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[Very Long] Combat as Sport vs. Combat as War: a Key Difference in D&D Play Styles...
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<blockquote data-quote="Tony Vargas" data-source="post: 5807880" data-attributes="member: 996"><p>Certainly, if you're trying to rationalize to yourself or justify to others a preference for a game that's lacking in the balance department, denying the very concept of balance would be a good first step.</p><p> </p><p>Perfect balance is, indeed, impossible. That's no reason not to try to make a game as balanced as possible, though. And there's /nothing/ inherently contradictory in balance and different character types. Indeed, the better balanced a game is, the more different character concepts can work within it.</p><p></p><p>Take 3.5, it has 3 top-tier classes, you play a tier 1 game, you have three character concepts to choose from. There are tons more classes, but they aren't competative. Play a tier 2 game, and though you eliminate classes from play, you have more viable choices for class.</p><p></p><p></p><p>I can see how you feel that way if you've mostly played D&D. Balance has been poor through most eds of D&D, and old-school D&D was certainly subject to massive variants in endless variety. Which, I admit, was kinda fun at the time. But the game's slowly improved. 3.x, for instance, was modestly well balanced at lower levels. The 3.x ruleset was also a lot more consistent from table to table than AD&D or BECMI or 0D&D had been, far fewer variants ('house rules,' now) and a certain amount of hostility towards the very idea of tweaking the rules.</p><p></p><p>4e has similar table-to-table consistency, but is decently balanced. You don't need to re-work it extensively to play it, which I suppose, might make it harder to 'sell' players on voluminous variants (I haven't really tried with 4e, since, well, it works as writen, and I have less free time than when I was 15).</p><p></p><p>Funny, seems like lots of people have been willing to do that when they needed to. Maybe there's just less need?</p><p></p><p>They were for quite a while, yeah. Maybe some of 'em have moved on a bit, though.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Tony Vargas, post: 5807880, member: 996"] Certainly, if you're trying to rationalize to yourself or justify to others a preference for a game that's lacking in the balance department, denying the very concept of balance would be a good first step. Perfect balance is, indeed, impossible. That's no reason not to try to make a game as balanced as possible, though. And there's /nothing/ inherently contradictory in balance and different character types. Indeed, the better balanced a game is, the more different character concepts can work within it. Take 3.5, it has 3 top-tier classes, you play a tier 1 game, you have three character concepts to choose from. There are tons more classes, but they aren't competative. Play a tier 2 game, and though you eliminate classes from play, you have more viable choices for class. I can see how you feel that way if you've mostly played D&D. Balance has been poor through most eds of D&D, and old-school D&D was certainly subject to massive variants in endless variety. Which, I admit, was kinda fun at the time. But the game's slowly improved. 3.x, for instance, was modestly well balanced at lower levels. The 3.x ruleset was also a lot more consistent from table to table than AD&D or BECMI or 0D&D had been, far fewer variants ('house rules,' now) and a certain amount of hostility towards the very idea of tweaking the rules. 4e has similar table-to-table consistency, but is decently balanced. You don't need to re-work it extensively to play it, which I suppose, might make it harder to 'sell' players on voluminous variants (I haven't really tried with 4e, since, well, it works as writen, and I have less free time than when I was 15). Funny, seems like lots of people have been willing to do that when they needed to. Maybe there's just less need? They were for quite a while, yeah. Maybe some of 'em have moved on a bit, though. [/QUOTE]
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