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How much should 5e aim at balance?
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<blockquote data-quote="Neonchameleon" data-source="post: 6008264" data-attributes="member: 87792"><p>Balance issues are different in different editions. Late 1e/early 2e is probably the best balanced edition of D&D before late 2010 era 4e. Gygax paid a lot of care and attention to game balance although he was subtler about it than the 4e designers (who were reacting to the excesses of 3.X). Which means that although 2e doesn't <em>look</em> that well balanced it isn't bad. And so when 2e players say balance isn't an issue it's because they've never seen what lack of balance can do to a game.</p><p></p><p>And a lot of what you've heard about 4e is almost certainly wrong; there is a vast amount of completely factually wrong information out there. 4e at its core is arguably a simpler system than B/X, never mind AD&D (and it's been more than a year since I cracked open a non-MM rulebook in play as DM) - but it requires almost a perceptual shift to run properly from more classic forms of D&D. It takes longer to put it bluntly because orcs are designed to die in a combat with ebb and flow over four hits rather than in one.</p><p></p><p>As for being a grognard, I wouldn't have said so. I wouldn't call someone a grog just for liking old games because those are the ones you know and because in some ways they are objectively better than successors. It's the vehemence and the reasoning that make for a Grognard.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Neonchameleon, post: 6008264, member: 87792"] Balance issues are different in different editions. Late 1e/early 2e is probably the best balanced edition of D&D before late 2010 era 4e. Gygax paid a lot of care and attention to game balance although he was subtler about it than the 4e designers (who were reacting to the excesses of 3.X). Which means that although 2e doesn't [I]look[/I] that well balanced it isn't bad. And so when 2e players say balance isn't an issue it's because they've never seen what lack of balance can do to a game. And a lot of what you've heard about 4e is almost certainly wrong; there is a vast amount of completely factually wrong information out there. 4e at its core is arguably a simpler system than B/X, never mind AD&D (and it's been more than a year since I cracked open a non-MM rulebook in play as DM) - but it requires almost a perceptual shift to run properly from more classic forms of D&D. It takes longer to put it bluntly because orcs are designed to die in a combat with ebb and flow over four hits rather than in one. As for being a grognard, I wouldn't have said so. I wouldn't call someone a grog just for liking old games because those are the ones you know and because in some ways they are objectively better than successors. It's the vehemence and the reasoning that make for a Grognard. [/QUOTE]
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