Wow...great posts everyone! Covering a lot of great ground here. I had my work cut out for me reading every single post.
There are so many points I want to cover, I'll just try to address people by name instead of invidual posts I can't remember (let alone quote all of them). Apologies if I misspell anyone's name.
@greenknight0
Excellent posts, as usual.
@ Autolycus
Great posts, I agree with you.
@abdulAlhazred
You had one great post about balance being important in the game. I totally agreed with that. After that I'm not sure I can fully agree with your other points.
@mablok:
Excellent posts, as always. Kudos!
@rykku
Excellent posts. So much good information I couldn't even begin to address all the great points you brought up. I hope the WotC crew seriously considers your opinnions for 5e.
@Lord Daxi
I think you win the 'best post while I was gone' award. Your post doesn't consider game balance whatsoever, but it pretty much sums up what this whole thread is about. I wouldn't quite go so far as to say 'game balance' is completely irrelevant. However, I too, would like a much higher ratio of role-playing/options/exploration to combat in the game. I think game balance is a seperate issue. I'm all for game balance.
@Gunthar
I think you need a better GM. Just saying. In any game I run no player would ever be left out of the loop for 2 1/2 hours. If anyone ever ended up with a character 'weaker' than the others like what you're describing I'd arbitrarily soup them up. Powergaming is pretty much irrelevant in my games. I'm sorry you had to experience all that.
@Gelatinous Octahedron, Tony Vargas, Aldrien, Lawolf, Lokaire and anyone else I missed who's awesome
Sorry for not addressing your points directly. You guys are geniuses. I just don't have enough space (or time) to address all your points without going insane. Keep up the good work!
To sum up:
I think I'm detecting a trend here with everyone arguing 'for game-balance'. I think we're kind of missing the thread topic. Everyone likes game balance, I like it, you like, the guy who created the thread probably liked it. I don't think anyone is arguing for a 'less balanced' game (or if they are, I have to disagree).
What they 'are' arguing for is: better role-playing options, more exploration, and less emphasis on combat in the rules. In other words, we love game balance, but we love role-playing/options/exploration 'more' than game balance.
I'd say that in D&D role-playing/options/exploration outranks game balance in importance by several orders of magnitude. Give me a game rich in role-playing oportunity (for everyone at all times) and story and I'm happy as a pig in a mud hole (and I wouldn't care if the game balance was shot to he**).
If we can have both, that's awesome. If we have to choose between role-playing/options/and exploration vs. combat and game balance; I'd have to say I'd choose the fomer in a heartbeat over the latter.
It's only set up to be about feats but if you include a 'comment' saying it should apply to the whole game, that would be awesome. (if you disagree with me, please, also, vote. Share your opinion everyone!)
--David L. Dostaler Author, Challenger RPG (it's free)
I think my basic reaction though is if nobody is arguing against game balance then why are there so many people stating that game balance does all these bad things? I have yet to see any argument for why game balance is opposed to other goals. I see ABSOLUTELY no reason to believe that game balance is antithetical to things like exploration or other aspects of the game being highlighted more. The best 'logic' I can see for this kind of theory is that if wizards are a bit less powerful then it is harder for the party to get past those kinds of obstacles. OK, that's fine. Why does there have to be a simple convenient way to spell-cast your way past things? Is it really ADDING to the fun of exploration if one character is always handed more and better tools? Especially when those tools are as straightforward to deploy as most spells are in most situations. It isn't like a huge chasm across the way is hard to defeat with a fly spell. I'd find it hard to imagine that scenario is improved by having easy access to flight. Maybe more to the point I can't see any reason why it is made more interesting by having the fly spell 'just work' while the rogue has a good chance of falling and the fighter has a good chance of coming up short trying to jump across.
Honestly, a careful analysis of 4e's character resources shows that they really did a pretty decent job of making things interesting. Noncombat situations are actually handled quite well. I can understand the "combat is spotlighted too much" thing, but that is not a subject that relates to balance per-se. Nor does a design goal of having PCs be fairly balanced in combat really relate much to other situations. It simply insures that in one of the more common activities in the game most of the time most of the characters will be reasonably capable.
