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When a DHCP server receives a DHCP discover message it broadcasts the offer across the entire network. If a malicious machine joined a network and somehow began spamming DHCP discover messages, would the resulting high number of broadcasts from the DHCP server be able to bring the network down?

Oscar Robinson
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Any broadcast traffic or switch flooding of a sufficiently high volume could bring a network down. A switching loop is a good example of this very thing. A malware infection is another good example. I've seen malware infections that used ARP to effectively bring a network to it's knees due to the volume of ARP broadcasts generated by the malware.

joeqwerty
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    I once saw a malfunctioning device (a network integrated time register) spamming DHCP discover that caused the network to go down. Same principle. – Maurício Mota May 07 '15 at 19:03