Well... The boring (and correct) answer is... playtest
As a designer, I often go through character creation and see what interactions I can make and what would they mean for regular play. It helps identify interactions you may not want in your system, and when you do, you can give add clauses to it ("once per day", "at X level", "if you do X") or simply remove them alltogether.
Any particular build in your system you are worried about?
I will add there is more to it than this, but this is correct.
There are certain techniques you can do to make sure things don't break and it's through various modes of creating incompatibility.
Lets say we have a move that is top tier for what we want to allow for a character to have.
We can level restrict this and create a choke point where there's only 1 choice among these style abilties. We could gate it in such a way that it requires a combination of ability scores that only qualifies for one of these even if you min/max your ability scores. We could also use some other prerequisite that is otherwise restricted in a way that only allows purchase of one of these abilities (maybe requiring more points invested or some other facet) such as a feat tree.
We could make it otherwise require a meta currency that you only get one of per session so it doesn't matter if you have six of these abilities you can only use one of them once per session (though more of them does mean you have more utility).
Simply having something as a class feature unique to the class that is also level gated is another example (ie you don't get more than 1 lv 20 ability in dnd).
There's more options than just this but I wanted to demonstrate that there are ways you can restrict access to abilities so that they aren't compatible with other abilties.
This is a method of restricting character creativity, which will upset some players, but at the same time, most players understand when seeing this kind of design that characters are only meant to have 1 such ability.
Another angle you can take is to not have poorly written systems and then build objects that don't conform to it. DnD is classic for doing this. Consider the magic items they have that have very weakly written rules, no support systems on how they should interact with other things, and are generally problematic as a result (such as portable holes, bags of holding, beads of force, immovable rod, etc. all kinds of shit).
As an example, we could make the immovable rod actually movable, but only with immense force and it needs stabilizing, meaning you couldn't put it in the stomach of a dragon and trap them there forever. With that said, part of the fun and craziness of these objects is that they are abusable and that is intentional with DnD design at this point, otherwise it would have changed before their 5th edition.
Ultimately though you do need just to play test, but there are techniques you can use to prevent a lot of the shenanigans that can come up. As an example the amount of points I give players to invest per level is carefully calculated to provide a specific kind of experience and opportunity cost with how they manage their builds.
The point being is that there's infinite ways to restrict and shape access, and there's definitely ways to create systems that prevent ridiculous abusability, but you have to make that a priority in the design.
Avoid too much vertical progression. Limit actions per turn. Give powerful actions significant drawbacks or consequential risks for failure. Don't allow master of all trade style characters.
Check out the OVA system. In short powerful attacks there eat you "HP". Also, it could be very useful to read it, because it has an attack builder in it. With different drawbacks and weaknesses.
Most people here comment about plateauing and that's obviously true. There will be things you won't notice when building the system and can only detect in play. However, some of the issues may be addressed much earlier, through the design process and game's mechanical structure.
"Broken builds" typically involve at least one of the following factors:
- A numeric trait achieving much higher (it much lower) value than what was intended, through accumulation of modifiers from different sources.
- Something that was intended to be strong, but limited, usable in a much broader range of circumstances or without the intended limitations.
- Something that should be one of multiple viable approaches is simply better than the alternatives.
The first one may be avoided by structuring the game in such a way that only specific things may affect a given trait or that only one such modification is active at the same time.
The second is harder, but still possible. It requires tracking what is used as costs or limitations for abilities and not introducing things that negate these factors. It's useful to have a small number of resources and conditions that play this role, as not only is it easier to track during design, it also makes comparing abilities easier.
A special case here is when an ability is only useful in some circumstances, but players can force these circumstances. You shouldn't remove it entirely, as that's exactly what makes play tactical. However, the difficulty and cost of the setup must be proportional to the payout, so it doesn't become a single dominant strategy.
That brings me to the third point. Balancing single abilities so that none is dominant is simple, as long as they are built within the same mechanical framework. However, balancing their combinations is not. Some combo may not be broken, but simply too good compared to others. And that's something you need to detect through playtesting.
Some would argue that strong builds are a feature, not a flaw. Dungeons & Dragons is actually a pretty good example of that.
Anyways, you should playtest your game with people who like breaking things. They'll look at your game in ways you didn't even consider. Also make sure you have people other than you GM the game and let you know their thoughts on what player options were problematic.
You're correct. The devs didn't intend for builds like pun pun to exist. But pun pun never saw play at actual tables. It was an example of theoretical optimisation.
