This isn't really a request for advice, I'm more in the mood to complain in general. Our DM has decided that we should be accompanied by two DMPCs. While I understand that we don't have a rogue, we've got methods by which we intended to deal with locked obstacles and traps. But I can understand us having a DMPC rogue just incase.
The real issue is the second, also know as the Mary Sue, the All Powerful DMPC, the PC that would be overpowered in anyone elses hands (and still is). In our last game the DM boosted some of the too weak creatures we were about to face (we're 2 levels higher than suggested). That was all good, we went back and forth a little bit, no one was doing poorly and we'd knocked out one of the three baddies, the other being half dead. The DMPC had been hanging back for a bit, "afraid" of the big monster, but now that it was alone (we having killed the second sidekick), the DMPC charges at the 'boss' monster. And crits. And knocks off half of its health.
I'm thinking, whatever, crits happen there are more fish in the sea. Knocking out half it's health is a little high, since it also seems to be a full progression divine caster, but maybe that's because it's also the chosen of a god, so whatever. The thing is still putting up something of a challenge. We beat on it a little more when it grabs a potion and chugs it. All of it's wounds disappear and we gear up for a big throw down. This would have been pretty cool, but the DM explained clearly that she did it because the fight was going to quickly (maybe we shouldn't travel with agents of the gods then?), in the middle of the fight, which ruined the effect. So we start beating on him (again), only now the monster passes every save it comes across. Well guess who crits? She who is the DM's PC. Again, half off hit point night. The fight wraps up shortly after while the DM complains that it had been anti-climactic.
Really? Your scion of a god made the fight with buffed up goblins too easy? Maybe if she couldn't heal us to full after every single fight? Maybe if she didn't make every spot, search, listen, and knowledge check that we fail? Maybe if she couldn't fly at the blasted speed of sound and had DM-Vision, so that she always knows what everything is and tells us. I'm a little irritated because my character is presenting an alter ego, but the DMPC grins and explains that "Oh, that character isn't everything they appear to be." Great, that's awesome. Maybe-here's a thought-I should play a rock and you can throw me at enemies.
That wouldn't be so bad if I hadn't been largely forced into a character. Race chosen for me, backstory half-chosen for me, so on, so forth. Completely counter-intuitive to my idea, hell, completely counter intuitive to my classes. My class bases it's power off Constitution, but the race I've been given has a -2 there, no es bueno amigo. It gets a +2 to Dex and Cha though! Except I don't really need either. Arg! The game can be pretty fun, but there are just moments where I feel like my head is going to just pop off, like "BOOM" pop off. So, I'm letting it out. That was actually pretty theraputic to me. Hooray Therapy!
Disclaimer: The game is not a bad game and aside from a few things, the DM isn't a bad DM. I don't want to leave and still have fun for the majority of the game. Some pent up irritations are just boiling over and the DM is not the type that takes criticism well (at all). All in all, it's a positive experience, just, really really frustrating sometimes.
Sorry to hear. Hope you feel better, I know getting things off my chest helps. And because misery loves company, here's a story from my only real encounter with the DMPC:
I played in a group once where the DMPC would kill every major baddie. Sure we could kill the Goblins but who scored the killing blow on the Hobgoblin? DMPC. Always the kill shot. ALWAYS! I kept track after it happened a couple of times. I suspected the DM would either just say the monster dies when it still had HP or would add hit points until it was his DMPC's turn.
And these stories would be the reason DMPC's are bad.
Dealing with the Mary Sue DMPC is relatively easy. Just sit back and don't do anything.
"Us, help YOU? Pfft. You're so much more competent than us, we'd just get in the way. You go ahead and take care of this, we'll make some sandwiches."
I must admit to feeling conflicted on reading this. If you wanna stay, that's great! But may I reccomend giving your DM a few hints so that she may improve? (Even if they must be delivered via a smack upside the head)
The next question is, how blunt should the hints be? I mean, I guess you could RP your PC making popcorn and passing it around to the rest of the party, claiming that the scion will kill everything, or try to be a bit more, well, subtle.
