Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ahnehnois" data-source="post: 5832116" data-attributes="member: 17106">I choose not to acknowledge 4e because I do not have enough experience with it to know whether it destroyed the magic/mundane distinction enough to have "fixed" the balance issues. I do, however, posit that it must either be balanced or be D&D, it can't be both. I also believe that the basic issue of high-level casters pervades through every version of D&D, as well as its spin-offs, including PF, TB, FC, and various retroclones. At what point would this idea become "precedent" rather than "mistake". How many successful and enjoyable games have to be played with this melange of classic D&D rulesets before this paradigm becomes valid?Your point of view seems to assume that a straight-up balance of power is essential to D&D, which I disagree with. D&D is a game only in the sense that some kids running around a playground pointing at each other shouting "pew pew" is a game. D&D is not competitive. No one wins or loses. D&D is not chess, warhammer, or even Baldur's Gate. It's *possible* that you could have a party made up of high-level adventurers and a low-level commoner and have a great time.The rules are here to describe situations and help us to decide outcomes that are not immediately obvious or which we would like to leave to chance rather than decide ourselves. Balance is a secondary goal, albeit a meaningful one.Really, no precedent? As for that second assertion, it's a valid opinion but it certainly doesn't apply to everyone or even a majority.Wait, so D&D would be D&D without Wish? Not all spells are created equal. Wish is certainly more iconic than Hideous Laughter and is pretty fundamental to the classic D&D conception of magic.Hey I'm all on board with that, as long as it doesn't mean that they get abilities arbitrarily limited to use per unit time or be able to do supernatural things. I'm not here to defend the 20 level progression of the 3.X fighter. There definitely need to be some changes there.I think what you're talking about is within the realm of divine or epic rules, not the fighter class (though I certainly agree that these things are within the scope of what the rules should cover).***The bottom line is that the poll and many of the responses seem to assume that the classic D&D model (spellcasters attaining greater power over time than others) is "unbalanced" and the 4e model (everyone gaining similar powers with flavor difference and some substantive differences based on power source) is "balanced". 3.X and its predecessors and successors are balanced enough. They're balanced in the sense that all character types can be played and enjoyed, but not in the sense that every character can take on his equal-level counterpart in a g;adiator battle. Which is why the poll overstates the case. As many respondents have said, you can have balance without making everyone the same.</blockquote>

Verification