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| Author | Extremely Flawed Balancing |
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I can't believe so much effort have been put into balancing this game and yet so much flaw has been seen in design perspective especially in earlier levels.
YOu don't add 2 negative effect together to create unplayable combination.
For example. Lack of damage on tier 1 knights adds up to the lack of HP of farmers to protect archers
Another extreme imbalance. Necros have 0 usage of raise because of stupid standing on corpse system plus super-low initiation. In team games, there's no way necro can be of any use at lvl 2-3 vs a similarly skilled player.
U can have 2 complimentary ability on a faction... but not 2 UNCOMPLIMENTARY effect to a race. creating a no-win strat.
There are many yet similar case. | 1.
You just can't use your Ghosts properly.
Watch some battles of experienced necros. | "there's no way necro can be of any use at lvl 2-3 vs a similarly skilled player. "
note the word similarly skilled player
A system where similarly skilled player will always lose in a certain advantage is flawed. | | Is part of tactics. think before you play. every team is strong | The balance in this game consists in the fact that there isn-t any faction that rules from the level 1 till the end.
Each level has it-s favourites, and at every level, every faction has got another faction that can easily beat it, like that principle we can find in the game everybody of us knows very much: "rock-paper-scissors".
If one player could win every other player at his level, the game would lose it's very taste.
But if one player wants to win every battle though, he still has the possibility to buy the full-art and keep on using his brain properly in order to win. | it's a bit too shallow to say that if it's rock-paper-scissors format , it's fair.
Well IMHO, a good fundamental of game design should have winning factor based on Hard-SKILLs, Strategy, and maybe a bit of luck. Not choice of faction. If it is then the whole game mechanic revolves around choosing the correct faction. If a game puts player in a particular situation where the game tells you "Tough Luck, you chose necromancer, you have to lose this battle". It's called helplessness.
Helplessness creates frustration. Frustration is not good for games.
But then again, it's my 2 cents.
Initially i wanted to just complain on the surprisingly large number of corpse sitter exploiters, espeically at lvl 3 when ghosts are critical but then I realized later, the corpse sitting exploit is caused by many factor, which includes, the very low initiation of Necro Units and the fact that hero will almost always move first BEFORE their units. Therefore, even if your zombies ( or skelleys or vamps or ghosts ) manage to kill the corpse sitter, this game arrange it in a great way that enemy's unit will have several turns before your hero gets the next move.
It's a classic example of what I'm mentioning, how multiple weakness of a certain race compliment each other to create a no-win strat. Which doesn't make sense. Most cleverly designed game mechanics always have a workaround for a certain weakness, which creates additional fun for players to discover them. But to create a completely helpless situation is altogehter a different story. And again. frustration is always bad for games. | At the 5th combat level overnumbered skeleton archers balance very well the lackness of speed of this facion, especially if one has a lot of skill with them.
Before that, keep on trying to make it difficult for the enemy to cover your corpses (for example, by dividing ghosts in 2 stacks, or by not letting to enemy stacks to reach the corpses with your low-numbered stacks), and don't abandon your hopes because in group battles the things can be even more simple to you.
In duels, though, the principle of "rock-paper-scissors" is extremely strong, I'm sorry. And not only with necromancers, but with every faction: imho, it's impossible to make this game ideally balanced like the chess :) | | MP85 said it perfectly, i am hating my DE faction also. but seems to me, everyone has a prob with their faction. the point is i can totally just think... theres away towards everything and dont get so emotional with lost. | Well, don't get me wrong. I don't hate this game. I don't get emotionally attached with games like this. In fact i'm registered to more than 10 other online games on research purposes. I'm not whining either.
I'm stating some design flaws found in this game.
And to MP85, yes you are right about balancing on later stage, but once again that's what I'm trying to point out, on design perspective that the game design is flawed if balance can only be achieved by REACHING certain level . Ideally it has to be Tier to Tier balance. Victory or loss is achieved by making the correct choice and combination at that point. Not because of "Oh I'm a lvl 2 knight, I can only fight a certain race on certain level"
Click on duel and look at the number of battles that they state " NO DE, NO DEMON, NO ELF... etc". On one angle you could those players are noob/immatured or whatever, but then again, this is a PvP game, balance has to become at every tier, not only certain tier. Rock-paper-scissor is found in duel games, i agree, but it is a BAD model. I'll pick a game example, something that's popular, let's say Starcraft. Would Starcraft be nice if in a multiplayer, in the first 5 minutes, Zerg will 100% beat Terran on similar skill and Terran will 100% beat protoss , and Protoss will 100% beat Terran? Doesn't make sense does it?
Bevan, think again , if everyone has a prob with their faction, isn't there something wrong with the Design? Don't get me wrong, every race should have strength and weakness, I agree , but not a weakness that entirely has not workaround ( other than levelling up )
Of course the ideal balancing of game is to create something as balance as chess, but then again chess is bland in comparison with the choice and interactivity of video game. It is impossible to create a perfect balance
but it's possible that balance can be fun without frustrating. | 9.
