Affinity System Changes

[WindHunter]

Affinity System Changes

Affinities have been part of the game since the Renegade edition. In some cases, they provide a great design tool where by making a minor modification to a card we can open up new playstyles and support multiple deck archetypes. In other cases, they are needless additions which not only hurt game balance, but also dilute faction identity. A big problem we have is that nearly every card added to the game since the game's initial launch has an affinity effect, and many of these affinities are very similar, with the same 5-10 effects used over and over again across all factions. This has lead to a steady homogenization of faction identities as we have rebalanced more and more cards, making it increasingly hard for us to keep each faction feeling unique. Many cards simply do not need multiple affinities (while some Twilight edition cards would benefit from having them), and this is particularly true with many spell cards where we have needed to nerf individual affinities to account for players being able to include both in their deck (and thereby bypassing the spell's designed cooldown).

While we have modified effects and swapped between affinities, we have to date not added any new affinities to cards which did not release with them, nor removed affinities from cards which once had them. This is largely because we view ourselves as stewards of the game and are therefore generally very conservative with our changes to the game's existing systems. At the same time, we feel like our choice to not directly add or remove affinities from cards has begun to hurt the game's balance and also damage faction identity. As such, we intend to begin adding new affinities or removing existing affinities from some cards moving forward as part of balance changes. To help explain our decision, we have included some examples of good and bad examples of the affinity system, as well as some clarifying questions. 

Good and Bad Examples of Affinities

[ Good Examples ]

1. Batariel - Batariel has a fire affinity and a shadow affinity. The fire affinity is designed to work as a solo-unit, while the shadow affinity is designed to enable other units to deal more damage. This makes the fire affinity good in Enlightenment decks and the shadow affinity good in Pure Fire decks, meaning that one card can enable or even create two different deck archetypes.
2. Soul Splicer - The core function of Soul Splicer is to turn corpses into a buff effect. The nature affinity's healing has always been good, and with the release of Random Wall Defense we see that the fire affinity's damage buff has a good niche in empowering archers from behind walls. 
3. Nether Warp - While Nether Warp likely does not need affinities in an absolute sense, the two affinities it does have both bring something unique to the table. The nature affinity's healing is better in PvE, while the frost affinity's slow buffs the spell's defensive capacities in PvP.
4. Equilibrium - Equilibrium is a healing spell with a built-in scaling effect based on the amount of nearby life points. The frost affinity scales with enemy health and the nature affinity scales with friendly health. This means that one affinity is reliable when used with a friendly army, while the other affinity can scale even with single unit compositions so long as the player carefully places it around enemies. This allows each affinity to work with different decks and find its own niche. 

[ Bad Examples ]

1. Sylvan Gate - Sylvan Gate's central identity is to bridge long distances between root network groups. Yet, because it started with an affinity, we had to give it mostly random affinity effects even after reworking it. Both effects buff units in a 25m radius around the Gate itself, but since the fitting affinity effects were already taken by Root Nexus we ended up adding two affinity effects which root network decks do not need or which are unbalanced. For example, the shield piercing on the shadow affinity is mostly insubstantial when used in campaign and random PvE maps, but it causes balance problems in defensive PvE and therefore needs to be removed. But what other shadow-like effect does the root network need and which would be fitting for a root connector card to convey? Additionally, Sylvan Gate and the root network are already very strong and do not need anymore buffs when used defensively. Therefore, it would simply be better to not have any affinity effects on the card rather than slapping on another random effect which would ultimately need to be so weak that it is ignored.
2. Skydefender - Skydefender is a T2 Bandit anti-air tower and because it was released as a Renegade edition card it was given two affinities. If a player were to chose which one to use, it would always be the shadow affinity which can bypass shields. If the card would benefit from shield piercing, it could be incorporated into the base card design, and not added onto one affinity while the other affinity does little to nothing in comparison (The nature affinity effect would only be useful in PvP, but dedicated anti-air towers are not viable in PvP). Attempting to find a 2nd affinity which is comparable in strength to shield piercing and which also fits a Bandits T2 anti-air tower might be possible, but it is a lot of creative energy which is better used elsewhere. And in any case, simplicity in design is often better.
3. Cluster Explosion - The primary purpose of Cluster Explosion is to do a lot of damage. Therefore, whatever affinity does more damage is the affinity which players are going to use, unless both affinities do so much damage that the affinity effect simply does not matter. Additionally, Cluster Explosion is purposefully designed with only 4 total charges as a way to balance the card. If we were to make the second affinity even somewhat comparable in damage, it would be slotted into decks as a way to bypass the card's inherent charge and cooldown limitations. We therefore are required to keep the shadow affinity purposefully weak, which is hardly a good design practice with an ultra-rare card.  
4. Lost Dancer - Lost Dancer recently received some changes that moved her into a good spot, but as part of the balancing we also reduced the affinity effects to a mere +30% more damage to humans for the shadow affinity and a mere +30% siege for the fire affinity. The unit also has its own counter, so these additional counters are entirely superfluous to the card's central design. We only left them because the card has two affinities, but we had to make them so weak they are largely afterthoughts in the deckbuilding process. 

