The other kind of min-maxing

[Umael]

A few objections.

1. Power creep happens to lots of heroes.

*nod*

Not surprised - but just to be technical, I will assume you meant superheroes (especially as you mentioned Wolverine, Hulk, and Batman). Someone like Indiana Jones is definitely a heroic character, but he's no superhero, and his opponents don't have power creep.

[Cue the rebuttals mentioning "Kingdom of the Crystal Skull"]

2. Winning isn't what defines a Mary Sue. Winning in spite of all evidence to the contrary is a good warning sign.

True. I was going for more of the "He wins! He wins! He wins again! He never stops winning! Isn't this exciting?" angle.

3. Constantly winning doesn't make you not a hero, so long as you have setbacks along the way.

Sorry, my rhetoric must have been off.

In my definitions of "hero", I thought of Aragorn as one the literary heroes because he defies Sauron and his own legacy, despite great cost and potential cost to himself.

I certainly did not mean to imply that to be a hero you have to win all the time. It was more of a gripe about the mindset that puts certain people as "heroes" in the story, and the accompanying thought that since they are the "heroes", they can't fail, because they wouldn't be "heroic".

I think it can still be heroic to do something even if there's no risk to yourself, though. Saving someone's life when you might die? Definitely heroic. Saving someone's life when you definitely won't die? Can still be pretty heroic, depending on the circumstances. I mean, Superman gives up nearly his entire life to helping others. That's heroic, even if he's unlikely to get hurt along the way.

But in a way, he is getting hurt, or at least, he is making a sacrifice that we could conceivibly do as well but we often don't because it would hurt us.

Superman as Superman devotes his life to helping people. He believes that with great power comes great responsibility, so he uses his power in every way he can to be, basically, the ultimate Good Samaritan. He goes out of his way to help people and devotes so much of his time and energy and ability to do so.

On THAT I will grant him a measure of respect. He's like the Mother Teresa of the Justice League, not that he does any one good deed, but that he does so many of them.

I think it's only when you stop helping people for the sake of helping people that your heroism can be called into question.

I agree, but just because you are helping people for the sake of helping people - that doesn't necessarily make you a hero.

[Caphi]

Was your background focused at one point about luminous armor and how awesome your character thought it was but then ignored it? Otherwise... I have to go with this:

No, it was the opposite. Taking it would have been weird and sort of jarred the concept. It's a counterexample.

[White_North]

Groovy.

And no, I don't see that tendancy being widespread, but I do completely agree that optimization doesn't guarantee a good RP experience either. But I think what you are talking about are just poor RPers. They didn't get made poor by their optimizing tendancies, they were already bad at it. Seems they found a segment of the game that they like though - the mechanics - and its good they are enjoying themselves. Unless of course they are detracting from their fellow players' enjoyment, but as noted, there is a name for those folks too, and it isn't optimizer. It's jerk.

Yeah. Well, they're not jerks. They do have that immensely competitive spirit that makes them resent the DM if things don't go their way. That, and the fact that I just couldn't stand the way they played, is why I don't DM for them anymore. I still do play with them, but never as a DM (at least not with D&D). They're a good bunch and they sure do have fun, but, to me, it's become more of an elaborate wargame than anything else. I like my narratives to be intricate, real, and full of realistic, consistent, and interesting characters. That's kind of hard to do when one of your protagonist has more templates than he has points in his dump stat and changes alignment every session in order to fulfil the requirements for the next class/Prc in his build, in addition to not having much of a personality at all.

[Gametime]

[Cue the rebuttals mentioning "Kingdom of the Crystal Skull"]

I think that power creep was more on the part of the refrigerator. Either that, or Indy's DM nerfed nuclear weapons for being OP.

I certainly did not mean to imply that to be a hero you have to win all the time. It was more of a gripe about the mindset that puts certain people as "heroes" in the story, and the accompanying thought that since they are the "heroes", they can't fail, because they wouldn't be "heroic".

I agree, and I don't think always winning is necessary to be a hero. For the purposes of heroism in role-playing games, though, I think winning more often than not is usually going to be a requirement, if only because losing isn't usually as much fun.

