Skill balance in the expansions

Beta Ray Bill

Beta Ray Bill

Academy Page

Join Date: May 2005

The Frozen North

If this topic has been posted before, please forgive me. I did a search and couldn't find anything relevant in a reasonable amount of time, so I decided to post my own topic. A link to previous threads would be much appreciated.

Now for the subject matter:

I've often looked at the skill balance in GW as similar to Magic: the Gathering. I've only played M:tG a little, but I'm familiar with the card concepts and the balance issues that they strive for. Wizards of the Coast has done a great job keeping the game balanced, entertaining and fresh after 20-30 expansions. The tricky part comes in revamping old card ideas for expanded rules, play mechanics, strategies, artwork, etc. Often, older ideas or vague card powers/descriptions get the boot from tournament play through the "banned" list. It's an effective way to promote newer, more specific cards and sell new expansion packs. It also helps rebalance the game in light of other card combos and older ineffective cards and rules.

I have some serious misgivings about how ANet will accomplish the addition of new skills in an expansion without bringing serious imbalance to the current game (Chapter 1) and keeping to their "no extra fees" model. If they have to nerf or buff certain skills in Chap 1 to rebalance them to fit with the expansion, it will seriously effect the competitive aspect of the game. It would also require everyone to rethink their character builds.

I'd like some sort of response from ArenaNet ultimately. I love the game so far (just a couple missions away from ascension), and play GW exclusively when I have the option. I think it's a fun, engaging game and one of my best entertainment purchases in a long time. I'd just like to know how hard I should save for the expansion next year.

Responses?

arnansnow

arnansnow

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Jun 2005

DOOM

E/N

They balance skills by having people use them, and if the skill is unbalanced then people will complain in the forums, which Anet checks.

Scissors Lizard beats Paper Tiger . (magic the gathering cards)

Spooky

Spooky

Bokusatsu Tenshi

Join Date: Dec 2004

Bellevue, WA

KEA

E/Mo

The balance of skills in future expansions - not just amongst each other, but with the game as a whole - is something that will doubtless recieve as much rigorous testing before ever seeing the light of day, as was the case with chapter 1.

Of course, once something moves into the retail phase, there's always the potential for unexpected imbalances or abuses to pop up, which is why these and other forums are watched for feedback. There have been quite a few changes made to skills from retail until now, as balance is pretty much an ongoing responsibility.

Since it has been stated quite a few times that players will not be required to purchase the expansions to remain competitive, I would assume that all new skills would be balanced against the originals - if something is found to be particularly out of line, then the new skill would be the one tweaked, not the older. That's not official, mind you - just call it educated extrapolation.

KaPe

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: Jun 2005

Before they add new skills, they better first make current ones *used*. I mean, just look at Elementalists, Air is pretty much the sphere of choice on PvP and fire on PvE. Of course, this is not necessarily because they are OP, but 2 others certainly lack something. Same with Monks Smites - allthough this is probably more due to a fact that people expect monks to heal/protect and nothing else. Warrios - hammers. Adding new skills would only disturb the balance further, unless there would be some overpowered skills in other trees - which is bad way of "improving" such tree.

Kashrlyyk

Kashrlyyk

Jungle Guide

Join Date: May 2005

Quote:
Originally Posted by KaPe
Before they add new skills, they better first make current ones *used*. I mean, just look at Elementalists, Air is pretty much the sphere of choice on PvP and fire on PvE. Of course, this is not necessarily because they are OP, but 2 others certainly lack something. Same with Monks Smites - allthough this is probably more due to a fact that people expect monks to heal/protect and nothing else. Warrios - hammers. Adding new skills would only disturb the balance further, unless there would be some overpowered skills in other trees - which is bad way of "improving" such tree.
++++++++++++

Couldn´t agree more!!!

1004pyro

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: Jun 2005

The Netherlands // Alteveer

No one is Perfect

Mo/Me

if you read a skill you think its bad.
just keep all skills in mind because some skills mighte be more powerfull then you think.

arnansnow

arnansnow

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Jun 2005

DOOM

E/N

Quote:
Originally Posted by 1004pyro
if you read a skill you think its bad.
just keep all skills in mind because some skills mighte be more powerfull then you think.

Otyugh's Cry, Is it more powerful than I think it is? As I think it is horrible.

Aniewiel

Aniewiel

Smite Mistress

Join Date: Jun 2005

The Land of AZ, USA

Rt/E

I do agree though that with the plethora of skills available to all classes (assuming that most people are dual-classed), there are a LOT that are NEVER used. ANet needs to cull through the skills---maybe run some sort of program tracking server(s) wide skill use and such. Get rid of unused skills and add new ones with expansions and/or just adding them in patches.

