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

[Ahnehnois]

While some groups would consider charop cheating, certainly groups exist where it is the norm and everyone still has fun. There is nothing antisocial about charop as such.

In my groups, it's not wanted. But it is agreed upon by everyone not just the GM. If I'd get players who'd all want to charop, I'd allow it.

Good point; I've rather oversimplified the issue. In the context where a DM and a group are running one game and a single player is trying to break it, that player is "cheating". But if the entire group is okay with it, then it's not.

It's easy to dump on the charop crowd, but I enjoy reading old brilliantgameologists threads every now and then. For the people who write those, trying to min/max the rules can be an entertaining thought exercise and is a perfectly reasonable part of the game. In this case, the imbalances in the rules are actually creating the fun.

It's important that everyone in a given group be using the ame social contract.

 

[Ahnehnois]

HeroQuest revised advertises itself as being a universal system for adventure RPGing, yet every PC is mechanically identical but for the descriptors in front of the numbers. Diverse, as it claims? Or limited, as you describe 4e? There is obviously no single answer to that question, but I think it's a mistake to assume that 4e is narrow in character concepts just because of its uniform structure. It's just that those concepts are expressed in different terms - for example, doing radiant damage rather than fire damage, or untyped damage, is very signficcant in the narrative of play (because of the vulnerability of undead to radiant, and the association of radiant damage with divine PCs), but is not the sort of difference you seem to be advocating.

Well, I think it's narrow in concepts because of the combination of several factors, uniform mechanics being one, but "siloing", its focus on miniature-based combat, and the invention of a variety of new mechanics to limit character power are also relevent.

And vice versa. I can't build the PCs I want to build in 3E, nor GM the game I want to GM.

You can't? Or won't?

"Functioning" is another contentious term. I think 4e does have functioning versions of the story elements of earlier versions of D&D.
...
What is important in PC difference? Mechanical minutiae, or the nature of the effects that their actions have on the fiction? Different players answer this different ways.

I think my first level fighter doesn't have to track a daily power and can work with 100% effectiveness until fatigue or damage stops him, and my first level wizard can memorize a Magic Missile that automatically affects its target, Charm Person, and Sleep one day and Tenser's Floating Disk, Comprehend Languages, and Silent Image the next day. Not exactly fringe examples. Not exactly minutiae.

I think D&Dnext, as best I can project it via the playtest documents, the blogs and the L&L columns, lacks many of the features that make 4e appealing to me as a fantasy RPG. The only thing that keeps me remotely hopeful about it is [MENTION=54877]Crazy Jerome[/MENTION]'s posts on this forum, which often show new ways whereby what looks to me like a clunky simulationist mechanic might be tweaked or dialled or added to in order to support a different playstyle.

I'm guessing that if you give it a fair chance, you'll do fine.

 

[Ratskinner]

Have you ever read or played 1e? It's a pretty coherently gamist RPG by my estimation. I don't think you tried very hard not to offend people who like pre-3e editions best.

Yup. We just got done with a brief 1e campaign a few months ago. I'll stand by my statements/opinions. It doesn't necessarily make it a terrible experience, either. On the whole, I would say that 1e started out pretty gamist, but there are lots of little "sim" parts scattered around the rules. Its the "coherent" part that I'd disagree with. Even from the start, though, people were trying to add more sim. Looking at the products and changes up through 2e, until the structures of the AD&D system couldn't handle it anymore.

I also disagree with your analysis of 4e. I basically agree with pemerton's earlier reply to you. My frustrations reading pemerton's posts arise from the fact that he's not always clear just how much theoretical and practical knowledge he relies on for his way of playing 4e that is not in the 4e DMG. When I claim to be analyzing 4e, I'm just looking at the text itself; I'm not crossreferencing it with Burning Wheel or Maelstrom Storytelling (never even heard of this one). To me, 4e doesn't really support any metagame agenda -- gamism or narrativism -- well out of the box. The DMG presents it as essentially an adventure path system. If you follow the adventure creation guidelines then you end up with a boring piece of crap like the Keep on the Shadowfell. The DM plans a series of 10 encounters at a time, some being battles and some being skill challenges, and then the players work through it linearly with very little wiggle room for differing rewards based on skilled play or risk tolerance. It's bloodless and perfunctory. It has no metagame agenda "spark" at all; pretty much all of the entertainment value has to come from the work the DM puts in to make the encounters narratively interesting. In GNS terms the only creative agenda I see this as supporting is high concept sim -- aka play through the DMs story as new powers get unlocked now and then. I think most 4e groups play the game this way. I think this playstyle has a pretty brutal prepwork to fun ratio and limited ability to draw in new players from other forms of gaming and I don't want to see it presented as the default way to play D&D ever again.

