Hi all, its important that I preface this with the fact that this player and I have been best friends for well over 6 years and lived together through college, though not since graduation. I began a DnD campaign after graduation and it just hit its 2 year anniversary. The other players are our fellow friends from college and 2 of my childhood friends as well. 5 players, level 12. This player also runs his own campaign for the last 5 or so months in which we are all players. We all play over discord video and use Roll20.
Now my "troubles" have really only began over these last few months, there's been an increasing amount of tension and headbutting over what kinds of homebrew I do and do not allow as well as a significant amount of rules lawyering mid-session and arguments about asking for buffs and expanded options for spells such as fiends and devils and op homebrew beasts for polymorph or mass suggestion improvements, or even picking a fiend patron ability despite being a hexblade because his patron has fiendish ties, and changing multiple invocations and mystic arcanum each level. General complaints for more power, even though he's already obtained a +2 magic sword from his patron, and I've given his familiar the ability to speak any language he knows. I think I've been more than generous with allowing/giving him these abilities already through rp and his "high rolls"
He plays a hexblade pact of the chain warlock that is an absolute power gamer, almost always stealing the majority of the spotlight and making checks that would better involve other players. Such as sending his always-invisible familiar to go scout rather than our monk or rogue, investing in all the spammable utility spells such as mass suggestion to get his way anytime something he doesn't like happens or an npc is disagreeable, and picking all the eldritch invocations around dealing damage to the point where he outperforms the paladin. All this coupled with the fact that he somehow never rolls below a 16 (We play online, but he's standoffish and complains that roll20 rolls low and isn't fair so he rolls in person privately) I'm working on fixing that at the moment. All the players are feeling like they're being cheated out of doing what their class does.
I've received advice that I should make encounters and ability checks more difficult because the familiar isn't as observant or perceptive as he is, but that often isn't useful because, as I said, he hasn't rolled low below a 16 in a massive amount of consecutive sessions.
Now his most recent request was about changing his character without changing his character, after I had turned down or refused his requests for additional power-ups in order to maintain balance for encounters and plot, most fights are too hard for the other party members, but easy for him, for one reason or another with several nat 20s appearing.
Anyway, now that you have a good amount of background, the current request of his is that he is getting bored of this character because he thinks all he does is hit things and be strong, despite my and other players complaints about feeling useless in game with him around.
He wants to, for some reason try and go against his patron and redeem himself in the eyes of his fallen Aasimar angelic guide and thinks that this should allow him to completely re-spec as a cleric 1-12, completely abandoning warlock rather than multiclassing (because it's too late to multiclass at 12 apparently). I said absolutely not, because wisdom and strength are pretty low stats for him and he doesn't want paladin because we already have one and allowing to make stat changes means you'd need to just make another character. He said he wants to play the same character and personality. His next request following this was to make a cleric who is the brother or twin brother of this character who is on a quest to go to the nine hells and retrieve this current character's lost soul from his patron, essentially pulling the entire campaign and plot on a massive expansive "side quest" simply to keep his old character while playing an identical one as a cleric instead.
I'm quite frankly becoming rather exhausted and annoyed by the constant headbutting, rules lawyering, and unnecessary input into how my campaign is and should be run and telling me what other players want. I am absolutely at my wits end about how I should approach this, because it does feel a bit dismissive and wrong to keep saying no, but these requests are, in my honest option, absurd and a hindrance to my campaign and storytelling, when I have to spend 10-15 minutes arguing about what my rulings are mid combat.
Can my fellow DMs please give input on how I should handle the situation? I would like to avoid any conflict regarding the matter as we are good friends and I don't want this to become personal?
I apologize for the wall of text, I felt that proper background would be helpful.
I keep finding myself wondering what kind of player/DM dynamic you guys have that he feels empowered to make demands of you. I've never played in a game before where you just got things by begging the DM instead of unlocking things in-game. What's the in-game justification for all these crazy new powers when they just show up?
My solution (aside from a frank and honest discussion with the player detailing all the issues as you've laid them out here--TRY THIS FIRST) would be either to give all the other players the ability to edit their powers on the fly and homebrew their classes, or throw out homebrew altogether and say it's getting to be a bit much. After all, there's *plenty* of published material so it's not like you can't have any fun without homebrew.
As far as changing class or characters, he's fine to decide to roll a new character whenever he wants and give it any kind of backstory within reason and with your approval, so if he wants to make a cleric twin with the long term goal of rescuing his other character's soul then I'd let him. Just let him go forward with the assumption that just because that's your character's end goal does not mean the rest of the party is obligated to drop everything and do that right away. Remind him he's not alone at the table.
Lastly, I'm curious as to what kind of game he runs, cause you said he ran one too. Does he allow that kind of stuff in his game? Does he try to make things particularly balanced then? You didn't mention, which I assume because it wasn't relevant, so from that I have to extrapolate that it's a fairly ordinary game with none of these crazy homebrew spotlight issues, so I wonder if (as I said before) this character is just a blind spot for him and if he thought of it like a DM he'd see that?
Just tell him that he has reached a point where he needs to choose between his friendship and the game. Because the more you go with his request, the more outrageous they become, and there has to be a limit to the escalation.
