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| #1SorxoresAug 29, 2014 10:10:20 | Sorry I jsut need to rant, about this, I am dead tired to see people always complaining, about archer putting 14 in your Dex then take a wood elf race to maximize their archery skill? then calling them a min/maxer and saying stuff like "I prefer to play something I will enjoy instead"
TLDR: min/maxer is not a bad thing, even in literature, your favorite hero are min/max for there role, Raistlin is the best wizard to ever exist on Dragonlance, Bilbo is a great sneaky character able to go anywhere, might not be good at fighting, but his role is not fighting he his min max for sneaking around and surviving using it's wits, Drizz got great Dexterity when he's weilding his 2 finess weapon. Min/Max do not make a character not fun, min/max do not limit your RP possibilities, min/max simply make your character more realist.
what do you mean play something you will enjoy? do you mean you'll create an archer, but you are going to put 8 in Dex, and 15 in Charisma because you want your archer to be good at talking to people? then you'll take the variant human and take the linguist feat because it match your "my character like to talk to people"
What if what I enjoy to do is a character that won't die on the first encounter against goblins? What if what I enjoy to play is a character that will reach level 2, and lvl 3 and all the way to lvl 15 if the adventure last long enought?
Yes I am a Min/Maxer, I enjoy optimizing my character, and that doesn't make me a bad person, my friend enjoy playign with me, my DM enjoy the challenge. and I enjoy playing my character. When I sit down to create my character my first decision is what do I want to play? a conventional spellcaster? a melee warrior? a tank? a support? a sneaky characater?
When I choosed what I want to play then I start crunching the number to see how I can make my character the best at that. so If i want to create a Archer, then yes I will go put 14 in my Dex, then choose a race that offer me +2 dex (or if a race better racial but only +1 dex, then I'll put 15 in my dex) Yes I will go get the feat sharpshooter, and I willl boost my Dex at 20, because if I want to be a good archer, that what I need to do.
I know the argument, when I was younger I didn't like superman because he was too powerfull all around, but somehow you still know superman and you still watch the movie. and even if we go see Character with major flaw like Raistlin Majere from Dragonlance. Yes Raistin might have had 3 Constitution, but he had 18 in Intellect, and hwo did Raistlin survive all that time even with this major flaw, he used his borther, a big strong fighter with good Constitution as a meat shield, later he used spell to protect himself, this is the definition of Min/Maxing, maximizing your strong point and minimizing the flaw, you got no Constitution, then make sure no one will attack you and that is exactly what Raistlin did, and this is exactly how he became a God, by min/maxing everything,
to all of you who enjoy RP more then combat who think RP should be more important when you create your character, can you tell me how much RP you are doing with your front line melee greatAxe fighter with only 8 strenght and 8 Contitution but 15 Charisma and 15 Intellect because this is how you do good RP, yes your RP will be very good; you are on the road to Phandelin when a group of goblin ambush you. Me the weak slickly fighter go to attack the goblin but can barely lift his greataxe and the goblin dodge the attack and attack the fighter, the fighter still off balance from his attack is unable to escape the goblin short sword and the goblin cut his troath, 18 second later, the fighter die bleeding to death. Great RP indeed, but it wasn't very long
On the other hand, with my "min/max" fighter I proudly walk in front of the caravan looking around. When the goblin come out I swing my greatAxe at them, and slice the first goblin in half, with my face full of blood I look at the other goblin and tell him: do you feel lucky punk? the goblin ignore me because he doesn't speak common. and he attack. I try to deflect the blow but the gobli is too agile for me and hit me, as a brave fighter, I ignore the pain and retaliate swing my great axe and behead the goblin, this was a glorious battle.
Yes true because I didn't took linguist as my feat I couldn't speak to the goblin, but I simply took it into my roleplay and made it a part of my character and now I'm still able to continue the adventure to do more RP, while the weak sickly linguist fighter that was suppose to be really good at roleplaying, need to create a new character and join us later.
Yes I do agree that some min/maxer might bring it a littl ebit too far (back in 3,5 I remember some build where the player at level 20 had 1 or 2 level of 13 different class and prestige. but just choosing to play a sorcere teifling because tiefling give +2 Cha, is not min maxing, it's playing a character that will survive the first adventure. If you are so strong with RP, let's RP a little bit
A rich merchant enter in a tavern and look around for a mighty group of adventurer who will be able to help me, in the tavern his see a weak slickly fighter and a strong muscular fighter who even with 5 pin of beer around him he look like he had drink water. Who do you think the merchant will go see?