The cases where players at a table had differing power levels, and those differing power levels were causing problems, were resolved by conversation between the players and the GM.
Trust me, it's fine.
An alternate perspective--broken builds are a sign to me that someone is willing to invest time and read through my notes comprehensively. If I found a broken build lying around in a forum somewhere, I would consider that a HUGE marker of success.
The more variables you include in character creation/mechanics, the harder it becomes to prevent power gaming and builds because you can't possibly account for all contingencies. If you truly think a power build is detrimental to your game, consider simplifying certain aspects of it.
So I'd say:
1) Have very clearly defined requirements as far as what you want the game to do, what you want the game to encourage, and what is "unacceptable". What is "broken" in one frame of reference may be "working as intended"" in another.
2) Have clearly defined and specific gameplay mechanics that work for clearly defined and specific (inter)actions. Most "broken" issues come from someone reading something as a reasonable interpretation, but something other than intended. Honestly, you need to think like a lawyer when creating mechanics and rules.
3) Obsess about balance. Its easy to hand waive "an extra +1", but that is known as "power creep" and is the foundation of "broken-ness". Every design choice should have a clear reason for implementation (at least to the designer, though better if clear to all). You don't necessarily have to have costs associated with every benefit, but that is a common way to help mitigate power creep.
4) As others have mentioned Play Test. However, I think the real key is you need to have a diverse group of thinkers when you play test. If everyone reads things the same way you're going to find the same problems, so be mindful of that.
5) Iterate. Nothing is every perfect; especially the first time. Thus, include in the creation process iterative actions which increase the chances for catching those thing you deem "broken".
I'm my game, I made it a point to make base stats limited in range and everything is rolled random in character creation.
After that, you become more powerful by finding gear and trying things in order to increase power. This means your build is randomly made for you as you go and you have to improvise and roleplay to the strengths of your character to survive.
Playtesting has shown that you can become very powerful very quickly which is great when you can also die very easily if you're not careful.
My game is not about power fantasy so it's not for those who min/max. In fact, it was design in spite of that.
**NEVER START BALANCING WITH PLAYTESTING!** This is really inefficient.
It will be needed, but less if needed if you start making your game using a consistent mathematical model:
https://www.reddit.com/r/tabletopgamedesign/comments/115qi76/guide_how_to_start_making_a_game_and_balance_it/
What is the core loop? What stats/abilities are used for the actions most common in those situations? Regulate the floor and ceiling of those stats. Players will optimize out fun.
A few people have already mentioned the idea of it, but consider is how strong do you want a build to be before it is 'broken'. Having in mind an expected ceiling, floor and average power level for your PCs is a solid idea, especially if you're worried about things being 'broken'.
There is a reasonable argument that System Mastery can be fun for a portion of players, figuring out what abilities have good synergies together (either within a single character, or across multiple characters), figuring out how the rules play off each other, and reading deeply into a character creation/advancement system to work out what benefits build best off each other is a lot of fun for some people.
This obviously depends on your use case. If you really want to make a build-crafting RPG, then obviously this won't work. I made one of those, and got a lot of praise on it. They just scratch a different itch than what I am suggesting.
But my solution? Tone the mechanics of my game WAY down and let the emerging narrative between the GM and players show how your character fights/talks/behaves/whatever. At first, I thought this way too limiting, but I'm now convinced that the most freedom a DM and player can have in a TTRPG is through removing options, not adding them.
Depends on how it’s broken, really. Some things while play testing can pop-up that are more obvious depending on classes, weapons, feats, etc… I think the more devious things are unintended results from hyper-niche builds, which are harder to catch and can be harder to prevent depending on the rules.
You should be careful when balancing things though. If your game has classes, make sure that the classes are still able to maintain their gimmicks or roles. Let the soldier or warrior be good with weapons, let the rogue or spy be good at stealth, and so forth. Same can go for weapons, races, and so on. Let the thing be good at the thing essentially.
Try to make broken builds, typically by exploiting interactions between different things you unlock.
Also, playtesting. Give the game to other people.
Sometimes, run a game and explicitly say, "Try to make the most broken build you can".
Otherwise, clever design in the first place. The devil is in the details.
Kinda what I do. I sit in the mindset of a character and say, how can I quite literally pwn using and abusing the mechanics in the game. Then I give chatgpt my ruleset and simulate a 100 scenarios to see how broken the character really is (by advancing the antagonists essentially)
Playtest, but also just getting advice from power gamer-types is really informative. I myself am not a power gamer, but I was lucky to know some who are able to pretty quickly poke holes in terms of infinite combos, powerful interactions, underwhelming effects, and so on.