Aziz

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: Jun 2005

Pirates of B B Q Bay [BBQ]

for the record, my guild has used some form of smiting very sucessfully alot and water and earth are the better lines for eles imo, hammer wars are very good for what they are for and i see them used alot

dargon

Furnace Stoker

Join Date: May 2005

The Seraphim Knights [TSK]

R/

For otyughs cry. Imagine an all ranger team with pets. For 5 mana, all those pets just got a +20 armor boost and they are all hitting the same target.

Doctor Anomalo

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: May 2005

San Diego, CA

R/W

mtg is different in that people are not invested so much in the colors. if white is underpowered, people will just happily play the other colors. in guild wars, there is more roleplaying. people will play ranger (for example) even if it is underpowered because of the flavor. then they will complain that ranger sucks.

Rieselle

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: May 2005

Melbourne, Australia

E/Rt

Heheh, I think when they release the expansion they should UAS the normal game skills for everyone :P

theclam

Jungle Guide

Join Date: May 2005

Since skills can be balanced on the fly, this will be less of a problem than in Magic.

Beta Ray Bill

Beta Ray Bill

Academy Page

Join Date: May 2005

The Frozen North

Quote:
Originally Posted by Aniewiel
I do agree though that with the plethora of skills available to all classes (assuming that most people are dual-classed), there are a LOT that are NEVER used. ANet needs to cull through the skills---maybe run some sort of program tracking server(s) wide skill use and such. Get rid of unused skills and add new ones with expansions and/or just adding them in patches.
This is precisely the type of modification that I fear, because someone somewhere is building a successful character around rarely used skills and finding a niche they enjoy playing. Even the most "useless" skills to the majority of players are critical to a player who knows how to use them effectively.

I currently play a fire/air ele, just recently adding air to the mix. Here, now, I read that the elementalists in the Tombs focus mostly on water and earth. I've dabbled in earth, but I've never touched water. Just goes to show that all the skills are useful to those who know how to use them.

This is what I'm looking at in anticipation for Chapter 2. I don't want to see current skills nerfed or buffed; I'm just mainly concerned to see new skills fold evenly into the mix.

Morganas

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: May 2005

Quote:
Originally Posted by Aniewiel
I do agree though that with the plethora of skills available to all classes (assuming that most people are dual-classed), there are a LOT that are NEVER used. ANet needs to cull through the skills---maybe run some sort of program tracking server(s) wide skill use and such. Get rid of unused skills and add new ones with expansions and/or just adding them in patches.

Maybe we should filter out less used class/attribute combinations too. We really only need w/mo's, lightening elementalists, and monks.

Great Idea!

arnansnow

arnansnow

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Jun 2005

DOOM

E/N

There is no ability that no one uses (even that signet that was taken out was used, and otyugh's cry which people use for laughs or for curiosity).

Aniewiel

Aniewiel

Smite Mistress

Join Date: Jun 2005

The Land of AZ, USA

Rt/E

Quote:
Originally Posted by Morganas
Maybe we should filter out less used class/attribute combinations too. We really only need w/mo's, lightening elementalists, and monks.

Great Idea!
LOL! OK...

Beta Ray Bill

Beta Ray Bill

Academy Page

Join Date: May 2005

The Frozen North

Quote:
Originally Posted by Spooky
Since it has been stated quite a few times that players will not be required to purchase the expansions to remain competitive, I would assume that all new skills would be balanced against the originals - if something is found to be particularly out of line, then the new skill would be the one tweaked, not the older. That's not official, mind you - just call it educated extrapolation.
This leads me to wonder just how far ANet can go with expansions. Realistically, I can see 4-5 expansions at the most (which may be enough considering how quickly technological advancement can change gaming venues and player interest).

The only way WotC have been able to continue pumping out the expansions for M:tG is by banning or rewriting older cards to fit with newer cards, gameplay mechanics, etc. This marketing technique almost requires a player to buy new cards to keep up and stay competitive in tournament play, something ANet has emphatically denounced as part of their corporate strategy for GW.

Epinephrine

Epinephrine

Master of Beasts

Join Date: Mar 2005

Ottawa, Canada

Servants of Fortuna [SoF]

It is an interesting point - the fact is that MtG does junk older sets - but there are many problems with the comparison between MtG and GW.

In MtG when a card is unbalanced it gets added to a restricted or banned list; in GW they tweak it back to within spec. They can rewrite all the "cards" in GW, so it doesn't require a banned list.

