The ideas of a Wesnoth Rebalance

[Elvish_Hunter]

People are being very ignorant and counter productive.

I'm sure this proud declaration will get you a *lot* of friends and enthusiastic listeners !
It would be even better if you put it into your signature. Then everyone could see the good opinion you have on them.

There's no need to start a flame. Let's stay on topic, people.

[BasiC]

People are being very ignorant and counter productive.

I'm sure this proud declaration will get you a *lot* of friends and enthusiastic listeners !
It would be even better if you put it into your signature. Then everyone could see the good opinion you have on them.

Friendly,

thanks for this idea. But say it is meaningless...really frustrated me a lot.

Sorry, but I remember you study physics and maths. So you know the way in physics one model a system, searching values which can describe it accurately, like entropy in thermodynamics. You're making the assumption some linear combination of the existing parameters should work. It's an empirical approach, not a theoretical one.

Friendly,

well, maybe what i meant is deliberately ignorant, as in, not thinking about this through before commentating.
I think people have a wrong idea about how a mathematics based balance works...

[battlestar]

How do they work? (ie. how would you actually do it, not what it means theoretically)

[artisticdude]

I think people have a wrong idea about how a mathematics based balance works...

But that's not the point here. Regardless of how/whether mathematical balance works in other instances, it has yet to be proven that it can work in Wesnoth. In other TBS games, maybe. But in Wesnoth, no one has ever proven that "mathematics based balance" is possible. Instead, all the attempts that have been made to prove it possible have only further bolstered the perception that it is, in fact, impossible. You can refer to other TBS games and what works for them and how they do stuff etc., but at the end of the day Wesnoth is its own game with its own mechanics and features, and what works for one TBS won't always work for another. In the case of Wesnoth, it is my belief that mathematical balancing is completely impossible, and until there's any solid evidence to the contrary I really can't be expected to alter my view on the subject, can I?

Of course, I'd be all too willing to change my mind if someone could prove me wrong.

[AxalaraFlame]

BasiC wrote:
People are being very ignorant and counter productive.
I think this effort is very welcome and the result, if The OP keeps working on it, will be much better than anything pure intuitive balancing can achieve.
I have some experience balancing RTS games using equations and i have some tips i think might help.

First of all we must remember that balance of strategy games is not only about tweaking units stats, there is another major issue and its the map set allowed to be played on, in the ladder.
The point of equations in a game like Wesnoth is not to precalculate all possible moves and unit combinations on every map in the map set and than based on that information change the stats so all factions are balanced(again balanced for who, since a player will never be able to play perfectly and make the perfect decision so even if a computer could recalculate all moves the balance it will eventually generate will only be balanced to other computers playing the game while precalculating evrything).
This is impossible, just like its impossible to precalculate all possible moves in chess to decide at every moment what is the perfect move.

What equations are good for is to allow us to minimize intuitive guessing and improve consistancy...
Equations will never be able to say how much exactly should the heal ability costs(for example) however it will allow us to intuitively decide the cost of all the different abilities and resistances and defense values and than based on those costs correctly give every unit a proper price.

Instead of having to intuitively guess the cost of every ability on each unit we will only have to give values to things once and than calculate the costs of every new units.
We do not need to start from scratch.
We take equations, Assign, intuitively, based on our game experience, values to all the basic stats like resistances defenses ratios all the abilities, movement points, dmg etc...After values are set by us we see if those values and the unit costs they generate are close to the unit values we got in Wesnoth now.
we do this because Wesnoth already has an OK balance, work has been done and the balance is not terrible.
Whe nwe see the values placed in the equation for all the different stats generate unit costs similar to the current unit costs we will know we are makign progress.
After this is accomplished we can begin tweaking and seeing what units are wildly standing out of the cost the equation assigned to them.
These units will be the unbalanced units.

In short, using an equation to calculate a unit's cost based on its stats will allow us to make cross-section balance tweaks and allow us to correct wildly unbalanced units.
Instead of tweaking a single unit's stats cause it seems OP just to find out that that tweak has now contributed to another unit being OP or UP we will be able to say, "ok this unit is wildly unbalanced compared to the other units and we need to nerf this and this GLOBAL value to put it into the balance frame" or "the healing stat is too cheap we need to assign it a new, higher or lower, GLOBAL value and than correct the pricing of all units that use this value,heal".

