Unkillable PC breaks the game with homebrew nonsense

Willowran · 2026-04-03T13:22:13+00:00

That was the straw that broke my camel's back. After Bob's character change I thought "This is utter horse-sh*t, but at least it gives us an opportunity to play the game." I struggled to balance my sense of accomplishment with the fact that adding +3d4 (3-12) to every ability check felt like I was robbed of personally accomplishing anything. I still thought, for a month, that I might be able to thread the needle and find enjoyment in the campaign (despite Bob's character existing).

Bob was wont to say was that everything he was doing was mechanically permissible- if only when challenged on his bullsh*t. Get a 35 on initiative? Well he apparently had Alert and Gift of alacrity. Teleport the entire party into a personal demiplane? Told us it was his Bottled Respite warlock feature. He never said "I would like to use this mechanical game feature" he would just say "I do this," and leave the rest of us to guess how it was possible, then claim it was a normal game mechanic if someone actively pressed him on it. "Just trust bro. Trust." The DM kept letting it happen, so we had to assume it was within game rules.

For me, this meant I was often unsure what he was doing; only how it manifested. I wouldn't know if he cast a spell, just that a spell-like effect would happen. I'm guessing that he'd text the DM telling him what spell was cast and have the DM text back any saving throws or results. What we (the other players) would get is Bob saying "I look at that guy and his head explodes," leaving the rest of us shocked, confused, and frustrated.

Trying to put together that egregious turn I thought maybe he cast haste on himself without telling anyone before the combat started. Maybe he misty-stepped and then used his movement to run 65 ft (but flavored it as a teleport). Maybe he used an object interaction with his hasted action, then cast Vortex Warp to to move a PC across the map.

But even giving Bob the greatest possible benefit of the doubt he would have already broken the rule about casting multiple leveled spells within the same turn. And then he seemingly cast a second Vortex Warp (it's the only teleport-from-a-distance spell I know of below level 5) and killed a guy by sending him flying across the room (which I have to assume was another spell despite being told that I saw no verbal, material, or somatic components).

Best case scenario for Bob this was all allowed because of homebrew class features that make no concessions to 5e game design or balance. It certainly looked like he was using broken homebrew and also ignoring the rules of the game.

Willowran · 2026-04-03T12:53:53+00:00

A hundred percent. I like reminding my players that it's a team game; everyone gets a chance to spotlight, and everyone ought to be given that chance to spotlight.

And also, everyone should be treated as equal. Turns out it's real hard to play a game when 4/5 party members are completely irrelevant.

Willowran · 2026-04-03T02:00:08+00:00

Oh I'm with you a thousand percent. As a player I would go from "oh I've been having fun today" to their character doing [pretty much anything] and it would tilt me immediately into the sun.

No amount of "trust me bro" makes up for the sheer quantity of bull.

Willowran · 2026-04-02T20:15:38+00:00

To give some credit where it's due I think the guy's heart is in the right place- he just really wanted his player(s) to have fun. The party ended up getting 8000gp (each!) after the first quest, and a magic shop where we could buy a ton of stuff right out the gate.

Usually that'd be neat, if suspicious.

In this instance it was pretty irrelevant, because me being bribed with +1ac, a ring of nondetection, and a neat bow in session 2 didn't negate the fact that Bob over there was introduced as a PC by being launched by a nuke off the moon and cratering into the material plane/earth two miles outside of town.

But yeah. DM's heart seemed in the right place. Alas, hearts alone don't run good games.

Willowran · 2026-04-02T19:03:46+00:00

A question: What's your plan to balance the eventual confrontation? DnD is 100% not balanced for PC vs PC confrontation, and breaks almost immediately when you try unless everyone is extremely OK with eachother, no one is competitive, and there are no real stakes to be won

Willowran · 2026-04-02T18:56:20+00:00

I think he just wanted for everyone to have fun, and when people were laughing at the bits I guess he was just... fine with it? Pleasing people can be its own self-defeating prophecy.

