Balance changes Balance changes to game

[nofearek9]

thought your problem was that you cant add 12 players in a map.

[Treim]

1 hour ago, Kubik said:

 

@Treim I never heard that name "MentalOmega" is he active on forum, or on discord?

He was active on the forum. He was quite active in the daily card discussion thread that was popular for a while 2(?) years back. I think at some point he name changed though - i never seem to remember his new name though. Not sure if he is still active either. Very knowledgable about cards though iirc.

[MrDanilov]

9 hours ago, Deldrimor said:

This is absolutely nonsense.

As a experienced speedrunner, normal pve and rpve player and top 10 pvp player in 1v1 and top 5 in 2v2 i can say its fact that every possible and very needed change for pvp as for example: Mortarnerf, phasetowernerf, netherwarp (green) glitchfix, thugsnerf, cursed well, Altar of Nihil, voidstorm and so on, does absolutely NOT affect any of the speedrun tactics. Every speedrun tactic on every map is absolutely still doable with any cardchanges for pvp.

The PvP scene needs some big balancing changes. The speedrun scene needs exactly 0 balancing changes.

 

In clearly most of the competitive pvp games the pvp has the absolute highest balancing priority. This should also count to battleforge. If not than the game cant be taken serious belonging to the word "competitive" and overall this would be catastrophical. This i am saying as an ESL (esportleague) player but also as an passionate speedrunner and pve player. 

 

Ofcourse there are stronger and weaker cards in every game but in pvp there have to be cards, combinations and deck variations that have to be nearly equal to each other. Because of some broken cards two colours arent really competitive in pvp: Nature and Frost t1. Nearly every competitive player plays fire or shadow t1. For a "competitive" pvp mode this is absolutely catastrophical.

 

The pvp needs balancing changes big time and now.

Frost lack of swift really ruins it for most players, the only buffs I could see is either to home soil and/or ice guardian by a bit or just nerf fire/shadow (mortar, phase tower)

 

Also, there is this thread that radical made, I think worth taking a look:

 

Edited July 24, 2019 by felkin

[RadicalX]

I think a set of balancing changes would be able to influence both PvP and PvE in a positive way.

PvE casual: 

From my perspective the casual player benefits from changes because it would open up more variety and playable decks. Splash decks are able to do everything (and even more) compared to pure and faction based decks making them underwhelming to play. Also by having all core advantages that factions provide (Crowd Control, Void Manipulation, Charge Manipulation, damage reductions and healing combined with a mobile high dps unit composition) you don't have to play as a team in order to suceed. I think every faction should get more unique strengths. In addition to that some dead abilities could be fixed by small changes to make them more useful and units more interactive. Right now you usually lose tempo and dps in most fights as abilities are expensive with a high cast time and low to medium effects. 

 

PvE Speedrunning: 

I think the only negative aspect regarding balaning would be within the PvE speedrun setting. They want to have a fair competition and with constant changes around cards this aspect is not given anymore for cPvE alltime records. Certain nerfs may weaken current strategies and certain buffs may open up new superior ones. 

By looking at the games history I think nerfs regarding PvE were justified and made the game a little bit healthier overall. Lost Spirit Ship, Second Chance, FoF+ embalmer + Splicer void manipulation fixes were good first steps. Overall I think some changes do make speedrunning more interesting as it forces people to create new strategies and not play current ones to perfection to get extra seconds. I'd clearly like to see the new T4 strategies without Batariel & LSS being super dominant. That may just be my opinion though. 

In the case where changes are applied they should be brought up in a way that allows speedrunners to have a fair competition: 

-> If changes are applied please do it at the start of the month to allow a fair competition. If there is some big nerf applied in the middle of a month records aren't comparable anymore. 

 

PvP 

I think there is a crystal clear consenous, that PvP players want changes. But we need to be very cautious about who is in charge of those changes. I don't think being at the top of the ladder directly qualifies a person to work on healthy balancing ideas. I've seen very questionable balancing ideas from people, that are reasonably high in the ladder. Majority votes also lead to some terrible decisions by EA back then. Alot of things need to be discussed in order to find the correct cards that need to be changed and also find healthy changes. 

 

I think the forum is the best place to discuss changes to have an open discussion due to better visibility of older posts. 

[Fannabar]

I doubt a lot of people remember it but there was a system in place in the original BF though it only got to implement a couple of changes.