To put it another way, there are heroic saviors and heroic martyrs, and the former is (usually) the more enjoyable to be.

[Keld Denar]

Yeah. Well, they're not jerks. They do have that immensely competitive spirit that makes them resent the DM if things don't go their way.

AKA jerk

That, and the fact that I just couldn't stand the way they played, is why I don't DM for them anymore.

See also: jerk

I still do play with them, but never as a DM (at least not with D&D). They're a good bunch and they sure do have fun, but, to me, it's become more of an elaborate wargame than anything else. I like my narratives to be intricate, real, and full of realistic, consistent, and interesting characters. That's kind of hard to do when one of your protagonist has more templates than he has points in his dump stat and changes alignment every session in order to fulfil the requirements for the next class/Prc in his build, in addition to not having much of a personality at all.

Sounds like D&D isn't the game for you. Just like not every character is a fit for every player, not every system is a fit for every player. Try a lower rules system like Fudge or Fate, or a non-rules narative style game. Some people enjoy that. Some people enjoy squeezing every last drop of power out of a given set of constraints. Some people like apples, others enjoy rhudabagga.

[Tyger]

Yeah. Well, they're not jerks. They do have that immensely competitive spirit that makes them resent the DM if things don't go their way. That, and the fact that I just couldn't stand the way they played, is why I don't DM for them anymore. I still do play with them, but never as a DM (at least not with D&D). They're a good bunch and they sure do have fun, but, to me, it's become more of an elaborate wargame than anything else. I like my narratives to be intricate, real, and full of realistic, consistent, and interesting characters. That's kind of hard to do when one of your protagonist has more templates than he has points in his dump stat and changes alignment every session in order to fulfil the requirements for the next class/Prc in his build, in addition to not having much of a personality at all.

AKA jerk

See also: jerk

Sounds like D&D isn't the game for you. Just like not every character is a fit for every player, not every system is a fit for every player. Try a lower rules system like Fudge or Fate, or a non-rules narative style game. Some people enjoy that. Some people enjoy squeezing every last drop of power out of a given set of constraints. Some people like apples, others enjoy rhudabagga.

Well, I'd say that it isn't so much D&D, as it is the group you were playing with there. While Keld may be right (D&D is a very mechanical game compared to a lot of the ones on the market), you can have D&D campaigns where drama, RP, tension, intrigue and character interactions are huge. Now, and here is my favorite part, you can have those campaigns either using the D&D rules, or ignoring the rules. Different strokes for different folks.

[Runestar]

Fair point. However, the example that I'm arguing against essentially stated that players would create a backstory for their character, then willfully ignore it in order to make a more powerful set of numbers. That just isn't the way that optimization works.

Why can't I create a character build first, then build a backstory around it? Or revise my backstory later on when I realise the former can no longer accommodate the concept I have in mind? I agree that backstory is useful and all, but it shouldn't become a straitjacket for character design.

[Keld Denar]

One of the most fun aspects of optimization is when you have a given set of constraints. Make the most powerful character you can...using Green Star Adept. Or...using only 2 books outside of core. Or...who is a competant melee specialist at all levels (not just 17+ when you get Shapechange). Or...whatever. You can pick a character flaw, and optimize around it, finding abilities that negate your flaws.

Since we are using superhero analogies today, I point you toward Daredevil. Blind is a VERY suboptimal characteristic for a hero to have. Its nearly crippling, from a D&D PoV. But Daredevil's aquired an accute sense of hearing that essentially gives him Blindsense, and trained in hand-to-hand combat using subtle differences in air currents to predict incoming blows.

THATS character optimization at work. Its not always making THE MOST POWERFUL CHARACTER EVAR!!!!! That character already exists, is named Pun-Pun, and shall never see play at any table, ever.

If you want to play a low-str fighter, good for you. If you think you are gonna do it as a straight fighter, well, you are gonna be SORELY in trouble. There are, however, a number of different classes, abilities, and feats printed that allow you to pick up bonus damage from a HOST of different sources, from high knowledge checks, to dex based Champions of CL, to magically augemented stats and/or formshifting, to swinging your Cha like a hammer.