This process will add consistancy and allow less intuitive guessing and trying to make sure you thought of all the possible outcomes of nerfing or buffing just a single unit.

Thx a lot, friend...utill now only your ideas helped me out from reality. l have been thinking the same and differents things as u suggested long ago, and here is where l stepped so far.

map things: l have already concerned this element for a long time, and l strongly believe that there is a certain balanced terrian propertion/map for a completely balanced wesnoth.

ability and wesponspecials: l build differnet formulas and models focus on each of them particular. The calculation work is vast and l am bad at programming, so computer programs do not help me much...most of them are done by Texas Calculators. For AOEs, my idea is to adapt and recollect information from a player called leocrotta , whose tactics are manipulated nearly perfectly as if Kasparov did, intsead of many players. l presume his wars as the triumph of mankind. How many times he used his AOEs are under gathering process, and he will be regarded as standard.

mobility: there is actually a...something we may name it "mobility potencial coefficient". Mobility is always not fully utilized and most times used for retreat, regroup and recharge. For some units having comparatively low RMs, would release less potencial when regrouping. Instead of having neutral effects amongest all races, lawful and chaotic units seem to have worked worse and released less potencial than neutral units, which pricinples is unknown and suspectible.

intuition: denied and defied, while hard to deny and defy at the same time, some "unbalanced units" are modified in this way, since we only have so scarce chances in each version, making so few groups of changes, while the real need is big. For instance "swarm", "slow" and some exotic units


l stopped writting my ideas on the forum because these ideas are too vast and l dun' suppose l can type them all...many processes are not unveiled, and these navie attempts are only the very first stage of my works one year ago.

[AxalaraFlame]

Finally, l got some new ways to pave "slow" ability. I think balancing wesnoth is very like balancing StarCraft now, while the former is easier the latter is not doable for such person without any high-tech stuff If I could define all kinds of attack types and hps and weapon specials and abilities, before the end of this year l hope, wesnoth will be revolutionized forever！

[Raindancer]

wow! someone finally gotta do this! I've been thinking this game is balanced badly for a long time, but nobody listen .I watched your duel against nelson. Well, 1300 over 2100 is not possibly a doable thing, but u won...though u are not so daultless or little bit foolish as he said (friendly, really friendly), because he is kinda too daring, or little bit foolish as well, to attack with drakos at night; and u strategically decimated most of the drakos before daytime, thus he loses advantage.

I suppose if u are gonna to do it, u'd better solve those 15 match-ups' multirace balance first, then the Age Heros, then the campaigns. Drake v. human and UD have notorious fame of balance, and elves are known for indistructable treefolks (vs. UD, most obviously unbalanced). What's more, add an overlapped Combat role is a great bane to wesnoth--l mean mages. Possessing a same unit by two races would cause high causalities, if u don't believe that, see how BLIZZARD make Starcraft.

[The_Other]

I think you need to provide a solid argument as to why 'this game is balanced badly'. Bear in mind that, unlike most games, Wesnoth developers receive constant feedback from players (whether they want it or not!), so if something is over- or under-powered, a lot of people tend to point it out pretty fast, and it then gets fixed. If you find that certain units are useless, you're probably using them wrong. If certain enemies are too hard to kill, you need to try a different tactic. No offence is meant by this - I am a pretty bad player a lot of the time, but I don't blame the game for it.
Also, there have been numerous attempts to mathematically rebalance this game. Nobody has ever succeeded. I'm not saying that it can't be done, or that AxalaraFlame can't do it - I'd be hugely impressed if he can! - but it's a bit of a Holy Grail, that many people have searched for and nobody has achieved.

Oh, and for Undead vs 'indestructible treefolk' - use ghouls to poison them (so they don't regenerate for a turn), and zap them with Dark Adepts. Repeat as necessary. Yes, they take a lot of killing, but they're also expensive and slow, have no ranged attack, and with only 2 strikes have a fair chance of missing both times.