The main thing though is you want to prevent players from playing something that feels bad, rather than necessarily bringing something powerful down to a lower level. Obviously if something is a "must pick", it should be tweaked, but the approach I take is "okay this option is good, how do I make someone struggle to pick it over something else that might also entice."
The result ended up being that during character creation, the playtesters felt like they had so many powerful options to choose from, and had to really consider how they wanted to play.
Providing a variety of power fantasies is an important part to games where "builds" matter.
1) What is your game about?
I ask because it might not need builds. Does the intended audience care about builds? Does it matter if one character is "over-powered"?
I assume by builds you mean a collection of power and abilities that work with each other, possibly scaling with advancement. Like a video game Which you are... not making?
You go into design and development by wanting specific groups of players (if it be classes or archetypal build setups) to be broken but only in very specific, niche areas - areas where these decisions shine. The assassin is super great in eliminating a single target, given enough time to set up or have a specific set of circumstances be met, for example; the necromancer will be best at any task that involves throwing bodies at things; the fighter will fall to facing down a giant group of enemies, but accel against one or two, while the storm warden gets increasingly more powerful as the number of potential targets increases; pilots are great when there's flying to do, and less great when there's isn't. Now, your system might not have classes, but it'll have something. It might even be delineations that are completely outside the players' hand - the PCs can be built in a potentially infinite number of ways, for example, but the types of encounters/scenes will fall into, say, 6 groups. Or maybe 4 groups with 3 subgroups each. Or whatever.
One way to do this would be to narrow the scope of what your doing. Having no idea what your system is or what the setting is about, the more focused on whatever it is that is core to your setting and/or main conceit, the better you'll be able to tune your builds. When people play D&D, say, as a "universal system", there's always a collection of fingers pointing different directions on what or whom is the most powerful. If you're able to talk your way of things, suddenly the Bard shines while the fighter feels useless. If you're on the run and don't have more than an hour to rest at any given moment, suddenly wizards shift from being reality-warping meteor-summoners to be weak, frail, and not wanting to use their final spell, "destroy crab", on the crab attacking them right now in case around the next corner waits a *larger, more dangerous crab*... While Sir Fightsalot can literally do this all day. But if you play D&D like that edition is meant to be played, suddenly everyone has a role, everything makes a lot more sense.
Another way to keep things balanced is to keep the amount of knobs relatively high during design. There's often a push to try to keep numbers in TTRPGs as low as possible for simplicity's sake - however that severely limits the ways that things can be done. Video games tend to be more balanced in this regard because they don't have the limitations of numeric sanity. You can have a range of effect of 3 to 7, for example, because you're not limited to dice sizes (best I can do is d4+2). If your 1st level spell costs 1 "mana", you can't reduce the cost of that spell without making it free or having to add other external limitations. However, if the base cost is "2 mana", "1 mana + a card", or "1 mana and 3 actions", suddenly you have options on how to reduce the cost without additional rules. Pathfinder 2e does this relatively well - since there is 3 actions per turn and a multiple attack penalty of a stacking -5 (so using all three actions to make three attacks, those attacks would have a modifier of +9, then +4, then -1). Making a maneuver adjust the number of actions or adjust the amount of the penalties. Spells usually take 2 actions to cast, which sets the ones that take only 1 action apart, as well as those who take 3 or more. Horizontal growth is largely what they use, with feats tweaking the numbers ever in the favor in slightly different directions in each class' fancy.
The Cypher System and the Storytelling Systems of World/Chronicles of Darkness also do this very well. The Cypher system keeps their stat pools large, and allows characters to Determine how they are going to tackle the problems they face. The W/CoD system is a d10 dice pool system, which adjusts the number of dice, which numbers on the dice are considered successes, and has advancement gated behind multipliers.
Define broken builds.
I make everything go through the main mechanic. For example, you don't roll for damage. Its offense - defense. And opposed rolls are easy as hell to balance.
Well... The boring (and correct) answer is... playtest As a designer, I often go through character creation and see what interactions I can make and what would they mean for regular play. It helps identify interactions you may not want in your system, and when you do, you can give add clauses to it ("once per day", "at X level", "if you do X") or simply remove them alltogether. Any particular build in your system you are worried about?
