"Balance", "Fairness" ?

[Domhnall]

M. J. Young responded in a topic (Immersive-Relevant Realism (essay)) concerning the issue of game balance/fairness among character types.  

An argument that justifies a game system being imbalanced: balanced characters are unrealistic. They don't happen in life. They aren't even representative of good fantasy. No one with a lick of sense thinks that Frodo, Aragorn, Legalos, Boromir, Faramir, Samwise, and Gandalf were all created with the same number of points, nor would we say the same of Han Solo, Luke Skywalker, Obi-wan Kenobi, Princess Leia, R2D2, and C3PO.

However, the statement that "fairness is a foundational issue in all games" assumes that "fairness" has anything like the same meaning in all games. It clearly does not.

In Chess, "fairness" means that each player starts with exactly the same power and options, because each has the same sixteen pieces set in the same arrangement. That's one definition of fair. In Poker, by contrast, each player starts with a completely different hand, based on an entirely random deal of the deck. Fairness in this case is defined by potential and obscurement--that each player is aware that he has as much chance to have been dealt the best hand as the worst, and that no one knows who has the best hand until the cards are laid on the table.

And in both of those games, the conception of "fairness" is based on the fundamental assumption that the players are attempting to beat each other. That is rarely the case in role playing games, in which it is most likely for gamist play to be expressed in players that are attempting to unite their abilities in a combined effort to overcome obstacles created by a referee. In this context, the typical RPG character party is more akin to a football team. What matters is that each participant have strengths that matter to the team. No one pretends that the abilities of the offensive lineman, who is primarily there to stop opposing defensive linemen from sacking the quarterback, are nearly the same or any substitute for those abilities of a quarterback or a running back or an end. Observers generally praise the players who make the touchdowns. The players on the field, though, are quite aware that they need each other's skills, even though some of them have less impressive or varied or unusual skills than others. Nothing here has to be "balanced" for the game to be "fair", as the important question is not whether the players are as able to act as each other, but rather whether the characters as a cooperative are equal to the task set by the referee. This really is a much better picture of the character parties of LotR and Star Wars--not that they are comprised of characters of equal ability, but that they are comprised of characters whose abilities are sufficient for the role they must play in what is to come.

In most role playing games, "balance" and "fairness" have much more to do with ensuring screen time than they have with any inherent value in equally proficient characters. Some other means of ensuring screen time can be just as effective. John Kim's reports of his Buffy the Vampire Slayer play is quite informative on this point, as it appears that character generation empowers weaker characters to create story lines while stronger characters can only respond to them (if I understand aright), thus giving screen time rights to the characters who don't have the power to solve the problems.

I hope this is sufficiently clear. I'm all for "game balance" of the sort you advocate when the game's objectives include character versus character competition, but I think that there are a lot of ways to make imbalanced games not only as fair but more fun.

--M. J. Young

Since it seems like a large issue, I wanted to start this as a new topic here.  This is the first time I have encountered this argument before, but there are a lot of virginal experiences I have had at the Forge.  

His post asserts (if I am reading his correctly) that character-type (or "class") equality is only warranted in competition-style ("Gamist") RPG settings.  I'm trying to refrain from any conclusion until I think more about this issue, but would like to hear other responses as well.  

I'd like to hear again from M. J. asking him to start by stating detailed definitions of "imbalance/balance," and "fair".

[Troy_Costisick]

Heya,

I dealt with a very similar thread of ideas in this thread a while back:

http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=12324&highlight=

Mainly, I think that Character Balance (or Balance of Character as I put it) is an ideal for certain Gamist players and a necessary requirement for Narrativist play.  The first paragraph in MJ's essay seems to address Simulationist design/play and I totally agree that Balance of Character is unrealistic.

But in the end, fairness is a designer's tool not a player's creation.  A designer can make a game "fair" or he can choose not to.  It will depend on the style and goal of the game, IMHO.

Peace,

-Troy

[JMendes]

Ei, :)

fairness is a designer's tool not a player's creation.  A designer can make a game "fair" or he can choose not to.  It will depend on the style and goal of the game

I am totally in line with this as well. Furthermore, from a design standpoint, I am very much in favor of "fairness" or "balance" as concepts and analysis tools, and very much against the school of thought that says "fairness is axiomatic to game design".

Edit: As I have just read the thread where this whole thing started, let me expand on this.

I think an RPG should be fair to the players, in that it should give each player a decent opportunity at protagonism and/or screen time. But this concept is largely unrelated to "play-balance". To take LotR as an example, Merry and Aragorn were hardly "play-balanced", yet they both had decent opportunities for protagonism as the story developed. To me, that's what game fairness should be about.

Cheers,

J.

[lumpley]

Check out Primetime Adventures for an illustrative take on play balance.

