this sort of question always makes me think of the infamous "Pun-Pun" build. it depends on a supplementary book, so most DMs will disallow it. i forget the details, but it involves a Kobold Druid with a specific obscure creature as a Familiar.
I was the broken build. One-off campaign. I'm playing an ogre, Bygo Hogan. Specialising in Unarmed melee combat. During a fight with a BBEG black dragon, the dice were on Bygo's side. Nat 20 after Nat 20. The lowest roll I got was a 12. After caving in the skull of said black dragon with the goblin DMPC, He earned the nickname of "Hulk" (in reference to the incredible hulk). Now townsfolk fear the legend that is Bygo "Hulk" Hogan Aaaaand said goblin's family curse him for the death of their son.
Was in a campaign that went from 1 to 20. By the end of it, my Gloom Stalker Ranger (12 levels), Arcane Archer Fighter (8 levels) that was a blue dragonborn had an ascendant dragon longbow (Blue) and got access to the Blue Dragon Mask which gave me immunity to lightning damage. I have Close Quarters Shooter, and the long range one that let me attack at at normal rolls all the way out to the long bow's max range. I once dropped an adult green dragon to less than half hp on my first turn, and that was before the dragon wrath bow and mask. I was a menace, and it is the only time I would ever consider myself to have "power gamed"
Pathfinder. Level 15 Samurai, Ronin. Chosen Destiny let’s you take one d20 roll per day and treat it as a natural 20. Vorpal plus any instant crit confirm like that scarab brooch magic item. Once per day you can vorpal instant kill a target. Simple but powerful enough to make your GM groan.
not necessarily the most broken but it was absolutely beautiful as a build. It was a Dhampir with 3 levels in Paladin for Divine Smite and Oath of Vengeance, so I could Hunter's Mark my targets. After that I went 6 levels into Bladesinger Wizard and boy the fun during combat was through the roof. I would either cast the Vow of Enmity or start my bladesong out of combat when I could, and I go to town BITING people with the Dhampir's fanged bite. If the DM agreed that a Dhampir's fangs would be worth at least 1 Silver Piece, so on my turn I would bite and smite, then cast either booming blade or flaming blade on my second attack and smite again (all at Advantage). I had a crazy high AC (Bladesong, Defense Fighting Style, Shield spell) and run around biting people to death and also healing myself occasionally. The short campaign ended around that time but from there on out the possibilites are endless. A couple levels in rogue gives cunning action to disengage, and pretty much all of the Battlemaster Fighter's manouvers work with the Fanged Bite. A friend suggested a dip in Sorcerer as well but I don't really remember what for.
In an arena game i played in years ago, I played a Dwarf Swashbuckler Rogue with a two level dip in Barbarian. I used STR for my main weapon to stack both sneak attack and rage damage, and during one encounter under the Haste spell, I one-shot four or five cockatrice in one turn.
I built a Lizardfolk Path of the Beast Barbarian, having both Natural Armor and Unarmored Defense, then getting to choose an unarmed attack at 3rd level to either make 4 attacks at 5th level with claws, increase my AC further using my tail, or have a bite that heals. At 6th level, I could either get a swim speed and breathe underwater (Already covered by race), an enhanced jump (pass), or get a climbing speed without difficulty (Yes Please). Plus the attacks with natural weapons were magical to bypass resistances to non-magical damage. The DM then decided to use more save attacks just to handle it.
Thought up a good build for hexblade that is good on paper, e-blast, hexblade curse, and spirit shroud, level 11 damage with +5 charisma is 175 average damage, not counting crits
As someone who always likes to make homebrew stuff and classes (Voodoo Warlock, Plague Domain Cleric and College of Dirge Bard), the most broken stuff is always the beta builds of these classes. The stupidest I’ve seen was a “Pirate” Fighter that was able to do 3D12 + Weapon damage every turn and also stacked with all the extra attacks that Fighter gets.
My favorite I ever made is one of the strongest/broken characters in all of my DM's games. Also cause my DM leans very, very heavily into high fantasy, and gives really powerful items he's created.
