Pathfinder 1E Pathfinder outselling D&D

Dannager said:

Actually, I'd argue that the real showstopper is that the vast majority of those billions wouldn't come anywhere near actually playing the game even if it were translated into a language they spoke (which, of course, goes a long way towards explaining why they never pursued those translations in the first place), but I understand what you're getting at.

I'm not saying that you shouldn't play the game you like just because others see problems with it. That would be a silly thing to say.

What I am saying is that balance is a worthy goal in game design, and the "I don't see any problems with balance in my D&D games," isn't really ammunition against that argument.

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The problem kicks in when the rest of the line is '4e creates new and, in my estimation, worse problems in its quest for balance'.

And that seems to be the part that you gloss over - that some people feel that 4e has worse problems than the perceived lack of balance in 3.X - 3.P. That 4e has not fixed the problems, it has merely exchanged them for others, and those are problems that ruin the game for some folks. Me, I would rather have the problems that are in 3.X than play 4e.

And some do not see the perceived lack of balance to be a problem at all, let alone a problem worth changing the entire game to 'fix'. That it was not broken to begin with, and the fix is worse than the 'problem'. Something like 'Congratulations, the square wheel is more stable than a round one....'

The Auld Grump

Hussar said:

Umm, please correct me if I'm wrong, and I'm sure that there are those here who will have no problems doing just that, but...

Wasn't a large part of Pathfinder's design bridging the apparent gap between caster and non-caster? I'm not really all that familiar with Pathfinder to be honest, but, from what I've read here and other places, wasn't that a major concern during the development of Pathfinder?

So, instead of telling Danniger that the problem he's identified - the imbalance in play between caster and non-caster - doesn't exist, doesn't the design of Pathfinder actually speak directly to his criticism? Granted, it's done in a different way than 4e, that's fine. 4e hardly has the lock on how to do things.

But, if there was no problem, why did Pathfinder spend so much time fixing it?

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This is a great point.

When my group switched from 3e to 3.5 the changes were niceish mostly, but not really exciting.

When we switched from 3.5 to pathfinder, we, at least once a game session for a long time, exclaimed "whoah, nice change to the rules!" We said it so often that is sort of became a running joke. Most, if not all of these changes were moves in the direction of balance (some between classes, some to speed up game play, some buffs or nerfs to abilities or items, etc).


What I believe I've observed in the last several pages of this thread is a debate between Dannager and everyone else on how important balance is.

To [MENTION=73683]Dannager[/MENTION], balance might be really, really important in his gaming. Judging from what he has posted in a number of threads, Dannager really likes combat. He thinks d&d is "about" combat (from the "about combat" thread) and he really enjoys excellent balance in that combat, so much so that he de-prioritizes other elements (not to say he doesn't roleplay or doesn't care about them at all) that some of us here put as a priority over balance.

That's ok. We have different gaming styles, and heck, prefer different editions as a result of those styles.

What I believe I've observed in the last few pages is simply Dannager expressing his preference, while to several others the way in which he's done so appears to reify and deify balance in a way we would not want in our gaming.

To Dannager directly, I don't mean to be insulting to you in any way there, and hope I haven't been. Please correct me if I've put any words in your mouth or have misunderstood you.

[MENTION=64209]Aberzanzorax[/MENTION] I mostly agree with you. Also, great sig/status combo.

As a bit on balance, and possibly also a conversation starter(I do so tire of the "Dannager vs a lot of people" thing), I think balance is important. But whether or not I think so is not the issue I seek to raise, but rather, why I think so.

The reason I like balance in my gaming is because imbalance feels to me like rules telling me which archetype is best. Having one archetype so much weaker than another says to me, "You're dumb for liking this type of character. You should like this other type instead. They're just better." But I don't want to be told that the barbarian chieftain or valorous paladin I want to play is less cool than the arcane scholar or psychic warrior someone else wants to play. I want balance, because my idea is just as cool as the other players', and their ideas are just as cool as mine.

Dark Mistress said:

You guys do realize you are just going around in circles in this "debate" right? I mean reading this thread is like watching a dog chase it's own tail convinced if it just tries a little harder it will catch it's own tail.

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You are 100% right. I think most of us (at least those of us who have been here from early on) realize this. I know I cannot say anythink that will sway the other side, their opinions have no direct impact on my life, and all of us have been repeating the same arguments. Yet I feel compelled to participate.

Pentius said:

[MENTION=64209]Aberzanzorax[/MENTION] I mostly agree with you. Also, great sig/status combo.

As a bit on balance, and possibly also a conversation starter(I do so tire of the "Dannager vs a lot of people" thing), I think balance is important. But whether or not I think so is not the issue I seek to raise, but rather, why I think so.