First of all, Starcraft has 10 years of balancing. Lemme see you in this game in 10 years and speak about balance then :)
Second, Necromancer heroes can use "Wait" command in battle to ease corpse raising.
Third, have you tried moving Ghosts behind a wall of ones or twos of zombies? It helps much in raising them. | | nerco want to complain? lmao
i thought knight suspose to complain? they have to suffer until lv 3 or 4 to get something to fight in solo duel LOL | haha poor Pang, ive been friends with him since lvl 1 and he has never beat me *i think =)* Ahaha NOW he should be complaining. And valeria is right. 10years bro. Blizzard is best at what they do which is RTS. and this game i far rate is above every other browser games. 2 THUMBS UP admin!! =)
check out the new upgrades for HWM. =P | | if you ask me necros are the bast race and i dont even use them. the ability to bring troops back makes them best. they can instantly make the tides of battle completely reverse with 1 move. ifanything there too strong. zombies should have slightly less health, but you could have more numbers with them. | | first off i think the necromancers are great, there zombies are slow but great damage absorbers even in lvl 3 and when the skelly stacks die then it increases thier damage so really the only thing i would change would be the number of squares archers can move as sometimes the archars out run my helpless zombies and snipe them from a distance | "Bevan, think again , if everyone has a prob with their faction, isn't there something wrong with the Design?"
In my opinion, since EVERYONE has a problem with their faction then it's perfectly balanced! Otherwise, all but one faction would be complaining or there would be no more than 1 faction at all. The problem simply is that everyone wants the benefits of a race without the weaknesses. | i think i'm being heavily misunderstood here on the point of discussion. It's not about whether necro is a good race or whether this game is entirely balanced or not, or whether Blizzard is a good game studio or not. I'm simply pointing out 2 flaws which in my opinion is harmful to the game.
1) Lack of workaround on racial weaknesses.
2) The manner the game is being balanced In design perspective, you can balance games in many ways, which I will not further deviate the topic. What I'm saying is, the method HeroesWM is using , of balancing the game with certain timing, like what many mentioned, "Elf Ain't Good till LVL3 ", "Necro Ain't GOOD till lvl 5" or Certain race are more powerful in certain lvl or such.
Arioch, everyeone have a prob with their faction does not mean it's balance. It simply means it's frustrating. It simply means the weaknesses stand out MORE than their strength. Ever wonder why? Simple, because players get frustrated again and again by the limitations due to point 1 ( lack of workaround to counter weaknesses of own race ) .
So , i guess you're going to say, if every faction has its own frustration then the game is balance. Again , not entirely true. But that's not the point I want to debate.
End Note:
I hope the developer of this game got this message. It's just a feedback thingy, not a demand, it's up to them to their judgment. Here's what I wanna say,
Every Player will have their own say on what should be improved, Demon Gating imbalance, raise dead imbalance, archers movement too fast, minataur hp too high. Rogues movment too fast. Whatever... but the fact remains, not everyone understand what balancing truly is. In fact games are not created to be entire balanced on the first day and it's impossible to say whether a game is completely balance or not. I agree to completely make a game balance is impossible no matter how much feedback the community give ( developer will soon realize some of the feeedback community give is conflicting ). Therefore it shouldn't be the goal to completely balance it, it's an unachievable goal.
IMHO, the highest goal is to make sure the game is fun. To make sure weaknesses of race shouldn't be frustrating. I do agree competitive game must have its own frustration because losing should frustrating, otherwise it's not competitive anymore. HOWEVER, there's a thin line between frustrating weaknesses and acceptable weaknesses, lemme give an example.
I'm gonna give a necro example since I'm playing necro:
Unable to resurrect creature being stood upon IS frustrating.
Having HP Penalty for resurrect is NOT frustrating.
See the diff? Well, whats the difference? Simple, frustration is what you get when you have the feeling of helplessness. Players are suppose to have FUN in games. It's an entertainment business. Here's an abstract example: player die willingly if they die shooting. Players will die frustrated if their gun's jammed and got killed.
Conclusion, IMHO ( in my humble opinion ), remove frustrating feature, game balancing can come later. Players who die happily don't get frustrated ( although they lose due to imbalance ) | 17.
I'm gonna give a necro example since I'm playing necro:
Unable to resurrect creature being stood upon IS frustrating.
Having HP Penalty for resurrect is NOT frustrating.
All other races cannot resurrect their units at all.
Necros have a "plus" - ability to resurrect, but it comes with "minuses" - being unable to resurrect when somebody stoods on their corpse. | 17.
Also:
Conclusion, IMHO ( in my humble opinion ), remove frustrating feature, game balancing can come later. Players who die happily don't get frustrated ( although they lose due to imbalance )
Then remove hit'n'miss nature of Ghosts too - it really frustrates me when I'm fighting Necros. | | Standing on the dead stack to prevent resurrection is the only weapon others have to counter it. It's up to you to plan your moves in such way that it doesn't happen. I've lost many battles for mindlessly exposing my ghosts to the opponent that way and I've won many almost doomed battles by exploiting others' mistakes. Imho, it's not a frustrating feature, it's a logical strategical weakness that you have to work around. |
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