Balance Ideas (Unit Changes)

Discussion of all aspects of multiplayer development: unit balancing, map development, server development, and so forth.

Moderator: Forum Moderators

Post Reply
User avatar
Rigor
Posts: 941
Joined: September 27th, 2007, 1:40 am

Re: Balance Ideas (Unit Changes)

Post by Rigor »

i really mean it. i know that the change happened in 1.9 but i have NO IDEA about the problems u described with 1.8.x! does this mean a 1.8.4 player would have problems playing with a 1.8.6 player? imho, thats clear, but not a problem at all. is it ? maybe not. everybody would change his version to 1.8.6 then, words travel very fast in our community. especially if there are severe OOS. until we have the next stable version we have to put up with this "situation" which is really...ugh.

i played the dev version but it crashed so many times that i found it discouraging to continue. sorry, but i couldnt take it anymore.
Velensk
Multiplayer Contributor
Posts: 4002
Joined: January 24th, 2007, 12:56 am

Re: Balance Ideas (Unit Changes)

Post by Velensk »

The whole point of the stable branch is to be 'stable'. No OOS, no major need to update, steady supply of opponents ect.

The whole point of the development branch is to the latest developments such as balance changes. It's fairly stable in the crashing sense at the moment.

Speaking as one who makes all of his maps in the latest version, the lack of players willing to update to the development branch is a bit annoying.
"There are two kinds of old men in the world. The kind who didn't go to war and who say that they should have lived fast died young and left a handsome corpse and the old men who did go to war and who say that there is no such thing as a handsome corpse."
Huumy
Posts: 293
Joined: October 15th, 2009, 9:52 pm

Re: Balance Ideas (Unit Changes)

Post by Huumy »

Sup I don't have facts to back up my opinion but I wouldn't mind to see cavalry be nerfed.
Nerfs I would most favor in this order:
1. Damage to 5-3 or remove Strong trait.
2. Defense lowered on villages and hills.
3. Same resistances as horseman.
4. Lower HP -3 or -4.

I would love to see how the lower damage would work, because to me it seems to solve the problem. Cavalries would be less deadly and more like annoyance, recruiting too many of them would make the loyalist army much weaker. This would benefit the northeners army a lot because in longer fight the loyalist would be slightly weaker.

Tho to be honest I would like see cavalries nerfed but not too much. Try something small if that makes things better, good :)
"And the girl that you want is directly out in front, And she’s waving her caboose at you, You sneeze achoo, She calls you out and boom!"
The offspring, trolling you since forever.
User avatar
Rigor
Posts: 941
Joined: September 27th, 2007, 1:40 am

Re: Balance Ideas (Unit Changes)

Post by Rigor »

Velensk wrote:It's fairly stable in the crashing sense at the moment.
is that so? look, im not the kind of guy whos just talking, so heres the deal:

if we can really play it without major problems, such as frequent crashes during the game etc. i will send out an invitation to all ladder players via main page and propagate the 1.9. branch. i imagine that the community would play those games on 1.9. for at least a month and check it out, and if its not ready by then, we will switch back. if it should prove to be as good as u make me think i dont see a reason why we shouldnt keep playing the dev version. okay?
soul_steven
Posts: 144
Joined: September 5th, 2009, 5:47 pm

Re: Balance Ideas (Unit Changes)

Post by soul_steven »

I support the idea of testing on the 1.9 branch if two stipulations are met.
1. Other ladder players are willing to head over there as well
2. The changes to the cav are met before the switch or else what is the point?
User avatar
Doc Paterson
Drake Cartographer
Posts: 1973
Joined: February 21st, 2005, 9:37 pm
Location: Kazakh
Contact:

Re: Balance Ideas (Unit Changes)

Post by Doc Paterson »

If you guys are going to attempt a ladder migration to 1.9x, just give me a few days notice, so I can translate all of the map updates into 1.9-form. Most of them are already ready to go, but I've been holding off on committing them until they could all be done in one big bunch. Anyways, let me know, and I will accelerate the process. As it is now, many of the 1.9 maps are older versions.
I will not tell you my corner / where threads don't get locked because of mostly no reason /
because I don't want your hostile disease / to spread all over the world.
I prefer that corner to remain hidden /
without your noses.
-Nosebane, Sorcerer Supreme
The Black Sword
Posts: 373
Joined: October 13th, 2008, 4:35 pm

Re: Balance Ideas (Unit Changes)

Post by The Black Sword »

Eh, I'm not so sure switching all ladder games to 1.9 is the best idea. Encouraging games on the 1.9 server is good and making it clear that any games are official and that we consider the balance to be better there but at the very least, no presence on the 1.8 server would mean very little new players.

