Why does the party need to be balanced?

[Quertus]

Yesterday, I made a huge post, lots of replies, and, several hours in, I typed the fateful "I'll stop here so that I don't lose the post.". And that's when I lost the post. So, today, I'll make several posts.

What is your main point? I don't think it is the optimization adjusting power level thing (which is certainly true but not as easy as you have portrayed it). It might be that some stories require unbalanced characters which is true, but many also require balanced characters. Is it one of those? Is it something else?

I have lots of different points, as I'm trying to build a more holistic picture of a larger thing than just one point. But, if I had to pick one as my "main" point, it would probably be

TL;DR: You don't have to make a game that generates balanced parties. But if you tell people your game is balanced, it kinda should be balanced.

Quertus Oh, my bad, sorry about that. Probably should’ve avoided the topic of exploration entirely, since certain classes in DND can literally warp what exploration even means (ie class that always sees secret doors entirely removes “searching for secret doors” as a distinct activity)

Why are you sorry? I consider exploration a great backdrop for the discussion of balance.

On your point about selecting a balance target first: many people do not want to do that.

If people are going to do things wrong, and then complain that they messed up, but don't want to fix it, why should i care?

A great many people, imo most players, think of a character concept first, THEN try to figure out how to build it using the rules of the game. Once they are done, then maybe they would start looking into how it meshes with the rest of the party in terms of power. Very few people start off saying “I want to build a tier 3 character”, most go “I want to play a knife-throwing daredevil” or “I want to play Draxton Vess, Chainbreaker of Ur”

So, to do things my way, one could start with *both* the concept of DVCoU (about whom I, personally, know nothing, btw) *and* the sample characters. "OK, the closest sample character has an expected DPS of 17.2, and 3 relevant skills at 'Adept'. <Works on build> well, I've got 19.7 DPS, 'fleen nut gathering' at 'Master' level, and 4 other relevant skills at 'Studied'. That should fall within our group's balance range of the sample characters, and feels like DVCoU to me. Done."

Or one could create a character that feels appropriate, and then wait for a game where they will fit within the group's balance range.

In 3e, some entire character concepts are traps. The mechanics, on a basic level, do not allow a character who does x to be as effective as a character who does y, even if x and y accomplish the exact same goal. So if you want your character to do x, then you just have to accept that someone who does y will outclass you. Then there are the mistakes you can make during chargen that will mess you up if you don’t have access to the relevant knowledge. The opposite also applies. A person who wants to play a summoner shouldn’t have to worry about breaking the game by doing it.

Yeah, I've tried to face tank with a Wizard, but with their d4 HP and no armor, it's hard! Thanks to feats like Trollblooded and Roll With It, I was able to come close to achieving my vision - something I couldn't have done in a system with exclusively "balanced" components.

There are certainly people who find a rules interaction or evocative subclass and build a character around that instead, I’m one of those people. But very few people do that for all of their characters, and those who don’t shouldn’t be ignored. Plus even the mechanics-first players can suffer a lot under unbalanced systems, since it restricts their options if they’re looking to be optimal.

Are they looking to be optimal, or to be balanced? Because those are two opposed stances.