Rebalancing WZ: A Modest Proposal

[zydonk]

hello

I broached this topic elsewhere without getting a response. So I would like here to set out some kind of argument against the growing tendency to interfere with the balance of the original WZ game.

I propose that the game should be developed with reference to WZ v10 (the last update from Pumpkin), and that modifications of that reference version should be offered in the form of mods that can be applied to the reference game.

I offer two arguments for this proposal, 1) the significance of what was achieved by Pumpkin back in 1999, and 2) the limitations imposed on the game by most (if not all) mods.

The years 1999-2000 seem now to have been the high point in the development of game AI. Computers by then were powerful enough to handle complex decision trees over a wide range of players. Think of the games of the period and their impact: WZ, HL, Deus Ex, Ultima IX, System Shock, to name a few. Later, graphics would take over, so that the development of AI would suffer in the name of flashier imagery and a narrow versimilitude (compare Morrowind and its successors Oblivion and Stalker; or WZ and the absurd Earth 2160 or flashy SupCom). Among these great games, WZ is unique in what it achieved: true 3D graphics, effective action animation, research trees allowing for the creation of unique units, and above all a demanding and immersive gameplay that could still attract the player after almost a decade.

Because of the comprehensive nature of WZ's AI, it is possible to play the game in different ways, depending upon the interests and temperament of the individual player. This can be seen in the range of custom maps created over the years for the game: huge rush maps with generous resources and few is any strategic demands; smaller, more complex layouts, where strategy is important and continuous micro-management is needed.

Now, the already available rebalance and AI mods reflect this spread of interest. There are fantastic rush mods with inspired weaponry (rotary flamers, anybody) and tight, locked-down mods, like Aivolution, where watching your friends is as important as watching your enemies.

And this is how it should be. Play a rush game tonight? Then choose a suitable mod. How about a micro strategy game? Pick your mod. In this way, WZ (reference v10) is a core game retaining all the strengths of the original, but amended at will to suit this or that inclination.

Now, the present rebalancing (v21 betas) are very clearly tending to favour the rush game alone. But it is also seriously limiting the original game. Examples: the rebalancing of the Lancer has turned it into a duplicate mortar. It is easily foxed with decoy bunkers (set your truck to start a bunker, then pull it off - cost zilch or thereabouts), and then eliminated by mortars (which are both more accurate and powerful?). I push research thru' to the pulse laser emplacement (researching also power improvements but not building materials); set these in lines behind decoy bunkers and they are a match for anything the AI can throw at them. So, cannon, rockets, flamers are not needed (I was v surprised in one game when a few cannon tanks turned up; some AI player showing a spark of initiative). The thing is here, both human and AI players are ruled by one law: economy. If you have something that works, you stick to it. The Lancer firework does it for the AI (against other AI players, anyway; I suspect because it scares them off), pulse lasers do it for me. Result: no middle game and a short anticlimactic end game. I'm always surprised when I'm offered the Lancer for research, way past the point at which it is useful. VTOLs: Zillions of superfast bombers are met with zillions of AA, which is pretty mechanical gaming worthy of C&C (Stormbringers are supposed to operate near light speed, in WZ they look more like party poppers).

OK, that's it, point hopfully made. I'm not against modding - I hope that's clear. But I am against messing with the original game. The dev seems to be getting there. I have played computer games for nearly twenty years. I am not a computer specialist, but I am impressed by the elaborate development protocol that has come into being here. Sometimes, though, it is necessary to formulate some kind of overview of what the dev is all about. It can't be about this or that fiddling with weaponry or research lists. No one wants to change the skins of the units or structures, so why mess with the balance? We all know why: it is easy to do, and given the nature of WZ, it is an intriguing intellectual exercise.

Don't forget now, this is intended as a modest proposal.

byee

[Kreuvf]

OK, that's it, point hopfully made. I'm not against modding - I hope that's clear. But I am against messing with the original game. The dev seems to be getting there.

Over a year ago I wrote a notice on this particular topic in German on my site. I have not translated it, but the core of what I thought then is just what I quoted from you right now ;)

I do not know if the developers talked about this "problem" after that notice, but I think they did.

Nowadays you can consider me part of the WRP and I try to assist Troman - it is mainly he doing the rebalancing work - whenever I find him working on the balancing. Why? Cause I could not stop balancing changes ^_^

It is obvious that 1.10-balancing sucked and it is even more obvious that one has to fix this. So fixing the defaults ensures that everybody gets the new/fairer/better balancing instead of using the old one.