It was a sort of "player council" that would discuss balance changes with the developers following certain steps:

1. Cards would be submitted to balance changes by community vote

2. If the devs agreed that the card could use a change (based on the Database: Number of places \ Win Rate etc.) the "council" would be asked to submit arguments for certain changes in a secluded part of the Forum
3. The Devs would collect theese changes and propose a certain change wich would be disscused in a Live Chat with the "council"

That only happend about 4 Times in the time where i was on it. The major Problem was that the changes came to slow and that there was no way to reimburse players who spend a lot of BFP on a card only to have it nerved. The Devs were quite carefull with changes due to that fact.

Overall i belive it would be a solid system if u introduce a regularity and now that the game is free to play

And since my forum account has a different name (some1 took my old one) this is Feagul

[SunWu]

11 hours ago, Treim said:

i never seem to remember his new name though. Not sure if he is still active either. Very knowledgable about cards though iirc.

https://forum.skylords.eu/index.php?/profile/2579-imaginarynumb3r/ ?

Edited July 24, 2019 by SunWu II.

[Deldrimor]

20 hours ago, LEBOVIN said:

I strongly disagree. At best I would like a pvp only balancing for existing cards. Keeping EVERYTHING as it is for pve, not just supposedly everything. 

This pvp only balancing isnt a realistic solution since it would take a lot of programming work. 

In the original bf there were balancing changes and in this bf there will be.

 

Also you brought exactly 0 arguements what makes speedrun worse.

As i said i was a very competitive speedrunner back in the days and i can tell you that speedrunners only profit from balancing changes. Why so?

Speedrunning is always about keeping secrets. If you cant solve the riddle and find its solution you most of the time never will be as good as others. One phasetowernerf for example does absolutely not affect any of the strategys. If there is anything that affect one single strategy then i really dont see the problem. Players just have to find equal strategys or the same one and they just have to speed things up. Thats it.

 

I also want to mention overall the competitive speedrunning scene is very small (only maximum 15 players) and it was in the original bf only a side mode implemented after years. In pvp there are overall hundreds of players.

 

Also in the original bf were balancing changes. And if you believe it or not. Even when the speedrunning ranking list was implemented after years, there still were balancing changes ongoing. The balancing changes were mainly focused on pvp in the original bf and this absolutely has to be continued now. Because nothing affects speedrun and ofcourse nothing of pvp changes will affect normal pve.

 

The truth for the small speedrunner scene that makes maybe only 5% of the playerbase of bf is:

 

The balancing was fine all time for them and it will be fine all time after new balancing changes.

Edited July 24, 2019 by Deldrimor

[DuellLord]

Balancing changes would be good, but it has to be the right changes. 

Its important that the change makes the game better/more balanced and its also required that the worst things are prioritized. 

To take the right decision what has to be changed, its important to let the knowledge of the right players (highranked or skill of a highrank and experienced with more than just one fraction) decide. If this is not considered, there will be more decisions like the exaggerated buff of thugs or the senseless nerf of home soil (maybe 15 percent of pvp players played frost t1 before the nerf, even less after).

Be sure that things like thugs, phase tower, timeless one and some others which reduce qualitiy of the game experience and diversity will be the first changes.

[LEBOVIN]

50 minutes ago, Deldrimor said:

This pvp only balancing isnt a realistic solution since it would take a lot of programming work. 

In the original bf there were balancing changes and in this bf there will be.

 

Also you brought exactly 0 arguements what makes speedrun worse.

As i said i was a very competitive speedrunner back in the days and i can tell you that speedrunners only profit from balancing changes. Why so?

Speedrunning is always about keeping secrets. If you cant solve the riddle and find its solution you most of the time never will be as good as others. One phasetowernerf for example does absolutely not affect any of the strategys. If there is anything that affect one single strategy then i really dont see the problem. Players just have to find equal strategys or the same one and they just have to speed things up. Thats it.

 

I also want to mention overall the competitive speedrunning scene is very small (only maximum 15 players) and it was in the original bf only a side mode implemented after years. In pvp there are overall hundreds of players.

 

Also in the original bf were balancing changes. And if you believe it or not. Even when the speedrunning ranking list was implemented after years, there still were balancing changes ongoing. The balancing changes were mainly focused on pvp in the original bf and this absolutely has to be continued now. Because nothing affects speedrun and ofcourse nothing of pvp changes will affect normal pve.