In my opinion, +1g would be the simplest solution to the cav problem. Keeps the cav flavour while decreasing its effectiveness a bit. If it's still a problem then we could consider other changes.
Velensk
Multiplayer Contributor
Posts: 4002
Joined: January 24th, 2007, 12:56 am

Re: Balance Ideas (Unit Changes)

Post by Velensk »

if we can really play it without major problems, such as frequent crashes during the game etc. i will send out an invitation to all ladder players via main page and propagate the 1.9. branch. i imagine that the community would play those games on 1.9. for at least a month and check it out, and if its not ready by then, we will switch back. if it should prove to be as good as u make me think i dont see a reason why we shouldnt keep playing the dev version. okay?
That sounds like a good idea. I look forward to it having more people to test my maps with.
"There are two kinds of old men in the world. The kind who didn't go to war and who say that they should have lived fast died young and left a handsome corpse and the old men who did go to war and who say that there is no such thing as a handsome corpse."
User avatar
Wintermute
Inactive Developer
Posts: 840
Joined: March 23rd, 2006, 10:28 pm
Location: On IRC as "happygrue" at: #wesnoth-mp

Re: Balance Ideas (Unit Changes)

Post by Wintermute »

Velensk wrote:
if we can really play it without major problems, such as frequent crashes during the game etc. i will send out an invitation to all ladder players via main page and propagate the 1.9. branch. i imagine that the community would play those games on 1.9. for at least a month and check it out, and if its not ready by then, we will switch back. if it should prove to be as good as u make me think i dont see a reason why we shouldnt keep playing the dev version. okay?
That sounds like a good idea. I look forward to it having more people to test my maps with.
I agree that it would be fantastic to move some (doesn't need to be all, but more is better!) over the development side of things. The downside is that it IS going to be more buggy than stable. The upside is that we CAN make changes and tweaks between versions and anyone playing (and reporting bugs!) on the development server is really REALLY helping out the community and actively making Wesnoth better. One big problem that we have been facing in the past several versions is that the stable branch is good enough that there isn't as much reason to play on the development server. Contrast this with when I started playing around version 1.0 when the stable branch was brokenly imbalanced and this was fixed on the dev side. All the good players played the development branch and it was the 'happening' place. Now most people play stable and as a result we don't get feedback on current bugs and changes. The footpad change is still relatively untested. Does it work? Who knows - we have received little feedback about it! We desperately need high-level games there so it would be great to encourage ladder games in 1.9.x

That said, I agree with Soul Steven that we should wait until there is a change to the cav so that it can be a part of the testing. And after reviewing the replays (thanks for linking them!) I'm keen to get some more games in. One thing that was helpful to see is that it was a wide range of leaders and maps - which helps to focus on what the problem is not. I'm certainly going to push for a close examination of this with the other devs and I think we've moved beyond if something should be done - the question is more what.
"I just started playing this game a few days ago, and I already see some balance issues."
grrr
Posts: 252
Joined: May 25th, 2007, 9:49 pm

Re: Balance Ideas (Unit Changes)

Post by grrr »

Well, no. Wintermute, you still got it wrong, sorry. At some point in Wesnoth's history, the community composition shifted from "mostly developers, able to cope with dev version" to "typical (and demanding) online players". Expecting the latter to take the pain of running unstable versions means you don't understand your target audience at all.

See, the ladder folks get their fix now by using specific add-ons, and as Doc stated earlier, add-ons for 1.8 contain more recent map version than what you have in 1.9

Think about it, testing faction changes and map updates simply doesn't require the latest version but can be done with the stable version easily (unless you really do take advantage of new WML, but how often does that happen, realistically?). When we started with the ship-multiplayer-map-updates-per-add-on strategy a while back, one immediate advantage was the fast feedback cycle. Now the idea became so pervasive over time that most ladder players indeed use the recommended add-ons - and *not* default content of the stable version - to play their games.

Wesnoth's add-on system has become usable and is widely accepted. It strikes me as odd that the developers themselves don't support it but instead expect their users to use unstable versions of the game to test balance changes.

If you want feedback on the footie change, or the upcoming cav balancing, then cater to the needs of your community and provide an add-on for the stable version. Forcing people into using unstable software is simply not nice, regardless of how you slice it.
User avatar
Doc Paterson
Drake Cartographer
Posts: 1973
Joined: February 21st, 2005, 9:37 pm
Location: Kazakh
Contact:

Re: Balance Ideas (Unit Changes)

Post by Doc Paterson »

Well, for those who do want to jump over to the 1.9x side, I've just spent the last 8 or so hours working on a 1.9x version of all of the relatively recent map updates. I feel kind of bad for not doing this sooner actually, but I've been so busy with the testing and tinkering of the new maps, and the ladder update packs were a quick and easy way to get a lot of replays. Most of the time I've had for Wesnoth has gone into that. Anyways, it's almost done, and I'll post it soon.
I will not tell you my corner / where threads don't get locked because of mostly no reason /
because I don't want your hostile disease / to spread all over the world.
I prefer that corner to remain hidden /
without your noses.
-Nosebane, Sorcerer Supreme
User avatar
Wintermute
Inactive Developer
Posts: 840
Joined: March 23rd, 2006, 10:28 pm
Location: On IRC as "happygrue" at: #wesnoth-mp

