Whole game rebalance?

[Watermelon]

This game is very imbalance in my opinion,not just the stats of different parts/components,but the game mechanics is broken too.

List of imbalance/game mechanics flaws:
1.Unit rank/experience:
Honestly I dont know what bonus your unit gets for getting higher rank,but the current rank/experience system is useless because by the time you have few 'experienced' units of a type,the type is probably very outdate rendering the unit rank/experience useless.Also the 512 kills hero is absurd...

2.Resource system:
You have 4 oil derrick at the start of a game on any? map.Basically every additional oil derrick you control you only have 25% more resource income compare to a 'turtle' player and you'll need to build sparse defensive structure to defend remote oil derrick,in most other RTS games,every 'expansion' you control your income is doubled or maybe tripled,so this greatly encourage 'turtling at main base and tech' and inevitably lengthens the duration per game in wz.

3.Attack damage/Armor system:
Some weapon type/armor type counters are too 'hard',like machine gun only deals very little damage to bunker and flame weapon only deals 5% damage to 'hardpoint defensive structure'.Also there are some pointless weapon types like bunker buster.

4.The uselessness of VTOL:
I never played MP games online,but I think they are useless in MP unless your opponent is too stupid to build some anti-air units/structures when there is a sign of VTOL massing.They cost alot,deal little damage because of ammo limitation,take forever to rearm and the rearm pad itself costs a fortune...

5.The Commanders:
I am not sure what they can do except remotely targeting for artillery units,sort of useless too.In my opinion,the commander should be sort of special unit who can gain experience by commanding(gets experience from the units it leads kill),the commander itself should be either a super unit or a leader type with the ability to inspire nearby units and the experience of a commander should really improve the commander's leadership/firepower or maybe some stats and visual changes.Once killed,they can be rebuilt without experience losses,since this kind of 'miracle' is definately explainable with the technologies in wz time.

My solutions:(noob's who never played MP point of view)
1.Experience transfer system,all units have the ability to transfer/exchange experience level ability,so you can transfer the experience/rank from outdated units to newly built units,thus making ranking/experienced unit preservation more useful and eventually making high level units possible.(not very hard to do in source imo)

2.Maybe 'super neutral oil derrick' in remote locations.(map and data change?)

3.Stats tweaks.

4.More ammo/less HP?

5.No idea how to do that at the moment. 

Probably the ppl who plays wz MP regularly/frequently are ideal person for balancing suggestions and such,so correct me if anything listed above doesnt exist in MP or it's total bullsh1t. 

[Troman]

I was thinking about the way to fix things.

We must put more stress on the rock-paper-scissors principle. We should make technologies more specialized (especially weapon technologies), meaning a certain technology will do well in some circumstances while in other ones investing too much power into it will end up in desaster. This will require mixed unit groups as opposite to mass lancers or mass HC and add strategic depth to the game.

Bunker Buster rocket is a good beginning actually.

3.Attack damage/Armor system:
Some weapon type/armor type counters are too 'hard',like machine gun only deals very little damage to bunker and flame weapon only deals 5% damage to 'hardpoint defensive structure'.Also there are some pointless weapon types like bunker buster.

This is rock-paper-scissors principle in work, but it all needs carefull balancing, too much of rock-paper-scissors can destroy balance as well.

Bunker Buster is not pointless, but ineffective. I think it is the only weapon that has no upgrades and it should do better against structures and hardpoints, not only bunkers, this will make it more attractive.


I agree about ranking system. The player should get more profit from higher unit ranks, this will make players "babysit" their units and repairing them whenever needed.

Same with commanders. IMHO commanders have to be made more attractive and should get more usability, have more effect on the gameplay (like maybe enabling additional/smarter unit AI behaviour).

2.Maybe 'super neutral oil derrick' in remote locations.(map and data change?)

Considering the popularity of the mass-oil flat maps maybe it's good idea to rebalance 3 power levels there are, although I'm not completely sure if it's really necessary, since there are power upgrades that let you get more oil/sec from the same number of oil derricks.

Rebalancing the game is tricky and there are as many opinitions as there are people, some think a certain technology is more or less pointless, while others might be specializing on it.

I suggest to start with a mod, without actually toying with the game itself. We can test technology balance on this MOD (an additional .wz file) without being afraid of breaking anything in the game. In such a MOD we can collect all rebalancing ideas, test them and then we can carry over the successfull modifications to the game if there will be any.

