Metaphor for Skill vs. Imbalance.

Introduction

Do you ever find yourself arguing over balance on forums?

Damn right you do - or at least I do occasionally.

One thing I find in every single gaming community is that many people (new to the game and experienced alike) don't understand that when discussing balance, you must eliminate skill as a variable.

Hence, most discussions are like so:

"X is too powerful"

"Just use [unreliable attack] to kill him!"
"But that assumes he just stands there and lets you use it!"

In this situation, someone defends a unit by assuming a player of low skill is playing it.

Or
"X is too powerful"
"I find it to be balanced as when I'm playing, other people kill me with [unreliable attack] all the time!"

"That attack is easy to counter if you are aware of your surroundings, though."

In this situation, people often degrade their own skills, or give examples of extremely strong opponents to defend the unit.

Obviously, all of this argument is invalid, because, your test subjects should be at an equal skill level, or, as I posted in a previous article ( http://zandagamedesign.blogspot.com/2010/02/skill-ceilings-and-floors.html ) - they should be at the skill ceiling of their respective units to accurately judge absolute potential.

Anyway, I'm not going to dive into all that and restate everything - this article is made so that, if you ever do need to explain to a person how skill relates to a unit's potential, you can just refer them to this article.

On with the Metaphor!

To balance two units, you MUST measure their potential at their skill ceiling (or peak human skill if the skill ceiling is higher than the limits of human qualities).

To demonstrate this, I will be discussing the fine art of carpentry.

Firstly, imagine that instead of complex characters, the units in your game are simple tools, that you as a player, utilise to win the game.

This is exactly what they are. You unit in a game is a tool. Nothing more.

So, let's say we have two Hammers, the "Craptacular Nailpusher 101" and the "Super-Gold-Hammer Deluxe 5000". We'll assume that, as their names suggest, the 5000 model is far superior to the 101.

Let's say that "Balanced Hammer Co." wants to measure up the hammers against each other - as they are unsure of whether the Deluxe model really is any better.

So, they pick two carpenters from the local area, Tom and Dave to test out the hammers.

The thing is, Tom has been hammering for an odd 20 years now, and specialises with his Nailpusher 101, while Dave is completely new to the trade, and was frankly dropped a few too many times on his head while he was a baby.

The test begins, and Tom immediately takes the lead. He finishes the task deftly and with prowess, while Dave manages to hit himself in the face more than the nails he's supposed to be hammering.

The company records these findings, but obviously note that Dave was a really bad test subject, and so they discard the reports.

To relate this back to balance briefly, this shows that just because a unit is overpowered, it does not necessarily mean that new and unskilled players will immediately dominate skilled players with it. Even in unbalanced scenarios, a wide skill gap will still favour the more skilled player.

If it doesn't, then the balance issue should be so plainly obvious, it would have to be intentional.

So, back to the hammers.

Balanced Hammer Co. goes back to the drawing board.

What could they possibly use to test the hammers?

They search around, and find another carpenter - Adam, who has the same degree in hammery as Tom, and has been hammering for exactly the same number of days as Tom.

As far we can tell, Tom and Adam are both skilled at carpentry, and they are both about equal in terms of skill.

So, the competition starts off again, and, Tom, who now gets to try out the 5000 model, wins by a mere nail.

The company takes the results, and concludes that their new hammer isn't worth the 200% markup over the 101 model, and agrees that they must add more and more features to the 5000 model.

Seeing as Tom has been a willing participant in two tests, the company give him a free 5000 model as thanks - and guarantee him a discount on the model when they finish superpowering it.

So, Tom goes home, and, decides to use the hammer full time. It did win the competition, so why not?

Anyway, 3 weeks later, he's hammering some nails when he realises that on this particular model, the handle has a flat base that, on every 3rd swing, can be used to strike nails harder than usual.

Conducting his own test, he decides that this feature should be raised with the Hammer Co. company, to help them with their designs.

What does this show us?

Just because players aren't currently bunnyhopping with the Sniper class, headshotting every player they encounter with quickscoping, doesn't mean that the unit cannot do it. Players will often gain more and more skill until a large portion of a unit's potential is realised.

When judging balance, you cannot just use "good" players, you must go further, you must evaluate the unit's absolute potential.

Back to hammers.

So, Balanced Hammer Co. take this last lesson in their stride, but unfortunately they're still unsure of how they can measure up the two hammers.

But, one of their engineers has been doing some searching, and he finds the contact details of a couple of Romanian Hammer Brothers who are said to have such amazing skill in carpentry that they can immediately take one look at a hammer, work out every single trick with it, and utilise the hammer and all its features to a near perfect degree. The degree at which they can utilise these hammers is at the absolute limit of human hammering ability.

So, the company flies them in, and hands them each hammer.

The brothers take a quick moment to analyse the hammers, and the competition begins.

The result is that the brother with the Deluxe Super-Gold-Hammer 5000 wins by a land slide. He found many more tricks to this new hammer, than the other brother could find with the older one due to the new design's slick form, useful handle, and other features.

The brothers were completely equal in skill - and both were at the peak of human skill in hammering terms - so what happened?

As we started at the beginning, the Deluxe Hammer was simply better.

If we liken this to games, you can have a player at the skill ceiling of a Machine Gun class - but, if the machine gun class only deals 2 damage per second, while the others deal 100 damage per second, all that skill does not matter. The class is inferior to the others.

Conclusion

So, Balanced Hammer Co. choose these results over all others - why?

• We are not comparing a bad player to a good player.
• We are not comparing two equal players, that cannot utilise their units properly yet.

We are comparing two players, who use the units to their full (human) potential - and they demonstrate how powerful the units really are in comparison to each other.

This is how you evaluate balance.

I hope everyone enjoyed this post, and I want to try to follow this up with more skill vs. balance articles really soon.

Speed is Opportunity.

Speed is Opportunity

If I were to ask you what's the most important stat in your favourite game, I'd get a range of answers depending on the game, and the playstyle of the person at hand.

But, chances are, after a bit of investigating, maths, and some analysis of the competitive format of the game - I'm 95% sure that with any given game, the correct answer would be "Speed".

Why Speed?

Because Speed is Opportunity.

Let's take the most common forms of speed, "Movement Speed" (mobility), and "Attack Speed".

Movement Speed

In every game, Movement Speed, and general mobility are extremely important.

Mobility is Control.

In an RTS, if you outmaneuver your opponent, it's often called Flanking.

In a Fighting game, it's Spacing.

In an FPS, it's Zoning. (Or gaining weapon advantage, flanking, spacing, etc.)

Whatever the tactic is called in each game, your ability to utilise the geometry of the playing area, and use the distance between you and your opponent is a domination tactic. It's controlling. It's fighting on your own terms.