Ok, so it's not so much the character build itself but what I did with it. I have a Warforged Juggernaut (UA) Necromancy Wizard/Twilight Cleric and I used Iron Golems, Demiplane, Glyph of Warding, Delayed Blast Fireball and Dimension Door to HILARIOUS effect. I named it "The Carpet Bomb Surprise".
That same build has another combo that uses Spell Gems, set into rings, holding Demiplane for another purpose. Inside each Demiplane are hundreds of skeletons, with armor and weapons, on racks, right up to the ceiling. Each skeleton has a Spellbook next to it and if I stick my head in and yell "STER-NO-CLY-DO-MAS-TOID" each syllable activates the first Glyph in every spellbook for a corresponding level of the Demiplane, firing off the rest in a cascade. Starting with Awaken Dead, then Haste (only for the first few), Fly, Stoneskin, Magic Weapon and finally Dragons Breath. Upcast to the max where applicable. I got this idea when I was separated from my group and almost had to fight a Beholder by myself. I wanted an ace up my sleeve.
the fighter crossbow build I can make even nastier by changing out the level 4 feat to dual wielder. Now the fighter is a machine gun when using handcrossbows.
Pathfinder/D&D 3.5 There was a guy who used a slingshot that he said 'Always does one point of damage.' I of course knew way better as the GM. He would hit a target, and then it would ricochet a few times and topped out around 50 points of damage. And I'm hear thinking 'Yes, that's how the game works.' The only problem with this game was that the boss at the end was only weak to certain spells, so although it was overpowered, it was essentially useless against the BBEG.
My system is basically running off of rule of cool when it comes to skills, as it basically doesn't restrict you to class abilities, with class skills usually just being there to flavor a class. Im really hoping for impossible precentile damage builds, or unlimited status effect builds, or FULL COUNTER builds that make everything just deal no damage to the players characters. This would also encourage exploring the world, as you can get skills in many ways. (Also im gonna be running the setting like botw/totk/elden ring or adjacent open world game, so it'll be fun to explore and maybe find something you couldn't before.)
Pathfinder 1e Saurian Shaman 5/Monk 1/Eristal Evangelist 10. Have a periapt of Wisdom +6, giving me a 26 Wisdom. Spiritual form gives me a +4 Wisdom so I've got a 30... which is my AC with totem transformation and a +5 ring of protection. Faithful archer lets me add, not replace, my Wisdom to my attack and damage rolls on longbows within 30 feet, meaning I have a +30/25/20 on my attacks. Said bow also has greater designation, giving everyone else +4 to hit and +6 to damage. My gnome rides atop his ankylosaurus, so he always has full round action. For a bonus, he can summon more dinosaurs, shoot the enemy and his summons can finish them off.
Not necessarily broken, but my Aaracokra Beastmaster Ranger is multiclassed into Shepard Druid, and I have plans to get Conjure animals and wildshape into the animal I summon to mob the heck out of any enemies were up against
Not a character but one time my paladin did a ridiculous number of damage with my longsword + divine smite against a succubus so she tried to charm me however I had a +4 modifier to wisdom saves and advantage thanks to fey ancestry so my DM just said no need Another time our warlock dropped a nuke with scorching ray doing an unbelievable 68 damage at level 7
My Dm let me have a homebrew feat as a reward for solo killing a lich, and thus avoid a TPK. My barb can use his strength stat for charisma rolls... He instantly regrets this as Kronk becomes the king of all the barbarians!
Lizardfolk Monk with the Mobile feat. By level 4 you have 50 feet of base movement or 100 feet with Step of the Wind, your AC is 13 + Dex + Wisdom, and (assuming a Dexterity modifier of +2, wielding a Quarterstaff and using Flurry of Blows) you can deal up to 26 damage and then move up to the aforementioned 50 feet movement without triggering opportunity attacks in a single turn.
