Notice that I said absolutely nothing about starting equipment. The fact that they weren't using basic equipment doesn't mean that they were minmaxed, it just means that they were a higher level party with level-appropriate gear. You're trying to force the term to mean "anyone who's better at something than I am." Seriously, if you made a character who was 1st level and had basic starting gear, would you call another character who was 5th level and had a few magic items "minmaxed?"
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
we don't know that the "semi pros" were actually skilled,
Oops, I didn't include the outcome. Sorry about that.
There were three companies involved in the game: our supplier (the semi-pro team), us, and one of our customers. Each of us had 10 people. We teamed with our customer, making it 20 v 10. The semi-pro team of 10 won the first gameby a small margin.
For the second game, the people running the arena had noticed what was going on so they got us to play a game with mixed teams of 5. That was much more fun, and what we should have done right at the beginning.
Okay, to steer this conversation back to D&D, in 5E it's extremely easy to make a character that's good at one particular thing. It's nearly impossible to build a character who's the best at everything. People forget that the "min" part of "minmax" is part of the equation. Such a character will inevitably have some things that they're not good at. If one character is minmaxed and dominating every fight, the GM is probably screwing up in one or more ways. For one, they're probably not throwing enough encounters at the party per long rest, allowing the minmaxer to freely use all their limited use abilities instead of having to actually consider whether or not they want to burn them now or wait for the next fight. If the minmaxer is also a spellcaster, the GM is likely clustering enemies too tightly together, allowing AoE spells like Fireball to become more effective than they really should be. And they're probably not throwing enough variety into the fights so the party never encounters foes that force them to change tactics once in a while.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
Notice that I said absolutely nothing about starting equipment. The fact that they weren't using basic equipment doesn't mean that they were minmaxed, it just means that they were a higher level party with level-appropriate gear. You're trying to force the term to mean "anyone who's better at something than I am." Seriously, if you made a character who was 1st level and had basic starting gear, would you call another character who was 5th level and had a few magic items "minmaxed?"
is level disparity always min/maxing? no. is it sometimes? maybe. what's fundamental is that there are ways to stand out while not alienating others. seems like player intent would swing things heavily, but that's difficult to rely on (or interpret).
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
unhappy at the way in which we lost individual purchases for one-off subclasses, magic items, and monsters?
tell them you don't like features disappeared quietly in the night: providefeedback!
Optimization/ Min-maxing is by no means bad when used appropriately. The problem comes when somebody only cares about dealing with any kind of issue by blowing everything up. It can also get in the way of the story or what would make sense within the campaign, like having 28 AC at Level 4. For example, say an average sized party is in a very dangerous situation against an enemy that they really need to weigh their options on what they're going to do, and plan out their moves. Now, if there is a very heavy optimizer in the party, this can all go out the window when they only want to deal an average of 120+ damage per turn at level 9. This can completely lower the stakes of almost every situation the players are in, considering that if a character is very well optimized, they are better than just about everyone else in their party at anything, and can make players feel useless or less interesting in any situation. As long as a DM can find a way to make this work so that they and the other players are having fun and feel useful though, then it's all fine.
Okay, to steer this conversation back to D&D, in 5E it's extremely easy to make a character that's good at one particular thing. It's nearly impossible to build a character who's the best at everything. People forget that the "min" part of "minmax" is part of the equation. Such a character will inevitably have some things that they're not good at. If one character is minmaxed and dominating every fight, the GM is probably screwing up in one or more ways. For one, they're probably not throwing enough encounters at the party per long rest, allowing the minmaxer to freely use all their limited use abilities instead of having to actually consider whether or not they want to burn them now or wait for the next fight. If the minmaxer is also a spellcaster, the GM is likely clustering enemies too tightly together, allowing AoE spells like Fireball to become more effective than they really should be. And they're probably not throwing enough variety into the fights so the party never encounters foes that force them to change tactics once in a while.
This is true in a vacuum, but it kind of misses the forest for the trees. I can build an encounter around a highly optimized character; I can't build a game around a player who wants to be a god. The two aren't the same thing, but they are correlated; I'm not saying every optimizer is a selfish jerk, but I am saying that a disproportionate number of selfish jerks are optimizers. Restructuring your encounter design doesn't solve the selfish jerk problem, and that's why a lot of DMs are apprehensive about highly optimized character builds; it's not necessarily about what they specifically do, it's about what they represent.
