Crazy DM

[noob]

Paragon Mindflayer Monster of Legend psion, illithid savant then then did the clockwork mage with it.

Found a feat in one of the dms books that allowed me to interchange metamagic and metamind feats. Did a back story that the dn allowed that made my character start life as a human and took chosen of mysta and spellfire chaneller with spellfire mage, but shar cursed him and changed him to a mind flayer.

So you had mystra initiate and were able to cast in antimagic zones is not it?
How did the gm shut down your powers then?
Was there an antimagic measure better than antimagic zone?
(Technically dead magic is not better than antimagic zones since it counts as antimagic for stopping spells)

[MrSandman]

Game session 1: So far our characters were teleported to an unknown land in which none of our recent abilities or spells worked. We were forced into an arena type setting where we had to fight for our lives. Upon completing our goal we were sent to meet the person responsible for bringing us there. After a series of questions and answering by this Powerful being we were told the only way we can obtain our freedom is to partake an epic journey to retrieve for him the hand and eye of Vecna.

Tells players to create extraordinarily powerful characters. Puts them in a place where none of their powerful abilities works.

Lol?

[Crichton]

Paragon Mindflayer Monster of Legend psion, illithid savant then then did the clockwork mage with it.

Found a feat in one of the dms books that allowed me to interchange metamagic and metamind feats. Did a back story that the dn allowed that made my character start life as a human and took chosen of mysta and spellfire chaneller with spellfire mage, but shar cursed him and changed him to a mind flayer.

Just out of curiosity, what 9 spells did you choose to be immune to, as a Chosen of Mystra? Also, in-universe, I don't think even the gods can shut down Mystra's silver fire, since she controls the Weave, if you're going with the Forgotten Realms lore.

[noob]

Tells players to create extraordinarily powerful characters. Puts them in a place where none of their powerful abilities works.

Lol?

On one hand I think that is not cool for the adventurers living that.
On the other hand it improve the absurdness of that silly epic world to have absurdities like that happening.

[Anachronity]

Game session 1: So far our characters were teleported to an unknown land in which none of our recent abilities or spells worked.

Does he just not know what he's doing? If so, he probably just wants a more abstract superhero-level game, and he's going to get confused when large attack and damage numbers don't challenge the party but then you're suddenly stuck when he sends you to the antimagic demiplane. I would just talk to him, or else accept that combat outcomes are more or less just going to happen via GM fiat and instead try to interact mostly with the story with plot abilities like teleport, plane shift, and divinations.

Called it!

So you had mystra initiate and were able to cast in antimagic zones is not it?
How did the gm shut down your powers then?
Was there an antimagic measure better than antimagic zone?
(Technically dead magic is not better than antimagic zones since it counts as antimagic for stopping spells)

In theory being able to cast when the GM says you can't is a good ability.

In practice, if you have the sort of GM who is going to forcefully put you in a dead magic zone, they're probably just going to say "no, you still can't cast spells, a god did it, nyah!"

[Batman45505]

Ok so the dm was getting overwhelmed at the fact that with epic spellcasting with metamagic and metapsionic abilities. We are fighting an epic advanced terrasque so i begin with an empowered mazimized timestop through my quicken metamagic wand and start the whole spell barrage. Now he is saying casting that many epic spells is taxing on my character and am mentally fatigued and was unable to cast spells for 1d20 turns..... His excuse is it is a variant rule for casters found in the books. I have never encountered that rule. Is he pulling bs out his butt or sid i miss that rule? The most he is willing to allow me to cast is 4 spells a rd provided there is no metamagic involved.

[AvatarVecna]

Ok so the dm was getting overwhelmed at the fact that with epic spellcasting with metamagic and metapsionic abilities. We are fighting an epic advanced terrasque so i begin with an empowered mazimized timestop through my quicken metamagic wand and start the whole spell barrage. Now he is saying casting that many epic spells is taxing on my character and am mentally fatigued and was unable to cast spells for 1d20 turns..... His excuse is it is a variant rule for casters found in the books. I have never encountered that rule. Is he pulling bs out his butt or sid i miss that rule? The most he is willing to allow me to cast is 4 spells a rd provided there is no metamagic involved.