Really I don't even personally see a HUGE problem with what happens in combat balance-wise with 1e casters, at least up to say 12th level. They can get problematic in specific situations but reasonably my ranger could mostly still manage to pull his weight. All 4e did was tone things down a bit for the casters and put some powers on my character so he didn't have to be just an item caddy to hope to compete there. I can't help finding that to be a good thing.
What if I counter argue that the DM should easily be able to hand the wizard worldshaking power with items and favorable situations and such so he's got his superiority to the fighter? I don't think you'd like that argument. Yet it is EXACTLY the same argument you're making. Stand back and think about this for a minute. Not one argument you've made doesn't work exactly as well in reverse? So don't you think you have a certain bias here that is getting in the way of perhaps seeing other points of view?
Nobody ever says, "I play 4E except I give all spells +6 to hit, I only allow saves after the 3rd round of a magical effect, I give casters a free feat that divides ritual cost and casting time by 10, but I compensate by making only about 1/4 of the treasure good for casters which IMO is the perfect balance." It's one thing to say a system should be designed to favor one type of character, but when given an easy opportunity to make it happen, well, you're right, no one bothers. If the imbalance is already there in the rules, it's embraced because it seems like it was sanctioned by a far wiser person, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary.
Ed_Warlord, on what it takes to make a thread work: I think for it to be really constructive, everyone would have to be honest with each other, and with themselves.
Areleth: How does this help the problems we have with Fighters? Do you think that every time I thought I was playing D&D what I was actually doing was slamming my head in a car door and that if you just explain how to play without doing that then I'll finally enjoy the game?
Where does the system mastery concern that actually came up in the thread fit into this? Or are you simply renaming "system mastery" as "an extreme form of reading comprehension?"
Someone complained that they did not want a game that requires system mastery.
Pro DnD Member of the Axis of Awesome
Fighters: Using socks to kill monsters since 2012
DnD Next: Now with more then 4 minutes of Roleplay per gaming hour
"If you can't make an interesting human fighter, then you aren't ready to play anything else yet" Edymnion
"The idea of resting up between encounters to fill-up on hit points and spells struck my meta-gaming nine-year-old as a distinct possibility. "Are you mad?" says my seven-year-old "This place is full of monsters!" "jamesgrahamuk
Sometimes that story is short and sometimes it is long. They can be tragic, comic or absurd. Some teach. Some are just to fill the empty spaces in our lives. Rarely it is a transcendent fugue only half remembered but wondered at. And frequently: "it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing." -William Shakespeare
If you don't like the wizard killing everything in the room in the first round, lets say he's sensitive and lets the guy charge in and attack. What is he supposed to just sit there and wait for the other guy to get tired, and beat up before casting his 1 hit kills all spell or what? It just reverses the person that's bored...
Indeed, lokiare, that really isn't a fix. The superior solution would be to remove the ability of one class to obviate anothers usefullness, while replacing it with the ability to contribute via synergy to the combat.
So, to use your example, why not let the Wizard cast Blind so that the fighter can slip past the monster's reach, and begin engaging the baddie at close range?
Why not let the Wizard do one of those AOE slides, break up the wall of meat protecting an enemy archer, so the Barbarian can charge in and splatter the thing?
Let the Wizard contribute to the battle, not dominate it. At the end of the fight, there shouldn't be someone who "won the fight." Everybody should have helped win the fight. Sure, there can be an MVP, but....there's a difference between a player who is valuble and a player who is essential. 3e Wizards dominate battles, and are essential. 4e Wizards contribute to battles, and are valuble.
But Ogiwan, 4e is TA DEVILLLL!!!! It CANNOT have done anything right! Get your story straight and get on board man!
+1!!! I love rifts! Great stories and setting! It's totally unbalanced but totally fun. It's far from perfect, but I love it.
stuff about rifts
It's true, the system can put a rogue scholar with a glitterboy pilot. I think it's a bit more realistic, since people are what they are. There aren't classes so much as occupations. It's not like in D&D where your class might be a rogue, but your job is an adventurer, or assassin, or spy, or whatever. If you're a spy, you OCC (occcupational character class) is a spy. There are tons of these like preachers, police officer, mechanic, etc. along with more combatty ones like your soldiers, robot pilots, cyborgs, mages, psychics, pretty much anything you can think of.
