The Cost of Using Magic?

[Lanefan]

Balance is about what your character can do in a round, not in a day and definitely not over his career.

Balance is NOT about what your character can do in a round or even in a combat or a day, it's about what it can do over an adventure or an entire career.

And folks, that right there is the entire balance argument in a nutshell.

Lan-"I think it would take a lot of beer for Ahnehnois and I to sort this one out"-efan

 

[Lanefan]

In the game, it might work something like this:

The characters are faced with an underground chasm they need to get across. The chasm is clearly too wide to jump across by normal means. This is considered an "Average" challenge that is designed to net each character 300 XP when crossed.

The wizard casts fly and sails across easily. However, his XP is reduced by 300 XP for using the fly spell to circumnavigate the challenge. Basically, no challenge, no XP.

The monk takes several steps back and uses leap of the clouds to jump across. The monk gains a huge bonus to his jump skill, making it feasible to get across - as long as he rolls a 5+ on d20. However, the XP he gains is reduced by 150 for using the leap of the clouds ability.

The fighter moves forward, swinging a grappling hook with rope attached and secures the hook on the opposite side with a lucky throw. After shimmying across using a climb check with an equipment bonus, he gains the standard 300 XP.

Lastly, the rogue scales the side wall of the cavern and clambers up to the ceiling, where he makes his way across with his climb skill. Because he used the climb skill without the assistance of gear or magic, he gains a 100 XP bonus.

Sorry, but in the game it would much more likely work something like this:

The wizard casts fly and ferries everyone across. No XP for anyone. Move on.

For the most part I'm not really seeing the point to the original idea here. If you don't want your party using magic to solve problems then run a low- or no-magic campaign and have done with it. But if you give out magic you have to expect your players are going to use it, and in ways you never thought possible.

Lanefan

 

[Ahnehnois]

Balance is NOT about what your character can do in a round or even in a combat or a day, it's about what it can do over an adventure or an entire career.

And folks, that right there is the entire balance argument in a nutshell.

Lan-"I think it would take a lot of beer for Ahnehnois and I to sort this one out"-efan

No, I totally see what you're saying.

This is one of those semantic issues with "balance". I'm talking about a real hardcore mechanical balance, where two characters of the same level should have a 50% chance each of prevailing in a straight-up gladiatorial arena fight (i.e. the kind of balance that hardcore rules lawyers and power gamers care about, and the kind that 4e was supposed to address). In that balance, the round is the key. Most characters are only in a meaningful battle situation for a couple of rounds per day, so if one can do more powerful things than the other, it doesn't usually matter if the one is limited by uses per day.

You're probably talking about the kind of balance where every character is involved and every player is enjoying himself. That absolutely happens over the course of the campaign, and every character can expect to have the advantage and/or the spotlight at some times while yielding it at others. This is the kind of balance that most people care about, and the kind that the rest of D&D was designed to address.

The word balance simply isn't well-defined in a gaming context; it's used to mean different things.

 

[Votan]

No, I totally see what you're saying.

This is one of those semantic issues with "balance". I'm talking about a real hardcore mechanical balance, where two characters of the same level should have a 50% chance each of prevailing in a straight-up gladiatorial arena fight (i.e. the kind of balance that hardcore rules lawyers and power gamers care about, and the kind that 4e was supposed to address). In that balance, the round is the key. Most characters are only in a meaningful battle situation for a couple of rounds per day, so if one can do more powerful things than the other, it doesn't usually matter if the one is limited by uses per day.

You're probably talking about the kind of balance where every character is involved and every player is enjoying himself. That absolutely happens over the course of the campaign, and every character can expect to have the advantage and/or the spotlight at some times while yielding it at others. This is the kind of balance that most people care about, and the kind that the rest of D&D was designed to address.

The word balance simply isn't well-defined in a gaming context; it's used to mean different things.

I think a lot of the conversational issues between OSR types and 4E types comes down to these differences. If you are going to play D&D as a series of pick-up games (see Living Greyhawk) then the unit of balance needs to be the adventure. If you are playing a tournament (two men enter, one man leaves style) then round to round needs to be balanced.

But the original conception of the unit of balance was over a campaign. This included odd balance points like scarcity: Paladins and Rangers could be objectively overpowered but everyone would likely lose characters and have an equal shot at one as a replacement. The Thief was underpowered in combat but got a lot of table time in non-combat. Fighters and wizards evolved very differently in power curves. High level play included castles for the Fighter, but not necessarily the wizard (getting rid of followers in high level play really hurt the Fighter more than the Wizard, who do not see a loss of high level spells).

People have strong opinions about both forms of balance, and I believe that it is impossible to have both without cookie-cutter characters.