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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Mustrum_Ridcully" data-source="post: 3985322" data-attributes="member: 710">From the given option, 2 fits best for what I want. But the real "balance" is not related to 1:1 death matches. You could balance a game around it, but this is not a major part of a regular D&D game. The party works together to solve a problem (often enough, the problem is a group of monsters in their way to the McGuffin/Treasure/Virgin Sacrifice.) The goal of good balance is that every member of the group meaningful contributes to the solution. In some ways it is about "DPS" ("Damage per Seconds"), but not always in the direct sense. As an example: The Bard in 3.x doesn't contribute much DPS by fighting with a sword or bow. He contributes the DPS indirectly by granting a bonus to attack and damage of others. (But the Bard is underpowered because he doesn't contribute enough. He can give a damage bonus around 5-20 % to one or two members that benefit from his abilities, but he needed to reach something around +100 %. The Warlords "Feather Yon Oaf"-ability seems to come closer to it, since it seems to grant extra attacks). A healer contribute by reducing the enemies effective DPS by healing their damage. There do also exist abilities that are harder to adjucate - what's the "DPS" contribution of a Wall of Stone or Glitterdust or a rushed Diplomacy check, or having a Range of 150 ft instead of 100? But harder doesn't mean impossible (though it might imply "less exact then weapon damage", because we might use a simplified model for projecting the effects.It's becoming a bit more complicated outside of combats. There is no clear analogon for damage/hit points in these cases, so you can't balance by DPS. You could start with something like "Succeeds at set goal in n checks á m minutes with x % chance" and work from there.It's not that bad if a Wizard can cast Knock to open doors. It's just bad if this means he needs less resources (money, time, skills/feats/powers) then another character.Another part of balance is "fun balance". Even if every class is guaranteed to have equivalent DPS per combat encounter, that doesn't mean that it's equal fun. A Spellcaster that always casts one spell for 1000 points of damage and is then unable to act for 90 % of the combat isn't as "fun" as the Fighter that dealt the same damage over 10 rounds, by cleverly combinging trips, disarms or charge attacks or using other powers at his disposal.From what I saw so far, I think the D&D 4 team has identified both aspects of balance and is trying to achieve it. We'll see if what they devised works...</blockquote>

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