Also, of course "Roll20 rolls low" compared to cheating, but it's using quantum dice rolling which can be overseen by all players, so there is nothing more fair on the planet. So insist that it is part of the game, everyone does it, there is no reason to make an exception for him.
I know you don't want conflict, but at this point I'm afraid that you will lose your other players if you continue doing what you have been doing, and you need to tell him this as well. It's not going to be an easy discussion but you can do it.
Finally, you can also tell him that it's OK, he can switch to cleric, but it will be on YOUR terms, with no homebrew and losing everything that he had before except his background. He will be on probation with his new deity, it's a huge opportunity for roleplaying and to reset all the bad feelings. At this stage, it could almost be take it or leave, because otherwise it can only get worse. And that will allow you to roll back all the homebrew that you did in your attempt to please him.
P.S.: For all those out there who still are huge fans of powergaming, this is what you get when there is one in the group when the others are more casual and when on top of everything, you allow homebrew. Just one more example to add to the list, but I'm sure that there will still be some to defend powergaming... *sigh* Again, there is no wrong way to play the game, and it's fine when all around the table are powergamers, but if you could please stop encouraging people on a casual basis as if it was the normal way to play the game, it really would be nice.
Well to preface, my entire campaign is homebrew. Entirely created by myself with obvious influences and usage of certain lore. But I think, aside from this character, I've done a good job of keeping things balanced, the monk uses a revised 4 elements class build because he was under perfroming, my necromancer is multiclassed into a biomancer class I found and play-tested from DMguild (because it was very appropriate and fitting with his own story arc and the one they were going through at that moment).
I do plan on having a serious discussion of everyone using roll20 because I'm the dm and i don't want to ask repeatedly (I was avoiding pulling the "I'm the DM and I said so!" card but I will have to)
As for the cleric thing, I have no problem with him switching, but changing the entire core of the character just so you can play the same personality is absolutely off limits.
I don't have a problem with powergamers, per say, but you should have the awareness that you can't sap the fun of other people doing their class's thing, its fun for players to roll dice. DM may take it for granted, but thats all the players are there to actively do...
I keep finding myself wondering what kind of player/DM dynamic you guys have that he feels empowered to make demands of you. I've never played in a game before where you just got things by begging the DM instead of unlocking things in-game. What's the in-game justification for all these crazy new powers when they just show up?
My solution (aside from a frank and honest discussion with the player detailing all the issues as you've laid them out here--TRY THIS FIRST) would be either to give all the other players the ability to edit their powers on the fly and homebrew their classes, or throw out homebrew altogether and say it's getting to be a bit much. After all, there's *plenty* of published material so it's not like you can't have any fun without homebrew.
As far as changing class or characters, he's fine to decide to roll a new character whenever he wants and give it any kind of backstory within reason and with your approval, so if he wants to make a cleric twin with the long term goal of rescuing his other character's soul then I'd let him. Just let him go forward with the assumption that just because that's your character's end goal does not mean the rest of the party is obligated to drop everything and do that right away. Remind him he's not alone at the table.
Lastly, I'm curious as to what kind of game he runs, cause you said he ran one too. Does he allow that kind of stuff in his game? Does he try to make things particularly balanced then? You didn't mention, which I assume because it wasn't relevant, so from that I have to extrapolate that it's a fairly ordinary game with none of these crazy homebrew spotlight issues, so I wonder if (as I said before) this character is just a blind spot for him and if he thought of it like a DM he'd see that?
I don't want to come off as arrogant or cocky, but his campaign leaves much to be desired and we've already lost 1 player, another hardly shows up to session, and actively 2-3 of us are uninterested or looking for a way out. Not saying it's a bad campaign (we've found out he's based it in the realm of Forgotten Realms but it's a recreation of The Dresden Files novel series). The plot is simply TOO complicated because he has name dropped a solid 10+ factions of which we have only met 2 or 3 and we get railroaded constantly against impossible DC rolls (I rolled a Wisdom save with a 30 as a cleric with inspiration, guidance and advantage, and I still lost the save. We are level 7....) He also wrapped up/resolved my entire 7 page backstory in 13 sessions, to which I am personally offended and disappointed with the work I put in to be wasted. I went from a banished outcast, to the Summer knight of the Seelie Fey by level 5, all in 1 session (long story, seems undeserved, overpowered, and disappointing)
I avoided including that initially because I don't want to come off as having a vendetta or grudge against him. I simply don't enjoy his pacing and gratuitous hand outs of power. I REALLY wanted to play this character and do the backstory justice, but now that I feel robbed of having a proper cahracter arc and development, I feel no need to keep playing, nor a desire to make a new character... But I can say with absolute honesty that my negative experience in his game, has no impact on my perception of his character in my campaign. In fact, I've got quite a bit planned for him individually and within the main plot as well...
Beer Summit. Hang out with the dude in a none DnD context and just casually bring up the campaign and your issues with him while your doing something else. He may not even know he is affecting you this badly so try not to completely vent at him. You have to thread the needle of telling him his annoying you, without attacking him. Its hard, the out of game social aspect of DnD is the hardest part of the game.
If y'all don't live close enough to grab a beer together (or something age appropriate) maybe try to connect with a multi-player videos game and chat while doing that.