This would have been pretty cool, but the DM explained clearly that she did it because the fight was going to quickly
You may want to explain to her that such explanations take the enjoyment right out of the game for you. If she's going to pull DM fiat, she must keep quiet about it.
For the DMPC problem, I'd communicate with the other players and agree to delay every round, while cheering on Mary Sue. Just huddle together with weapons sheathed and watch Mary Sue save the day. If the DM offers to 'tone the DMPC down', don't take the bait. All DMPCs must leave the party before you, the players, will enjoy the game again. If the DM pouts, it is time to talk about someone else putting on the DM hat.
All DMPCs must leave the party before you, the players, will enjoy the game again. If the DM pouts, it is time to talk about someone else putting on the DM hat.
I have found one way to make DMPCs more-or-less acceptable to a group - it is controlled by a PC in-battle. Out of battle, the DM has control of it, but in-battle it is treated as a PC and is run by a PC. It doesn't always help with the sort of DM shenanigans that exist, but it can mitigate them at the least.
My DM doesn't have a DMPC. He as DMNPCs! Admittedly the party is very powerful. (3E game.) We can take a lot and dish out a lot. However, every so often we have to face a big tough monster we just can't defeat. No matter what we do to it, it's still there knocking everyone close to 0 or even below. After several rounds of this, in comes the NPC out of nowhere to save the day.
When the party collectively does 500 points of damage or more over several rounds, we deserve the monster to be dead already and not have some NPC who didn't travel with us pop in with some instant kill effect, which can include its own melee attacks.
I have found one way to make DMPCs more-or-less acceptable to a group - it is controlled by a PC in-battle. Out of battle, the DM has control of it, but in-battle it is treated as a PC and is run by a PC. It doesn't always help with the sort of DM shenanigans that exist, but it can mitigate them at the least.
Another option I formulated for myself is the notion of a DMPC that isn't a PC. So an NPC that you control that aids the party, but usually can't fight. Perhaps it's a parrot with the soul of a human. Perhaps a monkey familiar that is incredibly intelligent, that ran away from its master. Perhaps a ghost that doesn't want to hurt anyone or anything with its abilities.Something that allows the DM to steer the party, something that probably has some story significance, yet something that cannot steal the party's thunder and is designed to fill a hole the party had.
Here's how we handled our budding DMPC.
Though the DM was relitively new, he'd done an awesome job of mapping out a continant, detailing places/people/things/events, etc. And, aside from a few minor things, the initial adventure was pretty good.
However.... He was operating under the delusion that he could continue to play the game as both DM & Player. Thus in our 1st adventure we were forced to travel with his drow monk character. At first this wasn't all that bad (well, except for the fact that it was a drow - had he paid attention to the backgrounds we'd written he'd have known this would present a real racial problem. And it did) & we gave him the benifit of the doubt. Afterall, both our characters & the drow were working for the same patron AND for this particular instance cooperation made some sense. But as the first few weeks of play progressed we came to realize that this wasn't just an NPC designed for this opening arc.... No, he actually thought this character would always be with us.
We had other ideas.
We also had differing ideas about wich directions we wanted to go adventure-wise. The DM? He had something in mind where we'd become embroiled in the local politics of this one city & get sucked into a war up on the northern border. Once again, had he actually read the backgrounds of the characters we'd made.... Thus the surviving characters found themselves with zero motivation to be involved in the plot of city x. Especially as they apparently dealt with drow.
And so the surviving 2 pcs determined that this was not where they wanted to be. That we'd be better off seeking our fortunes elsewhere. Once we got back to town we pulled out our awesome map, arbitrarily chose a few interesting sounding places (far far away) & proceeded to ask the DM what we knew/could find out about them. Then we chose one based upon that info, laid in supplies for a 4 week journy, hired some extra muscle (IE; the 2 new replacement PCs of the other characters) & set out south 3 days later. 
Next session would be chapter one of our journey south.