Y'all can skip this story if you want, it's not core to the point, but I can tell you the exact reason I decided I had to audit my players' build choices. I once ran a three-session short adventure for young adults at a library; at session zero, all the players indicated that they were familiar with 5e, so we decided to play at level 6. One player asked if he could use the Tunnel Fighter style from that one Unearthed Arcana. Should've been a bigger red flag, but I decided to let him. I had a general idea what was coming, so I made sure the first combat included a few spellcasters to give the other players time to shine. Sure enough, our boy showed up with the legendary Bugbear Polearm Sentinel with Tunnel Fighter, and proceeded to shut down every melee monster on the field. That was fine because there were also casters, and his Wis save was +0. The look in this dude's eyes when he got hit with one Command spell. His party mates mopped up the casters (teamwork!) but I could tell from that moment on this was gonna be war.
He showed up to the next session with a completely different character build (without asking), and I let him play it because we only had the room for two hours and I decided it wasn't worth it. Sorlock this time; the super-long-ranged kind. I threw in a few monsters with a burrow speed and halfway decent stealth; the rest of the party thought that was great, but you best believe big man didn't care for it. I wanna be clear that at no point was min-Maxwell anything but the absolute most deadly character on that table, but it wasn't enough for him. Third session he showed up with some kind of weird Barbarian-Rogue hybrid; I'm honestly not sure what it was supposed to do and by that point it didn't matter; party fought a zombie dragon, party killed the zombie dragon, adventure ended, I never saw that guy again.
So here's the punchline; I did the thing DMs are supposed to do. I adjusted my encounters to allow a player to use their highly optimized build while also providing opportunities for their less optimized teammates to do well. You know what I got for it? I got a butthurt optimizer and four other reasonably satisfied players who had no idea they'd just watched me DM three of the hardest sessions of my life. (I also got invited back to DM at the library again but thus far I've demurred) Could I have sat down and had a talk with Bugbear guy? Sure, maybe, but I'm not his dad and despite what a lot of players seem to think, DMs aren't literal magicians. I don't know a series of words that turns a jerk into a not jerk, and I feel it's kind of unfair to tack amateur therapy onto all the other work I'm already doing for my campaigns. So, yeah, minmaxing isn't the problem; but it's sometimes a pretty good barometer of the problem, and I for one am never letting a player who wants to use Tunnel Fighter sit at my table again. Unless they bring snacks.
Notice that I said absolutely nothing about starting equipment. The fact that they weren't using basic equipment doesn't mean that they were minmaxed, it just means that they were a higher level party with level-appropriate gear. You're trying to force the term to mean "anyone who's better at something than I am." Seriously, if you made a character who was 1st level and had basic starting gear, would you call another character who was 5th level and had a few magic items "minmaxed?"
is level disparity always min/maxing? no. is it sometimes? maybe.
Explain exactly how you use minmaxing to achieve a level disparity in the party.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
This is true in a vacuum, but it kind of misses the forest for the trees. I can build an encounter around a highly optimized character; I can't build a game around a player who wants to be a god. The two aren't the same thing, but they are correlated; I'm not saying every optimizer is a selfish jerk, but I am saying that a disproportionate number of selfish jerks are optimizers.
My experience is that the selfish jerks don't really optimize, they just cheat.
This is true in a vacuum, but it kind of misses the forest for the trees. I can build an encounter around a highly optimized character; I can't build a game around a player who wants to be a god. The two aren't the same thing, but they are correlated; I'm not saying every optimizer is a selfish jerk, but I am saying that a disproportionate number of selfish jerks are optimizers.
My experience is that the selfish jerks don't really optimize, they just cheat.
Okay I know this isn't the topic but I'm morbidly curious; cheat how?
This is true in a vacuum, but it kind of misses the forest for the trees. I can build an encounter around a highly optimized character; I can't build a game around a player who wants to be a god. The two aren't the same thing, but they are correlated; I'm not saying every optimizer is a selfish jerk, but I am saying that a disproportionate number of selfish jerks are optimizers.
My experience is that the selfish jerks don't really optimize, they just cheat.
Okay I know this isn't the topic but I'm morbidly curious; cheat how?