I'm not sure what you are trying to say here. The thing with powergaming is that it's a subtle thing, the game is fairly balanced as it is, but the drift only appears gradually over the levels...
I was trying, rather ineffectively, to say that there should be a self-awareness as a powergaming player to not constantly steal the spotlight from the other players and eat up session time doing things like arguing with the dm about rulings and making it all about yourself. DnD and RP is a group activity otherwise you can just go write a book.
I think there is probably more than enough blame to go around. For instance, you now see the risks you run by doing a bunch of homebrew. I have allowed a small amount of it, and like you, for my best friend. He's a good guy and keeps an eye on balance, but this is the one and only time, the last time, I will ever allow a player to make up his own homebrew subclass, even though it's gone about as well as it can go. You open yourself to all kinds of issues with homebrew, and clearly, it is giving you some headaches. If you like it on balance, great... but homebrewing classes, subclasses, feats, and the likes, leads into certain risks, some of which you are seeing.
The player does not seem like a powergamer but rather a muchkin (notice, there is no "n" in the middle of the word - its proper spelling is MUCH-kin). A muchkin is an old Champions term from the BBS days (yes, I am that old; no, I was not on the Champions BBS -- but in the usenet days, which I do remember, an old BBS-er explained it to me).
Muchkins were named for people who are always asking for more and more power -- they want so much, too much, hence the term, "Much-kin." (This term was misread by other people on the BBS or typoed to "munchkin" and now is used interchangeably with powergamer, btw).
The difference between MUCH-kins and powergamers is that powergamers are about "squeezing every last ounce of efficiency out of their character" (whether it is IC or not), but are not necessarily about being over-powered. For instance, the most efficient combo for a DEX-based character might be high dex, rapier, shield, chain shirt (let's say). A powergamer chooses that. The MUCH-kin, wants all that plus the ability to do fireball because "it would be cool." Fireball isn't efficient here, it is overpowered (potentially, depending on the character). The muchkin wants it because he or she wants more power, just to have more power.
The thing with muchkins is, there often is no way to satisfy them (another difference with a powergamer). If you let a powergamer have the efficient combo, put the stat bonuses anywhere instead of basing on race, and take the classes/multiclasses the PGer wants, they're usually good. Often they don't care to be the "most powerful in the party" -- they just want their particular character to be super-efficient, i.e., no waste, everything in the right spot. But the muchkin is never satisfied. You give them a homebrew class that allows them 2 attacks per round when other classes have one, and the muchkin will ask for 3 attacks. You let them have 3, and they will want a crit on a 19-20 for the first of the three. You let them have that, and it'll be crit on 19-20 with every attack. Give them that, and it'll be crit on 18-20, and so forth. Say no and they come up with something else. Stop their muchkining with their Warlock class (as you have done, somewhat) and they multiclass into something else they can use to get "too much." Let them do that, and they'll want to triple class. Let them triple-class, and they'll ask to quad-class. And on, and on. It will not end. Ever. Because the muchkin is never satisfied - the grass is always greener on the other side of the next power-up.
Further evidence that he's a muchkin and not a powergamer: he seems to be cheating on die rolls. A true powergamer wouldn't do that - cheating is antithetical to the nature of a powergamer. Because the PGer is trying to make an efficient character; cheating would be an admission that the character is not well built, so can't rely on "natural" die rolls to succeed. No true powergamer worth his or her salt would cheat. EVER. Only muchkins cheat. (Again, they want too MUCH for their character, hence the name, MUCH-kin.)
I had a friend like this in Champions, once. We didn't have a name for it then (again, I was not on the BBS). He both tried to take too much for his characters (often in violation of our collective house rules.) And he cheated (not with dice, but he cheated on recording his STUN and END). There was, sadly, no solution - we put up with it for a while but eventually we just stopped playing with him.
I don't like being the bearer of bad news but, I am not sure there is a good way to fix this. If your friend is truly a muchkin, and always has to have more and more, even to the point of cheating with die rolls, this often comes from a place in the psyche with which it is not possible to reason. He may not even know he is doing it, or why. As his friend and DM then you have to figure out how to deal with it and there are no good options, only imperfect ones. You can keep going like you have been, letting him have as much as you can stomach giving him, with the understanding he will never, ever, be satisfied and you will have to argue with him every single session and in between, while protecting the rest of the players from his destructiveness, or you can risk your friendship by kicking him out of the campaign.
You can have a talk with him OOC, but... I am not hopeful of the success you would have. My experience with muchkins has been, they cannot be reasoned with the way other people can be. Even if they say OK, they will stop... I've never seen them actually stop.
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WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
Well to preface, my entire campaign is homebrew. Entirely created by myself with obvious influences and usage of certain lore. But I think, aside from this character, I've done a good job of keeping things balanced, the monk uses a revised 4 elements class build because he was under perfroming, my necromancer is multiclassed into a biomancer class I found and play-tested from DMguild (because it was very appropriate and fitting with his own story arc and the one they were going through at that moment).
To clarify, when i suggested possibly cutting back on homebrew, I don't mean setting or plot, there's nothing at all unbalanced about that. I'd just look out for wonky homebrew classes and features, though it seems like you're doing a decent job of that.