The book this rule can be found in is betwixt the DM's cheeks. At least, I'm pretty sure that's where it's being pulled from. It also speaks more evidence to the DM's incompetence: a DM comfortable with epic would have real mechanics limiting your spellcasting - auto-counterspelling auras or something, for instance, while a DM who just randomly makes up rules to shut you down has no idea what they're doing and is in over their head.

[Mordaedil]

The taxing part of epic spells is already built into the epic spells themselves, he doesn't have to add additional bullcrap on top of it.

[MrSandman]

This basically means that your Dungeon Master had no real idea of what they were getting themselves into. First you can't use your epic powers, then rules pop up ad hoc to solve unforeseen situations...

Really, talk to your Dungeon Master and go back to playing 12th-level characters.

[MeimuHakurei]

This basically means that your Dungeon Master had no real idea of what they were getting themselves into. First you can't use your epic powers, then rules pop up ad hoc to solve unforeseen situations...

Really, talk to your Dungeon Master and go back to playing 12th-level characters.

I'd first ask what kind of power level the DM expected and why they felt the need to push the player levels that high - maybe you can run a short-term/one-shot game at 15-18th level as an example for high-level play.

[GrayDeath]

Sigh, too bad, I had actually hoped for a REAL game with this setup.
Never seen one or even heard of one from a reliable source.

Too bad it seems we were right with assuming the DM has no fricking Idea what he`s doing....

[Arael666]

At lvl 30 you can get pretty mauch lots of monstrous HD or LA and still not hurt your character lvl progression.

I really like melee, so while other people may sugest casters I would go with this:

Antro Baleen Whale, Half Minotaur, Mineral Warrior, for the price of 3 LA and 2 monstrous humanoid HD (not that bad of a HD) you get +22 STR, +2 DEX, +14 CON, -4 INT, +2 WIS, -6 CHA, 17 Natural Armor and lotsa other goodies

[chimaeraUndying]

I'm not sure why other templates are being suggested when Symbiotic and Tauric are on the table (and Eldrich, if we're also using Pathfinder stuff). You can just be a symbiotic tauric creature of four symbiotic tauric creatures, each of which are themselves a combination of three symbiotic tauric creatures and one other creature you want the fun stuff from, ad infinitum.

Even if you're not going with the absolutely insane interpretation, you can still rack up some truly wild freebies from other things with them -- no reason to take a template, race, or monster when you can symbiote or taur your way into being it and more.

[noob]

I'm not sure why other templates are being suggested when Symbiotic and Tauric are on the table (and Eldrich, if we're also using Pathfinder stuff). You can just be a symbiotic tauric creature of four symbiotic tauric creatures, each of which are themselves a combination of three symbiotic tauric creatures and one other creature you want the fun stuff from, ad infinitum.

Even if you're not going with the absolutely insane interpretation, you can still rack up some truly wild freebies from other things with them -- no reason to take a template, race, or monster when you can symbiote or taur your way into being it and more.

Do not forget monstrous lycanthrope if it is allowed and also amalgam creature(again if allowed) it can allow to have all the powers of all the creature you want while increasing of less than 9 your cr if you nest it enough.
Also there is a class allowing to transfer yourself in a machine while losing none of your abilities and you gain the ones of the machine.
Transfer yourself in another machine with that power you kept in the same way as the first time and gain again extra abilities without losing any.
Restart with all the trompe l'oeuils you want until you have all the desired powers.

[chimaeraUndying]

I'd completely forgotten about ML and Trompes, dangit, but that's the first time I'd heard of amalgam -- must've missed it, since it's from 2014.

Now you've got me thinking about what the optimal stack of tauric, symbiotic, amalgam, and monstrous lycanthrope would be. Hmmm...

[noob]

I'd completely forgotten about ML and Trompes, dangit, but that's the first time I'd heard of amalgam -- must've missed it, since it's from 2014.

Now you've got me thinking about what the optimal stack of tauric, symbiotic, amalgam, and monstrous lycanthrope would be. Hmmm...

Simply putting monstrous lycanthrope of human 200 times(a monstrous lycanthrope of an human which is monstrous ... you get the idea) and then putting on the last base monster all the cool stuff you want which is amalgam of all the monsters and T1 mythic spellcasters and awesome martial builds you want (since the cr of the last creature will get divided 200 times in a row by 3)
There is a minimum of +1 cr so you will have all the powers you want for +1 cr.

