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

[Mistwell]

Wut? Least gamist? I honestly can't believe you have the neck to even say that. 4th edition is "the" most gamist edition of D&D ever. Encounter powers, healing surges, full healing through non-magic in a matter of minutes, just to name a few. Opening the books, setting out your character sheets, placing your miniatures, and then sitting back and telling a story does not make a game a narrative one. If that is your definition then I would make Tic Tac Toe a narrative game, or even chess.

It is apparent from the failure of 4th edition that people don't want the gamist experience. They want more of a traditional D&D that allows you to set the focus whether it's combat, a little of both, or more non-combat.

This is just a matter of miscommunication. You mean something different than he does by the words "gamist" and "narrative". He's using some definitions from a group called The Forge. I despise that group, but at least they have a uniform set of definitions people can use to talk about different aspects of the game.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

I disagree.

The reason I disagree is because there were many instances at every single game we played that when it came to describing certain things we couldn't do it. We just had to shake our heads, ignore the fact that we couldn't explain what happened even in a fantasy way and just left it at that. Turned a lot of us off the game.

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

 

[GMforPowergamers]

He's using some definitions from a group called The Forge. I despise that group, but at least they have a uniform set of definitions people can use to talk about different aspects of the game.

what is the forge I have never heard of it that I remember?? It sounds like a secret conspiracy or cabal of game designers though.

 

[Mistwell]

what is the forge I have never heard of it that I remember?? It sounds like a secret conspiracy or cabal of game designers though.

It's really not worth exploring much. But, you can read their glossary here.

But to be clear, I think they do a lot more harm than good to RPGs in general, and I don't want to get into that debate. And they're...not fans of D&D and anyone who plays D&D.

 

[Remathilis]

Its all fun and games until someone brings Forgespeak into it.

 

[Marshall]

I'd need a fair bit of convincing that rigor and transparency act as detriments to gamist play. Wargames, for example, are often long on both and quite gamist (obviously). There exist folks who use the 4e mechanics with a few tweaks to play a very competitive "Old-School" game. I can't see how more regulated rewards makes them any less rewards. Sure, it takes an element of chance out of the game (that is, a recent OSR game I played in kinda disintegrated after two very fortunate sets of rolls on the random treasure tables.) However, I tend to see it as primarily a shift in frequency and potency. If anything, it makes 4e a better gamist game, because your character + stuff even more directly reflects your accomplishments with that character, rather than random rolls on a chart.

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!

I'm not sure how you figure that (and I dread to bring this up). Look at any of the Mario Bros games, now turn one into a tabletop game. They certainly aren't Nar or Sim, they are almost purely gamist. Similar to your note about 1e, what level can you get to is a measure of player skill, not character skill. Yet Mario doesn't get substantially more effective as the game goes on (temporary power ups notwithstanding). The only thing that changes as you progress in Mario levels is the complexity of the levels. 4e can, to some extent, be played in a very similar vein. From my point of view, its regulated to play that way (at least "rules-as-suggested"). You will receive these benefits as you level up for precisely the reason of maintaining a specific challenge level while we tour a bunch of "levels/tiers" with different trappings/flavor...a very gamist concept indeed, that treadmill. At least AFAICT.

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.

Consider also intra-class balance. From what I can tell, this is a purely gamist concept, because its measured directly against that challenge level from above. Its also not (from what I can tell) incompatible with the 1e take on gamism, which include tacit admissions that playing a Fighter is "easy mode" and playing thief or wizard is "hard mode" or "normal mode" (which is which seems to vary a bit between the editions and presentations). The wizard player receives his rewards of power for surviving all those low levels at a much higher difficulty setting than the fighter player. The difference is not one of gamism, but of design choice in how to affect it best.

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

You might think that challenge or difficulty level is not Gamist, but I can't see how it isn't. For the (pure) Sim player, the world just is, and I'm exploring it. It may be terrible and gritty, or it may be rainbows and unicorns, but its just there. If I am correctly experiencing the world as my character would (living the dream), then there is no "fair" except as he would experience it. For the pure Narrative player...heck, there are Narrativist games where victory is a foregone conclusion and the players are merely dickering over how the victory happens. Difficulty or challenge is merely flavor for such a player. (Of course, no real player is such a purist in TTRPGs, at least IME.)

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

When should a party be able to take on a pack of 3 wolves or a lion or a bear or a Dragon or....

 

[GMforPowergamers]

It's really not worth exploring much. But, you can read their glossary here.

But to be clear, I think they do a lot more harm than good to RPGs in general, and I don't want to get into that debate. And they're...not fans of D&D and anyone who plays D&D.

wow... ok I didn't know there was such an anti D&D mindset out side of religious circles...

 

[Savage Wombat]

I understood that "gamist" meant in Forge-terms, and I'm OK with that, but I'm never clear what the writer means using it. I would personally prefer if someone writing a phrase like "4e is the least gamist" would follow it with something like "[and by that I mean blah blah blah]" for benefit of those who aren't following their reasoning. Forge classifications cover a lot of ground.

 

[Mistwell]

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.

 

[Bluenose]

I'd need a fair bit of convincing that rigor and transparency act as detriments to gamist play. Wargames, for example, are often long on both and quite gamist (obviously).

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.