Back then I proposed that the developers should include an old-school mod so people could play plain old Warzone, if they liked to. This turned out to be impossible as certain things such as the hit-system have been changed and for a 1:1 experience of the game these would have to be reverted or switches would have to be integrated (I think this will be quite some work..). I changed my mind then and am now working towards progress.. or what I think progress means here and although I do not programme, I still can help the project and try doing so.

But I think if enough users make noise, a way - perhaps not for 2.1 - could be found to add certain switches into the game that enables you to play the old-school Warzone. The future for Warzone is that the game becomes more modder-friendly, so a way to e. g. use the old hit-system could be one of those modder-friendly things. However, this is no official WRP opinion, only Kreuvf's one. :P

[NucNut]

Can we just change the way the storm bringer AA worked? in 1.10 its projectiles had a flight speed of -1 (allowing it to instant hit the target I believe) and it fired a continuous straight beam of green light from the muzzle to the target - doing this and maybe give it a cooldwon between shots perhaps?

[Delphinio]

in 1.10 its projectiles had a flight speed of -1 (allowing it to instant hit the target I believe)

no, the hit rate is in 1.10 70-75% (without upgrade).

[NucNut]

Whoops, by instant hit i meant the projectiles flew to the impact point instantly, regardless if it hit the target or not.

But then again, a flight speed of 3x10^8 m/s should cover it anyway

[zydonk]

me again.

Well, kreuvf, looks as though the dev team did read my Modest Proposal. Someone has taken the trouble to spite the gameplay I laid out there. Lancers no longer imitate mortars, partially built bunkers disappear, mortars and lasers (pulse, anyway - none of the others is worth much anyway) less powerful, and I don't seem to be able to research any missile, should I want to. It's faintly absurd to find myself with only the mg bunkers as defence against heavy cannon and railguns. I have to build a million or so crackerjacks (ripples) and then watch the fireworks rain down by the dozen in order to knock out one tank. It's ridiculous.

You say troman is mainly responsible for this un-rebalancing. I was genuinely surprised to read that. I have great affection for the aivolution mod for v1.10 (can't get the updated version to work with 2.1 - doesn't seem as good as the original, in any case). I thought it was the best development of the game bar none, and I still think so (I always play v1.10 with the aivolution mod). To think that the person who so carefully rebalanced the game for that mod is now responsible for the present shambles is very hard to take. What happened in the meantime?

I was disappointed to learn that the gameplay has been so altered that it is pretty difficult to create a pseudo v1.10 mod, let alone actually restoring it as the default gameplay. Goodness knows where the game is going to end up: peashooters, maybe.

Looks as though none is playing the game anymore. Development is becoming an end in itself. Dev is the new WZ.

au revoir

[ratarf]

Maybe the game is a bit unbalanced at the moment, but it's still in a beta stage.
And take the new hit system as an example. Correct me if I'm wrong, but in the old days this was just done randomly. It didn't matter what bullets did on the screen, there was just a certain chance they wouldn't deal any damage. And now they replaced it with a real hit system. And it should be like that in 2008. And that's just a small example. Sometimes good things need to be changed to make room for even better things. We don't want people to forget about this great game and therefore we need to look at the future. And where it might not be possible to recreate the old balance for the full 100%, it might be possible for 90%? In the end, the game will be better. I trust the developers and players enough for that. We can even play the original music and fmv's in the game now xD
And you think noone is playing the game no more? I think there are more players than you think, who are also trying to set up games online on xfire, giving lots of feedback here on the forums etc.

[Buginator]

...
You say troman is mainly responsible for this un-rebalancing. I was genuinely surprised to read that. I have great affection for the aivolution mod for v1.10 (can't get the updated version to work with 2.1 - doesn't seem as good as the original, in any case). I thought it was the best development of the game bar none, and I still think so (I always play v1.10 with the aivolution mod). To think that the person who so carefully rebalanced the game for that mod is now responsible for the present shambles is very hard to take. What happened in the meantime?

I was disappointed to learn that the gameplay has been so altered that it is pretty difficult to create a pseudo v1.10 mod, let alone actually restoring it as the default gameplay. Goodness knows where the game is going to end up: peashooters, maybe.

Looks as though none is playing the game anymore. Development is becoming an end in itself. Dev is the new WZ.
au revoir

The problem is balancing is *very* hard to get right. Not enough people are testing, so there is no feedback.
Overall, Troman has done some good work, and I can bet he doesn't purposely mean to unbalance gameplay (if he did). He is only (semi) human you know--I still think a part of him is cyborg!