Now, usually I resent people quoting Sun Tzu with regards to video games (it's overdone), I love his work otherwise - but really, the best way to express myself is through his quote:

"And therefore those skilled in war bring the enemy to the field of battle and are not brought there by him."

Which is precisely what I'm getting at.

Superior Mobility offers:

• Control over the terms of the encounter.
• Control over your enemy's options.
• Greater ability to scout the enemy's strategy.
• Superior options and opportunity to counter the enemy's attacks.

Attack Speed

Attack Speed is less important as mobility in most games, but don't get me wrong - it sure helps.

When you think about it, in most games, no-one is attacking without pause. Guns reload, characters guard, and attention is given to other priorities - so, nobody is really attacking at their highest speed, they are choosing to attack at designated times. With a higher attack speed, it's far easier to slot your attack into these times.

So, when you think about it, a character whose standard attack speed is a single attack in 0.2 seconds, will be able to shield until the time is right, and be shielded again after 0.2 seconds - giving his opponent a small window to attack him - in which case the opponent will usually have to attack through a hitbox.

Contrasted to a character who has an attack that takes an entire second to deploy - its opponent will have a much larger window to seize the opportunity to attack.

In this very simple case, it's obvious to see that the 0.2 second attack is superior, and, if these characters were to fight each other, the first could likely read the opponent's attack, and hit it 3-4 times in this window - which in most games means that the opponent's attack would be interrupted.

Think of it this way - every attack animation has foreswing, and backswing.

Foreswing is the lead-up to the attack, whether it be the charging of a strong attack, or the time between the input of the command, and the attack's full potential being reached.

Backswing is often the recoil from the attack. The sword going back into the sheath, the gun being prepared for the next shot.

The addition of these is what gives you the speed, or time of the attack. For example, the speed of an attack that has 0.5s Fore and Backswing, is the same as one that has 0.25 Fore, and 0.75 Back.

A lower Foreswing is mainly important for preventing your opponent from guarding against your attacks - if the punch comes out in less than 0.2 seconds, the opponent will generally have to input the guard command before they know that you've punched. In the same light, a move with a large foreswing (such as 0.8 seconds) can often be recognised, and shielded before the attack is even close to hitting.

A low Backswing is important to prevent the attack from being punished.

The act of punishing an attack is where an attack is blocked, or dodged, and the opponent seeks to attack back before the original attacker can regain control of their character. This is heavily aided by mobility, but simply having an attack with a lower Foreswing than the opponent's Backswing will do the trick.

So, a High Attack Speed:

• Gives you the ability to punish attacks.
• Gives your opponents little chance to punish yours.

So, what are you getting at?

You know the slow and heavy, but powerful units in games?

Time and analysis has shown that across many games, across many genres - they rank lower than faster units on average.

This is poor balance, carried by the widely-spread, flawed notion that "Slow but Powerful is equal to Fast but Weaker".

Due to the Control afforded by Mobility, and the Opportunities afforded by Attack Speed, this will likely never be true unless paired with higher resistance to all consequences of being attacked (such as flinching) and, at least some attacks that break the mold.

It seems that many developers are starting to see this, and that's great - but, they are still falling into the biggest trap, which, is continuing to give the units slow Movement Speed to compliment their slow Attack Speed.

To be blunt, this can rarely work, and is unnecessary.

To start with, have all your units start with the same movement speed, and then alter them individually as needed.

Summing Up:

• Movement Speed gives one the ability to control the terms of engagement.
• Attack Speed gives the opportunity to attack with less chance of being countered.
• A larger Foreswing increases the chance of an attack being guarded.
• A larger Backswing increases the chance of an attack being punished.
• "Slow but Powerful" vs. "Faster but Weaker" is a false balance notion.
• If a unit is slow in attacking, they will usually need to be compensated with Resistance to attack.
• All units should start at the same Movement Speed, and they should be altered after a lot of testing and analysing.
• If a unit has a slow Movement Speed, they will usually have fewer options against faster opponents.
• Units with slower Movement Speed often have a lower skill ceiling, and lose the competitive edge in skilled play due to the previous point.

Simple Balance Rules.

Introduction:

Balance is a big topic - and each game will require different balance strategies, but there are a few simple principles that are common to all games. These mainly pertain to winning conditions, and equal opportunity for all parties able to win. Also, David E. Kelley.

#1: All parties that can win a match, should have equal ability to win a match.

This one is blatantly obvious - whether you have two teams in an FPS, two armies in an RTS, or four players in a Fighting game, all should have the ability to win from out the outset of the match. It should be up to each party to make the choices, and use their skills to win or lose the match. The maps, levels, and other match settings should benefit each party equally - such as in the RTS, one player shouldn't start with a huge wood supply, while the other has all the rock.

Basic game settings and maps shouldn't determine the outcome of a match to any degree.

#2: Basic initial player choices should for the most part hold little significance to the outcome of the match.

In simple Player1 vs. Player 2 games, their choice in unit should not be significant to the outcome of the game. For example, in an RTS, one player should not be immediately in a losing position because they chose the Elves while the other chose the Orcs. In a Fighting game, a player shouldn't be disadvantaged because they chose Johnny Cage and the other chose Bridget.

Players should be able to choose any character, army, etc. that they want, and be able to win the game.

That said, in games where there are teams of players, the situation is a little different. For example, if Team A's players all choose pistols, while Team B's players choose a variety of Sniper Rifles, Pistols, Machine Guns, and Assault Rifles - the team that chooses their units to more actively reflect the nature of the game should win.

#3: Ensure that there are no dominating strategies that ensure that one party will win the match.

This is a mixture of the above points. You must make sure that with the mechanics of the game, the designs of different levels, and the features of different characters can't all mis together to make a perfect strategy that dominates the game.

A common problem in some games is where defensive options are so strong - that offensive strategies would be punished heavily. This creates a campy style of game where strong defensive characters are kings.

To guard against this one, you have to ensure that the game's mechanics are designed with equally viable offensive and defensive strategies and counter-strategies, while ensuring that your game modes and maps don't favour a particular play style.

Similarly, you need to design maps with your unit's capabilities in mind, a good example being Team Fortress 2, where there are "Magic numbers" that denote important figures such as a Sentry Gun's range.

Unit Balancing Strategies:

These ensure your game in itself is balanced - but doesn't say much about the individual units. We'll go to those next.

One point I'd like to make is that every designer has their own criteria that say that a unit is balanced.

I have read some criteria that simply say that "If something is beatable, it is balanced" - and others that say something like "Each unit should have to exert as much force to kill itself, to kill an opponent".

I absolutely cannot stand the "If it's beatable, it's balanced" argument - as it pretty much validates any unit with a health bar that can reach zero. It's a very ignorant justification.

