Googleshng: Hello everyone, and welcome to another Roundtable discussion here at RPGamer. Tonight, we'll be discussing some balance issues in RPGs, some odd money making schemes, and some composers whose names I'll have to look up. But first, why don't our panelists introduce themselves?

Alex: Hi, my name is Alex, I'm currently teaching English in Tokyo, I just experienced another weak earthquake about 25 minutes ago so I'm still a little shaken, and I can't wait to get to talking about music in RPGs.

Brian: Brian's back for yet another round(table). I swear I'm not here just to get out of doing a media update! Bribes were (sadly) not involved.

Chris: Hello, I'm Chris Privitere. I've been on coming to #rpgamer for a bit now, and www.rpgamer.com for years. I just joined staff so look for a massive media update soon. I like music lots too.

Zack: The name's Zack, curator of such local wonders as Points of View, the index title, and the weekly poll. I write a lot of reviews, too.

Marshal: Hi, I'm Marshall Dragoon, resident starving art school student. I'm currently neglecting some heavy reading to be here.

David: Hi I'm David. Desperate times call for desperate measures, which is why I am here.

Googleshng: Our first topic tonight is a bit of a holdover from last week. A large number of RPGs today, and indeed since the 16-bit days, have given you a party like this: The fighter; the mage; the healer; and the main character, who can out-fight the fighter, cast healing spells, and big huge attack spells. What are everyone's thoughts on this convention?

Alex: The problem is that you need a main character. And the main character has to be the hero, and he/she has to be really strong, if not the strongest in the party. So how do you balance the hero and the supporting cast?

Marshal: I've always noticed that even when there's the big, dumb, strong guy in your party, the main character hits harder than he does.

Zack: I think that having a hero character that can't be removed from your party except during specific scenes and plot events is an extremely frustrating problem.

David: Considering in many RPGs, you have the main character for the entire game, while PCs either come and go, or they change, by game balancing they have to be stronger. Also, given you use the main character more, the are stronger.

Alex: Well Marsh, I don't think that's always the case.

Zack: It makes them far more powerful than they need to be.

Googleshng: Well, you can always go the route of Dragon Warrior II, and make the main character a straight fighter.

David: and by that point, who wants to use a normal straight fighter the entire game? The magic adds SPICE!

Brian: I find attack magic quite bland, actually . . .!

Brian: Tactical RPGs give you a good bit of flexibility over that main character problem, letting you decide how powerful you want to let him get. It doesn't limit the vast powerful potential he/she has, but it's a better balance.

Chris: Final Fantasy VI had a good balance I thought . . . unless you turned everyone into the all powerful main character.

Googleshng: FF6 was indeed good there. Of course, it also didn't really have a main character.

Brian: FFVI was grand because there wasn't really a main character.

Chris: Something that should be done more often perhaps?

Brian: Hah, never! I have yet to see someone go a FFVI clone, probably because FFVI is just too well done.

Marshal: I think this goes in line with the whole logic put into most anime, and in fact, most television. The good guy can shoot accurately from a moving train, but if a flurry of arrows is aimed his way, he magically dodges them all.

David: And, don't most people give their main character the best equipment?

David: I know I always do.

Marshal: It's truer to life that way.

Googleshng: From a plot perspective, I've never been a fan of the godly main character concept. Your average main character falls into the role of a miserable little street worm, who picks himself up, dusts himself off, and goes to save the world. This makes it rather odd that he's usually the toughest, coolest, strongest person in the game.

Marshal: Without a main character I mean.

David: He gets the godlike sword of +5 to diediedie, while everyone else is stuck with a common sword.

Googleshng: Marshal: True enough.

Alex: Well, I don't play it that way, Dave.

Chris: I personally pump the main characters in TRPGs only because I like them more.

Zack: Secret of Mana handled it fairly well, in my opinion. But then again, the main character doesn't have lines in it, either.

Marshal: But nobody can outshine the hero, you must remember.

David: I don't know, I know people who grew up on the streets, and they are some of the toughest people I know

Alex: Especially since most RPGs hand you weapons with the character names printed right on them.

Googleshng: The Phantasy Star series has actually been pretty good about balancing out this sort of thing. Alis from PS1 is your standard fighter/mage/healer sure, but she's outclassed by someone in any given field.

Marshal: I agree. In PSIV, Chaz was never necessarily the strongest until the very end.

Brian: That's why you steal the main character's weapon and give it to your weakest guy!

David: You have to be strong to survive the streets. Survival of the fittest and all.

Googleshng: Dave: This is true, but then the straggly street punk characters who end up being thieves should be even bigger powerhouses than the main character.

