level 2 - this is an extra large group with 7 adventurers in it - I already doubled most of the encounters and they breezed through.  The other session is a group of 4 and have just reached level 3 - they took down Glasstaff before he could even react.  My wife said that the look on my face was priceless. I was geared up for running them through a tough battle, even though I knew they had the drop on him and were most likely going to surprise.
#4 ConsumedReality Jan 30, 2015 7:49:25	Yeah this is mainly boiled down to the player creativity, since you cannot just rely on stats to do all the work, from originally playing 3/3.5 and a little of 4e, I feel like each character is able to be more unique than what was able to be had with 4th. Try coxing the players to be creative with handling combat, alot of times I have seen players just sit there and say I move I swing,/ cast and it just seems like they are trying to play a video game where they can't be creative or spectacular with their attacks or actions. To me bein spectacular is all based on how the player utilizes what they have to best effectiveness, instead of relying on the system solely to try and provide that to them.
#5 Ranthalan Jan 30, 2015 7:56:00	I'm with akr.  I and some others in my group last played 2E and we're dumbfounded how powerful the 1st level characters are.  A wizard with more than 4 hp?! More than one spell per day?!  Just about every class has a magic using varient?!
#6 bawylie Jan 30, 2015 9:09:27	The game is less Kratos and more Conan. It can be disjarring if you're making that switch. Just don't lose sight of how awesome Conan is.
#7 ChrisTheS Jan 30, 2015 10:31:30	One way you can ensure individual skill and niche protection is to ask each player to name one thing that she does best out of all the party, supported by her background.  If that situation comes up, that player gets the right of first refusal on attempting it and always has advantage on the first roll of the scene related to it.  For instance, one character (human rogue) is an ex-army scout, while another (elf cleric) has never left the cloister.  The cleric technically has a better perception score (due to elf and high Wis class), but the rogue can declare that she's the best at scouting - so the elf doesn't get to try spotting that ambush until after the human has rolled with advantage.   If we'd done this in our one and only 4E campaign, it would have saved me a lot of grief...
#8 durntaur Jan 30, 2015 12:09:09	bawylie wrote:
(Reply to #8) Ranthalan	durntaur wrote:
#10 Touc Jan 30, 2015 14:53:24	If your game world reacts to the accomplishments of the characters, hopefully they'll come to appreciate that heroes are special not because of a stat-line but because they are willing to act and take risks where others balk.    I'm guessing you have a video-game syndrome where the player might not feel he can think outside the box, that he looks at his character sheet when determining what he can and cannot do rather than simply say it.  The sheet becomes a hindrance to the game rather than an aid because it's a limitation that says you're only as good as your stats.    A couple options: Increase role play, decrease roll play. Give players a chance to take action outside the scope of their sheets, role play it. Never ever ever go back to "I make a diplomacy check." Make the game world reactive to player deeds. The players are doing what others wish they could do, such as taking out bandits. That's special. Have the town folk live and breathe, gossip about the player's accomplishments. Get to 3rd level and ensure everyone knows 1st and 2nd level are intentionally meant to be "mediocre."  Heroes come from humble beginnings and at those levels death is one swing away. 3rd level opens up a lot of options for most classes and begins to bring the feel one is coming into their own.
#11 ChrisSteele Jan 30, 2015 15:53:07	Boontaker wrote:
#12 Archon007 Jan 30, 2015 20:15:35	If you feel the characters aren't that heroic you could always increase attribute buy points from 27 to 32 and/or use the DMG optional rule Hero Points
#13 Psikerlord Jan 30, 2015 21:25:22	Boontaker wrote:
#14 Eggnogfool Jan 31, 2015 11:23:28	I think there is a reasonable criticism that there isn't a lot of mechanical customization available in 5th; there's an inherent incompatibility between depth of options and simplicity/accessibility of the system, I feel like simplicity rightly won.  Good news is that this is more true at low levels; subclasses mostly show up at 3rd level and feats/multiclas options broaden as level increases as well.  Bad news is the feat system not worth the price of admission for most classes other than fighter/rogue.  Hence me giving players an extra (non-big 6) feat at level 1.
Dreamstryder Jan 31, 2015 14:19:07	Your player sounds like they're looking for gratification in the building (maybe the building and testing) rather than the using, if that makes sense. Along the line of bawylie's advice, push some inspiration material this player's way, stuff wherein the characters aren't super or unbreakable, and have to survive, not by having special assets, but by using their assets cleverly. My regular player caught on quick because he's familiar with humbling games like Etrian Odyssey and Dark Souls (his inspirational material).   It may also be that the special things this player wishes to perform aren't rule-exceptional (in other words, the PC can perform such stunts without needing any feats). You might point out opportunities to do cool things as they come up in-game, things they can try without rules telling them explicitly that they can ("rules permission" / "Rulebook May I?"). Give them a decent opportunity to succeed, too.
#16 cowleymen Jan 31, 2015 22:47:00	Im not a huge fan of the idea that player characters are be all end of all of power levels. For the most part, I like the idea that players need to advance beyond about....5th or 6th level to start becoming truely exceptional in my game worlds. And I let my players know that before we go in
#17 JohnLynch Feb 01, 2015 1:50:19	Boontaker wrote:
#18 bob_goes_up Feb 01, 2015 4:14:21	Alternatively you can start the characters at level 5. Would that help?   I personally like the low level play.
#19 akr71 Feb 01, 2015 6:24:30	bob_goes_up wrote:
#20 Vahnyu Feb 02, 2015 8:43:38	I prefer starting at low levels too, but the problem with low levels is that it doesn't let you costumize your character in a meaningful and/or conceptful way, at least before you've first put quite a few adventuring levels.   For example, I want to play an unarmed martial artist with thunder fists. It's impossible to do this at first level, unless you take human variant as your race. The second closest you could get would be taking Dragonborn as your race, and reflavoring his breath, and even then, you'd be limited to living up to your concept once per short rest.
#21 MascisMan Feb 02, 2015 11:21:12	I think defining roles helps as well. For example, a Rogue is the party's lock-picker, sneak, spy, etc. If we were to run in to a locked door, send the Rogue up because he is the "expert." Yes we could all try and one of us would succeed most likely, but, in-character he/she is the trained specialist. Would a wizard with zero lock picking experience have the gumption to give it a whirl? Probably not. Now some areas sure, but not areas of expertise. This applies to all the classes really. A Wizard is the expert in Arcana knowledge and possibly history, a Bard in the more uncommon folklore and history, a Cleric in religious history and the undead, a Ranger in flora/fauna, tracking, their preferred enemy, etc. That doesn't mean all classes should be typecasted. Maybe, for some reason, the Wizard is the sneak. Who knows, but, these are roles that a party determines as they adventure together and gain experience. In my party our best interrogator is actually our Dragonborn Bard. The flipside is that not all "country-folk" are too thrilled about a smooth talking 7 foot Dragonoid. So it's a double edged sword. But it sure makes things interesting.
#22 Noon Feb 02, 2015 13:29:53	It just sounds as if he wants to be more powerful than any other player playing the same class, from sheer min maxing ability.   It's not a game world thing at all, it's an inter-player competative thing.
#23 BRJN Feb 03, 2015 17:42:52	Dreamstryder wrote: