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

[Ahnehnois]

Surely you can recognize a difference between knowing what the 8 chess pieces do and being a chess expert?

To someone who knows what the 8 pieces do but does not have an understanding of the strategy of play, chess is often a frustrating experience. I don't think that means that chess is broken, or that people who struggle with it are broken, simply that there is a bar for entry. Having a fulfilling tactical experience requires that you gain expertise, either through play or by reading or studying the game.

Given that D&D is a more sophisticated game, I don't see it as a problem that the bar for entry is higher.

You might not, but I sure as heck do. And I hope that every game designer does, too.

I hope not. I had plenty of scratchy experiences as a beginning player and DM, and it didn't dissuade me, nor was it the fault of the game designers, nor did I think that it was at the time. I looked at my early D&D sessions as being like a beginning baskeball player clanking free throw after free throw off the rim, or a beginning writer tossing pages of garbage into the trash and struggling with writer's block.

I don't think growing pains can be legislated out of the hobby. I hope that the people who write it write it for experts, not beginners. If there's a demand for a beginner version of the game, it'll be filled (as it was with Pathfinder).

 

[The Human Target]

You are so hung up on the idea that balance= DPR that there is no real value in discussing it.

That's the myth.

 

[The Human Target]

I have an interesting personal anecdote.

One of the reasons my players love 4e so much is that they don't have to have a lot of system mastery to be all around effective as characters.

They're all fairly busy late 20 to early 30 year olds. They don't spend much time if any thinking about their mechanics away from the table. Half of them have never even read a 4e PHB.

They realized the basics if the game are fairly simple and balanced. And fun. They don't need to worry much about effectiveness. They spend their time thinking about roleplaying, and the story.

I feel the same way about monster balance and ease of running the game as a DM. The strong, well thought out rules free me up to work on the other aspects if the game.

That's all the argument for balance being good I will ever need.

Notice I never said anything about DPR.

 

[Halivar]

You are so hung up on the idea that balance= DPR that there is no real value in discussing it.

That's the myth.

Agreed. 4E is being used as an example of "over-balanced" in this thread, and yet there is no uniformity of "DPR" (a rather awkward way of trying to tie 4E to the MMO concept of DPS), indicating that "DPR" is not how the classes were balanced in the first place.

The balance is this: no character is useless in any given fight. That's all the balance I'm asking for. By useless I mean rogues stacking dice during a construct encounter, or enchanters fiddling with their phones during an undead encounter, blah blah blah. One solution I particularly disliked was, "well, you can buy some alchemists fire and stuff beforehand," because that's something any 0-level expert can do. I'll bring a hireling. Let my class DO something unique.

 

[The Human Target]

Agreed. 4E is being used as an example of "over-balanced" in this thread, and yet there is no uniformity of "DPR" (a rather awkward way of trying to tie 4E to the MMO concept of DPS), indicating that "DPR" is not how the classes were balanced in the first place.

The balance is this: no character is useless in any given fight. That's all the balance I'm asking for. By useless I mean rogues stacking dice during a construct encounter, or enchanters fiddling with their phones during an undead encounter, blah blah blah. One solution I particularly disliked was, "well, you can buy some alchemists fire and stuff beforehand," because that's something any 0-level expert can do. I'll bring a hireling. Let my class DO something unique.

That's another monstrous balance feature my players and I enjoy.

Your character having cool useful options, not your gear.

Also a heavy reduction in bookkeeping. Few potions, no scrolls, no wand charges, no heaps of "I need these supplies to be effective in niche situation" items.

 

[ImperatorK]

What concept you begin with of course has to be constrained by does it fit within the campaign setting, what level is everyone starting with, etc. These are all things I find best discussed with the DM when everyone is coming up with what they want to play. Not everything will work, some will need to be adjusted to fit, etc.

Nicely dodged the question.

 

[billd91]

I will avoid another pizza analogy(i must be hungry) and ask why if you feel you van find and change any bad rules and make them work you care what rules i want in the game... you can always change them.

The important point is I can adjust the game to fit the needs of the table. Rules that work for one group don't always work for another and, as DM, my job is to handle that. In the specific case, unrestricted multiclassing may work for some concepts, particularly when the XP penalties are brought to bear over the course of a PCs career. Stacking 4 classes into 5 levels, maybe not, particularly since it stacks the hell out of save bonuses.

And again, if you don't recognize the problem right away, adjust later. Discuss it rationally. And if the player doesn't agree to it, for the good of the group, that's what the boot is for.

 

[Derren]

By useless I mean rogues stacking dice during a construct encounter, or enchanters fiddling with their phones during an undead encounter, blah blah blah.

Perfect examples of players who are only concerned with the damage they do. If they weren't, they would not "stack dice" but use other ways to help in combat.
If those people want to play a tabletop wargame, fine. But they are, or at least should not be, the target group of D&D.

 

[Kurotowa]

You are so hung up on the idea that balance= DPR that there is no real value in discussing it.

Rudely put, but accurate. Look, I'm a raid leader for my WoW guild, I pay attention to things like DPS, and I know that white-box simulation DPS is rarely the same as actual combat DPS. In a game like D&D where combat has even more variety and flexibility than WoW, theoretical DPR is a very misleading number to throw around.

That said, balance is a real issue. In the longest 3.5 campaign I ever played, a 1st to 18th level affair, the rogue's player spent the last third pretty much ignoring combat and only making token rolls because he'd fallen so far being the casters in effectiveness. That sort of thing is bad because it makes players feel useless and ruins the feeling of a party as a team of equals.

There should be balance between classes, and that includes general damage output. Claims of DPR are a terrible metric for measuring that and are often used to insist on far more razor edge balancing than is actually necessary or even possible.

 

[Halivar]

Perfect examples of players who are only concerned with the damage they do. If they weren't, they would not "stack dice" but use other ways to help in combat.

The problem with classes like, say, rogues in pre-4E is that their sum total of combat usefulness IS "+X damage except against blah." If we're going to continue with blanket immunities, then I would like to see a more diverse combat skill-set, NOT related to damage so that they can still contribute meaningfully in encounters where their damage tops out at 1d6+1. For instance, using attacks to expose weak points for teammates, or whatever.

On the flip-side, the fighter in every edition is just horrible in non-combat encounters. I like fighters, and I like roleplaying, and I don't like chanting the mantra "please, DM, don't look at my character sheet" in my head while I'm roleplaying. Now, out-of-combat is easier to solve, house-ruling-wise. Implementing Backgrounds from 4th Age is a great solution, but even a bit more lenience on class skills is sufficient to fix most of those problems.

The problem of combat usefulness, however, is a tougher nut to crack.