The Str 7D Esoomian

[Dr. Bidlo]

I once played an esoomian named Koroq ("Rocco" with the eye rolling tagline of "Rocco smash!") who I statted out at the maximum 7D Strength and minimum 1D Knowledge. I did think intentionally knowing it would both help and hurt me. Sure, I was not too afraid of small arms fire, but I was by no means blaster proof. Also, if I acted like I had not a care for the law, then I would have to answer to imperials or planetary police who could bring to bear speeder scale weapons or heavy repeaters if needed. Even though I had massive strength, it did not make me invincible or make the game less fun.

So my question is: have you as a GM (or player) every really had a problem with high attributes or stats that could not be mitigated by a good GM? I know the math behind the 6D STR blaster proof wookie, but I can tell you that actually playing a 7D STR esoomian was not a problem.

[Whill]

No, I have never had that problem in my game, but that may be because I have never allowed that level of min-maxing in my game. Part of being a good GM is knowing your weaknesses. For examples, one of my weaknesses is dealing with grenades.

Another weakness I have is an extreme intolerance for power gaming. It is the epitome of selfish roleplaying, where a player's personal enjoyment of dominating enemies outweighs any interest in collaborative story making. I've only experienced it with other co-players (as a player under other GMs), which is thankfully rare in my life since I much rather be the GM. It was really challenging for me to suppress my face's expression of disgust and contempt for the players and GMs (and convention groups) who allow it.

Min-maxing is the path to powergaming. In Star Wars, I have several character creation rules to stymie it. One is, regardless of species attribute ranges, no PC may have less than 2D in any non-Force attribute, or greater than 5D in any attribute. So only NPCs can have normal attributes below 2D and above 5D, for species with such attribute ranges. Furthermore, no PC may have more than one attribute with a value of 4D or higher. The exception is if it is a predesigned PC template of mine that breaks the rule. I'm pretty sure there is only a single one that slightly does (a Shard astromech droid that has a 5D TEC and a 4D MEC).

The rules do also have another practical purpose. Shrinking players groups and normal player attrition over the course of a campaign generally mean fewer PCs have to cover the total PC group skill set needed. Overspecialized PCs tend to be a problem for their group's success, and their own survival. PCs inevitably end up on their own at some points in some adventures of the campaign. But also necessary for the group's success and survival are unselfish players.

In my life, I have only had a couple players I hadn't previously played with who decided not to play in my game after learning about my character creation rules. They never explicitly stated it was because they couldn't create munchkins, but others players told me they thought that was why. If so, then the preventative measures worked as intended, and no one had to see my "ugly face."

If you say you made a 7D STR and 1D KNO character only to create a challenging roleplaying experience for yourself and it was never a problem in the game, then I believe you. But that PC could still never exist in my game because then it wouldn't be fair to any wannabe powergamers who I wouldn't let do it.
_________________
*
Site Map
Forum Guidelines
Registration/Log-In Help
The Rancor Pit Library
Star Wars D6 Damage

[Dr. Bidlo]

I can certainly understand that and know there are quite a few power gamers out there. This was my first and only extreme character, as I usually pick mundane and average characters. While Rocco was a brute, he didn't really spend much time busting skulls and more often found himself in situations where he just did not fit - both socially and physically. The GM also ran this character solo, so character composition was not a factor - I was ill equipped to deal with a lot of situations, so had to make friends in the criminal underground for support. Eventually I threw this character as an NPC opponent at the person who GMed for me in a pit fight!

Incidentally, my worst experience with min/max power gamers were all humans or aliens with attributes comparable with humans. I never got the appeal - what fun is it to even think you are always going to succeed at everything?