[Math_Mage]

One of the most fun aspects of optimization is when you have a given set of constraints. Make the most powerful character you can...using Green Star Adept. Or...using only 2 books outside of core. Or...who is a competant melee specialist at all levels (not just 17+ when you get Shapechange). Or...whatever. You can pick a character flaw, and optimize around it, finding abilities that negate your flaws.

What many of the 'roleplay first' people are arguing about is that optimizers let their optimization constrain their roleplaying. "I want to make a Conjurer because it's more powerful than an Evoker, so find a backstory justification for my character being a Conjurer." It skirts the edge of making a backstory to justify one's mechanical power, rather than to fill out one's concept beyond mechanics. Not only is this likely to result in a more shallow backstory, but it also indicates a subordination of roleplaying considerations to mechanical ones.

That's the argument, anyway. I've made my disagreement clear enough on other threads that I don't feel like rehashing it here. But since you mentioned mechanics as a constraint on mechanics, I thought I'd clarify the discussion of mechanics as a constraint on roleplaying.

Since we are using superhero analogies today, I point you toward Daredevil. Blind is a VERY suboptimal characteristic for a hero to have. Its nearly crippling, from a D&D PoV. But Daredevil's aquired an accute sense of hearing that essentially gives him Blindsense, and trained in hand-to-hand combat using subtle differences in air currents to predict incoming blows.

I'd say that's min-maxing, actually. Take a disadvantage (blindness), and then acquire a skill that makes the disadvantage not matter mechanically (blindsense), and also gain benefits from your skill above and beyond what you would have had without the disadvantage.

Yeah, you end up with the disadvantage of not being able to read, but, well, that's just roleplaying.

[Lhurgyof]

Sounds like D&D isn't the game for you. Just like not every character is a fit for every player, not every system is a fit for every player. Try a lower rules system like Fudge or Fate, or a non-rules narative style game. Some people enjoy that. Some people enjoy squeezing every last drop of power out of a given set of constraints. Some people like apples, others enjoy rhudabagga.

Amber is a pretty good role playing game. You have your stats and some abilities and that's really it, roleplaying from then on out.

[Runestar]

I think the bottom line is - You play your game, I play mine, and we leave each other well alone. Don't care about whether you are playing dnd the one right way or not. Everyone's happy.

[Psyx]

It failed to take into account option B - don't contrive circumstances.

But that's the massive characterisation trap with optimising: It encourages and rewards reverse engineering. The player wants to play X uber character, and then reverse engineers the entire character process -right down to region of birth in FR games- in order to fit the optimised 1-20 character build. That's completely the opposite of the way that 95% of games tell you to build characters, and leads to those awful, awful contrived backgrounds that are seen with startling regularity. And I will go out on a limb here and say that the most optimised characters do often tend towards the most unlikely and absurd backstories (if they have one at all), whereas a character designed character-first, numbers later tends towards a more 'realistic' and often better thought out background.

I'll put my hand up here and say that I cheerfully min-max. But I do it in order to crowbar my character concept and back-story into the framework of the rules: The maths comes after the character is designed, because D&D is a constrained game and you have to beat the rules with a stick to make some concepts work.

thirteen times the speed of light

Speedforce baby! Solves everything!

I think all of us would agree that showing up your party is a jerk move.

Yet half a dozen times in the last two dozen threads I've read is something like 'I have to keep bailing them out' or 'None of the other players are optimisers', or utterly rabid offences yelling tired old tropes arguing against even the possibility that optimisation can lead to poor characterisation. Maybe advice on optimisation 'help me' threads should come with a public safety warning: Doing this can make you a complete jerk.

Tell that to the people whose lives he just saved.
You've lost me completely here. So if I'm up against a dragon, and I prepare all kinds of anti-dragon countermeasures and kick his scaly posterior, thus saving the village he's been terrorizing, am I suddenly not a hero?

You were doing your job.