The other seems to be somewhat useful - particularly if you relate it to hit-counting, but I prefer my own definition.

What Criteria does a Unit have to fit to be Balanced?

Considering each player has equal skill, and the circumstances don't favor any unit:

• A balanced unit must have a variety of other units and simple strategies that can reliably defeat it.
• Corollary to the point above, if a unit is heavily specialised such that few units have innate ability to effectively nullify it, its specific counters must be extremely reliable, and commonly employable.
• The unit's absolute power must accurately reflect the effort required to use it.

I think they're pretty self-explanatory.

The second point is basically saying that if you have a unit that is supposed to be hard to kill for many units, the ones that can kill it should be readily available, and very potent.

A good example would be Stealth units in Real Time Strategies - if you don't have an anti-Stealth unit, your groups of units can easily be ripped up without being able to fight back - but, with an Anti-Stealth unit, the invisible unit is visible - and can be attacked to exploit their often-low defenses.

My favourite thing about these criteria, however, is their versatility. While they are often meant to check for units being too powerful, with some quick word changes, they can be used to evaluate if a unit is underpowered, like so:

Considering each player has equal skill, and the circumstances don't favor any unit:

• A balanced unit must have a variety of features and simple strategies that can be used to reliably defeat other units.
• If a unit is heavily countered such that many units have innate ability to effectively nullify it, its specific features must be extremely reliable, and commonly usable.
• The effort required to use the unit must be accurately reflected in its absolute power.

Now you have some good criteria to ensure that none of your units are rendered redundant during play.

Anyway, I'm ready to tie this one off, so I just want to make a note that I will hopefully be doing more articles very soon, and perhaps even some 3-minute-pitch videos.

I want to write about

- Balance Through Common Traits and Mutual Exclusivity.

- Sloth (game idea).

- Shapeshifter game idea.

- A Trick of the Light game idea.

At the very least.

I swear I had some others... I'll need to remember them.

Counters: Short Explanation.

It took me this long?

I just realised that while I have referenced counters in many of my articles on balance, I have never explained them.

I really though I had already done this... perhaps I accidentally deleted an article that has all of this information in it. I hope not.

What is a Counter?

A counter is a situation where a Player Controlled Unit has an advantage over another, and can be applied in a number of different situations.

A unit may counter another if it:

• Limits the other player's options. (The simplest instance is where a unit will avoid a unit that counters it, limiting its maneuverability)
• Appeals to the other unit's weakness, and thus excels at eliminating it. (Example, a Sniper unit will often excel at killing a slow unit)
• Removes the other unit's main strengths, or nullifies its advantages. (Example, a 'true-sight' unit countering a steal unit by removing its invisibility)

Badly designed Counters usually result in:

• Content Redundancy. (Limited choices when deciding what units or content is viable to use)
• Fewer viable in-game choices, and fewer strategies that a player can employ. (Players have a harder time playing how they wish)

Soft vs. Hard Counters

A Soft Counter is one where a unit has a statistical advantage over another, but skill and circumstance still determine the overall outcome of a match-up between a unit and their Soft Counter. Most game balance should be based on Soft Counters - as they help to enforce balance between units, but don't limit the countered player too much. Soft Counters are often described by saying that a unit "has the edge" or a slight advantage over the other - but the main feature of a Soft Counter is that skill still prevails.

A Hard Counter is one where there one unit has such a one-sided advantage over another, that the countered unit is seen as redundant and useless when the counter is in play. More often than not, the only way a unit can beat its Hard Counter is when there is a massive shift in power due to luck, or circumstance (finding your hard counter unaware, for example - or getting a lucky critical hit on them).

These should be avoided like the plague for the most part, as they create Content Redundancy. Still, if planned and executed perfectly, Hard Counters can be used effectively to stop dominations by exceptionally powerful, specialised units. And example of where hard counters are acceptable, is in RTS where invisible units can easily dominate players who do not counter them with anti-stealth towers.

A counter in between Soft and hard counters are often called 'Solid' or 'Tough' - and more often then not rely on circumstance as to where the counter is Soft or Hard.

How to Set Up Balance

So as you all know, the Undeadables is in development as a Warcraft 3 map.

Hewie sleeps over once a week, and we just make progress, watch movies, stuff our faces, and then as I wake up earlier than him in the morning I sneak out making him feel like a cheap whore.

Err... for the last reference I'd recommend seeing Up In The Air.

Also, a classmate at the AIE kind of pointed out an issue with game design blogs (or more, a personal reason for why he doesn't blog) - and that's because of people possibly stealing ideas.

I made my blog for educational reasons - both for myself and others. I like to clarify my thought by writing it all down, and I hope people read it so they can maybe refine the way they think about games - or, in some cases, they can flat out disagree and perhaps change mine.

That said, projects such as The Undeadables, and any other full game concepts I post here are my intellectual property (and any others who I am working with), and pretty much don't steal them.

Not saying they're good enough to be stolen, but in a world where they're selling L4D expansions as totally new games - I'm just being careful.

Introduction

This blog post is about starting your game, and setting it up to be balanced.

This is something you need to get right from the start. Prepare for it before you start making the first prototype. If you don't set it up properly at the start, you're going to regret it - especially if you don't apply any other methods of balance, or test it extensively.

Test your changes throughly with reference to balance. For every change you make to a player's stats and such, don't just boot up the game and see if it updated properly... makes tests to see how many enemies you can take on at once (for example), in comparison to what you'd like the player to be able to do.

Not testing as you go creates not only potential for massive code errors, but potential for terrible balance problems.

I follow this process when creating a game idea, when thinking of balance.

7 Steps to Ensuring Balance

1. Create expectations for all basic variables that will affect play, and evaluate how they will affect balance.
2. Apply any simple balance strategies that will be used.
3. Develop expectations for a battle between two or three basic units.
4. Test the match ups.
5. Alter until expected results are reached.
6. Repeat step 3-5 for all other units, with reference to step 1-2.
7. Test over and over and over whenever changes are made.

Now I'll go over each step.

Step 1 - Create expectations for all basic variables that will affect play, and evaluate how they will affect balance.

#1 is extremely important, but very few people even think of it. Most people jump right into "Okay how many backstabs should it take to kill a Mage?" without thinking of variables that will make these numbers vary a lot.

You should consider such variables as:

1. Game Time - The average time total in an instance of the game (such as a 'round' or a 'game'), as well as the rate at which players progress through the game is extremely important when it comes to balance.

For example, A character who slowly amasses massive amounts of power throughout a game will love a full 80 minute game as it suits his play style, while a character who totally dominates early in the game would love a game style that can be beaten within 10-20 minutes.

