D&D 5E How much should 5e aim at balance?

Ahnehnois · Aug 6, 2012

Alzrius said:
I haven't read through the entire thread, so apologies if this has already been expressed.

In all my years of gaming, I've come to the following conclusion regarding balance:

It's something that's found at the game table, not in the rules.

"Balance" is usually taken to mean "parity" between various facets of the game, be they characters, combat options, economy of actions, or something else. However, all of these are affected by what your characters are actually going through at any given moment.

"Balance" isn't some perfect state that the game rules can deliver; it's an equilibrium that changes from one moment to the next, and so requires the GM and the players to work together in keeping it at the center of the game.

Can't XP, but a thousand times yes.

Ratskinner · Aug 6, 2012

pemerton said:
Not remotely offended, but don't completely agree.

I want to add - without a doubt, 3E was the version of D&D most aimed at supporting simulationist play - just look at the changes to saving throws, for example, from a metagame mechanic to a process simulation.

But interestingly - and fitting with @MichaelSomething and @Mustrum_Ridcully 's comments upthread - the game is not really designed to support full-fledged simulationist play. If you start exploring the system, and the fantasy world that it implicitly creates, in ways that go beyond AD&D expectations, the game breaks fairly easily.

I think 3E is therefore a curious thing - intended to satisfy a certain sort of simulationist aesthetic, while being used for a less-than-fully simulationist purpose - AD&D-style gamism with a heavy exploratory chassis.

I pretty much agree with all of this. I gotta figure any generic fantasy game has breakdowns in the magic end of things. (Of course, what constitutes a breakdown varies with the observer.)

pemerton said:
I think 4e is extremely diffrent in feel from 3E. It doesn't cater to a process-simulation aesthetic at all - it is blatantly built on metagame mechanics.

But it doesn't support traditional D&D gamisim either, because you get XP just for turning up and playing the game (look at the rules for awarding XP, including the DMG 2 - it's not like AD&D, where you have to actually hunt out the XP, in the form of treasure), and likewise treasure turns up in pre-packaged parcels.

Correct on both counts, AFAIC. This is precisely why 4e "doesn't feel like D&D" to a lot of people, I would say. Both the process sim and traditional gamism were lost (for the most part). When the edition wars kicked up, the strange thing to me was how many and how strongly old-timers jumped into either camp. For some of them, it was a triumphant return to gamism, for others....it was the wrong gamism!

pemerton said:
For me, 4e is a breath of fresh air because it lets me play fairly traditional D&D (in terms of the tropes and themes) in a narrativist way without the system getting in the way.

I agree the game is ambiguous on who has plot authority, but I think that, as a whole (including the empahsis on scene framing; player choices actually mattering to action resolution and scene outcomes in either combat or skill challenges; player-designed quests; players getting to choose what thematic aspects to foreground via choice of race, class, paragon path, epic destiny, and the like; etc) that it most naturally supports plot as emergent from play, rather than predetermined and managed by the GM.

...underlining added by me.

(kinda funny...read your list again. It makes it sound like plot isn't emergent, but predetermined and managed by the players. At least to the extent of picking from a list can do that.)

pemerton said:
I think this is one point of breakdown in the AD&D to 3E transition. In AD&D there basically is no such thing as character customisation: you roll your stats, then do the best you can with them.

Tunnels & Trolls takes this to its maximum limit: only PCs with good stats can wield the best weapons, or enter the best classes. Other PCs will be mechanically less effective.

True enough. Later 1e and 2e had some very limited development through the acquisition of proficiencies (and some classes had bennies that kicked in at higher levels, allowing for some choice/flavor.)

pemerton said:
The oddity in 3E is that, instead of the winning or losing in PC build turning on luck, it starts to turn on familiarity with the range of choices and their interactions ("system mastery"). I agree with you that this is bad for the game - whereas as the more classic D&D/T&T approach is fine for a certain sort of light-hearted fun, I think.

Its not so odd when you consider that 3e wasn't designed with the thought that "winning or losing" should have anything to do with the game at all.

Li Shenron · Aug 6, 2012

Neonchameleon said:
Um... the Druid gets twice as many rounds or actions per round as the fighter - he has a set of actions for himself and one for his animal companion. A Pathfinder Summoner without an Eidolon is arguably worse - he gets his own actions plus (normally) those of d3+1 summoned critters. Who can, at high level, be spellcasters in their own right.

Good point there. I forgot that most groups play it that way (when I DM I've always run the pets and summoned monsters myself although the reason is not spotlight)

Neonchameleon said:
And this is one of my big criticisms of Gygaxo-Vancian spellcasting. Which spells you take is an in character choice. Purposely not picking them in the design phase is one thing - but if the character is smart then they should be trying to learn the good spells. Picking sub-optimal feats or sub-optimal spells for a sorceror is one thing. But for an Int 18 wizard picking a poor spell list is an in character choice to downplay.

Only if you assume that your Wizard has access to learning every spell. Even if the DM tells me that I can, I believe I have the right to come up with some in-character reason why I can't.

Ratskinner · Aug 6, 2012

The Choice said:
You do realize you're quoting a (ficticious) freaking sociopath to bolster your "argument", right?