Simply winning does not - from the point of view of culture - make a hero. It makes for a dull, dull, dull story. 'The wizard prepared his buffs in advance, strode in and killed a dragon at no personal risk' makes a duller story and a far smaller hero than a bloke with one leg saving a dog from the river.

True. I was going for more of the "He wins! He wins! He wins again! He never stops winning! Isn't this exciting?" angle.

It's even more tedious in team stories. Ronin started as an ace movie, then when down the pan when it transpired that DeNiro was a better killer than the killer, a better driver then the driver, and could basically do everything.


Heroes have to have flaws and be real people.

[Amphetryon]

But that's the massive characterisation trap with optimising: It encourages and rewards reverse engineering. The player wants to play X uber character, and then reverse engineers the entire character process -right down to region of birth in FR games- in order to fit the optimised 1-20 character build. That's completely the opposite of the way that 95% of games tell you to build characters, and leads to those awful, awful contrived backgrounds that are seen with startling regularity. And I will go out on a limb here and say that the most optimised characters do often tend towards the most unlikely and absurd backstories (if they have one at all), whereas a character designed character-first, numbers later tends towards a more 'realistic' and often better thought out background.

I'll put my hand up here and say that I cheerfully min-max. But I do it in order to crowbar my character concept and back-story into the framework of the rules: The maths comes after the character is designed, because D&D is a constrained game and you have to beat the rules with a stick to make some concepts work.

Once again, I'll ask where you get your percentages and just tell you that the tendencies you describe above are neither typical for my experiences nor in keeping with the vast majority of those posting to this thread. Either a) your perception of the percentages is woefully skewed, b) there's a real statistical anomaly going on with the folks posting here versus the percentages in "real games" or c) you're throwing out unsubstantiated claims and percentages in an effort to make your POV appear substantiated.

I'll just go ahead and flat out disagree with what is apparently your stated opinion that a person who is 'just doing his job' is automatically disqualified from being a hero. I personally wouldn't want to be the one to tell that to a police officer, fireman, or EMT that saved lives.

[Psyx]

Once again, I'll ask where you get your percentages and just tell you that the tendencies you describe above are neither typical for my experiences nor in keeping with the vast majority of those posting to this thread. Either a) your perception of the percentages is woefully skewed, b) there's a real statistical anomaly going on with the folks posting here versus the percentages in "real games" or c) you're throwing out unsubstantiated claims and percentages in an effort to make your POV appear substantiated.

Wow. Can we possibly converse without there being some kind of line in the sand that one has to stand one side of ? "CITE CITE CITE PROVE IT" is not a conversation; it's an argument, and a poor one at that.


Ok... I've been gaming for 28 years. I game a couple of nights a week with a variety of different people; some are optimisers, some are not. I'm involved in a games club, which means that I get to swap co-players fairly regularly. I've gamed with hundreds of players over the years in a wide range of geographical locations, so I have a pretty good sample size. I sometimes go to larger gaming events/conventions and get to roleplay alongside complete strangers. Is that ok with you? How about yourself?

I sit here genuinely amazed that you aren't familiar with the concept of gamers who gen up superman then crowbar any old background into place afterwards, in order to fit the bill and meet all the regional feat/whatever requirements.

[Putting my shrink hat on for a second: Powergaming/competitive gaming/oneupmanship in RPGs CAN (before you jump on it - not always) be indicative of an ingrained need to win/compete/narcissistic personality traits, and Optimisation is an essential tool for that style of gaming. So I'd postulate that the side of the floor defending the legitimacy of optimisation would hypothetically, given a large enough sample size include such players, who would be unwilling to concede even small points in favour of an opposing argument, or be subject to a reinforcing cognitive bias. That would then lead to a statistical bias in the given evidence. I digress]

I'll just go ahead and flat out disagree with what is apparently your stated opinion that a person who is 'just doing his job' is automatically disqualified from being a hero. I personally wouldn't want to be the one to tell that to a police officer, fireman, or EMT that saved lives.

Please go back and read the sentence underneath it, instead of selectively reading with negativity in mind to start with.