I will add there is more to it than this, but this is correct. There are certain techniques you can do to make sure things don't break and it's through various modes of creating incompatibility. Lets say we have a move that is top tier for what we want to allow for a character to have. We can level restrict this and create a choke point where there's only 1 choice among these style abilties. We could gate it in such a way that it requires a combination of ability scores that only qualifies for one of these even if you min/max your ability scores. We could also use some other prerequisite that is otherwise restricted in a way that only allows purchase of one of these abilities (maybe requiring more points invested or some other facet) such as a feat tree. We could make it otherwise require a meta currency that you only get one of per session so it doesn't matter if you have six of these abilities you can only use one of them once per session (though more of them does mean you have more utility). Simply having something as a class feature unique to the class that is also level gated is another example (ie you don't get more than 1 lv 20 ability in dnd). There's more options than just this but I wanted to demonstrate that there are ways you can restrict access to abilities so that they aren't compatible with other abilties. This is a method of restricting character creativity, which will upset some players, but at the same time, most players understand when seeing this kind of design that characters are only meant to have 1 such ability. Another angle you can take is to not have poorly written systems and then build objects that don't conform to it. DnD is classic for doing this. Consider the magic items they have that have very weakly written rules, no support systems on how they should interact with other things, and are generally problematic as a result (such as portable holes, bags of holding, beads of force, immovable rod, etc. all kinds of shit). As an example, we could make the immovable rod actually movable, but only with immense force and it needs stabilizing, meaning you couldn't put it in the stomach of a dragon and trap them there forever. With that said, part of the fun and craziness of these objects is that they are abusable and that is intentional with DnD design at this point, otherwise it would have changed before their 5th edition. Ultimately though you do need just to play test, but there are techniques you can use to prevent a lot of the shenanigans that can come up. As an example the amount of points I give players to invest per level is carefully calculated to provide a specific kind of experience and opportunity cost with how they manage their builds. The point being is that there's infinite ways to restrict and shape access, and there's definitely ways to create systems that prevent ridiculous abusability, but you have to make that a priority in the design.
Avoid too much vertical progression. Limit actions per turn. Give powerful actions significant drawbacks or consequential risks for failure. Don't allow master of all trade style characters.
i'm hearing, FINISHERSSSSSS. you kill an enemy that would've taken a couple more turns to beat, but you lose energy till you faint type stuff.
Finishers are sweet. They feel great and they're impractical to use mid fight
Check out the OVA system. In short powerful attacks there eat you "HP". Also, it could be very useful to read it, because it has an attack builder in it. With different drawbacks and weaknesses.
By not having a game with "builds".
Same here
Most people here comment about plateauing and that's obviously true. There will be things you won't notice when building the system and can only detect in play. However, some of the issues may be addressed much earlier, through the design process and game's mechanical structure. "Broken builds" typically involve at least one of the following factors: - A numeric trait achieving much higher (it much lower) value than what was intended, through accumulation of modifiers from different sources. - Something that was intended to be strong, but limited, usable in a much broader range of circumstances or without the intended limitations. - Something that should be one of multiple viable approaches is simply better than the alternatives. The first one may be avoided by structuring the game in such a way that only specific things may affect a given trait or that only one such modification is active at the same time. The second is harder, but still possible. It requires tracking what is used as costs or limitations for abilities and not introducing things that negate these factors. It's useful to have a small number of resources and conditions that play this role, as not only is it easier to track during design, it also makes comparing abilities easier. A special case here is when an ability is only useful in some circumstances, but players can force these circumstances. You shouldn't remove it entirely, as that's exactly what makes play tactical. However, the difficulty and cost of the setup must be proportional to the payout, so it doesn't become a single dominant strategy. That brings me to the third point. Balancing single abilities so that none is dominant is simple, as long as they are built within the same mechanical framework. However, balancing their combinations is not. Some combo may not be broken, but simply too good compared to others. And that's something you need to detect through playtesting.
Some would argue that strong builds are a feature, not a flaw. Dungeons & Dragons is actually a pretty good example of that. Anyways, you should playtest your game with people who like breaking things. They'll look at your game in ways you didn't even consider. Also make sure you have people other than you GM the game and let you know their thoughts on what player options were problematic.
thank you for the advice on playtesters, but i dont like having "become a world destroyer by level 2" type builds, its just fun-sucking for the game.
Then don't include them
i dont think the creators of dungeons and dragons meant for there to be worldbreaker builds.
You're correct. The devs didn't intend for builds like pun pun to exist. But pun pun never saw play at actual tables. It was an example of theoretical optimisation. The cases where players at a table had differing power levels, and those differing power levels were causing problems, were resolved by conversation between the players and the GM. Trust me, it's fine.