The classics are "forgetting" to record use of spell slots, points, and other consumable features or even damage, frequently "accidentally" rolling so the d20 falls off the table or is otherwise out of most peoples' LoS and insisting they got a high roll that should count, and insisting that spells or abilities have much more powerful effects than they actually do.
Okay I know this isn't the topic but I'm morbidly curious; cheat how?
There are lots of ways. It tends to start in character creation when you're rolling stats and they get coincidentally very lucky on their attribute rolls... which you didn't actually see them make.
This is true in a vacuum, but it kind of misses the forest for the trees. I can build an encounter around a highly optimized character; I can't build a game around a player who wants to be a god. The two aren't the same thing, but they are correlated; I'm not saying every optimizer is a selfish jerk, but I am saying that a disproportionate number of selfish jerks are optimizers.
My experience is that the selfish jerks don't really optimize, they just cheat.
And when you have someone who cheats, you either get them to stop (if possible) or boot them.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
I mean so far it seems pretty obvious to me that the problem is not optimisation or multiclassing (which is an optional rule anyway, even if I normally use it.). The problems are:
- Lack of communication of expected power level in session 0.
- ******* players (which you really can’t fix, there’s always going to be some people)
- And differing perceptions of what constitutes optimisation at all. I wouldn’t consider multiclassing or even taking good feats optimisation, personally, but I would consider a highly specialised build optimisation (e.g. that wizard/cleric build which shall remain nameless).
I’m about to start running a game at level 8, in a high-magic, high-power and very dangerous world. As a result, my players (who are all experienced and rules-savvy) have optimised. And because this was communicated, and because we all know each other, there is unlikely to be any problems, even though one of them has triple digit nova damage. It’s an individual issue rather than a systemic issue.
Notice that I said absolutely nothing about starting equipment. The fact that they weren't using basic equipment doesn't mean that they were minmaxed, it just means that they were a higher level party with level-appropriate gear. You're trying to force the term to mean "anyone who's better at something than I am." Seriously, if you made a character who was 1st level and had basic starting gear, would you call another character who was 5th level and had a few magic items "minmaxed?"
is level disparity always min/maxing? no. is it sometimes? maybe.
Explain exactly how you use minmaxing to achieve a level disparity in the party.
could the use of level disparity ever be called min/maxing? maybe, i said. my inner brennan lee mulligan wants to go on to suggest that advantageous seating at an adventures league table could be a thing. i'm not committed to fleshing out that scenario, though. could the use of min/maxing achieve a level disparity? that's a different question. no, probably not without deliberate miscommunication. or a lax dm. in which case: yes. there's probably a universe where drawing a lucky joker from a "sure, you can start with any one magical item" deck of many things could happen. but sanctioned min/maxing isn't sucking the air out of the room by itself.
Okay, I'm out. When a scenario requires someone drawing one specific card from the Deck of Many Things, it's an indication that the discussion has moved well beyond reasonable concerns and is just looking for arguments.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
could the use of level disparity ever be called min/maxing?
Min-maxing is about getting the largest possible benefit out of a fixed resource pool. Having a larger resource pool (higher level, better stats, etc) isn't min-maxing, though it has a good chance of being power gaming.
I mean so far it seems pretty obvious to me that the problem is not optimisation or multiclassing (which is an optional rule anyway, even if I normally use it.). The problems are:
- Lack of communication of expected power level in session 0.
- ******* players (which you really can’t fix, there’s always going to be some people)
- And differing perceptions of what constitutes optimisation at all. I wouldn’t consider multiclassing or even taking good feats optimisation, personally, but I would consider a highly specialised build optimisation (e.g. that wizard/cleric build which shall remain nameless).
I’m about to start running a game at level 8, in a high-magic, high-power and very dangerous world. As a result, my players (who are all experienced and rules-savvy) have optimised. And because this was communicated, and because we all know each other, there is unlikely to be any problems, even though one of them has triple digit nova damage. It’s an individual issue rather than a systemic issue.