If you've identified one or two trustworthy sources of homebrew on DMsguild, maybe limit homebrew classes and stuff for your campaign to those select creators, and put a full moratorium on self-tweaking. (That last part came out sounding dirty but you know what I mean haha)
In retrospect, I think if I ever start a campaign again, my rule will be: No UA, no homebrewed classes/feats/etc., published content only. This doesn't guarantee good balance, but it does keep completely off-the-wall homebrew out, and there can be no arguments. (Well, I picture an argument when I announce the policy, but as my policy will be "otherwise someone else DM," we'll either be playing with that rule, or it won't be my problem.)
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
I think there is probably more than enough blame to go around. For instance, you now see the risks you run by doing a bunch of homebrew. I have allowed a small amount of it, and like you, for my best friend. He's a good guy and keeps an eye on balance, but this is the one and only time, the last time, I will ever allow a player to make up his own homebrew subclass, even though it's gone about as well as it can go. You open yourself to all kinds of issues with homebrew, and clearly, it is giving you some headaches. If you like it on balance, great... but homebrewing classes, subclasses, feats, and the likes, leads into certain risks, some of which you are seeing.
The player does not seem like a powergamer but rather a muchkin (notice, there is no "n" in the middle of the word - its proper spelling is MUCH-kin). A muchkin is an old Champions term from the BBS days (yes, I am that old; no, I was not on the Champions BBS -- but in the usenet days, which I do remember, an old BBS-er explained it to me).
Muchkins were named for people who are always asking for more and more power -- they want so much, too much, hence the term, "Much-kin." (This term was misread by other people on the BBS or typoed to "munchkin" and now is used interchangeably with powergamer, btw).
The difference between MUCH-kins and powergamers is that powergamers are about "squeezing every last ounce of efficiency out of their character" (whether it is IC or not), but are not necessarily about being over-powered. For instance, the most efficient combo for a DEX-based character might be high dex, rapier, shield, chain shirt (let's say). A powergamer chooses that. The MUCH-kin, wants all that plus the ability to do fireball because "it would be cool." Fireball isn't efficient here, it is overpowered (potentially, depending on the character). The muchkin wants it because he or she wants more power, just to have more power.
The thing with muchkins is, there often is no way to satisfy them (another difference with a powergamer). If you let a powergamer have the efficient combo, put the stat bonuses anywhere instead of basing on race, and take the classes/multiclasses the PGer wants, they're usually good. Often they don't care to be the "most powerful in the party" -- they just want their particular character to be super-efficient, i.e., no waste, everything in the right spot. But the muchkin is never satisfied. You give them a homebrew class that allows them 2 attacks per round when other classes have one, and the muchkin will ask for 3 attacks. You let them have 3, and they will want a crit on a 19-20 for the first of the three. You let them have that, and it'll be crit on 19-20 with every attack. Give them that, and it'll be crit on 18-20, and so forth. Say no and they come up with something else. Stop their muchkining with their Warlock class (as you have done, somewhat) and they multiclass into something else they can use to get "too much." Let them do that, and they'll want to triple class. Let them triple-class, and they'll ask to quad-class. And on, and on. It will not end. Ever. Because the muchkin is never satisfied - the grass is always greener on the other side of the next power-up.
Further evidence that he's a muchkin and not a powergamer: he seems to be cheating on die rolls. A true powergamer wouldn't do that - cheating is antithetical to the nature of a powergamer. Because the PGer is trying to make an efficient character; cheating would be an admission that the character is not well built, so can't rely on "natural" die rolls to succeed. No true powergamer worth his or her salt would cheat. EVER. Only muchkins cheat. (Again, they want too MUCH for their character, hence the name, MUCH-kin.)
I had a friend like this in Champions, once. We didn't have a name for it then (again, I was not on the BBS). He both tried to take too much for his characters (often in violation of our collective house rules.) And he cheated (not with dice, but he cheated on recording his STUN and END). There was, sadly, no solution - we put up with it for a while but eventually we just stopped playing with him.
I don't like being the bearer of bad news but, I am not sure there is a good way to fix this. If your friend is truly a muchkin, and always has to have more and more, even to the point of cheating with die rolls, this often comes from a place in the psyche with which it is not possible to reason. He may not even know he is doing it, or why. As his friend and DM then you have to figure out how to deal with it and there are no good options, only imperfect ones. You can keep going like you have been, letting him have as much as you can stomach giving him, with the understanding he will never, ever, be satisfied and you will have to argue with him every single session and in between, while protecting the rest of the players from his destructiveness, or you can risk your friendship by kicking him out of the campaign.
You can have a talk with him OOC, but... I am not hopeful of the success you would have. My experience with muchkins has been, they cannot be reasoned with the way other people can be. Even if they say OK, they will stop... I've never seen them actually stop.
That's quite a shame to hear, and I'm afraid you are correct in your analysis. I am now forced to make some critical decisions and have some unsavory conversations in order to salvage and maintain order and enjoyment, both mine and the rest of the party. Thanks for the anecdotal advice. I have a lot to think about and I have to figure out how to be tact about it...
I think there might be more going on here for you to think about.