[Anachronity]

Ok so the dm was getting overwhelmed at the fact that with epic spellcasting with metamagic and metapsionic abilities. We are fighting an epic advanced terrasque so i begin with an empowered mazimized timestop through my quicken metamagic wand and start the whole spell barrage. Now he is saying casting that many epic spells is taxing on my character and am mentally fatigued and was unable to cast spells for 1d20 turns..... His excuse is it is a variant rule for casters found in the books. I have never encountered that rule. Is he pulling bs out his butt or sid i miss that rule? The most he is willing to allow me to cast is 4 spells a rd provided there is no metamagic involved.

It's not a real rule, and there are only nominally going to be actual rules of any sort in this game.

The problem is that the books say having a +30 to attack instead of a +10 is the same as having 9th-level spells instead of 4th-level spells, when they are not in any way comparable. This confuses inexperienced GMs, who expect that their templated, melee-reliant superbeast that the book says is CR 30 will challenge an actual 30th-level party.

I will echo what has already been suggested: talk to the GM. If he's not willing to listen then you may want to quit.

If you don't want to quit (if it's an IRL game then there's a good chance your friends are also playing and it's as much about socializing as about the game) well, then your character is already a monster. Just play him as one. Be the mindflayer!

When people say "there's no reason not to do X", they're speaking from a perspective of game design, not of actual in-practice gameplay. Your GM expects that a high-level character is basically just larger numbers than a lower-level one with a few neat tricks. These tricks might win a fight if used cleverly or if something is particularly vulnerable to them, but they otherwise don't interrupt the status quo of normal melee attacks being valid and important. Play along with that expectation. Buff yourself just enough that you can stand toe-to-toe with the baddies, or launch some spells that do thirty d6s or so but don't sweep all who oppose you into oblivion with a single uncaring gesture. Take liberties in describing the dramatic combat between you and the 25th-level dual-wielding champion of justice that is actually just an 8th level character with higher numbers.


You're still going to get railroaded, because it sounds like your GM also doesn't understand how to give the players meaningful choices, but at least this way you might have some fun stories to relate.

[Batman45505]

I was bummed about the game and thought the dm was able too run it well since hes been running and playing the game since 1978. Lol i was so wrong. I will say that in 2e he ran a level 50 campaign which absolutely rocked. End game reward was a piece of ambrosia which would allow one character to transcend to godhood. Having one piece left the party all wanting it to it became a battle royal.

[EldritchWeaver]

Did you get a chance to talk the GM about your issues?

[Anachronity]

I was bummed about the game and thought the dm was able too run it well since hes been running and playing the game since 1978. Lol i was so wrong. I will say that in 2e he ran a level 50 campaign which absolutely rocked. End game reward was a piece of ambrosia which would allow one character to transcend to godhood. Having one piece left the party all wanting it to it became a battle royal.

2nd edition has a lot fewer dimensions of complexity, making the task of running that campaign a lot easier on him. It's a very dangerous edition where even epic-level characters can realistically bite it to a single failed save versus poison. Factor in that most high-level spells take longer to cast than someone running up and hitting you with a sword, plus the fact that a large number of high-level spells actively encourage the GM to screw with you, and it's not difficult to challenge the players with a block of stats that has three to four curveball abilities.

That amounts to a lot more time spent developing the story, and it still remains easy to improvise if something unexpected happens.



Smash-cut to 3.5, and we have characters that are not just able to do anything in a single turn, but everything within a single turn (or less than that, with things like Celerity, Contingency, Time Stop, and other planes with alternate time traits). Preparing a proper and engaging challenge ahead of time for such a character can take weeks, which are weeks not spent developing the plot, and your GM's improvisational skills which had once been adequate are now limited to kludgy impromptu meganerfs because no easily-conceived threat can harm you otherwise.


Again I urge you to talk to your GM; he's in over his head (and again I expect you'll give us no indication that you have done so, or that you even read my lengthy rants )

The most elegant solution I can think of is a Co-GM; your current GM manages the story and background of the villains, and delegates to the Co-GM by describing them. The Co-GM then does the legwork in mechanically designing these villains and devising what strategies they might employ even before they roll for initiative, since pre-fight planning is a huge factor in epic levels and the villains must be able to do the same.

Even then there need to be limitations beyond just the written rules of the game, because once a character or villain makes the leap of living in a fast-time demiplane and acting only through his army of deific ice assassins it truly does become calvinball.