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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Raven Crowking" data-source="post: 5039450" data-attributes="member: 18280">Right, and wrong.The game balance that happens at the table is an emergent property.What is designed into the rules of an RPG is not game balance, but tools intended to make it easier to achieve balance at the table.  It is an error to imagine that both (1) you cannot plan for an emergent property (i.e., the balance that occurs at the table, and (2) you can engineer that emergent property into the game.Clearly, as has been demonstrated in many fields, one can plan for emergent properties, and one can safeguard against other emergent properties.  The "balance" that 4e largely has, that 1e certainly has far less of, is safeguards against certain types of "balance" that the designers viewed as undesireable.  For example, the balance that was promoted in the earliest versions of the game.Both 4e and 1e attempt to restrict the emergent balance into channels that the authors/designers thought "fun".  4e's definition of "fun" is just far narrower than that of 1e.  This isn't necessarily relevant.X playtesters over Y time, playing Z hours per day can provide far better playtesting than X+A playtesters over Y-B time, playing Z-C hours per day.  Moreover, the way that the feedback is utilized, and the agenda of the designer(s) are at least as important.I bet I could list more playtesters for RCFG than for 4e if I liked.  What do you think that would prove?  The answer is simple:  The number of listed playtesters simply isn't relevant without other data.RCRC</blockquote>

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