 

The truth for the small speedrunner scene that makes maybe only 5% of the playerbase of bf is:

 

The balancing was fine all time for them and it will be fine all time after new balancing changes.

Just because something used to be  doesn’t mean we need to stick with it. I do agree that game mode specific balancing might be difficult but who knows what our lovely devs can come up with ?.

Regarding the changes interference: that depends on the kind of changes, already seemingly unimportant changes like nerfing a t1 unit’s hp pool can have cascading effects, as for instance you rely on your teammates feeding you with a unit, now Post nerf fof void return decreases, so they have to swap to another unit, unfortunately due to deck limitations this unit was also the only swift unit they had to get around, making them unable to dodge incomes or outrun them etc. 

This is a constructed example just to show that changes that might not influence pve in fact can do.

[Kubik]

48 minutes ago, DuellLord said:

its also required that the worst things are prioritized

I said in the first post what kind of changes will be allowed at the beginning. If someone do not agree with that NO should be voted.

[Deldrimor]

2 hours ago, LEBOVIN said:

Just because something used to be  doesn’t mean we need to stick with it. I do agree that game mode specific balancing might be difficult but who knows what our lovely devs can come up with ?.

Regarding the changes interference: that depends on the kind of changes, already seemingly unimportant changes like nerfing a t1 unit’s hp pool can have cascading effects, as for instance you rely on your teammates feeding you with a unit, now Post nerf fof void return decreases, so they have to swap to another unit, unfortunately due to deck limitations this unit was also the only swift unit they had to get around, making them unable to dodge incomes or outrun them etc. 

This is a constructed example just to show that changes that might not influence pve in fact can do.

Still you can do it with the same tactics. You have same chances, same tactics, same decks, same combinations. Its always the same scheme. Nothing to loose. Its really always the same.

In pvp its not the same. Different matchups, some mainstreamdecks force to make decks like for example bandits, frost t1, nature t1, not really playable.

 

If you nerf the hp by thugs -70 pvp only will profit in getting more balanced matchups while speedrunners have still the same chance, the same decks, the same tactics and so on.

I clearly can say speedrunners dont loose anything while pvp will get to a better place.

 

I can now only finish with my statement telling to the devs: Please continue balancing cards mainly focused on pvp like it was common practice in the original bf.

It is for sure not in the senses of the devs in the old bf to stop balancing pvp just because there are a few speedrunners having the opinion their from the beginning on of the original bf not intended "mode" would be in big danger. Its clearly wrong.

Edited July 24, 2019 by Deldrimor

[LEBOVIN]

1 hour ago, Deldrimor said:

Still you can do it with the same tactics. You have same chances, same tactics, same decks, same combinations. Its always the same scheme. Nothing to loose. Its really always the same.

In pvp its not the same. Different matchups, some mainstreamdecks force to make decks like for example bandits, frost t1, nature t1, not really playable.

 

If you nerf the hp by thugs -70 pvp only will profit in getting more balanced matchups while speedrunners have still the same chance, the same decks, the same tactics and so on.

I clearly can say speedrunners dont loose anything while pvp will get to a better place.

 

I can now only finish with my statement telling to the devs: Please continue balancing cards mainly focused on pvp like it was common practice in the original bf.

It is for sure not in the senses of the devs in the old bf to stop balancing pvp just because there are a few speedrunners having the opinion their from the beginning on of the original bf not intended "mode" would be in big danger. Its clearly wrong.

Nothing to lose ? Achieving old times would no longer be possible for example. And my example above, stated that a deck chance is necessary, same for thugs whose ability is just as much beneficial in pve as in pvp (if not even more...).

Having the game mode specific balancing if possible sounds good to me. Not to balance in pve (as you say everythign is fine there) would then remain an option.

Edited July 24, 2019 by LEBOVIN

[Emmaerzeh]

To be honest. Few days ago I wanted to report a bug, then I realized in the forum there can't be opened a thread  in the section anymore and also there is no notice where to report it then. Where "This is where all client-sided issues go, which generally have lower priority than server-sided issues" text is should write "report here is disabled if u want report a bug go..." . I guess on discord. Also it's not easy to know if the bug has been reported before. And the template that has to be followed also is a difficulty. And I am a long time user of this forum even though I missed the report bug is deactivated. 

 

And I think you should do card changes to increase variety and balance. 