Your campaign has been going on for two years. Problems have only developed in the last few months. Has anything changed in your friend's life that could be expressed in how he is playing the game? Or in running his own game? Frustrated at work? Relationships? Medical issues? The pandemic? Depression? Even just playing over Roll20 and Discord can be an issue for some folks. Perhaps, playing remotely makes him feel more anonymous which when combined with the ability to cheat die rolls just leaves them feeling unsatisfied.
The game likely gets boring when you can never fail because you can never roll low AND they might be constantly feeling guilty for cheating and are not dealing with it well. Or there could be a lot more going on.
Some folks have talked about how this guy is a "powergamer" or "muchkin" or "munchkin" ... but presumably he wasn't that way for the first however many levels or it would have been a problem sooner.
Part of the arguing could be because he is DMing now and thinks what he says should have more weight. It doesn't but one of the challenges of being a DM is not back seat DMing when playing yourself. This happens when the DM running the game makes a call you wouldn't - it can be very hard to remain silent. If the DM is clearly making a call that disagrees with RAW and you are actually playing by RAW, it might be polite to mention it, but if the DM says that is how they are running it tonight then a good DM/player knows to drop it and take it offline privately later if they are still concerned. It doesn't sound like your friend knows this yet.
Anyway, if I was in your situation, I would have a separate conversation with the player ...
1) Politely explain that DMs can have different styles and that if he has a concern about how you rule something then he can mention it but if you say that is how it will be tonight then he should discuss it after the session or by email.
2) Explain also that the spells do what they say and that you don't plan on making modifications. Although you do allow homebrew (which is fine), just say that you don't want to keep making changes.
3) Explain to everyone in the group that all dice rolls will be made on Roll20 by everyone. No exceptions. Do not accuse him of cheating but take away the opportunity for cheating. Although the Roll20 dice roller is supposed to be fair, I've had a time as DM rolling for monsters that scored two double crits in a row (rolled 4 20 results ... on two attacks with advantage). The odds of that are about 1/16,000. This is probably just the effect of confirmation bias - the exceptional rolls are memorable and all the others aren't but it is very easy for players or DMs to get the impression that a dice roller is "streaky" because, by the nature of probability :), they are.
Anyway, get everyone using the built in dice roller.
4) Finally, explain to the player that you want them to play the game and have fun but that you won't be making any further home brew changes for their character. I wouldn't tend to let them change their character to a level 12 cleric. However, if they are intent on making a break with their previous character, I might consider allowing them to retire the old character and introduce an alternate level 12 character to play instead. However, I wouldn't allow any homebrew for the replacement. This might get you back to a more balanced situation and the fact that you won't allow additional homebrew might limit future problems but (although it is mostly just semantics) I'd have them play a different character rather than changing their existing one to be a 12 cleric since it will remove any basis they might have for arguing special treatment due to their backstory (among other reasons).
Anyway, the starting point is likely a chat with your friend to explain how you see things going forward and maybe find out if there is something else going on that might be coming out in their gaming.
P.S. On the topic of "muchkin" vs "munchkin" ... I've never heard of muchkin and I've likely been playing games as long as the other poster who mentioned it. It could have been a term specific to the Champions community since I've never played that.
However, munchkin was used (since at least the late 70's or early 80's?) based, as far as I know, on the little people with high squeaky voices from the Wizard of Oz as a stereotype for younger and perhaps less mature gamers for whom "stuff" and "gold" and "xp" and "phat lootz" were the motivating factors for playing the game (long before the term "phat lootz" was even coined :) ).
Munchkin is a very common term for a power gamer, there has even been a game about it called Munchkin released by Steve Jackson Games - the creator of GURPS. It is hilarious.
Hi all, its important that I preface this with the fact that this player and I have been best friends for well over 6 years and lived together through college, though not since graduation. I began a DnD campaign after graduation and it just hit its 2 year anniversary. The other players are our fellow friends from college and 2 of my childhood friends as well. 5 players, level 12. This player also runs his own campaign for the last 5 or so months in which we are all players. We all play over discord video and use Roll20.
Now my "troubles" have really only began over these last few months, there's been an increasing amount of tension and headbutting over what kinds of homebrew I do and do not allow as well as a significant amount of rules lawyering mid-session and arguments about asking for buffs and expanded options for spells such as fiends and devils and op homebrew beasts for polymorph or mass suggestion improvements, or even picking a fiend patron ability despite being a hexblade because his patron has fiendish ties, and changing multiple invocations and mystic arcanum each level. General complaints for more power, even though he's already obtained a +2 magic sword from his patron, and I've given his familiar the ability to speak any language he knows. I think I've been more than generous with allowing/giving him these abilities already through rp and his "high rolls"
He plays a hexblade pact of the chain warlock that is an absolute power gamer, almost always stealing the majority of the spotlight and making checks that would better involve other players. Such as sending his always-invisible familiar to go scout rather than our monk or rogue, investing in all the spammable utility spells such as mass suggestion to get his way anytime something he doesn't like happens or an npc is disagreeable, and picking all the eldritch invocations around dealing damage to the point where he outperforms the paladin. All this coupled with the fact that he somehow never rolls below a 16 (We play online, but he's standoffish and complains that roll20 rolls low and isn't fair so he rolls in person privately) I'm working on fixing that at the moment. All the players are feeling like they're being cheated out of doing what their class does.