Marshal: Shouldn't the guys with military expertise be the strongest fighters? In this regard, FFVII made much sense.

Brian: There was also the case of Seiken Densetsu III where most all the characters were very well balanced.

Chris: I think we need a game where the cutest party member is the strongest.

Googleshng: Brian: But again, there's no main character there.

David: But really, you have to caveat it. I mean, you can't apply too much logic to it.

David: You have to go with internal game logic.

Googleshng: Of course.

David: Of course Cloud was stronger in FFVII, given his Jenova cells.

Googleshng: But that said, the characters should all be balanced.

Chris: Indeed.

Zack: The hero must be proportionately bad@$$ to the villain.

Brian: Googleshng: Your first pick was your main character, actually. Most storyline and such for your first pick and such.

Googleshng: Well here again we get back to the plot angle.

Alex: I think the problem is a combination of all of the things we've discussed so far. In many cases, it's not just the game design problem. Sometimes player involvement is a factor.

Zack: So maybe the villains should be powered down?

Googleshng: Zack: Heck no.

Chris: So it's cool story vs. balance then?

Googleshng: No. You can have both at once, and usually have neither. Take Lunar for example. Alex is a little snot-nosed kid, yet he does 5 times as much damage as the seasoned warrior--both unbalanced and unrealistic.

David: I am in the camp that I want my character to be the biggest, baddest mofo ever. Well, be able to by the end of the game, at least. Call it wish fulfillment.

Chris: Makes for better identifying with the character.

Zack: Why must the villains always have the power to eradicate the world? Can't anyone get enjoyment out of a bad guy who only wants to massacre people and revel in his fortune?

Alex: Yes I do.

Marshal: I still think it's primarily the aesthetic--in the majority of anime and other television--where the hero is always the most powerful, even if the bad guys look extremely tough. Take Trigun or Cowboy Bebop for instance. This aesthetic is universal.

Googleshng: Interesting point there.

Brian: This is why in some games, you are the main character with no other party members. Threads of Fate for example.

Alex: Who wants to play a loser?

Marshal: Not really.

Chris: Well if we want realistic, the hero shouldn't get past the third town or so. Or the villain should just wipe him out at some point.

Marshal: Lord of the Rings?

Marshal: Reminder: Sam was the strong hero at the end, not our ring-bearing Frodo.

Googleshng watches thousands of people familiar only with the new movies lose it.

Googleshng: Alex: Well, going back again to anime. Look at shows like Tenchi.

Alex: Well all praise goes to J.R.R. Tolkien.

Brian: Except LotR isn't an RPG!

Marshal: In an RPG or anime, Frodo would be able to kill the spider blindfolded, and he'd do three times as much damage as Gimli or Aragorn.

Chris: Well it's been tried, Brian. . . . 

Marshal: I'm just saying, it isn't universal.

Brian: Not in originality, though, Chris. That's my point.

Chris: Ah.

Brian: It is a book series never meant to be taken farther . . . even though it has!

David: Or they'd just make I'm-not-a-Christ-metaphor-really Gandalf the main character.

Zack: LotR fits the mould of an ideal RPG in many respects, but it's something that has inherent difficulty being translated into one. Just look at the SNES title.

Alex: Or don't.

Brian: The SNES title . . . eww.

Alex: What a pathetic game that was.

Googleshng: So, before we get totally sidetracked into a Lord of the Rings discussion, does anyone have any final thoughts on the matter of godly main characters?

Brian: Down with main characters. Equality is key.

Chris: It's a problem but an enjoyable one for some.

Marshal: I felt that VP had balanced characters. At least for as far as I played through it.

Zack: The hero only needs to become as powerful as his adversary. Anything else is just overboard.

Marshal: Balanced, that is to say, so that Lenneth was not always the most powerful.

David: If I am to relate to the main character most, he/she should be most powerful. otherwise equality!

Googleshng: That's true, but the occasional flaw is nice too. I mean, is your favorite superhero Superman?

Brian: YES.

Brian: No.

Chris: But then how do you do the sidequests, Zack ;)

Marshal: Everyone had a role to play.

Zack: Why do we need sidequests ;)

Googleshng: I myself would like to see an end, or at least a reduction, in the number of godly main characters, but I would of course first like to see more games that didn't force you to always use him in favor of reserve characters.

Alex: I'm sure that if you really wanted to, you can ignore a main character and build up one of the others. Buy them the best equipment, let the hero die in a battle and don't revive him ever. But I think people like to depend on the hero. They want to see a one on one fight against the bad guy at the end.

Marshal: Final Thought: A party is technically a team. And an all powerful member is not playing as a team.

Alex: He's leading it.

Chris: I think this gets into how the stories are written.