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Message: <blockquote data-quote="J_D" data-source="post: 1644099" data-attributes="member: 20956">There are limits to that based on the physical limitations and culture of the various races.  I think that a dwarf is going to be a little awkward wielding a longsword, but it's possible, but dwarven culture would steer a dwarf away from a logsword regardless of any statistical superiority.  For a more extreme example, there's no way a halfling is ever going to wield a greatsword even if the greatsword is statistically far and away the best weapon in the whole world, and if a player brought a greatsword-wielding halfling character to the gaming table he deserves to be laughed away with derision.No, it doesn't, but just about every portrayal of dwarves in literature - from which I think most people draw inspiration for their character concepts - portrays them as axe or hammer wielders, not sword wielders.  If dwarves were going to wield swords at all, I think a shortsword would fit better.That's not the job of the rules, in my opinion.  That's the job of the DM.  The job of the rules is just to provide mechanics that will allow objective resolution of events and actions in the game world with a reasonable degree of verisimilitude.  Nothing more.  If you want more than that from the book rules, you're expecting too much of them.It's not the game system that insures this, it's the DM providing the adventure and the way the players work together to resolve it that does this.Combat isn't the only thing there is to an adventure and even in combat there's more than one way to be useful besides dealing immediate damage.  Sounds like the DM and/or the player wasn't doing his job.  If the player cares about his character and the game, why didn't he use his imagination to come up with other ways he could contribute?  If the DM is providing combat-heavy adventures when one of the characters isn't a combat character, that's more a fault with the DM than the game system, yet you're blaming the gaming system for not providing "balance".  Now maybe there might be portions of an adventure where one character isn't very useful, but isn't this to be expected? Or do you expect every character to be equally useful to the others in every situation so all players are involved at all times?  Personally, I think this latter is too much to expect.In and of itself, as long as the second person isn't cheating, I don't see that this is inherently a problem.  Maybe the first character contributes in ways other than dealing damage.  Frankly, this is what I mean about the jealousy and envy part.  As long as both players are getting their time in the round to do their thing and all the players are kept busy and involved and act in-character, it doesn't matter that one can do 3 points while another can do 120.While the DM shouldn't have to give every character sheet a detailed examination every session, it's the DM's job to have a basic knowledge of the general abilities of all the characters, enough at least to have a general idea if the player's cheating or not.  There are a lot of ways to be useful, and a good adventure requires a broad range of skills to get it all done.  When the DM does his job, every player is going to have his moments for glory.  When a player just focuses on a round of combat and whines that some other character does a lot more damage than his does, that's just jealousy and envy and not legitmate grounds for the player to be annoyed.  Tell him that such things aren't welcome at the table and that he should quit whining and play his character.  I think a good goal is to have a game system that will adjudicate actions in an impartial and believable manner (and to a fair degree of detail for my personal tastes), and that's all I ask for or want from the mechanics of a game system.  Everything else is - and should be - up to the DM and the players.  In terms of inter-party balance, the only thing that should be important is that every player is given the opportunity to participate in the playing of the adventure, participate in role-playing, and through participating have fun.  That's it.  Not some micromanaged balance of damage per round.  And, bottom line, no game system can provide for this proper kind of balance.  Only a good DM and good players can do this.  You expect too much of a game system to do this mechanically, and expect not enough of players to behave maturely when not all things are equal.As long as a character has some niche that he specializes in and it comes into play during the adventure so the player can participate, that should be enough for any player.  That a longsword does more damage than an axe -- that an axe-wielder will do less damage in combat -- is frankly a pretty pathetic reason to dump a character that is otherwise a decent concept.I guess, in the end, we just expect and find enjoyment in different things out of our games.</blockquote>

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