The players' mechanical input into the game varies, explicitly, from session to session. Like, in this session I'm rolling 1d, next session I'll be rolling 2d, while this session you're rolling 3d and next session you'll be rolling 1d. That explicitly. But at the same time each player is guaranteed the same overall input as every other player, over the course of the whole game.

Cool stuff.

-Vincent

[Andrew Norris]

I think another important point is that character balance and play balance don't have to be lockstepped. If you're playing a party-based game, then yes, they are, but there are other methods of play that aren't that uncommon -- specifically troupe-style play.

The references to Ars Magica in the parent thread are referring to this. Play revolves around a cabal of Medieval mages, but each player is responsible for, at different times, a member of that cabal (who has quite a lot of power in the game world, considering the rarity of magic), several members of that mage's retinue, and Grogs, commoners who handle the grunt work.

In a given session, the raw power of each character may be grossly mismatched. (You might have one adventure involving a mage, his men-at-arms, and the poor sods who get to pry the cart out of the mud.) This is sort of a Lord of the Rings situation, except that over time it's expected that each player will have a chance to play their mage. (I know this is a gross simplification of the system, but it's definately troupe-style.)

Another way play balance and character balance may be separated is with games that don't have a party structure at all. It's possible to intercut between the lives of several different characters, one per player, who cross paths infrequently. In this situation, characters might vary widely in ability, but their competence relative to their own respective challenges are similar.

My personal experiences with "keeping things fair" deal entirely with screentime allocation, which has already been discussed previously. My last campaign included characters such as (a) a dissolute, lecherous con-man with a lot of contacts in the underworld, and (b) a dead woman who could freely jump from host to host, possessing their bodies. There was no question that if the two came to blows, the con-man had no chance at all. But the game was about personality conflicts and the consequences of power, so neither felt slighted.

I think the "big picture" issue here is that the advice you're giving in your various essays is very effective at reinforcing the style of play that you personally enjoy. You're making efforts to avoid types of play you don't enjoy and that you personally find dysfunctional. That's laudable. But there are a lot of styles of play out there, and your advice is not necessarily appropriate for them. I think that's what we're trying to impart to you.

[Marco]

My personal experiences with "keeping things fair" deal entirely with screentime allocation, which has already been discussed previously. My last campaign included characters such as (a) a dissolute, lecherous con-man with a lot of contacts in the underworld, and (b) a dead woman who could freely jump from host to host, possessing their bodies. There was no question that if the two came to blows, the con-man had no chance at all. But the game was about personality conflicts and the consequences of power, so neither felt slighted.

I agree with this entirely. The problem comes in practical application when:

1. Player A decides that, during the game, he's going to move into Player B's spotlight and the system is set up so that B gets dominated despite having what are ostinsibly valide niches.

2. The roating of character-spotlight runs into problems wherein a player feels it is implausible that he would not accept help from a vastly superior PC but to accept the help renderes him insignificant. This is especially problematic if both characters are concived of as equals by the world presented.

Etc ...

I can play Frodo next to Aragorn but unless the GM specifies that Aragorn can't be near the ring I'm not going to get to do much durning the game other than carry it (which is what Frodo does for the first half of the fellowship).

Game mechanics are only responsible for some of this--but there are cases where strong mechanical niche protection and attention to multiple equal modes of effectivness within a given niche (i.e. the strong fighter is roughly equal yet distinct from the fast fighter) is helpful.

-Marco

[M. J. Young]

I'd like to hear again from M. J. asking him to start by stating detailed definitions of "imbalance/balance," and "fair".

I think these terms are loaded as they relate to RPG circles. Like "realism" they are the sort of words that people throw around as if they had an absolute meaning and an absolute value, but they really only mean "what I like in a game".

Let me predicate and expand what has been stated by others: in a role playing game, what matters is that all the players have fun. That is most commonly achieved by making sure everyone has a turn. Since we don't "take turns" in most games, those "turns" must be assured through some means of balancing spotlight time.

In a strongly competitive game, particularly one that is combat based, we balance spotlight time by making all the player characters equally strong in those ways that matter in play. The fighter has his multiple attacks and damage bonuses; the thief has his sneak attack and damage multiplier; the magic-user has his killer spells; the cleric has his power to tip the odds (blessings and curses). We try to make these such that each will shine in his own way to the same degree in combat. If we fail, then whenever we enter combat some players are effectively sidelined, and they're not enjoying that part of the game.

