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How much should 5e aim at balance?
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<blockquote data-quote="Mercule" data-source="post: 5984051" data-attributes="member: 5100"><p>The problem with trying too hard to bake balance deeply into the rules is that it starts to sap away what makes a TTRPG different from a minis game, a board game, or a CRPG -- the ability to do things entirely unanticipated by the game designers and not covered by the rules.</p><p></p><p>I'll agree with you that the statistical value of things like feats should be reasonably transparent and predictable. I will adamantly resist, and even ridicule, an attempt to ensure a feat, spell, etc. can only be used in the manner intended by the game designer. 4e had a good mechanical base, but was rife with those bounds. Even late 3e had a ton of those.</p><p></p><p>I date the decline of D&D starting at the "errata" for <em>polymorph</em>. I <u>never</u> saw a problem with it. Maybe there was one, and it needed to be fixed. I can accept that. But the handling was completely botched. Worse, that way of handling "balance" was perpetuated for the remainder of 3e and carved into the soul of 4e. Kill that thought process. Kill it with fire.</p><p></p><p>Should players be sitting on their thumbs because of lousy design? No. That's stupid. It's no worse than balancing everything around the assumption that all camera time is in combat. The game should be built to support games that don't revolve around combat. The irony of d20 over AD&D is that, while d20 has more mechanics and more refined mechanics around non-combat play, it seems to have become more focused on combat.</p><p></p><p>There are different axes around which to balance a game (the "three pillars", though I'm not sure I agree with which three). Combat is only one of these. I'm not only okay with the fighter being noticeably better in combat than the rogue/thief, I think the designers screwed up royally if that isn't the case. Likewise, the rogue is expected to be better outside of combat. As long as the "time to shine" works out well enough for everyone to have fun, who cares? </p><p></p><p>It's also entirely possible that a campaign/group/DM style may be such that some classes simply <u>are</u> better than others. Despite all the whining I've heard over the years about CoDzillas, no one in my group has ever found clerics to be particularly worthwhile to play. In fact, the druid was considered pretty darn worthless beyond some roleplay potential. That might be because I expected divine types to actually know, promote, and act upon the doctrines of their gods. Or, it could just be a matter of the only players interested in clerics were inept at playing them. Either way, I'm not overly concerned.</p><p></p><p>Similarly, when we played AD&D, the thief tended to be extremely useful, almost indispensable. By 5th level, a group could potentially anchor to a thief because the thief just got stuff done. Of course, you still needed the fighter for the thief to use as a meat shield and the magic-user to advise the group. Magic-users also never went nova. Even at low levels, they actually played the part of the smart guy who knew what was really going on. At first level, he memorized a utility spell or sleep. If he tossed all his spells early and wanted to rest, the fighters would have left him as the useless turd he was (probably to taunts about firing prematurely and performance issues), so he actually managed his resources over the course of the day.</p><p></p><p>I don't have a problem with "fundamentally fair and honest". I think that sounds great. I want to know what we're being "fair" about, though. If it means every character has an equal shot at glory in every adventure and most sessions, I'm totally on board. If it means every scene -- whether combat, diplomacy, or investigation -- then I have a problem. I think the former case can be facilitated by well written rules, but is still largely a function of DM skill and player creativity. The latter can be accomplished by appropriate game design, but explicitly creates a game I don't want to play.</p><p></p><p>As far as "honest" goes, I have a similar question. Do you mean that the way a given rule/feat/spell/etc. interacts with another is written in a way that does not intentionally promote system mastery and give an experienced player a statistical advantage over a newbie, but do not limit creativity? If so, I'm definitely with you. Or, do you mean that rules/feats/spells/etc. are structured in such a way that they are generally only useful for the specific cases the developer had in mind? In this case, this really is a game design issue. I want the developers to have put some effort into things and create a game that holds up under actual play, but I don't want them to turn it into a closed system that generally restricts meaningful choices to a finite list. Openness is what make TTRPGs so compelling, but there's a balance to be struck with it being a game.</p><p></p><p>All in all, I lean towards erring on the side of being open-ended and big-picture and letting the DM clean up the mess. That comes as a guy with almost thirty years of gaming experience, about 80% of which was on the solo side of the screen. The biggest thing I want is a system that moves quickly and empowers the folks at the table to make more decisions.