Pure cavalier fighter. All depends on the mount. There are no base line mechanics to keep the mount scaling with the party. Pretty quickly my war horse became a liability. This was before the hireling/companion trio of classes where introduced. My DM ibfigured that my mounts would get equal hit dice equal to mine if lower. To gain more powerful amounts I would need to acquire a more powerful one. I was eventually able to acquire a wyvern egg and hatch it. Took a while, but a trained wyvern ridden by a cavalier does create many issues for the GM.
3.5 Made a super smash bros. kobold accidentally. A guy I play with wanted to DM for the first time. Cool! I'm super supportive. I love the idea. I ask what level we should make our characters. 14. Are you sure? That's awfully high. He double checks the CRs of the badguys, and says 14 should be a tough fight for us. Ok. We will see about that. I'll play nice, but I like to keep a nuke up my sleave. So using races of the dragon, players handbook 2 and complete adventurer, I put together a kobold that was inspired by Kain from Final Fantasy 2/4. RikRok jumps/glides/flies as part of a charge attack with a spear. Certain feats increase the potency of his power attack with his spear. Going all out with power attack I had a 50/50 chance to hit most targets doing 1d6+30 or 1d6 +125 if I charged and used diving attack. I wasn't planning on using it unless the encounter was obviously unbalanced. The encounter was unbalanced. In 2 turns we 3 players found ourselves against a dozen or more demons and undead with more spawning every turn. All CR 12-16. I can take out 1 every 2 turns but this is too much. I'm looking over my character sheet and notice I took driving attack. When attacking with a piercing weapon, I can make a bull rush attack and add any damage dealt, as a strength bonus to my bull rush check. Oops. I made a broken character. So my small kobold RikRok charges, jumps 20ft in the air.and plungs.down in front of some bigass undead monster. RikRok hits dealing 130 damage and sends to large undead hurtling backwards 115 ft but is stopped by another monster, causing them both to take another 11d6. With my brother's Warlock using wall of fire, controlling movement on the map, we EVENTUALLY cleared the board of enemies. But we saved the best attack for last. He lined 2 walls of fire right behind the BBEG. RikRok Slammed him with a driving spear attack sending him flying 125ft backwards like a Super Smash Brothers finishing move, right down the 2 walls of fire. We never could properly calculate the damage he took from that attack. It was somewhere between 1-2k.
Level 5 blood hunter path ov lycon three levels in ranger beast master and one level in fighter plus shader Kai isn't fully done yet still building my character out but with shader kai he us resistant to necrotic plus transformation that gives me resistance to most damage expect necrotic i took a powerful attack and it only delt 12 damage
Honestly, I have a build that I didn't THINK would be that broken but ... kinda ... ended up being a tanky motherfucker. Background: Giant Foundling for the free Strike of the Giants feat (go Storm Strike) Class: Rune Knight Fighter and Go Protection fighting style. Go Fire Rune at level 1 for a free once per day restraining a foe with shackles that deal 2d6 fire damage ... per turn till they pass a STR saving throw AND Hill rune for the ability to resist all bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage for 1 minute. Ignore the first ASI and pick up Soul of the Storm Giant, so you can generate an aura that gives you resistance to Lightning and Thunder damage, and make foes have to pass a strength save. On a fail, the enemy's speed is halved for one round. 7th level you get Defensive Runes and pick up Cloud Rune ... now you can use a magic portal to redirect any attack within 30 feet of you to hit someone else, even the attacker. Get heavy armor and a shield and you are A GOD of tanking and being an absolute dick to HIT.
To me most of these builds don’t seem op since most are just high level builds anyway that just don’t seem as impressive at least on paper compared to say a lower level built in a way that is broken.
this sort of question always makes me think of the infamous "Pun-Pun" build.
it depends on a supplementary book, so most DMs will disallow it.
i forget the details, but it involves a Kobold Druid with a specific obscure creature as a Familiar.
I was the broken build.
One-off campaign.
I'm playing an ogre, Bygo Hogan.
Specialising in Unarmed melee combat.
During a fight with a BBEG black dragon, the dice were on Bygo's side.