In MtG they need to keep selling cards, and part of that push results in more powerful cards with each generation - they aren't immediately better, but newer cards have bigger effects than older ones most of the time, with the exception of the restricted cards etc... - Anet gets around the forced upping of card power by offering further PvE with each pack.

I do see it as being difficult to get away from the current archetypes, but we'll see how they do with that. I have confidence in them in that regard, and if the new skills are balanced against the old ones things will be fine.

Ensign

Ensign

Just Plain Fluffy

Join Date: Dec 2004

Berkeley, CA

Idiot Savants

Well, to answer the basic question, a player with access to expansion skills will be more powerful than a player with only the skills from the basic game. Options = power, and those without the options will get left behind. Unfortunate, but there's little that can be done about this.

Adding skills in an expension will not unbalance the original game. There will be an imbalance between expansion enabled characters and those without the expansion, but you're likely going to hear nothing but rhetoric about this.

They shouldn't have to nerf or buff skills from the original game to fit the expansion. Hell, they don't have to nerf or buff skills at all, and things will still sort themselves out. Only so many skills can be the cream, better balance just blurs the line.

But I'd expect balance changes to come with the expansion anyway. One of my biggest disappointments so far has been the lack of balance changes (besides 'bug fixes') that we've seen in retail, despite there being some skills that are clearly overpowered (Healing Seed) and others that are so bad that we make jokes about them (Searing Heat). I can understand them not wanting to tweak the skills in the middle too much, but why haven't they addressed the obvious cases?

Peace,
-CxE

Mister Pie

Academy Page

Join Date: Jun 2005

Evil Avatar

W/Me

It seems like it'd make more sense to me to have expansion arenas, etc. You get to use expansion skills in the expansion arenas, otherwise you're limited to the original skill set. I think it would really hamper the possibilities for the new skills if they had to balance all of them against the original ones.

Morganas

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: May 2005

Well, I'm guessing that if they added new skills, those skills would be available in the new areas they added. There'd be no reason to bar them from use in the old areas, as PVE chars won't even get them until they get to the new areas, and PvP players shouldn't be denied the ability to use their build (which isn't more powerful then an original skills build, just different) in the old pvp arenas (I doubt they'd add new pvp arenas with new expansions unless they were entirely new game types, i.e. king of the hill version of droks).

Seeing the new skills in action in pvp would be good motivation to buy an expansion, it wouldn't be a good idea on arenanets part to stifle that.

Epinephrine

Epinephrine

Master of Beasts

Join Date: Mar 2005

Ottawa, Canada

Servants of Fortuna [SoF]

Quote:
Originally Posted by Mister Pie
It seems like it'd make more sense to me to have expansion arenas, etc. You get to use expansion skills in the expansion arenas, otherwise you're limited to the original skill set. I think it would really hamper the possibilities for the new skills if they had to balance all of them against the original ones.
But if you want to increase sales you want people buying the expansion - you can compete without it, true, and possibly very well - but if you want to full range of skills you'll need to have the expansion. I am hoping that the expansions will be no more powerful, but MtG went with more powerful as the way to keep people buying, and I wonder how ANet will do it.

Look at MtG - back in "Legends" they introduced a creature with a two colour cost, legendary, with power 5, toughness 5 - it was a hair better than a common creature, was legendary and required 2 types of mana. In a modern set you have cards at lower cost with the same stats and special abilities (trample and two protections) tied to them. The game has been evolving, and increasing the power of the cards is one good way to keep the game selling.

Draken

Draken

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Feb 2005

The Exiled

What i see is that when they do rebalance or rearrange the game they will reset the ladder and the competition will start all over again keeping the game fresh and interesting. similar to the huge nerfs diablo II had on certain character types every so often when they became cliché. As for expansions.. yes their will probably be some issues about competition between non-expansion characters and expansion characters but that’s economics my friend we don't pay monthly fees anyway . I mean im not being cynical there has to be a number of reasons for us to want to buy expansions being competitive will probably be one.

Phades

Phades

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Jun 2005

Quote:
Originally Posted by Ensign
Well, to answer the basic question, a player with access to expansion skills will be more powerful than a player with only the skills from the basic game. Options = power, and those without the options will get left behind. Unfortunate, but there's little that can be done about this.

Adding skills in an expension will not unbalance the original game. There will be an imbalance between expansion enabled characters and those without the expansion, but you're likely going to hear nothing but rhetoric about this.

They shouldn't have to nerf or buff skills from the original game to fit the expansion. Hell, they don't have to nerf or buff skills at all, and things will still sort themselves out. Only so many skills can be the cream, better balance just blurs the line.