I recall a friend of a friend who was all about power gaming with Warhammer Fantasy Battles. My friend I are travelled from Arizona to California to play a massive battle with this guy. He spend hours talking about how his Bretonnian army was statistically unbeatable and X and Y and blah blah blah. He had every scenario figured out and foiled. My friend and I were playing a massive undead army that was purchased for theme and fun rather than to win. However, after hearing this blow hard go on and on, I reconfigured the army using a cheap tactic creating tiny units of zombies to act as speed bumps. The rules were there and could be exploited, so I dud- not because I thought it would be fun, but to take him and his attitude down a peg. He ended up having to charge one of the speed bump zombie units with his big bad unit of ultra knights, so he was stopped and the next turn I bogged him down with a massive zombie horde. In a turn or two his army was crumbling and his elite super win unit was tied up in a hopeless battle with an constantly replenishing horde of 120 or so zombies. He ended up rage quitting, making all kinds of excuses and saying hiw the game rules were broken because I found a way to exploit them to his detriment. He never got the point, unfortunately and we spent the rest of the weekend hearing him talk about how he could reconfigure his army to beat my army with 98% certainty...

[garhkal]

[Dr. Bidlo]

I did play this character solo, so problem fir others wasn't an issue. I was never faced with E-WEBs but I was in real danger plenty of times.

I have noticed a tendency that people assume the span of a couple dice in defence over attack damage makes the defender invulnerable. That is the type of thinking my friend's friend in California had - how his army was unbeatable. It was not. When I attacked him and won when ststistically I should not have (never telm me the odds!), he was mad that I even tried (and succeeded) because I should have known I was supposed to fail. I have several examples of this with other players too come to think of it. Power games tend to get mad when their calculated probabilities do not play out. To me, the fun is knowing "There's a chance!"

In Star Wars I have seen more times than I can remember a horrible defence roll with a lot of dice paired against a wonderful damage roll with fewer dice and a few 6's on wild dice.

No one is safe from damage. Less likely to get hurt, yes, but blaster-proof, no. That is decades on Star Wars and thousands of rolls for my support. However, as commercials say "individual results may vary". Aside from stats and odds, do you have experiences as a player or GM to share when a player with a high attribute worked well? Secondarily, an example where it did not work well (those are probably more abundant).

[Whill]

[Dr. Bidlo]

I hope it doesn't blow out or get heated - that is not my intent at all. My intent was really to see if anyone else has had experiences (particularly good) with characters with some of the more extreme attributes and abilities. Thete is always a lot of talk about how things ate broken and I just have not noticed that on my end. An extra couple of dice is certainly a nice edge, but not broken in my own opinion and experiences. However, if you don't think this is a wise topic to discuss due to the potential for it to break down into chaos, we can cut it short. If we had the opportunity to play or GM for me, you would see that I am not a power gamers and play for story and theme over winning at all costs. I also like to test out rules at the extreme ends too, so that may have been the desire to create this character.

To answer one of your questions, yes, most NPCs do actually have the 6D above their base species attribute dice in my games. Only the lowest and most disposable NPCs have the base. That is just how my groups have typically played. Instead of a default of all Attributes are assumed to be 2D, I set the default at 3D.

One more factor I forgot to mention is the power of combined actions. Even the lowly blaster Pistol goes from 4D to 6D damage when four people coordinate a shot. If you use a blaster rifle that goes to 7D. As for my Esoomian, he was large enough that if he caused too much of a stir the locals would send out even more - 8 to 16 enforcers to get me in line. That kind of combined damage it very dangerous even with 7D Strength. Finally, based on the esomian's size, no armor of any kind was an option and frankly I did not even think about getting any...

I have seen powerful characters easily mitigated enough times I haven't personally seen this as a problem and MOST of the people I have played with over the years have not been power gamers. Those that were not only maxed stats, they also frequently cheater on dice rolls because it was never enough...

[garhkal]

[Dr. Bidlo]

I can claim it was balanced because my character couldn't do whatever he wanted, couldn't fight off dozens of squads of stormtroopers and come out of it without a scratch. Even though he was tough, he was still vulnerable to damage and to the law (or rival criminal elements). The GM never had any problem creating fun and challenging scenarios for the character. That was my experience, so that is how I can say it was balanced.

