Essays on Game Design

[DandD]

[I'm talking about overall game balance in regards to how characters interact with the world around them and the forces that oppose them.

That is a given thing, which is why I didn't mention it.
Good luck anyway with your RPG-attempt. I advise that you find some people who will work with you on the rules and the background, as one person alone isn't going to accomplish much, and very prone to giving up midway, because of it being too much work.

 

[Hussar]

Jack, I'm not sure that you can separate those two though.

Balanced classes are not balanced by being equally likely to kill each other in a 1:1 fight. That kind of balance is meaningless. The only balance that actually means anything is your second kind, where it's a question of whether each player, playing any given PC, has equal opportunities during the game. Not that that has to occur every possible second, that would be stupid. But, over the course of a reasonable stretch of time, they have to have equal chances of doing something meaningful.

I strongly disagree with the idea that unbalance=more unique and that balance=bland. That's a fairly easy one to disprove actually. Unbalance=less unique.

If Option A is clearly better than Option B, then any reasonable person will choose Option A every time. That's basic human nature. Deliberately gibbling yourself is not something people generally do. In an unbalanced system, you will always have these dichotomies, where a given choice will be heavily weighted towards a single output. Thus, more often than not, you will wind up with more people making the same choice than if both options were equal.

In your blog, I left a note about two weapon fighting in 2e. It's a textbook case. TWF in 2e was head and shoulders better than Sword and board or Two Handed. You doubled your attacks per round in a system where you didn't get many extra attacks, you doubled your potential damage output because your strength bonuses were not penalized on the off hand. And, for the cost of two weapon proficiencies, AT WORST, you gained all this at first level.

Players were deliberately handicapping themselves if they didn't do this. So, IME, every fighter type in 2e that I ever saw used two weapons. Might be two axes, or longsword and shortsword, but, it was almost always two weapons with very, very few exceptions.

If your point that unbalanced=more unique were true, then my experience should not have occured.

 

[justanobody]

I think Jack means balance like I do.

Class A does an average of 10 damage per round, and class B does an average of 10 damage per round. Both have the same abilities they can do out of combat with only slight differences in the way they are done and modified a little depending on what options you have taken.

So no matter which class you chose, they can be interchanged since they are so balanced.

 

[Jack7]

No, what I'm talking about in To Hell With Balance is not character to character balance.

I'm talking about character-to-monster balance in a specific sense, but more generally also about the idea that balance brings excitement and heroic action in-game. (Character versus monster balance, does it promote heroism, achievement, innovation, or even fun, or does it discourage these things, and are such things more, or less important, than the idea of balance? Or put another way, is balance an over-riding and main concern in game play and game design, or are other things far more important?)

Should characters and character parties exclusively, or even just primarily, fight against monsters or challenges and that kind of thing, "which are balanced for their level." Obviously balanced encounters promote "balance," but what does balance supercede in doing this, and is it that important a concept? (Or is it just an uncritically accepted ideal.) What does balance promote and what does it negate? (And if it does serve a function, to what degree and in what exact way and in what particular circumstances? How does balance work and how should it work?)

As for me though, I'm talking about should characters face opponents who are only "blanked to meet them." Not what are the internal aspects of balance between different character classes (inter-class) or even between different expressions of the same character class (intra-class balance).

I really wasn't thinking about character class design balance at all in that sense, though I find the idea interesting and you're welcome to discuss it. It isn't what I was addressing, but perhaps it should be discussed. Because maybe the whole idea of balance should be re-examined, as well as things like whether balanced classes (balanced between each other) bring more or less game interest and more or less in-game heroism, fun, innovation, variety of experience, excitement, etc? Does balance, depending on what kind of balance you mean, bring more benefit to the game overall (any game) or less benefit to the game overall, and why, or why not? As far as I'm concerned you could discuss or argue the idea here, or here if you're interested in Design, or start your own thread for that matter.

Anywho, nice yakking with you guys.
I gotta get back to work.

 

[justanobody]

Sorry, I thought the other Jack wrote that. I got to remember to keep the 99 and 7 straight.

 

[Raven Crowking]

I would say that it is not balance, per se, which is problematic, but a kind of overweening balance that puts the ultimately futile goal of perfect balance (encounter balance, and balance between characters) in a position of higher importance than a fun, fast-moving game.

Of course, IMHO, YMMV, and all that.


RC

 

[Scribble]

As for me though, I'm talking about should characters face opponents who are only "blanked to meet them." Not what are the internal aspects of balance between different character classes (inter-class) or even between different expressions of the same character class (intra-class balance).

Balance in this instance is a tool that the DM can use when designing adventures. It lets him know in advance what the odds will be in a given encounter, and rewards PCs based on those odds. It doesn't dictate anything- It's just a guage.

 

[Jack7]

That's true enough Scrib, in one sense that I wouldn't argue, but apparently I'm not making myself clear enough in what exactly I'm proposing.

Suppose it is a gauge, what exactly does it measure?

It seems obvious at first until you stop to consider the idea that measuring balance may possibly interfere with other things of a more necessary function.

That is if you achieve balance, over the idea of say, allowing players to face tough challenges, of suppressing heroic action in play, in transforming fun or even difficult problem solving into mere "balanced" tactical exercises, then is the attempt to achieve balance more, or less important, than other gaming and/or design considerations?

