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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lanefan" data-source="post: 9503139" data-attributes="member: 29398">OK, let's assume we've cut it to the subset of people who a) like fantasy roleplaying in whatever form or stance and b) are willing to do (and can handle) some simple arithmetic. (added: and c) are looking for a rules structure to abstract those things which cannot be roleplayed)That's still a lot of people.  Tens of millions at least, if WotC is to be believed (and in this case I do believe them).My point is that this group en masse should now be the target audience for our big-tent RPG and that subdividing that potential audience further is counterproductive.  Instead, we should try to identify what sub-divisions or sub-groups are likely to exist among that en-masse potential audience and then design one game that can more or less accommodate ideally all of them and in practice as many as it can.And maybe this turns out not to be possible, but can be done with two adjacent and compatible versions of the same game (which is where I personally think we're at right now; with 5e being one version and an as-yet-hypothetical grittier OSR-like version being the other).In absolute terms this is true, as one possible approach is in fact "completely freeform without rules".But in useful terms as designers it's also pointless, as no matter what we design they ain't gonna buy it nor use it; they're eliminated from our target audience as not being in the 'c)' group noted above.I see them as being the same degree of difficulty.  Designing a system (or kitbashing an existing system) is what it is, and balance is but one of many factors deserving of consideration.  It might not even be the most important factor.Thing is, I'm not adding wine to sewage or sewage to wine.  Ideally I've already designed away the sewage before even getting to this point.  Now I'm adding wine to beer or beer to wine: the resulting drink might be awful, or it might be good enough, or it might be better than either of its initial components; but I won't know until I do it and taste the result.  The analagous stage of RPG design here would be looking at all the other RPG designs out there and seeing if there's anything worth copying or reskinning.Or for even finer tuning, I could have two barrels of different wine - say one a sparking white and another a vintage red - and try mixing them together in different ratios to see if any such mixture is an overall improvement.  The design-stage analogy here would be taking a finished or near-finished system and trying some kitbashes.The bolded bit here and the bolded bit further up don't quite mesh.  If balance = symmetry then "good asymmetrical balance" in theory can't exist.</blockquote>

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