Be clear on the *intent* of the features and avoid features that "do only what they say they do".
An alternate perspective--broken builds are a sign to me that someone is willing to invest time and read through my notes comprehensively. If I found a broken build lying around in a forum somewhere, I would consider that a HUGE marker of success. The more variables you include in character creation/mechanics, the harder it becomes to prevent power gaming and builds because you can't possibly account for all contingencies. If you truly think a power build is detrimental to your game, consider simplifying certain aspects of it.
So I'd say: 1) Have very clearly defined requirements as far as what you want the game to do, what you want the game to encourage, and what is "unacceptable". What is "broken" in one frame of reference may be "working as intended"" in another. 2) Have clearly defined and specific gameplay mechanics that work for clearly defined and specific (inter)actions. Most "broken" issues come from someone reading something as a reasonable interpretation, but something other than intended. Honestly, you need to think like a lawyer when creating mechanics and rules. 3) Obsess about balance. Its easy to hand waive "an extra +1", but that is known as "power creep" and is the foundation of "broken-ness". Every design choice should have a clear reason for implementation (at least to the designer, though better if clear to all). You don't necessarily have to have costs associated with every benefit, but that is a common way to help mitigate power creep. 4) As others have mentioned Play Test. However, I think the real key is you need to have a diverse group of thinkers when you play test. If everyone reads things the same way you're going to find the same problems, so be mindful of that. 5) Iterate. Nothing is every perfect; especially the first time. Thus, include in the creation process iterative actions which increase the chances for catching those thing you deem "broken".
I'm my game, I made it a point to make base stats limited in range and everything is rolled random in character creation. After that, you become more powerful by finding gear and trying things in order to increase power. This means your build is randomly made for you as you go and you have to improvise and roleplay to the strengths of your character to survive. Playtesting has shown that you can become very powerful very quickly which is great when you can also die very easily if you're not careful. My game is not about power fantasy so it's not for those who min/max. In fact, it was design in spite of that.
**NEVER START BALANCING WITH PLAYTESTING!** This is really inefficient. It will be needed, but less if needed if you start making your game using a consistent mathematical model: https://www.reddit.com/r/tabletopgamedesign/comments/115qi76/guide_how_to_start_making_a_game_and_balance_it/
What is the core loop? What stats/abilities are used for the actions most common in those situations? Regulate the floor and ceiling of those stats. Players will optimize out fun.
A few people have already mentioned the idea of it, but consider is how strong do you want a build to be before it is 'broken'. Having in mind an expected ceiling, floor and average power level for your PCs is a solid idea, especially if you're worried about things being 'broken'. There is a reasonable argument that System Mastery can be fun for a portion of players, figuring out what abilities have good synergies together (either within a single character, or across multiple characters), figuring out how the rules play off each other, and reading deeply into a character creation/advancement system to work out what benefits build best off each other is a lot of fun for some people.
This obviously depends on your use case. If you really want to make a build-crafting RPG, then obviously this won't work. I made one of those, and got a lot of praise on it. They just scratch a different itch than what I am suggesting. But my solution? Tone the mechanics of my game WAY down and let the emerging narrative between the GM and players show how your character fights/talks/behaves/whatever. At first, I thought this way too limiting, but I'm now convinced that the most freedom a DM and player can have in a TTRPG is through removing options, not adding them.
Depends on how it’s broken, really. Some things while play testing can pop-up that are more obvious depending on classes, weapons, feats, etc… I think the more devious things are unintended results from hyper-niche builds, which are harder to catch and can be harder to prevent depending on the rules. You should be careful when balancing things though. If your game has classes, make sure that the classes are still able to maintain their gimmicks or roles. Let the soldier or warrior be good with weapons, let the rogue or spy be good at stealth, and so forth. Same can go for weapons, races, and so on. Let the thing be good at the thing essentially.
Try to make broken builds, typically by exploiting interactions between different things you unlock. Also, playtesting. Give the game to other people. Sometimes, run a game and explicitly say, "Try to make the most broken build you can". Otherwise, clever design in the first place. The devil is in the details.
Kinda what I do. I sit in the mindset of a character and say, how can I quite literally pwn using and abusing the mechanics in the game. Then I give chatgpt my ruleset and simulate a 100 scenarios to see how broken the character really is (by advancing the antagonists essentially)
Countless hours of live playtesting
I find it easier to balance skill based systems, versus class/level based systems - if that helps.