Nat 20 after Nat 20. The lowest roll I got was a 12.
After caving in the skull of said black dragon with the goblin DMPC,
He earned the nickname of "Hulk" (in reference to the incredible hulk).
Now townsfolk fear the legend that is Bygo "Hulk" Hogan
Aaaaand said goblin's family curse him for the death of their son.
Was in a campaign that went from 1 to 20. By the end of it, my Gloom Stalker Ranger (12 levels), Arcane Archer Fighter (8 levels) that was a blue dragonborn had an ascendant dragon longbow (Blue) and got access to the Blue Dragon Mask which gave me immunity to lightning damage. I have Close Quarters Shooter, and the long range one that let me attack at at normal rolls all the way out to the long bow's max range. I once dropped an adult green dragon to less than half hp on my first turn, and that was before the dragon wrath bow and mask. I was a menace, and it is the only time I would ever consider myself to have "power gamed"
Pathfinder. Level 15 Samurai, Ronin. Chosen Destiny let’s you take one d20 roll per day and treat it as a natural 20. Vorpal plus any instant crit confirm like that scarab brooch magic item. Once per day you can vorpal instant kill a target.
Simple but powerful enough to make your GM groan.
not necessarily the most broken but it was absolutely beautiful as a build. It was a Dhampir with 3 levels in Paladin for Divine Smite and Oath of Vengeance, so I could Hunter's Mark my targets. After that I went 6 levels into Bladesinger Wizard and boy the fun during combat was through the roof. I would either cast the Vow of Enmity or start my bladesong out of combat when I could, and I go to town BITING people with the Dhampir's fanged bite. If the DM agreed that a Dhampir's fangs would be worth at least 1 Silver Piece, so on my turn I would bite and smite, then cast either booming blade or flaming blade on my second attack and smite again (all at Advantage). I had a crazy high AC (Bladesong, Defense Fighting Style, Shield spell) and run around biting people to death and also healing myself occasionally. The short campaign ended around that time but from there on out the possibilites are endless. A couple levels in rogue gives cunning action to disengage, and pretty much all of the Battlemaster Fighter's manouvers work with the Fanged Bite. A friend suggested a dip in Sorcerer as well but I don't really remember what for.
*Me right now*
"Patrick, write that down write that down!
What kind of war crimes are we taking notes on today?
In an arena game i played in years ago, I played a Dwarf Swashbuckler Rogue with a two level dip in Barbarian. I used STR for my main weapon to stack both sneak attack and rage damage, and during one encounter under the Haste spell, I one-shot four or five cockatrice in one turn.
Ecco from Ecco knight+ ancestral guardian+ haste+ action surge+ fury of blows= blender.
I built a Lizardfolk Path of the Beast Barbarian, having both Natural Armor and Unarmored Defense, then getting to choose an unarmed attack at 3rd level to either make 4 attacks at 5th level with claws, increase my AC further using my tail, or have a bite that heals. At 6th level, I could either get a swim speed and breathe underwater (Already covered by race), an enhanced jump (pass), or get a climbing speed without difficulty (Yes Please). Plus the attacks with natural weapons were magical to bypass resistances to non-magical damage.
The DM then decided to use more save attacks just to handle it.
natural armor and unarmored defense dont stack
Thought up a good build for hexblade that is good on paper, e-blast, hexblade curse, and spirit shroud, level 11 damage with +5 charisma is 175 average damage, not counting crits
As someone who always likes to make homebrew stuff and classes (Voodoo Warlock, Plague Domain Cleric and College of Dirge Bard), the most broken stuff is always the beta builds of these classes.
The stupidest I’ve seen was a “Pirate” Fighter that was able to do 3D12 + Weapon damage every turn and also stacked with all the extra attacks that Fighter gets.
My favorite I ever made is one of the strongest/broken characters in all of my DM's games. Also cause my DM leans very, very heavily into high fantasy, and gives really powerful items he's created.
Ok, so it's not so much the character build itself but what I did with it.
