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<blockquote data-quote="Henry" data-source="post: 64573" data-attributes="member: 158">The balance in Call of Cthulhu and in Unknown Armies is supplied by the fact that the PC's will have very little mechanical game effect on their enemies that they will typically face. (I know more about Chaosium's CoC than Unknown armies, but I know it's true with CoC). Balance is maintained by the fact that PC's are outshadowed, powerwise, by their opposition, so even though you have interesting PC's, they do not shine through one PC compared to another, the way they do in another game system where the PC's are more evenly power-balanced against the good guys. Want to take on a Shoggoth or a Gug in Call of Cthulhu, or frankly anything more powerful than a deep one)? Tear your character sheet up. You must defeat them with something other than force of arms or superpowers.In D&amp;D, GURPS, d6 Star Wars, etc. care must be taken so that one player does not attain a capability that makes all his or her challenges easy, and reduce all other PC's to the status of henchmen, or not getting their 15 minutes of fame. You don't have that problem in CoC, because everybody is just as pathetic versus the true evils of the world.I prefer a game system that doesn't need me to to statistical analysis for ever ability a PC gets. By and large, most of the d20 released stuff doesn't give outrageous levels of power, unlike so many things I saw in 2nd edition.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Henry, post: 64573, member: 158"] The balance in Call of Cthulhu and in Unknown Armies is supplied by the fact that the PC's will have very little mechanical game effect on their enemies that they will typically face. (I know more about Chaosium's CoC than Unknown armies, but I know it's true with CoC). Balance is maintained by the fact that PC's are outshadowed, powerwise, by their opposition, so even though you have interesting PC's, they do not shine through one PC compared to another, the way they do in another game system where the PC's are more evenly power-balanced against the good guys. Want to take on a Shoggoth or a Gug in Call of Cthulhu, or frankly anything more powerful than a deep one)? Tear your character sheet up. You must defeat them with something other than force of arms or superpowers. In D&D, GURPS, d6 Star Wars, etc. care must be taken so that one player does not attain a capability that makes all his or her challenges easy, and reduce all other PC's to the status of henchmen, or not getting their 15 minutes of fame. You don't have that problem in CoC, because everybody is just as pathetic versus the true evils of the world. I prefer a game system that doesn't need me to to statistical analysis for ever ability a PC gets. By and large, most of the d20 released stuff doesn't give outrageous levels of power, unlike so many things I saw in 2nd edition. [/QUOTE]

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