The only way for anyone to know if it is very out of balance is to talk about it, and say what needs to be tweaked, and the reason behind it.

Also remember, the source code/data files are open, so if someone has better balancing, then attach the required files here, or e-mail the mailing list about them.

[Troman]

zydonk, when I read your first post I didn't reply to it, because, not that I think you do it on purpose, but the misinformation/information ratio is simply amazing. I just can't grasp your observations and I have no idea how you come to some comclusions. I think it is some kind of a placebo effect, sorry to put it this way but you see things which do not exist. I could refute 99% of your statements, but my post will probably become huge.
I will not go into the details of the balancing improvements here, although I can defend any of those changes if needed; they are all listed in the changelog and if you take your time to learn them you might notice the positive aspects as well, at least I hope so.

I propose that the game should be developed with reference to WZ v10 (the last update from Pumpkin), and that modifications of that reference version should be offered in the form of mods that can be applied to the reference game.

I offer two arguments for this proposal, 1) the significance of what was achieved by Pumpkin back in 1999, and 2) the limitations imposed on the game by most (if not all) mods.

Sorry, but these are not arguments, these are just personal emotional preferences.
1) Significance? You mean we should play with 2/3 weapons being useless to honor Pumpkin? Honestly I think they do not deserve such an 'honor'
2) What limitations?

Now, the present rebalancing (v21 betas) are very clearly tending to favour the rush game alone.

It is known that people have a tendency to notice and overrate things they are most afraid of. Considering Warzone has always been a turtler paradise and even though rush is a totally valid tactic in an RTS game I can understand that somehow, but can you elaborate on the 'how'?

But it is also seriously limiting the original game.

Sorry again, but this is serious bs. You probably didn't take your time to comprehend the effects of the changes if you can't research any missiles or better defenses than mg bunkers and you are already compaining.

Examples: the rebalancing of the Lancer has turned it into a duplicate mortar.

It is easily foxed with decoy bunkers (set your truck to start a bunker, then pull it off - cost zilch or thereabouts), and then eliminated by mortars (which are both more accurate and powerful?).

You mean in the 1.10 they were not easily foxed by decoys? In what way was it different back then?
Mortars more powerfull than lancer? Only if you take the 3rd one - Pepperpot and research some upgrades for it. You have to keep in mind that a single upgrade in Warzone can boost weapon's firepower by 30%. So your weapon firepower heavily depends on the amout of weapon and body upgrades and you your enemies have researched.

OK, that's it, point hopfully made. I'm not against modding - I hope that's clear. But I am against messing with the original game.

I can understand that. But thing is if Pumpkin left the game in the state Beta 4 is in now and if we tried to make the game look like 1.10 version of the game you would still protest. One thing you have to keep in mind: playing Warzone is not sightseeing. We have many new Warzone fans who will simply not understand the point about keeping broken things just because someone got used to it. Sorry, this is ridiculous.

It can't be about this or that fiddling with weaponry or research lists. No one wants to change the skins of the units or structures, so why mess with the balance? We all know why: it is easy to do, and given the nature of WZ, it is an intriguing intellectual exercise.

No, but what we all know is why you don't want the balance to be fixed. Life would be so much easier if nothing ever changed. Cherishing the past is always so much more pleasant maybe because we tend to recall only the good moments.

I started playing Warzone and joined the community in the year it was released. I would be against changes that could ruin Warzone. I am against reckless changes and I have problems with the attitude when someone puts, say, the code of the game above the game itself and above the community too without even knowing its history and how to play it. But ... i'm not paranoid about changes in general.
The fact is both the research tree and especially the game balance were badly broken and they still are. I can't understand "don't mess with the balance" complains when more than 50% of all weapons are never used in the game. I didn't hear any valid argument against it from you.

And as for 'fiddling' you can ask some other developer how I annoyed them with all kinds of calculation, diagrams and facts during rebalancing. Only after that process I started to understand what was wrong with the balance, now I can see through it. Was what I did perfect? Probably not. For example MG weapons became more or less useless against tanks now. But MG is an Anti-personnel weapon, so in order to fix it you must make cyborgs more attractive, so as ratarf said "Sometimes good things need to be changed to make room for even better things."

Well, kreuvf, looks as though the dev team did read my Modest Proposal. Someone has taken the trouble to spite the gameplay I laid out there.