Think about some really great stories here the hero is perfect and flawless and always wins for a moment, please. It's a struggle, isn't it? For hundreds of years we've culturally and literally recognised the fact that heroism is overcoming adversity; not just winning. Roleplaying games are about telling a story.


We aren't talking about real life. In real life those people take serious risks and make serious sacrifices if they are to be seen as heroes (LEOs who work traffic duty are not lauded as heroes). They are not perfect, they are not invulnerable, they have threatening problems to overcome. They are not vastly better in terms of HP/lvl/CR than their buddies. They are weak bags of flesh that breaks all too easily.

(And...if you ask them, then 99 days out of 100 they WILL tell you that they're just doing their job, and deny being a hero. Someone who genuinely believes -regardless of their employment- that they are routinely a hero is mentally unbalanced.)

[olentu]

Wow. Can we possibly converse without there being some kind of line in the sand that one has to stand one side of ? "CITE CITE CITE PROVE IT" is not a conversation; it's an argument, and a poor one at that.


Ok... I've been gaming for 28 years. I game a couple of nights a week with a variety of different people; some are optimisers, some are not. I'm involved in a games club, which means that I get to swap co-players fairly regularly. I've gamed with hundreds of players over the years in a wide range of geographical locations, so I have a pretty good sample size. I sometimes go to larger gaming events/conventions and get to roleplay alongside complete strangers. Is that ok with you? How about yourself?

I sit here genuinely amazed that you aren't familiar with the concept of gamers who gen up superman then crowbar any old background into place afterwards, in order to fit the bill and meet all the regional feat/whatever requirements.

[Putting my shrink hat on for a second: Powergaming/competitive gaming/oneupmanship in RPGs CAN (before you jump on it - not always) be indicative of an ingrained need to win/compete/narcissistic personality traits, and Optimisation is an essential tool for that style of gaming. So I'd postulate that the side of the floor defending the legitimacy of optimisation would hypothetically, given a large enough sample size include such players, who would be unwilling to concede even small points in favour of an opposing argument, or be subject to a reinforcing cognitive bias. That would then lead to a statistical bias in the given evidence. I digress]

Well here is the thing there is a difference between understanding a concept but only in theory, seeing it once or twice, and believing that the characterization is one of the most widespread types of gamers. It seems that he is saying that so far as he has seen the type of person you present is not especially common.

[Amphetryon]

Well here is the thing there is a difference between understanding a concept but only in theory, seeing it once or twice, and believing that the characterization is one of the most widespread types of gamers. It seems that he is saying that so far as he has seen the type of person you present is not especially common.

Got it in one.

[2xMachina]

Druids CAN be exalted. There are exalted feats for them you know...
NG can be exalted. Pure Good without the hangups of Law and Chaos.

[Caphi]

Wow. Can we possibly converse without there being some kind of line in the sand that one has to stand one side of ? "CITE CITE CITE PROVE IT" is not a conversation; it's an argument, and a poor one at that.

If you make a claim, and someone else says "no, I think that claim is flawed", it's only polite to try and back up the claim if you intend to stand by it. You can't stand by a claim under contention and refuse to provide any reasoning for it - or at least, that would not be a conversation, just a performance of stubbornness.

Simply winning does not - from the point of view of culture - make a hero. It makes for a dull, dull, dull story. 'The wizard prepared his buffs in advance, strode in and killed a dragon at no personal risk' makes a duller story and a far smaller hero than a bloke with one leg saving a dog from the river.

"Mangarr raged, strode in, and beat up the dragon." That's not interesting either.

If you tell the story boringly, of course it's going to be boring. The wizard isn't omnipotent. His battle was one of intellect characterized by research and preparation and planning, but that doesn't make it inherently less heroic than Mangarr the barbarian, whose battle was one of strength and yelling and rage, and didn't start until he entered the dragon's lair while Wizardington's was completed before he set foot in the dragon's country.

It's a different kind of story, to be sure, but not, in itself, worse. "Psychological thriller" is a genre.

BONUS EDIT:

And as esrz22 said, all optimizers aren't the wizard. A lot of us are playing Mangarr - but we're playing a really strong Mangarr with a lot of talent and tricks under his belt. He may not be invincible, but he's good at being Mangarr. That's optimization.

