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<blockquote data-quote="ruleslawyer" data-source="post: 3200016" data-attributes="member: 1757">QFT.&quot;Balance&quot; does seem to be a popular chimera. A lot of people seem to like to dismiss balance concerns by pointing out that &quot;balance&quot; differs from group to group. However, there's a *big* difference between designing for an individual group and designing for the market. Your Elven High Mage class with the ability to cast epic spells at -50 Spellcraft DCs&nbsp; may be &quot;balanced&quot; for your group simply because a) no one gets to play one unless they can compellingly justify how their character lived through the 500 years of study required to take the class and b) everyone is concentrating on roleplaying different archetypes, so the other players won't mind if one guy is the spell-hurling bad@$$, since they've got their own character development going. However, a game design company can't go on that principle, since they're designing for hundreds or thousands of gaming groups, most of whom will want a reasonably balanced array of character options. Thus, mechanical balance is a pretty important component of good game design, simply based on the level playing field paradigm.Incidentally, I think it's a truism that no game system can perfectly balance every option with every other. It's a question of how much damage control you can perform in reining in runaway options.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="ruleslawyer, post: 3200016, member: 1757"] QFT. "Balance" does seem to be a popular chimera. A lot of people seem to like to dismiss balance concerns by pointing out that "balance" differs from group to group. However, there's a *big* difference between designing for an individual group and designing for the market. Your Elven High Mage class with the ability to cast epic spells at -50 Spellcraft DCs may be "balanced" for your group simply because a) no one gets to play one unless they can compellingly justify how their character lived through the 500 years of study required to take the class and b) everyone is concentrating on roleplaying different archetypes, so the other players won't mind if one guy is the spell-hurling bad@$$, since they've got their own character development going. However, a game design company can't go on that principle, since they're designing for hundreds or thousands of gaming groups, most of whom will want a reasonably balanced array of character options. Thus, mechanical balance is a pretty important component of good game design, simply based on the level playing field paradigm. Incidentally, I think it's a truism that no game system can perfectly balance every option with every other. It's a question of how much damage control you can perform in reining in runaway options. [/QUOTE]

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