As we were exiting the city gates the DM asks us "What about the monk?" Our reply was "What about him? Why would we tell him where we're heading? He's not part of our party."
Talk about a look of surprise on the DMs face!
This led to a rather lengthy after game discussion where the DM realized that this group played ALOT differently than what he was used to & that his style would have to evolve. Towards the end of his run he'd become a much better DM.
My DM doesn't have a DMPC. He as DMNPCs! Admittedly the party is very powerful. (3E game.) We can take a lot and dish out a lot. However, every so often we have to face a big tough monster we just can't defeat. No matter what we do to it, it's still there knocking everyone close to 0 or even below. After several rounds of this, in comes the NPC out of nowhere to save the day.
When the party collectively does 500 points of damage or more over several rounds, we deserve the monster to be dead already and not have some NPC who didn't travel with us pop in with some instant kill effect, which can include its own melee attacks.
I feel for you! Been there, had that done to me. The adventure felt about as heroic as a bunch of turnips rolling down a hill.
DMPC's are awful most of the time. The only ones acceptable are NPC's that stick with the group for a short time and then leave.
If you don't have enough players suggest using companion/leader/Hireling feats. Or simply run an extra character done by the players. The DM should NEVER player from the party point of view.
Ok first I would like to point out that a DMPC is not BAD. It is a tool that if used right can bring great fun to the game. Some people don't know how to use them right so they give the tool a bad name.
Now Here is what I would do. First talk to the rest of the group to see how they feel about this subject. If they feel the same as you then as a group talk to the DM before the next game. Tell the DM that you all love the DMs game for the most part and think he is doing a great job But that the DMPC is taking some of the fun away from the group. There is a point when the DMPC tool became to flashy and takes the spot light from the PCs and that is when the DM should take the DMPC out.
Note: Some DMs use a NPC as a DMPC for other reasons. Like they act flashy with the character just to get your goat so they can turn the NPC/DMPC into a on going bad guy so be careful. You might suggest this for the Character if you like. It could make for a great story ark.
I can certainly relate. I've had two very different experiences with DMPCs. One of them a mutants and masterminds campaign, where all of us players are weak physically, and the DMPC is a super powered robot. His character is more than capable of doing everything on his own, but he doesn't. He is almost incapable of doing less-than-lethal attacks, and in a super-hero game, this is bad. This makes the game pretty fun, as we have a tool at our disposal(character is VERY open to player commands), however, its very dangerous to use said tool. I think this is probably a pretty good method of DMPCing.
However, I've had a pretty rough experience as well. This is especially irritating for the afore mentioned secret identity issue. Somehow, my character is using nondetect, conceal allignment and misdirection spells out the wazoo, but this character still knows every gorram thing about me. Makes it really hard to do business, when all the dm has to do to railroad the party is waltz in next to me and proclaim I'm an assassin. Guess I had it coming trying to kill his favorite npc and whatnot. This character is also extremely powerful. When enemies attack or he attacks enemies, we just watch him roll, and then gleefully proclaim either, "_____ takes no damage again!" or, "Looks like _____ just killed a couple of them!" Another problem is the character is admittedly 4 levels higher than our characters, from the getgo. He's much too powerful on paper, which wouldn't bug me if he'd show some restraint. And, for the battles ending too quickly, he actually sorta hulked out on our first bossfight, as soon as we were able to fight him(hulked out meaning turning into a werewolf, EGADS!) and actually proclaimed, "You guys probably should just stay out of the way, you dont want to get too close to ______ when he's angry like this." The boss of course only tried to fight the dmpc, and was incapable of hurting him. About the time I managed to sneak behind the boss, the DM decides he flees, cause the DMPC is beatin on him so badly. I'm not sure how one justifies what seemed to be intentionally making the party completely useless. On the bright side, the game is taking a time-out while my good DM gives this guy some anti-railroadin lessons. Perhaps this will fix it.