[Amphetryon]

We aren't talking about real life. In real life those people take serious risks and make serious sacrifices if they are to be seen as heroes (LEOs who work traffic duty are not lauded as heroes). They are not perfect, they are not invulnerable, they have threatening problems to overcome. They are not vastly better in terms of HP/lvl/CR than their buddies. They are weak bags of flesh that breaks all too easily.

And they train and prepare to minimize and mitigate those risks inherent in being 'weak bags of flesh.' Simply because a Wizard, a Cleric, or a Druid (to name a few examples) use Magic to minimize and mitigate the risks instead of doing squat thrusts and running laps, it does not negate their training or preparation, nor should it inherently limit the scope of their heroism when they kill the dragon that's been terrorizing the kingdom.

[Psyx]

And they train and prepare to minimize and mitigate those risks inherent in being 'weak bags of flesh.' Simply because a Wizard, a Cleric, or a Druid (to name a few examples) use Magic to minimize and mitigate the risks instead of doing squat thrusts and running laps, it does not negate their training or preparation, nor should it inherently limit the scope of their heroism when they kill the dragon that's been terrorizing the kingdom.

And minimising and mitigating those risks does make it less heroic. Diving in to save a drowning child is less heroic if you stop to put on a life preserver. That's the way of it. The greater the personal risk, the greater the heroism. Our armed forces don't dish out medals for simply sucking down an artillery barrage from the safety of a nicely prepared bunker, because that's simply not heroic.

Again though: We are discussing stories, not real life. Proper Preparation might Prevent Pi...errr...Very Poor Performance, but it makes a rubbish story. Tales of a hero preparing for a combat that they then sail through don't make the best seller list. Saga-wise, tales of heroes obtaining items to defeat a foe are themselves laced with oodles of risk.

Culturally speaking I'll once again ask if you can think of a few examples of heroes always sailing through without risk to themselves, while being perfect. Those tales don't survive because there is no literary tension.

Instead of launching a constant offence against any perceived weak point in my individual comments [which there will be, because this is an imperfect medium], please think about the wider scope of what is being said, and think in terms of ideas, rather than a series of blows to be either riposted if appropriate or side-stepped and forgotten if not. I'm not planning on doing any fencing until tomorrow evening.

You asked about my experience and said it didn't tally with your own. What has your own experience of the points you raised been?

[Esser-Z]

(one comic had him doing something that would require him to move thirteen times the speed of light)

Worse than that. Thirteen TRILLION times the speed of light.

I'll just go ahead and flat out disagree with what is apparently your stated opinion that a person who is 'just doing his job' is automatically disqualified from being a hero. I personally wouldn't want to be the one to tell that to a police officer, fireman, or EMT that saved lives.

"I wish more soldiers had your definition of 'just doing your job'"--Admiral Hackett

Tales of a hero preparing for a combat that they then sail through don't make the best seller list.

Batman.

[Umael]

Just something to toss in here on optimization:

I'm making a character for a 7th Sea game - it will be the first time most of us have ever played in 7th Sea or made a character for it.

When I first was told about the game system and had a chance to look at it, I didn't really have a concept. New game, new setting, new system, all of that. Eventually I came across the idea of doing a runic sorcerer. This was my concept, barely formed.

The first big chance to talk about it with our GM for this game, he told me that I would want to pick up the "Fury" rune.

Long story short - no, no I did not.

A beginning runic character who picks up the "Fury" rune has made a big mistake. At higher "levels" (7th Sea doesn't really use levels, but whatever), sure, it is decent, but at the lower levels it sucks!

Spoiler

Show

A beginning character starts with at most Resolve 3 and Wits 3, and a max Rank of 3 for any sorcerer skill. (Resolve + Rank) keep (Resolve) means that a beginning character must roll 6d10, keeping the highest 3 (aka 6k3), or take damage. With Wits 3, a beginning character can only cast 3 beginning spells per day - and multiple casting and failures count towards this total.

