D&D 5E Why the claim of combat and class balance between the classes is mainly a forum issue. (In my opinion)

Ahnehnois

First Post
That's perfectly fine. That's a particular playstyle/agenda. (I'll make no claims on its popularity vs. other ones.) However, in the line of your "balance should be a DM thing" I would still think it would be better to have classes be balanced and then let the individual DM "unbalance" them according to his fancy.
I think it would be better to create the classes without thinking about the issue one way or another, and let the DM decide what his goals are and what kind of balance if any he wants. My contention is that absent a strong (and fairly unusual) imperative driven by a competitive playstyle, it's irrelevant. I've yet to see a campaign be derailed by not having enough of it, but I've certainly seen the negative consequences of homogeneity and inappropriate metagame mechanics.

And, as many have noted over the years, what's balanced in my game almost assuredly won't be balanced in yours, so trying to write something that's balanced for both of us is something of a fool's errand.
 

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Ratskinner

Adventurer
Ron Edwards had certain views and wrote most of the columns for the Forge. The Forge itself was about encouraging people to publish RPGs. Burning Wheel (which I believe to be the third most successful company that emerged via the Forge after only Evil Hat (Fate) and Bully Pulpit (Fiasco)) in no way appears to be in line with GNS theory or look like a stereotypical Forge Game.

erm?....hang on a minute there. Burning Wheel is a darling of folks looking for a "Narrativism" example. (I can't say I fully agree with them, but still.) [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION] has cited it to me several times.
 

Imaro

Legend
Also to touch on what [MENTION=6688937]Ratskinner[/MENTION] posted earlier in the thread, here is the introduction on the Forge boards for Evil Hat when the board was first created... It appears the board was, for the most part created to promote Evil Hat's non-FATE games and that FATE in fact already had a Yahoo group dedicated to it for discussion, and while Evil Hat doesn't seem to object to discussion of FATE on the boards they again clearly make a call out that looking at FATE with "a special Forge eye applied to it" is an, if not special, not necessarily ordinary (compared to their yahoo group) case. It doesn't seem that FATE was actually created on the Forge boards either... since this board opened in 2004 and the first edition of FATE was published in 2003.

A quick hello and thank-you to the Forge for its continued support of Evilhat Production games -- in particular Fate and Pace (but I'll tip my hat to Texorami as well). If you're looking for our games, you can find them on http://www.evilhat.com/

While Fate has its own discussion group on Yahoo, our smaller games do not, and it's my hope that this forum will provide a context for those discussions. I expect Fate, with a special Forge eye applied to it, to be discussed here as well.

I'm still pretty young to my intentions regarding this forum. Stay tuned to see future posts about our more specific goals for bringing the Evil Hat to the Forge! (Suggestions, of course, welcome.)

 

Ron Edwards was the face, of the Forge... plain and simple.

OAN... Evil Hat retired their presence at the Forge in 2008... the latest edition of Fate (FATE core which is the one I believe you are erroneously, or not, citing as 2nd in popularity to D&D) was published in 2013... that means it hasn't been a "Forge game" by your definition for over five years... Unless you are now arguing that any publisher who has ever set up a message board on the Forge site has his games forever labeled as "Forge games".

I'm citing Fate as a system. Dresden Files has outsold Fate Core 2:1 so far.

And yes, every publisher that used the forge resources came out of the Forge. Spirit of the Century, the prior version of Fate, was produced in 2006 - so it's definitely Forge by your definition. And Fate Core is the next version of the same system.

Of course The Forge has been closed for over a year and a half now (Ron Edwards made the final post in June 2012) so by your definition there are no forge games. So why are you worried about a closed down historical footnote and a message board no one can post on?
 

Ratskinner

Adventurer
I've yet to see a campaign be derailed by not having enough of it, but I've certainly seen the negative consequences of homogeneity and inappropriate metagame mechanics.

I will say that I have on several occasions. I was running a 2e campaign that just about imploded because of a Bladesinger, and more recently I saw a homebrew OSR game collapse because of a horribly broken Dwarf class. There have been others.

