Does the average gamer really care about game balance?

[Bill Bisco: Isometric Imp]

As I've been posting to a Civilization IV mod forum, highlighting the most optimal strategies, it strikes me as very puzzling that some people don't quite get it.

If one strategy is akin to using Shin Akuma in Street Fighter II Turbo (he beats all other characters) shouldn't everyone be more concerned with that than if elves are more heavily populated than humans or if according to the game lore, this one unit really belongs to another religion.

Should people really be worrying about if what a Fighter can do is realistic when wizards are much much more powerful than Fighers?

What don't I understand? Are we playing different games? Why is every strategy or tactic that beats everything called an exploit rather than a legitimate strategy that you'd be a fool not to do?

[Caedrus]

If one strategy is akin to using Shin Akuma in Street Fighter II Turbo (he beats all other characters) shouldn't everyone be more concerned with that than if elves are more heavily populated than humans or if according to the game lore, this one unit really belongs to another religion.

Should I care more about mechanical balance than the integrity of the plot and game world? I don't think so, no. At least not as a universal principle.

Should people really be worrying about if what a Fighter can do is realistic when wizards are much much more powerful than Fighers?

This is a rather different question, and the issue here is basically "you can't have it both ways." (I want to stab dragons the size of a small keep with skin like supple adamantine and command over time and space to death with my longsword in head to head combat, but I want to be totally within realistic capabilities of a real human being!)

[Psychic Robot]

Are we playing different games?

Yes, you are, in a sense.

Why is every strategy or tactic that beats everything called an exploit rather than a legitimate strategy that you'd be a fool not to do?

Because it's lame when everyone uses the same strategy that happens to beat everyone else's strategy.

[Lago PARANOIA]

Should I care more about mechanical balance than the integrity of the plot and game world? I don't think so, no. At least not as a universal principle.

These two things are related in an RPG. Actually, related implies too weak of a connection but then again sometimes it isn't necessarily so.

That might be a bit too abstract so let me put this in another way. Most D&D settings have all of the real (high levels) movers and shakers end up being wizards or spellcasters of some sort. This is an obvious outcome of D&D's (even 4th Edition's) spellcaster fetishism. However, this also contradicts an obvious game balance axiom: that there are also fighters, rogues, warlords, etc. and they're supposed to be equal to the wizards.

So you have a problem here. Either there's a problem with your representation of the movers and shakers (which means that there should be more high-level rogues and fighters who move things, there's just wizard-bias) or there's dissonance with your 'classes are balanced' paradigm--such as high-level rogues and fighters don't get to be in the Who's Who of badasses because they are not in fact badasses. Which means that since equal-levelled fighters and rogues aren't as world-shaking they are not in fact badasses.

Of course, you can also just introduce a third tenet into your setting that clears up the contradiction. Such as most NPC fighters and rogues don't make it to high level because, even though they would be equal to their wizard buddies if they did reach it, their advancement scheme (fight badasses and go spelunking in hell dungeons) kills off most of them. Wizards by contrast can become badasses just by safely sitting in a tower all day and studying.

Or if you're in, say, a Harry Potter setting you could have it so that wizards who forgo the magic path and just train really hardcore with swords and weights. Even though you, once you reach high level, could theoretically still be mechanically equal with your wizard buddies the culture of the setting frowns upon swordery and champions magicery. So the Rogue's Gallery still has more wizards in it.

[RandomCasualty2]

Why is every strategy or tactic that beats everything called an exploit rather than a legitimate strategy that you'd be a fool not to do?

It's not really an exploit, it's just the sign of a terrible strategy game.

[Lago PARANOIA]

Should people really be worrying about if what a Fighter can do is realistic when wizards are much much more powerful than Fighers?

Depends.

If you have a setting where magic is low-key then you can have 'realistic' fighters and wizards in the same setting.

In Shadowrun, it works out okay. Mind, magic isn't really that huge of a deal in the setting. It'd definitely be a huge deal if all of the magic went away but the setting wouldn't fall apart.

In a lot of heroic fantasy games however magic is a lot more powerful and more important to the setting. It is a very big deal when you hold magic to a different standard to nonmagic. You can either make everyone nonmagic (like 4E does) or you can make everyone magic (like Ars Magica does) but you can't do the half-and-half 3E approach.

[souran]

It depends on what you mean by balance and what sort of game you are playing.

Any game where all sides are supposedly equal people care. I mean if you were playing chess and white got to start with all the pawns as queens there would be pretty heavy QQ.