Then when the strong fighter will try to gather a group, who do you think he will recruti in his team (we are talking RP here, the DM is not there to force you to take that player in your team) in the tavern the fighter see a wizard studing his spellbook, and a wizard putting crayon up his nose (for those wondering this is a simpson reference), who do you think the fighter will go see first?
Then when teh booksmart wizard and the strong fighter go to the church to recruit a cleric to help them on there quest, who will they take, the one prying at his god, with his mace and armor ready to defeat the evil in this world? or the goofy cleric, playing with children outside?
Then when our trio will go search for a rogue, who will they take, the one who pass them stealing all 3 purses and come back to them giving there purse back? or the famous rogue that the guard arrest every night trying to break in the wizard tower, but doing more noise doing so then a bard singing in the middle of a battle field?
While our group composed of the strong fighter, the booksmart wizard, the honest rogue and the pious cleric face the danger of there path, do what does teh group compose of the weak fighter, the dump wizard, the playfull cleric and the clumsy rogue do? even if they do find someone courageous enought to offer them a quest, do you really think they can succeed in this quest? |
| #2Captain_KoboldAug 29, 2014 10:55:55 | There is a difference between building an effective character and searching forums and splatbooks to find the most advantageous rule interactions, no matter how obscure, to make your character as mathematically powerful as possible.
Likewise, the claims that the only alternative to min/maxing is deliberately designing an ineffective character, or that RP characters cannot also be effective is fallacious.
Out of curiosity, where have people been complaining about putting a decent score in dex for a ranged character and such? I must have missed that. |
| #3Setzer_GAug 29, 2014 11:01:15 | (slow clap) thank you....I have this discussion more than I'd like, and it comes down to this. It's ok to play something that doesn't have a lot of motivation to get better, and that's fine. There are, however a ton of people in this world waking up to say, "I'm going to be the best __________________ I can be and research, strive, and train to do so." No adventurer, putting his life on the line constantly, is going to wake up, stretch, yawn and say "What a great day....time to be the most mediocre ____________ I can be, time to practice my whittling, because training is for chumps."
EDIT: I jumped on a similar but different topic of Stormwind Fallacy and lost sight...excuse me. |
| #4ZyphAug 29, 2014 11:17:25 | Maybe I'm crazy, but I've never viewed Min Maxing as being something as simple as "I'm an archer character so I'm putting 16 into my dex with my racial modifier".
Min Maxing would be giving yourself an 8 strength, int, and charisma (all things that, combat wise, would have little significant use to you as an archer) while going 15 in dex, con, and wisdom (for perception).
Min Maxing is scouring source books and trying to build a character singularly based around a mechanic or feature you're trying to do, willingly lowering your power in the other pillars of the game in exchange for exceedingly strong power in one pillar.
Mind you, there's NOTHING inherently wrong with min/maxing or character optimizing. There's also NOTHING wrong with DM's and players that prefer NOT to play with min-maxing characters. Each are a very different style. Min-Maxing doesn't make you a bad person...nor does making a "gimped" non-optimized character make you a bad person. But it might make you the style of player that some people don't want to play with. And that's fine, it's ridiculous to expect everyone to be the same style or for everyones style to mesh with everyone elses.
If you're into character optimization and you have a group that is into it and a DM that's into it then awesome. More power to you. Optimize to your hearts content. If you are into it and the rest of the players aren't and the DM isn't, then you either need to refrain from doing it or try and search out a group that DOES like it. They're not "bad" for not wanting to deal with your style, just like you're not "bad" if you don't want to deal with THEIR style.
The one issue I have in terms of "min maxing" from a systemic thing is when there's a base assumption that a ruleset must be made with an idea that min-maxing is going to be the norm. For example, I'd have a problem if every monster was balanced for a party made up of 4 characters perfectly optimized for the combat pillar at the expense of the other pillars and that was the "Default".
