D&D 5E Why the claim of combat and class balance between the classes is mainly a forum issue. (In my opinion)

[XunValdorl_of_Kilsek]

Try this one on for size then (3.5) There was a girl that used to post here, back when people were talking about the knight class getting d12's for hit points who told the story of jumping into a volcano swimming down and getting an artifact then climbing back out... no magic...

I have seen fighters over level 10 jump off 300+ft falls and survive.

A charging monster with a gore attack that says it does extra damage on a charge crits putting it's horn into the PC and it only does HP damage so the PC keeps fighting...

HP is always the breaking point

4th edition and now 5th edition has put the spotlight on hit points where before, you knew they were there but there was less emphasis on them. In our games there would be no swimming in lava unless you had some sort of protection from fire. Hit points are something you can't escape in D&D but creating mechanics such as healing surges and damage on a miss draw it into the light more.

 

[Mistwell]

4th edition and now 5th edition has put the spotlight on hit points where before

What makes you say earlier editions didn't emphasize hit points? Indeed, the older the edition, the more emphasis I feel hit points had, as you had fewer emphasized choices on what to do on your turn. It was less common to trip something, shove them, disarm them, and other things like that when those options were not front and center in the rules, so focusing on their hit points tended to be emphasized more.

 

[Ratskinner]

I disagree - but only on a technicality. I'd count OD&D and B/X as more gamist than 1e.

Fair enough.

Have a look at the Powered by the Apocalypse games sometime. Apocalypse World and especially Monsterhearts. Also Marvel Heroic Roleplaying and Fiasco. But those are genre sims rather than process sims.

That may be true. But D&D Next isn't even close to being as good a goofing off and generating stories D&D as Dungeon World. (It's very hard to beat Dungeon World at that).

I've got Dungeon World and eagerly anticipate trying it soon with my group!

 

[billd91]

I think these two things are included in Gamist (but maybe some more things as well):

Gamists tend to play competitive in nature. 4e however introduced defined roles for classes such that it fostered more focus on cooperative play. Strikers did the damage, defenders protected the strikers from getting stomped, controllers focused the foe down a funnel path to get struck by the striker, leaders healed and kept everyone in position, etc... It was built to encourage players to cooperate with each other.

Gamist is also sometimes considered the opposite of narrativist. 4e introduced a lot more narrative control in the players hands. Some powers...changed what happened in the game, after it had already happened. Re-rolls, certain reactions, action points, skill challenges, etc. changed the narrative, and those changes were made at the decision of the players. If they players are exercising a lot of narrative control, then in this view of the terms that means they were doing the opposite of gamist control.

That's how I read it at least.

I would also say that for non-Forge-speakers, gamist is more commonly seen as the opposite of simulationist in the sense that gamist structures and abstractions in the game are what simplify the simulations to make them more playable or more game-like than simulation-like. Clearly, all RPGs have had a lot of gamist structures to make them playable from hit points to armor classes to movement rates to 2-dimensional star maps and all push away from from being a simulation of either reality or literature. But the more you simplify and abstract, the more gamist you're moving until you're not really simulating anything specific. And more you move into detailed simulation, the less you're promoting gamist playability.

It has been my opinion that Forge-speak has been a barrier in communication between Forgists and lay gamers for some time.

 

[Ratskinner]

Marshall, I think you may have inferred a negative tone to my post that I was trying to avoid. I see 4e as very playable in a very gamist mode, but I don't see that as a bad thing at all!

Wealth by level and expected magic items are DM tools to judge the power of the party and in doing so be able to create the desired challenge level. Thats it. Its the overwhelming strength of the system that the DM can know "This level party with this equipment can do this level challenge while expending these resources." Even better, its accurate!

ermm....yes? That's kinda my point.

Thats not true. A 12th level PC will mop the floor with 1st level monsters in 4e. They just wont normally face 1st level monsters. The main reason everything scales in 4e is so that the d20 stays relevant vs level appropriate challenges. You still outlevel early opponents at the same 5% per level that D&D always has. Except now you have the option to fight the same Ogre as a level 3 solo. level 5 elite, level 7 standard or level 9 minion and you get to feel bad-a** because the bad guy that took the whole party to take down at level 3 goes down in one shot when you are level 9. And the DM doesnt have to worry about that ogre being no real threat to your resources with a functionally -30% chance to hit.

