Characters in Role-Playing games come in a variety of shapes and sizes. Some do indeed turn out to be more powerful than others. Players who play a lot get a lot of practice making these characters, and some Players can take this to extremes. One particular style of character generation has the term Min-Maxing. In short, this is using the minimum number of points to get the maximum effect.
Some game systems allow the Player more control over how their characters are created. A restrictive system may make everything based on random dice rolls, which takes most of the creativity out of the Players’ hands. Other systems give the Players a uniform allotment of points, and the Players can use those points as they see fit. This open-ended form of character generation can allow crafty Players to exploit rules in the system to give their character an edge or three.
An example of this is taking advantage of a game system that breaks things down into fives. As an example, in our game Strength has break-points at 5,10,15 and 20 points, rounding your Strength to the nearest five. Every five points, you get one more die for your attempt. A normal Player may put in ten points and be happy with their two dice. A Min-Maxer may try to put in eight points. Three points above five should put you into the two-dice category, but save you two points for something else.
A bit of this is fine, and even to be expected. However, someone who really understands the rules can get a surprising amount of power out of a small number of points. Game Masters can have campaigns thrown off the rails by having one Player far outclass the others. Most games are designed around having the whole party at the same power level. If one Player can do everything by themselves, the rest of the group will feel dissatisfied.
This can be an issue for both Players and Game Masters. A GM wants to allow the Players some creativity in their characters, but a dedicated Min-Maxer can find loopholes in the rules to make a character that takes things to extremes. Both Players and GM’s need to work together to make sure the whole group can play well together.
Here is an interesting thread on this topic over at the Privateer Press Forums.