And, as many have noted over the years, what's balanced in my game almost assuredly won't be balanced in yours, so trying to write something that's balanced for both of us is something of a fool's errand.

I certainly agree that attempting to create some sort of "perfect" balance would be impossible to do with a game like D&D which is serving so many different playstyles and game types.* However, I don't think much is actually gained by abandoning the idea of balance entirely. Certainly a sort of general balance amongst the (at least core 4) classes is possible, IMO.


*If we knew that all D&D was being played as "dungeon porn" with very little plot and activity outside of highly gamist dungeoncrawling, that would be different.
 

erm?....hang on a minute there. Burning Wheel is a darling of folks looking for a "Narrativism" example. (I can't say I fully agree with them, but still.) @pemerton has cited it to me several times.

The first time I heard of Burning Wheel IRL it was by an indie-gamer (an Indy-exclusive one as far as I know). And described using the words "Trad as :):):):)". It really doesn't fit the other games I know of that come from the community round The Forge.
 

Imaro

Legend
I'm citing Fate as a system. Dresden Files has outsold Fate Core 2:1 so far.

And yes, every publisher that used the forge resources came out of the Forge. Spirit of the Century, the prior version of Fate, was produced in 2006 - so it's definitely Forge by your definition. And Fate Core is the next version of the same system.

Of course The Forge has been closed for over a year and a half now (Ron Edwards made the final post in June 2012) so by your definition there are no forge games. So why are you worried about a closed down historical footnote and a message board no one can post on?

FATE as a system wasn't designed on the Forge... it was first published in 2003

Because it's the basis of your entire, IMO flawed, argument concerning what type of game FATE is...
 

Ratskinner

Adventurer
The first time I heard of Burning Wheel IRL it was by an indie-gamer (an Indy-exclusive one as far as I know). And described using the words "Trad as :):):):)". It really doesn't fit the other games I know of that come from the community round The Forge.

No argument from me, personally. I just keep getting told about how wonderful and Narrativist it is. My personal take is that its far too complicated/rigorous for me. I've come to really value a certain "sloppiness" in the rules. I think it lends a necessary flexibility to the play at table.
 

I don't think we were citing particular mechanics to discuss. We instead have two rather blanket claims:

"I don't care about balance"
"Pursuing balance introduces elements which I find objectionable."

Now, I don't see how both can be true. To me this sounds much more like someone attempting to take a moral high ground of assumed neutrality to promote their actual position.

To be clear, I'm perfectly okay with saying "I don't like balanced games" or "Balanced classes don't fit my playstyle" or any similar thing. There are playstyles/agendas for which that is a perfectly legitimate concern. That's fine, but then you can't say you don't care about it, because well, you do, you object to it.

I feel one can be nuetral on balance, or even in favor of balance, but also recognize it can be taken too far or there are btter and worse ways to achieve. That was my only point. So i can not care about balance, but start to if the pursuit of balance affects my enjoyment of the game.
 

billd91

Not your screen monkey (he/him)
This. People who claim not to care about balance should be neutral on the subject. And positive about it because if what they are saying is accurate it helps many of us while not hurting them.

For a brand new game? Maybe so. But for a new edition of an already existing game? Not necessarily. It depends on what the changes in balance costs the game - and it will cost something. The changes in structure 4e brought may have brought a particular kind of balance you favored, but it basically made it a different game as well. And it wasn't a game I (and a lot of other people) wanted to play as D&D.
 

FATE as a system wasn't designed on the Forge... it was first published in 2003

Because it's the basis of your entire, IMO flawed, argument concerning what type of game FATE is...

And this entire argument revolves round your misunderstanding of The Forge. Your equating of The Forge to Ron Edwards rather than to its purpose as an incubator.

If you look at what The Forge was
About the Forge
This site is dedicated to the promotion, creation, and review of independent role-playing games. What is an independent role-playing game? Our main criterion is that the game is owned by its author, or creator-owned. We don't care what its physical format is - it can be:

  • a book in the game store​
  • a PDF or HTML download from the Internet​
  • a direct mail-order only​
  • or anything else that is readily available​
The Forge is not only a place for role-playing game authors, though. It's here for anyone interested in discovering new games, having better role-playing experiences, or discussing role-playing game theory.