Mario stays the same, because all his opponents stay the same. The only thing that changes in Mario is the world around him.

ermm....yes? The 4e rules (at least the copy I have) strongly advise the DM to keep your PCs on that treadmill (although not in those terms, and I'll allow that later 4e publications may have amended that). Even to the point of simply "leveling up" or rewriting adversaries at higher level (the big advantage of that whole enemies are not PCs thing, IMO.) As you note, those 5% increments are (generally) applied to the foes as well. Mario just skips the treadmill math part. My only personal objection to the treadmill is that its a lot of math for little gain. Someone around hear suggested just skipping the 5% increments for leveling and just use HP to determine level...that seems a whole lot simpler to me.

No, its gamist because its measured in levels. That is a the core gamist conceit in D&D. Class and Level.

I'm not sure "Class" is a gamist conceit, but level certainly is...at least as D&D usually has it.

The only way to make those levels meaningful is to make them mean roughly the same thing. Which lets the DM compare them to other markers and run the game. It also lets players know where they stand.

I would disagree that its the only way to make levels meaningful. Even in the older editions, where levels came with different XP values, etc. gaining a level is usually a meaningful thing mechanically. The other things you mention are (to my mind) significant "value-added" propositions for keeping levels relatively balanced amongst the classes, but certainly not a requisite for meaning.

Sure, challenge level/difficulty level is a DM tool to run the game. Its not an indicator of playstyle or anything else.

I think within the context of trying to evaluate rulesets in GNS terms (something which is a no-no, but often indulged in), saying that game X has levels, challenge ratings, or difficulty levels of the type which we are discussing is fairly indicative that game X probably is somewhat gamist, at least in comparison to a game without those things.

Even in a Sim game(ALL games are Sim games), the players also need to know the challenge ratings or they cant make informed decisions on how their character should react to the world at large.

Whoa there! All games are Sim games!?! I know some Simulationist die-hards who would argue harshly against that point. (Although, I honestly think the Simulationist Definition is somewhat weak and people seem to be stretching it nowadays. So for some definitions that might work.)

However, players knowing the challenge ratings of foes and the like would be against Simulationist play agendas, I would think. At best, the idea that all possible encounters can be numerically rated is Simulationist-neutral.

 

[Ratskinner]

Wargames also include people who obsess over the differences between a PzIVF2 and a PzIVG, and who have longer threads on their message boards over the numerical strength of the 10th (Maori) Battalion of the 2nd New Zealand Infantry Division in the battle for Crete than this board has on Fighters vs Spellcasters. The vice they can't be accused of very often is Narrative-style play, but Simulationism (process sim mostly) to a degree that would horrify RPG players is certainly present, as well as pure Gamism. Most tabletop wargames are designed much more with simulationism in mind, though it can be argued that this also makes it easier for gamists to judge what may be effective.

No argument there. It varies significantly with the game in question, but as you mention they tend to have very detailed and precise point-values and army build rules. The gamism is usually most evident in the army build and scenario design rules. Once play begins, the simulation is in full swing.

 

[Ratskinner]

I would also say that for non-Forge-speakers, gamist is more commonly seen as the opposite of simulationist in the sense that gamist structures and abstractions in the game are what simplify the simulations to make them more playable or more game-like than simulation-like. Clearly, all RPGs have had a lot of gamist structures to make them playable from hit points to armor classes to movement rates to 2-dimensional star maps and all push away from from being a simulation of either reality or literature. But the more you simplify and abstract, the more gamist you're moving until you're not really simulating anything specific. And more you move into detailed simulation, the less you're promoting gamist playability.

Abstraction is generally anti-Simulationist, but it doesn't push toward either Gamism or Narrativism in particular. Everyone should please note that I am mentally waving my hands a lot while I type that to indicate that I am speaking in very general terms.

It has been my opinion that Forge-speak has been a barrier in communication between Forgists and lay gamers for some time.

