Poll: Do you Min-max with your RPG parties or do you pick what looks cool?

[BathorysGraveland]

I prefer to just look the part of the character I'm playing.

For Skyrim, as an example, I'm playing a nationalistic Nord character influenced by dark age Viking raiders (helped by with some appropriate mods). So he is currently wearing simple chain mail and lamellar armour along with a Nordic sword (that seems to be influenced by King Theoden's sword in Lord of the Rings), but he would continue wearing it and pass over a daedric cuirass and an ebony longsword simply because it isn't a part of his character and what he currently has looks more the part.

So yeah, I tend to have role playing elements and what I prefer override the actual quality of items for the most part. I'm pretty fussy like that.

 

[Glademaster_v1legacy]

Depends PvP or PvE? PvP will always be min/max that just comes with the territory but in PvE aesthetics come first.

 

[Austin Howe]

I won't call any JRPG balanced, (it's an inherently unbalanced genre, which works since it plays into the narrative,) but I will say that most of the time, the tiers in JRPG parties are balanced enough that you can make anything work. I mean, let's put it this way, I've beaten Final Fantasy IX more times than I care to count, and I have never done significant grinding with Quina. I pretty much make sure she mas Mighty Guard and Thousand Needles, and that's all I ever need for the parts of the game where she's a required party member.

 

[Vault101]

asthetics over stats..anytime

though putting my ME1 squad in pink gear is pretty funny

 

[splayfoot1]

back in my WoW days I was very much into getting the absolute best out of my raiding characters.
If I'm not in a serious situation though, like stuffing around in 5 mans, i enjoy really bad builds and attempting to make them work, or just using pretty armour.

In single player games I love nothing more than making an utterly random character that may or may not fail horribly, like a merchant/support caster that is utterly worthless alone and has to rely on summons/helpers

 

[Jmp_man]

This takes me back... about 6 months.

The only game I can REALLY say that I have min-max'd on would be Divinity 2 (The less buggy version). Personally though it didn't make the game more fun, just more tedious. Sure I had a char. that was about +10 levels higher then the surrounding enemies, but believe me it was not worth it to have to wait until the absolute last second to turn in ALL my quests at once or having to revert saves just because I missed a good mind-read/I wandered too close to a chest.

Any other game I'm fine without min-maxing. I tried to min-max Final Fantasy Tactics A2 once...
...
...
...
... never again. (O.K. not THAT bad but still)

 

[ThePenguinKnight]

I have pretty bad OCD, so even though I absolutely hate min-maxing I always end up going through great lengths and worry to do it anyway. Everything has to be perfect, but I think I'm starting to get over it little by little by choosing to specialize and focus all my obsession over the specializations.

 

[wintercoat]

Min-max. You never know, that one strength could be the difference between victory or defeat!

 

[kayo of the Well]

.

 

[Alexias_Sandar]

I play my character. If this makes me an awesome combat god...yay. If not...also yay. It's worked out rather well for me...and with quite a few very capable and successful characters. Sometimes at battle, sometimes at other things...sometimes at just about everything they touch. *shrug* I'd rather follow where their roleplay and the story takes me. Now, am I going to play someone that's utterly useless intentionally from the get go for 'RP'? No. Those 'RP Purists' who believe actively screwing their character over and making them useless means they're 'better roleplayers' are idiots.

 

[kouriichi]

You know, im weird. I like to pick what i want to pick, even if it doesnt work. My warriors are more Charismatic then a bard, and my mages have a lot of health. I just go with what feels right at the time.

You need a smooth talking warrior to impress the Queen? Call on me.

 

[Versuvius]

Do i squeeze every last drop of power and optimise so efficiently the char beats everything level appropriate? No i fucking don't. And nor do i allow anyone in my games to do so. If someone hyper specialises, selects specific items and combines specific feats from across the whole range of available material to create the ultimate character possible for that specific class/race i tell them to re fucking roll. I don't minmax when i play and i don't minmax NPCs or enemies when i DM and if some sperglord decides they want to stomp on my campaign and make the party redundant with their math fetish i get my nark on.

