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[NullForceOmega]

I think the term 'broken' gets thrown around a bit too casually.  Really what most people mean when they say it is that it is easy to break the system through obvious combinations, but being easy to break does not automatically mean 'broken'.

'Broken' should be used for games that are obviously imbalanced from the get go, with base elements that render others completely meaningless (or at the very least mean gimping yourself to hell by focusing on them.)

Off the top of my head I can think of one serious example; RIFTS.

There is no point in playing anything other than a supernatural being or power-armored soldier.
Mages are completely useless, even at the highest levels of play, because almost no spell scales, and the few that do are terribly under-powered compared to basic equipment like laser rifles and body armor (to say nothing of PA and robot vehicles.)
Psionics are borderline usable especially at lower levels, but rapidly get left in the dust by more combat-centric classes.

Simply, if you don't have a huge number of attacks/actions and a massive amount of armor AND dodge, you are a utility character who is relegated to side roles in a game that (unintentionally, due to poor design choices) focuses almost exclusively on combat.

tl:dr, broken is overused, but raises a valid point about a game's design.

[Neonivek]

There are many ways a game itself can be broken.

But yes the ability to break isn't alone what makes something broken. Dungeons and Dragons has plenty of ways to break the game over your knee (and in fact 4e had to introduce an errata for two broken abilities).

I don't think "From the get go" is a valid requirement. Most broken games are relatively fine at the start... it is only once characters start growing in power that things start to sort of fall apart.

Nor do I think imbalance necessarily breaks a game... nor is the only way in which it can be broken. If, for example, it is for right (wait is that a word?) about the imbalance then it becomes thematic.

---

But as I said. The ability to break a game and its ability to be broken... does not what Broken make.

It is why I qualify it with "regular play, not attempting to break it"

At least the way I define it.

[NullForceOmega]

Neo, by the definition you just posted every single pnp RPG would be 'broken'.  Because as the PCs gain power they gain the ability to bypass things that would have been mandatory at lower levels (through assorted means, intimidation, spells/abilities that allow flight/teleportation/invisibility etc.)

Broken stems from fundamental failures of balance and mechanics, if your game has those fundamental problems it is broken, if players are inventing ways to bypass things or otherwise damage gameplay, the problem is the GM and players.

[Criptfeind]

I think I'd generally agree with that Null. I mean, I'm pretty flexible in how I use words. I'd call both shadowrun and D&D broken, but mean totally different things. But yeah overall in the sense I think most people use when they say broken I agree, it's applicable to a game that just totally fails overall. Well. Honestly I might not even call that rifts example a broken game, certainly parts of it sound so, but I guess if the rest of the game is okay I'd only call the parts pertaining to the useless characters broken and the rest okay.

[Neonivek]

Neo, by the definition you just posted every single pnp RPG would be 'broken'.  Because as the PCs gain power they gain the ability to bypass things that would have been mandatory at lower levels (through assorted means, intimidation, spells/abilities that allow flight/teleportation/invisibility etc.)

That... isn't "Broken" or "Breaking" because you didn't break the gameplay. I think you be stretching my definition far outside its boundaries.

In fact... It is contrary to what I listed which is that Dungeons and dragons is NOT broken. So you are inventing what I mean in order to contradict it (Which is Strawmanning)

[NullForceOmega]

RIFTS is badly done in so many other ways it would take hours, or possibly days, to cover them all.  The game is straight up broken, with broken abilities, classes, races, setting, and on and on.

Neo: I did not stawman you, your post is entirely too vague to get anything from it beyond: Players gain power and the game changes, and that is broken.  If you don't want to be misinterpreted, be more detailed when posting on a subject.

[Neonivek]

Neo: I did not stawman you, your post is entirely too vague to get anything from it beyond: Players gain power and the game changes, and that is broken.  If you don't want to be misinterpreted, be more detailed when posting on a subject.

All I said was that a game doesn't need to be broken from the start... to be broken... and that most games, that are broken, start to break once characters gain power. As in "The problem that didn't exist before, exists after a condition has been met" rather than "The condition is the problem"

Which you interpreted as being "Ohh, being more powerful means you are broken" which is a stretch even by my "Being vague" measure... because it requires you to draw upon total nonsense and to super impose it even when it is being directly contradicted.

There is understandable misinterpretation and then there is... well... what just happened. Especially in a conversation where I am arguing against two people where an intentional misinterpretation would go in your favor.

[Criptfeind]

RIFTS is badly done in so many other ways it would take hours, or possibly days, to cover them all.  The game is straight up broken, with broken abilities, classes, races, setting, and on and on.

RIP RIFTS I guess.

[NullForceOmega]

When the words you posted are very literally: "Most broken games are relatively fine at the start... it is only once characters start growing in power that things start to sort of fall apart."  And I just copy pasted that from your post so don't gripe about being misquoted.

