Balance... does it really matter that much to you?

[francisca]

I think I'm firmly in the "Balance Schmalance" camp. To me, it is up to the DM to provide encounters/roleplay/whatever which are a challenge to the charcters and entertaining to the players. That's balance. Everyone invloved, no jealousy at the table, everyone having fun. Lack of "balance" in 1E and Basic/Expert never kept me from having a good time. I didn't play 2E, so maybe the splatbooks were so egregiously imbalanced that they ruined it for everyone, so YMMV.

On a related note, who cares? I as a DM provide adventures for the chars in my game to play in. I provide scenarios which play against both strengths and weaknesses of the party. It's always been this way with homebrews, and it will always be, whether or not balance is codified into the ruleset. I guess if you only used published material which is designed for the pre-fab four you might have some balance issues (but nobody buys published adventures anymore, right ). I mean, it's no fun fighting hordes of undead without a Cleric, right?

 

[Bendris Noulg]

As for "game balance", I think it is important for a DM to know what is "normal". Playing a balanced game is like a long relaxing bike ride on a beautiful day. Playing a unbalanced game is like BMX racing.

This... This... This just brings a tear to my eye.

A shame you live on the other side of the state...

>sniff<

 

[Arnwyn]

I think that balance is important between characters, but not the simplistic version of balance that means "combat effective."

I'm going to ditto this.

 

[Zappo]

I define balance as the property that two characters of the same ECL should have the same power, and power as effectiveness at overcoming challenges. Substitute ECL for CP in GURPS, or whatever your system of choice uses.
Which means that
1) balance != combat balance, and
2) balance depends on the nature of challenges; a barbarian in a no-combat politics campaign is probably very underpowered, and
3) balance != party balance, you want a party where a character is stronger, just make him higher level; this doesn't make the system unbalanced.

That said, balance is not a necessity, but it is a highly desirable quality. The aim of the game is to have fun, and good balance makes that easier. Further, good balance greatly encourages character diversity, which is generally seen as another desirable quality. Finally, good balance has no negative effects on any game or gaming style that I can think of.
From these considerations, I find 3E's attention towards balance amply justified.

As for the idea of "throwing balance out of the window", IMO it is just irrational. Unless you tell me what I gain in return, and it better be something good - "more time to do something else" doesn't make the cut, that's just laziness or poor design skills talking.

 

[Altalazar]

I vote for balance. It doesn't have to be perfect. There can be some things slightly out of whack with others, but overall, I think you need to strive for balance - otherwise there are so many headaches that you can end up with.

 

[Bendris Noulg]

Unless you tell me what I gain in return, and it better be something good - "more time to do something else" doesn't make the cut, that's just laziness or poor design skills talking.

Actually, the DMG says otherwise...

Page 8, Under the header "Deep-Immersion Storytelling", paragraph 3, relevant sentance in bold:
Rules become less important in this style. Since combat isn't the focus, game mechanics take a back seat to character development. Skills take precedence over combat bonuses, and even then the actual numbers often don't mean much. Feel free to change rules to fit the player's roleplaying needs. You may even want to streamline the combat system so that it takes less time away from the story.

 

[hong]

Actually, the DMG says otherwise...

Page 8, Under the header "Deep-Immersion Storytelling", paragraph 3, relevant sentance in bold:
Rules become less important in this style. Since combat isn't the focus, game mechanics take a back seat to character development. Skills take precedence over combat bonuses, and even then the actual numbers often don't mean much. Feel free to change rules to fit the player's roleplaying needs. You may even want to streamline the combat system so that it takes less time away from the story.

You fascinatingly missed this bit, relevant sentence [sic] in bold:

1) balance != combat balance, and
2) balance depends on the nature of challenges; a barbarian in a no-combat politics campaign is probably very underpowered, and
3) balance != party balance, you want a party where a character is stronger, just make him higher level; this doesn't make the system unbalanced.

 

[Angcuru]

If every class were meant to be perfectly balanced with each other, every character class would be the Bard with a different name. 'cause Bards can do practically anything, but are not phenomenal at anything.

You pick your class to reflect the character, not the character to reflect the class. Otherwise the whole game becomes one big competition to see who can cast the most powerful spell, wield the sharpest sword, vomit on the most nobles, etc.

 

[Amaroq]

I don't think that it is important for each class to be perfectly balanced to each other class, and definitely agree with the 'balance does not equal combat effectiveness' camp.

I do want to see balance between the character classes to the point where I want to play a long-running character of each major class. This becomes especially important to me when you have similar classes.

If you're going to write Sorceror and Wizard classes, they need to be balanced enough that I as a player am intrigued to play both, and don't look at the rules and think, "Oh, this one is far superior to that one." I don't want to see an Assassin class which provides everything the Thief can do and then some... I want an Assassin class which does some things better, at the cost of giving up other things.

This is the problem I'm having with so many of the published prestige classes - I know, different boat, but I want to make an example, not open a can of worms. I've seen a number of prestige classes which spin off of one of the base classes... but seem to offer significantly more 'new cool powers' which the character wouldn't get by continuing to progress with the base class. If the prC doesn't have some serious and hefty counterweights to that, then it becomes a 'no-brainer' choice for anyone playing the base class to move into the prC class at higher levels.

So it is with balancing the base classes: you need to provide a niche for each, and ensure that no class overwhelms one of its neighbors at the neighbor's niche. If you're writing a Fighter and a Monk, its very important that the Fighter win if they square off with swords and armor, and the Monk win if they square off with bare knuckles and chests. If that isn't true.. then whichever one would "win" the opposite's niche is overbalanced.

Then, as others have pointed out, its the GM's job to provide a roughly equal number of uses of the players' niches, giving each an opportunity to 'shine'... and ideally, calling up situations which focus on the niche of a class the players don't have, so that they must improvise their way around that weakness.

 

[reiella]

Well just another quick comment from me here.

It's far easier for the end user to 'take caution to the wind and the heck with balance' if the game is already balanced than 'to apply caution and enforce balance' if the game is already (grossly) unbalanced (see Rifts with an 'Open Call' for any OCC or RCC, even amongst the core book).