Its the worst way to talk about games....except for all the others out there....maybe not, Robin D Laws has a lot of interesting things to say as well. However, he doesn't seem to have a lot of hate (or praise) for the Forge.

 

[Majoru Oakheart]

Because it's not actually true. If we look at the proportion of the rulebook, we find that other than 4e it doesn't matter. About 40% of the PHB in any D&D edition other than 4e is made up of spells. OK, so a lot of those spells are combat spells - but the spell list is where D&D has historically stored much of its flavour and worldbuilding.

But the fact that most of them are combat spells is kind of the point. When you look at a character sheet in D&D or the rules in general, here's how the game looks:

"What can I do? Well, I can cast fireball, magic missile, burning hands, hold person, mage armor, hold portal, or comprehend languages, make a melee attack with my quarterstaff, make a ranged attack with my darts, have knowledge of magic, I can spot hidden things well, I have knowledge of religion, or I can do something else that I can think of that isn't on my character sheet."

Thinking is hard, so most people default to the options on their character sheet, and when 80% of those options are combat options it looks like the game is a combat game. Especially given that over half the DMG in most editions is about how to plan proper encounters, how to use monsters, which monsters are most appropriate, which levels of the dungeon each monster should be on, how to make dungeons, how to make traps, how much xp monsters and traps are worth, how much treasure should you give out for defeating monsters, what the treasure that you find after killing the monsters does, and so on. Also, it should be noted that those magic items you find after killing monsters...the vast majority of them have abilities that are only useful for fighting monsters as well.

I think that you might be able to make a case that 2e wasn't so much about combat. It was still heavily combat based but it was the one edition where the source material all kind of pointed to non-combat oriented adventures. There was a vast increase in the number of non-combat spells and magic items. The adventures that were published tended to have slightly less combat in them. There were books that focused more on world building for world building sake instead of couching everything in terms of "and this is why PCs will want to go there and kill things".

 

[Ratskinner]

I think these two things are included in Gamist (but maybe some more things as well):

Gamists tend to play competitive in nature. 4e however introduced defined roles for classes such that it fostered more focus on cooperative play. Strikers did the damage, defenders protected the strikers from getting stomped, controllers focused the foe down a funnel path to get struck by the striker, leaders healed and kept everyone in position, etc... It was built to encourage players to cooperate with each other.

Gamist is also sometimes considered the opposite of narrativist. 4e introduced a lot more narrative control in the players hands. Some powers...changed what happened in the game, after it had already happened. Re-rolls, certain reactions, action points, skill challenges, etc. changed the narrative, and those changes were made at the decision of the players. If they players are exercising a lot of narrative control, then in this view of the terms that means they were doing the opposite of gamist control.

That's how I read it at least.

My personal shorthanded take on how things shook out at the Forge:

Gamist: for the sake of the player(s) experiencing the challenge and thrill of victory. "Step on up"
Simulationist: for the sake of the player(s) experiencing how the setting would work. "The Right to Dream"
Narrativist: for the sake of the player(s) experiencing the "authorial" thrill of exploring a dramatic conflict/tension. "Story Now"

The links are to the "definitive" articles for each concept. They are not light reading, but aren't like an economics textbook, either. Personally, I think the best way to figure out the differences is to play games that are strongly devised to focus on one or the other.

None of the three are technically "opposites" of the others. However, Forgies tend to think that a game that didn't pick one or the other as its base would be "dysfunctional". I disagree, and have played at least one game that strongly hit two of them simultaneously (Gamist and Narrativist, in this case). I'm fair sure I can envision a Sim-Nar game (with the allowance that the Sim be genre-sim). I think a Gamist-Simulationist game would feel fairly contrived in nature (that is, the setting would need to openly acknowledge the artifacts of gamism creeping into its reality) maybe something like Erfworld could do it.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

I think a Gamist-Simulationist game would feel fairly contrived in nature (that is, the setting would need to openly acknowledge the artifacts of gamism creeping into its reality) maybe something like Erfworld could do it.

Some one get the giant on the phone... an Order of the Stick MMO is needed stat...