Hihello Im one of the players in this group(Not the triple digit nova one, hes better at this than me lol. My steady is 54, my nova is 95). I completely agree that its an individual group thing if its an issue, but I especially have a point to make about the third bullet here about differing opinions of optimization. Ive been at tables where they angrily called it 'minmaxing'(They meant optimization) when I put my highest stat in DEX...... As a rogue. Or WIS as a cleric. Or INT as a wizard. The fact that the idea of what optimization is to each group is so different, combined with the needless stigma around having anyone coming even close to 'minmaxing' makes it annoyingly stressful to find new groups(Especially without a session 0), as sometimes simply putting your highest score in a primary stat for your class is completely unacceptable to groups.
Im gettin a bit ramble-y here, but the point is PLEASE HAVE SESSION 0S WITH YOUR PLAYERS and establish exactly what constitutes as reasonable and unreasonable optimization for everyone
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NNCHRIS: SOUL THIEF, MASTER OF THE ARCANE, AND KING OF NEW YORKNN Gdl Creator of Ilheia and her Knights of the Fallen Stars ldG Lesser Student of Technomancy [undergrad student in computer science] Supporter of the 2014 rules, and a MASSIVE Homebrewer. Come to me all ye who seek salvation in wording thy brews! Open to homebrew trades at any time!! Or feel free to request HB, and Ill see if I can get it done for ya! Characters (Outdated)
could the use of level disparity ever be called min/maxing?
Min-maxing is about getting the largest possible benefit out of a fixed resource pool. Having a larger resource pool (higher level, better stats, etc) isn't min-maxing, though it has a good chance of being power gaming.
since this is directed at me, I'll add that different people could view "a fixed resource pool" differently. that's the only way I could begin to explain something like ChrisTheSoulcasterMage's issue with ability score allocation consternation. session zero, for sure.
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unhappy at the way in which we lost individual purchases for one-off subclasses, magic items, and monsters?
tell them you don't like features disappeared quietly in the night: providefeedback!
since this is directed at me, I'll add that different people could view "a fixed resource pool" differently. that's the only way I could begin to explain something like ChrisTheSoulcasterMage's issue with ability score allocation consternation. session zero, for sure.
That is min-maxing. It's just so very basic that most people don't react to it.
since this is directed at me, I'll add that different people could view "a fixed resource pool" differently. that's the only way I could begin to explain something like ChrisTheSoulcasterMage's issue with ability score allocation consternation. session zero, for sure.
That is min-maxing. It's just so very basic that most people don't react to it.
Debatably, it's the origin of the term. You roll your stats randomly, and put the big numbers in the stats you plan to use and the small numbers in the stats you aren't going to use.
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Notice that I said absolutely nothing about starting equipment. The fact that they weren't using basic equipment doesn't mean that they were minmaxed, it just means that they were a higher level party with level-appropriate gear. You're trying to force the term to mean "anyone who's better at something than I am." Seriously, if you made a character who was 1st level and had basic starting gear, would you call another character who was 5th level and had a few magic items "minmaxed?"
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
Oops, I didn't include the outcome. Sorry about that.
There were three companies involved in the game: our supplier (the semi-pro team), us, and one of our customers. Each of us had 10 people. We teamed with our customer, making it 20 v 10. The semi-pro team of 10 won the first gameby a small margin.
For the second game, the people running the arena had noticed what was going on so they got us to play a game with mixed teams of 5. That was much more fun, and what we should have done right at the beginning.
Okay, to steer this conversation back to D&D, in 5E it's extremely easy to make a character that's good at one particular thing. It's nearly impossible to build a character who's the best at everything. People forget that the "min" part of "minmax" is part of the equation. Such a character will inevitably have some things that they're not good at. If one character is minmaxed and dominating every fight, the GM is probably screwing up in one or more ways. For one, they're probably not throwing enough encounters at the party per long rest, allowing the minmaxer to freely use all their limited use abilities instead of having to actually consider whether or not they want to burn them now or wait for the next fight. If the minmaxer is also a spellcaster, the GM is likely clustering enemies too tightly together, allowing AoE spells like Fireball to become more effective than they really should be. And they're probably not throwing enough variety into the fights so the party never encounters foes that force them to change tactics once in a while.
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
is level disparity always min/maxing? no. is it sometimes? maybe. what's fundamental is that there are ways to stand out while not alienating others. seems like player intent would swing things heavily, but that's difficult to rely on (or interpret).
unhappy at the way in which we lost individual purchases for one-off subclasses, magic items, and monsters?
tell them you don't like features disappeared quietly in the night: provide feedback!
