My players are scared of ruining the balance

[Pyoor]

I DM a game on a bi-weekly basis and to keep the game from getting stale I like to incorporate new things into my game.

I recently purchased ‘Buy the Numbers’ by ST Cooley Publishing and I was very excited to use that system for a new campaign. I repeatedly told my players that I was going to try something new and to expect something different for the next game. When we finally got together for character creation, my players totally rejected the idea of using a different system because it would require “too much record keeping” and it might be “unbalanced”.

Normally I would think people would jump at the chance to try something new. I agree that ‘Buy the Numbers’ would require a little extra number crunching, but I think it is an acceptable trade off for the flexibility it offers. I didn’t require anyone to buy the product and I wasn’t inserting the rules into an existing game. Finally, I am the DM and that’s the game I wanted to run. If the rules didn’t work, I would scrap the idea and return to an old campaign for the next session.

I’ve run into this before when I’ve tried using feats or spells I created. Every time I’ve done this I’ve included a breakdown on how the new feat or spell is balanced to the core products, but my players are very reluctant to use non-WOTC rules. This fear of ruining balance has even extended to books released by Monte Cook and Green Ronin, most of which seem extremely balanced to me.

Have any other DM’s run into this? It seems like a waste not to explore new rules and supplements with all of the great d20 products out there.

I need help broadening my players’ horizons!

 

[Psion]

Flexibility is on the list of good qualities to desire in a game, but too many people place it as top priority, behind things like playability, availability, and, yes, balance.

So yeah. I don't blame your players.

 

[Thornir Alekeg]

If this is something you really want, you may need to find other players. Some people like the comfort of familiarity.

There are times I would kill for players like this so I didn't have to review rules from whatever latest book came out and try and make a call on whether to allow it in my game or not. And this may be part of the concern of your players. You allow a couple of rules from some new book, next thing you know all kinds of books are being introduced and the players feel like they need to keep up.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

You know how some GMs complain the game (especially non-core stuff) gets too complicated? Making the game more complicated does not always appeal to players.

Players don't always want new things. (Comic book writers found that out the hard way - when dealing with fans, not RPG players, of course. The fans kept saying they wanted something new - then trashed almost everything new. I think it's just basic human psychololgy.) Your players might even tell you they want new things, but don't really know what new thing they want, so they can't help you, and 95% of the new stuff you try won't be something they like.

I agree that ‘Buy the Numbers’ would require a little extra number crunching

Define "little". Actually, don't bother What you consider little might be "much" for your players. If you're creating new stuff for your game, you're probably better at number-crunching than your players.

I’ve run into this before when I’ve tried using feats or spells I created. Every time I’ve done this I’ve included a breakdown on how the new feat or spell is balanced to the core products, but my players are very reluctant to use non-WOTC rules. This fear of ruining balance has even extended to books released by Monte Cook and Green Ronin, most of which seem extremely balanced to me.

Have any other DM’s run into this? It seems like a waste not to explore new rules and supplements with all of the great d20 products out there.

I think your players are comfortable with DnD and don't want a whole new rules system. Maybe you could try introducing them to D20 Modern, Spycraft II, Blue Rose, etc. It's different, but close enough to DnD that anyone who has played it can quickly learn the system. (Is By the Numbers D20, by the way?)

Anything that increases complexity (in a given game like DnD - this isn't a bash on By The Numbers which I know nothing about anyway) almost always unbalances the system. Often there's new bonus types, spells that could "stack" with other spells from other books, etc. Playtesters do not get a fully stocked library of RPG products when playtesting something - when I was an XPH playtester, I did not get a CD with other new products coming out at the same time. So if someone complains that XPH feat A is broken when combined with campaign setting feat B and Complete X spell C, I don't feel I should take the blame for that I seriously doubt designers take other books into account - except maybe setting books - when writing splats. There's so many other splats that it would literally waste their time trying to balance a splat with every other splat. The end result - lots of complexity, lots of confusion, lots of imbalance, especially when using multiple books.

In my group, hardly anyone uses more than three books to make a character (and one is going to be the PH, even if they're using a new base class). Even if someone ends up with a broken character (and assuming, for the moment, that all the broken stuff is non-core) they're probably just using a "base" setting book and an expansion book. For a particularly "heavy" scenario, you could get a psi-forged psion using a power or two from Races of Eberron - that would be using the PH, XPH, Eberron Campaign Setting, Magic of Eberron and Races of Eberron (a five book combo!). I've never seen that happen, actually. It gets too complicated using a huge number of books.

