I read the Merles / D&D 4th Ed thread. I still play 3.5, so I wasn't able to comment on the 4th Ed stuff specifically, but I thought a thread talking about what balance is might be interesting.
It's something I've been thinking about recently.
Two points before I jump in though:
Does Balance Matter?
I think balance is important in a game, but mainly to ensure that there are a variety of valid, diverse character designs who can all play in the same party without the GM having to work too hard to make challenging, satisfying fights for the whole group.
Point-Buy As A Standard
I assume some kind of point-buy character gen approach for this post, but I think the points could be applied to any system where players get to make decisions and balance is a priority. Obviously a game like Traveler would fit more poorly.
I assume the Balance is supposed to make the game more fun to play
Whether balance is important or not, it doesn't make sense to talk about it without having some basic goals agreed on. I think the basic theory about balance is that characters in the same party (Same points) should be about as powerful as each other and should be able to fight the same enemies with roughly the same effectiveness. Clearly this is contingent on other things (no one expects the Thief to fight as well as the Fighter, but they should both be able to go in the same dungeon).
Here's my thinking on what balance basically means and where I've got questions I don't know the answer to:
A Basic (inadequate) Definition of 'Balance':
Any two characters built on the same points should win a fair 50% of the time.
To my mind this is a minimalistic definition of balance which is a critical starting point, but doesn't get the job done without at least a few supporting points:
* Fight Fair: The basic scenario assumes the characters fight in neutral terrain and neither is surprised, caught flat-footed, etc. May assume weapons are drawn at the start of the fight. Probably assumes something like 20-paces (~60') range (so a guy with a laser gun has some advantage on a guy with a sword, I guess)...
* % Spam: The 50/50 split assumes the same amount of character points are spent on combat stuff. A character who spent most of his points on being pretty or a brilliant scientist wouldn't win half the time against a combat machine. Balance simply assumes that whatever the % is, it's the same (and if someone chooses more spam, they have no reason to complain when they're not as effective).
* Character Design Strategy: If the game supports a variety of character design strategies then some strategies may be inherently more effective against others, and a character employing "Rock Strategy" will win more fights against the guy on the same points who employed "Scissors" strategy and lose more fight to the guy who went with "Paper Strategy."
* No Optimal Design Strategy?: If there's some character design strategy that beats all other strategies (e.g. if Sword + Shield beats all other legal combinations) then maybe you can't call game isn't properly balanced.However, if there's some strategy that beats most other strategies, but loses to one that's not (otherwise) dominant, that might still be considered "balanced."
Some open questions I don't know the answer to:
Ganging up on one guy?
What does a "balanced" game say about n-on-1 fights? Should a character built on 100 points fight 2 50pt characters to a stand-still? What about characters that are built to exploit team attacks -- how do they rate/rank?
One Guy against the army?
Let's say I make a guy designed to take out multiple (assumedly lower powered) opponents (say he has an area-of-effect attack)... If the game makes me less effective against peers, is that proper? How much less effective should I be?
Strategic Capabilities?
If a character has abilities that tends to give him advantages in terrain (e.g. flight) or surprise (silent movement, long-range sensors, invisibility) or surveillance (Spidey Sense, always-on-X-ray vision) how should those be charged for? He might win 50/50 in a fair fight, but win considerably more in a real game. Would such a character be considered "unbalanced?"
Balance over Character Progression (e.g. AD&D Magic User)?
If a character starts out as an ineffective basket case and then becomes more powerful than everyone else, would that be considered balanced? I dislike this kind of thing for a variety of personal reasons, but it seems statistically valid under some circumstances. I don't see that many modern games that are as extreme as AD&D was, so maybe this kind of "balance" is out of favor.
Anyway, those were my thoughts.
Cheers,
-E.