And TBO once sayed in his endinterview, when they did a change sometimes it affected something they never thought it will affect it.(bugs not the meta) 

I know u sayed only Change the energy and the stats first but I just want to mention I think at some point it would be good to change the orb requirements. As stated before, some cards bring to much for only require 1 orb. F. E. Sow. 

 

Kind Regards 

Edited July 24, 2019 by Karl Lavafeld

[Hans275]

If you do balancing. Do it right. Implement some logging, what cards are in what pvp setup played.
And then go and change those cards no one uses, rather than changing the well balanced T1.

 

Buf if i were you guys i would try to get more player playing. Without a bigger playerbase the balancing gets tough.

Oh and maybe take a look at business intelligence. Some of this suff might be usefull. 

Edited July 24, 2019 by Hans275

[Loriens]

I cant understand speedruners who dont want balance changes.
Normal speedruners just invent new sequence of actions in this case.
Of course, all time records for some maps should be count from last balance/map change patch.

Edited July 25, 2019 by Loriens

[Chibiterasu]

I would love to see some balance changes especially some nerf for those way too often used LSS, Amii-Monument and Enlightment/Batariel in Pve. However I think in the latter case there should be more of a change in the way it works instead of simple number changes.

I think everyone in this community should be able to say which card they want to see changed. In many PvP games there is a class / strategy / whatever which is greatly balanced from the competetive view but just stupid for beginners and I don't think that's a good approach for this game. Beginners already get frustrated because of the amount of time they have to spend to get all the good cards anyway. So only picking some good players for every mode and let them decide isn't a good idea imo. Besides everyone has a favorite deck and therefore isn't completely objective. The more people can judge over a specific card, the more objective it is. Though it should also be necessary to tell the reason for the opinion. Not just buff or nerf. More like "Buff because I never saw that card" or "Buff because I used it and it was useless" or something like that.

In my opinion the forum is a better place for that. It's way more orginized and you can read older posts more easily. Besides when you post something in a forum, you automaticly think more about the stuff you write and argue better. Therefore you read more well-thought-out ideas here than in discord. At least thats my feeling.

[Kubik]

@Karl Lavafeld this subsection is disabled for you? https://forum.skylords.eu/index.php?/forum/41-report-a-bug/

@Karl Lavafeld I think orb requirements are also just a number (would need to check)

"game mode specific balancing" NO even if it would be possible (which I really doubt) I am against it, it would make the game only more confusing, because which numbers you would see on the card?

1 hour ago, Chibiterasu said:

I think everyone in this community should be able to say which card they want to see changed.

Agreed, but on the other hand it is also important to know who that person is.
Speedrunners "exploit" some cards strengths that may be invisible to someone who just start playing and for the new guy it may seem too week.

There are good reasons why to use forum, but what about these good reasons why to use Discord:

• On forum the name and picture are separated from the text, so I first read the text and then maybe the name, which I most probably forgot anyway, so I have no idea which group of players write what. on Discord I would be able to set colour codes for names that appear above the text, so I would always know if the text was written by known PvP player, speedrunner, or someone I do not know about
• On forum people write longer posts, but more often than not, they do not add more information/reasoning/etc. to it, just more words
• If I would create a discord server just for balancing I would have all the permissions there, here on forum I can not ever create sections
• On forum 1 line and 10 line message take same space so shorter messages waste space, on discord that is much better
• On discord I would be able to delete messages, here I can not
• On discord I can scroll up as much as I want, here I need to go trough pages, and I can not really go from newest to oldest, because ever page change move to to the top
• And on the main discord server for Skylords Reborn is more active people than on the forum

[Chibiterasu]

40 minutes ago, Kubik said:

Agreed, but on the other hand it is also important to know who that person is.

That's exactly what I mean. When you pay extra attention to the people you know, you balance the game in general for more experient players. That's why I think it's better to only look at the reasoning.

The only real problem I see with discord is that one person mentions a card maybe with a good idea and then many other people discuss about that card forever, then another card get mentioned and so on until you have to scroll up for like 5 minutes until you see that good idea. I know you can search for it but when you don't know about that idea and just want to see which cards are suggested, it's almost impossible to find that idea after a few days.

[Kubik]

I do not see that as problem on discord, 1 channel per card, anyone who will post non related things here will get kicked from server, as simple as that

Yes I pay extra attention to people "I know" because I will not need to start game each time and validate that the person is telling the trueth or just look at the card image and think more DMG would be good idea. I am not saying I will ignore people I do not know. Point is if two people say opposite things like "decrease DMG" vs "increase DMG" I will know that one play mainly PvP and the other is speedrunner that can combine t1 and t4 because of combo that is just impossible in PvP.

