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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Willie the Duck" data-source="post: 8623138" data-attributes="member: 6799660">I generally agree with those that have said that balance is not a goal in and of itself and that over-focus on balance is perhaps putting the cart before the horse.That said, a theoretical 'balance isn't important' mindset is how we got TSR-era* Thieves -- a play option that is needed** in a party (and to which plenty of gamers gravitate, thematically), gets one type of spotlight time that they might (depending on which version) actually be good at, but overall really underperformed, and were un-fun enough as-written that many game tables had houserule fixes, and many OSR games mirror the TSR norm except for Thieves in some way.*post oD&D w/o supplement I**although certain DMs (particularly those that started with oD&D) might allow other classes to do the things for which one might choose a Thief class simply be describing , which certainly doesn't improve the Thief's lot.That's the general limitation of '_____ isn't important' or 'all that matters is that people have fun' points -- oftentimes specific game rules can end up making balance important, and lack balance can conspire to make things un-fun. Yes, we over-obsess about balance on forums and the like, but that doesn't make it not a concern. I think there is generally a middle ground -- Balance is a component of the overall structure of the game. Game structure, as a whole, in a perfect gaming group with a perfect (-ly prepared and quick-thinking) GM, rarely matter. The farther one gets from that scenario, the more the specific structures of the game rules help keep the game from becoming lopsided in some way (which can, although not always, lead to things being un-fun). MCU Hawkeye suffers from 'why is he here?' having become part of his character, although they did an okay job of making his 'he has a family, reminding the others of why they fight for good, etc.' schtick a big deal. Marvel comics in general have always hewed pretty close to being about the interpersonal relationships and struggles superheroes have while being superheroes as mostly a backdrop (Chris Claremont era X-Men made Nightcrawler interesting and Angel boring, despite them both having oft-not-even-used transport powers, simply because the writers happened to like Nightcrawler). Supes vs. Batman does more 'actual contribution' effects for Batman, and tend to lean into situations where invulnerability and super-power don't factor in as much as knowing where to be or what to do or other detective + contacts kinda stuff. D&D could do similar (and honestly, if you count OOC magic as similar, already does).</blockquote>

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