That can be acceptable if there is some other way in which spotlight time is protected. One such approach is what we call niche protection. This means that there are different situations, all equally as likely to arise in play, in which we need different character abilities which can only be had by specific characters. Only the fighter can accept the challenge to joust against the black knight. Only the thief can scout ahead and disarm the traps. Only the cleric can keep us alive and restore our health when we are injured. Only the magic-user can provide the sort of spells we need for this mission. This ensures shared spotlight time by providing moments for each. Unfortunately, niche protection has a lot of pitfalls. One of these is encroachment--initially only the thief has any chance of opening a lock, but the fighter can still smash through the door if he fails and eventually the magic user will be able to get through it by a spell, and then the thief has lost his spotlight. The same is true to some degree for all games, and the more so if they're skill- rather than class-based: I can say in designing the thief that no one else can open locks by any means, but it's a lot tougher to protect "opening locks" when it's an available skill, as someone else will eventually decide it would be good to know. Also problematic is sidelining, that when the spotlight is on the thief to open the locks or disarm the traps, everyone else is doing nothing that matters. This isn't necessarily bad, but the longer the spotlight stays on one specialist the less interesting the game is for everyone else. The Netrunners in one game (is it Shadowrun? I've got the wrong game and can't remember the right one) are often cited for this: they have a wonderful system that is a lot of fun and very interesting for what they do within the game, but while they're doing it the rest of the players might as well go see about popping some more corn or run out to pick up the pizza, because there's nothing here for them. Crossover is also a problem--we think fighters are important, and they are, but ultimately there are few things that a fighter can do in which other characters are not involved. Thus the fighter doesn't really have a protected niche and only shines because he's best at this, while the thief shines because everyone else has to wait while he does something.

An entirely different way of protecting spotlight time is through role significance. In Legends of Alyria, the players start the game by creating a set of characters who matter to the story--protagonists, associates, antagonists, important players in the events that are about to happen. Each player then takes one of these. Spotlight time is protected because the villain, who is one of the players, has to act in order for the story to move forward, and the sidekicks have important roles in the conflict so they have to play too. Everyone is involved because every character is initially defined in a way that makes him important to the story. One of these might be the helpless victim, a completely powerless character from any gamist perspective, whose role is the more important because the story revolves around his adversity. That player has ample opportunity to play and to make the story come alive, against the very powerful characters who are his persecutors and rescuers who would ordinarily drive a different kind of game.

As to "fairness", it is unfair to invite someone to play in a game where they are going to have a miserable time. That means you have to make it possible for them to contribute to the events of play in a meaningful way. It does not mean that they have to be superheroes or even equal to the others at the table. They might be, but it's not necessary.

I hope this helps elucidate my point.

--M. J. Young

[Callan S.]

His post asserts (if I am reading his correctly) that character-type (or "class") equality is only warranted in competition-style ("Gamist") RPG settings.  I'm trying to refrain from any conclusion until I think more about this issue, but would like to hear other responses as well.

I don't think that's true.

I think the call for fairness, is a call for equal directorial power.

Think of it this way. In a game where you are granted no direct directorial power, the only way you can direct the game is through your characters powers. Ie, you have directorial powers equal to your characters powers. If people have unequal power levels, the directorial power, which really aught to be evenly distributed amongst the real life peers, isn't.

So the entire party of LotRs can have any old power level they like, as long as directorial power is evenly distributed. Your halfling might be super crappy compared to Legolas, but with directorial power, he IS going to make it to mount doom. If you want him to.

On the other hand, it might be okay to have different levels of directorial power. Buffy comes to mind, with it's drama points. But I think when director stance power is a measured, finite resource, it's a far more comfortable affair. Regardless, I think the call for this sort of power to be controlled is not CA related.

[James Holloway]

Buffy comes to mind.

And Buffy is a very specific example of this: characters who have less in-game, in-character ability to influence the plot outcome -- have lower stats and skills -- have a greater ability to influence the plot at a meta-game level. It's a great example of "balance" being applied to the player's overall participating in the game, rather than the character's effectiveness.*

*Whether it is actually "balanced" in play is another question, and answers vary -- but you can see what it's trying to do, besides answer the question "why haven't these likeable yet puny supporting characters been stomped to death yet?"

[J. Tuomas Harviainen]

Sidestepping a bit in order to provide a point of comparison:

Every larp writer either quickly learns to utilize a system of narrative balance or has a very short career. What this means is that in a larp, every character has to be provided with an equal amount of story elements they can participate, but there doesn't have to be any equality between character attributes or between the scale of the given plots. Thus the weak peasant who has family trouble and the scheming Grand Vizier are considered narratively balanced as long as both have as many things to do. Note that the Vizier almost certainly has much more directorial control over the course of things, but would only be considered a "better character" by players with Gamist and/or escapist tendencies. (Both of whom are often seen as "problem players who are completely missing the point" within experiential larp circles.) This system of course breaks down if the entire structure of the game has been designed to primarily support a Gamist approach, be it Killer or any "Let's go to the woods and play hack'n'slash" larp.

As far as tabletop is concerned, I mostly agree with what's been said here already.

-Jiituomas

[Troy_Costisick]

Heya

I think the call for fairness, is a call for equal directorial power.