In wargames and strategy games its a little different. Unless the sides get the same playing pieces part of the strategy becomes piece selection. In this sort of scenario what players want is an equal opportunity to win. Even if it is clear that piece a is suckors and piece b is awesome, somebody will probably be willing to play piece set a as long as he gets say 3 to 1 or 5 to one or something like that. However, if one group has a weakness that is always fatal it will cause more complaining than one group having an ability that is nearly insurmountable.

The other common thing is that people can often be fooled by "game changing" abilities or some characteristic that can supposedly swing the game in their favor. If all groups in the game have these, and some are clearly inferior to others, its still possible to get fairly even distribution because people will think that if things are claimed to be equal that they are equal.


Just look at warhammer. As the production cycle moves so do which armies are viable and which are not. Armies are weakest when going by the "generic" version of their army without special rules and strongest right after the release of their armybook when their rules are unknown to people who don't go over each book with a magnifingy glass. While the game gets loots of QQ it also is generally believed to be fairly balanced between factions and fairly balanced between melee/ranged combat.

If your talking about RPGs its different yet again. While you can dissect all the playre types and whatnot what most people find that they want is to contribute and maybe even hog the spotlight for something. Nobody wants to be 6th best player on a basketball team. They just want to be starters. They want to be always relevant and do their thing. Thats why there is so much talk about the fighter here. Its also why bo9s helped. bo9s characters where not as good as wizards but they were also not totally irrelevant in combat either. It pretty much let people be high level fighters.

[Caedrus]

Should people really be worrying about if what a Fighter can do is realistic when wizards are much much more powerful than Fighers?

Depends.

Lago, this is a blatant misquote. Those words are Bill Bisco's, not mine. Please fix your quote so that it does not misrepresent me. :irked:

[Hicks]

Should people really be worrying about if what a Fighter can do is realistic when wizards are much much more powerful than Fighers?

As long as there is a player that write's "Fighter" on their character sheet, their dungeon master and fellow players should care. Unless that singular player is a master class rules ninja who creates a "Fighter" with 3 or more synergestic classes with feats and alternate abilities scoured from 7 books, that character is a liability to himself, his party, and the narrative continuation of the game.

Are we playing different games?

The "fighter" is, and his game tastes a lot like an ass shaped cake with chocolate shit frosting. I've played that character, and it is not fun to see all and any of your efforts turn to ash within your hands.

---

The concept of a compleatly balanced roleplaying game is laughable at best as long as there is a dungeon master. The game must always be inherently unbalanced in favor of the players, or else the players will not be playing long. Years ago, I gave up complete balance as a design goal, replacing it with the desire for equivalent compotency. As it stands, a "Fighter's" actions are anything but equivalent to a "Mage's"; I believe the the monkier of "Fighter" should not be equavalent to the monkier "Incompotent". Others believe differently; the second most horrible arguement I've ever had with my girlfriend was where she said that a player should sit down at a gaming table and play a "Fighter" alongside another's wizard character and expect to be infiror, because they are fighters.

[Taleran]

I play games, any game for Fun and I can forgive alot if I am having a good time


and 90% of the time that comes down to the DM, and a good DM can make up for a lot of flaws in a system

[Thymos]

While the average gamer may not even know what the word balance is, they care.

Why? Because it makes games more fun.

If you have a game where it being unbalanced doesn't make it less fun, then hell, I don't even care from a game design point of view.

[Bill Bisco: Isometric Imp]

That's an interesting phenomena I don't quite understand Thymos. As soon as these people fight other players or monsters or armies that are much better than them, then their "fun" is ruined.

It's hilarious to watch people ask for the old AI to come back after they can't handle the new smarter AI.

[Maj]

Does the average gamer really care about game balance?

No.

A balanced system is only as good as the calibre of the people playing it. I, for example, hate chess because I'm not very visual or tactical. My mind just doesn't get it, and losing continuously for decades sucks. I would rather handpaint a chess set than play the game, and in fact, I actually have.

The average player cares about whether their character gets enough spotlight time and is useful to the storyline. You could take the most perfectly balanced game and still have unhappy players because they didn't have enough success/fun/participation to make their characters worth playing.

Should people really be worrying about if what a Fighter can do is realistic when wizards are much much more powerful than Fighers?

It's not when wizards are more powerful, it's when wizards are more fantastic. There are more irrational numbers than rational. Likewise, of course a wizard is going to be more powerful when there's no rational limit on what they can actually accomplish. People who limit their fighters based on "reality" or "rationality" when they're involved in a fantasy game are just begging to play weaker characters. The wizard needs no justification for why meteors are falling from the sky indoors. Why should a fighter need an explanation before being able to accomplish something of the same magnitude?

[cthulhu]

Games played head to head have to be balanced. Games that are played co-cooperatively do not have to be balanced.

[Psychic Robot]

As soon as these people fight other players or monsters or armies that are much better than them, then their "fun" is ruined.

