D&D General Wizard vs Fighter - the math

[EzekielRaiden]

Well, I could reiterate: why are you turning an argument about mechanical balance into one about quality of design?

Because balance is one of the important elements of design quality in any mathematical structure designed to achieve a specific end?

The statement is technically tautological ("balanced" means "achieves the designed end," within defined statistical limits), but I hope that that is acceptable.

 

[pemerton]

Because balance is one of the important elements of design quality in any mathematical structure designed to achieve a specific end?

The statement is technically tautological ("balanced" means "achieves the designed end," within defined statistical limits), but I hope that that is acceptable.

But obviously for a lot of RPGers a RPG is not a "mathematical structure designed to achieve a specific end".

The discussion about mechanical balance makes sense on its own terms, but the attempt to generalise it to quality of design or playability of the game - from either side - seems fraught to me.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

But obviously for a lot of RPGers a RPG is not a "mathematical structure designed to achieve a specific end".

The discussion about mechanical balance makes sense on its own terms, but the attempt to generalise it to quality of design or playability of the game - from either side - seems fraught to me.

Alright. If others are willing to discharge the "sales/dollars = quality" argument, I'm willing to do the same on this.

 

[payn]

Alright. If others are willing to discharge the "sales/dollars = quality" argument, I'm willing to do the same on this.

Who is making that argument?

 

[pemerton]

Alright. If others are willing to discharge the "sales/dollars = quality" argument, I'm willing to do the same on this.

To me, it seems obvious that there is a big part of the D&D play community for whom the principal function of the PC sheet is to serve as a loosely-rated series of descriptors, and for whom the principal element in resolution is not the maths but the GM. This was true back in the days of AD&D 2nd ed (and even later AD&D play), and 5e D&D seems to foster a very similar approach albeit with more focus on the realisation of the player's vision of their PC.

For these play groups, the mathematical/mechanical balance between classes doesn't really matter (provided it's not so bonkers that the descriptors become unworkable) as all the real action in adjudicating outcomes is via the GM.

Part of the point of my post upthread about the "why can't everyone do that" element of design is as follows:

To an extent, it is true to say that the sorts of players I've described just above won't be adversely affected by adjustments to the fighter that improve mechanical balance - for instance, strengthening a particular feat (say, the Grappler feat) probably won't adversely affect them. But this is true only to an extent. Give the fighter too many more instances of Action Surge, for instance, and for this group the ability ceases to serve its purpose in their play - of connoting the fighter making a mighty, Captain America-esque surge of strength to help their friends and bop more bad guys - and instead starts to make the fighter just look like the Flash, racing around at what is (for them) an implausible rate of activity relative to the rest of the participants in the combat.

My feeling is that the WotC design team is quite conscious of this sort of issue - I think it's what they are getting at when they talk about the "feel" or the "story" of a particular class. And it's why mechanical balance is not the only goal of their design. Saying that it's bad design to keep in mind this important part of their customer base strikes me as unhelpful. It seems better just to focus on the actual issue - ie the lack of mechanical balance.

 

[James Gasik]

To me, it seems obvious that there is a big part of the D&D play community for whom the principal function of the PC sheet is to serve as a loosely-rated series of descriptors, and for whom the principal element in resolution is not the maths but the GM. This was true back in the days of AD&D 2nd ed (and even later AD&D play), and 5e D&D seems to foster a very similar approach albeit with more focus on the realisation of the player's vision of their PC.

For these play groups, the mathematical/mechanical balance between classes doesn't really matter (provided it's not so bonkers that the descriptors become unworkable) as all the real action in adjudicating outcomes is via the GM.

Part of the point of my post upthread about the "why can't everyone do that" element of design is as follows:

To an extent, it is true to say that the sorts of players I've described just above won't be adversely affected by adjustments to the fighter that improve mechanical balance - for instance, strengthening a particular feat (say, the Grappler feat) probably won't adversely affect them. But this is true only to an extent. Give the fighter too many more instances of Action Surge, for instance, and for this group the ability ceases to serve its purpose in their play - of connoting the fighter making a mighty, Captain America-esque surge of strength to help their friends and bop more bad guys - and instead starts to make the fighter just look like the Flash, racing around at what is (for them) an implausible rate of activity relative to the rest of the participants in the combat.

My feeling is that the WotC design team is quite conscious of this sort of issue - I think it's what they are getting at when they talk about the "feel" or the "story" of a particular class. And it's why mechanical balance is not the only goal of their design. Saying that it's bad design to keep in mind this important part of their customer base strikes me as unhelpful. It seems better just to focus on the actual issue - ie the lack of mechanical balance.

Which means the quality of the design is in the eye of the beholder (not Xanathar). If you actually think Fighters tapping into the Speed Force is cool, you really could see more uses of Action Surge as good design!

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Who is making that argument?

Well, let's see.

And those games sell .001% of what WotC does. Why? One reason is, they don't appeal to the masses. I have played other games. Some are really good. But they are good for a specific playstyle. Like crunching numbers all day, play PF1. It's awesome for that. Want realistic crit charts and tables upon tables of different damage via armor and weapons. Grab some old school Rolemaster. Etc.
These are great games. They cater to a specific playstyle. D&D 5e caters to a specific playstyle. And they are more popular than anything. It's not just legacy. It is a better and broader play experience that most people enjoy.