Affinities are at their best when they enable new play styles and directly enhance the card's core function. They are at their worst when they detract from the core function, add unneeded complexity, or are randomly tacked on effects.

Clarifications

• Question 1 - Does this mean you are removing the affinity system?
  • Answer 1 - No, we will not be removing the affinity system. We think it has its place in the game and where it fits we will leave it or even expand it.
• Question 2 - Will you be changing all cards?
  • Answer 2 - No, we will only be changing some cards, and we will do so slowly overtime and with community input, just like our present balance process.
• Question 3 - What happens when you remove affinities from a card? What if I own one or both versions of this card?
  • Answer 3 - If a card has its affinities removed, any player who owns a copy of either affinity will have any copies they own swapped out for the new affinity-less version of that card. In this way, you will not lose any cards you own. For example, if we removed the affinities from Forest's Vim and you had 4 copies of the nature affinity and 7 copies of the shadow affinity, you would be given 11 copies of the affinity-less version after the balance change. Additionally, all upgrades the cards had will be removed and their gold refunded (in case you had both affinities upgraded).  
• Question 4 - What happens when you add a new affinity to a card? What happens to any currently affinity-less copies I own?
  • Answer 4 - If a card has a new affinity added, all of the existing affinity-less versions will be transformed into one of the affinities. The other affinity will then begin to drop from boosters like normal.

[Navilac]

I think it's a good idea to get rid of some affinities, especially when both of them are not really unique and make testing and deck building additionally time consuming when the outcome is not that impactful. (I currently don't have a specific card in mind but in general)

I have one question to Answer 4. What if I get the one affinity that is commonly as the worse considered and my friend with the same card gets thanks to RNG the better affinity. I don't know a solution for this dilemma but that is disappointing.

Is there a chance you can implement something where you can check boxes which affinity you like to get like the radio button's at the end of a pve map where you can choose the card upgrade. And therefore if you add a lot of cards with affinities when opening the game the first time after the patch you choose the affinities for all the new cards like when opening boosters X times.

[WindHunter]

If/when we add a new affinity, it will likely be by keeping the existing card nearly the same and that becoming one affinity. There is not a randomization of which one you get, everyone will get the same affinity while the other affinity will start to drop from boosters. Having the player choose each affinity they want is a good idea, but it is likely to be too much work, and we don't really have the UI to support it. 

[Draconnor]

Good idea but i will miss Sylvans game samage buff. While i still regret that it lost healing 😉

but yes - affinities were kinda 5/10 idea 😉 

[JiiPee]

Affinity system was made just to milk more money from the game. Most of the affinity cards are just useless, one is superior to other. Then there is cards where affinity means very little. Even current devs is to blame to release cards like that.

IMHO I would be happy to see whole affinity thing go away.

[Metagross31]

16 hours ago, Draconnor said:

Good idea but i will miss Sylvans game samage buff. While i still regret that it lost healing 😉

I also really liked its healing. But with the large range, you can place a few backup root units at the back of your base and cast Forest Vim (p) on them for MASSIVE healing for the entire network.

[DrPsy]

Sometimes the reason Affinity is good, is being able to have 2 times the card in the deck even if the effect is not great. Lost Dancer are nice and i had cases having both saved the day cause i needed a lot being stuck on t2 (and they have a usefull affinity even if it's "just" 30%). With spell cards CD also comes to play... I don't like the idea removing them on cards already existing at all. Adding i'm all in 🙂

Edited June 2 by DrPsy

[WindHunter]

Card charges should be handled directly, not via affinities. A pretty good example of this is Necroblaster. Why does this tower only have 8 charges when all comparable T3 units, meaning those with a similar power cost, have 12-16 charges? Right now the affinities are papering off the fact that the base card is not properly balanced as regards charges. 

As for spells, the ability to bypass the spell cooldown is actually one of the biggest balancing problems we have faced with affinities. Frenetic Assault, to give a prominent example, has a longer cooldown than it would if the card did not have affinities, and this is because the card is so strong we generally expect players to bring both copies. Additionally, because T3 void return is so strong that it nearly instantly returns void power, charges and cooldown are the only 2 real balancing levers we have for spells. 

[JiiPee]

9 hours ago, WindHunter said:

Why does this tower only have 8 charges when all comparable T3 units, meaning those with a similar power cost, have 12-16 charges?

 

We have also opposite exasmple: Why does fire drake have only 8 charges, when windhunter have 12? They do about same damage, windhunter cost less and because of life stealing is imho better unit. Sure you can fit fire drake in wider range of decks but imho it should have same 12 charges.

 

9 hours ago, WindHunter said:

As for spells, the ability to bypass the spell cooldown is actually one of the biggest balancing problems we have faced with affinities.

 

I dont see double spell cards as big issue because there is offering what you can use to double cast. Its very rare when I actually take both frenetics. You only have 20 slots after all.

So if you want to get rid of double spells balace issue, then we need to get rid of offering also or fix offering somehow.

[Metagross31]

8 hours ago, JiiPee said:

We have also opposite exasmple: Why does fire drake have only 8 charges, when windhunter have 12? They do about same damage, windhunter cost less and because of life stealing is imho better unit. Sure you can fit fire drake in wider range of decks but imho it should have same 12 charges.