The Forge contains the following resources and materials:

Ron Edwards (IMO flawed) essays in game design were resources to help people analyse games and were intended as a resource to help people create and produce role-playing games. Evil Hat used The Forge to help them create and produce role-playing games. Creator owned games at that. They were using The Forge for its purpose. (And its presence there dates back to 2003)
 

For a brand new game? Maybe so. But for a new edition of an already existing game? Not necessarily. It depends on what the changes in balance costs the game - and it will cost something. The changes in structure 4e brought may have brought a particular kind of balance you favored, but it basically made it a different game as well. And it wasn't a game I (and a lot of other people) wanted to play as D&D.

Everything has a cost. I really don't think it is worth rehashing these debates, but I will say prior to the release of 4E, I was very much in the camp of the game needs more balance. I felt 3E had too many loopholes and problems in that respect. But even though I supported balance, I found that, for me, 4E simply went too far in the direction of parity and balance. This isn't to say others should feel how I did about that system. Just to point out, one can be neutral or in favor of balance and still see it as a problem if it is too heavily implemented. Balance has a cost, just like realism and simplicity of play have costs. I find,these days, I favor a "balanced" approach to these elements.
 

Imaro

Legend
And this entire argument revolves round your misunderstanding of The Forge. Your equating of The Forge to Ron Edwards rather than to its purpose as an incubator.

If you look at what The Forge was
About the Forge
This site is dedicated to the promotion, creation, and review of independent role-playing games. What is an independent role-playing game? Our main criterion is that the game is owned by its author, or creator-owned. We don't care what its physical format is - it can be:

  • a book in the game store​
  • a PDF or HTML download from the Internet​
  • a direct mail-order only​
  • or anything else that is readily available​
The Forge is not only a place for role-playing game authors, though. It's here for anyone interested in discovering new games, having better role-playing experiences, or discussing role-playing game theory.

The Forge contains the following resources and materials:

Ron Edwards (IMO flawed) essays in game design were resources to help people analyse games and were intended as a resource to help people create and produce role-playing games. Evil Hat used The Forge to help them create and produce role-playing games. Creator owned games at that. They were using The Forge for its purpose. (And its presence there dates back to 2003)

No this entire argument seems to be revolving around you making the definition of "Forge Game" so broad that it doesn't really mean anything when we use your definition... I see a description for an indie game... show me the description for a Forge game.
 
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And this entire argument revolves round your misunderstanding of The Forge. Your equating of The Forge to Ron Edwards rather than to its purpose as an incubator.

If you look at what The Forge was
About the Forge
This site is dedicated to the promotion, creation, and review of independent role-playing games. What is an independent role-playing game? Our main criterion is that the game is owned by its author, or creator-owned. We don't care what its physical format is - it can be:

  • a book in the game store​
  • a PDF or HTML download from the Internet​
  • a direct mail-order only​
  • or anything else that is readily available​
The Forge is not only a place for role-playing game authors, though. It's here for anyone interested in discovering new games, having better role-playing experiences, or discussing role-playing game theory.

The Forge contains the following resources and materials:

Ron Edwards (IMO flawed) essays in game design were resources to help people analyse games and were intended as a resource to help people create and produce role-playing games. Evil Hat used The Forge to help them create and produce role-playing games. Creator owned games at that. They were using The Forge for its purpose. (And its presence there dates back to 2003)

I think when most people say The Forge, they don't mean indie rpg, they mean GNS or games developed by the forge membership that reflect values associated with the forge and its GNS model.
 

No this entire argument seems to be revolving around you making the definition of "Forge Game" so broad that it doesn't really mean anything when we use your definition...

Forge Game: A game that was incubated with the resources the Forge provided - or from a publisher the Forge incubated. Lumpley, Bully Pulpit, Evil Hat, Burning Wheel being the main four successful-ish companies at the moment. (And I doubt there will be more).

That's a clear and meaningful definition and the one I've been using all along.
 

Imaro

Legend
Forge Game: A game that was incubated with the resources the Forge provided - or from a publisher the Forge incubated. Lumpley, Bully Pulpit, Evil Hat, Burning Wheel being the main four successful-ish companies at the moment. (And I doubt there will be more).