I've received advice that I should make encounters and ability checks more difficult because the familiar isn't as observant or perceptive as he is, but that often isn't useful because, as I said, he hasn't rolled low below a 16 in a massive amount of consecutive sessions.
Now his most recent request was about changing his character without changing his character, after I had turned down or refused his requests for additional power-ups in order to maintain balance for encounters and plot, most fights are too hard for the other party members, but easy for him, for one reason or another with several nat 20s appearing.
Anyway, now that you have a good amount of background, the current request of his is that he is getting bored of this character because he thinks all he does is hit things and be strong, despite my and other players complaints about feeling useless in game with him around.
He wants to, for some reason try and go against his patron and redeem himself in the eyes of his fallen Aasimar angelic guide and thinks that this should allow him to completely re-spec as a cleric 1-12, completely abandoning warlock rather than multiclassing (because it's too late to multiclass at 12 apparently). I said absolutely not, because wisdom and strength are pretty low stats for him and he doesn't want paladin because we already have one and allowing to make stat changes means you'd need to just make another character. He said he wants to play the same character and personality. His next request following this was to make a cleric who is the brother or twin brother of this character who is on a quest to go to the nine hells and retrieve this current character's lost soul from his patron, essentially pulling the entire campaign and plot on a massive expansive "side quest" simply to keep his old character while playing an identical one as a cleric instead.
I'm quite frankly becoming rather exhausted and annoyed by the constant headbutting, rules lawyering, and unnecessary input into how my campaign is and should be run and telling me what other players want. I am absolutely at my wits end about how I should approach this, because it does feel a bit dismissive and wrong to keep saying no, but these requests are, in my honest option, absurd and a hindrance to my campaign and storytelling, when I have to spend 10-15 minutes arguing about what my rulings are mid combat.
Can my fellow DMs please give input on how I should handle the situation? I would like to avoid any conflict regarding the matter as we are good friends and I don't want this to become personal?
I apologize for the wall of text, I felt that proper background would be helpful.
I keep finding myself wondering what kind of player/DM dynamic you guys have that he feels empowered to make demands of you. I've never played in a game before where you just got things by begging the DM instead of unlocking things in-game. What's the in-game justification for all these crazy new powers when they just show up?
My solution (aside from a frank and honest discussion with the player detailing all the issues as you've laid them out here--TRY THIS FIRST) would be either to give all the other players the ability to edit their powers on the fly and homebrew their classes, or throw out homebrew altogether and say it's getting to be a bit much. After all, there's *plenty* of published material so it's not like you can't have any fun without homebrew.
As far as changing class or characters, he's fine to decide to roll a new character whenever he wants and give it any kind of backstory within reason and with your approval, so if he wants to make a cleric twin with the long term goal of rescuing his other character's soul then I'd let him. Just let him go forward with the assumption that just because that's your character's end goal does not mean the rest of the party is obligated to drop everything and do that right away. Remind him he's not alone at the table.
Lastly, I'm curious as to what kind of game he runs, cause you said he ran one too. Does he allow that kind of stuff in his game? Does he try to make things particularly balanced then? You didn't mention, which I assume because it wasn't relevant, so from that I have to extrapolate that it's a fairly ordinary game with none of these crazy homebrew spotlight issues, so I wonder if (as I said before) this character is just a blind spot for him and if he thought of it like a DM he'd see that?
Well to preface, my entire campaign is homebrew. Entirely created by myself with obvious influences and usage of certain lore. But I think, aside from this character, I've done a good job of keeping things balanced, the monk uses a revised 4 elements class build because he was under perfroming, my necromancer is multiclassed into a biomancer class I found and play-tested from DMguild (because it was very appropriate and fitting with his own story arc and the one they were going through at that moment).
I do plan on having a serious discussion of everyone using roll20 because I'm the dm and i don't want to ask repeatedly (I was avoiding pulling the "I'm the DM and I said so!" card but I will have to)
As for the cleric thing, I have no problem with him switching, but changing the entire core of the character just so you can play the same personality is absolutely off limits.
I don't have a problem with powergamers, per say, but you should have the awareness that you can't sap the fun of other people doing their class's thing, its fun for players to roll dice. DM may take it for granted, but thats all the players are there to actively do...
I don't want to come off as arrogant or cocky, but his campaign leaves much to be desired and we've already lost 1 player, another hardly shows up to session, and actively 2-3 of us are uninterested or looking for a way out. Not saying it's a bad campaign (we've found out he's based it in the realm of Forgotten Realms but it's a recreation of The Dresden Files novel series). The plot is simply TOO complicated because he has name dropped a solid 10+ factions of which we have only met 2 or 3 and we get railroaded constantly against impossible DC rolls (I rolled a Wisdom save with a 30 as a cleric with inspiration, guidance and advantage, and I still lost the save. We are level 7....) He also wrapped up/resolved my entire 7 page backstory in 13 sessions, to which I am personally offended and disappointed with the work I put in to be wasted. I went from a banished outcast, to the Summer knight of the Seelie Fey by level 5, all in 1 session (long story, seems undeserved, overpowered, and disappointing)
I avoided including that initially because I don't want to come off as having a vendetta or grudge against him. I simply don't enjoy his pacing and gratuitous hand outs of power. I REALLY wanted to play this character and do the backstory justice, but now that I feel robbed of having a proper cahracter arc and development, I feel no need to keep playing, nor a desire to make a new character... But I can say with absolute honesty that my negative experience in his game, has no impact on my perception of his character in my campaign. In fact, I've got quite a bit planned for him individually and within the main plot as well...
