Reply to thread

Message

<blockquote data-quote="woodelf" data-source="post: 1201295" data-attributes="member: 10201">OK, &quot;no mainline balance&quot; and &quot;no value&quot; are NOT synonyms.&nbsp; You're completely discounting the possibility that one of the appeals of AD&amp;D2 was not attempting to enforce balance mechanically.My experience is that, for all the improvements made at the mechanical level in D&amp;D3E, the actual game play is no better, and in some ways worse.&nbsp; Thus, i conclude that mechanically-enforced balance is not a virtue--it may even be a vice, though it is more likely just irrelevant.Oh, i can do better--i just don't know if i can do better on a high-complexity system.&nbsp; That said, i can point to empirical evidence that it can be done better: Spycraft, M&amp;MM, Everquest D20, Traveller D20, Arcana Unearthed--all do &quot;the same thing&quot; better than D&amp;D3(.5)E, and within basically the same mechanical framework.Also, &quot;transparent design intent&quot; does not necessarily equal &quot;transparent design&quot;: Over the Edge--hell, Archmage is more transparent than D&amp;D3E.&nbsp; I get a kick out of anyone referring to &quot;needless complexity&quot; as though contrasting with the existing D&amp;D3E combat rules.That said, it seems to me not at all unreasonable to claim that, if the AD&amp;D2 rules were balanced for your group, it was possible to make a change to one element that would, for the most part, not propagate to others.&nbsp; While, if the D&amp;D3E rules are balanced for your group, any change is likely to have meaningful propagations to other subsystems.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="woodelf, post: 1201295, member: 10201"] OK, "no mainline balance" and "no value" are NOT synonyms. You're completely discounting the possibility that one of the appeals of AD&D2 was not attempting to enforce balance mechanically. My experience is that, for all the improvements made at the mechanical level in D&D3E, the actual game play is no better, and in some ways worse. Thus, i conclude that mechanically-enforced balance is not a virtue--it may even be a vice, though it is more likely just irrelevant. Oh, i can do better--i just don't know if i can do better on a high-complexity system. That said, i can point to empirical evidence that it can be done better: Spycraft, M&MM, Everquest D20, Traveller D20, Arcana Unearthed--all do "the same thing" better than D&D3(.5)E, and within basically the same mechanical framework. Also, "transparent design intent" does not necessarily equal "transparent design": Over the Edge--hell, Archmage is more transparent than D&D3E. I get a kick out of anyone referring to "needless complexity" as though contrasting with the existing D&D3E combat rules. That said, it seems to me not at all unreasonable to claim that, [b]if the AD&D2 rules were balanced for your group[/b], it was possible to make a change to one element that would, for the most part, not propagate to others. While, [b]if the D&D3E rules are balanced for your group[/b], any change is likely to have meaningful propagations to other subsystems. [/QUOTE]

Verification