Sales = quality; other games sell less, so they are clearly lower quality, while D&D sells more, and is thus better quality. "A better...play experience".

I stand by what I said. In a game with multiple competing options the only objective measurement we can make is what people choose to play. That doesn't mean it's the best fighter that could hypothetically exist, there's always room for improvement. But in comparison to the other classes that actually exist in the game? People choose fighter over the other options.

Popularity (which, for products, really is pretty much identical to sales) = quality. If it is played a lot, it must be good, otherwise people wouldn't play it.

5e has made more money than any edition of D&D ever, it's still making gobs of money. Saying they would have made EVEN MORE money if they'd just done X (which happens to align with "my" tastes) is pure unsupportable hubris.

There is a reason they abandoned modular design (which is essentially what you are advocating for) - and the decision (though I personally am sad about it) seems to be working quite well for them.

"5e is already the best it can be because it makes ridiculous amounts of money. It is hubris to argue that changes any individual person likes could improve how much money 5e made, therefore, 5e is the best it can be." Again, sales = quality.

I welcome any corrections the above posters would like to make that disclaim the connection between popularity/sales and quality.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

My feeling is that the WotC design team is quite conscious of this sort of issue - I think it's what they are getting at when they talk about the "feel" or the "story" of a particular class. And it's why mechanical balance is not the only goal of their design. Saying that it's bad design to keep in mind this important part of their customer base strikes me as unhelpful. It seems better just to focus on the actual issue - ie the lack of mechanical balance.

Alright.

I believe they have focused on that to the exclusion of almost everything else, and as a result, consider that "uber alles" approach bad design.

 

[payn]

Well, let's see.


Sales = quality; other games sell less, so they are clearly lower quality, while D&D sells more, and is thus better quality. "A better...play experience".


Popularity (which, for products, really is pretty much identical to sales) = quality. If it is played a lot, it must be good, otherwise people wouldn't play it.


"5e is already the best it can be because it makes ridiculous amounts of money. It is hubris to argue that changes any individual person likes could improve how much money 5e made, therefore, 5e is the best it can be." Again, sales = quality.

I welcome any corrections the above posters would like to make that disclaim the connection between popularity/sales and quality.

I dont see the sales means quality here. I see arguments that the game is choice for many folks and widely accessible making 5E a good product as is. That its so popular the severity of need for mechanical changes could be a risk to its success.

Im also with the folks that dont agree with the "5E is bad design" as a settled fact.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

I dont see the sales means quality here. I see arguments that the game is choice for many folks and widely accessible making 5E a good product as is. That its so popular the severity of need for mechanical changes could be a risk to its success.

But the bolded statement is that argument. You are, quite literally, saying that this path, and this path alone, are the reason why it is financially successful. The only way your claim works is if it is bidirectional: this design caused success (which is inarguable, 5e has clearly made money!), but also success could only come from this design (which is extremely arguable).

The designers have already said that changes need to be made. They wouldn't put the money, time, and effort into making 5.5e, regardless of whatever names they want to use to dance around it, unless they felt changes were necessary.

Further, as I argued multiple times above and in other threads, the changes are not severe. This mischaracterization--that there needs to be some horrific massive overhaul that would totally replace huge chunks of the game--is a big part of why these discussions always go round and round and round. Someone (sometimes me!) asks for improvements, and gets painted as having posted the ninety-five theses. I would, of course, prefer bigger changes rather than smaller ones, and anyone who's known me for any length of time on here knows this, but I have to be pragmatic. That's the only reason I have any interest in 5e at all (well, other than helping friends navigate its rules). Finding games of any interest to me that aren't 5e D&D is nigh-on impossible, so I must take what I can get. That is why I provided actual, concrete suggestions for what I would consider an absolute bare-minimum, "ragged edge of acceptability" type solution to the problem. It isn't a solution I'm happy with, but it's a solution I can tolerate, designed to conform to the requirements @pemerton described above (straightforward, easy-to-use, compatible with nigh-exclusive focus on GM fiat, well-connected to the Fighter concept as a gritty hero rather than "The Flash," etc.), albeit not exactly knowingly, since I did so before those requirements were posted.

You may note that almost no one actually responded to those concrete examples. There's a reason I often don't bother--almost nobody is interested in that kind of conversation.

Im also with the folks that dont agree with the "5E is bad design" as a settled fact.

Okay. The designers disagree with you. That's literally why we have "2024 5e." You don't put out a video from one of your lead designers explicitly saying that certain classes fall behind because people fail to take the expected numbers of rests, if there are no faults present in the design.

Of course, this just loops back into the above, the either-or, black and white thinking problem. Either the game is absolutely perfect and making any changes at all would destroy its success utterly and irrevocably, or it is the dirt-worst most rotten garbage ever penned by man. It can't be a decent-ish product that mostly lucked into fantastical success by doing some things well and some things poorly. It has to either be the greatest thing since sliced bread or the worst thing since rancid mayonnaise--and the reason given is invariably "because a lot of people played it" (hence, popularity = quality) or "because it sold a lot" (hence, sales = quality.)