The reason I like balance in my gaming is because imbalance feels to me like rules telling me which archetype is best. Having one archetype so much weaker than another says to me, "You're dumb for liking this type of character. You should like this other type instead. They're just better." But I don't want to be told that the barbarian chieftain or valorous paladin I want to play is less cool than the arcane scholar or psychic warrior someone else wants to play. I want balance, because my idea is just as cool as the other players', and their ideas are just as cool as mine.

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This helps advance the conversation. I guess for my part i want some balance i just dont like the absolute balance of characters by encounter and i really didn't like what 4e did with wizards and other classes via the at wills, encounters and dailies. Personally i liked the basic mechanics of classes in 3e (though bab was a huge improvement) but just wanted to see some of the progression balance restored ( wizards advancing more slowly for example) and a little more balance between wizards and other classes (which could have been done by fine tuning spells rather than changing the underlying system).

I think i also was never very bothered by the fact thatsomeone could make or roll a crappy character. Though a few of the builds were way over powered but didn't want to feel like wizards was protecting me from bad character creation choices. So they should have reigned in some of the uber class dipping combos but still allowed for sup par cgaracters imo.

For me the whole notion that a wizard starts out weak and slowly becomes uber was essential to the class and tge flavor of the game.

Bedrockgames said:

This helps advance the conversation. I guess for my part i want some balance i just dont like the absolute balance of characters by encounter and i really didn't like what 4e did with wizards and other classes via the at wills, encounters and dailies. Personally i liked the basic mechanics of classes in 3e (though bab was a huge improvement) but just wanted to see some of the progression balance restored ( wizards advancing more slowly for example) and a little more balance between wizards and other classes (which could have been done by fine tuning spells rather than changing the underlying system).

I think i also was never very bothered by the fact thatsomeone could make or roll a crappy character. Though a few of the builds were way over powered but didn't want to feel like wizards was protecting me from bad character creation choices. So they should have reigned in some of the uber class dipping combos but still allowed for sup par cgaracters imo.

For me the whole notion that a wizard starts out weak and slowly becomes uber was essential to the class and tge flavor of the game.

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I agree that the ability to make an over or under powered character shouldn't be completely eradicated(though I love that 4e had made them less devastating to an individual game). I also would have been open to other ways of balancing spellcasters, though I personally detest the Vancian system, so I'm naturally glad to see its diminishment. On the other hand, I love balance largely because it bridges the gap between "optimizers" and "roleplayers". 4e has a great thing going in that if you just pick thematically suitable character creation choices, you're generally going to do well, power-level wise. In 3.x, I was very against optimizing, despite it being a very big part of the fun for me. I "knew" that if I really tried to engage the mechanics in any meaningful sense(to me) I was generally going to either outshine the other players, or more often, due to my personal love of martial types, I was going to be second fiddle, no matter how hard I tried. It always felt like the game was admonishing me for liking King Arthur, Beowulf, Xiahou Dun, and the other martial heroes who made up my basis for the archetype.

A focus on balance, to me, was a reassurance that the devs loved my favorite heroes as much as I do.

As for balance by the encounter, that is possibly more granular than I need, though I do enjoy it that way. My threshold is balance by game session. In that sense, I can see the devs picking by encounter, since by game session is a hard target, given that different groups play for different amounts of time. By campaign balance, though, to me, that feels like eternal imbalance. In any given session, the wizard is likely to be either over or underpowered. While I can see and maybe even respect the idea that that constitutes balance, it just doesn't work for me, either as the wizard, or as a player along side him.

For me i like vancian magic. I associate pretty strongly with d&d brand. I like other games with different systems as well, but one of the attractions to d&d for me is vancian casting.

I think I see where you are coming from on balance and understand how you want author to be as cool as merlin. For me balance over the campaign keeps author cool but retains the flavor i like of potent and mysterious magic. I guess i never take it as a personal commentary on my preferences by designers.

Bedrockgames said:

You are 100% right. I think most of us (at least those of us who have been here from early on) realize this. I know I cannot say anythink that will sway the other side, their opinions have no direct impact on my life, and all of us have been repeating the same arguments. Yet I feel compelled to participate.

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A few people posting in the thread have noticed this, as well as a few who have reported when it slips into getting a tad personal. And, in reading it over, I see it as well.

There is a solution - I'm going to enforce a rest on the topic. When folks describe and behave as if they *cannot* allow points to go unanswered, it is time to take a break. Folks, I encourage you to go engage in some constructive discussion, instead of this incessant gnawing over which game is better.