I, for one, don't find it fun to be dead in five seconds with the enemy teabagging my corpse. If the game is unwinnable, it rapidly becomes frustrating and unfun. That's not to say that difficult games aren't fun; in fact, they are often quite rewarding. However, if the game's difficulty hinges on any of the following, I consider it unfun.

1. The AI is a Cheating Bastard. You lose because the enemy starts off with twenty-five hydralisks and rushes your base before you can construct additional pylons.

2. Non-Random Random Number Generator: The RNG absolutely hates your guts and will make you miss five times in a row even though you have an 85% chance of hitting.

3. Inappropriate CR: You are fighting creatures or players that have such a numerical bonus over you that winning is nigh impossible.

4. Bullshit Tactics Spam: Instead of an actual strategy based on player skill, your opponent spams one thing--whether it's a unit, attack, spell, or what-have-you--and easily defeats you because he's using an unbeatable combination that shouldn't exist.

[Archmage]

If you haven't, Bill, I suggest checking out sirlin.net. Some of it is kind of annoying and pretentious crap, but the guy who writes the blog and whatever else there is a world Street Fighter championship player who talks about design, game balance, and what it means to "play to win." Here's a sample:

In Street Fighter, the scrub labels a wide variety of tactics and situations “cheap.” This “cheapness” is truly the mantra of the scrub. Performing a throw on someone is often called cheap...The entire purpose of the throw is to be able to damage an opponent who sits and blocks and doesn’t attack. As far as the game is concerned, throwing is an integral part of the design—it’s meant to be there—yet the scrub has constructed his own set of principles in his mind that state he should be totally impervious to all attacks while blocking. The scrub thinks of blocking as a kind of magic shield that will protect him indefinitely. Why? Exploring the reasoning is futile since the notion is ridiculous from the start.

...the scrub is only willing to play to win within his own made-up mental set of rules. These rules can be staggeringly arbitrary. If you beat a scrub by throwing projectile attacks at him, keeping your distance and preventing him from getting near you—that’s cheap. If you throw him repeatedly, that’s cheap, too. We’ve covered that one. If you block for fifty seconds doing no moves, that’s cheap. Nearly anything you do that ends up making you win is a prime candidate for being called cheap. Street Fighter was just one example; I could have picked any competitive game at all.

When we're talking about tabletop RPGs, the scrub takes a different form. Tabletop games are not competitive in the sense that they're not meant to be a adversarial games between players at the table; the party cooperates to achieve goals. But everyone has one goal, whether they admit it or not, and that's "do cool stuff," because people have fun in RPGs by doing cool stuff. Cool is naturally totally subjective.

The tabletop scrub wants to do cool stuff without having to work for it. He believes cool stuff should be handed to him, and that it's his Gygax-given-right that cool stuff happen even if he does things that inevitably lead to boring stuff. It's true that a good GM can make an adventure, even an exciting adventure, out of anything, but players need to participate in the process.

The tabletop scrub doesn't want to learn the rules of the game because doing so takes work and there's the possibility that the game's rules are going to inconvenience him somehow. If the game's rules don't meet the scrub's expectations, it's the rules that need to change--even if the rules are fine and the scrub's expectations are unreasonable given the framework of the game.

Net result: The tabletop scrub's favorite game is Magic Tea Party, but the version of MTP they want to play is completely incomprehensible. They claim they want to be challenged, but they really want to be told they win no matter what they do. They talk big about "real roleplaying" and verisimilitude and how they hate "power gamers," but what they really hate is that idea that if some people at the table are working to exploit the system that their characters are going to look incompetent in play if they don't do the same.

And for some of them, it's not just that they don't want to learn the rules because they're lazy--it's that they think that learning the rules violates the rules and that the only person who should know the rules of the game is the GM. Everyone else is supposed to operate in a black box because even acknowledging that a game is being played and there are rules involved breaks the internal code against "metagaming." To the tabletop scrub, metagaming isn't using rules knowledge ICly in an unfair manner. Metagaming is knowing the rules.

A simulation game like CivIV attracts a lot of people who aren't competitive gamers, even if they claim to be. They want their favorite tactic to be effective, even if it isn't (or there's no reason it should be), because it's their favorite and that's what counts. They want the game to be balanced (so they can make choices based on flavor and still have a shot at winning), but they don't think they care about game balance because understanding game balance means thinking about rules and exploits. They like the illusion of competition, but as soon as someone is actually trying their hardest to win, they get upset because now they have to work at being good at the game. They don't think it's "fun" anymore if they have to put effort into learning the game and exploiting its features to their advantage; they liked it much better when nobody cared who won or lost and gaming was a purely social activity, something to do while you drank a beer or chatted idly.

