Was AD&D1 designed for game balance?

[Ariosto]

The only action the players could take in WGR1 to avoid random encounters was to not travel back and forth between the City of Greyhawk and the ruins. What I meant was that players who take reasonable precautions to avoid bandits in the original module still have a 1 in 6 chance, rolled 3 times, of encountering bandits each time they approach or leave the ruins.

Not if you use common sense. Not if you read the 1st ed. DMG, which on the very first page of the main text addresses precisely this situation -- as an example of why you're supposed to use common sense. There is in fact no statement in the module that taking reasonable precautions has no effect, any more than that an "encounter" means an unavoidable attack. Maybe that would be implied in, say, a 4e module -- but that has nothing at all to do with 1E AD&D.

So you never roll skill checks? Of course you do. And the Skill Challenge setup, if used in an interesting way, will seem just as organic as the skill rolls called for without them while also rewarding your players for completing a non-combat challenge.

Naturally, I never "roll skill checks" that are not part of the game in the first place. Do you "of course" use weapon speed factors and armor type modifiers, or strike ranks and hit locations, in 4e?? "Interesting" or not, the skill challenge baloney completely bypasses actual engagement with the game-world problem. That is its purpose! That is the only "benefit" of imposing utterly arbitrary probabilities instead of letting the players actually come up with and play out a plan that can succeed or fail on its own merits.

Your premise is that skill challenges are useless.

My premise is that skill challenges are very useful for overturning the game balance for which AD&D1 was designed. As in the thread topic, you know?

 

[Vyvyan Basterd]

Not if you use common sense. Not if you read the 1st ed. DMG, which on the very first page of the main text addresses precisely this situation -- as an example of why you're supposed to use common sense. There is in fact no statement in the module that taking reasonable precautions has no effect, any more than that an "encounter" means an unavoidable attack. Maybe that would be implied in, say, a 4e module -- but that has nothing at all to do with 1E AD&D.

Except common sense is not common, so you would get widely varying results dependant upon who was DMing. You imply that I'm not using common sense in 4E, which is a total crock. All the skill challenge mechanic does is put the thoughts of "common sense" up front, to prepare for common solutions to the problem. You are still suggested to be open to other solutions to the problem that you didn't prepare for when writing the skill challenge.

My premise is that skill challenges are very useful for overturning the game balance for which AD&D1 was designed. As in the thread topic, you know?

But they aren't used to overturn game balance. When written in a sensable manner they provide a framework for the DM to determine if the players have overcome a complex challenge. They accomplish the same exact thing DMs have always had to adjudicate, just with a chance to prepare and to provide a method of reward for overcoming complex challenges.

 

[Vyvyan Basterd]

Not if you use common sense. Not if you read the 1st ed. DMG, which on the very first page of the main text addresses precisely this situation -- as an example of why you're supposed to use common sense. There is in fact no statement in the module that taking reasonable precautions has no effect, any more than that an "encounter" means an unavoidable attack. Maybe that would be implied in, say, a 4e module -- but that has nothing at all to do with 1E AD&D.
My premise is that skill challenges are very useful for overturning the game balance for which AD&D1 was designed. As in the thread topic, you know?

Since I'm sure you haven't bothered to go look at what I'm talking about here it is:

[sblock]SKILL CHALLENGE #1
Avoiding harrassment by bandits
Level 4, Complexity 2 (350 XP) [Award XP whether challenge is completed successfully or not - do not award XP for encounters caused by failure.]

If the party tries to avoid the bandits in the area, each player should make a single check each time the party approaches or leaves the ruins. Award a single success or failure based on whether the checks are a majority success or failure. The Aid Another action is not allowed on these checks. If the party makes no attempt to avoid the bandits failure is automatic.

Common skill use examples:
Athletics DC 18 - Traversing more difficult terrain that isn't commonly travelled.
Bluff DC 13 - Seeming to be unworthy of attention or much more powerful.
Diplomacy DC 23 - Attempting to negotiate with the bandits at minimal cost.
Endurance DC 18 - Moving at a hastened pace to offer less window of opportunity for the bandits.
Insight DC 23 - Recognizing dangerous groups within the area.
Intimidate DC 13 - Seeming tougher and meaner to dissaude bandits from attacking.
Nature DC 13 - Recognizing areas that would provide the bandits with opportunities to ambush travelers.
Perception DC 18 - Spotting trouble before it occurs.
Stealth DC 13 - Moving unseen and unheard through the region.

Results:
6 successes: The group has built a reputation, found a safe path, or whatever else seems appropriate to their methods to not have to worry about attacks from bandits any more.

4-5 successes: The group has learned enough about the bandit activity to no longer be surprised by their attacks.

1-3 successes: No effect.

1st failure: Attacked by bandit group consisting of 4 human bandits and a human berserker.

