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February 11th, 2013, 02:00 PM
#1
Woody
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Be Specific (2/11)
Last night was the first session of our new campaign. If there were thoughts going in that Thunk might be a beast,last night confirmed it. He doesn't have any dailies, and his damage doesn't vary wildly from one hit to the next. But when, on average, you're starting with +20 to hit (before you drop dice) and are doing 24 points of damage. Monster start to take note. The trade off is in defenses. At level 10 I could be doing better, but it doesn't fit my class and our defender can only mark one target at a time. So, I'm constantly at risk. I racked up a lot of damage. Luckily Taks was there with heals all night.
An unfortunate side effect of Thunk's monstrous consistency though is that the DM is already feeling the need to ramp the monster up. This scares me. The DM rolls well. If he ramps monsters up a hair too far, he'll decimate the party in no time. And I just don't have the defense or hitpoints to keep everyone alive. Which is, in part, why I'm playing this character. "Keep everyone alive" is my usual role either by healing, controlling the battlefield, or waltzing into combat to grab attention, giving the others the opportunity to get out of harms way. With Thunk, not so much.
---
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February 11th, 2013, 04:24 PM
#2
HeroZero
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Always scary if they want to ramp the difficulty... you never know when your luck will run out.
On a completely unrelated note I made a Toast character in TERA, it just seemed... appropriate. i1320.photobucket.com/albums/...ps4854b04d.png
Out of Curiousity who was it that played Toast back during DAoC?
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February 11th, 2013, 04:48 PM
#3
dripnote
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February 12th, 2013, 08:01 AM
#4
Bonzai
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DM'ing an optimized party can be a challenge. You want to keep the party engaged, make them sweat a little, and keep things interesting. Unfortunately, when the party and the DM gets into an arms race, the balancing point that the DM must walk becomes razor thin. One slip can lead to a party wide wipe out, which is fun for no one.
An example? I play with some VERY experienced players. More experienced than myself. Still I volunteered to take a turn DM'ing. I don't know how familiar you re with 3.5 edition material, but here is what the party ended up as;
Wizard/ Psion/ Psychic Theurge: He had full access to two casting systems, and he devoted them entirely to problem solving and countering any threats that I threw at them.
Beguiler/Fatespinner/Guild Mage: He handled the rogue aspects, and in combat he used his enchantments and illusions to handle battle field control. This was potent enough, but his truly potent contribution came from Fatespinner. This PrC allows him to give re-rolls to allies, and force re-rolls on opponents. In essence, he took luck out of the equasion. Guild mage allowed him to expand his spell list significantly.
Ranger/?/? (I can't remember the exact PrC's he used (order of the bow intiate or some such, it's been a while). He was a maxed out, perfectly optimized archer. This was decent in and of it's self, but then the party casters tricked him out each day with magical buffs to ramp up his damage to extreme levels. Flaming, searing, etc... He was doing close to 300 damage a round.
Dread Necromancer: He had impressive minions who could tank, and had insane save or die spells.
So we had a magically powerful party with layers of defenses, various sources of damage, all played by very experienced players. We had started at lvl 1, and ended at lvl 22. At the end I quickly realized that in order to keep challenging the party, the encounters could potentially wipe out the party in one go, or at the very least end in multiple deaths. That was not something that I as a DM was willing to do. As a DM my goal was to challenge, not kill the players. Towards the end I started feeling like I was letting the party down, as they were blowing through the encounters with apparent ease.
I expressed my concerns to the party after the campaign ended, and they gave me some good advice. They said that not to worry about it. They were having fun, and that was all that mattered. Yes they were powerful, but they had earned that power through leveling, and I was simply allowing the characters to do what they were intended to do without handicaping them like many DMs do. As long as the story and encounters were interesting, then it didn't matter so much that the party could walk all over it.
So my advice to your DM is to not worry about an arms race. That leads to party deaths which shouldn't be the goal....ever.
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February 12th, 2013, 11:46 AM
#5
Woody
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This party is not optimized personally or within the group dynamic. The players made most of their decisions based on roleplaying. If this group was optimized (with 6 players at the table) it would be nigh impossible to DM for the group without just shrugging off XP budgets and putting us against stuff 4-5 levels above us.
Where I appreciate that you're "just trying to help" I'd like to reiterate here: please only offer directed advice when it's asked for. Unless you're part of the situation, you don't really know enough about said situation to give personal advice. I know that sounds a touch hard nosed. But I've found that it really does seem to cut down on forum disputes.
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February 12th, 2013, 01:06 PM
#6
magi7456
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I am a newbie with pen and paper RPG (mostly Pathfinder) and I didn't know what the DM was going to throw at us, but the group seemed more about role playing aspects rather than the combat. So it could be very boring and long when we weren't adventuring and/or exploring.
It is sad that we pride ourself on being mentally well adjusted to such a profoundly sick society.
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February 12th, 2013, 01:16 PM
#7
ShadowWolf81
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Slightly off/on topic .... but Woody, As much as youve been mentioning your weekly D&D sessions.. do any of your group ever play (or have played) Neverwinter? The game series based off D&D, were you could even build your own areas/quests... dungions.. and characters? Are ya looking forward to the release of that Neverwinter Online game if you have?
Whats your thoughts on how well they are able, or not able, to translate the 'fun' you can have at a weekly D&D table-top day, vs what theyve managed to do with the Neverwinter series?