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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ahnehnois" data-source="post: 6181694" data-attributes="member: 17106">These kind of statements remind me of a small number of late 2e/early 3e experiences I had, mostly before I started DMing. IME this was almost always a consequence of a DM failing to understand how the rules worked. For example, in one of my earliest DMing experiences I had a psion player, but I was not aware of the metacap, and furthermore I allowed him to convert spells directly to powers without adjusting for the differences in power point mechanics. The character was a tad overpowered, but the rules (despite rampant accusations of unbalance that went far beyond my group) were not.However, there are a variety of other issues at play here.To me, the overt inequality of characters isn't a problem. I used to think it was, but playing non-fantasy rpgs largely changed my mind.I also think that said inequality plays very differently depending on the length of the campaign. When sitting down for a long extended venture, it becomes more important to ensure that everyone will at some point be engaged, whereas for a one-shot game, I'll commonly accept that one character might by the protagonist and others might not be involved at the same level.Another thing that plays into it is passive DMing. When I see players with unequal levels of skill (or who for other reasons create unequal characters), I take it as my responsibility to identify and manage the resulting differences. When DMs don't do that, the inmates are effectively running the asylum, and mayhem may ensue.None of which is to say that the system mastery or balance things can't be addressed on some level. I think making simpler and clearer rules fixes a lot of things.I just wanted to highlight this statement because it illustrates the idea that balance is not simply something you have or you don't; it interacts with other aspects of the game experience, and creating balance can cause problems. What one thinks of the relative merits of different approaches is a separate issue, but balance does not simply refer to a "correctly" designed or professionally edited game.</blockquote>

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