That's a clear and meaningful definition and the one I've been using all along.

It's a definition you made up and, like [MENTION=85555]Bedrockgames[/MENTION] said not the definition most people are using in this discussion or outside of it. What exactly does incubating a game or publisher entail? FATE was incubated on the Yahoo groups dedicated to it... how does that fit into your definition?
 

It's a definition you made up and, like @Bedrockgames said not the definition most people are using in this discussion or outside of it. What exactly does incubating a game or publisher entail? FATE was incubated on the Yahoo groups dedicated to it... how does that fit into your definition?

OK. Let's recap this conversation.

It started off by Mistwell claiming that the Forge had sunk without trace (and inviting us to discuss things of all places on The RPG Site).

I pointed out that the Forge had closed - after doing what it intended to involving awesome games including Fate, Dogs in the Vineyard, and Burning Wheel. As such the Forge was a spectacular success. And for the purpose of what was produced the Forge's goal was to produce independent games and publishers of independent games. Lumpley, Burning Wheel, and Bully Pulpit came straight out of The Forge, and Evil Hat and their games came via The Forge. All for the purposes of this discussion are Forge games even if Burning Wheel is not much like what you'd expect a stereotypical game from The Forge to be like

You seem to want to pedant this discussion to be about what games used the IMO deeply flawed Forge theory rather than what came out of The Forge in line with the intent of the Forge itself. And if we are talking about The Forge's effect then looking at the games it has affected in line with its intent is absolutely the right way of treating it.
 

Imaro

Legend
OK. Let's recap this conversation.

It started off by Mistwell claiming that the Forge had sunk without trace (and inviting us to discuss things of all places on The RPG Site).

I pointed out that the Forge had closed - after doing what it intended to involving awesome games including Fate, Dogs in the Vineyard, and Burning Wheel. As such the Forge was a spectacular success. And for the purpose of what was produced the Forge's goal was to produce independent games and publishers of independent games. Lumpley, Burning Wheel, and Bully Pulpit came straight out of The Forge, and Evil Hat and their games came via The Forge. All for the purposes of this discussion are Forge games even if Burning Wheel is not much like what you'd expect a stereotypical game from The Forge to be like

You seem to want to pedant this discussion to be about what games used the IMO deeply flawed Forge theory rather than what came out of The Forge in line with the intent of the Forge itself. And if we are talking about The Forge's effect then looking at the games it has affected in line with its intent is absolutely the right way of treating it.

We were talking about the ideologies of the Forge and you jumped in with a broad statement concerning "Forge games". Well if everyone else in the conversation has been discussing the Forge to mean GNS, Edwards ideologies, and their effects on games in the hobby... then you jump in with a statement about "Forge games", but with a totally different meaning for it than almost everyone else... it would seem you're the one who is being unclear and overly pedantic by ignoring reference to the context of the larger conversation that was taking place and persisting even after numerous people have tried to tell you how "Forge games" was being used in this exchange and even by most people in general before you created your own definition for it... but of course you didn't listen then and you won't listen now so how's about we agree to disagree at this point... I'm actually tired of going back and forth with you.
 

There's no way my players would stand for that. After all, how do you know which squares are threatened? How can you place yourselves in a way that prevents the enemies from running past you without provoking opportunity attacks? How do you know if you hit 3 or 4 orcs with that burning hands? Ask the DM?

Yes .. like this "Can I make an OOP?" "Can I stop this attack?" "Can I stop that movement?" "How many orcs can I hit with my burning hands?"

What if they screw you out of one of your free attacks by forgetting the exact location of all the enemies and PCs? What if you say "I'm moving beside the barrel" and the DM assumes the wrong side of the barrel?
accidents happen you just keep going...

The rules clearly stated which squares people had to be in to be threatened and where they could move to without provoking. These things were important to my players. Failing to follow the rules precisely could mean life or death if an extra enemy could be included in an AOE or an opportunity attack could take place.
we mostly just played and trusted eachother...

