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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Tony Vargas" data-source="post: 9175035" data-attributes="member: 996">OK, so under that definition, 5e is profoundly imbalanced with a vast gulf between martials and casters - but you could fix that by removing the non-caster sub-classes from the game, entirely, since removing options has no effect on that definition of balance.But, then, you'd have a game with fewer options, including having excised the most popular option.By the same token, you could eliminate all sub-classes with any spells at all, making the game a lot more 'rules lite,' /and/ better-balanced, with all of 5 choices in the PH.How is a definition of balance that would lead you to making games worse a useful definition? Yes, making resource management a critical part of a cooperative game, then presenting some options which contribute many such resources and other that contribute few or none, is bad for balance (again, either definition), for agency, for playability, for designing challenges - it's just plain bad design. That's not homogenizing classes, tho, its simplifying/consolidating mechanics.  It's what 5e did when it made all full casters use the same 9 level progression with a new spell level at each odd numbered level 1-17, cast spells spontaneously using slots, and have at-will cantrips.  Then, did some more, by making psionics use spell formats and mechanics. It's not innately a bad thing by any measure, really, not balance (my preferred definition or yours), not agency, certainly not playability since it reduces complexity...Now, homogenizing classes could be done by re-cycling abilities, the way 5e gives Fighter, Paladin, and Ranger Combat Styles rather than just fighter getting them, or the way most spellcasting classes have only a minority of their spell lists unique to themselves (in the PH at launch, the Wizard was the champ with 33 - about 10% of all spells presented - uniquely Wizard-only spells, and Sorcerers were the whipping boy, with exactly 0)Force?  Classes are choices, class design is not done by the player, so the design of classes isn''t being forced, it should just be trying to present the player with as many good choices as possible.   So, specialization in the form of 'dominates play in a narrow scope in return for being worthless most of the rest of the time' - in a cooperative game, probably a bad idea.  Even if it were, say, mathmatically balanced over a long, currated, series of situations, it doesn't seem like recipe for good play experiences.... I've already mentioned "netrunner problem," right?Now, if the players have significant agency to shape the situations they face, it may make sense to make that a primary focus of play.  Players devise characters that are optimal for a specific situation, then apply said agency to bring about that situation.  The game is won or lost in engineering situations, not in resolving them.Doesn't actually change anything, the game would still need to be balanced, this time the balance would be around the plotting that brings about the desired situation, which in effect becomes a foregone victory.This style of game is sometimes called 'CaW'It depends on the scope of the game and the variability of that scope.  D&D presents itself as a generic fantasy game for characters as minor as apprentices, or as earth-shaking as the gods themselves.   It delivers a system that may arguably be balanced if you run little more than 6-encounter dungeon crawls that must be finished w/in 24 hours and consist mostly of combat encounters where the monsters are outnumbered, and the party's level is in the range of 3-10. So, yeah, if you want a game with a narrowly defined, consistent scope, you can have characters who are tightly specialized in something common/important w/in that scope, and others that are nearly as effective, more generally with virtually everything w/in that scope and maybe other things outside it that may happen once in a blue moon.If you want a game with a more expansive scope that might be run with very different emphasis w/in that, then, no, idiot-specialist is not a good design option even if you make it wildly effective if it ever comes up, every character will need to be usefully, and distinctly, contributing most of the time.</blockquote>

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