Optimization/ Min-maxing is by no means bad when used appropriately. The problem comes when somebody only cares about dealing with any kind of issue by blowing everything up. It can also get in the way of the story or what would make sense within the campaign, like having 28 AC at Level 4. For example, say an average sized party is in a very dangerous situation against an enemy that they really need to weigh their options on what they're going to do, and plan out their moves. Now, if there is a very heavy optimizer in the party, this can all go out the window when they only want to deal an average of 120+ damage per turn at level 9. This can completely lower the stakes of almost every situation the players are in, considering that if a character is very well optimized, they are better than just about everyone else in their party at anything, and can make players feel useless or less interesting in any situation. As long as a DM can find a way to make this work so that they and the other players are having fun and feel useful though, then it's all fine.
This is true in a vacuum, but it kind of misses the forest for the trees. I can build an encounter around a highly optimized character; I can't build a game around a player who wants to be a god. The two aren't the same thing, but they are correlated; I'm not saying every optimizer is a selfish jerk, but I am saying that a disproportionate number of selfish jerks are optimizers. Restructuring your encounter design doesn't solve the selfish jerk problem, and that's why a lot of DMs are apprehensive about highly optimized character builds; it's not necessarily about what they specifically do, it's about what they represent.
Y'all can skip this story if you want, it's not core to the point, but I can tell you the exact reason I decided I had to audit my players' build choices. I once ran a three-session short adventure for young adults at a library; at session zero, all the players indicated that they were familiar with 5e, so we decided to play at level 6. One player asked if he could use the Tunnel Fighter style from that one Unearthed Arcana. Should've been a bigger red flag, but I decided to let him. I had a general idea what was coming, so I made sure the first combat included a few spellcasters to give the other players time to shine. Sure enough, our boy showed up with the legendary Bugbear Polearm Sentinel with Tunnel Fighter, and proceeded to shut down every melee monster on the field. That was fine because there were also casters, and his Wis save was +0. The look in this dude's eyes when he got hit with one Command spell. His party mates mopped up the casters (teamwork!) but I could tell from that moment on this was gonna be war.
He showed up to the next session with a completely different character build (without asking), and I let him play it because we only had the room for two hours and I decided it wasn't worth it. Sorlock this time; the super-long-ranged kind. I threw in a few monsters with a burrow speed and halfway decent stealth; the rest of the party thought that was great, but you best believe big man didn't care for it. I wanna be clear that at no point was min-Maxwell anything but the absolute most deadly character on that table, but it wasn't enough for him. Third session he showed up with some kind of weird Barbarian-Rogue hybrid; I'm honestly not sure what it was supposed to do and by that point it didn't matter; party fought a zombie dragon, party killed the zombie dragon, adventure ended, I never saw that guy again.
So here's the punchline; I did the thing DMs are supposed to do. I adjusted my encounters to allow a player to use their highly optimized build while also providing opportunities for their less optimized teammates to do well. You know what I got for it? I got a butthurt optimizer and four other reasonably satisfied players who had no idea they'd just watched me DM three of the hardest sessions of my life. (I also got invited back to DM at the library again but thus far I've demurred) Could I have sat down and had a talk with Bugbear guy? Sure, maybe, but I'm not his dad and despite what a lot of players seem to think, DMs aren't literal magicians. I don't know a series of words that turns a jerk into a not jerk, and I feel it's kind of unfair to tack amateur therapy onto all the other work I'm already doing for my campaigns. So, yeah, minmaxing isn't the problem; but it's sometimes a pretty good barometer of the problem, and I for one am never letting a player who wants to use Tunnel Fighter sit at my table again. Unless they bring snacks.
Explain exactly how you use minmaxing to achieve a level disparity in the party.
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
My experience is that the selfish jerks don't really optimize, they just cheat.
Okay I know this isn't the topic but I'm morbidly curious; cheat how?
The classics are "forgetting" to record use of spell slots, points, and other consumable features or even damage, frequently "accidentally" rolling so the d20 falls off the table or is otherwise out of most peoples' LoS and insisting they got a high roll that should count, and insisting that spells or abilities have much more powerful effects than they actually do.
There are lots of ways. It tends to start in character creation when you're rolling stats and they get coincidentally very lucky on their attribute rolls... which you didn't actually see them make.
