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<blockquote data-quote="happyhermit" data-source="post: 6884014" data-attributes="member: 6834463">I tried to think of a way to see this, but I just have to disagree. It is possible to define away everything as &quot;not really a trap&quot; and I can go along with that, but 4e's mechanical balance did not do this. It is hard to not conclude that while &quot;bounded accuracy&quot; reduces the chance of building a largely ineffectual character, 4e's level based number inflation system does the opposite.In 4e, not boosting your primary stats, particularly your attack stat could make you extremely bad in the system that 4e utilized. Without increasing your abilities, achieving the numbers required to perform basic tasks could become extremely difficult. Trying to do something that happened to rely on another stat was largely ineffectual.Playing a fighter with a bow made you a really bad archer, compared to a ranger. Of course the argument is &quot;well don't do that&quot; which could be easily followed by &quot; because it's a trap&quot;. It is not obvious to someone unfamiliar with 4e that playing a fighter with a bow would be a bad idea, so they could easily make that decision, heck fighters were even proficient with bows.By comparison in 5e a player that chooses to put less points into their abilities, or utilize a non-standard weapon (that they are proficient in), or not taking the feat that lets them do something with some other stat, is going to be much more effective than a player in 4e that makes those decisions. There are many similar examples.Making character classes that are balanced with each other doesn't preclude &quot;trap options&quot; or character building choices that leads to a character that can't do much of anything. This is probably why &quot;optimizers&quot; had a lot more fun with 4e, the &quot;rewards&quot; of choosing optimally versus sub-optimally were much greater.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="happyhermit, post: 6884014, member: 6834463"] I tried to think of a way to see this, but I just have to disagree. It is possible to define away everything as "not really a trap" and I can go along with that, but 4e's mechanical balance did not do this. It is hard to not conclude that while "bounded accuracy" reduces the chance of building a largely ineffectual character, 4e's level based number inflation system does the opposite. In 4e, not boosting your primary stats, particularly your attack stat could make you extremely bad in the system that 4e utilized. Without increasing your abilities, achieving the numbers required to perform basic tasks could become extremely difficult. Trying to do something that happened to rely on another stat was largely ineffectual. Playing a fighter with a bow made you a really bad archer, compared to a ranger. Of course the argument is "well don't do that" which could be easily followed by " because it's a trap". It is not obvious to someone unfamiliar with 4e that playing a fighter with a bow would be a bad idea, so they could easily make that decision, heck fighters were even proficient with bows. By comparison in 5e a player that chooses to put less points into their abilities, or utilize a non-standard weapon (that they are proficient in), or not taking the feat that lets them do something with some other stat, is going to be much more effective than a player in 4e that makes those decisions. There are many similar examples. Making character classes that are balanced with each other doesn't preclude "trap options" or character building choices that leads to a character that can't do much of anything. This is probably why "optimizers" had a lot more fun with 4e, the "rewards" of choosing optimally versus sub-optimally were much greater. [/QUOTE]

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