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<blockquote data-quote="ExploderWizard" data-source="post: 6238294" data-attributes="member: 66434">The very concept of game balance has become warped over the years. At one time the term actually meant what it said- balance for the game. The game is not a single encounter, nor is it a single session of play. Balancing things at this small a scale results in a &quot;sameness&quot; between all character types. The type of balance that is needed for a board game intended to resolve itself in a single session not an rpg campaign. The shorter timeframe that balance must be acheived in, the more euro-boardgamey the game will feel. The design of the game overall can also heavily influence balance type. Originally, the score keeping in D&amp;D was done via treasure won. It could be fought for, found by luck, stolen, or tricked/negotiated away from its owner. The exact round by round combat capability of each character was not of huge importance. Everyone could contribute to obtaining treasure in different ways. XP in later versions was obtained primarily via winning encounters. In this case, combat capability was much more important. If a large percentage of encounters involve combat, and those encounters also provide most of the XP, then the game has forced balance into a smaller scale- the play session or the encounter. When playing under such encounter based rules, it is not crazy, nor overly powergaming to want an on-par combat capability regardless of class chosen. If the bulk of play time involves hitting things and the primary means of advancement is likewise, common sense dictates rough equality in this area. I can't fault a player for having two brain cells to rub together. In reality, both larger scale and small scale balance have their place depending on what type of play experience one is going for. I wouldn't want to play a 1E character in a game using the 3E XP system.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="ExploderWizard, post: 6238294, member: 66434"] The very concept of game balance has become warped over the years. At one time the term actually meant what it said- balance for the game. The game is not a single encounter, nor is it a single session of play. Balancing things at this small a scale results in a "sameness" between all character types. The type of balance that is needed for a board game intended to resolve itself in a single session not an rpg campaign. The shorter timeframe that balance must be acheived in, the more euro-boardgamey the game will feel. The design of the game overall can also heavily influence balance type. Originally, the score keeping in D&D was done via treasure won. It could be fought for, found by luck, stolen, or tricked/negotiated away from its owner. The exact round by round combat capability of each character was not of huge importance. Everyone could contribute to obtaining treasure in different ways. XP in later versions was obtained primarily via winning encounters. In this case, combat capability was much more important. If a large percentage of encounters involve combat, and those encounters also provide most of the XP, then the game has forced balance into a smaller scale- the play session or the encounter. When playing under such encounter based rules, it is not crazy, nor overly powergaming to want an on-par combat capability regardless of class chosen. If the bulk of play time involves hitting things and the primary means of advancement is likewise, common sense dictates rough equality in this area. I can't fault a player for having two brain cells to rub together. In reality, both larger scale and small scale balance have their place depending on what type of play experience one is going for. I wouldn't want to play a 1E character in a game using the 3E XP system. [/QUOTE]

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