And when you have someone who cheats, you either get them to stop (if possible) or boot them.
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
I mean so far it seems pretty obvious to me that the problem is not optimisation or multiclassing (which is an optional rule anyway, even if I normally use it.). The problems are:
- Lack of communication of expected power level in session 0.
- ******* players (which you really can’t fix, there’s always going to be some people)
- And differing perceptions of what constitutes optimisation at all. I wouldn’t consider multiclassing or even taking good feats optimisation, personally, but I would consider a highly specialised build optimisation (e.g. that wizard/cleric build which shall remain nameless).
I’m about to start running a game at level 8, in a high-magic, high-power and very dangerous world. As a result, my players (who are all experienced and rules-savvy) have optimised. And because this was communicated, and because we all know each other, there is unlikely to be any problems, even though one of them has triple digit nova damage. It’s an individual issue rather than a systemic issue.
I can’t remember what’s supposed to go here.
could the use of level disparity ever be called min/maxing? maybe, i said. my inner brennan lee mulligan wants to go on to suggest that advantageous seating at an adventures league table could be a thing. i'm not committed to fleshing out that scenario, though. could the use of min/maxing achieve a level disparity? that's a different question. no, probably not without deliberate miscommunication. or a lax dm. in which case: yes. there's probably a universe where drawing a lucky joker from a "sure, you can start with any one magical item" deck of many things could happen. but sanctioned min/maxing isn't sucking the air out of the room by itself.
no level disparity in my 5e games. games for which i'm often the dm. so take that with a grain of salt.
also, i didn't mean to pull the "freedom from level disparity" sword from the stone. someone else can lead camelot against the saxons.
anyway, i agree: all dice roll on the table. floor dice go to dice jail unremarked for border infractions and attempted caltrops impersonation.
unhappy at the way in which we lost individual purchases for one-off subclasses, magic items, and monsters?
tell them you don't like features disappeared quietly in the night: provide feedback!
Okay, I'm out. When a scenario requires someone drawing one specific card from the Deck of Many Things, it's an indication that the discussion has moved well beyond reasonable concerns and is just looking for arguments.
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
Min-maxing is about getting the largest possible benefit out of a fixed resource pool. Having a larger resource pool (higher level, better stats, etc) isn't min-maxing, though it has a good chance of being power gaming.
Hihello Im one of the players in this group(Not the triple digit nova one, hes better at this than me lol. My steady is 54, my nova is 95). I completely agree that its an individual group thing if its an issue, but I especially have a point to make about the third bullet here about differing opinions of optimization. Ive been at tables where they angrily called it 'minmaxing'(They meant optimization) when I put my highest stat in DEX...... As a rogue. Or WIS as a cleric. Or INT as a wizard. The fact that the idea of what optimization is to each group is so different, combined with the needless stigma around having anyone coming even close to 'minmaxing' makes it annoyingly stressful to find new groups(Especially without a session 0), as sometimes simply putting your highest score in a primary stat for your class is completely unacceptable to groups.
Im gettin a bit ramble-y here, but the point is PLEASE HAVE SESSION 0S WITH YOUR PLAYERS and establish exactly what constitutes as reasonable and unreasonable optimization for everyone
NNCHRIS: SOUL THIEF, MASTER OF THE ARCANE, AND KING OF NEW YORKNN
Gdl Creator of Ilheia and her Knights of the Fallen Stars ldG
Lesser Student of Technomancy [undergrad student in computer science]
Supporter of the 2014 rules, and a MASSIVE Homebrewer. Come to me all ye who seek salvation in wording thy brews!
Open to homebrew trades at any time!! Or feel free to request HB, and Ill see if I can get it done for ya!
Characters (Outdated)
since this is directed at me, I'll add that different people could view "a fixed resource pool" differently. that's the only way I could begin to explain something like ChrisTheSoulcasterMage's issue with ability score allocation consternation. session zero, for sure.
unhappy at the way in which we lost individual purchases for one-off subclasses, magic items, and monsters?
tell them you don't like features disappeared quietly in the night: provide feedback!
That is min-maxing. It's just so very basic that most people don't react to it.
Debatably, it's the origin of the term. You roll your stats randomly, and put the big numbers in the stats you plan to use and the small numbers in the stats you aren't going to use.