Minis were needed for these situations to make everything fair.
even in 4e we run some battles without them... and it is much more mini heavy...

One of our DMs used to just say "Anyone higher than <the highest initiative rolled by an enemy>?" Until someone pointed out that knowing the highest initiative of the enemies could give the players an unfair advantage since they'd know how many of them get to act before the enemies do and change their tactics accordingly. This resulted in the "DM writes down everyone's initiative and calls them in order" method.

we never saw that problem...
I'm not entirely sure how they survived that. Though, CR being a really poor judge of difficulty, I can understand some of this being possible. However, it was my experience that using an encounter with EL more than 5 above the Average Party Level was instant death for all but the most min-maxed group.

I once saw a set of 9th level PCs down a CR 24 dragon with 1 spell...


Have the time we had to because of all the bonuses that were temporary. We didn't necessarily say them out loud but we certainly spent the time to calculate them.
we just add them and go...



It definitely sounds like you play entirely different games that I do or were written for Living Forgotten Realms or Living Greyhawk before it.

you know, that is normally something I disagree with, but for once I can honestly say "We play VERY different games"
 

innerdude

Legend
As I understand GNS theory, Gamism is why you play. It's an "aesthetic priority". Exploration (the shared imagining of characters, setting, situation, system, and colour) is that "something else".

If you swap out Gamism for "aesthetic priority", you can see that it doesn't make sense: "But an RPG only works as an RPG at all when there's something offered besides pure aesthetic priority."

It's been over two years since I really sat down and thoroughly went through Ron Edwards' GNS essays, but I don't recall that particular verbiage. If you have some supporting evidence that suggests it's valid in this context, I'd love to see it; otherwise, as it is "aesthetic priority" is too nebulous in this context to provide any real meaning here.

However, here is Ron Edwards' definition of gamism in his own words:


  • Gamism is expressed by competition among participants (the real people); it includes victory and loss conditions for characters, both short-term and long-term, that reflect on the people's actual play strategies. The listed elements provide an arena for the competition.

In this sense, an RPG with nothing but gamist rules structures is nothing more than "an arena for competition." Taken to its absolute extreme, gamism removes "narrative" and "story" from the equation entirely, and inhabits its own self-contained competitive space, with victory and loss conditions that reflect actual play strategy.

Sure, Edwards recognizes that there are both short- and long-term "win and loss" conditions----but unless the players and group ascribe some kind of narrative form, element, or substance to those conditions, they cease to exist beyond any single "step on up" encounter. Gamism in an RPG only achieves meaning in the fiction when it is necessarily attached to some kind of narrative structure---"We did this, and as a consequence this happened, and as such, we are now faced with challenges X, Y, and Z." Now, in some instances, a GM may only care about X, Y, and Z as situational variables to set up the next gamist encounter, to provide "flavor" for the next "step on up." But even in as minimal fashion as that, a gamist agenda still relies upon something besides pure gamism to create the "shared fiction" and flow of events happening in an RPG.

Again, don't get me wrong----I am absolutely not opposed to gamism. I am a die-hard Eurogamer. I absolutely love Dominion, Lord of the Rings Living Card Game, 7 Wonders, et. al. What I'm saying is that an RPG that radically, massively, and unabashedly makes gamism the primary focus of its playstyle agenda will RIGHT NOW, TODAY have a hard time differentiating itself from other gamist pursuits WITHOUT a very strong, coherent narrative / story component to back it up. The Legend of Drizzt board games have a more than superficial resemblance to the core 4e mechanics----but it's not an RPG any more than Dominion is.

Now, the flip side to this, is that narrativism without a rules structure literally is "a bunch of people sitting around a campfire telling stories." There's no interactive "space" for dramatic resolution other than simply everyone agreeing, "Yeah, that's what really happened." The game in an RPG is important. I'm merely saying that an RPG in our current social, technological, and entertainment climate is going to have a dramatically harder time differentiating itself as a gamist pursuit. In other words, when WotC made 4e, they attached the cart to the wrong horse. They thought an emphasis on encounter-level gamism was going to build their audience, when in fact, RPGs are now differentiated from other gamist pursuits by their narrative elements.
 

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