Legends and Lore: Balance

[triqui]

Wizards were the first controller in the first book of 4E.

Of course it was hard to make the class.

Later controllers were better at controlling, and were more ambitious to boot. It really is the nature of a new edition.

I agree. Just was pointing that Mages being better than Wizards do not make Mages overpowered. Just mean that Wizards were bad controllers to start with.

 

[Nork]

I think the biggest problem for RPGs is the spotlight concept. D&D is a team based game, yet the big theory on how to run it has nothing to do with teamwork.

Alternating spotlights on people isn't teamwork. It is a table full of people playing many different single player games.

The stereotypical means for learning teamwork is through sports.

In theory team sports are supposed to teach you how to accomplish a goal as a group, where you as the individual look at the goal and the situation on the field and then find a way to assist in making sure the goal is reached. The point isn't to take equal turns being ball-hogs so each person can feel like a special snowflake for awhile. The point is to be a group that is so good at adapting to assist each other on the fly that it becomes very hard to stop your group from accomplishing their goal.

4E is a much more of a teamwork oriented game. You have positions like Defender, Leader, Striker, and Controller. Each position has the tools to assist the other positions to make the party as a whole into a killing machine without relying on one or two characters rolling combat monsters so they can ball-hog during combat. Skill challenges could be better, but I think the goal is to have everyone contribute without turning traps/puzzles into the thief's time to ball-hog, or social encounters into the bard's time to ball-hog.

Spotlighting in general practice, normally done via things like awards, is used to encourage people to strive towards exceptional behavior. Which is to say: doing something hard. If you try to give an award to someone for something that did not take any effort, they generally don't want it. People think badly of awards given for doing nothing, and they think very badly indeed of people who those awards mean anything to. For example, the Global War on Terrorism Service Medal was deeply frowned upon in the Army. You already had a National Defense Service Medal for just being in during a period in time when you could be called upon to do something, giving a second award for just being in was insulting. They actually had to go around forcing us to add the ribbon. The point being, that rolling a mage or a thief, or whatever didn't represent hard work. Casting fireball because that is what your class does isn't normally what one would call "spotlight worthy" behavior, and accepting the spotlight for it seems a bit off to many people. It seems like taking pride in getting an award for doing nothing of note.

Personally, I think the spotlight theory is why a lot of people tend to not be into RPGs. I don't think people who get the standard socialization via things like sports see the point to sitting down around the table with 5 other people to play some game that involves some sort of weird interaction-less cooperation and putting attention on people for just doing something that anyone playing that class would do as standard.

Not that an RPG has to have spotlighting. People love stories, and people love team based gameplay, neither of which need deliberate spotlighting. I think 4E tried to move somewhat in that direction for a broader appeal, and now it seems like they are trying to reverse course. I don't know if it is a calculated decision or if now people are in charge and are simply pushing the game in the direction of the game that they personally want to play.

 

[triqui]

The stereotypical means for learning teamwork is through sports.

In theory team sports are supposed to teach you how to accomplish a goal as a group, where you as the individual look at the goal and the situation on the field and then find a way to assist in making sure the goal is reached. The point isn't to take equal turns being ball-hogs so each person can feel like a special snowflake for awhile. The point is to be a group that is so good at adapting to assist each other on the fly that it becomes very hard to stop your group from accomplishing their goal.

Let's say you make a RPG that simulates a NFL match. Would you like to be the center or the quaterback?

Even better: Imagine the sport in question is Quidditch. Do you think it's fair if one of the players is a Seeker (ie: Harry Potter. The game ends when he succeeds grasping the Snitch. Everything else that has happened in the game is irrelevant)?

If properly done, it's an Eigen Plot, which can be fine. If not, it's just the standard job for Aquaman

 

[Obryn]

So, the polls tacked onto the end of Legends and Lore often look a little slanted, to me. I suspect that's because I'm missing the slant in a few of 'em. And, Mr. Mearls has previously rolled up different responses to create a desired conclusion, and even spun a small minority as a mandate (The Gnomelogical Argument).

Having witnessed that, I think I can see where this poll is going. The question & available responses are:

How important is game balance to you in RPGs?

It's the most important thing in a game.
It's very important, not the most important thing but it’s up there.
It's useful but not a huge factor in how I assess an RPG.
I don't care about balance at all.
Imbalance is fine if it reflects the setting or the genre

The extreme responses are the first and last. The first is stated starkly, making it feel unreasonable. The last provides a rationale, making it seem more considered.