Probably a PvP balance thing. WIndhunter also costs 120 power compared to Skyfire Drake's 100. And they are commonly used in different decks and have different counters.

8 hours ago, JiiPee said:

I dont see double spell cards as big issue because there is offering what you can use to double cast. Its very rare when I actually take both frenetics. You only have 20 slots after all.

So if you want to get rid of double spells balace issue, then we need to get rid of offering also or fix offering somehow.

Offering also takes up a slot, and you might need offering targets (e.g. rifle cultists at T4), so even more slots. The point about offering is, that it is one card by one faction, which can bypass charges (plus I think Evil Eye?), while double slotting spells can in principle be done by each faction.

[DrPsy]

maybe reduce or delete void return mechanics? as said considering you only have 20 cards and void drips in back slowly should be a balance for having multiple stacks of a card in your deck for better cd or uses. speedrunners hate me now i know for sure but what should be more an issue is spamming power with void return and rushing maps to dodge aspects of the map before they happen while playing. there are many times i hear you don't want cheesing tacticts and try shuting them down while also pushing speedruns and time machanics that motivate to skip and cheese as much as possible wherever they can... makes not much sense to me, but that's maybe another storie XD

[JiiPee]

11 hours ago, Metagross31 said:

Probably a PvP balance thing. WIndhunter also costs 120 power compared to Skyfire Drake's 100. And they are commonly used in different decks and have different counters.

 

At least my windhunters cost 100 on any upgrade lvl. Drake also cost 100 at U3

 

11 hours ago, Metagross31 said:

Offering also takes up a slot, and you might need offering targets (e.g. rifle cultists at T4), so even more slots. The point about offering is, that it is one card by one faction, which can bypass charges (plus I think Evil Eye?), while double slotting spells can in principle be done by each faction.

 

Thing is you can use offering on all tiers. Some t2 spell may not be very usefull anymore at t4 so it makes you question if you should take double or not. Also if you play LS deck, you do not need rifle cultist because you can use it on revenants.

3 hours ago, DrPsy said:

speedrunners hate me now i know for sure but what should be more an issue is spamming power with void return and rushing maps to dodge aspects of the map before they happen while playing. there are many times i hear you don't want cheesing tacticts and try shuting them down while also pushing speedruns and time machanics that motivate to skip and cheese as much as possible wherever they can...

 

There is serious flaw in many many maps that difficulty increase based on time spend. Very good example is Heart of Trouble. If you go slow there, you are gonna have serious issues. If you rush fast as possible, its very easy map.

Difficulty should increase also based on progress. Shifting Temple have this mechanics.

Edited June 3 by JiiPee

[WindHunter]

Windhunter and Skyfire are balanced based on PvP. There are different considerations here compared to defense towers which see very little play in PvP, and if they do, charges are not a balancing consideration. 

One of the benefits of Offering is cooldown refreshing. It is also limited to one faction. This is an advanced mechanic anyway. 

Heart of Trouble and The Shifting Temple have nearly identical scaling mechanics, though of course balanced very differently. They use an objective + timed wave scaling mechanic where a wave scales up when the player reaches a specific point (typically building an orb) and the once more 5-6 minutes later. The wave then does not scale any further until the next objective is reached, regardless of how much time has passed. 

[JiiPee]

52 minutes ago, WindHunter said:

Windhunter and Skyfire are balanced based on PvP. There are different considerations here compared to defense towers which see very little play in PvP, and if they do, charges are not a balancing consideration. 

 

Please explain in details how  drake is such a monster in PvP that it requires limiting charges to 8? Also I think its very unfair that there is made balance changes because of PvP what very few actually play. 

 

56 minutes ago, WindHunter said:

Heart of Trouble and The Shifting Temple have nearly identical scaling mechanics, though of course balanced very differently.

 

If you say so then it must be true. However that is not a experience what I have got by playing both maps. Heart of Troubles has failed on something where Shifting Temple has succeed.

 

[RadicalX]

7 hours ago, JiiPee said:

Please explain in details how  drake is such a monster in PvP that it requires limiting charges to 8? Also I think its very unfair that there is made balance changes because of PvP what very few actually play. 

In PvP some factions have very few cards to counter air units cost efficiently. If these charges deplete before Skyfire Drake gets unavailable, it would create a very unhealthy dynamic where one player can force wins through repeadately attacking with the same strategy. Windhunter doesn't need to have the same level of constraint as it's only available in one faction which doesn't have the same level of support systems compared to twilight for example.

If PvE ever needs such a change, we could just power creep the entire anti air system, but the average playcount per deck inclusion in campaign lies around 4, which really doesn't indicate any necessity. In regards to resource investments between gamemodes PvE gets substantially more support than PvP overall. It's just that PvP is inherently more dependent on functional player card vs player card balance. Therefore, the largest portion of PvP related efforts go into fine tuning the dynamics between the game mode specific cards whereas PvE has more focus on overall content creation like overall faction-, map- and new game mode design. And even then, the majority of high effort card changes are PvE related.