'Balancing' Races?

[Skunkape]

The biggest problem I see with trying to balance characters is that you've got to determine what constitutes a benefit as far as your game play is concerned. Until you get that idea resolved, making one characteristic, (meaning stats, powers, etc.) worth more than another is really only just speculation.

What I would suggest to find a way to 'balance' characters would be to examine how every aspect of the character will work for your campaign. Let me explain in a way that hopefully, I'll get my point across in.

Let's say as a GM, your campaign will be one that's mainly hack and slash. Obviously, any stat that helps with combat, whether we're talking melee or magic, would be worth more than a stat that helped strictly with role-playing. So for instance, the STR stat would be worth more than the APP stat in that campaign because STR helps in combat, while APP helps with role-playing.

If your campaign is one that deals with political intrigue or other role-playing aspects, more than combat, then APP would be worth more than STR. I'm generalizing to the extreme here, but you should get my point.

So how do you come up with a method of balance? To me, you’ll have to look over what kind of campaign you’re interested in running and then try to determine which stats, powers, skills, etc. are going to be the most important. Then those same abilities would be worth more to have at higher levels. Until you get that information set, I don't see how you'll be able to 'balance' characters for your game.

I hope that gets my point across?

[sladethesniper]

The biggest problem I see with trying to balance characters is that you've got to determine what constitutes a benefit as far as your game play is concerned. Until you get that idea resolved, making one characteristic, (meaning stats, powers, etc.) worth more than another is really only just speculation.

What I would suggest to find a way to 'balance' characters would be to examine how every aspect of the character will work for your campaign. Let me explain in a way that hopefully, I'll get my point across in.

Let's say as a GM, your campaign will be one that's mainly hack and slash. Obviously, any stat that helps with combat, whether we're talking melee or magic, would be worth more than a stat that helped strictly with role-playing. So for instance, the STR stat would be worth more than the APP stat in that campaign because STR helps in combat, while APP helps with role-playing.

If your campaign is one that deals with political intrigue or other role-playing aspects, more than combat, then APP would be worth more than STR. I'm generalizing to the extreme here, but you should get my point.

So how do you come up with a method of balance? To me, you’ll have to look over what kind of campaign you’re interested in running and then try to determine which stats, powers, skills, etc. are going to be the most important. Then those same abilities would be worth more to have at higher levels. Until you get that information set, I don't see how you'll be able to 'balance' characters for your game.

I hope that gets my point across?

Skunkape has stated what I thought I was trying to say, although he did it in a more appropos and easily understood manner.

Distilled, I think it comes down to the GM, with player input, determining what the campaign will focus on. From that information, make characters to fit that campaign instead of making a campaign to fit characters, which has happened far too many times in my experience.

frogspawner's point:

But it's not necessarily about slapping down the powergamer. Maybe it's just to avoid a fledgeling roleplayer being disappointed, to find their interesting character choice is inneffectual compared to their friends'.

Viewed that way, balanced character creation (which must include races) is actually an aid to good roleplaying.

is valid, and comes close to what I think Tywyll was trying to discuss.

I agree that coming up with an incentive for players to choose a certain class/profession/race, especially for new players, is important...but, again, in my experience, a beginning player's first character is usually a joint effort between that player (who has a "cool" idea), other players (to point out what would make it "better") and the GM (to give guidance initially and approval to the final character).

Therefore, it seems to me that what it ultimately comes down to is finding a niche for each race/class/profession combination. Some niches can be found in racial stats, profession bonuses and other "crunchy bits", others are found in the setting and the remainder are for the GM to make.

The caveat to that is "coolness". I have played just about every race, including "lame" ones, because the GM said: "We are playing a game about a Goblin tribe...make your goblin...and here's the mods I'm allowing".

It was a fun game, even though I lost my first character in the first "combat" round of the first fight to a 9 year old girl with a butcher knife...critical strike...she was hiding in the cabinet...

Therefore, I would posit that even though a goblin would NEVER, EVER be something I would have chosen to play (along with Twillek violinist/mob lawyer, a D&D druid, or a homeless ex-corporate middle manager, a human District Attorney, a Quickling Mercenary that rode around on his Yak Man slave...) due their ultimate failure as combat monsters, I enjoyed playing all of them because the Characters fit the campaign...

:deadhorse:

:focus:

Ahem...so...I think balance is a GM issue with rules/stats playing a minor supporting role, if at all.

Again, all my opinions.

- STS