The game time in a single instance of play greatly affects balance depending on PCU's rate of power gain throughout the curve, so Game Time should be clearly defined.

That said, game time should be clearly defined anyway - as let's face it, most players can't play a 3 hour game, and others won't get much satisfaction from a 1 minute skirmish.

For the most part, most team based player vs. player games are focused around 40 minute times, often split into halves and quarters. For individual versus individual games, the time may be anywhere from 5-10 minutes.

That said, it depends on the game, and its gameplay. An RTS will always be slower than a fighting game, and an RPG will hopefully be even slower than that.

Pick a game similar to yours, and shoot for that game time.

Also, as a little pointer, if you're having trouble finding find the best game time for your game, shorter is better than longer for the majority of players.

2. Number of Players - the number of players in an instance of a game is important. Thankfully, most people will immediately define this, unlike average game time. Like game time, number of players definitely affects game balance.

If the game is based around teams of 2, and one character has the ability to disable another for a long period of time, that player will have a lot of power as he can reduce the power of a team by half, and potentially make combinations of that team's abilities impossible to pull of. Rather, if he was in a game where teams were of hundreds of units, being able to disable one is fairly pointless.

Similarly, Area of Effect abilities become more useful than single target abilities when teams get larger. Common sense.

Pretty much, make sure you know how many players will be playing, and how it will affect your game.

3. Player Skills - How much skill can a player apply to your game? And what skills in particular? Will your players have to out-aim each other, or will other skills be called into play?

If you haven't read my article about Skill Ceilings and Floors, I recommend you do so.

Remember how your effectiveness at your skill ceiling is equal to your absolute potential?

If a unit can reach their absolute potential, and it is far more effective than other units at this potential or skill level - you have an imbalance.

This one can be difficult to test, as you don't know how players will play until you have them playing and developing skills. Still, applying logical reason will at least lower the chances of massive imbalance if players formulate unexpected play styles.

First off, know your genre and how it's played - if you're making an FPS, know that there are Quake players out there who will hit players in the air with rockets from half the map away, and there'll be Counter Strike Snipers who can hit a head with less then half a second exposure.

Research other games and skill levels of players who at the top of these games.

Another concept to understand is... simple inbuilt restrictions. Cooldowns on abilities means they can't be spammed as fast as a user clicks a button. Move speed limits means a player can't zip around the map as fast as they can hammer the WASD buttons.

I feel like I'm babying you all, but - well, if you introduce simple time limitations on each action that require it, you're not going to have strange bugs and combinations of actions that can result in imbalanced movements and attack strategies.

The last point relates largely to the first two - know your engine. If you're creating your own engine, your software designers are going to have to understand the game and what is and is not allowed. You need to communicate properly.
Make sure they are knowledgeable of similar games and bugs/exploits/etc. that were in those. You may want to make a list of possible problems, and you will need good communication to ensure no bugs pop up.

If you're using another engine, play the games that have been made on it- and test bugs yourself. If one has a large following, especially a competitive scene - ask them about any bugs that are due to technicalities in the game (they may call them 'Advanced Techniques').

4. Game Area
The playable area in game also affects balance. This is quite obvious - someone who can maneuver faster will be able to run rings around slower opponents in enclosed areas, while Area of Effect attacks are extremely effective in enclosed spaces.
To limit the effects of game area on your game, you can try to make neutral areas that don't particularly favour any character - this is best for games where a stage advantage will imbalance match ups and can't be compensated for with intelligent play or team strategy (such as fighting games, in which stage balance is required as it's 1v1 and games are often very close and skill based).

There are many other variables that you must consider - and they will definitely change for individual games.
Find these variables then define them and their impact on your game's balance.

Step 2 - Apply any simple balance strategies that will be used.
Balance strategies are theoretical approaches to game balance that don't necessarily rely on number crunching to balance.

1. Role-based Balance
Role-based balance is a widely used balancing strategy - or, at least, it should be.
The approach involves looking at your PCUs, and giving them very specific and different roles within a team - while ensuring that the more rounded PCUs do not encroach too heavily on these roles.
If done correctly, you have a range of units who are not only exceptionally different and appeal to different players, but you ensure that no PCU is considered useless the entire role is considered redundant (in which case you have quite an issue and you may need to refocus your unit).

2. Strength/Weakness-based Balance.
Strength/Weakness-based Balance is where you give every PCU a main area of strength, and an easily exploitable weakness. The weakness is the key balancing point here. With the weakness, the PCU can be outplayed and exploited by hopefully any other PCU, whose own weaknesses can be played on. Similarly, with the different weaknesses come different strengths - and so players strive to battle in their element. The winner is ultimately the player who exploits the other's weaknesses and plays on their own strengths best - or, if both players evaluate the situation properly (and so don't enter situations where they will be weaker), it is defined by other skills.

The only issue is that often encounters will thus be based on luck, and running into someone who's in the wrong place at the wrong time. To counter this, map/game awareness should be highlighted as an important skill to players - and all PCUs should have the opportunity to act on awareness and turn ambushes around.

3. Counter-based Balance
Counter-based balance basically says "If every PCU has a reliable way of countering a strategy, unit or move, less attention needs to be focussed on balancing individual moves, units and strategies."

This is true to a point - but, well, you obviously can't smack an easy-to-use OHKO on a single PCU and tell everyone to "just dodge it" (much to the contrary of what many gamers think). Similarly, this strategy has the limitation of not being usable for all games

The idea is that if counters are readily available, and every player and PCU has access to them - there are no situations in which a player will be totally overpowered by another equally skilled player unless there are ridiculous mistakes (a character starts with 10% of the HP of other characters) or bugs in the game.

A good example is in Guilty Gear XX - where characters have the ability to do such things as

• Make their upper hitboxes invulnerable
• Emit a force that pushes enemies away.
• Do an immediate counter attack from block.

But that's not all, they can also use "Burst" which lets them totally break out of a combo if they are locked - counterattacking their opponent to break the combo.

Now here's the kicker - all characters have access to these moves. This means they have an array of defensive moves that effectively break them out of any situation, so, they always have a way of countering their opponent's actions.

Though, just so you don't read the above features of Guilty Gear and think people are unkillable turtles because they have too many defensive options, rest assured - every action above takes up 'Super' - meaning that you can't use them too many times unless you regenerate super by playing effectively.
The Burst actually uses up the Player's burst power, which regenerates slowly such that you will likely only get one burst per round. Also, if you fail to hit with a burst (which are fairly easy to block and punish), you lose all of your burst power, meaning you no longer have such a strong counter measure.
Pretty much, the game isn't too defensive - but every player has a lot of defence options to counter all imbalanced situations. This means you can have a larger variety of characters with a large variety of moves - with the potential for imbalance being far less than other games with a similarly varied roster.

