"Balanced Encounters"

[sir_pudding]

Nymdok's thread about his balancing notation got drifted to general questions about the balance in general (which seems to happen to all of his threads on the subject). Therefore I decided to start this thread on the general merits of "balance" without further crapping him.

Originally Posted by Collective_Restraint

I dont think DnD4 is responsible for that [posts about "challenge" metrics in GURPS] at all. I do see a lot of newbie GURPSers that are actively looking for info on how to correctly balance encounters.

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

D&D 3.5 was the first place I personally encountered the idea that a roleplaying game adventure can be deconstructed as no more than a series of "encounters, that "challenge" is quantifiable metric, that encounters can be "balanced" mathematically like a chemistry equation, and that a good adventure consists of a specific ratio of encounters of given relative difficulties. Earlier versions of D&D certainly had the notion that tougher monsters were worth more XP, but I don't ever recall such a systematic approach, before 3rd edition.

To expand on that, I've run a lot of RPG sessions in at least half a dozen systems (and multiple full campaigns in GURPS (3rd and 4th), D&D (2nd and 3rd), Paranoia (2nd), CP (2013 and 2020), Rifts, Torg, and by now I've probably forgotten some. I had never encountered this systematic approach to "balance" before I decided to run an Ebberron game a couple of years ago.

I decided to run D&D 3.5 as straight RAW as possible, largely because every D&D 3 game I've played in was full of House-Rules and for the meta-challenge. I found the CR/SR/EC system to be frequently frustrating, though often fun in a meta-game way. I don't think it really works as advertised though.

The end result was I would spend a lot longer preparing for a game session than I normally do. This time increased dramatically as the player's leveled; to the extent that I ended the campaign earlier than I had originally intended because I just couldn't keep up anymore. Individual encounters were often difficult to balance, since I knew what kind of creature, NPC, or trap the narrative called for I had to spend hours fiddling with the numbers of opponents, templates, extra-hit dice, class levels and so on just to get it right EC. Then I had to make sure my adventure had enough of the right kind of encounters. This made me plan out encounters much more in advance than I was accustomed to (not really a bad thing) and made me include encounters for the sole purpose of hitting all the wickets (and still have them be sensible narratively). This was particularly frustrating when the PCs weren't exploring a "dungeon" and were therefore hard to predict. Challenge Rating systems definitely favor "boxed-in" scenarios.

The system works sometimes. In practice the encounters were often vastly easier or harder than the difficulty would indicate. Typically traps and other non-combat encounters were the hardest to "balance" but NPCs and monsters would sometimes cause problems too. Esoteric player or monster abilities, terrain, and bad player tactics would often as not make the calculations meaningless. I feel that the system got less and less accurate as the PCs leveled (so therefore the system became increasingly more cumbersome and less accurate as the game progressed).

At the time I was running this (and not GURPS) several posters here complained that GURPS was more time consuming to generate encounters for than D&D 3.5. I found this to be the opposite of true. GURPS encounters often require only a handful of relevant stats and none of this laborious (and dubious) number crunching. I suppose you could chalk it up to experience, except that by the time I was done with my D&D game I was more familiar with the rules (especially the CR system) than most of the "old-hands" in my gaming group. I suspect that most DMs either didn't really bother with the CR system or having encounters that make narrative sense.

Originally Posted by lexington

Except that in an RPG combat is actually defined by a set probabilities and numbers that are known before the fight begins. No formula will balance 100% but asking for such a thing (or disparaging anything less) is a fallacy, since the tool is still very useful.

I don't think that the numbers are actually a metric of "challenge", in particular it's hard to quantify the effects of terrain, the creative use of esoteric abilities that aren't direct attacks or defense, or particularly good or bad player tactics.

Honestly I really don't bother with "balance" at all when I run most games. I interpret the goal of good adventure to be an entertaining yarn, and I don't think that can be deconstructed into a series of "encounters" of varying metrical difficulty conforming to a bell-curve centered on "moderately challenging" or whatever. Adventures, if you must deconstruct them at all, probably should have a beginning, middle and end, a conflict, rising tensions, a climax and a denouement. The rising tensions can be just as entertaining whether the PCs fight, think, talk or run their way out of the situations they encounter. They are often more entertaining when the PCs fail to accomplish something.

I "balance" encounters simply by deciding what makes sense, and what would be entertaining. In my current game, as we speak there are forces watching the PCs. I know what their goals are, and I know what roughly resources they have available. When they "encounter" the PCs, it will be in the manner of their choosing, unless the PCs can turn the tables. I haven't bothered to crunch any numbers and I don't expect the PCs to fight them necessarily (although they might).

Later they will be exploring an old ruin. There will be traps and hazards there. Most likely I expect the PCs to disarm or avoid them. I haven't bothered to "balance" these against the PCs. I merely put traps that were appropriate to the TL of the builders and hazards appropriate to the condition of the ruins.

