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What does balance mean to you?
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<blockquote data-quote="Tony Vargas" data-source="post: 7158198" data-attributes="member: 996"><p>Well, it's a definition I came across, and phrased in my own words...</p><p></p><p> By what definition? And how good is a definition of balance which classes functionally identical systems (the game where all weapons do the same damage, and the game where one weapon does so much more damage that no other weapons are ever used) as somehow different? </p><p></p><p> It's a perfectly fair game. It fails my definition of balance because the choices aren't meaningful. Each is perfectly viable - it defeats one other choice and is defeated by one other. But none of them have any meaning, they're arbitrary. </p><p></p><p>3 is also a quite low number of choices relative to what you find in RPGs.</p><p></p><p> Depends on the system and how robustly it's balanced. Adding choices to a system that's just a list of arbitrary sub-systems that can thus interact in unexpected ways is likely to result in a new choice rendering swaths of previous ones non-viable, or a new choice synergizing with certain past choices in a combo with similar consequences. That can reduce the net number of viable choices, rendering the game less balanced.</p><p></p><p>But, it's not inevitable, it's just a danger of increasing the scope and depth of a game. RPGs, though, thrive on scope and depth, they're 'infinite games...'</p><p></p><p> Nod. While 'viability' is more prone to quantitative analysis, judgement does come into it, especially in the context of RPGs where situations can vary so widely. Meaningful, OTOH, can be outright subjective. Being allowed to choose the name/appearance of your weapon (or character, for that matter), and thus tie it to fiction, connotations, cultural signposts, metaphors or even simple puns, might seem 'meaningful' to some players. Thus the game with the large list of mechanically identical weapons or the option to define your weapon how you like, /can/ be experienced as better-balanced than the one with a list of weapons, one of which is so strictly superior as to render all others non-viable.</p><p></p><p> Correct. Perfection is not achievable. </p><p>Striving for perfection, OTOH, can result in continuous improvement.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Tony Vargas, post: 7158198, member: 996"] Well, it's a definition I came across, and phrased in my own words... By what definition? And how good is a definition of balance which classes functionally identical systems (the game where all weapons do the same damage, and the game where one weapon does so much more damage that no other weapons are ever used) as somehow different? It's a perfectly fair game. It fails my definition of balance because the choices aren't meaningful. Each is perfectly viable - it defeats one other choice and is defeated by one other. But none of them have any meaning, they're arbitrary. 3 is also a quite low number of choices relative to what you find in RPGs. Depends on the system and how robustly it's balanced. Adding choices to a system that's just a list of arbitrary sub-systems that can thus interact in unexpected ways is likely to result in a new choice rendering swaths of previous ones non-viable, or a new choice synergizing with certain past choices in a combo with similar consequences. That can reduce the net number of viable choices, rendering the game less balanced. But, it's not inevitable, it's just a danger of increasing the scope and depth of a game. RPGs, though, thrive on scope and depth, they're 'infinite games...' Nod. While 'viability' is more prone to quantitative analysis, judgement does come into it, especially in the context of RPGs where situations can vary so widely. Meaningful, OTOH, can be outright subjective. Being allowed to choose the name/appearance of your weapon (or character, for that matter), and thus tie it to fiction, connotations, cultural signposts, metaphors or even simple puns, might seem 'meaningful' to some players. Thus the game with the large list of mechanically identical weapons or the option to define your weapon how you like, /can/ be experienced as better-balanced than the one with a list of weapons, one of which is so strictly superior as to render all others non-viable. Correct. Perfection is not achievable. Striving for perfection, OTOH, can result in continuous improvement. [/QUOTE]
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