http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Role-playing_game

"Games such as GURPS and Champions also served to introduce to role-playing games game balance between player characters; later, Vampire: The Masquerade and similar games served to emphasise storytelling and plot and character development over rules and combat."

The nineties are over, so let´s get over that crap.

And the mention of game balance in a sentence without a "no" alongside GURPS is totally ridiculous.

Suggestions for a replacement?

Woo Hoo! A Wikipedia spat! :win: Please keep me updated!!!!!112 :sleeping:

Well, it might need to be reworded, but it's basically true.

At their core purposes, GURPS and Champions are concerned with balancing characters and making sure character capabilities can be gauged accurately.  Whether they succeed or not, that is their mission goal.  The latter 80s and onward are full of the types of games these two game birth to: games which address giving a player some kind of advantage for choosing a flaw.

Likewise, Vampire's alleged goal was to take the focus off rules and be more about storytelling.  But, perhaps Vampire gets WAY too much credit for this, because the storytelling movement was alive and well back in the AD&D1 Dragonlance days.

No matter what you put there you'll probably have someone saying "but what about ___, it's not balanced at all?"

QuoteWoo Hoo! A Wikipedia spat!

That´s what we Germans are all about. look at the number of German Articles!

Quote from: GabrielWell, it might need to be reworded, but it's basically true.

At their core purposes, GURPS and Champions are concerned with balancing characters and making sure character capabilities can be gauged accurately.  Whether they succeed or not, that is their mission goal.  The latter 80s and onward are full of the types of games these two game birth to: games which address giving a player some kind of advantage for choosing a flaw.

Well, it was in theory something that served to create "game balance" in the sense that all characters were supposed to have overall the same level of power with which to construct themselves.

In practice, it is usually way more "Unbalanced" than anything D&D could come up with, since experienced players were able to milk the systems of GURPS and Champions to give themselves near-invulnerable/unstoppable characters, while less experienced players who had not pored through every detail of the byzantine system were stuck with far less competent characters.

I would say, if anything, that games like GURPS and Champions "encouraged the movement towards RPGs being games that required a high level of "hobby-like" dedication and moved RPGs away from a casual activity anyone could buy into".

RPGPundit

Quote from: GabrielAt their core purposes, GURPS and Champions are concerned with balancing characters and making sure character capabilities can be gauged accurately.  Whether they succeed or not, that is their mission goal.  The latter 80s and onward are full of the types of games these two game birth to: games which address giving a player some kind of advantage for choosing a flaw.

Wasn't the purpose to provide a means within a games rules for more player flexibility in creation of the characters?  To that end it seemed to succeed. Of course the implementations as they were had serious issues. Such as character creation become a more lengthy process and without self-disipline the player could wile away days tweaking their character this way and that. Plus serious min/max problems, that I think have a lot to do with what was attempting to be balanaced.

If there is one single explanation for D&Ds design decisions it´s balance.

Quote from: SettembriniIf there is one single explanation for D&Ds design decisions it´s balance.

"I'm going to balance this game" is like saying "I'm going to walk 3 today". Three what?

Further 'balanced' is a pretty damn crappy endgoal. It is however very handy as a means to an end. Which sometimes people forget about (or never realise to start with).

Quote from: SettembriniIf there is one single explanation for D&Ds design decisions it´s balance.

I'd agree - all the way back to OD&D.  Balance has always been part of the original RPGs.  They were, after all, inspired by wargames (which are almost always about balanced sides, except for some specific historical scenarios).

Quote from: blakkie"I'm going to balance this game" is like saying "I'm going to walk 3 today". Three what?

How so? The first makes sense, the second is missing a word.

Quote from: James McMurrayHow so? The first makes sense, the second is missing a word.

Balance WHAT?

The game rules. What else is there to balance when talking about a game?

Quote from: James McMurrayThe game rules. What else is there to balance when talking about a game?

Yeah.  It's like saying you need to get your car balanced - it's understood that you mean the tires.

Quote from: James McMurrayThe game rules. What else is there to balance when talking about a game?

Balance what part of them, in which way?  Because there are a number of things that can be 'balanced' on different criterial.