Beer Summit. Hang out with the dude in a none DnD context and just casually bring up the campaign and your issues with him while your doing something else. He may not even know he is affecting you this badly so try not to completely vent at him. You have to thread the needle of telling him his annoying you, without attacking him. Its hard, the out of game social aspect of DnD is the hardest part of the game.
If y'all don't live close enough to grab a beer together (or something age appropriate) maybe try to connect with a multi-player videos game and chat while doing that.
I was trying, rather ineffectively, to say that there should be a self-awareness as a powergaming player to not constantly steal the spotlight from the other players and eat up session time doing things like arguing with the dm about rulings and making it all about yourself. DnD and RP is a group activity otherwise you can just go write a book.
I think there is probably more than enough blame to go around. For instance, you now see the risks you run by doing a bunch of homebrew. I have allowed a small amount of it, and like you, for my best friend. He's a good guy and keeps an eye on balance, but this is the one and only time, the last time, I will ever allow a player to make up his own homebrew subclass, even though it's gone about as well as it can go. You open yourself to all kinds of issues with homebrew, and clearly, it is giving you some headaches. If you like it on balance, great... but homebrewing classes, subclasses, feats, and the likes, leads into certain risks, some of which you are seeing.
The player does not seem like a powergamer but rather a muchkin (notice, there is no "n" in the middle of the word - its proper spelling is MUCH-kin). A muchkin is an old Champions term from the BBS days (yes, I am that old; no, I was not on the Champions BBS -- but in the usenet days, which I do remember, an old BBS-er explained it to me).
Muchkins were named for people who are always asking for more and more power -- they want so much, too much, hence the term, "Much-kin." (This term was misread by other people on the BBS or typoed to "munchkin" and now is used interchangeably with powergamer, btw).
The difference between MUCH-kins and powergamers is that powergamers are about "squeezing every last ounce of efficiency out of their character" (whether it is IC or not), but are not necessarily about being over-powered. For instance, the most efficient combo for a DEX-based character might be high dex, rapier, shield, chain shirt (let's say). A powergamer chooses that. The MUCH-kin, wants all that plus the ability to do fireball because "it would be cool." Fireball isn't efficient here, it is overpowered (potentially, depending on the character). The muchkin wants it because he or she wants more power, just to have more power.
The thing with muchkins is, there often is no way to satisfy them (another difference with a powergamer). If you let a powergamer have the efficient combo, put the stat bonuses anywhere instead of basing on race, and take the classes/multiclasses the PGer wants, they're usually good. Often they don't care to be the "most powerful in the party" -- they just want their particular character to be super-efficient, i.e., no waste, everything in the right spot. But the muchkin is never satisfied. You give them a homebrew class that allows them 2 attacks per round when other classes have one, and the muchkin will ask for 3 attacks. You let them have 3, and they will want a crit on a 19-20 for the first of the three. You let them have that, and it'll be crit on 19-20 with every attack. Give them that, and it'll be crit on 18-20, and so forth. Say no and they come up with something else. Stop their muchkining with their Warlock class (as you have done, somewhat) and they multiclass into something else they can use to get "too much." Let them do that, and they'll want to triple class. Let them triple-class, and they'll ask to quad-class. And on, and on. It will not end. Ever. Because the muchkin is never satisfied - the grass is always greener on the other side of the next power-up.
Further evidence that he's a muchkin and not a powergamer: he seems to be cheating on die rolls. A true powergamer wouldn't do that - cheating is antithetical to the nature of a powergamer. Because the PGer is trying to make an efficient character; cheating would be an admission that the character is not well built, so can't rely on "natural" die rolls to succeed. No true powergamer worth his or her salt would cheat. EVER. Only muchkins cheat. (Again, they want too MUCH for their character, hence the name, MUCH-kin.)
I had a friend like this in Champions, once. We didn't have a name for it then (again, I was not on the BBS). He both tried to take too much for his characters (often in violation of our collective house rules.) And he cheated (not with dice, but he cheated on recording his STUN and END). There was, sadly, no solution - we put up with it for a while but eventually we just stopped playing with him.
I don't like being the bearer of bad news but, I am not sure there is a good way to fix this. If your friend is truly a muchkin, and always has to have more and more, even to the point of cheating with die rolls, this often comes from a place in the psyche with which it is not possible to reason. He may not even know he is doing it, or why. As his friend and DM then you have to figure out how to deal with it and there are no good options, only imperfect ones. You can keep going like you have been, letting him have as much as you can stomach giving him, with the understanding he will never, ever, be satisfied and you will have to argue with him every single session and in between, while protecting the rest of the players from his destructiveness, or you can risk your friendship by kicking him out of the campaign.
You can have a talk with him OOC, but... I am not hopeful of the success you would have. My experience with muchkins has been, they cannot be reasoned with the way other people can be. Even if they say OK, they will stop... I've never seen them actually stop.