2nd failure: Attacked by bandit group consisting of 4 human guards and a human mage.

3rd failure: Attacked by bandit group consisting of 10 orc drudges and 2 gnoll huntmasters. After a 3rd failure the party has earned a reputation in blood and will no longer be at risk of bandit attacks.
[/sblock]

This skill challenge requires initiation by the players. There is no decree of "Skill Challenge Time!" It sets up examples of skill uses and the difficulty of the exampled uses to give myself a gauge for adjudicating player ideas that I haven't thought of. It does use the #success/#failure framework, but in a way that makes sense in game terms. In other words, I have in-game reasons why the skill challenge ends after the full number of successes or the full number of failures.

And I'm sure you'll pick on my use of the term "Attacked" in the failure section of the skill challenge. I mean that in terms of intent. The bandits are coming after you to take your stuff forcibly. Whether that results in combat is up to the players. They could surrender and give the bandits their stuff, they could try to use diplomacy/bluffs/initimidation to deter the bandits from attacking or anything else they think of when encountering the bandits.

 

[Gentlegamer]

Yes. Absolutely. Even though it is true that Gary Gygax gave explicit permission to play in other ways, every game (including 1e, 4e, and RCFG) is designed to be played in a specific way. The designer's views of "the best/most fun way to play" informs the design goals of the designer(s), whether they are aware of it or not.

Gary Gygax was merely upfront about what he thought was the best/most fun way to play, and why. Some of his reasoning I agree with; some I do not. However, his reasoning and design goals are different than the reasoning and design goals of the designers of 3e, 4e, and even 2e.

Heck, the design goals of AD&D 1e and Basic D&D are explicitly different.

Any game has its "best play" experience occur when the user and the designer have the same end goal in mind. Note that I do not mean here the best play experience a given specific person can have; I mean the optimum experience available to the optimum user for that system.



Sure you can. All you have to do is make humans, in some way, the best choice. It doesn't matter what way this is done in. All that matters is that it is done.

IOW, if all options are equal, there is no "central" option.

It was an intentional design goal in 3e to decentralize options (as opposed to the humanocentric 1e). I would argue that decentralized options were an unstated goal of 2e, which saw splatbooks for every race except humans, and saw official endorsement for monster PCs.

1e's mechanics were informed by its design goals. 2e's mechanics were modelled off of 1e's, but the design goals were far more similar to those of 3e. It was a mismatch of mechanics and goals that, ultimately, hurt the system. 3e was not "1e with better mechanics"; it was, if anything, "2e with better mechanics (in some cases)". Prestige classes offered a more balanced take on kits. The 2e skill system was refined and improved. The 2e idea of the bard was retained. Even the early 3e spaltbooks followed the basic model of the "Complete Book" series.

And, perhaps, for the majority, the design goals of 4e, 3e, and/or 2e lead to a better game than the design goals of Gary Gygax in 1e. But they are different design goals, leading to different "best play" experiences. All this means is that these games have a different set of optimum users.

You know, I've never heard anyone who prefers checkers to chess claim that checkers is chess with better rules. Perhaps we are letting the name of the game(s) blind us when attempting to view what these games seek to accomplish? 4e can "be D&D" without being "1e with better rules".

Sign my name on this post, too.

 

[Vyvyan Basterd]

Naturally, I never "roll skill checks" that are not part of the game in the first place. "Interesting" or not, the skill challenge baloney completely bypasses actual engagement with the game-world problem. That is its purpose! That is the only "benefit" of imposing utterly arbitrary probabilities instead of letting the players actually come up with and play out a plan that can succeed or fail on its own merits.

Is this just a matter of not having skills in 1E? Well, at least until the Wilderness and Dungeoneer's Survival Guides. Skills may impose "utterly arbitrary probabilities" but so did playing out a plan that can succeed or fail on its own merits. How, you ask? Because your DM is the final decider on whethe your plan succeeds or fails. The probability involved is whether your idea of common sense in the situation matches your DM's. Different methods, same results.

 

[Ariosto]

But they aren't used to overturn game balance. When written in a sensable manner they provide a framework for the DM to determine if the players have overcome a complex challenge. They accomplish the same exact thing

They implement the game balance of 4e; they overturn the game balance of 1e (and pretty much every other RPG of my experience).

The issue at hand is not how much you happen to like the mechanism. The issue at hand is whether AD&D1 was designed for game balance. I think the "skill challenge" sub-game illustrates design for different balance -- not at all "the same exact thing".

The "imbalance corrected" here in 4e is the variation in ability among players. The influence of skill that seems not just permitted but encouraged in the combat game is clearly not desired elsewhere.

AD&D1 was designed to give player skill scope in actual strategic and tactical decisions of combat (while not imposing time-consuming minutia) -- and in other undertakings.

It is in my experience not greatly different when playing Traveller or RuneQuest, or some other game in which characters have "skill ratings".