The second response is the killer one, it virtually guarantees that Mr. Mearls will be able to say, in the next Legends & Lore that "Most of you think other things are more important than game balance." It sounds like it's a pro-balance response, because it says, right up front that balance is 'very important.' But, rolled together with the ones that follow, everyone who picks it can be counted as thinking "other things are more important than balance."

The only pro-balance response is the first one: "It's the most important thing in the game."

I think your own bias is showing in how you're interpreting the poll. (And how you interpreted the class balance poll, but that argument is elsewhere.)

When you break it down, the only bizarro option is the fifth one, much like the "I don't want to do the same thing over and over again" option on the class poll. It's basically meaningless; it's closest to the fourth, and should probably be considered in with that or else removed entirely.

Otherwise it's basically...

Most Important
Very Important
Somewhat Important
Not important at all

...which are standard survey answers.

Answering "Most Important" means just that - it's the most important consideration for any new game element. Answering "Very Important" again means just that - it's a very important consideration, but not the only one. That's only a problematic answer if you put down Most Important, yourself, because the person who picks that obviously thinks that other considerations are (on rare occasions) just as important.

-O

 

[UngainlyTitan]

Wizards were the first controller in the first book of 4E.

Of course it was hard to make the class.

Later controllers were better at controlling, and were more ambitious to boot. It really is the nature of a new edition.

As for making wizard with more boom spells, I would not bring this into 4E. They do enough.

I do think rituals need to be a lot more flexible, with shorter casting times being penalized iwth healing surge loss, far higher component costs or the like. SO a standard action water breathing could be triple component cost or a loss of a couple healing surges.

That option alone would make wizards and rituals a lot more effective.

Or even better a wizard utility (as a daily or encounter power, probably a daily) that allowed this to be done. I have never understood why Wizards, supposed masters of rituals, have not a single power (maybe they do in a DDI article) that makes them do rituals better.

I also like this idea, I would give you xp but must spread it around first.

 

[ppaladin123]

Wizards were the first controller in the first book of 4E.

Of course it was hard to make the class.

Later controllers were better at controlling, and were more ambitious to boot. It really is the nature of a new edition.

As for making wizard with more boom spells, I would not bring this into 4E. They do enough.

I do think rituals need to be a lot more flexible, with shorter casting times being penalized iwth healing surge loss, far higher component costs or the like. SO a standard action water breathing could be triple component cost or a loss of a couple healing surges.

That option alone would make wizards and rituals a lot more effective.

Or even better a wizard utility (as a daily or encounter power, probably a daily) that allowed this to be done. I have never understood why Wizards, supposed masters of rituals, have not a single power (maybe they do in a DDI article) that makes them do rituals better.

I just checked and there is precedence for this. Check out the Planeshifter paragon path from Manual of the Planes. They get a level 12 encounter utility power called, Quick Portal:

No one can open a portal quicker than you.
Encounter

Arcane, Teleportation
Standard Action Ranged 5
Effect: You create a portal in an unoccupied square within range that lasts until the end of your next turn. The portal leads to a permanent teleportation circle on your current plane. You must know the teleportation circle’s sigil sequence, and you lose three healing surges when you create the portal. If you have fewer than three healing surges when you use this power, you take damage equal to your healing surge value for each healing surge you don’t lose.
Sustain Standard: You lose a healing surge or take damage equal to your healing surge value when you sustain the portal.

This basically lets the wizard cast the teleportation ritual as a standard action at high cost to his health. The longer it is sustained, the more damage her takes. I could certainly see this extended to other rituals or even made into a generic power for any ritual (except item creation, unless all the required materials are also present).

The problem of course is this ritual: Comrade's succor:

While performing this ritual, you and up to 5 participants in the ritual can choose to lose any number of healing surges and select another participant to gain an equal number of healing surges. No participant can have more healing surges than his or her daily maximum. Additionally, you or one participant must lose 1 healing surge when performing this ritual.

That might let the wizard (or other ritual caster) recharge his surges several times throughout the day. That could be unbalancing.

Otherwise I think this is a great idea. The party caster can go ahead and pull out a seriously impressive magical effect (water walk, shadow bridge, hallucinatory creature, Wizard's escape, etc.) but it will seriously weaken him.