But I'd expect balance changes to come with the expansion anyway. One of my biggest disappointments so far has been the lack of balance changes (besides 'bug fixes') that we've seen in retail, despite there being some skills that are clearly overpowered (Healing Seed) and others that are so bad that we make jokes about them (Searing Heat). I can understand them not wanting to tweak the skills in the middle too much, but why haven't they addressed the obvious cases?

Peace,
-CxE
Woot circular logic. You do have some valid points here, but what i think needs to happen is that a list be gathered up of all the less useful skills (i will survive anyone?) and underpowered skills, when observing cross class comparisons and have them removed or changed to be useful. There is no point in wasting database space for things that dont work. In the same stance, there are quite a few spell lines (not just spells) that are too optimised for the pve and need to get trimmed back for pvp. Protective spirit->mark of protection->divine intervention anyone or perhaps dual bonds setups? Granted they can be removed, but it is rather annoying (i think i might have the order a little incorrect, just working off memory here). Along the same lines of thought would be the total and utter lack of counter for wards.

I have no beef with the bugfixes. Bugfixes are nice, but id prefer if they were weeded out in beta instead of post release. Balance should have been fine in the design phase, while beta crushed the bugs, but i guess too much time was spent in the arena by the testers. Alot of the bugfixes ive seen have been for the PvE side so far. Although, i have been trapped inside world geometry just like the npc henchmen and id would expect something like that have been fixed/removed in beta as well. I can tolerate, to a point, getting stuck on the world geometry if i try to move through more rough terrain akwardly, but i see no reason for a character to perform a skill that causes the animation to pull the character into a wall for any reason.

Just a random question here to round out my thoughts. Who here has seen npcs of the same type, same name, always in the area in the same spot, that randomly begins to fight each other? The same monsters also randomly just move along the pathing given to them instead of attacking player characters. They also break off from fighting player characters to move along the path and do nothing once they reach a home point. I have also seen a different type monster, in the same area, that will refuse to attack a single character if 2 of the same type of monster is already attacking that character and will just stand and watch until one od the already attacking monsters die. If the one that doesnt fight is engaged first, then it will just try to run away and not defend its self. Both of these exist in the same area post searing, but are pre-ascention.

On a sidenote, i think its kinda sad that the npc henchment/pets have worse AI logic than the npc monsters. If they have the same logic, then they arent optimised at all. NPC monster healers > henchmen healers, while imps seem to be > all henchmen moving out of AOE damage areas and target switching and focusing fire ect.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Epinephrine
But if you want to increase sales you want people buying the expansion - you can compete without it, true, and possibly very well - but if you want to full range of skills you'll need to have the expansion. I am hoping that the expansions will be no more powerful, but MtG went with more powerful as the way to keep people buying, and I wonder how ANet will do it.

Look at MtG - back in "Legends" they introduced a creature with a two colour cost, legendary, with power 5, toughness 5 - it was a hair better than a common creature, was legendary and required 2 types of mana. In a modern set you have cards at lower cost with the same stats and special abilities (trample and two protections) tied to them. The game has been evolving, and increasing the power of the cards is one good way to keep the game selling.
Course some of the most powerful cards to come out happened in the first 4 sets. The dark was complete and utter junk though for the most part and the following expansion (forgotton empires?) was even worse. They also had a major distribution problem combined with a rarity problem early in the game, this caused some things to become exclusive content and unavailable to many players only to be left behind in power down the road. Going the route of "collectable" is a very very bad concept for balance. I believe this also applies to GW for both runes and weapon fittings.

Makkert

Makkert

Black Beast of Aarrrrgghh

Join Date: May 2005

The Netherlands

The Biggyverse [PLEB] // Servants of Fortuna [SoF]

Quote:
Originally Posted by theclam
Since skills can be balanced on the fly, this will be less of a problem than in Magic.
*DING*
.
we have a winner!

Beta Ray Bill

Beta Ray Bill

Academy Page

Join Date: May 2005

The Frozen North

Keep in mind, all, that ANet has vowed not to "force" anyone into buying *any* expansion just to keep competitive. I plan to buy Chapter 2 simply because I enjoy the PvE role-play aspect of the game. I just can't see where they would find justification to renege on their promise to never charge additional fees for those who don't wish to pay for them.

It will be a challenge for them, I realize, and this is where my original question comes from. How will they keep the cost per player limited to chapter purchases and still allow for the best competition over the course of 3 or 4 chapter releases?

