Mearls on Balance in D&D

[JoeGKushner]

In terms of the whole "per day" thing, how many other game systems are like that?

From my experience and recollection, not many.

 

[Voadam]

In terms of the whole "per day" thing, how many other game systems are like that?

From my experience and recollection, not many.

Palladium for spells and psionics IIRC.

Also IIRC the WFRP magic points were day based.

 

[Ourph]

Again, if you define a "bad GM" to exclude most GMs in existence, the phrase isn't very useful.

It's very useful when I'm specifically talking about "bad DM" as defined by the small group of GMs who make their players miserable when the rules instruct them to use common sense and good judgement to adjudicate some in-game situations. Which was exactly the group of people that were being discussed earlier.

Can we accept that as a common ground? Regardless of the semantic debate about what constitutes a bad DM for each of us?

I'm quite happy to accept the statement "The right game system can mitigate an already adequate DM's weaknesses and enhance their strengths, making their game more enjoyable than it would be using a different system. Whether that game system is complex or simple, realistic or abstract, granular or freeform, etc. is entirely dependent upon the individual DM." as common ground. But, again, that has nothing to do with my original point. What I'm not prepared to accept as common ground is that there is a continuum between average DMs and bad DMs based solely on their comfort with the ruleset. In my experience there are inadequate DM's, those who simply don't have or haven't developed the necessary skills to be a decent DM and those individuals aren't aided by changing the rules they are using. They are inadequate exactly because they lack the basic skills a DM needs to use any ruleset effectively (i.e. - good judgement, creativity, the ability to communicate well, a good attitude, etc.). These are the DMs who are brought up as examples of the dangers of "use your own best judgement" rulesets. I continue to maintain that when talking about that specific subset of DMs, the danger is no less when using more comprehensive rulesets because those DMs are not bad because the rules tell them to use their own judgement, they are bad because their judgement is bad, and good judgement is something that is required of any DM, using any ruleset.

 

[Maggan]

I don't disagree, necessarily, but what about the case in which the work of the later designer (whom I called "X") is derivative of the work of the original designer ("Y"). For example, I don't think one might say that "Monte Cook is a better game designer than Gary Gygax because 3e is so much better than 1e." The conclusion doesn't follow from the premise because 3e is derivative of 1e.

I on the other hand would have no problem claiming that a designer who created derivative rules could be a better designer than the designer of the original rules.

Who knows what for example Monte could have done had he been contemporary with Gary Gygax? He wasn't, so he works in the field that Gary Gygax was part of creating. It is entirely possible that Monte could take an idea and a proto rule by Gary and improve on it.

/M

 

[T. Foster]

Palladium for spells and psionics IIRC.

Also IIRC the WFRP magic points were day based.

Magic Points in BRP RuneQuest (and presumably other BRP games, though I can't recall specifically) refresh over a 24 hour period (at a variable rate depending on the character's POW characteristic -- so if you have POW 8 you get one MP back every 3 hours, POW 12 gets one back every 2 hours, POW 16 gets one back every 90 minutes, etc.).

 

[jasin]

If no one complained that Nine Swords was too anime or overpowered, that would've been a good sign that we screwed up.

This is sigworthy!

 

[jasin]

The underlying genius of the class system is that it requires the players to work together to mask each others' weaknesses.

Also, relevant to this, a class system provides a framework which lets you make meaningful choices without necessarily letting you make theoretically equal choices which result in utterly imbalanced characters. Imbalanced not in the sense of being too strong or too weak, but in the sense of "I will put all of my advancement points in AC and none into Will, and my superpowered character will have AC 65 and Will -1."

Obviously, this feature can be subverted at least to a point, but it mostly takes an active attempt to do so. In completely freeform character creation systems, I've often seen people ending up with idiot savants without meaning to, just because they wanted to be really good at swordsmanship and simply neglected that they'll also need dodging. And they end up either coming off as overpowered because the DM avoids putting them in situations where they'll need dodging, or feeling cheated because their master swordsman who invested a bucketload of resources into being good at swordsmanship gets screwed everytime he needs to dodge something.

For example, imagine a feat that gives a +1 bonus to AC, plus the option to gain +4 AC against one attack in return for taking a -4 penalty to AC until the character uses a standard action to regain his defensive focus (or whatever).

Bah. This is just reinventing the wheel: it's just like stance of clarity, from this book Tome of Battle that this guy Mike Mearls worked on.

 

[dcas]

I on the other hand would have no problem claiming that a designer who created derivative rules could be a better designer than the designer of the original rules.

I'm not saying that he couldn't be -- I'm just saying that one couldn't come to the conclusion based solely on the premise that the derivative rules are better than the original rules.

It is entirely possible that Monte could take an idea and a proto rule by Gary and improve on it.

I agree. In fact it's entirely possible that you or I could take an idea or proto rule of Gary's and improve on it. It doesn't follow that you or I are better game designers than Gary.

 

[AntiStateQuixote]

As a physicist in the same field as Hawking, I have to say that he's quite smart but not in the same league as Einstein. If you want to pick someone alive today as having remotely the same kind of impact as AE, go with Ed Witten (publicity or lack of notwithstanding). Seriously!

Ed Witten should have put more points in CHA and less in INT.

There, it's on-topic now!

 

[Charwoman Gene]

I'm not sure how off-topic this is given how far we are from the OP already, but here goes:



As a physicist in the same field as Hawking, I have to say that he's quite smart but not in the same league as Einstein. If you want to pick someone alive today as having remotely the same kind of impact as AE, go with Ed Witten (publicity or lack of notwithstanding). Seriously!

Yeah, well, as a dilletante with only a cursory knowledge of the field I say your well-considered opinions are meaningless when stacked against my wild suppositions!

Yeah, it was a bad analogy anyway. I should have used Newton or Galileo for Gygax and Einstein for Mearls. Or maybe not. I have no idea.

I like per-encouter balancing, but I think it needs clearer guidelines