[Watermelon]

I was thinking about the way to fix things.

We must put more stress on the rock-paper-scissors principle. We should make technologies more specialized (especially weapon technologies), meaning a certain technology will do well in some circumstances while in other ones investing too much power into it will end up in desaster. This will require mixed unit groups as opposite to mass lancers or mass HC and add strategic depth to the game.

I think some weapons like HC just overshadow all other weapons,because they are too good with or without upgrades.

Bunker Buster rocket is a good beginning actually.

This is rock-paper-scissors principle in work, but it all needs carefull balancing, too much of rock-paper-scissors can destroy balance as well.

Bunker Buster is not pointless, but ineffective. I think it is the only weapon that has no upgrades and it should do better against structures and hardpoints, not only bunkers, this will make it more attractive.

Units specialized in destroying base-defense are still useless imo,unless they can also do some splash damage to enemy units,I think the wz engine supports 'real' projectiles and splash damage.

The only reason your enemy/adversary/opponent wants to destroy one of your unit is because the unit gives you great bonus or it can cause heavy causalities among his troops/units,otherwise he would just ignore it since the unit is just a moving wall/obstacle,no matter how many HPs the unit has.

I agree about ranking system. The player should get more profit from higher unit ranks, this will make players "babysit" their units and repairing them whenever needed.

Same with commanders. IMHO commanders have to be made more attractive and should get more usability, have more effect on the gameplay (like maybe enabling additional/smarter unit AI behaviour).

Considering the popularity of the mass-oil flat maps maybe it's good idea to rebalance 3 power levels there are, although I'm not completely sure if it's really necessary, since there are power upgrades that let you get more oil/sec from the same number of oil derricks.

Rebalancing the game is tricky and there are as many opinitions as there are people, some think a certain technology is more or less pointless, while others might be specializing on it.

I suggest to start with a mod, without actually toying with the game itself. We can test technology balance on this MOD (an additional .wz file) without being afraid of breaking anything in the game. In such a MOD we can collect all rebalancing ideas, test them and then we can carry over the successfull modifications to the game if there will be any.

rank should give the unit a overall stats boost(Max HP,armor,damage,ROF,range boost and possibly AI and speed boost) and should have the ability to transfer from one unit to another.

Commanders need a major revamp,they should be defined as 'super unit'/pre-designed units,and a decisive factor in games.

Both rank and commander ideas need source changes to be carried out though.

Still dont know what the 'power level' option does in-game,think 'high' is a bit too slow for a fast-paced RTS.

[lav_coyote25]

Considering the popularity of the mass-oil flat maps maybe it's good idea to rebalance 3 power levels there are, although I'm not completely sure if it's really necessary, since there are power upgrades that let you get more oil/sec from the same number of oil derricks.

maybe is time i dust off some of my maps eh?    or maybe they would be a little too hard for some.  Will see how many of the old maps i can find.  will try and post em later this week .



Also have been working on an updated version of the tech tree..HERE!

[MindRot]

My solutions:(noob's who never played MP point of view)
1.Experience transfer system,all units have the ability to transfer/exchange experience level ability,so you can transfer the experience/rank from outdated units to newly built units,thus making ranking/experienced unit preservation more useful and eventually making high level units possible.(not very hard to do in source imo)

When you recycle a unit the next unit you manufacture comes out with the same rank/experience.

[xpanthom]

One thing the commanders could do is concentrate fire. It's a tedious task to keep the discipline in a group of units since the ones at the back tend to just roam around in circles while the front units shoot at different targets, thus dealing damage more evenly but at the same time risking destruction. When you send troops to several locations simultaneously, you want them to do their job without constant human supervision. With a commander in the group, all units in the vicinity should follow the commander unit in whatever it's doing.

[Watermelon]

When you recycle a unit the next unit you manufacture comes out with the same rank/experience.

never knew about that,but the current rank level only gives very limited bonus to a unit i think.

One thing the commanders could do is concentrate fire. It's a tedious task to keep the discipline in a group of units since the ones at the back tend to just roam around in circles while the front units shoot at different targets, thus dealing damage more evenly but at the same time risking destruction. When you send troops to several locations simultaneously, you want them to do their job without constant human supervision. With a commander in the group, all units in the vicinity should follow the commander unit in whatever it's doing.

I tried to 'link' commander with non-artillery units,but there's no noticeable effect on unit behaviors leading by a commander.