Enough about Guilty Gear, anyway, I might make an entire separate post for it if I really feel like I need to give some praise for excellent balance strategy.

Step 3 - Develop expectations for a battle between two or three basic units.
Okay, so by now you're expected to know what variables will affect your game's balance, and you know what kinds of balancing techniques you can apply to your game (I also recommend you use one or create your own - think of what your game requires and what has been used in the genre.) - now you must highlight some basic combat situations and the outcomes of these situations.
Consider a couple of the units you wish to make, and say "X should be able to beat Y at close range, but should lose at close range" - or "X should be effective when pursuing this objective, but should be less effective when carrying out this task".
Do this with the most basic units - ones who are generally effective in most combat situations (for example a Sniper is not a good unit to start with because he sucks at close and moderate range combat, he is too much of a specialist).

A good idea is to use hit-counting and timing to describe exactly what you want to happen. This is not necessary, but useful of course.
If you want Unit X to kill Unit

Then you create these units in your prototype.

Step 4 - Test the match ups.
So you have your prototype and your units - you have your expectations for these units... let's get testing!
make
Play out several scenarios with the units and expectations in mind, and repeat them with slightly different positions etc. and make sure you're happy with the results - especially with regards to timing and hits.

If you're not, simply look at the values turning up, and see what can be tuned to make the match ups meet expectations.

As many scenarios as possible should be tested - but certain scenarios are well favoured over others.

You want to focus on common occurrences in the game - such as:

'Unit A counters Unit B. Unit B however has a slight level advantage over Unit A, and has ambushed the unit in favourable terrain at mid range - Unit B should win, but should sustain moderate damage (60% or so)'

This situation will arise.

However, there are obviously situations that are so unlikely that they aren't worth testing.

'Unit A counters Unit B, but has been afk for the whole game and so is still Level 1. Unit B is level 10 but ambushes Unit A in very unfavorable terrain at extremely long range. Unit B should still win without much problem.'

I think what I'm trying to say is, be thorough - but don't waste your time.

Really this is all just about controlled repetitions under different pretenses and tweaking the balance until it works well.

Repetition, repetition, repetition.

Step 5 - Alter until expected results are reached.

Ah I think I went over this in Step 4 with tweaking.

But, make sure you tweak intelligently. Make small changes, and make sure you clearly identify Variable Scope.

If you do this while tweaking, you should be fine. Save regularly, document and analyse any possible issues, test rigorously.

You know, all the good stuff.

Step 6 - Repeat step 3-5 for all other units, with reference to step 1-2.

Pretty much what we've covered so far - but more testing.

When you create a new unit - you need to know how the variables of the game will affect it (step 1), and if you have a balancing strategy in mind, you want to know how it will fit into that strategy (step 2), you want to know how it will interact with every other unit under different situations (step 3), you need to create and test these match-ups (step 4), then you need to make any alterations (step 5).

As said, we've covered it so far.

One little additional point I will make however is that as you create more units, the number of things you have to test increases and increases.

Think of it this way in a shooting game with 2 units you need to test perhaps 3 main situations - long range, medium range, close range.

Then you might want to test these in 3 areas, open area, moderately spaced area, enclosed area. That's 9 tests.

Let's add Unit 3 - you need to test him with 1 and 2 in each of these, so that's 18.

Perhaps units can be on teams, how will 2 unit 3s match up with a unit 1 and a unit 2.

What if unit 3 can choose between 2 weapons? What now?

As you add more and more, and there are more and more variables - the number of situations you need to test is astounding.

This is where balancing strategies come in.

The reason I recommend using balancing strategies is because they reduce necessary testing a bit - or, at the very least, aid it greatly.

This sounds awesome. But... well, let me be very clear.

You still need to test.

You still need to balance.

You still need to analyse.

I know some game designers that have taken a very devil may care attitude towards balance and testing because they think a balancing strategy will do all the heavy lifting for them.

"Hey, it's okay, we can do X because character Y still has a weakness to Z!"

No.

You're not allowed to arrive at that conclusion, unless you've done a lot of testing and analysis to come to it.

Don't get lazy.

Even with balancing strategies, I still test everything rigorously. Why? So I don't overlook an obvious problem and have to eat my words later.

Step 7 - Test over and over and over whenever changes are made.

This point has likely been sufficiently covered as well.

If I want you to go away with any knowledge after reading this blog post, it's constant testing is key to balance.

Conclusion:

This blog post was actually written over 2 weeks and had many paragraphs added and deleted over the period of writing, so frankly I'm just hoping it ties together nicely - but here's what I want you to go away with.

• Follow the 7 step process. If you follow it properly, and can follow the steps in reference to your game design - you won't miss a thing. Just know your game type, what variables will affect your balance, and possible balance strategies than can be applied and you'll be fine.
• Testing is key to balance.
• While balance strategies ease up on testing thousands of situations, don't even think of being lazy with it. You still need a lot of testing.
• If you're designing, do a lot of testing. If you're a programmer, get your designer to test. Designers often know what should and shouldn't happen, and how long it should take - or at least have a good idea of this.
• Setting up balance takes a lot of time, and must happen from the first prototype and units made, right through to the end. If you start too late, you'll likely need to totally remake some systems that would have been visibly problematic from the start. If you consider balance until the end, you'll likely have to backtrack changes.
• A monkey who understands balance scope and tweaking, testing a game for an infinite amount of time will eventually create a perfectly balanced game. Basically - don't give up. Keep testing, and thinking, and you'll get there with some hard work and ingenuity.

Anyway, thanks guys. I'd like to go in-depth for some balancing strategies.

Here's my to-do list for the moment:

• Pacing
• Single Player vs. Multiplayer Balance Concerns
• Balancing Strategies in Depth
• Canon vs. Gameplay
• Untitled Puzzle-Horror game idea.
• Untitled Puzzle-Adventure game idea.

I'll keep you all posted.

The Scope of Game Design (Refining the Problem)

Well, first off, I know you guys were all expecting a post on how awesome Knarf is - but to express that would take me too long to possibly contain in just a single blog. I would have to make volumes of blogs to cover her awesomeness.
(For those who don't know Knarf, she's an artist at the AIE :D)

Clarification

This blog post is what was originally going to be named 'Conservative Game Balance' - but I realised that I don't believe in conservative balance at all.

I believe in making the right changes.

This implies, of course, not making stupidly over the top alterations to systems that only need basic alterations. That is the meaning of conservative right there, but conservative also implies a resistance to change - and that goes against everything I believe in.

If there is a problem, I won't water down the solution to be "more conservative".

Introduction to Scope

So the title has been changed. I want to talk about Scope today.

