[Sliver]

In the campaign I have, one of my players has, unfortunately, created an overpowered melee-based character. We have one done one run in 4th edition (Just now switched over), and I allowed him to make the character on his own as we had been playing 3rd for a quite a while.

His melee weapon does base 10 damage, and he rolls 19 to hit. This is completely legitimate and broke no rules in the book.

The book says "Just because you can do something, doesn't mean you shouldn't." I agree with this statement, and it's always been my policy when it comes to this, but he completely disagrees with him. The only way to get him to balance his character (Or preferably make another one, I absolutely hate this character), is to pull my power as a GM and make him switch. In which case he would bitch, like crazy. He would complain until I just gave in and let him do whatever. Alternatively, if I continued to put him in legitimate situations in which he cannot do anything else, he would call me out as trying to punish him and single him out.

Keep in mind, normally he's a great guy. It's just this character, and this incident. I'd rather not piss of my close friend, and I'm at an odds at what to do. Any advice would be appreciated.

[dashifen]

Have him post it here so we can take a look.  I've built a fair number of characters and I'm not sure how he's gotten to that base damage.  The pool I believe, but the damage seems a little high.  Even after about 200 karma, one of the best melee fighters I've seen was only able to get to 7 or 8 as a base DV for his attacks.

--

On the social issue, if the dude is a friend, just tell him that this character isn't the right one for the game.  Maybe let him have his fun with it for a bit and then have him retire it and move on.  Or, if he refuses, just make sure that the time it takes him to get from range to melee gives the others a chance to act.  Suppressing fire can also help keep him pinned down so that ranged fighters, mages, hackers, etc. have to take out the NPC or drone doing the suppression before he can charge into melee and become a whirlwind of death once more.

[Chrona]

He MUST have a weakness, use it to challenge him and the team.

If he's  super deadly but weak willed hit him with control thoughts or a suggestion spell/power
Or show him he's still disciple level, bring in a prime-level martial-arts adept/street-sam to beat him, teach him restraint and put him on  path to rounding out his character.

[Makki]

you can get high DV and dice in melee. But it's still melee. Shoot at him. From a few hundred meters away. From the sky with drones. He's a sitting duck there.

[Operator]

I'm curious to how he receives 19 dice on a melee attack that does 10 DV damage. Do you have his statistics available?

[Sliver]

Have him post it here so we can take a look.  I've built a fair number of characters and I'm not sure how he's gotten to that base damage.  The pool I believe, but the damage seems a little high.  Even after about 200 karma, one of the best melee fighters I've seen was only able to get to 7 or 8 as a base DV for his attacks.

I might have been mistaken, the DV is probably somewhere around 8. But the problem is the fact that he rolls on average +8 on the hit, making the DV 16. It's hard to not die from that one. Also, I once made an unarmed character that I never used that hit with 11. I combined critical strike and bone lacing 3. So, it's not too hard to do.

And to those who suggested that I throw characters that exploit his weakness at him, the problem is that 1) He'll bitch that I'm trying to shut him down, and 2) It's no fun that way, because everything I throw at him will either get completely raped or just destroy him.

[Sliver]

I'm curious to how he receives 19 dice on a melee attack that does 10 DV damage. Do you have his statistics available?

The DV is probably around 8, but the 19 is something I'm sure about

- Base rating of 7 (With Aptitude quality)
- +2 because of a specialization
- Weapon Foci, force 5
- Agility of 5

There, Dice pool of 19.

[Chrona]

Imp in his foci

[Sliver]

I'm sorry, what? Imp?

[Chrona]

I'm sorry, what? Imp?

I'll PM info I swear I didn't make it up but I can't find it now... I thought it was in Digital Grimoire

Running Wild!

[Operator]

And to those who suggested that I throw characters that exploit his weakness at him, the problem is that 1) He'll bitch that I'm trying to shut him down, and 2) It's no fun that way, because everything I throw at him will either get completely raped or just destroy him.

How high is his Notoriety/PA? If he solves every one of his problems with physical violence, that should reflect upon his reputation in the shadows. If anyone's heard of him, there might just be a good chance they'd rather spend 100+ nuyen on ammo to pray, spray, and keep him away from the one place they know he's going to wreck them - in their faces. Word gets around quickly and people are going to adapt and plan accordingly.

It sounds like you're in a high level situation, so don't skimp on the opposition. Mages need to get out there and either hammer him with offensive magic or use spirits to distract and harass. Throw CS, tear gas, neurostun, anything that doesn't rely on a Success Test to take effect - those aren't items that should be ruled out. If bounty hunters are contracted to turn him in, consider narcoject darts or DMSO+Narcoject capsule rounds.

Otherwise, you may have shot yourself in the foot by letting him get such a high rating weapon focus. I personally wouldn't go higher than 3.

[Sliver]

Again, I'd get the feeling that he'd complain if I kept throwing unavoidable opposition at him. Because if they tried to shoot him, he'll lose. If they don't he'll win. It's boring, and he won't have any fun if he doesn't win.

Does it make any difference that we're using the decreased difficulty system, where 4, 5, and 6 are a success? It gives the opponents the same advantage, but maybe backing away from that will get rid of him staging the damage up to 16 and one-hitting everything.

[Stahlseele]

19 Dice under WHAT Circumstances EXACTLY?
Standing mano a mano in broad daylight on an empty street?
Or under Duress where there can be such things like a -8 to the dice pool.
Former? Completely legitimate, as that situation simply does not happen.
The latter?
Tell him to come here and teach us how to do that.

Furthermore:
No, the opposition does NOT get the same benefit from the 4/5/6 as success.
Because NUMBERS of successes are important. So if you have more dice that can come up as success AND you get success earlier, then you will get MUCH more successes . .

[Makki]

Again, I'd get the feeling that he'd complain if I kept throwing unavoidable opposition at him. Because if they tried to shoot him, he'll lose. If they don't he'll win. It's boring, and he won't have any fun if he doesn't win.

I'm sorry. But if you keep giving him melee opposition instead of guys shooting at him, you're just giving a very very very bad reflection of the SR world. Every guard has a gun. every medium facility has drones with guns. every other gang member has a gun.
A weapon focus is usually for nasty things like security accompanying spirits.

If he made a SR char that dies the first time it comes to a gun fight (so once per run), he did it wrong. If this spoils his fun, than he actually managed to loose a game where usually there are no winners and loosers, because the goal is to have fun together.

Never bring a knife to a gun fight is as old as the invention of gunpowder.

[Operator]

Your melee expert needs to realize that "winning" does not mean standing on top of the bloody corpses of his enemies in every run; that's going to earn him a major backlash. He should know that the logic of this scene from Raiders of the Lost Ark applies, and to ignore that is foolishness when guns are cheap and plentiful.

Make him rely on his secondary skills to get the job done. Consider the idea that blood and bodies will compromise a job, making the ability to subdue opposition with nonlethal/less-lethal options a necessity. If he doesn't have anything notable there, then he's built a one trick pony and should consider retiring the old character for a fresh start.