D&D (2024) Do players really want balance?

[Maxperson]

Na they went with 6'8 encounters based on polling.

Holy crap! I've been using 5'7" encounters. Maybe that's where I'm going wrong.

 

[SpellObjectEnthusiast]

Y'all make me wanna make a "Short Rest" game where attrition isn't a big part of the gameplay loop and it's instead built around the 5 minute adventuring day...

could be done with 5e as follows:
-Remove hit dice for healing entirely. HP is restored to full after a short rest.
-Reduce max HP to 66% of current max HP.
-divide all per-long-rest resources (including spell slots) by 3, rounding up or down to the nearest whole number. These resources refresh on short rest now.
-At level 13, a spellcaster gets a single 6th level slot.
-At level 17, a spellcaster gets a single 8th level slot.
-All consumable items (scrolls, potions) are reusable each encounter, but each PC may only use a single such item before taking a short rest.

 

[Oofta]

I'm not talking about popularity (to me it doesn't matter unless $$ is involved). I'm talking about intended playstyle; that is, intended by the designers of the game.

I don't care that you weren't talking about popularity. The thread of conversation was talking about game design and why the game works like it does ... developers write game with the intent that the game sells because it's popular. Not because it meets your specific idea of "good".

As far as what Gygax wrote, OD&D had a lot of ideas many of which were contradictory. The way it was actually played is relevant to the conversation because the implication was that everyone in OD&D played a super lethal game and it was still popular.

 

[AnotherGuy]

Holy crap! I've been using 5'7" encounters. Maybe that's where I'm going wrong.

Not necessarily, what you lose in length you can make up in width. Don't let that Māori give you any complexes.

 

[ezo]

In some RPGs. Not in Classic Traveller. Or in some versions of RuneQuest. Or in some versions of Pendragon. Or in Wuthering Heights.

I'm sure there are many other RPGs too where players don't get to decide their PCs' pasts.

Sorry, I particularly meant D&D since that is the focus here. And in other popular RPGs you decide your past.

But I can't take the notion that one is more realistic than the other at all seriously.

The PC is unconscious and can do nothing--they are literally in the Hands of Fate. Which, guess what, is exactly like real life. It is not a "will to live" mechanic, it is a "does your body stabilize without aid" mechanic. Are you bleeding out or not? Do you succumb to shock or not? Will you recover consciousness to help yourself or not? And so on.

Now, one thing I don't like about death saves is they are too easy. You are more likely to make them (roughly a 60/40 split IIRC). I like the DC higher, say 15, but allow your Constitution to impact the roll, since it is about how well your body can stablize and such from the trauma. A healthy person is more likely to make it than someone with a weak constitution.

Now, if you want to have a "will to live" mechanic that is fine. It is plot armor really, a form of "final HP" if you want. Not my taste, certainly, but also not "realistic" at all.

 

[SteveC]

It seems to me that there are different levels of players who want progressively more involved play. You have the "I want to smash something" players. You have the deep immersive role-players who don't want to even roll a die. And everything in between.

As the DM, it's your job to pitch the game you want to run and that you think your group would enjoy. It's a balancing act between what's fun for you and what they will like. I think the talk about balance has to start with that pitch for the game.

As a player, at it's most basic level, balance is getting to do fun stuff about as much as the other players. And feeling challenged, but not constantly overwhelmed, by the world. Most starting players won't understand how the game is tied into the Adventuring Day, and how short and long Rests apply. My group that I play with is full of experienced players, and they forget about short rests, even for classes that rely on them like Warlocks. "Hey, maybe we should take a Short Rest here and spend some Hit Dice? Didn't you use your spells? I think you used Action Surge earlier..." that's how I subtly suggest it playing a spellcaster who only has one class feature I use then.

I think discussion of balance at a serious level happens when players get more experienced. That's when you start to see differences like a Paladin with frequent Long Rests doing the lion's share of the damage.

I guess my answer to the question posed is: yes, but only so far as they can see and understand what's going on in the game.

 

[billd91]

The people who made 2e decided to model the Ranger on Drizz't. Big mistake.

The 1e Ranger never needed a wholesale makeover. A bit of tweaking, sure, but trying to turn what was originally a good solid tank class into a two-weapon swashbuckler (which they should have done to Thieves instead) was just plain dumb.

Except they didn't base the 2e Ranger on Drizzt. Snarf brought the receipts on that here a few years ago: D&D 5E - The Dual Wielding Ranger: How Aragorn, Drizzt, and Dual-Wielding Led to the Ranger's Loss of Identity

 

[Nefermandias]

Ah, yeah. If there was focus on more stuff than just combat, then the ranger would get to have his niche in a really cool way, IMO. Stuff outside of only combat is interesting to me. I was just thinking yesterday that the extreme focus on balance and nailing down every mechanic and spell removes a lot of the “magic” I remember from the game in the late 90s. Spells and magic items aren’t so mysterious and nebulous now as they were in 2e or B/X - they all have to have a firm rule with all the rough edges sanded down. We can’t just have a cloak that lets you meld into a shadow - it instead just gives you Advantage on Stealth rolls, or a +X modifier. To me that’s very, very boring. A stingy DM could use nebulous rules to be a jerk, but nothing stops a bad DM from behaving poorly in 5e either.

There's something to be said about that mentality of "spells/abilities/items can only ever do whatever is written in the text". This is as much as a myth as the notion that combatants have 360º super vision active all the time.

At least, the new PHB goes out of it's way to state that despite the text, any additional effect of spells are the purview of the DM.

 

[Baron Opal II]

Don't get me wrong: Aragorn might've been the inspiration.

The implementation, however, was kinda sloppy and nonsensical.

No argument there!
I heavily favor wizards on the rare chances I get to play. But, should I have the opportunity to play 5e (of whatever stripe) I have a powerful urge to play a premiere archer based on the fighter class. Not a ranger, not multiclassing, just pure fighter who is an archer / skirmisher. A bit of a test as well as indulging my contrariness.

Because, by the gods, a ranger should be defined by more than being an archer main.

 

[Voadam]

In D&D people roll to see whether or not they succumb to fear. And there's no reason there couldn't be rules for falling asleep on watch, or falling to temptation. In fact, those both sound like saving throws to me, and I would welcome them, because they are more realistic to me and because they are in line with the style of the game. Your will to live mechanic is in line with the style of a different game.

?

In D&D people roll to see if they succumb to supernaturally induced fear effects.

The player generally decides if they succumb to fear in the face of danger in D&D.

2e Ravenloft had optional fear rolls for the supernatural dread setting for dealing with certain scary situations where you would roll and then were instructed to roleplay as if you were scared if the check failed.