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Mercule, post: 5984051, member: 5100"] The problem with trying too hard to bake balance deeply into the rules is that it starts to sap away what makes a TTRPG different from a minis game, a board game, or a CRPG -- the ability to do things entirely unanticipated by the game designers and not covered by the rules. I'll agree with you that the statistical value of things like feats should be reasonably transparent and predictable. I will adamantly resist, and even ridicule, an attempt to ensure a feat, spell, etc. can only be used in the manner intended by the game designer. 4e had a good mechanical base, but was rife with those bounds. Even late 3e had a ton of those. I date the decline of D&D starting at the "errata" for [i]polymorph[/i]. I [u]never[/u] saw a problem with it. Maybe there was one, and it needed to be fixed. I can accept that. But the handling was completely botched. Worse, that way of handling "balance" was perpetuated for the remainder of 3e and carved into the soul of 4e. Kill that thought process. Kill it with fire. Should players be sitting on their thumbs because of lousy design? No. That's stupid. It's no worse than balancing everything around the assumption that all camera time is in combat. The game should be built to support games that don't revolve around combat. The irony of d20 over AD&D is that, while d20 has more mechanics and more refined mechanics around non-combat play, it seems to have become more focused on combat. There are different axes around which to balance a game (the "three pillars", though I'm not sure I agree with which three). Combat is only one of these. I'm not only okay with the fighter being noticeably better in combat than the rogue/thief, I think the designers screwed up royally if that isn't the case. Likewise, the rogue is expected to be better outside of combat. As long as the "time to shine" works out well enough for everyone to have fun, who cares? It's also entirely possible that a campaign/group/DM style may be such that some classes simply [u]are[/u] better than others. Despite all the whining I've heard over the years about CoDzillas, no one in my group has ever found clerics to be particularly worthwhile to play. In fact, the druid was considered pretty darn worthless beyond some roleplay potential. That might be because I expected divine types to actually know, promote, and act upon the doctrines of their gods. Or, it could just be a matter of the only players interested in clerics were inept at playing them. Either way, I'm not overly concerned. Similarly, when we played AD&D, the thief tended to be extremely useful, almost indispensable. By 5th level, a group could potentially anchor to a thief because the thief just got stuff done. Of course, you still needed the fighter for the thief to use as a meat shield and the magic-user to advise the group. Magic-users also never went nova. Even at low levels, they actually played the part of the smart guy who knew what was really going on. At first level, he memorized a utility spell or sleep. If he tossed all his spells early and wanted to rest, the fighters would have left him as the useless turd he was (probably to taunts about firing prematurely and performance issues), so he actually managed his resources over the course of the day. I don't have a problem with "fundamentally fair and honest". I think that sounds great. I want to know what we're being "fair" about, though. If it means every character has an equal shot at glory in every adventure and most sessions, I'm totally on board. If it means every scene -- whether combat, diplomacy, or investigation -- then I have a problem. I think the former case can be facilitated by well written rules, but is still largely a function of DM skill and player creativity. The latter can be accomplished by appropriate game design, but explicitly creates a game I don't want to play. As far as "honest" goes, I have a similar question. Do you mean that the way a given rule/feat/spell/etc. interacts with another is written in a way that does not intentionally promote system mastery and give an experienced player a statistical advantage over a newbie, but do not limit creativity? If so, I'm definitely with you. Or, do you mean that rules/feats/spells/etc. are structured in such a way that they are generally only useful for the specific cases the developer had in mind? In this case, this really is a game design issue. I want the developers to have put some effort into things and create a game that holds up under actual play, but I don't want them to turn it into a closed system that generally restricts meaningful choices to a finite list. Openness is what make TTRPGs so compelling, but there's a balance to be struck with it being a game. All in all, I lean towards erring on the side of being open-ended and big-picture and letting the DM clean up the mess. That comes as a guy with almost thirty years of gaming experience, about 80% of which was on the solo side of the screen. The biggest thing I want is a system that moves quickly and empowers the folks at the table to make more decisions. [/QUOTE]
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