If it is more important than other considerations, so that a mechanism needs to be developed to measure and regulate it, then why is it so important it must be gauged and regulated by design, or even by recommendation? The reason of course would be because it is considered more important than other game aspects. If so, why? Why is it more important than the things it suppresses, replaces, or regulates? So is it so important it needs even be considered in a normal set of circumstances?(I think most people could easily understand this equation, Balance is not equivalent to Imbalanced. But if the equation is expressed thus, Balance = Good Gaming, then by what criteria, and in what way? What is it about balance that makes it good, and why? And when, where, how? Or put another way, let's use these equation(s) Balance = Fun, or Balance = Heroic, or Balance = Innovation, or Balance = Memorable Encounters, then how many of those equations are actually true, and in what way are they true?)

For instance is balance like knowing airspeed to a pilot, or like , measuring altitude or attitude?
If so why?

Or is it more like a device than can count the number of human heads passed over by the airplane? A really interesting instrument, perhaps, a gauge that would tell you numerous bits of statistical data, but is in no way necessary to flying the plane, and if you were reading it all of the time, would actually interfere with you accounting for truly important instruments.

I suspect myself it is very much the latter as a gaming and design device. As a mechanism it is almost unnecessary except for the occasional gathering of data that is not really germane to play and one that in many cases actually interferes with good design.

Is it not also kind of subconsciously very much like the idea that if you lift weights with the same amount of weight all of the time you will keep making strength gains anyway? Do we become stronger and more capable and better at what we do by measuring out balanced opposition and resistance to our advances and encounters?

If balance is the objective, or the means, or even just the tool by which we should measure what we encounter and how and when, then it obviously should be an important game consideration.

If on the other hand balance superimposes a set of subtle limitations to real advancement, if it suppresses capabilities, rather than exploits them, then in my opinion it can go to the devil.

I'd rather my players become stronger and more capable over time than more balanced and measured.
They are after all playing heroes, not accountants.

They have a different aim, purpose, and method of operation than trying to "balance the books."

 

[Scribble]

That's true enough Scrib, in one sense that I wouldn't argue, but apparently I'm not making myself clear enough in what exactly I'm proposing.

Suppose it is a gauge, what exactly does it measure?

For instance is balance like knowing airspeed to a pilot, or like , measuring altitude or attitude?
If so why?

Neither really...

Balance in this case is more along the lines of knowing what the chances of the plane exploding are based on the amount of stress you place on it.

Balance in the case of D&D monster vrs players is a way for the DM to know what the chance of the PCs exploding are based on the amount of stress you place on them.

IE if you place two "very hard" encounters in a row, the chance of TPK is that much greater.

Nothing about that balance says I can't or I'm not allowed to place those two encounters next to eachother though.

Like in blackjack... if I have 20 in my hand, I know the chances of busting if I ask for another card are pretty high... I can still do so.

Balance is all about giving the DM a little bit of predictability in his game. It's not designed to prevent the DM from "going off track" it's just designed to clue him in to how things will change if he does.

 

[Lacyon]

That's true enough Scrib, in one sense that I wouldn't argue, but apparently I'm not making myself clear enough in what exactly I'm proposing.

Suppose it is a gauge, what exactly does it measure?

In a very abstract and average sense, encounter level (which I assume is what you're talking about) measures the amount of resources a party will use up overcoming a given challenge (and whether or not they're likely to have any chance to do so at all).

It seems obvious at first until you stop to consider the idea that measuring balance may possibly interfere with other things of a more necessary function.

That is if you achieve balance, over the idea of say, allowing players to face tough challenges, of suppressing heroic action in play, in transforming fun or even difficult problem solving into mere "balanced" tactical exercises, then is the attempt to achieve balance more, or less important, than other gaming and/or design considerations?

Balance, IMO, is not a thing to be "achieved" in play at all. There's a design goal in trying to ensure that things you want to see during play are actually reasonably likely to happen (and things you want to be memorable and rare are reasonably unlikely to happen).

If it is more important than other considerations, so that a mechanism needs to be developed to measure and regulate it, then why is it so important it must be gauged and regulated by design, or even by recommendation? The reason of course would be because it is considered more important than other game aspects. If so, why? Why is it more important than the things it suppresses, replaces, or regulates? So is it so important it needs even be considered in a normal set of circumstances?(I think most people could easily understand this equation, Balance is not equivalent to Imbalanced. But if the equation is expressed thus, Balance = Good Gaming, then by what criteria, and in what way? What is it about balance that makes it good, and why? And when, where, how? Or put another way, let's use these equation(s) Balance = Fun, or Balance = Heroic, or Balance = Innovation, or Balance = Memorable Encounters, then how many of those equations are actually true, and in what way are they true?)

For instance is balance like knowing airspeed to a pilot, or like , measuring altitude or attitude?
If so why?

The part that lets a party or DM gauge how likely an encounter is to be survivable or winnable is like a weather report (or an ejection seat). It lets a party know that the sailing will be easy (or that discretion is sometimes the better part of valor).

The part that lets a party or DM gauge what level of resource expenditure is likely to be required for victory is like a fuel gauge. It lets you know how far you can expect to get against that headwind (or with that nice tailwind) before you're going to need to land.