i was reading sites and it appears to be that i am a power gamer. i buff my party before i enter ANY room, and i always have certain tactics (like against lichs, i send in summons so he drains his spells on them. then he is easy to kill)
but i never use cheats etc. unless u include the xp cap remover.
does this make me a powergamer? (i still think my tactics logically against enemies) (except kobolds, i just hav fun murdering them, even if there r about 50 of the lil' blighters)

Why care? As long as you're having fun it's really no one's business how you play.

Some call it power gaming, I call it being prepared. To enter an unknown room without casting some protections is not the smartest thing to do. You can avoid casting all protection spells by scouting ahead to see what you will be facing first. Main thing is your having fun!!!!

[ 12-02-2002, 05:43 PM: Message edited by: pritchke ]

While obscene powergaming is frowned upon in real P'n'P roleplaying it is not the same in CRPG's.

After all CRPG's will never be real roleplaying since there is not the same communication and creative exchange between people. I see CRPG's (and most multi user dungeons) as a mix between an adventure game and a strategy game. The CRPG format does have a slight roleplaying flavour though as you often have several tactically valid choices that you might chose between after a "roleplaying" criterium. Also there is some of the satisfaction in seeing one's characters develop under one's leadership. "Powergaming" in CRPG's is simply focusing on the "strategy" aspect.

LOL, no kidding! Find me someone on this board who ISN'T a powergamer to some extent.

And a huge thumbs-up [img]graemlins/thumbsup.gif[/img] to what Indemaijinj just said. CRPG isn't the same as PnP. In PnP, "powergaming" is equated to being a munchkin, because that ruins the game for other players. When you're playing solo, who cares? [img]smile.gif[/img]

I will say this, though. If you are playing the game in multiplayer mode with others, it's best to be courteous and work together as a team rather than rushing ahead and doing everything on your own. That can make for some angry teammates. The first multiplay group I was in, we had a guy who had an Elven Archer who was bound and determined to do EVERYTHING on his own. He wouldn't give us a break! It got so bad that after the game ended one day and he'd logged off, a couple of the other players (I wasn't there, but I heard about it) took turns beating the holy living cr*p out of his character! As luck would have it, he lost interest and quit playing, and we formed a much more balanced and respectful group. [img]smile.gif[/img]

Cheers,
-Sazerac

Actually powergaming has it's place in P'n'P too. The mantra is: All actions must fit with the acting character and the situation described.

Also there are many ways to "cheese" out in P'n'P sessions, if you have a Game Master with a sense of humor.

Here is an example of a P'n'P 3rd ed cheese tactic:

We are a three man party of a sorceror (me), a mage/cleric and an orog fighter. We are being hunted by another party of adventurers desiring the same artifact. Our orog friend has recently been incapacitated by their thief with her Wand of Fireballs.

We are standing in an underground corridor and in front of us their obscene powerhouse of a half-ogre/half-dragon barbarian (can anyone say munchkin?) comes charging.

We are already pretty cornered since their thief has set up a sniping position with her wand. Going head to head is not an option and we can't really hurt the thing with spells either (an ugly combination of natural resistances, items and barbarian immunities).

I am desperately trying to come up with a nifty spell, and then it hits me. Monster summoning! None of the monsters would be able to fare in close combat with our adversary, but that's not the important thing. I had my eye on one specific creature whose vital statistic was neither armor class nor hitpoints but size: The celestial orca whale! I consult the book and our DM and it's clear. I designate exactly where the monster will appear (within the spell range of course). I chose it to appear directly above the ogre/dragon abomination.

But doesn't monsters appear standing on the ground? Well, not if they are flying monsters otherwise it would be stupid to summon arrowhawks (birds with four wings and no legs) for example. The celestial orca is a flying creature (it has huge angelic wings) and being a whale it does not have any legs to stand on. Under any conditions it would be stupid to assume that the creature would appear on the ground. The only logical places for such a creature to appear would be in midair or suspended in water. Since there is no water here the monster must appear in midair, all logic dictates that, and the spell description says that I can decide exactly where (within the range).

Now comes the clou: The tunnel is just big enough for the monster to fit, but it is not big enough to allow the whale to spread it's angel wings out fully. (The creature is huge and what kind of wingspan goes with that? ;) ).

The train of events is: The celestial orca appears in midair directly above the half-ogre/half-dragon. It fails to remain airborne because there is not enough space for it to spread it's wings. The orca falls dealing a large amount of instant hit bludgeoning damage to the half-ogre/half-dragon (one of the few things it wasn't resistant to). The amount of damage is enough to incapacitate the ogre/dragon and he is smothered to death as the orca waddles around trying to get out.

This was clearly not what was intended with this spell, but it worked.

LOLOL!!! Indemaijinj, that was freakin' hilarious! [img]graemlins/laugh2.gif[/img] That needs to be documented somewhere as one of the funniest uses of summons in a PnP game!

Cheers,
-Sazerac

I have more:

In following scenario I was part of a three man party routing and undead plague. I was a mad single class wizard who, besides suffering from delusions, had absolutely no common sense what so ever (his wisdom score was a whopping 3). Still his wild imagination and creativity saved his hide now and then.

I was lost in a forest swarming with undead. I had sauntered away from the others because I was angry at them. (They had taken away my flail because they were tired of me chargin everything in sight with a weapon I wasn't even proficient in). We had ventured into the forest to find a local nobleman's daughter who had been lost. By dumb luck I stumbled upon her sitting upon a suspicious looking altar, apparantly not bound or anything. Around her stood a circle of black skeletons with weird runes on them.

Determined on saving the day I did the only thing logical (to me) and strode in and grabbed the child. I had just before (in a rare moment of foresight) used Alter Self (my favourite spell) to grant myself a pair of velociraptor-like legs with matching tail granting me superior running speed. After picking the frightened girl up. The ominous black skeletons rears to life and lunges at me with astounding speed. I have the moment of suprise on my side, however and manage to gain a head start. But I am only able to keep my distance to them by using all my rounds to run as fast as possible. If I slow down the slightest the mysterious undead begin to catch in on me. Casting spells at them was out of the question.

I had a pretty neat magical returning throwing stone with a fat to hit bonus in my possession, but as I was using all my energy on running I couldn't employ it.

Then I looked at the child and got a bright idea. She was small and did hardly weigh anything. Still she was big enough to figure out how to throw a stone (my magical stone was rather small). Then I remembered that I still got an Unseen Servant active (this non-combat spell of extreme utility has an extremely long duration). Consulting the spell description tells me that their weight allowance was big enough to carry this little girl. So I jam the magical stone into her hand (stopping very briefly) and commands her to throw it at the advancing skeletons. Then the Unseen Servant picks her up allowing her to throw the stone at the skeletons while I do the running. See, Unseen Servants must be within a certain range of you. Since they have to maintain this closeness they will effectively always travel with the same speed as you do if you are running at maximum speed.

When my Alter Self spell(s) ran out there was only two skellies left. One was heavily wounded. (They were 3 hit die monsters who was permanently "hasted").

I managed to whack the last one with my backup morningstar and some magic missiles suffering only minor wounds. The girl was unharmed, but rather freaked out.

I agree with every letter written by Pritchke. And I would like to know what is meant by "powergaming". Being prepared? Is that a fault? Is it a honor to fall carelessly in each trap on your way? Developing carefully your characters and securing them the best equipment you can gather? Well, then I am a powergamer and I am proud of it.

Powergaming is often related to cheese, for example casting protective spells when you know a big fight is coming, but your character doesn't.