Honestly as a dm ive ran dmnpcs before. The first time it was in saga and i only had two players. so it was a docter (since neither could heal) who could also fly their ship. it worked fairly well i thought since it filled a hole they dident have and i only had him speak if the players wanted me to. heck they even had to rescue him once when he almost drowned.
The second time was in the same two person game but that was becuse it was another game system. the players wernt familiar with and he was tagging along with the group till they got the rules down and then he was going to betray them :P
But yea when i run them i rarley have them do anything the group should do other than drop the ocassional hint and i try to even weaken them in respect to a normal character so players should still fill better the the npc. I hated it when one of my last dms had a solar who traveled with the 4th level group that could go around and 1 shot everything, sigh.
I think your group needs to have a heart to heart with the DM. Tell him you enjoy your games, but the DMPC is really dragging things down, and it would be the better game without them.
I actually kind of wish we had a DMPC in my current game. We were traveling with a band of npcs for a while, and we had a common cause we were united under so it worked out good and they didn't feel just tacked on. Sometimes we would need to do quests that required more than one group so we would split up, with the npcs going one way us going the other. Or times maybe one or two of them would tag along with the party while we did a quest, but they were clearly npcs. Anyway one of them was a cleric, who later met some horrible death and ever since then we have no form of healing in the party besides my Crusader (3.5 game) and crusaders are not that good at healing. So at times I really wish we had a DMPC cleric. Not likely to ever going to happen though, the DM just doesn't play that way.
I think railroad comes into play alot more with DMPC tool is used wrong. It is just easier for some DMs to tell you what happened instead of making what you did into the story whether they wanted that way or not. It is kind of lazy IMO.
There are good ways and bad ways to use a "DMPC".
For example, the campaign i'm in righ now has a hobgoblin cook run by the DM. He doesn't participate in fights, he doesn't make decisions, he's a plot hook but a permanent one. If anyone can remember the conan the destroyer movie (yeah the one with Arnold governator): the blond is a DMPC. Shes there for all the story, she may even be the main character which all the other characters are there to protect, and she makes decisions. These can be thought of as party npcs.
The bad way: make the dm's character the best player in the group. Its a conflict of interest to have a player know everything the dm knows (that includes dm's boy/girlfriends roomates ect). There may be exceptions, such as you only have 2 or 3 people total, and you need an extra pc to make a party, but for the most part, its too hard to separate what you know behind the dmscreen from how your player will react.
Also bad "deus ex machina" the godlike being who swoops in and fixes everything. Think the level 10 or less party who has Elmister teleport in and cast an epic spell every time things get tough. it undermines the players sense of accomplishment.
if for some reason your group absolutly needs the extra body, make some rules like no action points, or only one encounter power per encounter.
Sounds like your GM is a bit off a Carebear, I dont think they're doing it for the glory. I'm curious to know whether or not you saw the crits rolled or were they behind the screen? Also, does your group have a healer?
In my 3 and 3.5 campaigns over the past years, I often had to provide my PC's with an NPC healer, because none of them would ever ever play a cleric, even when someone rolled a druid, the player stopped spell progression around about level 6 to become a shapechanging threshing machine. It was quite simply that or have the group run with no healer.
There are ofc right and wrong ways to do it. Second time round I made the NPC blind and had one of the players pick the spell list (except for a few sandbagged escape+commune spells). In the first game I made the NPC cleric a ghost posessing the groups paladin (CG vs the LG pala ;)), the PC could swap between the 2 characters. This lead to some fun highjinx, but in the end instead of being a handycap, her incorprealty problem resulted in them using her as a scout/spy, it got a ibt annoying. Sigh, paladin in leather fetish gear, brings a tear to my eye just thinking about it. 
I see 2 ways of dealing with this, IC and OC.
OC, just take the DM aside and tell her you'd rather risk your PC's dying by the whim of the dice than having the NPC tag along. If she's willing to cooperate, and still wants the NPC accompanying you, then suggest that she gets captured by enemies and her eyes put out, or just miraculously struck blind. Lol, IC you could just have a PC do, as long as that player doesnt mind rerolling after the rest of the group put him down for his "treachery".
