Can somebody explain the bias against game balance?

[Fifth Element]

If taken too far, this type of rules design ethos can fall into the trap of "everyone's special, so no one is." If everyone gets to "have the spotlight" on them all the time, then no one does.

If taken too far. That's a big if.

Don't get me wrong, I think it's important for characters/players to have as many meaningful choices as possible. But one of those meaningful choices is to choose to play a character that interests you, regardless of the "mechanical" consequences. And if this means the GM has to adjust encounters/play style to let that character have fun, well then that's why we have a GM in the first place.

If taken too far, this design ethos would be to jettison all rules, because having specific rules might prevent someone from playing exactly the character they want.

Nearly anything is bad if taken too far. Just don't take it too far.

 

[Fifth Element]

Nah. Calling something a fad is intended to recognize that it is transitory, and that its value is subjective to the time in which it is popular, rather than inherent.

You can see his confusion. You implied that newer forms of balance are fads which overtook older forms, which presumably then were not fads? Otherwise why would you phrase it as them "falling victim" to the fads of our times? Perhaps it would be more accurate to say the older forms of balance were fads whose times had passed?

 

[billd91]

Because there was no standardization to the system. As I've said before, I never played at two tables that were playing remotely the same way. Getting really good at playing at Bob's table only mattered at Bob's table. You go play at Jim's table and almost nothing is the same (barring people cursing at the THAC0 table. That was standard issue).

On that, I disagree. There was plenty of standardization in the system. That's what the rules were supposed to provide. If there was less standardization in implementation of the rules from table to table before 3e, I'd be inclined to underline a couple of factors that may have made a difference:

1) fewer immediate resources to consult
2) fewer computerized tools in use

It's a lot easier to conform in your interpretation of the rules if you have the means to communicate about those interpretations, get the designers' intentions, gain access to Q&A or other interpretations via customer service, or use standardized tools in dealing with certain aspects of running the game or building characters/monsters/other NPCs.

System mastery definitely existed before 3e, but I would say that by adding more customization options to characters in 3e/4e, more opportunities to wield system mastery were created. 4e's major deviation from 3e on this score is in building in more ways for combined system mastery to be used by the players as a group.

 

[Raven Crowking]

You can see his confusion. You implied that newer forms of balance are fads which overtook older forms, which presumably then were not fads? Otherwise why would you phrase it as them "falling victim" to the fads of our times? Perhaps it would be more accurate to say the older forms of balance were fads whose times had passed?

I was referring to the design philosophies ("What do folks today want in a game?") as fads. Forms of balance fall victim to those philosophies.

The fads of yore fell victim to the fads of now, which in turn will fall victim to the fads of tomorrow.

Monopoly and chess are excellent games, but had they not already existed, I doubt they would be designed today.


RC


EDIT: And I'm still not giving away my kidney.

 

[Garthanos]

You can see his confusion. You implied that newer forms of balance are fads which overtook older forms, which presumably then were not fads? Otherwise why would you phrase it as them "falling victim" to the fads of our times? Perhaps it would be more accurate to say the older forms of balance were fads whose times had passed?

Note the new balancing scheme was adopted by numerous games.. decades ago RuneQuest pops to mind making none of the fads at all fad like... just different

 

[Jeremy Ackerman-Yost]

Agreed, and also agree with: Yeah. Reading through explanations of how the Basic / Expert / AD&D rules actually worked leads me to deeply question my old group's actual understanding of those rules. It's not that we wanted to heavily house-rule everything, it's more that we had the attention span of 10 year old boys, because... well...

Cheers, -- N

Oh, aye, a significant portion of the variance was accounted for in my early years by.... my early years. The issue continued to exist even after we were old enough to read and follow rules, however, and among new groups I met where everyone was older.

This wasn't a rules issue per se, though. As Billd91 points out...

It's a lot easier to conform in your interpretation of the rules if you have the means to communicate about those interpretations, get the designers' intentions, gain access to Q&A or other interpretations via customer service, or use standardized tools in dealing with certain aspects of running the game or building characters/monsters/other NPCs.

Communication tools also changed.

Nah. Calling something a fad is intended to recognize that it is transitory, and that its value is subjective to the time in which it is popular, rather than inherent.

I fail to recognize the transitory nature. The kind of thinking that "discredits" older forms of balance has been around in board games, computer games, and basically everything but D&D since I was a pup. The "fad" is in thinking a good idea in all those types of games might also have some traction in D&D.

 

[Odhanan]

Game balance is actually something different than Rules balance, where the former is the act of balancing the game as it is being played at an actual game table, versus the latter which balances the mechanical elements used in this game and written on paper.

Some amount of Rules balance in a game is a commandable goal. It ensures that players have choices to play the characters they want, and yet do not get a mechanical upper hand that would rob other players from their own thunder. That's all fine and good.

Game balance does not solely rely on Rules balance to happen, though. (...)

If I may bounce on my own post, here, I will also point out that advice to DMs and players not only explaining why this or that mechanical aspect of the game's design matters, but also how it matters, in which particular game play assumption and particular situation as it relates to other elements of the game's design, is absolutely critical for the users of the game to make actual game balance happen in play.

It seems to me that in too many game designs, the rules, and the rules only, are thought to provide the frame through which enjoyable game play can happen. This is a dangerous fallacy, in my opinion.

RPG rules come in play through one medium only: not the rules book, not what the game designer thought the rules' role in game play ought to be, and certainly not in some sort of theoretical vacuum where "the average group would do this or that", but through the particular users of the game, the specific game group, as they actually play it. Therefore, making these users understand what the game designer had in mind, and providing them with the tools to understand the logic that sustains the game's design, is extremely important for them to be able to handle the system properly and extrapolate on its tenets as they come to "own" it through play.

Just as the rules themselves cannot make game balance happen, advice themselves probably won't either. There's a careful balancing act to be played here by the game designer. How well the audience of the game is identified, and what is thought to bring the most pleasure to each particular game table, ought to be one of the major tools to balance these two particular aspects of the design.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Note the new balancing scheme was adopted by numerous games.. decades ago RuneQuest pops to mind making none of the fads at all fad like... just different

(Shrug)

As you like; the term isn't germaine to my point, except to denote that preferences of a given set, rather than intrinsic value, drive the change.....We may also note that these preferences are often reactionary to whatever was previously considered "best" or "normal".

 

[BryonD]

And why "GM fix it" is a poppycock non solution.

You have stated this as an absolute.
If you meant it that way, then the only conclusion is that RPGs must be designed to work with the lowest common denominator.
Or, if it is intended as a relative comment, then at what threshold does your statement stop being true? Is it a sudden change? Or is it shades of grey?

What if, instead of discussing the universe in games in abstract, we discuss the specific game of one highly skilled DM....
Does your statement apply?

 

[ST]

What if, instead of discussing the universe in games in abstract, we discuss the specific game of one highly skilled DM....
Does your statement apply?

What's a "highly skilled DM"? Where do I get one? Why isn't there one in the box? Isn't it possible for one person's "highly skilled DM" to be someone else's "DM I really didn't have fun playing with"? Why is it all on the DM?

Et cetera, et cetera.