Scope in game balance are the different environments and features of game play, and units in a game. They are areas related to their effects on gameplay, in order of importance. This makes it essential for refining balance problems - so you can fix them in the most effective way possible.

A High Scope Context relates to a feature that, if changed, will affect a large amount of gameplay - for example, if 90% of characters in a game use swords, and you change the strengths of swords, you are dealing with High Scope as it affects a lot of the gameplay.

A Low Scope Context relates to a feature that will affect a small part of the game, for example, changing a character's stats will only directly affect that character.

I borrow the term from the scope of a variable in programming - as they are very similar. The scope of a variable in program determines how much of the program can access it, while the scope of a balance issue or change relates to how much of the game will be directly affected. Just as you want to use the lowest scope possible when dealing with variables, you want to deal with the lowest scope possible for a game change.

The easiest way to figure out the scope hierarchy is to see how units are categorised in the game. If units are defined by their weapon (e.g. Rapier, Pirate and Warrior are all 'Swordsmen'), then the weapon is likely of a higher scope than the class's traits. If you change the weapon, it greatly effects all of them.

On the other hand, if if all weapons are character specific (that is, changing a weapon doesn't affect any other classes), the weapon is of a lower scope than the character.

Why Determine Scope?

The Scope of a balance problem is essentially its location in the system, and how much of the game the problem affects. A problem of a single's characters stats being too low is low scope, while a major weapon type being too powerful is high scope.

Effectively finding the scope of a problem involves narrowing down the overall problem to its absolute core. You want to find the lowest Scope of the problem, and fix it there.

e.g.

"X is overpowered" --> "X's weapon is overpowered." --> "X's weapon's fire rate is too high".

The weapon's statistics are considered the scope of the problem (not the character), and so that's where you apply the solution (reducing the fire rate).

The basic idea of finding Scope, and refining the problem is to prevent issues where someone says "X is overpowered", and you nerf the wrong features, affecting large amounts of content in the game.

When balancing, you want to change as little as possible.

To get the perfect solution, you need to seek the core of the problem.

Real Project Application

This post came from my work on Pokemon Universe - in which we are trying to balance Pokemon to be viable in higher levels of play.

To balance each Pokemon, there are a huge number of variables we could change:

• The traits of the Pokemon's types.
• The Pokemon's types.
• The Pokemon's stat spread shape.
• The Pokemon's individual stats (HP, Defense, Attack, Special Attack, Special Defence, Speed)
• The Pokemon's ability.
• The Pokemon's move pool.
• The Pokemon's optimal move sets.
  

And there are an amazing amount of changes that can be applied to each variable - and so, we need to decide on what needs to be fixed.
We must also determine the scope of each variable, as we want to change as little as possible.

The highest scope variable in this situation are the traits of a Pokemon's types.
if you were to change the Water type to have fewer resistances, you would affect all Pokemon of the water type.
After that you have the Pokemon itself, as an individual entity. As we are trying to fix individual Pokemon, this is the ideal scope to work in, but there are lower scopes for a Pokemon's individual problems. We need to delve deeper.

Now, Internal Scopes (those that will only affect the particular unit) are prioritised according to how much they will affect that unit - in terms of identity.
It is strongly believed that when you create individual units in a game, they should be more than just rehashes and clones of other units. They should have their own strategies and moves - so players feel like they are experiencing a new character, and so this character may fill a niche in the player's playing style.
For the most part in game balancing, you want to preserve identity. If you were to aim to change the identity of a unit, the change would be called a remake.

The greatest variables that determine a Pokemon's identity are its type combination (evaluates the Pokemon's type matchups, and the over all themes of the Pokemon), its over all stat spread (define the unique traits of the class and its role), and its optimal move sets (which determine what the Pokemon can do, and its role).

I would consider all of these equal in priority - and you generally want to preserve them all as much as possible.

That said, if you go through the lower scope variables, and you find that the problem is not in the Pokemon's stats or move pool - you do need to look at (and possibly change) its higher scope traits.

An example of such a problem is in Pokemon is where certain 'Walls' (for RPG players, tanks) hav exceptionally bad type match-ups, such as being weak to water and ground, being some of the most used and effective types in the game (hey there Rock Pokemon). A pokemon with this type combination has no viability as a Wall as it will fall very easily to any well rounded team.
For some types, stats can make up for these problems - but for others (such as the above example), the type combination must be changed (or the Pokemon needs to be reallocated to another role).

Identity vs. Viability?
The example above is a situation in which you have a choice to make a Pokemon useful, or keep its identity completely intact.
Personally, I prefer to increase the standard of gameplay - I will cover this argument in full when I do my Gameplay vs. Canon article later.

There will be times in which you need to make a big change to fix a big problem, and so you need to ensure you find the best scope to fix the issue. Don't immediately dismiss a fix because it alters the higher scopes, unless you already know those scopes are best left unchanged as they affect too much of the game (such as the relationship of types in Pokemon.)
That said however, sometimes big problems have big solutions, it's your job to have a balancing strategy that catches these issues earlier rather than later.

Thanks, I hope I explained the concept of Scope well enough.
Zanda.

Skill Ceilings and Floors

Well, I have a night to update, and, people have been asking me when I plan to post - so I am posting now.

I have been at college, and occupied with other projects and commitments (hello, shuffling work shifts to not be when I am 2 hours away learning) - and so, well... hey.... I don't have to make excuses to you guys. >:[

Anyway, long story short, 2 articles tonight, this one, which is mainly definition, the other a more practical problem.

Player Controlled Units

Also, it has come to my attention that a very helpful term being used to describe a 'player controlled character or class' is a 'Player Controlled Unit' - a PCU for short. I plan to use this as I am sick of having to make the distinction. The term is also of great use because it can be used for any game I can think of, even ones where class and character don't work (such as in Space Invaders - where you don't identify with the unit (not a character), and it is not in a series of classes) - it can even be used to describe weapons. So, now you know what a Player Controlled Unit is.

On to the post.

Skill Ceilings and Floors

Skill ceilings and floors are terms given to the skill levels at which a player controlled unit is capped by the game mechanics. They are often mistakenly used to describe the effectiveness of a unit at various skill levels.

These terms are extremely... murky (in a word). They are poorly defined, and, are often used incorrectly - leading to somewhat of a double meaning.

I will try to clearly rectify this, but, I may fumble with my words a little and edit the post several times to make the point clearer.

On to the definitions!

Skill Ceilings

Skill Ceiling - This is the term for the maximum amount of skill that can be applied to a player controlled unit with regards to its technical limitations.

Similarly, you can say that it is the point at which an additional application of skill will yield no additional effectiveness due to the limitations imposed on the unit through the game mechanics.