Whew, big paragraph. As far as 4e supporting any agendas well... ::shrug:: ...my point is that it jogged well gamist from 3e, at least in overall design. Personally, I find the whole structure of 4e and its powers very gamist. It may be "bloodless and perfunctory", but the whole engine is set up to provide the party with a continuous series of mildly difficult victories. I would say the "success rate" or "win ratio" for the PCs is much higher than 1e, and its far more forgiving to the PCs. The game's defined mechanics and terms are fairly standardized and divorced from the SIS (frex: you move squares not feet, you can "trip" a cube, fireballs fill a cubic volume, etc.) Most of the things about 4e that [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION] describes as Narrative I would describe as "Color". I agree that Pem seems to have a unique take on 4e.

I'm not sure how you consider 4e to have a "a pretty brutal prepwork to fun ratio." My personal experience is that 4e is very easy to prep for.

 

[Underman]

Underman, I hope you don't mind if I present this as an example of (i) strong social contract, and (ii) a certain sort of readiness to use at least a degree of GM force.

I don't mind at all. I don't see it as GM force. I see it as everyone being on the same page: in that the rules are providing a fun big versatile playground for us to all play in, and that the builders of the playground trust us. The social contract is to respect the intentions of the rules as well as the letter of the rules, and both the players and GM are in on it.

But yes, when there's the inevitable occasional disagreement, the DM may employ a "degree of force" to overrule a player's desires. This may or may not cause un-fun. But in the grand scheme of things, the potential for un-fun via DM houseruling can be a lesser evil than the alternative.

I think an RPG's greatest strength (over wargames or boardgames or videogames) is the social contract (enabled by human agency and intelligence).

That said, I don't mind at all if 5E included "DM Beware!" advice. In fact, it's a probably a good thing. And depending on the gaming table, a DM might treat those guidelines into actual rules, as appropriate.

EDIT: This is written in mind with the theoretical loophole of the wizard summoning a creature which in turn summons another creature. A rule prevents that from occuring, but respecting the intention of the summoning spell via social contract accomplishes the exact same thing.

 

[TwoSix]

These are the kinds of perspectives that I struggle to reconcile with the experiences of everyone who has played 3.X in some form for a decade now and not had that kind of experience. Even if those events happen, I find it difficult to believe that it is the rules' fault. Is the contention really that these kinds of experiences are an inherent product of picking up a 3e PHB? Or even typical? If so, how do you explain the number of people playing it?

Social contract and the personalities of the players at the table.

In my last 3.X game, which ended last month, one other player and I were playing Wizards. The rest of the party was a Knight, a Rogue, and a Favored Soul.

As one would expect, the Wizards dominated the game, cleaning out encounters left and right. The rest of the table simply didn't care. They were getting their treasure. The player of the Knight got to use his Knight's Challenge every once in a while, which made him happy. The Favored Soul healed us up afterwards and used some buffs, which made him happy. The Rogue hid in the back and occasionally would run up to sneak attack. Again, happy.

Would I have been happy playing the rogue in a game with two wizards? Hell no. From my vantage point, it looked boring as anything. But he seemed to enjoy it, so am I wrong or is he wrong? I don't know. I don't think either of us is wrong. I just know a 3.X game of 5 me's would break, and a game of 5 him's would just sort of amble along.

So I think the reason is table dynamics. If you have players who aren't pushing the system, but also aren't concerned with their output, the game will be fine. The issue is those players who want to make a high amount of contribution but don't want to play casters, which is what you have to play if you really want to make a 3.X PC that can push the game.

 

[Ratskinner]

These are the kinds of perspectives that I struggle to reconcile with the experiences of everyone who has played 3.X in some form for a decade now and not had that kind of experience. Even if those events happen, I find it difficult to believe that it is the rules' fault. Is the contention really that these kinds of experiences are an inherent product of picking up a 3e PHB? Or even typical? If so, how do you explain the number of people playing it?

I think it depends on how the group reacts to such events. In one of my first 3e campaigns a druid and wizard used a combination of their abilities to assault a small fortress by riding an invisible flying whale as a siege engine (which I'm sure was buffed in several other ways). For us, it was a funny story, with the understanding that it wasn't going to be their SOP (the whale complained to the Druid that he didn't like it.) For other groups, this kind of thing can be a real problem.