Skills may impose "utterly arbitrary probabilities" ...

...but they need not. A "skill system" is not a big difference (indeed, is so little that I am delighted to do without one in a game designed without one).

Because your DM is the final decider on whethe your plan succeeds or fails. The probability involved is whether your idea of common sense in the situation matches your DM's. Different methods, same results.

So, the DM in 4e does not set the factors for a skill challenge? The DMG reads, "set the complexity based on how significant you want the challenge to be. ... Set a level for the challenge and DCs for the checks involved."

Again, it's not a matter of "skills". Come on -- you tell me how the DM setting the difficulty is any different from calling for "skill checks" or other rolls without the 4e formalism. All your +5 in Balderdash says is that you're a better choice to roll than some other player. The DM dictates where your chance falls between 0% and 100% (probably pretty shakily, with the "x successes before y failures" rule).

The big difference is that this abstraction has taken priority -- if not over completely, to the point that it does not matter what your supposed "plan" is. All that matters is the raw numbers.

It is obviously at its worst with a pre-designed formula (as in a published scenario). Could a DM instead first look at a plan during play and then come up with a skill challenge that roughly maps to it? Sure, but why impose the arbitrary scheme in the first place? Why force the sound and the silly into the same probabilistic mold?

The answer is that "all that matters is the raw numbers" is the purpose. Give the players enough options to pick the best numbers, and -- in combination with the "character build" system -- you should end up with about the same most of the time.

 

[Ariosto]

Since I'm sure you haven't bothered to go look at what I'm talking about here it is:

Great. After your complaint, you not only make it so that in fact there is nothing the players can do to avoid with certainty the certainty of not merely an encounter but an attack:

If the party makes no attempt to avoid the bandits failure is automatic. 1st failure: Attacked ...

... but (although this is unclear) you might also impose automatic surprise each time until:

4-5 successes: The group has learned enough about the bandit activity to no longer be surprised by their attacks.

It's fine that you have constructed a game system that you like. As the grand finale of that particular attack on Gygax's game design -- on the basis of a Second Edition work with which (quite poignantly) he had nothing to do -- it is just absurd.

YOU designed that "skill challenge", did you not?

Whatever my view of how much common sense the result demonstrates, I do not see how you can claim that AD&D somehow prevented you from exercising just as much judgment, or even from constructing such a complicated sub-system.

The great bottom-line bafflement is just how you see the "skill challenge" as directed at the same design goals as AD&D1.

I could go into detail, with your concoction as an example, but I think that would be almost as tiresome as a "skill challenge" itself. You can consider for yourself:

What skills does it challenge?

 

[Witty Comeback]

Clipped quote, all emphasis mine:

SKILL CHALLENGE #1
Avoiding harrassment by bandits
Level 4, Complexity 2 (350 XP) [Award XP whether challenge is completed successfully or not - do not award XP for encounters caused by failure.]

If the party tries to avoid the bandits in the area, each player should make a single check each time the party approaches or leaves the ruins. Award a single success or failure based on whether the checks are a majority success or failure. The Aid Another action is not allowed on these checks. If the party makes no attempt to avoid the bandits failure is automatic.

Common skill use examples: <snip>
Bluff DC 13 - Seeming to be unworthy of attention or much more powerful.
Diplomacy DC 23 - Attempting to negotiate with the bandits at minimal cost.
Intimidate DC 13 - Seeming tougher and meaner to dissaude bandits from attacking.

<snip>
The bandits are coming after you to take your stuff forcibly. Whether that results in combat is up to the players. They could surrender and give the bandits their stuff, they could try to use diplomacy/bluffs/initimidation to deter the bandits from attacking or anything else they think of when encountering the bandits.

Given that you've already gone through a Skill Challenge, why would you then allow the PCs to use those same skills to avoid the situation?

I don't have a horse in the edition war race, I am just a guy who likes to game and is strapped for time. So how is the time and effort justified for writing up and playing a skill challenge like this if, upon failure, the PCs can talk their way out of combat? Why not just listen to the description of PC precautions, figure out a reasonable probability on the fly, and then adjudicate according to the PCs' reactions?

 

[bardolph]

25% is pretty damn good for a first level character.

That's precisely my point. 25% is the upper range of a low level thief's ability. Most average characters are rolling against a 10 to 15. Which means, of course, that any thief actually trying to use his professional skills is likely a dead thief. The better strategy is to simply stay out of harm's way and take no chances. But then, why play a thief at all?

 

[Ariosto]

In the Greyhawk campaign, I think the thief was in fact overwhelmingly an NPC class apart from some multi-class characters. One might better ask why play a human thief at all?

"Any thief actually trying to use his professional skills is likely a dead thief." Only if his life depends on it, in which case his plight could only be worse without the second chance a thief function provides.