Note that this is different from recognizing that a game's rules are broken and wanting to fix them. Saying D&D 3.5 doesn't support many fighter archetypes properly and proposing rules changes to fix the problem is the actual solution to the problem and what the scrub would really do if he cared or had the power to think in a solution-oriented manner without tripping over mental roadblocks. The scrub approach is to play the ineffective fighter and complain that the reason they aren't effective is that the GM hasn't given them an artifact sword--which they are owed. (The more annoying version is the player who wants to play the fighter, complains about sucking, and then refuses the artifact sword because having an artifact sword is "munchkin gaming." There's no pleasing these people.)

So, yes, you are playing different games. You actually want to be good at whatever you're doing. They just think they do.

[cthulhu]

Stretching the scrub archetype to table top gaming is difficult, because the definition is a failure to understand that the only thing that matters is competitive success.

[Josh_Kablack]

A balanced system is only as good as the calibre of the people playing it. I, for example, hate chess because I'm not very visual or tactical. My mind just doesn't get it, and losing continuously for decades sucks.

Hey now, I once managed to beat a former junior state chess champion via a rules exploit: We played outside. I wanted to finish the game after the thunderstorm started, but he got cold and wet and conceded the match

[Archmage]

Stretching the scrub archetype to table top gaming is difficult, because the definition is a failure to understand that the only thing that matters is competitive success.

I have to disagree. Tabletop games aren't adversarial, but there is a yardstick for being successful. If you aren't meeting those measures because you won't let yourself, I think that qualifies as a form of scrubbiness, because being a scrub is all about attitude. It's a little different because the game is different, but what makes a scrub a scrub and not simply a "bad player" is the unwillingness to improve.

Even if the game isn't supposed to be the GM versus the players, the players are working as a team against a set of challenges. If you can't build a D&D 3.5 character who can survive an adventure or a series of level-appropriate encounters, you suck at D&D. (Let's not turn this into another thread about on-the-fly competency balancing.) You might be able to contribute to the party somehow even if your character sucks if your very presence enhances the overall fun of everyone at the table, but if you're constantly complaining about your character sucking you're probably not doing that. It's okay to suck at D&D because you're inexperienced or whatever if you take advice from your teammates about how to improve (you're bound to learn something eventually). It's not okay to suck because you've invented imaginary game rules about how knowing the game's rules is cheating.

[RandomCasualty2]

There's a distinct difference between a tabletop RPG and a competitive game. Namely that in a competitive game, you honestly don't care if a player's favorite tactic is viable or not. Even if he thinks massing hydralisks is awesome and should work every game, that's in fact, something you want to avoid. And it's fine to have strategies that suck so bad you'd never want to use them.

However in an RPG, you're actually looking to make your playable concepts viable. If your game has a swordsman option, it should be possible to make a swordsman that doens't suck. And if your game is good, it shouldn't involve jumping through a bunch of character creation hoops and doing a shitload of dumpster diving to achieve that. There is flat out no reason that 20 levels of fighter or barbarian shouldn't be viable, besides bad design and imbalance.

Now most casual players won't care about balance until it starts to affect them in a negative way, like playing a high level fighter.

[Hicks]

RC, I seldom agree with you, but I have nothing but praise for your post above mine. Right post is right.

[cthulhu]

Even if the game isn't supposed to be the GM versus the players, the players are working as a team against a set of challenges.

If you've redefined the 'success' metric as 'competitive success' then the game IS the GM vs the players. Or players vs player.

For example, if you adopt playing to win as the metric for success - the correct strategy is to kill the rest of the party and take their loot after the adventure, which is probably not what you actually want from a co-operative game.

Anyway, co-op isn't competitive, so applying competitive thinking (PtW) to Co-op is dopey.

It's not even team vs team!

[Kaelik]

All this crap is about playing to win is totally retarded.

By which I mean, everyone in this thread using it to mean anything.

The first principle of "Playing to Win" is figuring out what 'Winning' actually is.

Sirlin largely talks about certain types of competitive games in which the answer is blatantly obvious.

To talk with any sense about "Playing to Win" in D&D, you first have to determine what you mean by Winning, and that's why statements about 'killing your party and taking their loot' are fucking retarded.

[RandomCasualty2]

To talk with any sense about "Playing to Win" in D&D, you first have to determine what you mean by Winning, and that's why statements about 'killing your party and taking their loot' are fucking retarded.

Yeah, it'd be like a pitcher showing up to a baseball game and drawing a gun on the batter and shooting him dead.

[shau]

Yeah, it'd be like a pitcher showing up to a baseball game and drawing a gun on the batter and shooting him dead.

That's really more of rugby strategy.