Dawn of Ascension (D&D 3.5, Closed)

[InsaneKatKing]

saint odium

Then complete I do believe he is now x3  

[Kain Almasi]

InsaneKatKing475

saint odium

Then complete I do believe he is now x3

Okay then.  

[TheVulgarUnicorn]

So, on the note of equality among character, does it really matter that much?
I mean our dm is playing pretty damn loose with a fewe ules and in the end it wont matter much.
Sure the first part of the adventure we will be outclassed by the vampire.
Boohoo.
As time goes by we get loot and spread it out appropriatly.
The vampire is also a huge double edged sword whos ecl only takes into account raw stats.
The story restrictions and other slaps he will recieve are numerous.
Daylight, hunters, bigotry.
I mean, cant we focus on flavor instead of stats?
Cause soon his 6 more stata spread out wont be that much of a difference.
And, yes, i am asking for the dm to work with me in reshaping truenamer a bit so that its a bit more powerful, but the changes i have in mind still leave the entire class lagging behind every other caster.
My point being its to make the class fit its flavor a little more.

IN CONCLUSION, having a vampire on the team may give you that feeling of "******** im inferior in combat" but when that happens remember you have a truenamer on the team...
And you will realize you are still superior.

Also having that combat powerhouse.means you cam relax on min-maxing and choose class features and feats for flavor, and still be pretty confident the party will survive-- unless the dm.is expecting half a dozen minmaxers....
If thats the case i will need to change some.major components....  

[TheVulgarUnicorn]

So, on the note of equality among character, does it really matter that much?
I mean our dm is playing pretty damn loose with a fewe ules and in the end it wont matter much.
Sure the first part of the adventure we will be outclassed by the vampire.
Boohoo.
As time goes by we get loot and spread it out appropriatly.
The vampire is also a huge double edged sword whos ecl only takes into account raw stats.
The story restrictions and other slaps he will recieve are numerous.
Daylight, hunters, bigotry.
I mean, cant we focus on flavor instead of stats?
Cause soon his 6 more stata spread out wont be that much of a difference.
And, yes, i am asking for the dm to work with me in reshaping truenamer a bit so that its a bit more powerful, but the changes i have in mind still leave the entire class lagging behind every other caster.
My point being its to make the class fit its flavor a little more.

IN CONCLUSION, having a vampire on the team may give you that feeling of "******** im inferior in combat" but when that happens remember you have a truenamer on the team...
And you will realize you are still superior.

Also having that combat powerhouse.means you cam relax on min-maxing and choose class features and feats for flavor, and still be pretty confident the party will survive-- unless the dm.is expecting half a dozen minmaxers....
If thats the case i will need to change some.major components....  

[Mongooseh]

Meanwhile in the land of no level adjustment cus I cannae think of any appropriate templates.  

[RafeRavel]

TheVulgarUnicorn

I get the impression that you've never played with a munchkin, a flurb, or an obsessive. I have. Frequently. It was only a year or two ago that I started making a point of NOT gaming with the munchkin. He always looked for any loopholes to give him an advantage and had no sense of team sucess - just his own hoarding tendencies and game breaking

And then, in the first year I was in the guild, I had the wonderful experience to play a few games with a flurb. She (I assume she, it's hard to tell online) had fantasticly Mary Sue-esque characters that never had the actual skills or 'flavor' to back up her backstories. In example, a character who supposedly built her own Exotic, Masterwork weapons with no points in Craft: Weapon and and played the flute without any Perform: Wind instruments. Little stuff, but it directly opposed her 'roleplay focused' style of gaming.

And then, when trying another site for PbP gaming, I discovered that seemingly every other player online was an obsessive, or what you call a min/maxer. "If it's not optimized, what's the point," type personalities. Playing any non tier-1 class is scoffed at and insulted, which sucks for the player who loves martial prowess.

And in all that time, I've discovered for myself two things that seem to be a trend.
1) Character balance does matter. Maybe you don't care, but someone will. And it makes the game more fun for everyone. A place for every member/every member in it's place is fine, but make sure every character gets a chance to shine.
And
2) Games seem to flow best with a good blend of roleplay and mechanics. We play a game with numbers for a reason. Playing a bit loose with it? Fine. But to throw numbers to the wind defeats the very point of having a rulebook. Balance is a glorious thing.

This is all based on person experiences and opinion, so I don't expect anyone to agree with me. But it's what I've learned, and it's what works for me.  

[Gabriel Lord of Flame]

RafeRavel

I get the impression that you've never played with a munchkin, a flurb, or an obsessive. I have. Frequently. It was only a year or two ago that I started making a point of NOT gaming with the munchkin. He always looked for any loopholes to give him an advantage and had no sense of team sucess - just his own hoarding tendencies and game breaking

And then, in the first year I was in the guild, I had the wonderful experience to play a few games with a flurb. She (I assume she, it's hard to tell online) had fantasticly Mary Sue-esque characters that never had the actual skills or 'flavor' to back up her backstories. In example, a character who supposedly built her own Exotic, Masterwork weapons with no points in Craft: Weapon and and played the flute without any Perform: Wind instruments. Little stuff, but it directly opposed her 'roleplay focused' style of gaming.