Just for the record, no one worked on balancing after your first post.

It's faintly absurd to find myself with only the mg bunkers as defence against heavy cannon and railguns. I have to build a million or so crackerjacks (ripples) and then watch the fireworks rain down by the dozen in order to knock out one tank. It's ridiculous.

It is indeed absurd and ridiculous. The question is why you are making someone else responsible for your inability to research and build stronger defenses.

I have great affection for the aivolution mod for v1.10 (can't get the updated version to work with 2.1 - doesn't seem as good as the original, in any case).

If you are referring to the missing transporter support, then I can understand it, otherwise again: . It is definitely more challenging and entertaining than the 1.10 version.

To think that the person who so carefully rebalanced the game for that mod is now responsible for the present shambles is very hard to take. What happened in the meantime?

Carefully rebalanced? Nothing was rebalanced, it is using the original balancing.

I was disappointed to learn that the gameplay has been so altered that it is pretty difficult to create a pseudo v1.10 mod, let alone actually restoring it as the default gameplay.

Shouldn't be very difficult.

Goodness knows where the game is going to end up: peashooters, maybe.

After reading your posts I have the impression even if all future releases were absolutely the same you would still think that the game is becoming worse and worse with every release.

Looks as though none is playing the game anymore.

Well dunno, not in the world I live in. I had several 2vs2 games in the past days and many 2vs2 ais and I wasn't even using xfire or steam, only the game lobby. Wait time for people to join was usually small and I wasn't even playing during the 'rush hours'. Draw conclusions.

Development is becoming an end in itself. Dev is the new WZ.

See first paragraph of my post.

[EvilGuru]

Just a few points I would like to refute/rebuttal:

It is easily [sic] foxed with decoy bunkers (set your truck to start a bunker, then pull it off - cost zilch or thereabouts)

This is no longer possible in 2.1. As of https://gna.org/patch/?1030 decoy structures are no longer practical. Try it for yourself, after a few seconds you'll find your decoy will disappear unless a truck is working on it or if all the power is accrued.

In the past year (while in the process of re-writing the netcode) the other developers and myself have probably ranked up a total of 500+ hours of multiplayer gameplay. When we first started playing my tactic was simple: Spam Heavy MG Cobra Tracks and go straight for lancer. Rushing at its finest (as many of the other developers (victims) will attest to).

Same map, same teams, same players in the present day and my strategy is totally different. Rushing is much harder and less likely to succeed. Namely as a result of:

• MGs no longer being general-purpose weapons;
• buildings and structures having much higher HP;
• tracks and lancer being moved further down the tech tree.

2.1 is much more refined (for T1 at least) and enjoyable to play when compared to 1.10 (flamers, mini-pods anyone?). Should one desire 1.10 balance then it feel free to create a mod which makes use of the old research, body and weapon .txt files

Regards, Freddie.

[Delphinio]

i think my ntw mod has a good balance^^. there are just a few things which i dont like in 1.7beta2.
i balance it now for almost 2 years hehe and i hope iam happy with it in the final 1.7^^.

Try it for yourself, after a few seconds you'll find your decoy will disappear unless a truck is working on it or if all the power is accrued.

how did you do that? with a script?... i need it in ntw mod for 1.10^^.

[EvilGuru]

It should be possible to do it in a script (Troman will know). The code is basically:

• Loop through each structure for each player:
  • If the structure is NOT finished AND power is not fully accrued:
    • Loop through each of the players trucks to see a truck is building/working on it:
      • If no trucks are working on it:
        • Subtract n power from the structures accrued power.
        • If the structures total power accrued is 0, destroy it.

It still needs a little bit of work to add exceptions for factories (in case they are being upgraded).

Regards, Freddie.

[Troman]

how did you do that? with a script?... i need it in ntw mod for 1.10^^.

Unfortunately this part:

Subtract n power from the structures accrued power.

can't be done by a script. You can add power to the player, but you can't subtract it from a structure. The best thing you can do is keep damaging the structure if no truck is working on it, or maybe just wait n minutes/seconds and compeltely demolish it. If you are creative maybe you can come up with some other trick.

[Delphinio]

thanks guys : )

[Tiberian]

i noticed that cyborgs have become a LOT more useful since 1.10, back in the day i wouldn't even think twice about them, but now they are a welcome addition to my early game forces. (in fact, i usually rush through research to get them, since they easily destroy early game tanks)