But beyond that, I've got no PERSONAL issue with min-maxing. Do it to your hearts content, find people that like it and play with them, and have a gay old time. At the same time, don't sit here and tell me that "X" is broken becuase if you forgo Y and Z it becomes EXTREMELY power and just assume that because forgoing Y and Z may not affect your game much and thus isn't a balancing factor that the same is going to apply for everyone else.
I also think there's a big difference between your standard min-maxer / optimizer who in general are just trying to best optimize their concept and a flat out munchkin, who are specifically not just looking at ways to best excel at what they do but are specifically looking at ways to exploit the rules or find loopholes, or who build a character purely from a statistical stance (not "I want to be the best archer" but "I want to deal the most damage physically possible!!!), and by and large play the game like a single player Diablo run where everyone else at the table is just there to help them personally "win".
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| #5Setzer_GAug 29, 2014 11:23:20 | I think 3.x was part of the culprit here in fostering the culture. I will say as a DM I munchkined the hell out of the system and my players loved it, it created some of the most memorable, exciting, and challenging encounters we've had in my eleven years with them. we put a big kibosh on that when it dealt with other characters, but finding new and exciting mechanics to challenge your players with isn't a bad thing. |
| #6ZyphAug 29, 2014 11:37:17 | I don't really think you can just put the blame on 3e. Most of the editions had various ways you could min-max to such an extreme that those who find it mildly annoying would transfer to finding it distasteful.
I remember with 2nd edition Skills and Powers as a kid listening to a guy talk about how he used S&P's ability to lower and increase certain aspects of an ability score to make it so that his damage and to hit bonus from strength were ridiculous high but he just couldn't bend bars and carry things very well.
Then again it's been ages since I've played 2nd edition or even looked at the Skills and Powers book and was a kid at the time, and this is the same guy who once suggested in White Wolf's "Werewolf the Apocolypse" that the first rank ability to create elements allowed him to conjure up and hurl significantly damaging fireballs, so god knows if he was actually going "by the book" ;) |
| #7IllithidbixAug 29, 2014 15:30:47 | I understand the sentiment but the anger and implying that because you discuss optimisation on a forum it means you don't care about roleplay. Isn't very helpful Nor is implying people who focus on roleplay are better people, than people who enjoy.
A lot of people enjoy the process of working out and theorising about the most powerful builds possible for it's own sake. As a mental exercise, a point of discussion and a way of learning the detailed bits of the rules system. It's hard to discuss roleplay in quite the same way, since it's a circumstantial conversation.
Knowing the rules makes it easier to work with it, and saves fumbling in rules books and makes off-the-cuff rules calls more accurate. It also gives you a better idea of what you're actually changing when you change the rules.
DM's do it to test the system for any flaws they might want to be aware off.
Actually playing with the silly OP build is another thing entirely. And fundamentally, you don't need rules to roleplay. And enjoyable roleplay is it's own reward. The quality of the game and your roleplay experience is almost entirely Also some people spend a lot of time crafting a backstory for their character before a game starts, whilst others enjoy discovering the personality of their character as the game progressed.
People who like to theorycraft silly powerful builds are sometimes also people who are happy for sessions to go by without combat.
On a point about flawed characters. Flaws can be awesome fun to roleplay.
But a personality flaw that you choose to roleplay or an ability flaw that you have because you designed your character to suck at X an is quite different from being ineffective at something that you envisioned your character to be effective at.
Dungeons and Dragons is by and large a fairly crunchy game about kicking ass and gaining powers. There’s plenty of space for roleplaying and working the rules into your roleplay.
You can play many varieties of this theme, but if you want a more narrativist game, I'd suggest checking out other games, such as Dungeon World. Personally I've played very few games beyond the 1-8 level range, be it 2nd Ed, 3.5, 4E or various Next playtest packages and now 5E. |
| #8SorxoresAug 29, 2014 15:27:01 | I think some people took my rant the wrong way,
Personally I consider RP and rolepay as orange and apple, you can have both without a problem, you can enjoy both without a problem (and IMO in DnD it's even preferable to enjoy both optimization and RP) or you can like just Optimization or just RP and that is fine as well (even if personally I believe that you are missing a part of the game if you solely focus on one aspect)
It simply seem that there is a prejudice about min/maxer, it's taboo to admit that your a min/maxer, kind of like admiting your homosexual back in the 90s, it was taboo and if you would admit it, you were at risk to become the target of mockery, even loose your job or miss a promotion because of it.