If you play at the skill ceiling of a unit (you apply the maximum effective skill to it), the effectiveness reached is considered the absolute potential of the unit.

This is where I draw the distinction between the two 'definitions' of a Skill Ceiling.

If you play at the Skill Ceiling (skill cap) you reach the unit's absolute potential.

This does not saying anything about the effectiveness of the unit, aside from that its absolute potential has been reached. Even if the unit has a high skill ceiling, and you reach its absolute potential, it may still be ineffective - this is a problem, as the player is not being rewarded for his skill.

I repeat, reaching the unit's absolute potential does not actually definitely say anything about how effective it is in practice. This is where the definition problems arise.

An example of a high Skill Ceiling is in shooting games, where an accurate weapon compliments player skill greatly - and players are expected to become more accurate when aiming, and aim faster to reach the high skill ceiling. This is an impossible skill ceiling to reach however, as the rate at which a player can react to an enemy threat is limited to the slow human reaction time, when compared to a computer's reaction time - seen when a player uses an aimbot. In this situation, a skill ceiling is actually limited more by the human than the game mechanics put in place.

If you were to lower the accuracy of a weapon or give it a large damage falloff over range, you would lower the skill ceiling of a weapon, as now regardless of player skill, they cannot properly attack at longer ranges (which in the majority of games takes skill), and aim is less significant due to the lower accuracy (aim takes skill).

So how does this relate to game balance?

The main message here is that it doesn't define the unit's power. It affects balance of the unit on the skill vs. power issue (I will talk about this issue at another time), but saying that a unit has a high skill ceiling does not make it a powerful unit. You could have a weapon that takes massive amounts of skill to aim, but it can still shoot bullets that deal 1 damage.

It should be noted however, that when you discuss the overall balance of a unit, you will usually be discussing its absolute potential, rather than its potential at lower skill levels (you want to eliminate skill from the equation, which applying a skill ceiling does) - and so, Skill Ceilings also apply in this scenario.

Also, It is often ideal to try and balance all unit's potential at each skill level.

Skill Floors

Skill Floor - The skill floor is actually the opposite of the skill ceiling, it does not concern the application of a large amount of skill, but rather, a lower amount of skill. Due to the floorlessness of a realistic low skill setting (the lowest skill level is not inputting commands, but that's useless), Skill Floors are often directly tied to effectiveness when being discussed (they are useless to us otherwise).

Again, I will make the distinction between effectiveness and the meaning of a skill floor.

A Skill Floor is the application of the amount of skill yielded from the lowest amount of experience with the unit, game, or genre of game in question.

The reason why I mentioned experience was to eliminate the issues surrounding the floorlessness of low skill settings. Basically, we're talking about new players to the unit, game and genre.

Now, I will just get this out. There is no such thing as a high or low skill floor.

While the Skill Ceiling quantifies "How much skill can be applied", a Skill Floor is the opposite. "How much skill can't be applied" doesn't make any sense, nor does any other opposite trying to measure a valuable. You can graph a skill ceiling, you can't graph a skill floor (it's effectively 0 with our current definition).

So why would we bother talking about skill floors? We talk about a unit's effectiveness at its skill floor.

If a unit is highly effective at its skill floor, it is considered to be imbalanced with reference to skill (this is that thing that's coming later).

A unit that is considered ineffective at the skill floor is... well... normal. Nothing more needs to be said.

So remember:

There is no such thing as a high or low skill floor.

When discussing a unit's skill floor, you must mention its effectiveness at this skill floor.

Skill Curves

Using these measurements, we can make a Skill Curve (not to be confused with a Learning Curve or a Skill Aquisition Curve (used in RPGs to map when units get spells and such))

A Skill Curve is as such:

The vertical axis is Effectiveness (what we are measuring).

The horizontal axis is Skill Applied (what we are given).

The 'Skill Ceiling' is a constant value of applied skill, found at the maximum of the horizontal axis.

The 'Skill Floor' is a constant value of applied skill found at the minimum (0) of the horizontal axis.

In most situations, 0,0 is not a point on this curve, as even unskilled players are often at least a *little* effective with a difficult unit. If they weren't, there would likely be very little development in skill before a player gives up.

So we have:

Adding a typical Skill curve, we have

Note the X, that is what's known as:

Peak Skill - Peak skill is a common point found on Skill Curves that denotes a point at which the player will reach a point where any increase in skill results in a negligible gain in effectiveness. It's not a peak really, as the effectiveness doesn't turn downwards after this point (that would be dumb) - but that's just the term for it.

The Peak Skill doesn't really mean much when it comes to design and balance - though, as with all points on the Effectiveness vs. Skill Applied graph, it's ideal to have them all in similar places for all units in the game.

Conclusion

Anyway, that was possibly one of the toughest posts to write - due to the confusing nature of the terms, just remember:

Skill Floors and Ceilings are values in skill, not measures of effectiveness at their respective skill levels.

Thanks.

Content Redundancy

I wrote this material on content redundancy while writing the first Game Balance article - but found that it was getting too long and complex - so I am posting this section on Content Redundancy here. I also figure that if I can keep some of these articles shorter, they will be easier to reference.

Content Redunancy:

Content Redundancy is where previously introduced content is rendered useless by other content. There are two main types - Internal content redundancy and External content redundancy.

Internal Content Redundancy may be if your character finds Weapon B, which is better in every single way to his current Weapon A. This is a more so a problem in Shooting games and Action games - where players are more expected to choose between the two weapons comparing the trade-offs. However, Internal Content Redundancy is often totally disregarded in Role Playing Games, as the acquisiton of stronger weapons is consdered a part of the character's progression through the game, and you are expected to get stronger weapons as the game goes on.

Internal Content Redundancy is often considered less harmful than External, however, there can still be significant issues in class-based games, where a class may encroach on another's role such that it is better at that role, or, it may be reasonably good at that role and still great at its own role, such that it's considered a better choice as it can perform both roles well.

To solve this second issue (classes fulfilling too many roles), a significant investment is often added so that the class must choose between roles (such as with Skill Trees in Role Playing Games).

External Content Redundancy is where an external entity renders content useless - such as an enemy being a hard counter to your character - making you unable to continue using him (so you have to switch characters, build your character a particular way, etc.). This is a big problem in most games - you never want to have a player feel as if their character is useless in a given scenario (especially if they have to invest a lot of time into this character) - and you want the player to be able to play as he wishes to play.

External Content Redundancy is often a big problem in multiplayer games - in which players being countered by other players are nullified in play, or are at least weakened enough to cause them to switch characters, and not turn back to the other that they wanted to play.

There are two types of External Content Redundancy, Exclusive Content Redundancy and Complete Content Redundancy.