Of course, we do have the problem of the 15 minute day...

 

[mudlock]

Why does this always center around "Why isn't magic better?!" as an argument.

Surely we can have the truly exciting encounter where the fighter needs to move a REALLY BIG boulder while the magic users defend him. How equally thrilling and exciting!

You joke, but that was my last session (except it was 6 small boulders, one of which the caster moved.)

Good for a change of pace, but not something for every session; which I think mean "3 round spell of doom" needs a frequency EVEN SLOWER than "daily" in order to keep it from getting annoying.

 

[Ryujin]

I just checked and there is precedence for this. Check out the Planeshifter paragon path from Manual of the Planes. They get a level 12 encounter utility power called, Quick Portal:



This basically lets the wizard cast the teleportation ritual as a standard action at high cost to his health. The longer it is sustained, the more damage her takes. I could certainly see this extended to other rituals or even made into a generic power for any ritual (except item creation, unless all the required materials are also present).

The problem of course is this ritual: Comrade's succor:



That might let the wizard (or other ritual caster) recharge his surges several times throughout the day. That could be unbalancing.

Otherwise I think this is a great idea. The party caster can go ahead and pull out a seriously impressive magical effect (water walk, shadow bridge, hallucinatory creature, Wizard's escape, etc.) but it will seriously weaken him.

Of course, we do have the problem of the 15 minute day...

I would suggest, if using this model, that the 'quick casting' be kept to a single type of ritual, as a measure of specialization; Binding, Creation, Deception, Divination, Exploration, Restoration, Scrying, Travel, or Warding.

 

[Tony Vargas]

You then take the assumption that if the first choice is not a 98% selection that WotC will then absolutely throw balance out the window (which is certainly not confirmed by the article).

Balance is already lying in a scattering of broken glass. The intent of the PR communication strategy this poll is part of is to convince enough fans that it's not that bad, so they won't have another exodus of pissed off players.

I'd put the threshold for making them sit up and take some notice closer to 90%. If the pro-balance respondents top 90% the Gnome Effect starts to look like a weak excuse.

It's interesting that in the prior optionless-fighter poll, there was a response along the lines of "I don't really care about balance, so whatever." It got less than 4%. Turning that upside down, you can spin it as 96% of gamers think balance is important.

This poll might even be a follow-up to that one. Trying to shoot down the idea that balance is important.

To me, fun is the most important factor. Balance affects fun, but it does not guarantee it.

True, a balanced game can still be crap. It can have a bad setting, or clunky mechanics or whatever. An imbalanced game can be a lot of fun - for the folks leveraging those imbalances in their favor...

Personally, my view is that if either of the first two choices are the front runners (and particularly if they are the top two) then the message is sent that balance absolutely should be looked at and considered.

It could be taken that way - if you were the one writing the article where they talk about the results. But, you won't be. Any response but the first one can be rolled up and spun as: "Most of you think that there are other things more important than balance." Which is a liscense to continue sacrificing game balance at the altar of... well, any thing they like, because it doesn't /specify/ what is more important.

For the record, I went with the third choice because while I whole heartedly believe that balance CAN make a game more fun, I don't believe that either a) it automatically makes a game for or that b) a lack of balance guarantees that the game will not be fun.

Then your response will be used to excuse the lower priority balance was given in Essentials, and perhaps even to justify further degrading class balance in the hopes of luring back the CoDzilla/God-Wizard fans.

 

[Herremann the Wise]

...As for making wizard with more boom spells, I would not bring this into 4E. They do enough.

I do think rituals need to be a lot more flexible, with shorter casting times being penalized with healing surge loss, far higher component costs or the like. SO a standard action water breathing could be triple component cost or a loss of a couple healing surges.

That option alone would make wizards and rituals a lot more effective.

Or even better a wizard utility (as a daily or encounter power, probably a daily) that allowed this to be done. I have never understood why Wizards, supposed masters of rituals, have not a single power (maybe they do in a DDI article) that makes them do rituals better.

You make some interesting points here. Perhaps if there was a greater variety of ways that they could manifest their powers, they would get a little of their "shine" back (something that many will disagree with, others will revile [Aegeri I'm looking at you] but others will feel 4e took away). In this way, they manifest a broader range of options (that the canny player can employ to good effect) while at the same time not going down the raw power route. Lots of food for thought.

Best Regards
Herremann the Wise