 

[Ahnehnois]

Social contract and the personalities of the players at the table.

Yes.

[Examples of play.]

I recall one game I played in where a paladin was designated by the DM as being the "leader" and was a level higher than everyone else and received a powerful artifact sword at 1st level. Now that caused some balance problems. I played a rogue, relatively min-maxed to be his flanking parter, and thus contributed. No one else (including the casters) in this rather large party contributed very much.

In another campaign that I ran, one player really took over with a half-ogre barbarian with a dubiously low LA really took over for a while. Eventually, a cleric with a cheesy prestige class that gave him arcane spells became the most powerful character, though this was largely because his regular attendance and tendency to avoid melee (and thus death) put him ahead of everyone else in level and treasure. My bad for allowing those things.

In another game (probably my longest running campaign), a fighter, a sorcerer, a druid, and a psion were all relatively equivalent, functioning in totally different ways. A variety of other characters were around them, but weren't as impactful.

In my most recent one, the characters were well-balanced and all contributed very well. Probably the most powerful character was a ranger, who tanked so the wizard and druid could do their thing; the wizard was an evoker who never really deployed his best spells because I never gave him the right enecounter to do so. But he magic missile-d some powerful enemies and made a lot of knowledge checks and had fun.

Et cetera, et cetera.

I've played and DMed 3e D&D with dozens of people and seen almost every class in the PHB come out as being the most powerful in the game at one point or another (bard and monk jump to mind as exceptions). The few clearly unbalanced ones were non-core or DM-empowered characters that look nothing like CODzillas or god wizards and clearly needed fixing (the shifter comes to mind). The only game-breaking class I've seen in the PHB is the paladin; I watched its douchiness take over twice and then banned it.

I had roughly the same experience during the year or two I played 2e before 3e came out.

So I think the reason is table dynamics. If you have players who aren't pushing the system, but also aren't concerned with their output, the game will be fine. The issue is those players who want to make a high amount of contribution but don't want to play casters, which is what you have to play if you really want to make a 3.X PC that can push the game.

Like I always say, it's really the people at the table who determine how balanced the game is.

And yes, there is definitely room for improvement in all versions of the game.

 

[Aenghus]

To me the main advantage of better balance is that IMO it helps average referees run a better game. Refereeing involves keeping a lot of balls in the air, it's hard to do for average referees, who I think are probably in the majority, and anything that adds unnecesssarily to the workload is a pain.

Bad balance adds more work for the referee both in prep time -

• scrutinising rules for balance
• finding where the flavour text and mechanics don't support each other (something I hate, hate hate),
• banning or houseruling broken material
• advising players at character creation - it's never fun telling people that their character concept is going to suck in a particular game system

and at run time -

• balancing spotlight time between PCs with what can be wildly different power levels (a few people prefer to avoid the spotlight, but most like it some of the time)
• watching out for games material that unexpectedly turns out to be broken,
• encounters and situations that are unexpectedly far too dangerous or completely short-circuited and need to be adjusted on the fly

I prefer running games as close to as written as possible as this helps players know what to expect from the game - the more houserules the further away from "core" the game drifts, and the harder it is to create accurate expectations for the game.

4e was sufficiently well balanced for my purposes to eliminate the vast majority of the makework listed above, reducing my prep time and allowing me to use it for fun stuff like creating NPCs and plots.

 

[TwoSix]

Like I always say, it's really the people at the table who determine how balanced the game is.

And yes, there is definitely room for improvement in all versions of the game.

Well, I'd say the people at the table determine how balanced that particular instance of the game is. That really isn't relevant as to how the game as a whole is balanced.

If I bought Monopoly, and the rules said that whoever had the car piece got $600 every time they passed GO, I would argue that the rules aren't balanced and are therefore faulty. That doesn't mean I couldn't play with those rules by giving the car to my 5-year-old.

From my viewpoint, pre-4e D&D is Monopoly where some of the pieces don't have to roll, they just get to pick what spot they go to each turn. Fun for a laugh, but not something I use when I really want to get down and play, you know?

 

[Neonchameleon]

The system doesn't allow for characters or other game elements from other editions of D&D to be rendered effectively; i.e. there is no 4e character that could provide an approximately similar mechanical representation and play experience to my 3e (or earlier) fighter, wizard, rogue, druid, etc.