great RP go with good min/maxing, if I want to go 15 dex, con and Wisdom on my monk and 8 on strenght, int and Cha, it's perfectly fine, and when I'll go in the game with that character then I will roleplay him has being very wise, but unable to express it clearly, so no one listen to him for exemple
If I want to dip 2 levle in warlock to get eldritch blast with agonizing blast and blast repellant, then 18 level in sorcerer to quicken a eldritch blast every round, then I'll do it and I'll be happy to role play a sorcerer who fumbled in a littl ebit of forbidden lore.
and when a player will come sit at my table with a gnome barbarian because he tought the little video from 4e were halarious (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5KqjOGdOMtA), I will laught with him when he'll go "I'm a barbarian waaaaarrrgggg".
What bother me is when I say thing like: draconic sorcerer should have a feature to let you change the element of a spell so instead of leanring fireball you should be allowed to learn Acidball, they reply, stop min/maxing, you should RP instead and play what is fun for you. Well guess what? that why I do this suggestion to add this ability, becasue at the moment sorcerer only have 2 acid spell on the sorcerer spell list, and in order to RP a acid dragon sorcerer, it's not very convincing when all you can do it 2 low level spell. I also enjoy dealing some damage, and chromatique orb is one of the weakest attack spell in the book even if you level it up. So what if I want to RP an acid dragon sorcerer I need to RP a sorcerer who cast mainly fire spell? or a sorcerer casting vinegar in the face of the enemy. or on these forum, when someone come and ask to receive some help to optimize his character you often see someone coming posting: you should play what you want to play, and how you want to play it |
| #9Captain_KoboldAug 29, 2014 16:32:12 |
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| #10Thank_DogAug 29, 2014 16:40:27 |
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| #11Thank_DogAug 29, 2014 16:46:18 | The issue with min/maxing isn't that it's anti-roleplaying, it's that it's done solely to get a mechanical advantage in one particular area. The fact is, it's a detriment to the party because although your character might be fantastic at one thing, it ends up being terrible at everything else. Not only that, but in a system like 5e, the benefit to pumping everything into one narrow focus isn't really that much of a benefit, yet drawing on every character building resource to pump that one thing, most definitely is a drawback. It's honestly a bit weird that people would want to do that given that there is most definitely a lower return on investment and far more benefit to a more even spread of abilities and powers. In fact, that's one of the main benefits to 5e and the entire concept behind bound accuracy.
Personally, if min/maxing is really your thing, why fight tooth and nail to do it 5e when it's so much easier to do in 3.x/Pathfinder? Just go play a Pathfinder game and stop butting your head up against a brick wall. |
| #12ppaladin123Aug 29, 2014 17:03:14 | There is no wrong way to have fun as long as your group is all on the same page. Min/maxing is fun for some people and some groups and not fun for other groups. I am cool with it as a DM but I always check with the DM and other players to see if they are cool with it if I am a player. If they are not I hold back a bit or I try to find another group that fits better (depending on who the other players are and what my options are). Same goes for creating a gimped character for the sake of role playing some weird concept (a 8 intelligence wizard or a blind fighter or whatever). Just ask yourself, "is this that type of game?" If everyone is on the same page...brilliant.
That's all there is to it. "Don't be a jerk" It is a collaborative game.*
*Of course theoretical min/maxing on a message board is an inidvidual hobby and doesn't hurt anyone. So have fun...everyone else can piss off.
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| (Reply to #10)CorwynnMaelstrom |
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| #14Thoughts_My_AimAug 29, 2014 18:11:52 |
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| #15Jell_MooAug 29, 2014 18:19:36 | I think that there's a slight misconception as to what min/maxing means. The historical context is pretty simple:
Minimizing your weaknesses Maximizing your strengths
This can range a great deal. It can be as simple as making your character effective: "Hmm, I want to be a good fighter so I'll up my strength, take this combat feat, and play a race that has good melee bonuses."
It can involve looking through new books to find goodies that make your character even stronger: "Wow, this new Prestige Class really makes my Rogue so much better at sneaking and striking from the shadows!"