It's also a terrible "argument" to make about a collaborative game: YES, every player around the table deserves a chance to be bloody special, it's everybody's freaking game.

Assuming your talking about The Incredibles, the thought is first expressed by Dash, arguing with his mother in the car after getting in trouble at school:

Dash: You always say, "Do your best," but you don't really mean it. Why can't I do the best that I can do?
Helen: Right now, honey, the world just wants us to fit in, and to fit in, we just gotta be like everybody else.
Dash: But Dad always said our powers were nothing to be ashamed of. Our powers made us special.
Helen: Everyone's special, Dash.
Dash: Which is another way of saying no one is.

Not that that makes it any better an argument for the topic at hand. 'just saying.

SKyOdin · Aug 6, 2012

Alzrius said:
I haven't read through the entire thread, so apologies if this has already been expressed.

In all my years of gaming, I've come to the following conclusion regarding balance:

It's something that's found at the game table, not in the rules.

"Balance" is usually taken to mean "parity" between various facets of the game, be they characters, combat options, economy of actions, or something else. However, all of these are affected by what your characters are actually going through at any given moment.

"Balance" isn't some perfect state that the game rules can deliver; it's an equilibrium that changes from one moment to the next, and so requires the GM and the players to work together in keeping it at the center of the game.

What games have you been playing?

Since I think there is a pretty good possibility that all of your gaming experience comes from playing fundamentally unbalanced games and you just got used to putting in a lot of effort to make them work. Good balance is something that is woefully rare in this hobby.

Balance shouldn't require a lot of sacrifice and work on the part of the end-user to come into existence.

Dannyalcatraz · Aug 6, 2012

The Choice said:
You do realize you're quoting a (ficticious) freaking sociopath to bolster your "argument", right?

It's also a terrible "argument" to make about a collaborative game: YES, every player around the table deserves a chance to be bloody special, it's everybody's freaking game.

It actually has origins older than The Incredibles. Ayn Rand talks about it in her works, for instance.

SKyOdin · Aug 6, 2012

Ratskinner said:
Assuming your talking about The Incredibles, the thought is first expressed by Dash, arguing with his mother in the car after getting in trouble at school:

Not that that makes it any better an argument for the topic at hand. 'just saying.

It is worth pointing out (for the sake of the overall discussion) that Dash says that at the beginning of the movie, before his character development across the rest of the movie. At the end of the movie, he seems to have a very different perspective.

In short, the movie present the idea that those who say "If everyone is special, the no-one is", are expressing a childish desire to be praised by everyone around them. A big part of the movie is the main characters learning to not be reliant on other people's praise and recognition in order to find self-satisfaction and self-esteem. The villain is the villain is because, despite growing up and becoming an adult, he still holds onto his childish notions of needing to be praised and revered by others.

Meanwhile, Dash says such things because he is a child who has yet to mentally mature. Mr. Incredible is flawed because he retreats into reliving his youth and youthful foolishness to escape the pressures of his adult life. The entire point of the movie is that the two heroes grow past those flaws and mature.

Mustrum_Ridcully · Aug 6, 2012

Alzrius said:
I haven't read through the entire thread, so apologies if this has already been expressed.

In all my years of gaming, I've come to the following conclusion regarding balance:

It's something that's found at the game table, not in the rules.

"Balance" is usually taken to mean "parity" between various facets of the game, be they characters, combat options, economy of actions, or something else. However, all of these are affected by what your characters are actually going through at any given moment.

"Balance" isn't some perfect state that the game rules can deliver; it's an equilibrium that changes from one moment to the next, and so requires the GM and the players to work together in keeping it at the center of the game.

My experience with 4E suggests otherwise. Balance is created in the game rules, and the group can spend its energy on stuff other than complicated house rule to have their fun.

billd91 · Aug 6, 2012

Dannager said:
It seems like you're trying to be reductionist, here. That's not what balance is. Balance, as it relates to game design, is complex. It is in its infancy, as is the field as a whole. It is also a matter of perspective. But, above all, balance is of absolute and critical importance to game design. A game of Chess wherein one side of the board is comprised of a king and two rows of pawns, and the other side of nothing but queens is not a balanced game, and cannot be expected to be particularly enjoyable; it does not create room for fair play, or interesting play, or especially tactical play. Shrugging off balance as a trivial concern is an immediate red flag to me - it signals an incomplete understanding of game design priorities coupled with the mistaken belief that speaker knows something about game design priorities.

Isn't focusing on the balance between character classes in an RPG also reductionist? A character class (and stats, and skills, powers, etc) are all tools to get to the end results - how the character plays out through the course of the game. Isn't that where we want the balance to be reflected?

Herschel · Aug 6, 2012

Dannyalcatraz said:
It actually has origins older than The Incredibles. Ayn Rand talks about it in her works, for instance.

So a non-ficticious sociopath?

I think the game should aim for as great a balance as it can at its core. Use magic items and modules/adventures for it's chaotic elements/swing. Deities too. A Cleric of Tymora, for example, could get access to a bunch of crazy stuff. Have guidelines of "this is how things work played straight, and adding this can add fun but changes the way things work."

Wands of Wonder, for example, can add a whole lot of swing and be loads of fun, but for those who don't want the utter randomness, they don't use them.