I’m the DM for a new D&D campaign with five players. One of them is very experienced and knows how to build strong characters. The other four are either completely new or only played a little before, so they don’t really know the rules or how to optimize.
The experienced player made an Exblade Warlock inspired by Baldur’s Gate 3. In the very first combat, during the first round, he dealt 40 damage to the boss. Meanwhile, the others were doing maybe 5–10 damage each, and that was *with* me giving them little bonuses for creative ideas (like one player using lightning on a drenched enemy, so I doubled the damage).
I could tell the newer players felt bad. They didn’t say anything, but the vibe was basically: “Why are we even here if he’s doing everything?” I didn’t want them to feel useless or bored.
For the second session, I tried to focus more on roleplay and puzzles, but there was still combat. To balance things a bit, I added a small homebrew mechanic **only for the Warlock**: every time he cast a spell, he had to roll a d6.
* 6 = the spell worked even better
* 5 = normal spell
* 4 = slightly weaker
* 3 = something felt off
* 2 = the spell fizzled or something funny happened
* 1 = the spell failed because his patron “didn’t feel like helping”
It actually created some funny moments and the group seemed to enjoy it. But at the end of the session, the experienced player told me he didn’t appreciate it. He felt like his character wasn’t what he wanted anymore and that I was punishing him for building something strong.
AITA for nerfing his character to keep the game fun for the others?
\#EDIT#
*I’ve gotten a lot of similar questions, so here’s an explanation for everyone:*
*We started at level 2. I checked the other players’ character sheets, but not his, because I believed—wrongly, I know now—that he would make some kind of support build.*
*We used the 4d6 method, and he got really lucky: two 18s, one 17, one 15, and two 13s.*
*I also didn’t check his dice rolls, because I trusted him, and I was more focused on helping the newer players and giving them ideas on how to use their abilities.*
*I’m not usually the DM, and I understand I still need to work on it. This is only my third time DMing, but I really love the game and enjoy creating stories for people to play.*
*I tried to talk to him before the last session, but unfortunately we just couldn’t find a moment. I came up with this idea only a day before, so that part is also on me.*
*I’ll try to do better, and thanks to everyone for the advice*
*Thx to* [SuzanneStudies](https://www.reddit.com/user/SuzanneStudies/)
YTA for not talking to him about this and seeing how he felt before implementation.
YTA. You are telling me you allowed a build where a first level character could do 40 points of damage? Ever hear of balance? I would have left the game, even if I was not that player. Punishing players instead of stepping up as DM is A.
Also when you bring in new players, you all roll up new characters. This is pretty basic stuff. It can be negotiated that maybe when there is progression someone can switch out to their higher level character, but sounds like you have no concept of party balance. Or boost their levels so that everyone has a reasonable chance.
A good player will still be good at low levels. A new player needs encouragement. Nobody needs to be crapped on like you just did.
Yta for not getting involved with party balance. Something is going on here. It’s also not fair to single him out without telling him. Next time try just, like, talking about it.
YTA
Talk to people first. Sudden changes to specifically target a single player don’t feel fun.
Also worth talking with the rest of the players too. If they have made glaringly bad choices for some stats, they’re going to keep being frustrated.
If you’re level 1, I don’t get where 40 damage in one turn comes from, even with crits. Smells like shenanigans, maybe adding attribute modifiers twice on a couple crits or something.
Edit: Looks like a level 1 can do 40 damage in a round only if they’re extremely specific builds or classes, *and* they crit twice, *and* they roll max damage on both crits. If the stars aligned, let him have his win. That is like once a campaign lucky.
All of those guide to everything book subclasses are significantly more powerful than the base books. I honestly wouldn’t allow access to them in a game with new players.
Yta. You shouldn’t ever nerf a character if it’s vanilla. If you need to change something, make the other players characters better, making his weaker won’t make the other players feel better, you’ll only disappoint the player you nerfed.
A better discussion would be figuring out why it was so disproportionate. Was the warlock being played correctly? Were the other players just making dumb decisions? Check everyone’s math because if they are being played correctly, characters of similar levels should be near eachother and while the new warlock is great, it isn’t better than a fighter or barbarian in melee or wizard or sorcerer for ranged spells, so the fact it was so lopsided indicates that either your warlock is doing something wrong or your other players need some remedial combat training.
YTA.
DM here
You don’t nerf one player because the rest didn’t optimize their characters well.
What you need to do is intentionally throw opponents at them that CAN take the Warlock.
Monsters with high charisma stats to counter his saving throws. Monsters with resistance to force damage.
It’s YOUR job to balance the encounters OR help the other players optimize their sheets.
ALSO he literally has TWO spell slots come on man, this is a DM issue not a him issue.
You’re right, thanks. I’m still new at this, but I’ll look at other options and try to do better.
You got this, DMing can be hard.
Did you start them off at level 1? 40 damage in one turn seems suspect at level 1. Make sure he is following DND rules not BG3 rules.
You should’ve talked to the warlock first before hand, it’s never fun when DMs do something that either A) messes with a characters story or flow and B) makes new rules just for one player. I understand wanting the new players to be more involved and not just sitting on the sidelines. Even before session 1 you should’ve looked at everyone’s characters so you could’ve told him something like “hey I noticed you are going for an optimized build, that’s cool but the others are brand new so maybe we could do something so they don’t feel like there just in the background?” Or talked before session 2 not just spring it on them out of the blue
YTA. I’m going to be honest. If my dm tossed such an obscene rng ass nerf onto my character that I spent time and effort building, to turn my cool guy into an inconsistent joke, I would stand up and leave on the spot.
YTA- there are a lot of better ways to handle this. You jumped right to punishing the experienced player for the crime of being experienced. He wasn’t even doing anything mean or wrong. It’s just bad matchmaking/bad balance. You could’ve talked to him separately about this issue and asked him to dull down his character or to choose something else. I’m not super D&D savvy but I’d ask is reviewing everyone’s character sheets before a campaign starts out of the question?
YTA.
Forced “I think it would be better for everyone if you played like shit” mechanic is extremely not fun for the affected person. You should not have fucked with him without his consent.
You should have handled skill mismatch in a more diplomatic manner. From what you wrote, it seems like you didn’t even bother discussing the problem with him privately.
Info: please explain how the character was able to do 40 damage in a single attack at level 1. I don’t think that should be mathematically possible but I can’t tell without knowing what exactly he did.