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
To clarify, when i suggested possibly cutting back on homebrew, I don't mean setting or plot, there's nothing at all unbalanced about that. I'd just look out for wonky homebrew classes and features, though it seems like you're doing a decent job of that.
If you've identified one or two trustworthy sources of homebrew on DMsguild, maybe limit homebrew classes and stuff for your campaign to those select creators, and put a full moratorium on self-tweaking. (That last part came out sounding dirty but you know what I mean haha)
I agree.
In retrospect, I think if I ever start a campaign again, my rule will be: No UA, no homebrewed classes/feats/etc., published content only. This doesn't guarantee good balance, but it does keep completely off-the-wall homebrew out, and there can be no arguments. (Well, I picture an argument when I announce the policy, but as my policy will be "otherwise someone else DM," we'll either be playing with that rule, or it won't be my problem.)
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
That's quite a shame to hear, and I'm afraid you are correct in your analysis. I am now forced to make some critical decisions and have some unsavory conversations in order to salvage and maintain order and enjoyment, both mine and the rest of the party. Thanks for the anecdotal advice. I have a lot to think about and I have to figure out how to be tact about it...
Just say no. It really is that simple.
I think there might be more going on here for you to think about.
Your campaign has been going on for two years. Problems have only developed in the last few months. Has anything changed in your friend's life that could be expressed in how he is playing the game? Or in running his own game? Frustrated at work? Relationships? Medical issues? The pandemic? Depression? Even just playing over Roll20 and Discord can be an issue for some folks. Perhaps, playing remotely makes him feel more anonymous which when combined with the ability to cheat die rolls just leaves them feeling unsatisfied.
The game likely gets boring when you can never fail because you can never roll low AND they might be constantly feeling guilty for cheating and are not dealing with it well. Or there could be a lot more going on.
Some folks have talked about how this guy is a "powergamer" or "muchkin" or "munchkin" ... but presumably he wasn't that way for the first however many levels or it would have been a problem sooner.
Part of the arguing could be because he is DMing now and thinks what he says should have more weight. It doesn't but one of the challenges of being a DM is not back seat DMing when playing yourself. This happens when the DM running the game makes a call you wouldn't - it can be very hard to remain silent. If the DM is clearly making a call that disagrees with RAW and you are actually playing by RAW, it might be polite to mention it, but if the DM says that is how they are running it tonight then a good DM/player knows to drop it and take it offline privately later if they are still concerned. It doesn't sound like your friend knows this yet.
Anyway, if I was in your situation, I would have a separate conversation with the player ...
1) Politely explain that DMs can have different styles and that if he has a concern about how you rule something then he can mention it but if you say that is how it will be tonight then he should discuss it after the session or by email.
2) Explain also that the spells do what they say and that you don't plan on making modifications. Although you do allow homebrew (which is fine), just say that you don't want to keep making changes.
3) Explain to everyone in the group that all dice rolls will be made on Roll20 by everyone. No exceptions. Do not accuse him of cheating but take away the opportunity for cheating. Although the Roll20 dice roller is supposed to be fair, I've had a time as DM rolling for monsters that scored two double crits in a row (rolled 4 20 results ... on two attacks with advantage). The odds of that are about 1/16,000. This is probably just the effect of confirmation bias - the exceptional rolls are memorable and all the others aren't but it is very easy for players or DMs to get the impression that a dice roller is "streaky" because, by the nature of probability :), they are.
Anyway, get everyone using the built in dice roller.
4) Finally, explain to the player that you want them to play the game and have fun but that you won't be making any further home brew changes for their character. I wouldn't tend to let them change their character to a level 12 cleric. However, if they are intent on making a break with their previous character, I might consider allowing them to retire the old character and introduce an alternate level 12 character to play instead. However, I wouldn't allow any homebrew for the replacement. This might get you back to a more balanced situation and the fact that you won't allow additional homebrew might limit future problems but (although it is mostly just semantics) I'd have them play a different character rather than changing their existing one to be a 12 cleric since it will remove any basis they might have for arguing special treatment due to their backstory (among other reasons).
Anyway, the starting point is likely a chat with your friend to explain how you see things going forward and maybe find out if there is something else going on that might be coming out in their gaming.
P.S. On the topic of "muchkin" vs "munchkin" ... I've never heard of muchkin and I've likely been playing games as long as the other poster who mentioned it. It could have been a term specific to the Champions community since I've never played that.
However, munchkin was used (since at least the late 70's or early 80's?) based, as far as I know, on the little people with high squeaky voices from the Wizard of Oz as a stereotype for younger and perhaps less mature gamers for whom "stuff" and "gold" and "xp" and "phat lootz" were the motivating factors for playing the game (long before the term "phat lootz" was even coined :) ).
Munchkin is a very common term for a power gamer, there has even been a game about it called Munchkin released by Steve Jackson Games - the creator of GURPS. It is hilarious.
If he is requesting to have op homebrew powers, make them fight a dragon.
When he single-handedly slays it, have Tiamat eat him because he is too op.
tiamat is the queen of evil dragons
The DM's word is law. If he doesn't like it, he should find another group.