WotC often ends up printing unbalanced stuff, so maybe "dissing" non-WotC stuff isn't fair.. There might be WotC "snobbery" or simply a WotC "comfort zone" in play here. Mind you, stuff that isn't published by WotC can also be unbalanced or poorly designed, too. (I think Monte Cook is a great game designer, but he's done things like put broken spells into Book of Eldritch Might II, as an example. Even his perfectly balanced stuff might break on contact with spells in Complete Compendium that he's never seen before, or spells from an older arcane supplement that he might have even written... and then forgotten about. Think of how many spells there are out there!)

It's a bit sad, I think, that they didn't want to try the stuff you personally designed. What did they say about it?

I know in my group, my new feats, etc, are disliked more than liked. Boomstick was a hit, but Pistolero and the Marksman AdC... not so much, as they were viewed as underpowered. I'm too wussy to power them up, for fear that if I let a powered up feat into the game, that I have to nerf it later, and you know players usually hate nerfs.

 

[hexgrid]

Have any other DM’s run into this? It seems like a waste not to explore new rules and supplements with all of the great d20 products out there.

Yeah, I've run into it. I've discovered over and over again that my players are perfectly happy with standard D&D as written, and don't want me pushing variant or alternate systems on them. Someday, I might learn my lesson.

 

[Nebulous]

Have any other DM’s run into this? It seems like a waste not to explore new rules and supplements with all of the great d20 products out there.

Yup. Tweaking the d20 system is a lot of fun, to me anyway, but my players frequently reject house rules or new rules, even if from WotC. I don't think they'd like much from Unearthed Arcana, for example. I think that the basics of D&D work fine, but is still flawed, but can be worked into a really great system with massaging.

 

[Barendd Nobeard]

...balanced to the core products, but my players are very reluctant to use non-WOTC rules. This fear of ruining balance has even extended to books released by Monte Cook and Green Ronin, most of which seem extremely balanced to me.

You do not state this directly, but this statement implies (to me) that your players think everything WotC publishes for D&D is acceptable because it is (automatically) balanced. If so, that's an assumption that's just laughable. If not, do they pick apart every single WotC product (and Paizo product, if they use Dragon magazine) to make sure it's balanced (and, therefore, acceptable to use)?

I need help broadening my players’ horizons!

Good luck with that! There's some great stuff out there; it's a shame to discount all of it because it mighit be unbalanced.

 

[Umbran]

I’ve run into this before when I’ve tried using feats or spells I created. Every time I’ve done this I’ve included a breakdown on how the new feat or spell is balanced to the core products, but my players are very reluctant to use non-WOTC rules. This fear of ruining balance has even extended to books released by Monte Cook and Green Ronin, most of which seem extremely balanced to me.

Your players, of course, are mistaken if they think that being published by WotC means it is balanced. Specifically in combination - if you've got two non-core WotC products in the game, combinations of things from them are quite possibly unbalanced. And, of course, balance is always relative to the DM's other controls (like wealth, XP, and magic availability).

I need help broadening my players’ horizons!

Well, hold on a second. Do you, really? Obviously, as the DM, you can build critters and NPCs any way you want. So, the only reason to introduce this product to the players would be to give them flexibility they don't currently have, right? Well, if they don't want the flexibility why bother showing them the product? If they are happy with the characters they can create now, there's no need for it.

If it ain't broke, don't fix it. Or, in more modern parlance - Don't introduce solutions when there is no percieved problem

 

[The_Gneech]

Obviously, as the DM, you can build critters and NPCs any way you want. So, the only reason to introduce this product to the players would be to give them flexibility they don't currently have, right? Well, if they don't want the flexibility why bother showing them the product? If they are happy with the characters they can create now, there's no need for it.

This is an excellent point. Note that GMs tend to be more hardcore gamers than players do -- so we tend to want new and better systems for everything. The average player doesn't care about all that, they just want to kill monsters and take their stuff (or do palace intrigues or steal the Ruby Eyes of Alakazot or whatever their goal is). Hence the common refrain around here of "I want to play HERO/GURPs/Rolemaster/Grim Tales but the players want D&D." The power gamers care about the system; the players just care about the gameplay, at least in my experience.

-The Gneech

 

[Psion]

Yup. Tweaking the d20 system is a lot of fun, to me anyway, but my players frequently reject house rules or new rules, even if from WotC.

My players trust me and pretty much rely on me to call the shots.

But there's a REASON my players trust me, I think. And no, that reason is not because I am Wylie Coyote, super-genius of gaming. It's that I give them the stability in the first place.