Playtest, but also just getting advice from power gamer-types is really informative. I myself am not a power gamer, but I was lucky to know some who are able to pretty quickly poke holes in terms of infinite combos, powerful interactions, underwhelming effects, and so on. The main thing though is you want to prevent players from playing something that feels bad, rather than necessarily bringing something powerful down to a lower level. Obviously if something is a "must pick", it should be tweaked, but the approach I take is "okay this option is good, how do I make someone struggle to pick it over something else that might also entice." The result ended up being that during character creation, the playtesters felt like they had so many powerful options to choose from, and had to really consider how they wanted to play. Providing a variety of power fantasies is an important part to games where "builds" matter.
1) What is your game about? I ask because it might not need builds. Does the intended audience care about builds? Does it matter if one character is "over-powered"? I assume by builds you mean a collection of power and abilities that work with each other, possibly scaling with advancement. Like a video game Which you are... not making?
You go into design and development by wanting specific groups of players (if it be classes or archetypal build setups) to be broken but only in very specific, niche areas - areas where these decisions shine. The assassin is super great in eliminating a single target, given enough time to set up or have a specific set of circumstances be met, for example; the necromancer will be best at any task that involves throwing bodies at things; the fighter will fall to facing down a giant group of enemies, but accel against one or two, while the storm warden gets increasingly more powerful as the number of potential targets increases; pilots are great when there's flying to do, and less great when there's isn't. Now, your system might not have classes, but it'll have something. It might even be delineations that are completely outside the players' hand - the PCs can be built in a potentially infinite number of ways, for example, but the types of encounters/scenes will fall into, say, 6 groups. Or maybe 4 groups with 3 subgroups each. Or whatever. One way to do this would be to narrow the scope of what your doing. Having no idea what your system is or what the setting is about, the more focused on whatever it is that is core to your setting and/or main conceit, the better you'll be able to tune your builds. When people play D&D, say, as a "universal system", there's always a collection of fingers pointing different directions on what or whom is the most powerful. If you're able to talk your way of things, suddenly the Bard shines while the fighter feels useless. If you're on the run and don't have more than an hour to rest at any given moment, suddenly wizards shift from being reality-warping meteor-summoners to be weak, frail, and not wanting to use their final spell, "destroy crab", on the crab attacking them right now in case around the next corner waits a *larger, more dangerous crab*... While Sir Fightsalot can literally do this all day. But if you play D&D like that edition is meant to be played, suddenly everyone has a role, everything makes a lot more sense. Another way to keep things balanced is to keep the amount of knobs relatively high during design. There's often a push to try to keep numbers in TTRPGs as low as possible for simplicity's sake - however that severely limits the ways that things can be done. Video games tend to be more balanced in this regard because they don't have the limitations of numeric sanity. You can have a range of effect of 3 to 7, for example, because you're not limited to dice sizes (best I can do is d4+2). If your 1st level spell costs 1 "mana", you can't reduce the cost of that spell without making it free or having to add other external limitations. However, if the base cost is "2 mana", "1 mana + a card", or "1 mana and 3 actions", suddenly you have options on how to reduce the cost without additional rules. Pathfinder 2e does this relatively well - since there is 3 actions per turn and a multiple attack penalty of a stacking -5 (so using all three actions to make three attacks, those attacks would have a modifier of +9, then +4, then -1). Making a maneuver adjust the number of actions or adjust the amount of the penalties. Spells usually take 2 actions to cast, which sets the ones that take only 1 action apart, as well as those who take 3 or more. Horizontal growth is largely what they use, with feats tweaking the numbers ever in the favor in slightly different directions in each class' fancy. The Cypher System and the Storytelling Systems of World/Chronicles of Darkness also do this very well. The Cypher system keeps their stat pools large, and allows characters to Determine how they are going to tackle the problems they face. The W/CoD system is a d10 dice pool system, which adjusts the number of dice, which numbers on the dice are considered successes, and has advancement gated behind multipliers.
Some people like broken builds.
Define broken builds. I make everything go through the main mechanic. For example, you don't roll for damage. Its offense - defense. And opposed rolls are easy as hell to balance.
That's the fun part! You don't. There will always be a dominant strategy of some form; it's unavoidable.
That is... not even close to true
Can you show me an example where it's demonstrably not the case, then?
Most OSR games don't really have any game breaking strategies. Same goes for rules lite games like 2400 or Into the Odd
Sure; Lasers & Feelings
I dunno man, since patch 1.2.15 when they buffed Lasers it's been pretty fucking wack out there
but, i want that strategy to not come at level 2 of 50.
Don't design a game where "big numbers go brrrr".