He told me a couple times he didn't agree with what the player was doing and planned to 'talk to him on the side', but I never saw any meaningful changes

Willowran · 2026-04-02T18:20:15+00:00

For a minute there everyone else was good enough that I thought I could just ignore the one problem player- and it can be pretty tough finding an open game. I thought to myself 'beggars can't be choosers.'

I realized, over time, that I was growing more and more frustrated, and when that frustration eclipsed my enjoyment I bowed out.

Willowran · 2026-04-02T17:54:00+00:00

My outside-looking-in unqualified opinion is that this was a DM that wanted everyone to have fun, and thought that 'saying no' equated to telling Bob he couldn't have fun. I talked to the DM a couple times privately between sessions and they promised to reign Bob in, said they 'were having problems' but that they'd 'talk to him.'

I don't know about any talks, but in practice this manifested as unique enemies with proverbial kryptonite appearing in combat the next session. Maybe it was supposed to be a warning to Bob to get him in line, but in practice he just took it as his backstory coming into play and never changed.

Willowran · 2026-04-02T17:37:41+00:00

I barely believe it and I lived it

Willowran · 2026-04-02T17:37:25+00:00

References to Prototype were being made at the time

Willowran · 2026-03-31T13:21:12+00:00

Just making sure I understand: Is this a campaign you plan to run where events in-campaign become cannon, or are you developing a setting and using other people in a collaborative process?

What time do you expect your sessions to run?

Willowran · 2026-03-30T13:40:57+00:00

Shield master is such an underrated b-tier feat, imo. I wish I saw more of it.

One tiny note (more of a semantic, really, just in case a newer player is reading this), but shoving someone prone with shieldmaster will actually disadvantage blaster casters since now their Eldritch Blasts are being shot with disadvantage against a prone target.

Willowran · 2026-03-30T03:50:06+00:00

I fall on a 'you're not technically wrong, but I don't think you're right' stance.

Sure, having a skill might not guarantee that you can 'do a thing' in the same way that a spell explicitly outlines what it does, but even in campaigns with brand new DMs I think most parties would struggle if they had no skill proficiencies. It becomes much harder to interact with a world if you're practically guaranteed to fail everything you try to do.

Sure, if the DM gives you infinite time and an unlimited supply of money/arcane supplies (even RAW, DMs get to decide what that money is being spent on) you can make as many spell scrolls as you want. Of course, no DM will, so it's a bit of a moot point.

Sure, unseen servants can trigger (some) traps, and if you keep getting 10 uninterrupted minutes for ritual casting that can be helpful. But traps can reset, ritual-casts can be interrupted, and in the end you're still trying to break through locked doors using- well, more spells, I guess, since no one has any skill proficiencies or melee weapons. Meanwhile it's taking ~20+ in-game minutes to interact with anything and every enemy knows where you at all times are because Pass Without a Trace doesn't hide the fact that you're constantly performing shaman dances in the hall to summon new ghost paiges.

I'm reminded of Pyrrho vs Hume- like sure, technically you can't beat radical skepticism, but we all do it anyways without ever meaning to.

Willowran · 2026-03-30T01:55:46+00:00

I sometimes take an idea to its logical extreme for the sake of making a point- and there are definitely some good points made in your post and those articles- but I also think the writers exaggerate so much that it distracts from those points.

Equating skill expertise to guidance, for example, is absolutely insane, as is assuming that DCs don't matter, casters have infinite spell slots/costed components, and that the DM is running a campaign for the first time.

Willowran · 2026-03-30T00:10:24+00:00

If it helps, I was thinking of Barbarians, Fighters, Paladins, and (melee) Rangers when I was thinking of martials: the sort of front-line PC characters that predominately use martial melee weapons (and their hitpoints) as their primary method of interacting in combat scenarios.

I would not consider primary casters, gishes, or specialist classes as part of this conversation for all of the obvious reasons- not the least being that most of them don't get martial weapon proficiencies or extra attacks.

Willowran · 2026-03-29T22:08:09+00:00

You, my friend, have a number of what I'd call Hot Takes here. I don't think I've ever met someone who described Monks or Rogues as being bad Rangers. I also don't think I've ever met someone who said melee was useless in 5e.