I have a Warforged Juggernaut (UA) Necromancy Wizard/Twilight Cleric and I used Iron Golems, Demiplane, Glyph of Warding, Delayed Blast Fireball and Dimension Door to HILARIOUS effect.
I named it "The Carpet Bomb Surprise".
That same build has another combo that uses Spell Gems, set into rings, holding Demiplane for another purpose.
Inside each Demiplane are hundreds of skeletons, with armor and weapons, on racks, right up to the ceiling. Each skeleton has a Spellbook next to it and if I stick my head in and yell "STER-NO-CLY-DO-MAS-TOID" each syllable activates the first Glyph in every spellbook for a corresponding level of the Demiplane, firing off the rest in a cascade. Starting with Awaken Dead, then Haste (only for the first few), Fly, Stoneskin, Magic Weapon and finally Dragons Breath. Upcast to the max where applicable.
I got this idea when I was separated from my group and almost had to fight a Beholder by myself. I wanted an ace up my sleeve.
the fighter crossbow build I can make even nastier by changing out the level 4 feat to dual wielder. Now the fighter is a machine gun when using handcrossbows.
Pathfinder/D&D 3.5
There was a guy who used a slingshot that he said 'Always does one point of damage.' I of course knew way better as the GM. He would hit a target, and then it would ricochet a few times and topped out around 50 points of damage. And I'm hear thinking 'Yes, that's how the game works.' The only problem with this game was that the boss at the end was only weak to certain spells, so although it was overpowered, it was essentially useless against the BBEG.
My system is basically running off of rule of cool when it comes to skills, as it basically doesn't restrict you to class abilities, with class skills usually just being there to flavor a class.
Im really hoping for impossible precentile damage builds, or unlimited status effect builds, or FULL COUNTER builds that make everything just deal no damage to the players characters.
This would also encourage exploring the world, as you can get skills in many ways.
(Also im gonna be running the setting like botw/totk/elden ring or adjacent open world game, so it'll be fun to explore and maybe find something you couldn't before.)
I've got a halfling diviner wizard w the lucky feat. He is super fun to play. Reginald Rabbitfoot.
Pathfinder 1e Saurian Shaman 5/Monk 1/Eristal Evangelist 10. Have a periapt of Wisdom +6, giving me a 26 Wisdom. Spiritual form gives me a +4 Wisdom so I've got a 30... which is my AC with totem transformation and a +5 ring of protection. Faithful archer lets me add, not replace, my Wisdom to my attack and damage rolls on longbows within 30 feet, meaning I have a +30/25/20 on my attacks. Said bow also has greater designation, giving everyone else +4 to hit and +6 to damage. My gnome rides atop his ankylosaurus, so he always has full round action. For a bonus, he can summon more dinosaurs, shoot the enemy and his summons can finish them off.
Not necessarily broken, but my Aaracokra Beastmaster Ranger is multiclassed into Shepard Druid, and I have plans to get Conjure animals and wildshape into the animal I summon to mob the heck out of any enemies were up against
Not a character but one time my paladin did a ridiculous number of damage with my longsword + divine smite against a succubus so she tried to charm me however I had a +4 modifier to wisdom saves and advantage thanks to fey ancestry so my DM just said no need
Another time our warlock dropped a nuke with scorching ray doing an unbelievable 68 damage at level 7
My Dm let me have a homebrew feat as a reward for solo killing a lich, and thus avoid a TPK.
My barb can use his strength stat for charisma rolls...
He instantly regrets this as
Kronk becomes the king of all the barbarians!
So what I am hearing is that some DM's give items that are wayyyy too strong
Lizardfolk Monk with the Mobile feat. By level 4 you have 50 feet of base movement or 100 feet with Step of the Wind, your AC is 13 + Dex + Wisdom, and (assuming a Dexterity modifier of +2, wielding a Quarterstaff and using Flurry of Blows) you can deal up to 26 damage and then move up to the aforementioned 50 feet movement without triggering opportunity attacks in a single turn.