Or IC you could just have the party decide she is too valuable to risk dragging along in adventures, buy her a nice temple somewhere and ask her to focus on prayering for the ability to ressurect fallen PC's ;)
My party had a problem with DMPCs since the story line's progression. Not with an uber-powerful Mary Sue--we could have dealt with that.
We got a long list of ever-changing DMPCs. When a new class would come out, there's a new DMPC. When a new build comes out, there's a new DMPC. A new race? A few new feats? New DMPCs.
What made it worse was that for the first three months, there were seven players. Seven. And a DMPC. And a new DMPC every other week (one game a week). After a month, his characters didn't even have names to us. The Warden is now an Avenger? *shrug* That Dragonborn is now a Gnome? Meh. Okay.
It got to the point where we essentially ignored the character all the time. No conversation, no congratulation, rarely any healing. If the DMPC wanted to go somewhere in town, we waved our hands and said "Have fun."
Eventually, we had to talk to the DM (a very good friend of mine) and tell him that we thought it was time for him to stop with the DMPCs. My fianceé and I each said that if he wanted to play instead of run, either of us would be willing to run some short story arcs so he could have a real PC.
Since that conversation, there have been no DMPCs, and without them, our party has finally gelled into something pretty awesome. Our DM has more fun characterizing the random people and monsters we come across (at least more fun than he'd expressed earlier), and we've finally hit a real plot arc to finish out our heroic tier.
Hard as it can be to just be up-front with your DM, they need to know how you feel. Saying something like this (especially about something the DM seems to care about) can be really hard on party dynamics, but it will never work if you don't try. On the other hand, if you want to have your PC characters making popcorn and cheering, or scurrying up trees to throw fruit and heckle, that sounds hilarious. Make sure you laugh like Statler and Waldorf.
I've had little issues with GMPC's over the years, but perhaps my experiences have been lucky compared to the norm. In almost every scenario, GMPC's exist as temporary party members that join the group for a little while and then leave, for whatever reason. Death, family crisis, previous obligations, so on and so forth.
I can certainly understand when a GM wants to use a character to help move the story, or even just experience some of the fun the players do, but I would certainly try to keep the focus on the actual players and not the GM. GMPCing is not a horrible thing, or even a slanderous thing, but a useful tool in the right and proper hands.
Of course, any tool in the hands of the improper can be turned into a weapon, so beware!
To the Op: just send your DM and e-mail detailing how you feel about this. and also why are you complaigning abnout him basically making your charcter for you? the only way i see him being able to do that is if you allowed him to. at any rate just get the character killed and roll up something that you like
The new DMG2 has guidelines on 'Companion Characters' which would solve a lot of problems too. They're simplified characters (or can be tamed animals etc) with less abilities and mechanics that can be tailored to fill out a hole in a party. The DM controls him out of combat (minimally, he should be a companion rather than a party member) and a player gets to control him in combat (which is simple as they're much more basic than PCs).
For instance if your party of 3 is lacking a leader and your striker is an Avenger, then you could introduce a Companion clergyman (Cleric) who respects and follows cues from the Avenger (Avenger controls him during combat).
This way there's no chance of the DM stealing spotlight during a fight at all, and the companion doesn't burden the other player too much as they're so much more simple than full PCs.
And if you want to spread around the responsibility of a Companion to other players then you can always have different ones coming and going as appropriate to the story. The clergyman may lose his nerve after seeing too much fighting, but the Fighter's old trainer (Warlord) comes to aid the party (Fighter gets a turn with a Companion).
Here's how we handled our budding DMPC.
Though the DM was relitively new, he'd done an awesome job of mapping out a continant, detailing places/people/things/events, etc. And, aside from a few minor things, the initial adventure was pretty good.