Half the reason you provoke all of these arguments is because you won't slow down and elaborate on what you are trying to say, and instead just slap down something vague on the subject and then complain that the words you used, that could be interpreted in a number of ways, aren't being construed properly.

We cannot read your mind, if you want to tell us something you must state it in a fashion that conveys the information effectively.

[Neonivek]

When the words you posted are very literally: "Most broken games are relatively fine at the start... it is only once characters start growing in power that things start to sort of fall apart."  And I just copy pasted that from your post so don't gripe about being misquoted.

Yes but you took the phrase "Once characters start growing in power" as to mean "Because characters can grow in power"

Which are completely separate phrases that differ in meaning that are not at all similar...

I mean MAYBE you can stretch Once to infer direct causation... But to change start to can... I mean you directly quoted it, but you never really told me where you drawn the meaning from within that quote.

[NullForceOmega]

This is probably starting to come off as confrontational, I am sorry if that is the case as that is not my intent.

Neo, you made the statement, with no supporting data, and then expected someone you have never even spoken with face to face, and does not know your habits, speech patterns, or conversational tendencies, to interpret said statement as if they were in possession of the same data you are.  You say it has a different meaning, but at this point what you are arguing is semantics, and you are doing so in a void, because the other parties involved have no idea what you actually intended.

Also here is the problem with your previous statement: "it is only once characters start growing in power that things start to sort of fall apart"  This portion, in an information void, is just about the most misleading, non-informative statement on the subject possible, you provided no actual examples, no attempt was made to explain what was meant by 'start to fall apart'.

The whole line fell completely flat and failed to convey anything beyond: PC+Power=game breaking.

[Neonivek]

I am going to do what I should do and retype what I wrote for clarification.

My definition of a broken game. Is one that through natural gameplay, where one doesn't try to break it, breaks in some way.

A game doesn't need to start broken but through natural gameplay eventually it must, or very likely, hit a point where the game breaks. Typically games that break later do so because some power the player's obtain later on cause the gameplay to break down, become moot, or become horribly unfun, for example if a character can ignore all damage every other turn, than battle CAN take twice as long, or more, IF the game doesn't compensate for it.

The ability for a game to break itself isn't a qualifier to be broken. Most games have some ability to game the system irrevocably either by accident or by design and it is often up to the players and DM to make sure it never steers too far into that territory. The qualifier is whether or not a game breaks through the natural course of the game rather than through an imposition or uncontrolled action.

A game is broken when the game either becomes unplayable, unfun (This is a more complicated issue. A game isn't broken just because it isn't fun to play), the mechanics break down (Everyone autosucceeds forever), or there are serious gaps.

Likewise what breaks a game also must do so within its own sphere. Unbalance is terrible... and Rifts is likely broken (I haven't read it). Yet that is because Rifts isn't meant to be horribly unbalanced... it is just a horrible unbalanced game... Yet a game that isn't meant to be balanced, doesn't necessarily hit that issue (unless... it has egregious issues... which can happen)

[NullForceOmega]

That is much better, now you are conveying meaning.

Okay, I've got a couple of points here

Point no. 1: If the game breaks down through organic play then there is a fundamental flaw in either it's balance or rules, this flaw (or flaws) may not be visible on even a comprehensive read-through, and may only become apparent during play.

Point no. 2: If the game is flawed in such a way, then it is 'broken' as per my definition up above, through fundamental imbalance or mechanical failure.

[Neonivek]

That is much better, now you are conveying meaning.

Okay, I've got a couple of points here

Point no. 1: If the game breaks down through organic play then there is a fundamental flaw in either it's balance or rules, this flaw (or flaws) may not be visible on even a comprehensive read-through, and may only become apparent during play.

Point no. 2: If the game is flawed in such a way, then it is 'broken' as per my definition up above, through fundamental imbalance or mechanical failure.

Ohh yeah! I made some edits a little late...

By serious imbalance not necessarily meaning the game is broken... I meant when that is intentional (barring... other serious issues with balance... like making the weak characters useless and the strong characters Omni-useful). Rifts is definitely not that case.

The only part of your definition I had issue with was that the "only" way to break a game was balance... And that the "only" time a game could be broken was the start.

[NullForceOmega]

I wasn't really trying to infer that those were the 'only' ways for a game to be broken, and I agree that if part of the game's basic premise is for certain things to be imbalanced then it is not necessarily broken (but still might be.)

As for the 'from the get go' part was that the imbalance/mechanics problem was always there, because it is built in. not that it was immediately obvious.

As for RIFTS, it's a kitchen sink setting made by a man who thinks copy-paste = editing and reusing assets from his other products without adjusting them = design.  Of course it's broken to hell and back, the first thing any serious RIFTS GM does is fundamentally re-write the core rules for some level of consistency.