[KageRyu]

Much of what I would say in response has been said time and again in so many similar threads, and also in this one by fellow pit dwellers. There are even posts by OP targeting some of the criticism that are well known to deflect or discredit them based on personal observation, so clearly the answers are well known and the problems are well known. While I have not role played in a very long time, regrettably, I did role play from around 1984 through 2007 in a variety of games and groups and environments, and seen all manner of power gaming, munchkinism, min-maxing, etc.. I have played a version of the D6 system almost since its inception at conventions or in home groups, and run Star Wars (mainly 1e with house rules and addendums from 2e and 2R&E and Metabarons, and D6 core) from somewhere in the 80's until 2007 (when my last gaming group was torn apart by infighting...real life not in game). I feel I can say with some weight and authority that Excessive High attributes are a problem and it is not relevent how good the GM is because by Mitigate you mean either GM jumping through hoops to address that one aspect (more work for GM) or GM especially targetting the weaker areas (something I always disliked). The math does not changed by perspective, and it has been hashed to death, 6D is essentially blaster proof in practical d^ as to have a good chance of damage you need to bring heavy weapons not commonly used in a firefight. The majority of personal weapons up to and including rifles cap out at 5D and these will most often not wound, and not even stun under 2R&E rules = blasterproof. When the GM is forced to bring in vehicle scale weapons and support weapons like repeaters to pose a threat to one character, it places any and all other players in the crossfire and makes things very un-fun for them after having to create their third and fourth character because the weapon hits are almost certainly fatal to them now. This of course means that either the players rely on this personal tank they have to be able to walk through combat, or combat gets over the top. The only fall back is a game focusing on non-combat which is hard to do with a Knowledge of 1D and likely low scores in other attributes as well.

Trying to counter with "I played solo" actually hurts the attempt to claim this was not a problem character.

I have in past, and still would, allow a Wookie to have max strength, but I am very selective on who I allow to play such a character as it can be unbalancing, and can very easily disrupt a whole group.

If you can find a copy of the Champions 3rd Edition rules, I suggest reading the chapter on Game and Character Balance and power gaming, I find it informative and hilarious the examples of min-maxing presented there.
_________________
"There's a set way to gain new Force Points and it represents a very nice system, where you're rewarded for heroism, not for being a poor conductor to electricity." ~Jachra

[Dr. Bidlo]

[KageRyu]

[Dr. Bidlo]

Thank you KageRyu, that clears up your intent perfectly. Thanks for taking the extra time and effort to explain. I was not taking offense, but was also not privy to the full dark and belabored history of the topic. Though I have played this game for many years, I have not been involved in discussing it outside of my very small corner of gamers until joining the Pit a year ago.

Consider the topic dropped! Whill, can we put a lock on this turd and flush it?

[KageRyu]

[Ninja-Bear]

Dr. Bidlo, I get what you are saying. I have a buddy who has the classic (6D) Blaster-proof wookiee. It can be challenge but then any game can be a challenge. My buddy thinks that I don’t like his character, it more that I can’t seem to hit and if I do damage his character. My dice fail me! And its banter about it can be slightly irritating. I would like to point out though that you said that typically you use 3D instead 2D stats. That means your are mitigating some of the 7D character. And as mentioned Solo play can change some of the dynamics the game. But I too have statistic anomalies. Same friend different game system he had a mentalist (Super hero genre) and tried to Mind Control and the lowly agent rolled 3 ones on 3D6. Friend was annoyed because that shouldn’t have happen but well here you go. Another friend was mad cause every battle of W40k he would throw max amount of Orks against against one Space Marine and then my dice get hit and I’ll make Save after Save after After Save. And while I don’t doubt people when they say over the long run X or Y happens and maybe be broken, I know that I never get to play that long with any game so in the short term it isn’t a problem.