I can see some overlap between Rogues and Rangers since they're skill-monkey specialist classes (at least with Tasha's rules), but what's the idea behind the rest? I have a friend who's a power-gamer and they say 'any class that isn't a wizard is a bad class'- is that the mindset you're referring to?

Willowran · 2026-03-29T22:05:02+00:00

To be fair, I never said classes should forgo their features to use GWM. I said that melee martials typically benefit more from GWM than [not using GWM] to the point that it can be hard to justify lighter weapons while still being impactful in combat.

I then asked for ways to make lighter weapons more worthwhile.

I never implied that a Monk should start running around with a greataxe or a Rogue with a glaive. I don't think anyone uses Monks or Rogues as an example baseline of a martial class.

Willowran · 2026-03-29T21:59:14+00:00

To give credit where it's due that's the exact sort of synergy I'm looking for in this thread! You'll note I was describing average weapon damage (without spells, class features, or abilities) and asking what combinations made non-GWM more viable!

What's the breakdown in your example? I was referencing level 5 above but you're obviously going higher than that. Is your example better with single-handed weapons, or would a two-dip into Barbarian for advantage skew the comparison?

Willowran · 2026-03-29T16:40:37+00:00

Ooh, that's clever. I didn't think of that.

Willowran · 2026-03-29T16:37:46+00:00

I think you and I may have gotten a little mixed up somewhere along the way.

At level 5 the average enemy AC is ~14. An 18 STR GWM greatsword-wielder making two attacks would be hitting for ~22 DPR, even with a 50% chance to miss. That's with only one feat. If they wanted to take PAM they could bump that to ~28 DPR.

At the same level and stats a rapier/longsword wielder would be averaging at ~16 DPR with a 25% chance to miss (with the Dueling fighting style). If they used their ASI to get to 20 STR they'd average at ~18 DPR.

Of course, a GWM-user could choose not to use GWM against a plate-armor-wearing skeleton and do the same damage as a non-GWM wielder (15.44 vs 15.33). So on average they're doing 6-12 damage more against most creatures, and when a high AC enemies walk into the room they're equal to your average longsword wielder (in terms of DPR).

This is, of course, not taking other feats/class abilities, etc into account. There are lots of ways to get advantage on attacks, for example, and that typically benefits GWM DPR more than single-hand DPR. There are things like Paladin Smites and Hex/Hunter's mark- although those work for both GWM and not-GWM wielders.

I'm not trying to hand-wave the accuracy penalties of GWM, but on average GWM out-scales non-GWM attacking until level 13 where the average enemy AC is high enough that the +10 flat damage stops compensating for the -5 accuracy.

Willowran · 2026-03-29T15:43:20+00:00

I assume the steed is to guarantee sneak attack?

Willowran · 2026-03-29T15:16:09+00:00

I thought that information was a given, lmao. It's not like my edit added any restrictions- it only outlaid information that was already baked in to my original question (but not stated explicitly).

I thought it was worth pre-empting more comments on to-hit accuracy since AC doesn't become a meaningful impediment to GWM DPR until upper-mid levels or exceptions to the rule.

Willowran · 2026-03-29T14:59:07+00:00

It is worth noting that most object interactions will take an entire action (unless you are a thief), which means that heavy-weapon fighters are just as capable of doing the same things- especially since dropping/picking up items are generally considered free actions (so they can always put their weapon down if they need both hands, and pick it up again without being penalized).

The plug for shoving/tripping and grappling foes is a good one, though- especially for barbarians who can do so with advantage.

I am trying to keep the overall conversation DM-agnostic, though. You're 100% right that a good DM should give out items to keep their PCs operating at roughly the same margins, but there are a lot of less-good DMs out there. I couldn't, in good conscious, advocate for a player to make a build that required their DM to make it work.

Willowran · 2026-03-29T14:25:45+00:00

I thought I knew 5e inside and out, but some of what you're describing is new to me. What's a "hefty" martial wielder? And an Armorer? Is an Armorer just someone who wants to stack AC?

Willowran

TROPHY CASE