[LEBOVIN]

8 hours ago, Loriens said:

I cant understand speedruners who dont want balance changes.
Normal speedruners just invent new sequence of actions in this case.
Of course, all time records for some maps should be count from last balance/map change patch.

Well I stated my reasoning, nerfs permanently lower possible times in speedruns. What exactly is good about that ? 

You would like to spend more time in Soultree cause post-nerf amii  is no longer an option ?

 

[Kubik]

amii in soultree is BUG and will be fixed at some point

[Emmaerzeh]

@Kubik i was confused cause i wanted to open a thread in "client sided" . Wasnt there also a "server sided" subforum? But there is no start new thread button.  In the Main "Report a Bug" there is one. Sry for the confusion. Maybe u can write at subforums "Threads are moved here by devs , just post your reports in the Main "report a bug" forum" to help to orientate.  Kind Regards

 

Edited July 25, 2019 by Karl Lavafeld

[Pritstift]

8 hours ago, Loriens said:

I cant understand speedruners who dont want balance changes.
Normal speedruners just invent new sequence of actions in this case.
Of course, all time records for some maps should be count from last balance/map change patch.

Please define what is balance in battleforge for you? With the existing cards and how they work you can create a lot of different tactics - so why i should want to have balance changes in pve? I dont see any balance problems in pve - many players here try to see problems/balance problems but what about to accept the current mechanism and in consequence how the game works. Is this not the reason why you like to play battleforge?

I will give you some examples:

 

-Amii-Monument - i have no problem to play with or without Amii-Monument - for speedruns for sure i will use it - but is this really a balance problem? For speedruns you can use every existing option to make the run faster...Also for beginners this card can be helpful to finish expert maps. So some players here think that the same content will be better just after changing Amii-Monument? This makes no sence for me to be honest. To playblight or rpve with or without Amii-Monument will not change the balance - expert maps are still easy to play without Amii-Monument. So you should accept the Amii-Monument like it is and you can use it if you want or dont use it if you dont want.

 

-SOW - this card is perfect to make the game fast and it does fit to many different deck-colour combinations. So is it really balanching to change this card e.g. to 3x fire orbs? The consequence will be that less players will use SOW and just because some players think it is cool to play pure fire we will not have a better balanching. You should try to accept this card like it is and you can use it if you want or dont use if dont want. Also sow is a big help when you play with randoms players that have no clue about any void manipulation...

 

For me all existing maps are easy to play - so it makes no sence for me to change some important cards just with the idea to bring more balance and indireclty making the maps somehow harder...The maps are still easy to play even with a changed Amii-Monument , SOW....Afer you may have the idea to change other cards like cultist masters , englightment, batariel....

You just destroying the mechanics in this game we love it for...better concentrate on totally useless cards to bring more options for strategies in pve/pvp instead of killing core mechanics of the game...

And to finish - what are normal speedruners? I am also a normal speedruner - just with a lot of experience. After you performed the changes i am sure that the same names still will be on top of the rankings - if you know how the game is working you also know how it will work without e.g. Amii-Monument or SOW.....

"Of course, all time records for some maps should be count from last balance/map change patch" - this is somehow stupid - or not? How you want to know that a tactic of a player was affected by the last change???? So e.g. every month there is a balance change - so you have to play fastetst time again and again even if there was no change for the tactic???? And to be honest - some speedruns are hard to perform to get really the best time - i would not be motivated to repeat this every month again and again...

[LEBOVIN]

1 hour ago, Kubik said:

amii in soultree is BUG and will be fixed at some point

Why is that a bug ? You have 5 orbs so you fullfill the quest.

If you really want to ruin the speed and ease of a moderately good run, make it a difficulty very hard condition only, so expert can remain as it is

Edited July 25, 2019 by LEBOVIN

[Kubik]

1. When the map was released that card did not exist
2. so you skip part of map, just because single card
3. check map next time you will be playing it it show you which monuments you should have

Because of that I thin it is a bug, that they add card without checking for consequences (not to mention that you have the orb for only 250 instead of 300 power, that can aslos make big difference on some other maps, yes ability cost 160 power, but you get 100% of that back)