[DevUrandom]

The exp recycling is very bad in usability terms, IMHO...

Commanders giving kind of moral bonus would be cool. (Only to assigned units attacking his target or being hit by his target. Means an offensive bonus and a defensive bonus for commander assigned units.)

Less exp levels but greater effects of leveling up would probably also be interesting. Maybe an advanced chaingun can only be used by rank 5+ soldiers, so this would also be a kind of limited auto-upgrade, like discussed in the other thread.

There are hundreds of weapons and upgrades. Maybe too many? And my idea is to add much more info to the build menu in 2.1. So you have a help/info widget right next to the choosen item and some tooltips and so on.
Maybe it is also possible to make more clear what weapon does what by the name.

There are at least 2 oil derricks in each starting place on each map, if I remember correctly. Maybe make that one derrick and instead make each derrick output 2 times as much oil...

VTOLs: Perhaps we should take a look at other good RTS games which use flying units. Eg CnC Generals.
If I remember it correctly (haven't played it since long), if a chinese player in CnC:G builds flak canons it is very difficult for jets to attack. Instead the american player gets a cloakable jet, which is too fast to be attackaed, till it attacks.

[Watermelon]

The exp recycling is very bad in usability terms, IMHO...

think recycling exp in practice is useless too,since it takes a fairly time and risky for experienced droids to go back to base/nearest factory to be recycled.

Commanders giving kind of moral bonus would be cool. (Only to assigned units attacking his target or being hit by his target. Means an offensive bonus and a defensive bonus for commander assigned units.)

Maybe we can include 2 types of commander:
Super unit type:
costs alot but very powerful in combat/'super tank'.

Leader type commander units:
Fragile but giving impressive bonus for units it leads.

Less exp levels but greater effects of leveling up would probably also be interesting. Maybe an advanced chaingun can only be used by rank 5+ soldiers, so this would also be a kind of limited auto-upgrade, like discussed in the other thread.

yes the current levels/xp threshold is absurd:512 256 128 64 32 16 8 4 ?

There are hundreds of weapons and upgrades. Maybe too many? And my idea is to add much more info to the build menu in 2.1. So you have a help/info widget right next to the choosen item and some tooltips and so on.
Maybe it is also possible to make more clear what weapon does what by the name.

I think the upgrades/new weapons shouldnt make old tech/unit completely useless,currently all your machine units are useless as soon as you have heavy cannon,think this kind of problems are often avoided in other RTSs(like a decent upgrade/ability to make 'old' units more useful in late game)

There are at least 2 oil derricks in each starting place on each map, if I remember correctly. Maybe make that one derrick and instead make each derrick output 2 times as much oil...

think it's 4 oil derricks?

VTOLs: Perhaps we should take a look at other good RTS games which use flying units. Eg CnC Generals.
If I remember it correctly (haven't played it since long), if a chinese player in CnC:G builds flak canons it is very difficult for jets to attack. Instead the american player gets a cloakable jet, which is too fast to be attackaed, till it attacks.

yes the VTOLs are completely useless now imo,tons of HP,deals no damage = flying wall...

I think noone will ever bother to use medium/heavy with VTOL,since even the light body VTOLs can survive the fire of few AA-site/units easily when assaulting.

The ammo capacity is too small too,I seriously doubt you'll ever be able kill any medium size+ tank with 1 full-ammo VTOL of any type.

Their firepower is non-exist,it takes forever for a bomber VTOL to destroy a single target...

IIRC in CnC generals jets cost about twice as much as a 'decent' tank,but they are still a formidible force because of their super firepower,though they are extremely vulnerable to AA weapons(all flying units in most RTS games are extremely vulnerable to AA)

[karmazilla]

I don't know if I think the VTOL armor is too high.. maybe just a little. But the anti-air defenses on the higher tech levels are quite frightening.

But I think their firepower is alright. A single VTOL is quite weak, true. But a swarm of VTOLs can pack a quite impressive punch against structures.
Against units, they have thair use as an emergency strike force: they can quickly reach the designated location, deliver their punishment and disappear in a hurry. This has uses when you want to weak an incoming attack, or destroy that damn tank that's hunting you truck or scout.
As such, VTOLs are a bit of a luxury. But, there usually comes a point (on a large map) where you can afford luxuries like that.

[Troman]

Commanders giving kind of moral bonus would be cool. (Only to assigned units attacking his target or being hit by his target. Means an offensive bonus and a defensive bonus for commander assigned units.)

