Happy Sunday!

“The moving finger writes; and, having writ, moves on: nor all thy piety nor wit shall lure it back to cancel half a line, nor all thy tears wash out a word of it. — Omar Khayyam Companies like GW shouldn’t worry so much about balance in between editions of the game . The more they try the more criticism they will get for lack of balance. GWs production is like an old typewriter. As they hammer stuff out, the carriage moves across the page. Each thing more powerful and more desirable than the last. This drives excitement and therefore… Read more »

The Bruce Campbell version of herbie I think had an evil nazi black bettle

Yay who let the dice out COGz.

I think John’s family will be getting angry glare’s I hope they’ll like them?

Mega city 1 but in DnD…

Damnit Ben, you’re going to make me write that…

Also for confirmation, Gerry didn’t fail a cool roll until he was basically off the table. Which I was fine with by the way. Completely fine that Gerry whooped me at the game I brought with my minis that he had never played before.

Fine…

FAT BLOKE?

Aw shucks thanks fellas. Can confirm the cake was as delicious as it was brutal. Mrs G is a true cake genius.

Happy Sunday, The idea of balance is interesting one, there is a difference between friendly and tournament games. I play Mortem et Gloriam, both in a friendly setting and a competitive capacity. Ok this is a historical set of rules, which means there is a limited capacity for weird and wonderful. However it does span a period of 4000 years. There are over 650 lists. But it is built around characteristics that give bonuses and minuses. The lists are reviewed annually and tweaked, but the they are free to access electronically, and over the last 5 years most of the… Read more »

So who’s the new big hairy guy on the show guy’s an what have you done with GERRY?!?

Weren’t the Spartans doing each other B,Sex when they weren’t fighting training ???

Happy Sunday. That cake looks delicious and if I wasn’t scoffing my Sunday dinner at the time it would have made me a bit peckish. As for game balance I was thinking about solo games. Joe McCullough has commented several times how tricky it is to balance solo scenarios for Rangers of Shadow Deep, not making them too difficult or too easy. With games like Five Leagues and Five Parsecs the scenario and number of enemies are generated randomly so so games can be very different whereas others are much easier, but in either sense you walk away from the… Read more »

How very dare you Justin dis tank force’s.

A Brilliant fun show guy’s.

some things are just not going to be balanced. For instance, Lets say you get beaten up by a gang. You then go to a Kung-Fu instructor to learn the ancient eastern art. Then later you become a successful comedian who is shot by another comedy duo for being to good at what you do. Now your dying, but suddenly the devil appears before you to make a deal. You have to marry his daughter and give him a grandson, but the catch is she is just sooooo ugly. Now i ask you is that fair? FYI, Dont forget to… Read more »

Regarding Privateer Press, I have my own opinions about it. I don’t disagree with the two approach way to play the game – legacy and the new stuff, but I would have done things differently. I would of chosen several existing units of every faction that players already have (or are common in the armies), updated the model style and balanced the game around just those models. This way they would not have angered existing players who have supported the game or bought into the game throughout the years. A reduced model count, more manageable, allow players to use old… Read more »

Thank you so much for the Golden Button guys! Much appreciated, although I’d like to acknowledge @scribbs whose kind words and encouragement got me to pick up my brushes again after a personal, sudden bereavement knocked me for six. Our ‘Halloween Challenge” kickstarted me (take a look at @scribbs Aboleth – it’s fantastic) and as I reduced my own pile of shame, the Volkswagen model surfaced and it obviously needed to be turned into something fun – hence everyone’s unadulterated Herbie! I contemplated loads of Mad Max accoutrements, but Herbie doesn’t need them! If you scroll through previous entries on… Read more »

Balance? What is this thing? Like a heavy vodka fueled Balkan birthday bender there are some things that seriously lack it. The nightmare fuel driven into our brains from lacking moderation can, and often does, leave its mark in the remembering of crash and burn moments in those high times of cavalier revelry. More is more is often not best.

Happy Sunday…..Long Live STILLMANIA!!…There that’s my thought on Balanced games.

For game balance it depends! If we take Saga for example, that has 1 pt units regardless of what they are. Then minor tweaks aside that should be a even point game with your opponent. Lion Rampant and its ilk are 2-6 pts a unit depending what it is, with generally a minimum max allowed of 4-10 units and you have 24 pts. But those are going to be the same pool of units for each player, just composition will be different, similar to an ACW battle. So points as a time indicator is fine, otherwise hopefully good game design… Read more »

Balance in games is always such a tricky, subjective and emotive subject. If you’re going to play a game, you’d like to think you stand a chance of meeting some kind of objective (even if you’re not “winning” outright, being able to achieve an aim would be rewarding). But there are loads of ways of making a game balanced – the most obvious being by changing who is playing it. Chess was mentioned in the lead-up to this topic. Chess is a perfectly balanced game. Until a grand master comes up against a six-year-old. I’ve played games of chess where… Read more »

Game balance is for Euros! 😀

IMO, With Ameritrash, having a wide range of play styles is more important than balance. Balance should be a part of that — one “n00b” faction should be easy to play and “balanced” against two or so other factions (cf. Space Marines in WH40K, and the fighter class in AD&D). Then you can add other factions that may be more challenging to play for advanced gamers.

Happy Sun… Mon… Tu.. WEDNESDAY?!

How did that happen? oO

@avernos Great topic for a show. We should totally do this. Oh hang on… ;~] To reiterate what I said when we covered it on our stream I think that game balance is an admirable aspiration in any game design but ultimately no game ‘requires’ balance. As long as the way a game is portrayed in marketing and advertising gives a fair representation of the ‘gaming’ experience every style of game has a niche it can fill. If a game is a more swingy, random, storytelling experience then as a manufacturer please don’t endorse and encourage a competitive gaming scene… Read more »