It can mean cheesing the rules so that you can do things that were never intended but legally work: "Let's see... If I take Whirlwind Attack and Great Cleave... And I carry around a bag of... I dunno... Rats.... HEY!!!"
Or it can simply be taking an odd or atypical concept, and making the most out of it: "I really want to play a melee Warlock that uses a Halberd. If I take this feat, this Invocation and use these spells... Hey, I could be pretty damn good!"
Min/maxing isn't good or bad. It isn't really anything. It's simply a term used to lump together mechanical optimization on a very broad scope. It isn't anti-roleplaying or anything of the sort. It, like everything else has a place, and can become unpleasant if abused. It isn't min/maxers or concept roleplayers that ruin games. It's jerks that ruin games. |
| #16Thank_DogAug 29, 2014 18:31:19 |
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| #17SorxoresAug 29, 2014 20:56:12 |
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| #18crimfan07Aug 29, 2014 21:06:05 | Character optimization isn't in and of itself bad, and IMO some min/maxing is good. It's what we do in real life, where we play to our strengths. The old skool min/maxer went through the rules and found all sorts of little bends that gave every combat advantage (usually). The characters were thin and usually had no RP substance to them. Frequently they were associated with disruptive players who were only happy when they got to roll dice and do tons of damage and otherwise cause trouble. So that's why min/maxing has a bad rap. |
| #19bidAug 29, 2014 21:09:11 | I see min-maxing as bad when it takes that meaning: - max combat value, - min everything else.
The solution is to do stories heavy on challenges and roleplay with a sprinkling of combat. As long as you can handle challenges, you are min-maxing properly.
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| #20RCanineAug 29, 2014 22:06:22 | Since I do a lot of organized play, the problem I have with min/maxing is when players end up with practically the same mechanical options. I once played a high-heroic 4E game with two Eladrin Taclords that had literally the exact same character sheet. That's not fun.
What I love is when players find mechanically interesting rules interactions, and build a character around them. |
| #21ChaosmancerAug 30, 2014 23:01:30 | I think the problem is one of degrees.
There's a webcomic (I believe called Goblins) with a character named Minmax. He gave up his ability to read to gain proficiency in stool fighting. He gave up his ability to dance to get +1 when wielding two weapons of differing types. ect,ect ect. This is a caricature, except some people do stuff similiairly crazy (like the 13 different classes multi-class) and I feel I see it again when people talk about every class should dip into fighter for this ability and then rogue for that ability and then wizard because magic.
However, I always look towards race/class combos to benefit my primary stat, or used a human variant to start ith the powerful feat I want. I do everything I can (not has crazily as I used to) to have as few weak points as I can.
So when you bend things until they are pretzel shaped or broken beyond recognition I call foul. If you play a wood elf archer who takes the sharpshooter feat, I'm cool with that. I am not a fan of multi-classing though for the express puspose of picking up new abilities. It just irks me for some reason that I can't quite spell out |
| #22Jordan175Aug 31, 2014 20:18:42 |
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| (Reply to #12)shut_up_and_roll |
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| #24GobberlerraSep 01, 2014 8:01:33 | Stormwind Fallacy
/thread
From a DM perspective, difficulties only arise when massive power disparities occur within a party (for instance where one character always overshadows another member of the party mechanically when roleplay wise they are equals). In home games a good DM can account for this with encounters, loot distribution etc to let all players have their moments. This becomes more difficult in prescribed APs (and why I personally prefer home games), and I think this is where the bad impression of minmaxers comes from. However good players and groups will ensure that everyone gets the chance to play their character. (And note that this is caused by power disparity *not* specifically if one player is a minmaxer or not)
When I play I tend to try and make weird combinations work, often centered off of a particular unique ability and find that the character and personality grows as I build them. By starting with a suboptimal idea it tends to limit the overal power so that it stays on par with the rest of the group, and the process gives a better feel and investment in the character leading to me being able to role play them more deeply. Not that you have to do that to be able to role play (see stormwind fallacy) just that the constraints and numbers help me. |
| #25PetardoMauritiSep 02, 2014 12:55:55 | The point is that for example, a Wizard with low intelligence would not even become a wizard, or a Bard without charisma, fighter without good strength (or dexterity). Like you cannot go in the college and even finish it if you are too dumb or join firefighters if you are physically weak.
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