However.... He was operating under the delusion that he could continue to play the game as both DM & Player. Thus in our 1st adventure we were forced to travel with his drow monk character. At first this wasn't all that bad (well, except for the fact that it was a drow - had he paid attention to the backgrounds we'd written he'd have known this would present a real racial problem. And it did) & we gave him the benifit of the doubt. Afterall, both our characters & the drow were working for the same patron AND for this particular instance cooperation made some sense. But as the first few weeks of play progressed we came to realize that this wasn't just an NPC designed for this opening arc.... No, he actually thought this character would always be with us.
We had other ideas.
We also had differing ideas about wich directions we wanted to go adventure-wise. The DM? He had something in mind where we'd become embroiled in the local politics of this one city & get sucked into a war up on the northern border. Once again, had he actually read the backgrounds of the characters we'd made.... Thus the surviving characters found themselves with zero motivation to be involved in the plot of city x. Especially as they apparently dealt with drow.
And so the surviving 2 pcs determined that this was not where they wanted to be. That we'd be better off seeking our fortunes elsewhere. Once we got back to town we pulled out our awesome map, arbitrarily chose a few interesting sounding places (far far away) & proceeded to ask the DM what we knew/could find out about them. Then we chose one based upon that info, laid in supplies for a 4 week journy, hired some extra muscle (IE; the 2 new replacement PCs of the other characters) & set out south 3 days later.
As we were exiting the city gates the DM asks us "What about the monk?" Our reply was "What about him? Why would we tell him where we're heading? He's not part of our party."
Talk about a look of surprise on the DMs face!
This led to a rather lengthy after game discussion where the DM realized that this group played ALOT differently than what he was used to & that his style would have to evolve. Towards the end of his run he'd become a much better DM.
This is a pretty good way of dealing with it. Luckily you had a DM who was not vindictive.
You simply acted in character. Granted ditching a travelling companion like that would be a complete jerk move in real life, but really if your characters didnt care for that person in character, you would have in character reasons for ditching them. It not being a PC gave you the right.
I'm not normally a fan of passive aggressive BS, but I think the way you did it wasn't a passive aggressive action at him, but rather a well thought out way of explosing the fact that the DMPC was out of place.
DMPCs can have a place, but most of the time it is the sign of a DM bored with DMing.
I've been dming for a while in 4th edition. The problem with my current group is we have *no* healers. So I include a healer, and another NPC for storyline. This is mainly a religious themed campaign so fitting in a healer isn't all that hard.
The other NPC is attached to one of the non-religious characters.
The problem is the other NPC is a class I'm designing. It's a striker class based on the Ranger with some tweaks to make it fit with the story. He does some good damage and occasionally rolls pretty amazingly. My players tend to think that he's just meant to be powerful because he always does well in combat and does a lot of damage. When in reality, he's just playing in combat well and has some skills that I noticed the party was missing.(He's basically a ranger...his damage is going to be pretty awesome.)
This doesn't seem to be the case for you...I would just sit down and talk about it. Basically tell him the NPC's are stealing your thunder. He should be open to that...concern for a game and your PC's role shows well meaning interest in the game. He should realize that...and, if he doesn't, help him realize it.
The problem is the other NPC is a class I'm designing.
Good for you, this is a challenge in its own right.
Does it have to use up play time with your group though, with you running the character and assessing whether the design works, as well as DM-ing?
That's not a pointed question, I have no idea how else one would go about playtesting a class design. You could get it PEACHed in the houserules and homebrew section, but that's not the same as play-testing . . .
Somebody said your DM is a carebear. I'm not sure he/she is. That "DM played PC" is a little bit of a power/control trip for your DM, I think. I would never put a fully fleshed out player character in the game and play it myself!
I've never heard of a thing like this before... And that the character is overpowered is chosen by some God too. Somebody mentioned "Deux Ex Machina" and that is exactly what it is... More like "DM Ex Machina" tho. This "DMPC" steals the spotligt and controls things so that nothing unexpected happens that the DM doesn't want. It's the most fun when the player characters are the most important participants in the campaign story, and you + the DM tell it together.
That is just so... Not right!
