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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Nifft" data-source="post: 5196354" data-attributes="member: 6562">Sure, but there's also plenty of bad art which is bad for reasons that have nothing to do with being intellectual. Mmm. I've found balanced games offer more useful options than unbalanced games -- me & my players tend to gravitate to strong classes. I'm reminded of an argument about character optimization. It was argued that thinking about optimizing your character took away from role-playing -- the idea was that, by being more able to rationally evaluate your character's combat effectiveness, you were therefore less able to be a good role-player. People had some anecdotes about seeing this happen to their groups.My argument was that there are three stages to being a character optimizer. These stages are:1 - Mechanically Naive: "My character took Toughness because he is tough!" -- At this stage, the player evaluates options based on how appropriate he finds their names. Mechanical effects are ignored or misvalued. The player may become frustrated when he realizes that his choices do not allow him to exert enough influence on the campaign world.2 - System Mastery: "I made a half-orc spiked chain machinegun trip monkey. His name? Uh..." -- The player has achieved some system mastery, and his characters derive specifically from that system mastery. He picks options that are mechanically better in what he thinks is an objective sense. He "builds" all his characters.3 - Optimization Sublimated: "Jaurim answers the bandit with confidant honesty: I do not fear your challenge, rogue, for I am simply the best duelist in the land." -- This is system mastery in service of roleplaying. At this stage, the player is not bound by "objectively stronger" options. Instead, he is interested in taking cool concepts and being able to use his deep knowledge of the system to make those cool concepts work.Folks in stage 2 are the optimizers that everyone seemed to get upset at. Folks in stage 3 are fun in any game.- - -Now, what does this have to do with the discussion of "system balance"? IMHO, D&D is nearing the end of stage 2, which has taken us from 3.0e to 4e.It seems to me that we are coming to a point where we can reliably make systems to emulate any genre, to facilitate any desired style of play. Sure, some people will fall too far in love with the tools, but that's (hopefully) just stage 2. It's temporary. They'll get through it, and they'll be improved by the process.If you want to "achieve that cheering and whooping", you'd do well to take advantage of all the tools at your disposal. Balance is one of those tools. Perhaps it's one that seems to drive too much system design these days, but that's just how stage 2 goes: it's driven by mechanical concerns.With luck, we'll soon enter stage 3, and we'll be able to rationally choose mechanics which best serve our style / genre / "cheering and whooping".But the answer isn't to turn back, or throw away the work we've done so far. It's to realize that tools can (and should) be improved, but those tools only exist to serve the craftsman.Cheers, -- N</blockquote>

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