Ac calc is wrong, natural armor and unarmored defense dont stack.
Pure cavalier fighter. All depends on the mount. There are no base line mechanics to keep the mount scaling with the party. Pretty quickly my war horse became a liability. This was before the hireling/companion trio of classes where introduced. My DM ibfigured that my mounts would get equal hit dice equal to mine if lower. To gain more powerful amounts I would need to acquire a more powerful one. I was eventually able to acquire a wyvern egg and hatch it. Took a while, but a trained wyvern ridden by a cavalier does create many issues for the GM.
Mine is similar to the first but instead of a rogue, a divination wizard
Gloomstalkers
3.5
Made a super smash bros. kobold accidentally.
A guy I play with wanted to DM for the first time. Cool! I'm super supportive. I love the idea. I ask what level we should make our characters. 14. Are you sure? That's awfully high. He double checks the CRs of the badguys, and says 14 should be a tough fight for us.
Ok. We will see about that. I'll play nice, but I like to keep a nuke up my sleave.
So using races of the dragon, players handbook 2 and complete adventurer, I put together a kobold that was inspired by Kain from Final Fantasy 2/4. RikRok jumps/glides/flies as part of a charge attack with a spear. Certain feats increase the potency of his power attack with his spear. Going all out with power attack I had a 50/50 chance to hit most targets doing 1d6+30 or 1d6 +125 if I charged and used diving attack. I wasn't planning on using it unless the encounter was obviously unbalanced.
The encounter was unbalanced. In 2 turns we 3 players found ourselves against a dozen or more demons and undead with more spawning every turn. All CR 12-16. I can take out 1 every 2 turns but this is too much. I'm looking over my character sheet and notice I took driving attack. When attacking with a piercing weapon, I can make a bull rush attack and add any damage dealt, as a strength bonus to my bull rush check. Oops. I made a broken character. So my small kobold RikRok charges, jumps 20ft in the air.and plungs.down in front of some bigass undead monster. RikRok hits dealing 130 damage and sends to large undead hurtling backwards 115 ft but is stopped by another monster, causing them both to take another 11d6. With my brother's Warlock using wall of fire, controlling movement on the map, we EVENTUALLY cleared the board of enemies. But we saved the best attack for last. He lined 2 walls of fire right behind the BBEG. RikRok Slammed him with a driving spear attack sending him flying 125ft backwards like a Super Smash Brothers finishing move, right down the 2 walls of fire. We never could properly calculate the damage he took from that attack. It was somewhere between 1-2k.
Level 5 blood hunter path ov lycon three levels in ranger beast master and one level in fighter plus shader Kai isn't fully done yet still building my character out but with shader kai he us resistant to necrotic plus transformation that gives me resistance to most damage expect necrotic i took a powerful attack and it only delt 12 damage
I showed this video to my friend and now her boyfriend wants to try it too. Waiting for the report😘
Honestly, I have a build that I didn't THINK would be that broken but ... kinda ... ended up being a tanky motherfucker.
Background: Giant Foundling for the free Strike of the Giants feat (go Storm Strike)
Class: Rune Knight Fighter and Go Protection fighting style.
Go Fire Rune at level 1 for a free once per day restraining a foe with shackles that deal 2d6 fire damage ... per turn till they pass a STR saving throw AND Hill rune for the ability to resist all bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage for 1 minute.
Ignore the first ASI and pick up Soul of the Storm Giant, so you can generate an aura that gives you resistance to Lightning and Thunder damage, and make foes have to pass a strength save. On a fail, the enemy's speed is halved for one round.
7th level you get Defensive Runes and pick up Cloud Rune ... now you can use a magic portal to redirect any attack within 30 feet of you to hit someone else, even the attacker.
Get heavy armor and a shield and you are A GOD of tanking and being an absolute dick to HIT.
To me most of these builds don’t seem op since most are just high level builds anyway that just don’t seem as impressive at least on paper compared to say a lower level built in a way that is broken.
7 seconds after upload? I'm losing my touch.
Jeez I’m early