It would be good if we were not just hacking the weapon/ammo values but could make unit AI behaviour smarter if units are controlled by a commander, I don't know how though.

Less exp levels but greater effects of leveling up would probably also be interesting.

In mp games units have to kill half as many units as in campaign to advance to the next level, but this is still rather unrealistic and ranks should have greater effect I agree.

There are hundreds of weapons and upgrades. Maybe too many?

I don't think so. This is the beauty of WZ making it something special, as soon as there's nothing more to research the game is robbed of one of its strategic components.

There are at least 2 oil derricks in each starting place on each map, if I remember correctly. Maybe make that one derrick and instead make each derrick output 2 times as much oil...

Oil derricks are pre-placed by map designers, we probably don't want to tinker around with derrick number, instead we could tweak the power output or something. And lowering the number of derricks will again take away depth from the game. The more derricks the more effort you have to put into defence and the more possibilities enemy has to cause you some headache.

I think the upgrades/new weapons shouldnt make old tech/unit completely useless,currently all your machine units are useless as soon as you have heavy cannon,think this kind of problems are often avoided in other RTSs(like a decent upgrade/ability to make 'old' units more useful in late game)

I think it is ok the way it is now. I do like T1 weapons and miss them in T2/T3, but it is the same in real life. Would be funny to see some modified WW1 as counters against guided missiles and modern submarines.

I think we forgot to include cyborgs into considerations, they seem to be unbalanced too. If you consider number of people using lancer tracks/hovers and number of people using some cyborgs it is clear there's something wrong with them.

And there's also arty. I don't have much experience with arty, but from what I know it is also often non grata during online games, with probably range being the problem.

VTOLs seems to be a controversial subject. No one seems to be able to explain what's wrong with them, we should be carefull modifying their data. I personally agree that they should carry more ammo though.

I don't know if I think the VTOL armor is too high.. maybe just a little. But the anti-air defenses on the higher tech levels are quite frightening.

That's what I thought too, in the mid/late game it is rather easy to destroy VTOLs. Maybe the problem is that AA weapons are inbalanced as well with T1 AA being too weak and T2/T3 too strong.

Balancing issue seems to be a hydra, each time you cut off one of its head two grow back. (Are there any Heracles or other heroes in our community btw?  )

[DevUrandom]

I usually don't play this game, so I can only try to give suggestions on how to improve things you tell me about.

There are at least 2 oil derricks in each starting place on each map, if I remember correctly. Maybe make that one derrick and instead make each derrick output 2 times as much oil...

think it's 4 oil derricks?

That's why I said "at least". Means num(oil_derricks) >= 2

[Watermelon]

I think there should be helicopter VTOLs,all VTOLs use 'bomber run' attack style is weird.Maybe more HP and armor,ammo for heli-VTOLs.

Cyborg is useless too,I found the 'scavanger' infantry is much more interesting than the look-like-tank-but-not-tank cyborg,maybe they should be smaller/cheaper/mass-able

Every combat unit should have a chance to become 'commander' or 'hero' permanently(stores in a global droid struct array when have enough xp) with enough xp,prolly their armor/HP/damage need a massive boost when leveling up,and some visual changes to the tank/weapon models to reflect the levels/'commander status',not just the 'rank symbol' when selected.

[Troman]

Cyborg is useless too,I found the 'scavanger' infantry is much more interesting than the look-like-tank-but-not-tank cyborg,maybe they should be smaller/cheaper/mass-able

Not sure about smaller (since it would require gfx modifications), but cheaper/mass-able sounds like a good formula, hp and firepower will have to be tweaked accordingly.
There needs to be some justifications for the cyborgs to be used during the game. Right now these are the advantages cyborgs have that i'm aware of:
Cyborgs can climb up any hill - not very usefull with 95% of the maps.
Unless tanks cyborgs can be stuffed into cyborg transporter and dropped into the enemy base (mp games) - this is something unique to cyborgs, but I think this is still not enough for cyborgs to be attractive enough during online games.

Some musings about cyborgs. What if we indeed give them some cpecial ability, like make them easier repairable than tanks? Say a repair unit will need 1/3 as much time to repair a cyborg propultion as it needs now.

[DevUrandom]

I just got another idea, only slightly related to the current topic: special-abilities for units. You can give a special ability to your units in the design process. Maybe limit some interesting ones to cyborgs only. Eg cloaking.