D&D 5E What does balance mean to you?

[Azurewraith]

To me balance means 4th edition or rather everyone gets the same abilities just with different names and fluff.

 

[Ath'kethin]

To me balance means 4th edition or rather everyone gets the same abilities just with different names and fluff.

I agree with this statement completely, though I mean it in the most negative, derogatory way possible. To have a completely 'balance' game mechanically, everything needs to be identical.

That, to me, is also the least interesting way to design a game that I can think of.

What balance should be in my opinion, and this is how I try to structure my games, is everyone feeling fulfilled as part of the game experience. After every session, I ask my players what they did and didn't like. Some of the answers have surprised me, as stuff I thought went terribly was beloved and stuff I thought was great . . . wasn't. But as long as everyone is enjoying themselves, I call it a win.

I've said it before: there is no way that, on an ability-for-ability basis, a person who alters reality with a word and a person who pokes sharp sticks through things are going to be on an even power level. At least not without the "everything the same but with different names" approach. So to make the game balanced, or enjoyable, we need to look beyond that constraint.

Much of the burden for such an approach falls on the DM, and the players. That's fine. If I didn't want stuff falling on the DM and players, I'd play a video game instead of D&D.

 

[Azurewraith]

I agree with this statement completely, though I mean it in the most negative, derogatory way possible. To have a completely 'balance' game mechanically, everything needs to be identical.

That, to me, is also the least interesting way to design a game that I can think of.

What balance should be in my opinion, and this is how I try to structure my games, is everyone feeling fulfilled as part of the game experience. After every session, I ask my players what they did and didn't like. Some of the answers have surprised me, as stuff I thought went terribly was beloved and stuff I thought was great . . . wasn't. But as long as everyone is enjoying themselves, I call it a win.

I've said it before: there is no way that, on an ability-for-ability basis, a person who alters reality with a word and a person who pokes sharp sticks through things are going to be on an even power level. At least not without the "everything the same but with different names" approach. So to make the game balanced, or enjoyable, we need to look beyond that constraint.

Much of the burden for such an approach falls on the DM, and the players. That's fine. If I didn't want stuff falling on the DM and players, I'd play a video game instead of D&D.

Oh I never meant it was a good thing but to me that is what balance is but that stems from about 3years of hard core Arena. Well pure balance anyway. I agree things are often better when out of balance an example is "hey Mr.wizard that rock is blocking your path, move it" wizard rolls uber low "sorry it doesn't budge" "hey Mr barbarian move it" rolls low but adds his +5str "oh cool you moved it".

Yes its a bad scenario as a wizard would just disintegrate the rock but that's a valuable resources wasted.

 

[Sacrosanct]

What I find laughable is the game designers getting a free ride on not putting enough work into balancing things and then getting defended by people who say its not the designers' job to balance things its the DM's job. Great way to produce the perfect game lol

What I also find laughable is that if you think its the DM's job to balance things, why do you care if the game gets balanced differently? Can't your DM just adjust things at your table accordingly? hmmmm......

This is the second time you're accusing people of doing things they aren't doing. First, you inferred people are nihilists and that we are saying there shouldn't be any balance at all in the core game, and now you're saying we are giving designers a free ride because it's not their job to balance things.

I think you'd find that you'd have a much less disagreement if you would argue against what people have said, rather than what you keep imagining people are saying, and understand that just because the designers didn't balance the game how you want it, doesn't mean they didn't put in work balancing the game.

Not sure how many times I need to say this, but here goes one more time. We are saying that there does need to be a foundational balance in the game. However, when your (general you) style of game play is outside of what the game is designed to function to be (by focusing on tactical combat over the other aspects), then it is up to you to use the tools provided to you tweak the game to fit that style. This is needed because many of the things that would normally balance out most of your concerns you are ignoring by choosing to play the style you want, and are thus skewing certain abilities to be more powerful than they otherwise would be in a game that is played how D&D is designed.

Things you want changed to balance how you play would cause more balance issues to someone else who plays the game differently because all parts are intertwined among all pillars. Now I would appreciate it if you would cease with these accusations of nihilism or free rides. It's unnecessarily confrontational, and misses the point.

 

[Sacrosanct]

Why bother? His arguments are illogical. When people base their arguments on fallacy, you can't use reason or logic to argue against them, because it will just fall away like water off a duck's back.


So now you're telling people the right way to play the game. Nice.

Just so you know, this is the only time I'm going to reply to you, because clearly you have no intention of having an honest conversation and are just looking for a fight. That's why you were warned by a mod. However, I think you might be a bit confused because there is someone in this discussion who keeps relying on strawmen (accusations of nihilism and giving designers free passes when no one has remotely taken that position) and it's not me.

Secondly, it's not me telling others how to play. That's from the designer's themselves, about how 5e is designed with a more rulings over rules approach. I'm sorry you don't like it. But it's a fact. And it seems to be a good design approach because 5e is extremely popular.