I'm usually a player in the games we play and I'm glad we've never had a DMPC. That being said- I DM every so often and for one fight gave the party a DMPC.
The party had met this character before during an arena tournament and sought him out. Two players were cornered by guards (framed for murder) and another came back with this "DMPC" after finding him in the tavern (he was a 7'6'' tall goliath). The player rolled a burst attack against the guards and rolled awesome, I made the goliath pick up a pew/bench and attack about 10 guards (just made up an attack for it) and I only rolled one attack below 14. Needless to say the palyers escaped quite handily after that.
I know that the swordmage (the one that got the goliath) was really excited, he thought it was awesome. I don't think anyone else minded it too much. I made him leave right after and had a paladin help them out for a few fights during the climax the very next session. The paladin was weaker then them though. I tried to keep them the "stars."
All DMPCs must leave the party before you, the players, will enjoy the game again. If the DM pouts, it is time to talk about someone else putting on the DM hat.
I have found one way to make DMPCs more-or-less acceptable to a group - it is controlled by a PC in-battle. Out of battle, the DM has control of it, but in-battle it is treated as a PC and is run by a PC. It doesn't always help with the sort of DM shenanigans that exist, but it can mitigate them at the least.
Generally, I don't include NPC allies unless the PCs really work for them via skill checks, and then I pass combat control to the player who passed said check. However, if the player attempts to use that NPC against their nature they'll have to roll a skill check to command them to do it. Failures can result in the NPC refusing the order, leaving the party, or turning on the PCs, depending on the order and the degree of failure.
Works quite well.
I'm ADHD, and badly, so I avoid having NPC's tag along with the party. It's tough enough for me to keep track of as it is.
As the DM, though, I really wanted to be a player. Problem was, no one else wanted to DM. So I compromised, and created a pair of DMPC's to make up the numbers and sate my desire for PC awesomeness.
Worked pretty well... except that my characters were ridiculously effective. So much so that they occasionally outshone one or two of the other PC's. Moreover I discovered that one CANNOT be invested as a DM, actively trying to defeat the PC's with your allotted resources, if you also have characters you're invested in trying to succeed against you. You know the monster weaknesses, powers, and abilities. You know how strong they are, how hurt they are, and what they'll do next.
My attention was split, so I did poorly there... and I just wasn't challenging the group.
My solution? Tailor encounters to my party, pack off my DMPC's on a sidequest on their own (bye bye!) and create a PC of my own... a boss of sorts, a legal character, but with minions and allies! I now have a villain with depth, character, and armies of critters to back him up. He's fun, he's got character, and if the party kill him, so be it... but now at least I'm giving them a challenge!
Lesson learned. I still have trouble remembering that my story and my plot are not necessarily the main attractions of the game sometimes, but I'm getting there! *grins*
The problem is the other NPC is a class I'm designing.
Good for you, this is a challenge in its own right.
Does it have to use up play time with your group though, with you running the character and assessing whether the design works, as well as DM-ing?
That's not a pointed question, I have no idea how else one would go about playtesting a class design. You could get it PEACHed in the houserules and homebrew section, but that's not the same as play-testing . . .
That's a really good question...let me try not to be uber long winded about it.
It really doesn't use up play time with the group...because his story is very important to the PC he's attached to and the class is necessary to make the story more immersive. I have him built up to level 10 with the group and have had no complaints so far. He doesn't win battles or solve problems for the group unless it would be something that would make sense for him to know basically related to the story.
It honestly helps more to playtest him as a DM...I can see exactly what's going on with him. It also doesn't hold back or overpower another character if he's playtested by a PC. Also...if he's unbalancing or bothersome...he's easily pulled out as a DM.
If I were to give advice on playtesting...I would definitely advise to playtest in the manner I have...it's worked wonderful me.
I've been dming primarily my whole career in D&D and gaming in general...so DMing has become somewhat of a second nature to me...I love it and it's easy for me after so much experience...so it might not work for early goers...but if you're comfortable dming and you have everything well thought out it works pretty well.