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<blockquote data-quote="Umbran" data-source="post: 5022078" data-attributes="member: 177">My point is that &quot;improvement&quot; does not equate to &quot;fixing problems&quot;.&nbsp; Today, if you were trying to outfit an office worker to do his job, you'd not pick an IBM Thinkpad T-30.&nbsp; There is no &quot;problem&quot; with the T-30.&nbsp; It is a solid workhorse of an office machine, and it'll run Windows XP, web browsers, and MS Office just fine.&nbsp; However, the tech here is from early in the decade - it all functions well, but a T-60, or a T-500 would work *better*.Lots of folks here talk about how the definition of balance has changed.&nbsp; I think that may be barking up the wrong tree.&nbsp; I think the operative thing is how our understanding of balance has changed.It seems to me that Gygax and friends had basically the same definition of balance as I do - a game and its characters are balanced when all the basic choices available can leave the player feeling like they are an effective part of the overall game play, that nobody ends up twiddling their thumbs wondering why they bothered to come to the session, because the other guy gets to do all the fun stuff.&nbsp; That Gary understood this is born out by descriptions of gameplay under him as a GM, and I don't find the idea that he'd leave that out of his intent in designing a game to be credible.Now, Gary was at the forefront here - so his understanding of how to achieve that goal was limited by inexperience.&nbsp; He was restricted largely to what was in his own head, and in the heads of the relatively small group of people, with only a little playtesting, and little clear feedback.&nbsp; Basically, he was guessing.&nbsp; And while he got the basic idea in place, many of his measures fall short of the mark. Is 1e AD&amp;D playable?&nbsp; Most certainly.&nbsp; It works, and I like it.&nbsp; I still bring it out for the occasional one-shot.&nbsp; I have to spend some attention to keeping it balanced.&nbsp; This is not a &quot;problem&quot;.&nbsp; However, I have to spend less attention (not zero attention, just less) playing with newer systems, designed with better understandings of balance.&nbsp; In essence, a balanced game is like a faster computer - it makes it easier for me to spend more time doing the things I want to do.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Umbran, post: 5022078, member: 177"] My point is that "improvement" does not equate to "fixing problems". Today, if you were trying to outfit an office worker to do his job, you'd not pick an IBM Thinkpad T-30. There is no "problem" with the T-30. It is a solid workhorse of an office machine, and it'll run Windows XP, web browsers, and MS Office just fine. However, the tech here is from early in the decade - it all functions well, but a T-60, or a T-500 would work *better*. Lots of folks here talk about how the definition of balance has changed. I think that may be barking up the wrong tree. I think the operative thing is how our [i]understanding[/i] of balance has changed. It seems to me that Gygax and friends had basically the same definition of balance as I do - a game and its characters are balanced when all the basic choices available can leave the player feeling like they are an effective part of the overall game play, that nobody ends up twiddling their thumbs wondering why they bothered to come to the session, because the other guy gets to do all the fun stuff. That Gary understood this is born out by descriptions of gameplay under him as a GM, and I don't find the idea that he'd leave that out of his intent in designing a game to be credible. Now, Gary was at the forefront here - so his understanding of how to achieve that goal was limited by inexperience. He was restricted largely to what was in his own head, and in the heads of the relatively small group of people, with only a little playtesting, and little clear feedback. Basically, he was guessing. And while he got the basic idea in place, many of his measures fall short of the mark. Is 1e AD&D playable? Most certainly. It works, and I like it. I still bring it out for the occasional one-shot. I have to spend some attention to keeping it balanced. This is not a "problem". However, I have to spend less attention (not zero attention, just less) playing with newer systems, designed with better understandings of balance. In essence, a balanced game is like a faster computer - it makes it easier for me to spend more time doing the things I want to do. [/QUOTE]

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