[AxalaraFlame]

I suppose I have estimated some kinds of unit's value clearly now. Some units do not value an integer gold pieces; instead, they may value a little worse, or a littel stronger. In different situations, this may cause variables.

loyalsit spearman $14
actually it is 14.15+...this mean when u spam many spears, your advantage will accumalate, sometimes.

orcish grunt $12
actually, they values more than 12.49 . This means, when u spam great ammounts of orcs, ur army should be much tougher than ur enemy who has an army worthes a same value as urs do.
But we didn't really see orcs have obviously unbalanced wars over other races after 1.10. Why is that? Well, I suppose this is their poor quality's fault, which they gain power from it, and lose form it too. A big orc army will cost much more upkeep, but cannot deal more decent damage...if ur antagonist managed to resist long, say, until the fifth day morning, u will have already lost greater valunes of upkeeps than the "token advantage" u have accumalated from the hordes of grunts.

nain axeman $16
nearly balanced, a little less than 16. it depends and varies on different maps, since wesnoth don't really have a standard terrian/map proportion set.

elf blade $14
not very well...if we count them as who can always deal ultimate damage (neutral), by fight back with melee and offense with bow against all melee fighters and fight in contrary against range weapon bearers, they are really very tough things But that is not possible, for negativeness would cause them much trouble. On the other hand, their low hp aren't really able to resist one turn when it is ur enemy's advantageous time, even on forested terrian, which may cause damage waste. And what's more, battle fields change very quickly, so they must always be ready to play to the score. This will surely decrease their maxium damage.
value 13.78--15.10-, but approximately 13.9

ske fighter $15
only 14.5+. But undead gain their strength back fro mrange weapon bearers.

drako fighter $17
This is disturbing...I don't really understand why would they be so expensive, for they only value 16.11+. Their only strength is good mobility; but poor resistances, dodge ability, and low attack points(comparatively speaking) aren't very decent.
Specially, when used against undead, their value approaches near to 17, which is 16.85+. This is not very accurate because l may underestimated their mobility. In all other situations, if they don't fight and escape quick like guerrillas, drakos are the worst fighters, I would say.

[The_Other]

First, I would like to apologize if I upset or annoyed you earlier in this thread. I think I was a bit unclear - I'm not opposed to you doing this at all, I actually think it's a great idea. I just wanted to be sure you realized how complex it is. I don't mean to say "the game is perfectly balanced, leave it alone" - my meaning is more that "it's hard to make it any more balanced, because there are so man factors".
I actually hope you can find some formula to balance the game better than just relying on instinct - I myself can't see how it can be done, but if you're better at maths than me then, sincerely, good luck to you. Sorry for sounding more negative/hostile than I meant to!

You're right about the drakes - their mobility is a huge advantage, but balanced by lack of defence and weakness to common (piercing) weapons. They are very powerful if used correctly - they are really the only faction that can properly fight a guerilla war, since nobody else is mobile enough to hit-and-run effectively (except elves on a forest-heavy map) - drakes can handle their poor defense/resistance for a turn, two turns with luck, safe in the knowledge that they can probably escape to somewhere out of the enemy's reach (over the mountains/snow/desert, or hover out at sea where there defense is no worse than most other units'). I suspect they are very hard to balance properly, because their usefulness is so dependent on using unusual tactics.

[AxalaraFlame]

First, I would like to apologize if I upset or annoyed you earlier in this thread. I think I was a bit unclear - I'm not opposed to you doing this at all, I actually think it's a great idea. I just wanted to be sure you realized how complex it is. I don't mean to say "the game is perfectly balanced, leave it alone" - my meaning is more that "it's hard to make it any more balanced, because there are so man factors".
I actually hope you can find some formula to balance the game better than just relying on instinct - I myself can't see how it can be done, but if you're better at maths than me then, sincerely, good luck to you. Sorry for sounding more negative/hostile than I meant to!

You're right about the drakes - their mobility is a huge advantage, but balanced by lack of defence and weakness to common (piercing) weapons. They are very powerful if used correctly - they are really the only faction that can properly fight a guerilla war, since nobody else is mobile enough to hit-and-run effectively (except elves on a forest-heavy map) - drakes can handle their poor defense/resistance for a turn, two turns with luck, safe in the knowledge that they can probably escape to somewhere out of the enemy's reach (over the mountains/snow/desert, or hover out at sea where there defense is no worse than most other units'). I suspect they are very hard to balance properly, because their usefulness is so dependent on using unusual tactics.