Re: Balance Ideas (Unit Changes)

Post by Wintermute »

grrr wrote:Well, no. Wintermute, you still got it wrong, sorry. At some point in Wesnoth's history, the community composition shifted from "mostly developers, able to cope with dev version" to "typical (and demanding) online players". Expecting the latter to take the pain of running unstable versions means you don't understand your target audience at all.
I am saying that I appreciate Rigor's suggestion and that Wesnoth will be better if folks are testing the development branch. If I implied otherwise then I misspoke. Think about the transition to 1.8.x - there were bugs and problems and craziness, largely because lots and lots of changes were added in the development side and bugs weren't squashed before the stable release. If there are more players on the development server reporting bugs (even saying "I also get that bug" is valuable) then we're going to have a better game. So when Rigor offered to invite ladder users over naturally I am supportive.

Your suggestion to incorporate balance changes into stable via an add-on is great and would help the game a lot. There has been talk of a ladder (IE competitive 1v1) era for some time, and I think that would be fantastic. Set it up and I'm sure it will take off! Maybe that is the way we should test balance changes, it sounds good to me.
"I just started playing this game a few days ago, and I already see some balance issues."
User avatar
Doc Paterson
Drake Cartographer
Posts: 1973
Joined: February 21st, 2005, 9:37 pm
Location: Kazakh
Contact:

Re: Balance Ideas (Unit Changes)

Post by Doc Paterson »

And........here are those map updates, finally. :P

http://forums.wesnoth.org/viewtopic.php ... 73#p485773
I will not tell you my corner / where threads don't get locked because of mostly no reason /
because I don't want your hostile disease / to spread all over the world.
I prefer that corner to remain hidden /
without your noses.
-Nosebane, Sorcerer Supreme
User avatar
Faello
Posts: 441
Joined: June 7th, 2005, 9:01 am
Location: Holy Office

Re: Balance Ideas (Unit Changes)

Post by Faello »

grrr wrote: Think about it, testing faction changes and map updates simply doesn't require the latest version but can be done with the stable version easily (unless you really do take advantage of new WML, but how often does that happen, realistically?)(...)

If you want feedback on the footie change, or the upcoming cav balancing, then cater to the needs of your community and provide an add-on for the stable version. Forcing people into using unstable software is simply not nice, regardless of how you slice it.
I agree with grrr on this matter, I think stable version is the best place to test any changes that will affect cavalry & footpads - imbalances between units usually require vast amount of testing & deep analysis thus stable server seems to be obvious choice, despite the obvious need to test the development versions.

That competitive era Wintermute mentioned is also an awesome idea. I'm literally tired to watch imba cavs and foots doing their job better than they should actually do it in stable version atm.
Wintermute wrote:I'm certainly going to push for a close examination of this with the other devs and I think we've moved beyond if something should be done - the question is more what.
The fact that considerable amount of time passed between the present faction vs. faction balance changes and the questions about cavalry imbalance apperance, suggests that changes shouldn't go too far.

As I've already suggested, I'd vote for some hitpoints cut (-3hp maybe -4hp) from cavalry which would make it generally a little bit less resilient (which is it's main "flaw" in the current stable version) AND give orcish archers ability to gain the dextrous trait, thus raising the Northeners pierce damage output only in the very limited spectrum - in most of the games it would mean probably 1- max 3 dex archers on the field (Northeners simply NEED large amount of grunts on the field, thus no chance to really destroy the balance of this faction vs. others with such a change, espescially if rest of the orcish archer stats would be left alone.

Northeners need some boost in the pierce section of their army atm, and it seems to be a rational decision (I think it's a secret of Polichinelle between the experienced players, that Northeners are the weakest of them all atm). Orcish archers atm are the under-used unit, mostly because they're the worst 14gp archers around/they're underpowered, thus such a change seems to be obvious balance choice.

More radical nerfs of the cavalry (like general lowering of resistances) will suit Northeners vs. Loyalists matchups too, yet may kick offbalance other matchups too much to the side of Loyalist's opposition.

Whatever will be decided, let it be tested taking under consideration the Northeners vs. Loyalists matchup. Cutting just a few hp's from cavalry won't resolve the problem in this matchup and I've already posted the reasons why it won't be sufficient in the previous posts in this topic.

with regards,

Faello
The yellow jester does not play
but gently pulls the strings
and smiles as the puppets dance
in the court of the Crimson King.
User avatar
Rigor
Posts: 941
Joined: September 27th, 2007, 1:40 am

Re: Balance Ideas (Unit Changes)

Post by Rigor »

i just imagine u have the common situation that on a 33x40 sized map u find that ur local archer troops arent dextrous and the cavalry has 39 hp. just taking away 4 hp and giving the archer the possibility to deal a little more damage seems to be very meek (and doesnt solve the problem of forming a line, no hard counter ETC). i heard that loys are a way too good faction, and i wouldnt cry a single tear if the cavs would suffer like the footie did in 1.9 (its so nice to see it deal so little retaliation, really sweet.)
Post Reply