Yeah, it's not balanced and the system is pretty rough, but that's not really what it's about. It's about playing a role in a post apocalyptic world. It's not really about a 5th level party fighting a challenging encounter, it's just about living in a dangerous world and having to cope. It's more based on storytelling rather than being a game system. The rules are there just to resolve conflict and explain how the world works, not to be a great focus or entertaining. The entertainment comes from living in the rich world and playing a fun character whatever that may be (options are practically limitless in rifts)
Another thing is that even though one might play a vagabond with no great abilities, this vagabond can always have the great equalizer: a gun. Also, the glitterboy in your example is pretty strong, yes. However he also has to spend time to extend anchors from the power armor's feet into the ground because of the massive recoil from his Boom gun, which takes time and makes the glitter boy immobile and vulerable temporarily. Also, the glitter boy pilot is only so strong when inside of the glitter boy. One can't live inside it, so is very vulnerable outside of it. Of course outside a smart glitter boy pilot would still carry a gun and some body armor, but that just comes with living in a post apocalyptic world. And as far as non-combat related abilities the glitter boy pilot likely comes a bit short. Fighting is only so important.
Someone complained that they did not want a game that requires system mastery.
OK, I'm a guy who people think is being sarcastic when he isn't or is being serious when he isn't, so I try to understand people who may share my problem. Were you just snarkily calling system mastery by a different name but not really disagreeing with the basic concept, or were you trying to say that system mastery doesn't exist and that anyone who is unable to make high-end optimized characters needs to learn to read? Or something else?
Ed_Warlord, on what it takes to make a thread work: I think for it to be really constructive, everyone would have to be honest with each other, and with themselves.
Areleth: How does this help the problems we have with Fighters? Do you think that every time I thought I was playing D&D what I was actually doing was slamming my head in a car door and that if you just explain how to play without doing that then I'll finally enjoy the game?
Someone complained that they did not want a game that requires system mastery.
OK, I'm a guy who people think is being sarcastic when he isn't or is being serious when he isn't, so I try to understand people who may share my problem. Were you just snarkily calling system mastery by a different name but not really disagreeing with the basic concept, or were you trying to say that system mastery doesn't exist and that anyone who is unable to make high-end optimized characters needs to learn to read? Or something else?
1. System mastery should not be built into the game. It's bad design and rewards players who, to be honest, have nothing better to do than analzye the rules (or just browse Char Op forums). Very few people who just play the game, even regularly, reazlie mistakes made until it's too late in the game.
Sometimes I get the feeling that "System Mastery" is nothing more then "Reading Comprehension" in which case you are always going to have players at different levels unless you make it as easy to understand as possible.
I do not understand how the statement that "you need to make it as easy to understand as possible" is really code for "anyone who is unable to make high-end optimized characters needs to learn to read".
The core system really does need to be as easy to understand as possible.
However, the more options and expansions that you add to the core product the more you are going to increase "system mastery" because of differences in the levels of players reading comprehension. ie The guy that plays once every year just is not going to have the same level of comprehension as the guy who has nothing better to do then analyze the rules.
Personally I like to read DnD books and do not mind that there is system mastery in the game, but because I want DnD to be successful by being as accessible to as many people as possible then I also want the core system to be as easy to understand as possible.
Pro DnD Member of the Axis of Awesome
Fighters: Using socks to kill monsters since 2012
DnD Next: Now with more then 4 minutes of Roleplay per gaming hour
"If you can't make an interesting human fighter, then you aren't ready to play anything else yet" Edymnion
"The idea of resting up between encounters to fill-up on hit points and spells struck my meta-gaming nine-year-old as a distinct possibility. "Are you mad?" says my seven-year-old "This place is full of monsters!" "jamesgrahamuk
Sometimes that story is short and sometimes it is long. They can be tragic, comic or absurd. Some teach. Some are just to fill the empty spaces in our lives. Rarely it is a transcendent fugue only half remembered but wondered at. And frequently: "it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing." -William Shakespeare
Where does the system mastery concern that actually came up in the thread fit into this? Or are you simply renaming "system mastery" as "an extreme form of reading comprehension?"