What it can render effectively are PCs that were tried in other editions and were quite simple concepts but failed because they were fighting the rules set every step of the way. I'm currently DMing a throwback - 4e Undermountain where three of the PCs played mostly the same characters in 2e Undermountain. Three of the PCs are meant to be matches. The thief about is. The 2e firemage has become a 4e elementalist sorceror - and that's the character the player was trying to play in the 2e era; a big simple firemage who felt magical in part because he never ran out of magic. And a smart warrior who was a fighter in 2e and it didn't mesh well. In 4e she's a Taclord, and it fits the character perfectly.

So I have in a current party of four, two PCs who started off being played under 2e rules (or rather one who did and the other is the grandson of the original PC) - and the 4e rules fit the concept much much better than the 2e rules ever did in both cases.

A beginner finds in 4e a system that forces them into a much narrower design space than previous editions, preventing them from creating any character that is outside the AEDU, limited multiclassing, standard modifier box.

On the other hand they find themselves in a much better fleshed out design space. They find one with upwards of twenty five classes (it was 25 before Essentials completely muddied the count) that are written about archetypes and look, feel, and play distinctively (at least if you know how to play them).

It's in my experience only players of historic versions of D&D that find the multiclassing rules and the AEDU box to be restrictive. Because they already have mechanics in mind when they start to build the character. If you go in as an actual beginner and start with a concept then 4e is IME most likely to satisfy you out of any edition (with the exception of people who want to play weird species).

On the other hand the "casting is vancian only" box is something I've noticed beginners can find hideously restrictive. And even experienced players don't like much (the sorceror player I mentioned above started playing D&D in the late 1970s). "I can cast one spell per day, then get to be utterly mundane until the next morning". That's not what a beginner signed up to when they wanted to play a wizard. Instead they want something more like AEDU with cantrips.

Is the contention really that these kinds of experiences are an inherent product of picking up a 3e PHB? Or even typical? If so, how do you explain the number of people playing it?

It's my contention that such problems are an inevitable result of someone with one of several mindsets including systemic and strategic thinking picking up 3.X. On the other hand INTJ (IME the Meyers Briggs type most likely to shatter 3.X) are only a few percent of the population, and many of us looked at high level spells and polymorph, winced, and decided to do something else even if we wanted to play mages.

By the standards of several people who posted in this thread, I believe you have just described a perspective in which 4e is not balanced. (Along with most rpgs). Do you disagree with this conclusion (or with their standards)?

Not at all. Perfect balance is almost impossible. The question is how unbalanced it is. 4e is in about the 8 or 9 ring. 2e is in about the 4 or 5 ring, as is E6. Full court 3.X SRD is lucky to hit the paper at all - and with all splatbooks it misses the wall.

Interesting, I never thought of that. In those shoes, I would have self-regulated myself to not have the PC summon a Triton. And if I didn't, I wouldn't resist whatsoever if the DM made a ruling. I could justify this in several ways.

As a Wis 18 character worried for his life, I'd have in character gone for the Triton. And there being such an obvious loophole to me feels like I'm trying to make up for the game designer having ed up in an extremely obvious way.

Pun-Pun and the Omniscifer are one thing. But things used the way they are written with the intent they are written for

Well, I think it's narrow in concepts because of the combination of several factors, uniform mechanics being one, but "siloing", its focus on miniature-based combat, and the invention of a variety of new mechanics to limit character power are also relevent.

On the other hand the AEDU structure is fairly close to a decent narrative structure (normal, scene, episode), and unlike classic D&D the casters behave like something approaching casters in non-D&D fiction. Even the wizards from Jack Vance's novels don't have anything like Gygaxo-Vancian casting. And almost the whole of Appendix N (especially Vance and Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser) is better played in 4e with its increased role for non-casters and teamwork focus than it was in any previous edition of D&D.

4e may not be as much of a match for classic D&D as othe editions of D&D. But it's a much better match for almost any non-D&D heroic fiction than any other edition of D&D is. Vancian Casting is extremely narrow. So is the van Helsing based Cleric being almost essential for a party, and long bedrest. And the fighter not getting much cool stuff rather than being one of the more focal characters.

Edit:

I've played and DMed 3e D&D with dozens of people and seen almost every class in the PHB come out as being the most powerful in the game at one point or another (bard and monk jump to mind as exceptions). The few clearly unbalanced ones were non-core or DM-empowered characters that look nothing like CODzillas or god wizards and clearly needed fixing (the shifter comes to mind). The only game-breaking class I've seen in the PHB is the paladin; I watched its douchiness take over twice and then banned it.

You've never seen a well played bard then. Or one abusing the Glibness spell for another way into Social God Mode. (Seriously, that thing makes it too easy). As for the paladin, that's a playstyle issue.