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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Manbearcat" data-source="post: 6176930" data-attributes="member: 6696971">A thorough answer to the below can be found in @<a href="http://www.enworld.org/forum/member.php?42582-pemerton" target="_blank">pemerton</a> 's post #327 above referencing free-descriptor games and the fact that uniform class build mechanics do not create for a homogenous experience (at all) within the fiction nor from a mechanical resolution perspective.  Further, the diversity of the conflicts that each archetype can best resolve (and through what particular M.O.) is equally unaffected.  Thankfully, due to pemerton's full post, I'm not obliged to enter into this same arena again that starts from a premise that I don't remotely accept and have empirically experienced its failings repeatedly.There is vast space between "interested in being support characters" and "aggressively interested in being the star of the story."  In my experience, most players who sit down at a table and expect to invest 6 + months into play don't expect an incoherent game, awkwardly hitched to their lead horse character, while the other players cheer from the sidelines.  They generally expect to play one of the X-Men and to have their protagonism expressed cyclically and synergistically with the other players.You can use a uniform framework (eg AEDU, MHRP's build design, the archetype subclass framework off main-class chasiss in PF, or Wizard builds in prior editions) and achieve a vast array of character profiles, both within the fiction and from a mechanical resolution standpoint (both in what conflict types the characters' are best at tackling and in how, precisely, they tackle them).  Two quick examples:See <a href="http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?340143-Final-playtest-packet-due-in-mid-September&p=6175659&viewfull=1#post6175659" target="_blank">this post</a> for a quick breakdown on how an AEDU Fighter is vastly different from an AEDU Wizard and how both are different than the Bard with the legion of means its disposal to deal with social conflict (to both resolve conflicts or outright preempt them).  See <a href="http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?339757-GMed-first-MHRP-session-on-Sunday&p=6167499&viewfull=1#post6167499" target="_blank">this post</a> for some mild introspection into the differences of Deadpool and Wolverine in MHRP.  A further, relevant to discussion, breakout of this is that Deadpool and Wolverine share (i) a unified framework for character build and, (ii) an enormous amount of similarity in their power sets (Weapon X Program), in their specialties and in their affiliations.  According to the theory then, that homogeneity should enforce a conflict resolution paradigm and a fictional positioning that is indecipherable from one another.  Of course, this isn't remotely true.  Just because they both share so much in build characteristics does not mean they manifest the same in play, at all.  Through the subtleties of their Distinctions, their Milestones and the nuance of their differences within power sets and specialties, the two characters resolve conflicts differently and inhabit a fully disparate fictional positioning; one being similar to Clint Eastwood as the Man With No Name and one being similar to Bugs Bunny.Poor GM conflict/situation framing, apathetic player engagement and/or lack of fundamental understanding of the toolkit is what keeps the "unified mechanics equal homogeneity hypothesis" still alive and kicking when it should have been dead and buried some time ago.Supercars have been working off of the unified framework of mid-engine, V-8, rear-wheel or 4-wheel drive for a long time.  Jets have been working off the unified framework of swept-wing design for a long time.  The vast differences (aesthetically, in metrics, and in what they specialize in) in the varying vehicles are legion.I think the classes are fun and compelling.  I also don't see where they "pretty explicitly stated that they approached class balance in vague terms and it wasn't the be all end all of design."  There is a bit in the Customization section about letting a Paladin use the Ranger's Animal Companion in the stead of two of the Paladin's features and lots and lots of blurbs intermixed about various treatments of features.  However, none of those by themselves nor together say anything about balance not being "the be all end all of design" nor about class balance in "vague terms."  They very explicitly, throughout the class sections, speak about what is, by default, mechanically forbidden at the table; eg, (i) you can't take this build feature if you take that one, (ii) you can't do this forbidden thing with this action.  Further, the GM side is outcome-based design as monster math is tight and explicit, subjective (of-level challenge) DCs are tight and explicit, encounter budgeting is tight and explicit.  Target numbers are measured and made transparent so the GM can create predictable, math-derived challenges for the players.  This doesn't strike me as balance in "vague terms".</blockquote>

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