"Fury" lets out a lightning bolt attack. To attack and for damage, roll (Mastery + Rank) keep (Mastery). A beginner has Mastery 1. So 4k1... roll four ten-siders, keep the highest one.

A basic thug, the equal of a D&D 4.0 minion, has 1 hp. It also has a defense of 10. That means to hit a minion, I would roll four dice and hope that at least one of them is a "10". And I can only do this 3 times a day (Wits 3, remember).

Pretty pathetic, right? It gets better. Sorcery costs 40 points. A beginning character starts with 100 ponits. I spent 40% of my points to create someone who's magical ability is absolutely pathetic.

So I changed the concept. Without hesitation or guilt.

Believe me, I wanted the "Fury" idea to work, but the more I thought about it, the more convinced I was that my character concept would suffer because of the mechanics behind that decision.

That was a form of optimization, but it wasn't the only one.

Recently I sat down and looked at everything. Skills, Advantages, Backgrounds... which one, which one? I put more work into my character concept, and then sent my prelimary character sheet (a complete list of all relevant stats and my reasoning behind them) to the GM for his input and okay.

At this point in time... I have no solid story, no back history made in mind. Why bother? My character might not get approved as he stands. Things might need to be changed. Suggestions given.

I have, in essence, made my character without a backstory, done the character design, the mechanics, first.

Can anyone say with conviction that I am wrong, say it with enough conviction to convince a neutral, impartial third party? I doubt it.

[Caphi]

snip

Can anyone say with conviction that I am wrong, say it with enough conviction to convince a neutral, impartial third party? I doubt it.

I won't. Regardless of which end comes first, ultimately the character and the build should harmonize, and sometimes that requires compromise from one side or another. Adapt the concept if the system says you will not have fun playing it, and adapt the build decisions if they run against the grain of the character you want to play. Ultimately you have to play both sides of every character, so both sides have to be fun for you. Everything else is to be compromised for that, if necessary.

[Psyx]

Batman

One example doesn't make a cast-iron case at all, and it still seldom seems to go without any hitch anyway. An easy end to a story can be worse than a badly-written one, due to anti-climax.

I genuinely find batman dull though, for the same reasons that I find Superman dull. 'Look how awesome he is' doesn't work as a hook for too long. I appreciate Batman has been going a while, but there seems to have been a definite power creep, and he now seems utterly unstoppable. His only flaw is his angst it seems, and that to becomes tedious after about one book normally*.



*cf Elric, Drizzt *yawn*

[tiercel]

The thing about "Stormwind Fallacy" invocations/discussions is that it seems that about for every time someone falls into the trap of the fallacy, someone invokes it fallaciously.

To wit: "Stormwind Fallacy" merely says that optimization does not necessarily come at the expense of roleplaying development, and vice versa.

The problem arises when someone wields "Stormwind Fallacy" like a fasces built out of nightsticks in the hands of a Divine Metamagic: Persistent ClericZilla to say that optimization never comes/cannot come at the expense of roleplaying development (or, of course, vice versa). (Perhaps I should call this misapplication of the "Stormwind Fallacy" the "Tiercel Fallacy," so that people can invoke it, too, in a pithy way.)

Just because there doesn't *have* to be a correlation of "rollplaying vs roleplaying" doesn't mean the two are always completely independent.

Additionally, there is no one "correct" way to play D&D (or any other RPG). A "more optimized" character (whether we are talking about a "higher tier" character vs a "lower tier" character, or simply a more mechanically optimized version of a specific character for a particular build idea) does not inherently make for a better or worse gaming experience, because such a character does not exist in a vacuum.

It is a question of playstyle. We don't say the Ravenloft-loving player is inherently better than the, say, Spelljammer-loving player. Finding a single campaign to please both may be more difficult if players have radically different playstyles, though, and this is particularly evident if one player wants to play a "higher tier"/"heavily optimized" character in a party made up of lesser mortals (and who isn't willing to distribute much of his power amongst the other, i.e. as a buffer), or if one player wants to play a "lower tier"/"weakly optimized" character in a party made up of virtual demigods (without some mechanical ability that will allow him to contribute meaningfully and on the same level with any level of regularity).

