Getting Players Up To Speed

[LawOfTheLand]

In most tabletop systems, it's generally accepted that there are "good" and "bad" builds for characters. Despite apparent equality in character power level, some groups will have players of unequal skill levels. The disparity in player skill can easily translate to character power disparity over a few sessions as successful, optimized characters survive tougher challenges with higher stats and better strategies where lesser characters would simply fail and die.

Basically, you know that ONE GUY that plays munchkins and makes the game harder for everyone as a result? Now flip the script--a WHOLE PARTY of munchkins, and one normal dude. What are a few good ways for a DM to make sure this player gets to have his share of monster-bashing and dungeon-looting fun?

[Dawn ✩ Quixotic]

I know this is a cop-out answer, but the GM should have considered that from the beginning, before approving character builds.

Especially if it's a game you're advertising for online, it should include in the description the ideal level of optimization.

If you *do* end up with some disparity, you should hold a group powwow to discuss the issue, and perhaps rework the characters, and bring the other one up to speed with the others.

[The 275th]

So I mentioned it in the chat; the Party Equality Curse.

It's a plot device I mixed up in a game of mine I had a little while back where most of the players (veterans) were fairly powerful, and a new player joined with some pretty horrible stats. I helped where I could, but a combination of bad rolls, inexperience, and a focus on roleplaying made for a character that was functionally bad.

Now initially I said to hell with it let's roll; but it soon became clear that despite their best attempts, the poor player wasn't able to do anything, while the other players were able to continue doing what they did most efficiently.

Enter the PEC.

I contrived a way in the story for the group to get their hands on an artifact. This comes from know the group would want to use it and having it seem like a really good thing to their Detect Magic checks.
(A good tactic to use if the group itself is shitting on the weaker guy by the way; make the item obviously cursed and try to ensure they give it to him/her.)

What the item actually does is it takes the combined attributes of all those present and... well, equalizes them. With the exception of (ideally) the person who used the item. Basically contrive whatever you have to, but the end result is that the curse leaves all the other players' stats lowered (really nice vs. Min/maxers) but leaving the weaker guy unscathed.

From there it's a matter of actually tailoring events to work with the player's strengths. If he/she still doesn't have any you can just fiddle with the curse a bit to give them a stat boost to charisma or diplomacy or some such, just do what you want with it.

Now, the group I was playing with was surprised by the turn of events, but we all wanted to make sure that the new player actually got to have fun; and this was a good way of ensuring he got to be the focus of the story for a bit, leading the rest of the weakened players and finding a way to reverse the curse- while finding some nice stat boosts along the way (which default go to him since the others' stats can't be changed cause of the curse.)

With that said if you have a group that doesn't see a problem with their min-maxing and glory hogging, it makes things a bit trickier. In such cases you may have to literally equalize stats- or stat swap them, giving min-maxer A's immense strength to the Bard, and the Bard's immense Charisma to the new guy, etc.

Really there's a lot you can do with it. It's not terribly elegant and it might aggravate the players if they don't think they're doing anything wrong, but in such cases you can make it look more like a usual plot contrivance that happens to be of least detriment to the 'low' player.


Anyways hope that all made sense and isn't too silly sounding.

[Dawn ✩ Quixotic]

That's actually a really... iffy solution.
If your players loved it, then I suppose that's fine... most I know would find it too contrived, almost railroady.
A better solution would simply be... buff the other character up... rather than try to bring everyone down.

Even if you have to just... do it, and not have an in-story reason (because trying to have everything make sense in-story will just hold things down while not really getting rid of the problem).

I mean... it's the kind of thing a the type of GM who has contrived reasons to block anything from players they don't like (I knew a person who had a demigod named Captain Story who would actually fly down like "Captain Story says no!" when they tried something he didn't want happening)... the kind of thing someone like that would do.


It's not a bad idea, again, if your players really liked it... but the idea of an equalizing curse would work better as a story premise in its own right, rather than a patch for some other issue which is then worked into the story.

[LawOfTheLand]

One solution I've experienced in my own experiments is the DM pre-building all the characters, then letting the players pick between them sight unseen. This might be good for assuring initial power balance, but can lead to problems down the line, especially if the reason for the power gap is inexperience. "I don't know how to play a rogue/sorcerer, I'm sick of having +0 bab at 2nd level, I'm going into fighter!"

Another way I just thought of right now involves the weak character getting taken aside and going on some solo adventures. Perhaps a noted trainer in the area notices how one member of an otherwise solid adventuring party lags behind the others. His motives for offering his services can vary, and he might or might not charge for it, but the point is that he's going to pump somebody up in a perfectly believable fashion.

[MayContainPlagiarism]

As perpetual DM every time I play D&D, I don't design my game so that combat prowess or arcane/divine talent overshadows the narrative. My players talk, interact with things, and they only get into a fight when the story has good reason for it or it's crucial to their enjoyment; I don't roll random encounters or any of that nonsense, and I'm pretty good at designing fights so that every participant has something to do that makes them feel useful.

I also understand the systems I play and circumvent obnoxious min/max "builds," which is an entirely foreign concept to my 5e table. But so are drow, dragonborn, and tieflings, so every table is different. But I don't see it being a problem if you don't let it be a problem; I don't like power gamers, and I have the luxury of choosing not to play with them.