DM Rage Mode deactivated.

Had enough campaigns crippled due to the above shenanigans. I have no problem MAKING challenges for minmaxed chars because i simply don't use character building standard rules, because DM powers, but in doing so it likely makes the unoptimised chars dead meat 99% of the time. Never had a twink party to deal with, hope i never do, so no. I don't minmax and Minmaxers suffer the wrath of a pissed off DM.

Edit: Ruleofcool chars i help rebuild to be reasonable because on the opposite side of the scale useless/gimped chars are no fun either. Someone can PLAY It but i will rapidly okay a rebuild midcampaign if they stop having fun due to being utterly crap mechanically. Which is fine, i fall into the trap occasionally myself.

I DM Rogue Trader and Dark Heresy and play Pathfinder and 3.5 for reference.

On computer games: Naaah. Too lazy.

 

[The Pinray]

I can generally make anything work in RPGs unless its just balls to the walls retarded.

So I choose appearance over stats all the time. My highest level character is still in Wolf Armor, for instance.

 

[Thanatos5150]

I select something I want the character to do, mechanically.
And then I make them really, really good at it, to the expense of opening holes in their armour. Weaknesses if you will. And then I craft the other party members to specifically fill those weaknesses.

Rogue!Hawke, for example, was good at one thing, teleporting up to the bad guy, brutalizing them, and moving on. He was not good at being hit. That's what Anders was for., he couldn't heal Rogue!Hawke faster than Hawke took damage, but it he certainly tilted DPS in my favour. For example.

So, yeah. That's the classic definiton of min-maxing, I suppose. Do I ever munchkin the ever-loving beejus out of a system, leaving it steaming and broken in a mess of gears before me?
Never intentionally.
For some reason, it turns out a Magick-allergic Gunslinger in Arcanum is really, really good if you rush-build Guns and Perception.

 

[Berenzen]

I usually like taking skills and traits that synergize well with each other, but I wouldn't call it min-maxing. But min-maxing? No, not really unless it's in social skills. But in terms of combat? Not really, I prefer to play smart and think outside the box in my games rather than destroy something with the power of math. And believe me, I could- I'm study game system design and physics.

For computer games: sometimes, not really, I usually burn out on characters I min-max really fast. I think the only time I did do it was in raiding in WoW, where it was really needed.

 

[lacktheknack]

It depends on my mood that day.

I usually take the best, but...

Playing a linguist in Daggerfall? Simultaneously agonizing and rewarding.

 

[DustyDrB]

I role play and do what fits the character. That's the best way I can put it.

 

[MammothBlade]

A bit of tweaking, anything more than that and it's no fun unless you want to RP an idiot hero.

Do i squeeze every last drop of power and optimise so efficiently the char beats everything level appropriate? No i fucking don't. And nor do i allow anyone in my games to do so. If someone hyper specialises, selects specific items and combines specific feats from across the whole range of available material to create the ultimate character possible for that specific class/race i tell them to re fucking roll. I don't minmax when i play and i don't minmax NPCs or enemies when i DM and if some sperglord decides they want to stomp on my campaign and make the party redundant with their math fetish i get my nark on.

DM Rage Mode deactivated.

Had enough campaigns crippled due to the above shenanigans. I have no problem MAKING challenges for minmaxed chars because i simply don't use character building standard rules, because DM powers, but in doing so it likely makes the unoptimised chars dead meat 99% of the time. Never had a twink party to deal with, hope i never do, so no. I don't minmax and Minmaxers suffer the wrath of a pissed off DM.

Edit: Ruleofcool chars i help rebuild to be reasonable because on the opposite side of the scale useless/gimped chars are no fun either. Someone can PLAY It but i will rapidly okay a rebuild midcampaign if they stop having fun due to being utterly crap mechanically. Which is fine, i fall into the trap occasionally myself.

I DM Rogue Trader and Dark Heresy and play Pathfinder and 3.5 for reference.

On computer games: Naaah. Too lazy.

Here's a thought, maybe make it so that munchkin characters can't access the best weapons and armour, and make battles tougher for min-max whilst rewarding balanced characters.