I do think it's important to consider what the PCs might do, and if you do expect them to fight, it's a good idea to make sure the PCs have weapons that can hurt their foes and vise versa. This is as much a campaign issue though as an encounter one, IMO. You need to make sure that if you anticipate the PCs fighting tanks that they have access to anti-tank weapons in the course of the game.

In my current game the persons stalking the PCs are a small band armed with guns and magic. The PCs are a smaller band armed with guns and magic . Personal armor is basically non-existent in the setting (roughly TL6). That's "balanced" enough, IMO.

[tg_ambro]

Cool read, and I have to say I agree. I never had as much fun as a DM/GM in DnD 3.5 as I do in GURPS, the reason for this, I suspect, is that trying to balance things using the CR system (which at the time, I'd seen enough DnD players say was extremely iffy and more of guide than a system) would often lead to some really lame fights or some overly tough ones. GURPS has a much looser "Do I think this character/monster will instantly kill my PCs?" that I find much more fun and, in a strange way, easier to control.

[Anthony]

I would say the concept of a 'balanced encounter' is nothing new; I was trying to design encounters that would be challenging but beatable back in the 80, and that's basically what is usually meant by a 'balanced encounter'. D&D3 just tried to formalize that concept, so in theory you could just add up some numbers and figure out whether or not a fight would be interesting (D&D4 probably does a better job at it, though it does so by vastly limiting the decision space for players).

[rust]

My settings are "sandboxes" without structured adventures where the players
have to decide where their characters will go and what they will do.

There are potential opponents which the characters could easily defeat and
opponents which could just as easily wipe out the characters, and one of the
players' most important and interesting tasks is to decide which conflicts to
risk and which to avoid by any means - there is no encounter balance at all,
the idea of "balanced encounters" would seem extremely artificial to us.

Balance does only play a role in my settings where it is required to keep the
background plausible. For example, if two tribes of natives have been figh-
ting each other for years, there should be some balance between their forces,
because otherwise the conflict would have ended long ago with the victory
of one side.

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by Anthony

I would say the concept of a 'balanced encounter' is nothing new; I was trying to design encounters that would be challenging but beatable back in the 80, and that's basically what is usually meant by a 'balanced encounter'. D&D3 just tried to formalize that concept, so in theory you could just add up some numbers and figure out whether or not a fight would be interesting (D&D4 probably does a better job at it, though it does so by vastly limiting the decision space for players).

I don't think the concept of "balanced encounter" is new. The notion that "challenge" is quantifiable and that encounters are like balanced chemical reactions is though. Hit-Dice in D&D used to give a very rough correlation to the monsters power and was used as to award XP, but I don't ever recall it being used in the same way that 3.5 used CR. I certainly never went through so much trouble as I did when running 3.5 by the RAW. The notion that a every good adventure must consist of x% "easy", y% "moderate", z% "difficult" and n% "really difficult but with a trick" encounters is definitely new.

[Nymdok]

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

I don't think that the numbers are actually a metric of "challenge", in particular it's hard to quantify the effects of terrain, the creative use of esoteric abilities that aren't direct attacks or defense, or particularly good or bad player tactics.

They are only one part of the metrics that make up an encounter. Terrain and environment count, but if the terrain doesnt change, you can account for it. Creative use of esoteric abilities is going to happen and its great when it does, but its more of an exception than the rule.

Tactics I have no answer for, but what I can say is that if your players are skilled wargamers/tacticians then knowing in a recordable way what encounters were too easy gives you an indicator of how close you are to the right difficulty.

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

Honestly I really don't bother with "balance" at all when I run most games. I interpret the goal of good adventure to be an entertaining yarn, and I don't think that can be deconstructed into a series of "encounters" of varying metrical difficulty conforming to a bell-curve centered on "moderately challenging" or whatever. Adventures, if you must deconstruct them at all, probably should have a beginning, middle and end, a conflict, rising tensions, a climax and a denouement. The rising tensions can be just as entertaining whether the PCs fight, think, talk or run their way out of the situations they encounter. They are often more entertaining when the PCs fail to accomplish something.

I "balance" encounters simply by deciding what makes sense, and what would be entertaining. In my current game, as we speak there are forces watching the PCs. I know what their goals are, and I know what roughly resources they have available. When they "encounter" the PCs, it will be in the manner of their choosing, unless the PCs can turn the tables. I haven't bothered to crunch any numbers and I don't expect the PCs to fight them necessarily (although they might).

A good story well told is one of the purposes of any adventure. How we get that is with interesting plot elements , an engaging setting and unxpected twists.

The issue off balance is mostly for the 'unexpected twists and outcomes' part of it. This one reason why we fret over encouters that are difficult, but not impossible is so that the players wont know whether they live or die and we wont konw for certain as GMs. That way its fun and unexpected for everyone at the table.