Someone complained that they did not want a game that requires system mastery.
Ideally a game should be intuitive and simple enough that its easy to learn, but deep and varied enough that it can be played many times. There aren't a lot of ideal games - chess is often held up as an example, the rules being simple to learn, but the game being very hard to master (and even masters are always improving).
A balanced game with many balanced options is closer to an ideal game than a complex but poorly balanced one with few meaningful choices hidden among many bad ones, or an overly simple one with few choices at all.
A game that is broken by 'system mastery' is just not a very good game. It'll fail to stand up to repeated play because once everyone has identified the best choice it stops being a challenge.
The way D&D constantly adds suplements (or in the case of 4e, 'udates') and rolls revs is really pretty damning evidence that it's /never/ been very close to the ideal of what a game should be.
For the purposes of absurdist hyperbole, lets take a look at one of the other pillars of the game, SOCIAL. Right, so imagine that no matter your class, your background, you had something meaningful to do in every social occassion (cos if you didnt you may just die of boredom ). You meet the King in court, and the fighter, the rogue, the bard and the barbarian are all equally with great care to math and plusses relevant in this situation, equally, differently, but they can all do something. They all have power social cards to win him and his advisors over. The fighter goes all calm and plays "it is an honour your liege" social card, the female rogue plays "seductive, meow!", the bard plays "bring the house down!" and the barbarian plays "gift of the nomad walkers". Then you leave the king and meet the harbor master. The fighter sighs and plays "it is an honour your liege", the female rogue plays "seductive, meow!", the bard plays "booooooaaaatttssss on the water!" and the barbarian plays "gift of the nomad walkers".
See, the only problem I see with this situation is that apparently everyone only has one "social power" to use. I might lose you by using a combat example, but in my experience it is not uncommon in 4e to find that a particular power you have chosen fails to do anything useful in the current combat encounter because of situational considerations; this works fine, because you still have all the rest of your powers to use. Once the female rogue has more options in the social pillar than "seductive, meow!," then you can easily take that option off the table (maybe put a straight female NPC in an important position) without telling the player, "Sorry, since this guy is gay, you have to sit on your hands for the next ten minutes." Once you have that, you can use varying and nuanced social encounters, because if the circumstances of a particular encounter nullify a character's main conversational tactics, they can still adjust and participate. This is actually one of the problems with the way social skill challenges in 4e are often set up, because it's not uncommon to see published skill challenges where attempting to Intimidate the NPC is an automatic fail, which means you get to sit out the negotiations because you're playing a Barbarian and the only social skill on your class skill list is Intimidate.
Maybe you dont see the ridiculouslessness of making sure that each class remains EQUALLY relevant to one another in the social pillar. I'd argue, continue to argue, that forced parity (so that the player doesnt get bored) in any one pillar (combat included) isnt the kind of balance i'd want from a game system. The notion that combat balance is good and fine for the game system, suggests that there arent 3 pillars... There is one... Its called combat, the other two things are wooden supports in a dusty old forgotten mine called social and exploration. And if all classes can do all things in every situation no matter what, well they may as well all be wizards.
I can understand the argument that 4e spent so much book space on combat that it deemphasized the other pillars, but I don't see how balancing one pillar automatically requires the others to be neglected. If 3.X had removed all the mind-affecting spells and put everyone on equal footing in social skills, would that have resulted in combat and exploration being neglected? Maybe I'm misunderstanding what you're trying to say here.
Can somebody record a video of people playing 4E and role-playing and then put it on youtube.com? I want to bookmark it and trot it out every time somene complains that you can't roleplay in 4E.
). You meet the King in court, and the fighter, the rogue, the bard and the barbarian are all equally with great care to math and plusses relevant in this situation, equally, differently, but they can all do something. They all have power social cards to win him and his advisors over. The fighter goes all calm and plays "it is an honour your liege" social card, the female rogue plays "seductive, meow!", the bard plays "bring the house down!" and the barbarian plays "gift of the nomad walkers". Then you leave the king and meet the harbor master. The fighter sighs and plays "it is an honour your liege", the female rogue plays "seductive, meow!", the bard plays "booooooaaaatttssss on the water!" and the barbarian plays "gift of the nomad walkers".