 

[Xeviat]

And balance gives players more genuine choices rather than the illusion of choice.

Ah ah, we can't use that word.


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[Sacrosanct]

I agree with this statement completely, though I mean it in the most negative, derogatory way possible. To have a completely 'balance' game mechanically, everything needs to be identical.

That, to me, is also the least interesting way to design a game that I can think of.

What balance should be in my opinion, and this is how I try to structure my games, is everyone feeling fulfilled as part of the game experience. After every session, I ask my players what they did and didn't like. Some of the answers have surprised me, as stuff I thought went terribly was beloved and stuff I thought was great . . . wasn't. But as long as everyone is enjoying themselves, I call it a win.

I've said it before: there is no way that, on an ability-for-ability basis, a person who alters reality with a word and a person who pokes sharp sticks through things are going to be on an even power level. At least not without the "everything the same but with different names" approach. So to make the game balanced, or enjoyable, we need to look beyond that constraint.

Much of the burden for such an approach falls on the DM, and the players. That's fine. If I didn't want stuff falling on the DM and players, I'd play a video game instead of D&D.

Whenever I hear someone say "illusion of choice", this is what I think of. "Oh, you want real choice? Then why are you playing a game where every PC does basically the same thing, just with different flavor? That's no choice at all, because no matter which class you choose, you're doing the same thing as every other class in a net results way."

Ironically, many of the people who use that phrase "illusion of choice", point to games like that as their desired game. Seems like a bit of cognitive dissonance to me. Just my opinion of course, but if you can literally pick a class randomly and have the same result in every scenario as any other class, how is that an actual choice? All you're choosing is the paint color, and not the car, so to speak. And that seems like it limits choices more than advocated them.

 

[iserith]

I want a game where choices are meaningful, where there aren't options that vastly overshadow others, as well as no "reasonable" options that are vastly weaker than others. In combat, I want characters of similar roles to be able to contribute similarly. Out of combat, I want every character to be able to hold spotlight time, regardless of the roleplaying skill of the individual character. I want choices to mean something, and to not have too many "optimal" choices.

The DM who has a huge impact in my view on all of what you say above. Certain choices are always going to be better with certain DMs and with certain settings, adventures, etc. Is what you want even achievable?

 

[hawkeyefan]

And balance gives players more genuine choices rather than the illusion of choice.

Not necessarily. The reason being that "balance" can mean so many things.

For example, let's take weapons. Let's balance it so that all weapons do the same damage. Every weapon now does 1d8 damage. This is balanced. It also renders any choice meaningless.

You could also balance things along class lines. So that damage dealt is determined by class. Same as hit dice. So a fighter would do 1d10 damage regardless of weapon, a barbarian would do 1d12 and so on. This is also balanced, and makes the choice of class matter more, and choice of weapon meaningless.

Finally, you could take each weapon and give it a different damage value, along with other factors that vary from weapon to weapon, in an attempt to make each weapon have some form of appeal. This seems to be what they went for, to varying degrees of success; I think there are still some weapons that are almost never chosen, but most have some kind of appeal.

So, it really depends. Balance does not automatically mean more meaningful choices, or anything else. It's a highly subjective term that gets used as if it has very specific application.

The DM who has a huge impact in my view on all of what you say above. Certain choices are always going to be better with certain DMs and with certain settings, adventures, etc. Is what you want even achievable?

I think [MENTION=57494]Xeviat[/MENTION]'s description is a good goal in general. Choices should matter, and the rules should strive to make them matter. When they don't, the DM can step in and help out. But the DM can also be the source of the issue, too, as you say.

 

[Sacrosanct]

Not necessarily. The reason being that "balance" can mean so many things.

For example, let's take weapons. Let's balance it so that all weapons do the same damage. Every weapon now does 1d8 damage. This is balanced. It also renders any choice meaningless.
.

Exactly, and what I was getting at above. When you get down to it, "choice" means making a decision point that will have a noticeable impact on how the game plays out. If X, Y, and Z powers all end up with the same results, is it really a choice which one you chose? Or is it an illusion? If you have a party full of the same classes, but can do the same things as a diverse party, is that more or less "real" choice where your class option has a very real significance on the game play. I.e., let's use AD&D for an example (since classes were not balanced with each other to a high degree). The choice of party composition mattered a lot more than it would if all classes were tightly balanced against one another. If you chose a party of all fighters in AD&D, and a party of all fighters in 4e or even 5e, that decision choice in AD&D would have a much greater impact. So in AD&D, there is more choice that matters because of lack of tightly balanced mechanics.

That's why I find it ironic that someone complaining about the illusion of choice would prefer a tightly balanced game, because that's the very definition of what illusion of choice means--that your choice really isn't a choice because it doesn't change the impact of the game in any significant way mechanically. It's an illusion. Something you only see on the outside, but internally there is no real difference.