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

I do think it's important to consider what the PCs might do, and if you do expect them to fight, it's a good idea to make sure the PCs have weapons that can hurt their foes and vise versa. This is as much a campaign issue though as an encounter one, IMO. You need to make sure that if you anticipate the PCs fighting tanks that they have access to anti-tank weapons in the course of the game.

In my current game the persons stalking the PCs are a small band armed with guns and magic. The PCs are a smaller band armed with guns and magic . Personal armor is basically non-existent in the setting (roughly TL6). That's "balanced" enough, IMO.

Thats one of things Im looking to do with what Ive been working on. By looking at the party averages and thinking about what their 'goto' attacks and tactics are, that really can reveal alot about whats likely to hapen.

Nymdok

[Nymdok]

Why I think balance is importnat especially to GURPS:

BLOT:A mechanisim for Balancing encounters in GURPS will hopefully allow for the construction of Adventures which will be cheap and easy to balance for a specific group and make GMing much easier. Hopefully this will create a sense of unity in the GURPS community and increase market penetration by lowering the entry bar for starting GMs.

Why Balance Matters

Balance is important as it allows the GM a way to control the tension of the story with the difficulty of the encounter. If the challenge is too easy its a walk and ther is no tension. If its to hard, there is a slaughter and therefore also no tension.

Parties with different abilities and levels of those abilities require differnet challenges to maintain that tension.

Some systems have the abilites of the characters predefined. In 1e AD&D a 6th level Druid was pretty much the same as any other. Same story for a 10th level fighter or a 5th level magic user.

The point is that with those combat skills defined by the Charachter level, using the hit dice as a rough wag was easy and quick and normally close enough.

More importatly, that level/Hit dice structure allowed for Adventures to be written that could be applied to any party that fit within that level range.

The Problem with GURPS and Balance:

Well, GURPS has no levels. That meanst that its difficult to write adventures with any meaningful and useful stats because you simply dont know whos holding the book.

In addition, the flexibility menas that all GMs do it a bit differently and have thier own 'take' on what certain things are. Im often amazed at the spectrum of different Orcs, Elves and Goblins there are eventhough we all seem to agrr generally what they are. Depending on the Genre, A single goblin could be a laughably easy encounter ( DF) or a boss fight (for tiny Sprite//Fairy or insectoid adventurers).

For example, whats a challenging lock to pick? -1? -10? - 34? to your skill roll? Since you dont know whos holding the book, you cant even write down a basic modifier. Add to that the fact that the built in curved nature of GURPS probability means that being off by too much sends you slip sliding down the sigma into crits-only ville.

You cant design skill challenges, you cant design bad guys, you cant pre package ANYTHING that would normally make a GMs life easier other than the adventure plot.

So, without a way to balance encounters, there is almost no way to write an adventure that will be usefull and interesting to a large population of people.

The Common Experience and Easy Adventures

One of the most common complaints I hear is that GURPS has no prewritten adventures. There ARE pre written adventures, (Caravan, Fighters of the Purple Rage, Operation Endgame, Fat Man, etc) but you really have no way of tweaking them quickly and easily to suit YOUR group.

With out that, we all lack the 'common experiecne' that alot of us remember from 1ed AD&D adventures like Tomb of Horrors, Expedition to the Barrier Peaks, Keep on the border lands etc.

Im hoping that once I/We get this problem minimized more adventures can be written for ALL genres taht people can purchase cheap (less than 5$) read and tweak quickly (less than an hour) and play that night!

With any luck, lowering that entry bar will allow the adventures to help sell the core books the way 'Software sells Hardware' in the Video gaming world. (People will buy an XBox 360 to play Halo)

THATS the point, THATS the Purpose, and THATS why Im working on this and why Encounter balance matters, ESPECIALLY to GURPS.

Nymdok

[Six_Gun_Sam]

Balance = Fairness

Life isn't fair.

Sometimes your PC will encounter an Ork warband, a regiment of T-72s or an Imperial Fleet. If Tolkien had been a current gamer, then Lord of the Rings would of been one balanced encounter after another. Maybe they could of just walked into Morder?

[LemmingLord]

I think there is something be said for an encounter where the players have plenty of opportunties to make many choices without dying.

[Nymdok]

Originally Posted by Six_Gun_Sam

Balance = Fairness

Life isn't fair.

Sometimes your PC will encounter an Ork warband, a regiment of T-72s or an Imperial Fleet. If Tolkien had been a current gamer, then Lord of the Rings would of been one balanced encounter after another. Maybe they could of just walked into Morder?

Sometimes you want to game the conflict, sometimes you narate through it. If your choosing ot narate through it, then the balance issue isnt really a problem for you.

Keep in mind that balanced doesnt specifically mean Even Odds. It means that the encounters you set to be difficult will be difficult, the ones you set to be easy will be easy etc. Indeed I define average as the mosnters taking 2x their Hp in damge when the party has taken only 1x their HP.

Nymdok