Oh I am so sorry! I was busying fighting with Raindancer last week, and actually I didn't notice that u have posted here. sorry for my carelessness.

[The_Other]

Not a problem. Unfortunately I don't think I know enough math to be much help with this project, but I wish you good luck with it!

[AxalaraFlame]

ok, further test results revealed. I have to tell u guys, there is really no good way out for me to evaluate any units with -slow- ability. Even if I have collected these replays of master players, calculated the frenquency of "slow" ability used, the information is still insufficient, for "slow“ is after all too trisky. Increasing their own surviving ability, and most obviously used in offense as auxlias so others suck in less damage.("top player list" includes: leocrotta, Dauntless, Goldilock, enacui, Semler, Cremember, Fanjo, nelson, Mint. In sum 117. More replays needed.)

The test in ranged weapon bearers have a great break. Though we always think they must be more expensive than fighters, they could really have bore weapons deal greater damage and to be made cheaper if we modify all groups of archers ata same time. But that is not necessary. The Bold text are exotic units whose prices are thought to be not well evaluated, or have some quirky sides which remian unknown till now.

loyalist archer
$14/$14.06

thunderer
$17/$15.98(???)
What a disturbing thing it is...I don't know why. But the dwarvish foottype, basic knalagan mobility, fair enough melee damage and range damage could hardly reach $17. I need some feedbacks in real war tests.

poacher
$14/$12.94-13.85
This is harder to modify, for these idiots have another advantage: low exp. The necessary exp for leveling up is another trisky problem to solve...my idea for a perfectly balanced wesnoth have never had such assumptions that weaker or lamer units need lower exp to level up. Under default settings, 70% exp, a poacher only need to kill two units to level up. $14 can be fairly reasonable.

My setting subverts the oringianl settings. I give two settings to pick: a unit can either earn exp in proportion of the enemy units' prices which it killed, like many RTS games, or require exp to level in proportion of its own price. In this case, any unit have a certain exp to level for it has an inherrently certain price, while players no longer need to remember some units are easy to level while some not, serves KISS rule much more apporariate. This is based on an assumption that if all units are balanced and have a near real decent price for each piece of their ability, their battlefield surviving skills should be in proportion to the set price. For instance, a spearman have 1/7 better battle skills to keep him deal damage, survive against enemy attack than an orcish grunt, it shall require both 1/7 higher price than a grunt and 1/7 more exp to level up.

I think RTS rules shall not be much involved in wesnoth, so l pick the latter, and I set poachers at $13, which make more sense for their low damage, but become harder to level, which counters the benefits brought from decreased prices; but still, they are 1/14 easier to level than $14 archers.

orcish archer
$14/$14.50
This is very queer...oringinal 1.86 lamelamey orcish archer approaches nearer to $13.50, while 1.10 one becomes be the best archer in default era! Deal fire damage+conventional pierce damage, normal melee damage and hp, it seems just to make its price indisposed.
My idea is to give it 8*2 pierce damge, 4*1 melee damage, $13, but l am not sure for this.

Elv archer
$17/$16.58-17.47
It varies for having or not having "dextrous" ability.

Skeleton archer
$14/$15.26(fake one)
The real one shall be near 14.4
not much big surprise for me...the undead-skeleton foottype and revelant resistances is always evaluated much higher than usual. But each race have ways to encounter skeletons, so I gave my own opinions. While $14.4 is still much higher than $14, undead are weak for having lame melee weapons. They gain their strength back from range weapons.

Burner
$21/$20.98
A very well balanced unit, but I am not sure. I suggest they require less exp to level.

[AlaskanAvenger]

The burner does get leadership when upgraded which is a huge advantage so xp requirement is probably just fine for it.

[AxalaraFlame]

I noticed. All drakos have high exp standard, but that is not necessary. The drakes which are of 5 mobility standard are fragile actually, and can be easily killed by fast units by pierce units. Their exp for leveling just make little sense to their surviving ability.

What's more, I shall correct something. Dwarvish Thunder Nains are 17$, whose value is nearer to 16.98$, not 15.98$. So they are near balanced.
Orcish grunts still bring great causualities. 0.49 gold per units is not a little advantage, so swarm-rush tactics shall be useful. I wonder does anybody tested that before? At least on Isar, orcish grunt rush is very doable.