Also, how many expansions do they really have in them? If they can successfully mix in 3 chapters with skills and explorable areas similar in size and/or content to Chapter 1, game balance will be *very* tight and tedious to achieve. We originally heard about new chapter releases roughly every six months or so. The latest news is that Chapter 2 will be release approximately Spring '06. That's a full year from original release. Is this a sign that skill balance is particularly difficult, and, if so, how long will it take to successfully balance in Chapter 3 with not only the original game, but with Chapter 2 as well?

Phades

Phades

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Jun 2005

Quote:
Originally Posted by Beta Ray Bill
Keep in mind, all, that ANet has vowed not to "force" anyone into buying *any* expansion just to keep competitive. I plan to buy Chapter 2 simply because I enjoy the PvE role-play aspect of the game. I just can't see where they would find justification to renege on their promise to never charge additional fees for those who don't wish to pay for them.

It will be a challenge for them, I realize, and this is where my original question comes from. How will they keep the cost per player limited to chapter purchases and still allow for the best competition over the course of 3 or 4 chapter releases?

Also, how many expansions do they really have in them? If they can successfully mix in 3 chapters with skills and explorable areas similar in size and/or content to Chapter 1, game balance will be *very* tight and tedious to achieve. We originally heard about new chapter releases roughly every six months or so. The latest news is that Chapter 2 will be release approximately Spring '06. That's a full year from original release. Is this a sign that skill balance is particularly difficult, and, if so, how long will it take to successfully balance in Chapter 3 with not only the original game, but with Chapter 2 as well?
I dont mean to be as much of a raincloud as i end up being, but i pose these questions to you. How many people will be interested in grinding towards new skills, items, and abilities, if none of them are better or different than the existing ones? Do you believe areanet will think that people will buy new content based solely on new explorable PvE and possible PvP mission styles?

As seen from experience with things like X-box live (blah i know, but i didnt throw money at it), exclusive release new "content" only segments the community splitting the haves from the have nots in many instaces, causing a greater difficulty to get into a game or continue playing in some instances. In other games like planetside, it didnt have as much of an impact, because of the nature of the expansion, but in other pve only games the content becomes a must if you desire to do anything different. Looking at guildwars for what it is, i do not believe that they truly intended for the game to be veiwed as a strong pve environment, but having elements in the pve that make it different from other pve environments.

Phades

Phades

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Jun 2005

Quote:
Originally Posted by Blackace
They cant rebalance all the "useless" skills and buff them, they'd just turn the game into a junkfest. Every skill cant be good because with over 450 of them alot of them have to take a backseat to even some skills that are just slightly better. Then again with things like Energy Drain and Power Leak sitting around Mind Wrack and Ether Lord just go to the garbage no matter how you try to fix them.
Ether lord would be better with a longer duration, as it is multi-purpose, but mana regen is signifigantly slower than health, so i see your point. Mind wrack just seems like another one of those low cost, time bomb esce cover hexes that the mesmer class is riddled with.

To be honest the skills with a theme behind them, whether they are agressive, passive or counter in nature, the "weaker" ones could easily become useful if combined with another "weaker" one of the same class or complimentary class. Some of this exists within the eliete skill choices, but many of those eliete skills arent neccarially better overal, when compared to other eliete and normal skills, in addition to the sometimes greater cooldowns and higher energy/adrenalin costs.

For example you have 2 skills from different skill sets that do very similar things, however one is better than the other. In the instance of "i will survive" versus melandru's resiliance. One is eliete, but they both occupy the same space on the skill bar. One is clearly better than the other, because it has more functions. The undesirable part of both lie in the fact that it is better to remove the hexes or conditions and there are ways to do that, usually within the same class. Both of these skills could easily have a "removes all effects" upon experiation of the skill's duration and they would become very useful to their respective classes. The character would become free from the effects, IF they survive long enough for the non-cancelable skill to expire over time. This would be one way of making something less than useful more useful.

For other skills like rush, there really is no reason for it to exist, as there are other skills that arent as situational and others that do the same thing, but have other effects. Those kinds of skills should be removed, as quality of choices over quantity of choices is always a better design move. Should mesmers have a 5th skill tree and have part of all of their good skills move to it and then overly filled with useless crap? I dont think so, but that kind of streamlining should exist for every job and skill.

Part of the reason why im hesitant about any of the proposed pay for content expansions is that if they are unwilling to fix, balance, or remove the current skills i will have little to no faith that new balanced skills will be introduced. They will either be stronger in nature, to keep the cycle of search and grind, in order to keep the player's interest; or conversly they could be mediocre re-hashed garbage, to either be not used seriously or as a novelty in order to retain balance between the content enabled and the non-content enabled.