Exclusive Content Redundancy is a term given to a situation in which a character is countered by another, or several characters - such that it is considered to be a bad choice depending on the popularity of these other characters. The countered character is often played less than others without these counters, as players adapt and decide to favour a different character. Exclusive content redundancy can be troublesome in games with few characters/classes, while it is often overlooked in games with extensive rosters. Typically, Exclusive Content Redundancy affects a smaller percentage of the roster - however, an excessive amount leads to the second type of External Content Redudancy - Complete Content Redundancy.

Complete Content Redundancy is about as bad as it sounds. You do not want this in your game at any cost. It's pretty much when there is a lot of imbalance in the game, so, one character/class comes out the victor.

This character is then universally played by the vast majority of players, as he is the one with the fewest counters, and the largest strengths. You find that in most games, the matchups are simply Character X vs. Character X - or 'mirror-matchups'.

Your game then becomes really stale, really quick. It's very dangerous.

A notable case in this issue is Super Smash Bros. Brawl - which, despite its advertised particular focus on balance, has a notable Complete Content Redundancy with the character Metaknight, who, as far as I know, is on the verge of being banned (if not already) as recent tournaments have been over 50% Metaknight players.

Conclusion

Content redundancy is bad in most cases - and so Game Developers try to avoid it in most scenarios. As said, there are exceptions.

Most internal content redundancy is solved by mere balancing - if a weapon is too much better, nerf it, or buff the other. If a class encroaches on another's role, you can nerf it, or buff the other. If you wish, you can solve it through making the encroacher choose between being as effective at the other's role while sacrificing their own, or being effective at their own while sacrificing the others.

Exclusive redundancy can be really tricky, as if you nerf a character so he does not counter another so well, he may be countered by others. You need to get a really good look at the entire roster's relationship with each character, and decide where to go from there. Buffs and nerfs can be managed - though it is often rather difficult.

Complete Content Redundancy is either really easy to fix, or really hard. If the single character is the cause - he can be nerfed in whatever way is deemed most necessary. If the other characters all have large flaws however, you may be in a position where you need to consider a large scale balance revamp.

Thanks.

What is Game Balance?

Well, it's been a while since I've updated - but this is not as much because I'm lazy (for once), but because this post has been haunting me. It has been exceptionally hard to write and I've restarted it about 20 times, so I'm just going to get through it and see how I can create it in such a way that I can talk about different aspects of game balance later on.

The Reality of Game Balance

Frankly guys, the topic of Game Balance is huge - as it covers and affects pretty much EVERY aspect of the game, from your character, to the difficulty of levels, to the game time per round, to... everything. Further, every single type of game has its own balance concerns - some derived from genre, some from the number of players, others purely from the individual systems in the game.

Then, consider that both players and developers tear their hair about balance - and you've got a pretty tough safe to crack.

Did I mention it's also difficult at times? Though, it is probably the most rewarding thing to get right. Balancing a weapon or character well - making it fun to use and powerful, while not being too powerful makes you feel great.

Definition:

Game balance is often defined as a state of the game where players have multiple options or routes, where most or all of these options are about equally effective or feasible. (Copied pretty much word for word from Wikipedia - as in general, this definition of balance is as succinct as you can get it.)

Good balance is essential - as the benefits are a fun, balanced (err...) game, while bad balance creates issues surrounding content redundancy and a lack of options that makes the game far less fun for some/most/all players.

I won't lie to you though - the rewards of good balance aren't exactly as notable as the punishment for bad balance for the most part. A well balanced game will generally receive responses such as "Oh, that game's pretty balanced", but bad balance will ruin your game. You game is often reviewed on its other merits as good balance is expected, but good balance is needed as a prevention measure.

Often, you will also find that good balance goes unnoticed by most - as the game feels intuitive and no issues are encountered.

The Results of Bad Balance

As said, the main issues related with bad balance are content redundancy, and the removal of options.

Content Redundancy is where previously introduced content is rendered useless by other content. This limits players greatly in terms of what content they can/will choose to use, and effectively wastes the time of the developers who implemented the useless content

Content Redundancy is mainly caused by:

• Some characters being too strong
• Others being too weak
• Hard counters
• Role-intrusion in class-based games.

[[I originally had a huge section on the different types of content redundancy, but I will post that right after this post]]

The Removal of Options is something that you never want to do to players. You never want to force them into a certain playstyle, or force them to use X weapon, etc. - you want to merely direct them. Well, to clarify, if something is considered outside the rules or limits of the game, you don't want players to be trespassing, but - when it comes to options that you give them, you don't want to force them down a single path. First off, the removal of options is very closely linked to Content Redundancy - why make a fork in the road when only one option is viable?

Second, you want the player to feel in control, and you want them to be able to control the game in their own way, when given choices by you. Basically, you don't want to give the player an option and have it severely deficit them later.

Just remember - the idea of the game is to be fun for the player, not to control them.

Strategies for Game Balance

Now, let's look at some strategies to set up game balance, and then some strategies to maintain it.

I plan to write an entire article on setting up game balance, but I'll just briefly lay it out here.

Good strategies when setting up game balance:

• Use tried and tested game formulae, enemy stats, hero stats, etc. Don't be afraid to partially base your balance on another game's balance.
• Create a quick prototype.
• Consider a life as a basic character (basic hp, speed, weapons) - how they would progress through a level or game.
• Create the most basic character first - for example, make them run at the most basic speed (units per second depends on the game engine), give them 100 health (if your health is going to be base 100), then give them a standard sword, pistol, whatever. Base other characters off this template. You don't have to use this guy in your game, but he can just be for initial testing
• Count attacks. Counting attacks if a strategy used in many multiplayer games, such as saying "Class X should kill Class Y in a minimum of 4 shots from this weapon".

These won't create the balance for you, but will make balancing a lot easier.

Maintaining balance is a matter of basic, logical problem solving. I iterated the necessity of logical problem solving in my last post, but, well, get used to it - as you'll be seeing a lot of it.

If you find imbalance in your game,

1. Evaluate the problem
2. Simplify the problem.
3. Consider possible solutions.
4. Pick the most basic solution, that effectively solves the problem without creating others.
5. Implement solution
6. Test solution.

That's the full process - but the main steps really are 'Simplify the problem' and 'Pick the most basic solution'.

It should be obvious that if you don't simplify the problem to its core elements - and core problems, you cannot effectively solve it, while if you choose a solution that is not simple, does not effectively solve the problem, or creates new ones - you're... just making more problems.

So - I've gone over what balance is, why you need balance, and some balancing strategies.

I aim to perhaps create a list of balance concerns for each genre and style of game, but for now - I'm happy to stop here.

Thanks for reading.