From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Nicolas
Davoust
Sent: Thursday, January 25, 2001 10:58 PM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: [ogf-d20-l] Classless d20 ideas needed
<< hello (sorry for my bad english) >>
No apology is needed. It's better than my French. (Or my Italian. Or my
Spanish. Or...)
<< A friend of mine made a forensic of the creation
system and the classes. The results could allow to
create every class you need (or not, if you want a
classless game). We must discuss the results of his
examination this WE. >>
I hope to see that at some point. There are others working on similar
classless systems, but I haven't seen any yet.
<< To this point, it seems that some
choices that were made by the developpers of the game
are not balanced (exemple for Star Wars, the
differences between the Attack Bases and the defense
bonuses at high level (Attack max +20 / Def max +14))
Is there any answers to this point ? >>
Certainly, there are some balance problems. That's unavoidable for a couple
of reasons:
1. Different GMs and campaigns will emphasize different aspects of the game.
Suppose the classes were "perfectly" balanced: each class had activities at
which it was superior -- say, diplomacy -- to all other classes, and
activities where it was inferior -- say, combat. These would only be
"balanced" in a game that was a balance of a wide range of activities. Now
put a diplomat character into, say, "Escape From New York", where talking
helps only rarely, and guns keep you alive. The balance is off.
2. Certain genres are not well-served by balance. Looking at the charts in
Star Wars, it looks to me like a high-level Jedi has a serious advnatge over
most other characters. Well, yeah, that's kind of what we saw in the movies.
So I'm not sure perfect balance is attainable.
As for the specific example you cite: I think it's a very good observation:
attack bonuses grow higher (and faster) than defense bonuses. When you
factor in that the high-level characters also get multiple attacks, this
difference becomes even more visible. But perhaps there are a couple of
reasons why this is not so unbalanced:
1. The defense bonus works against every attack in a round, while the attack
bonus is limited in use.
2. The high-level characters get lots of Vitality Points, which means they
can sustain lots of hits.
Martin L. Shoemaker
Emerald Software, Inc. -- Custom Software and UML Training
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
www.EmeraldSoftwareInc.com
www.UMLBootCamp.com