And then, when trying another site for PbP gaming, I discovered that seemingly every other player online was an obsessive, or what you call a min/maxer. "If it's not optimized, what's the point," type personalities. Playing any non tier-1 class is scoffed at and insulted, which sucks for the player who loves martial prowess.

And in all that time, I've discovered for myself two things that seem to be a trend.
1) Character balance does matter. Maybe you don't care, but someone will. And it makes the game more fun for everyone. A place for every member/every member in it's place is fine, but make sure every character gets a chance to shine.
And
2) Games seem to flow best with a good blend of roleplay and mechanics. We play a game with numbers for a reason. Playing a bit loose with it? Fine. But to throw numbers to the wind defeats the very point of having a rulebook. Balance is a glorious thing.

This is all based on person experiences and opinion, so I don't expect anyone to agree with me. But it's what I've learned, and it's what works for me.

This. So much this. However do note. I have not been paying much attention to what has been going on in here I've been busy looking for very old notebooks filled with homebrew stuff because I get to use them here... >.>  

[RafeRavel]

Mongooseh

Meanwhile in the land of no level adjustment cus I cannae think of any appropriate templates.

Metal-Clad is from PF, but if you get permission to use it, Platinum is awesome. Varous LA
Metal Creature is a homebrew, and looks rather nice - excepting the whole Monk favored class thing. Might be able to drop that though. +3 LA  

[Mongooseh]

I've spotted a template (half-golem, iron golem variation) but then I read what it gave you and decided. "Nope that's op as fluff. It'd be cool..."  

[TheVulgarUnicorn]

There is always one munckin or min maxer at the table.
Its inevitable.
But you need to learn to just use them,
And rather than bug the dm to nerf them or buff you into equality just find a new niche, not every charactervshould be equally balanced.
It makes the entire game feel like a video game where everything is equal.
But when you think about it the relative powerblevels should be varried and rather than tryin to equal why not just compliment eachothers characters.
I know we are going to haveva spell castrr or two so i bypassed picking some of the skills that are super useful for personal glory and went with ones where all i do is give our caster badassery.
I mean when it all comes down to it as long as noones a dead weight and noones able to go rambo than its the party as a whole thats being tested.

And yes marrysues are the worst but as our dm mentioned he trusts the bloodsucker to not be a b***h.

So i say let her stand out with stats and numbers and choose a different role.
Be tge wild card.
Be the gnome with a flamboyant accent, who wears nothing but brightly colored outfits, and claims every kill for his own by jumping upon anothers, stabbin with his little twig and ming "aha, it is I antonio littleshit that has conquored you today! Know the name and spread the fear!"

Rather than min-maxing, for example my mix.of everything.is goimg.to look cool in combat, be effective.enough that i wont be dragging.you down, and.be a pretty decent encyclopedia of random knowledge. But i took half vampire whi h basically doesnt give me much that i actually want.
If i had really wanted to make this work id have gone woth an anymorphic charictor or.w.e they are called.
Had stats.out the a**.
Can warblade instead of sword.sag
And.gone with either dread necro or warlock or something silly and then just sat back as i blew through everything lolling the entire way.

And i get that some people find having a powerfil character more fun than actual roleplaying, but-- and no offence-- tabletop isnt really your gametype.
Being weaker than another character may be annoying but instead of winning with stats how about you outsmart them instead?
Find another niche in the party, stata dont need to be equal for everyone tp contribute equally.  

[RafeRavel]

TheVulgarUnicorn

That's just it - everyone contributing equally is everyone being equal. Power level is relative. The most amazing badass wizard with no personal skills is gonna suck when we have to talk the even more badass wizard down from bringing down apocalypse on the world. A knowledgeable but pacifistic sage is great - until blades are drawn. Each character has their skill. Each person has a role. Maybe one is better at killing certain types of enemies than another. The point is, statistic blocks are still part of the game. Each character has something they're good at. When the thing that character is best at is easily dwarfed by another character, it can be disheartening for the player. Or if a characters set of primary skills are never used, that's almost as bad. Glory and limelight should be spread out - no one character should dominate the game - combat or no.  

[Kain Almasi]

To everyone a group of mim/ maxers is less fun then a well balanced party that compliments each other. This is true and everyone sharing the glory is also good but then at a point it comes down to the DM.  

[RafeRavel]

So, how close are we to starting? I'm getting antsy...  

[TheVulgarUnicorn]

Stat blocks really arent that big thougg.
Thr gulf between a human and a vampire of equal skill is relitivly small.
Sure tha vamp wins in a flat out fight, but the human can be in sunlight.
The skills the human posses can be just as gppd or better.
And the human isnt going to be hunted to the endnof the earth because everyone things he/she is an abomination.
So rather worrying about statblocks, worry about creating your character in your head and then shaping the character sheet to fot that rather than the other way around.
Worrying about the stats beyond what is relatovly what you had in your minf is just as bad as min maxing, the difference is minmaxers know that they are doing it.

Try playing your character rather than the game, you might find it alot more enjoyable to have a well flushed out character thats stats are weak than a character whos based on good stats.
It takes more thinking and roleplaying and it ends with a better session  

[Kain Almasi]

RafeRavel

So, how close are we to starting? I'm getting antsy...

Waiting on Vulgar to tell me if she finished fixing her character and then we can move this to my subforum. I use the same one for multiple games that are part of my custom campaign setting also I have to make sure everyone has a proper background to fit the setting.