Or... it might be better stated that Fairness/Balance of Character/Equality/Whatever is really a desire to insure that all characters (and their players) have equal access to the Creative Agenda.  A Gamist character should not prevent the player from Stepping Up.  A Simmulationist character should not ruin the Dream.  And a Narrativist character must deliver Story Now.  

When a Gamist character gets out of balance it either A) over powers all the other characters, predisposing him as the natural choice to lead/take over the Step on Up phase of the game or B) loses effectiveness or limits player choice of strategy over a long period of time.  Either way, fun is ruined.

A Simulationist character out of balance would run counter to whatever is being explored.  A magical lazer rifle in a pre-steam world or a medieval knight in a Wild West setting are a couple extreem examples.  Basically, any character that gets around whatever is being simulated would be out of balance.  Thus the other players are alienated because the Dream is botched.

In a Narrativist system, and character that for some reason could not address the premise would be considered out of balance.  I personally think, that characters in a Narrativist system have to be balanced by default or the design of the game is flawed in some way.

Anyhow, that's my take on what you said. :)  I just want to reiterate that I believe what we are talking about in this thread is part of design and not part of play.

Peace,

-Troy

[Mike Holmes]

Troy has it.

"Balance" always comes down to ensuring that each player has an approximately equal opportunity to be creative using the creative agenda. Now, that doesn't mean that the methods have to be the same to provide these opportunities, as Buffy shows. It just means that the different methods have to be satisfactory to the player in terms of how it allows them to participate.

For example, in D&D Gamism, the cleric doesn't tend to have as much to do in a fight as others do. Bless spell just doesn't seem to add as much as doing 1d8 damage with a longsword. It's the cleric's out-of-combat abilities that are where they shine. Some people like playing the cleric, some don't. To the extent that nobody wants to play the cleric, or any other type of character division in any other game, it could be said that that type of character is unbalanced.

Mike

[John Kim]

I think the call for fairness, is a call for equal directorial power.

Or... it might be better stated that Fairness/Balance of Character/Equality/Whatever is really a desire to insure that all characters (and their players) have equal access to the Creative Agenda.

I've seen this discussed in man places before.  I think it is a mistake to imagine that all Fairness/Balance issues are really a single underlying concern.  There are many different kinds of balance.  
1) Balance of creative input by the player.  
2) Balance of character spotlight time.  (This is not the same, since a GM-lead subplot could put a character in the spotlight.)  
3) Balance of character coolness / power.  Again, this is distinct.  For some players, even if their PC is not regularly in the spotlight, their concerns are met if -- when their PC does appear -- it has a lot of impact.  
4) Combat balance.  

Personally, I feel that none of these are strictly necessary.  While some players feel that #1 is important, there are many players who are less agressive or controlling about the game -- who are fine with taking the back seat a little more often.  So I disagree that balance is necessary, and that desire for balance is all one preference.

[ffilz]

Personally, I feel that none of these are strictly necessary. While some players feel that #1 is important, there are many players who are less agressive or controlling about the game -- who are fine with taking the back seat a little more often. So I disagree that balance is necessary, and that desire for balance is all one preference.

True. Ultimately what matters is that each player be happy with their contribution to the game and their payoff from the game. But it is valuable to consider the various ways that imbalance is perceived and be willing to address them. Of course satisfying some players needs may dissatisfy others, so ultimately the whole group has to participate, and ideally the social contract addresses this explicitly (I'm amazed by the number of people who claim that since ultimately your responsible for your own fun that they don't owe you a lick of consideration - every man for himself).

An interesting point is when one player is bothered by a perceived imbalance between two other players characters, yet those two players are perfectly happy, and might even be upset at attempts to fix the perceived balance problem.

Frank

[John Kim]

Ultimately what matters is that each player be happy with their contribution to the game and their payoff from the game. But it is valuable to consider the various ways that imbalance is perceived and be willing to address them. Of course satisfying some players needs may dissatisfy others, so ultimately the whole group has to participate, and ideally the social contract addresses this explicitly (I'm amazed by the number of people who claim that since ultimately your responsible for your own fun that they don't owe you a lick of consideration - every man for himself).

About that last bit -- I don't do it much myself, but I don't think it's totally crazy.  The principle is that certain people naturally have compatible ways of having fun.  i.e. If I just play in a way that's fun for me without self-consciously changing my style, there exists a set of other people who will also have fun that way.  By not twisting around to please other people, the people who play with me will end up being people with similar tastes.  Their objection to negotiation would be that it supports incompatible groups who shouldn't be together in the first place, where no one gets what they want, because everyone is working to other people's standards.  

Anyhow, it's not the way I work, but I don't think it's immoral or anything.  

I think there's something of a spectrum.  On one end (the negotiation end) you decide who you want to game with first, and then pick a game and style which best fits their intersection of tastes.  On the other end (the selection end) you decide exactly what game and style you want, and then select players who are good with that.