I have, in essence, made my character without a backstory, done the character design, the mechanics, first.

Can anyone say with conviction that I am wrong, say it with enough conviction to convince a neutral, impartial third party? I doubt it.

Of course not, without knowing anything about how the other players are playing. If they are trying to play a "roleplay-intensive" game where backgrounds wind up being woven into the fabric of the story -- whether or not they are "heavily optimized" -- then creating a character this way, *for this game*, is probably not the best idea.

OTOH, if the game's story is going to be more or less what the game's story is, and roleplay (especially the impact of character background) is going to be relatively light, then designing a character in this fashion may be not only perfectly valid but a good idea (since anyone who invests too much time in character background might just wind up disappointed that it never matters).

[Boci]

Just because there doesn't *have* to be a correlation of "rollplaying vs roleplaying" doesn't mean the two are always completely independent.

Obviously, but so is whether you like cola or pepsi. Just because you like pepsi, doesn't mean you are automatically a worse roleplayer than someone who likes cola, but it can happen. Basically, sarcastic hyperbole aside, if the two are not automatically related, there is only limited value in bringing it up.

[AtwasAwamps]

Batman.

...is regularly battered because he's a punk and a bit stupider than popular and memetic culture make him out to be. This is a guy who got beat up by a drug-fueled luchador who outsmarted him, alright? Let's not go waving the Batman flag. Stupid black-leather-wearing reject from hot topic...::grumble grumble::

This thread is starting to feel like a sequel to the High-Op Man, Low-Op World one I started a while back, but with a great deal more venom. I suppose that’s bound to happen when two people choose to argue.

I am currently a player and a DM in two groups, one low-op, one high-op. The high-op group has better roleplayers, more creativity, and is more fun to play in and run for because of their ability to separate power and character. The low-op group is frustrating, as they tend to play one note characters, roleplay poorly, and make combat increasingly difficult to the point of frustration.

I enjoy my time in both of them because of the friends I’ve made, but I have to say, the high-op group plays a better game. One of them has never played 3.5 before and he’s playing his cloistered cleric flawlessly. It’s kinda awesome to watch.

Also, regarding Superman – something to remember about him is…he can’t really turn off most of his powers. He controls them and its almost second nature, but there was an entire issue about how difficult it is to control his super-hearing…to the point where he simply can’t. Which means he can hear every…single…crime happening not just in his city, but halfway across the continent. But he knows that he can’t stop them all. It would be too much even for him and then he’d be too drained to handle a real threat if it cropped up, or too distracted, or simply not fast enough. So every minute of his life, Superman has to make a choice…he has to let some people die because he knows that if he tries to save everyone, he’ll doom everyone eventually.

Badly-written, Superman is pathetic.

Well written…well, frankly, there’s a reason he’s Superman.

[Esser-Z]

Batman was actually a joke, because of the fan "with planning, he can beat anyone!" thing.


But on a more serious point... there's a very big difference between WATCHING some guy plan and then succeed and YOU YOURSELF planning and then succeeded. An RPG is a far more interactive environment, and its tropes are different than cultural fiction.

[AtwasAwamps]

Batman was actually a joke, because of the fan "with planning, he can beat anyone!" thing.


But on a more serious point... there's a very big difference between WATCHING some guy plan and then succeed and YOU YOURSELF planning and then succeeded. An RPG is a far more interactive environment, and its tropes are different than cultural fiction.

Obviously.

And also I despise batman. Stupid batman.

[Amphetryon]

And minimising and mitigating those risks does make it less heroic. Diving in to save a drowning child is less heroic if you stop to put on a life preserver. That's the way of it. The greater the personal risk, the greater the heroism. Our armed forces don't dish out medals for simply sucking down an artillery barrage from the safety of a nicely prepared bunker, because that's simply not heroic.

Your opinion on the inherent contradiction in calling a rescue worker, police officer, or soldier 'heroic' for doing their job is duly noted.

It's also an opinion. Your presentation style, thus far, has given many of us, myself included, the impression that you hold the belief that your opinion is fact. On this point, I must strenuously disagree.