A Tale of Two Races - Macro-balancing in a PvP-based RPG
Recently I've starting undertaking the task of macro-balancing: Balancing things on the larger scale of the game, not just for instance balancing different attacks to ensure that different strategies are viable, but balancing the two races. I've started these efforts with the new daily boss system that rewards race points for each race based on how much damage they did, and a training boost for the winning race. The race that's currently behind in things like generating race points and having active high-level members initially received the boss spawn notification 5 minutes before the other race, and the boss was 10% weaker against them. This has caused a lot of upset in users of the race that is ahead, who feel that they worked hard for their advantages and the opposing race shouldn't get anything for free. In this post I want to discuss some of the reasons this balancing is necessary, and why I'm doing some of the things I'm doing.
So essentially the Hollow control the entire top half of the top 10 players.
This is quite an accomplishment by them, but it creates a problem: If the Hollow have the strongest players by a large margin, it's very difficult for Shinigami to get race points. If they can't get race points, they can't get boosts. And if the Hollow keep getting boosts and Shinigami don't, the Shinigami will just fall farther and farther behind. It's like a snowball effect - Small advantage -> medium advantage -> large advantage. Things have gotten to the point where the Shinigami are already so scared of the higher level Hollow that when the Hollow invade, the Shinigami run straight to their barracks. The Hollow then have nobody to fight, leaving both parties pretty unhappy. Hollow are unhappy they can't get any kills, Shinigami are unhappy that they can't beat Hollow and the Hollow keep invading and disrupting normal SS training life. If this is allowed to continue for an extended period of time, Shinigami will quit because they're tired of losing, and Hollow will quit because they're bored of stomping the enemy without a fight. In short, a game where one side has a large, long-lasting advantage isn't fun for either side.
In WoB, that's obviously a problem. Race changes are hard to do and even harder to keep track of costs and levels for every move a user owns and re-institute those things on the other side, which is what most users who race change want. It's a tedious amount of work and also has to be very closely monitored by admins without good ideas of what makes a race truly ahead.
The solution is comprised of two main parts:
1) Teach the system to know which race is ahead.
This basically means establishing several metrics of forms of measuring what gives a race an advantage. This includes things like: Number of bosses killed, Race Points gained, number of successful invasions, and a few other things as systems evolve and we get more in-depth. For right now it's obvious that the Shinigami are behind, but these numbers need to track it constantly. If things get to where the Shinigami are only say, 10-15% behind the Hollow in generating all of these metrics, then there's really no need for catchup mechanics. And if the Shinigami pass the Hollow by a large margin, the Hollow need to receive these measures to keep from falling too far behind the Shini. It's not about making both races perfectly equal though, it's about making the distance between them within fighting range, not an unsurmountable lead.
2) Provide ways for the race that is behind to close the gap
Right now this revolves around the boss, with the earlier notification and boss stronger against Hollow. However this is upsetting the Hollow who feel that they put in the effort to get their stats and Shini shouldn't be rewarded for "being lazy". While I don't completely agree that that's the case, I'm fine with making things more about effort, so I changed the notifications: Both races now receive them 10 minutes after the boss spawns. This provides the opportunity for whoever wants the boss more to get a head start. If one race always has scouts in Kyoto City patrolling and searching for the boss, they'll get the head start because they put in the effort. Otherwise if a race doesn't put in the extra effort, they'll get the standard 10 min notification.
That change was just made, so I'm going to see how it shakes out before seeing if adjustments to the boss's combat strength are necessary. The key concept behind the boss's combat strength is that he prepares more against whoever he views as a bigger threat. With Shinigami behind, they're seen as less of a threat so he prepares less. If both sides are an equal threat, his strength against both will be the same.
In short, it's not fun for either side when one side has a large advantage for a long time. In the past the reverse of this situation actually happened where Shinigami had a large advantage over the Hollow. At the time the only measure I implemented was a yen bonus for humans to choose Hollow when they ranked up, because the Hollow had much less population than the Shinigami. But now that I have learned more, I have a better idea of how to design things so that it won't be months or even years until the Shinigami catch up to a position where the game can be fun for them. Both sides should have a chance. The boss will get more rewards soon once I've got a handle on a good balance for catchup mechanics(handicaps) so that one side isn't given an unfair advantage.
If you're a Hollow reading this and you still don't think the Shinigami should be receiving any advantages: I'm sorry you guys didn't get this in the past when you were behind, but that doesn't make it not the right thing to do now. The catchup mechanics might be a little overtuned at first but I'm keeping the boss rewards moderate until I've got them tuned better, then I'll turn things up. You will have to put in effort if you want to retain your position as the dominant race, because the Shinigami are tired of being behind and they're starting to rally together, coordinating boss raids in Shinigami social and encouraging each other to all fight the boss. But when the Shinigami are able to put up a decent fight, things will be more fun for everyone because they'll be willing to fight you again. And when it comes down to it, isn't fighting what you really want to do?
Why balance/give handicaps?
Well for starters, everyone knows losing isn't fun. Nobody likes losing even though it's part of every PvP game, but in general people will tolerate some losing as long as they get some winning too. However, if someone does nothing but lose, interest in even playing fades. For the race currently behind, the Shinigami, they've been invaded quite frequently up until recently, beaten in invasions, and beaten in the amount of race points they earn every month (their race points were recently something like half what the Hollow have, that gap has closed a little bit in the last couple days). The Hollow control the top 3 spots on the top 10 players, the #4 spot is a Shinigami, but she does not engage in any form of PvP activity and only plays the game for the social aspects (Total of 57 pvp battles won).So essentially the Hollow control the entire top half of the top 10 players.
This is quite an accomplishment by them, but it creates a problem: If the Hollow have the strongest players by a large margin, it's very difficult for Shinigami to get race points. If they can't get race points, they can't get boosts. And if the Hollow keep getting boosts and Shinigami don't, the Shinigami will just fall farther and farther behind. It's like a snowball effect - Small advantage -> medium advantage -> large advantage. Things have gotten to the point where the Shinigami are already so scared of the higher level Hollow that when the Hollow invade, the Shinigami run straight to their barracks. The Hollow then have nobody to fight, leaving both parties pretty unhappy. Hollow are unhappy they can't get any kills, Shinigami are unhappy that they can't beat Hollow and the Hollow keep invading and disrupting normal SS training life. If this is allowed to continue for an extended period of time, Shinigami will quit because they're tired of losing, and Hollow will quit because they're bored of stomping the enemy without a fight. In short, a game where one side has a large, long-lasting advantage isn't fun for either side.
How are you going to balance the races?
On a game like Call of Duty, a first-person shooter, macro-balancing is relatively straightforward. You can track each player's individual score, and then at the end of the round, if one team won by a large margin, swap some of their good players for some of the enemy team's bad players so that each team has (in theory) equal combined strength. In WoB, that's obviously a problem. Race changes are hard to do and even harder to keep track of costs and levels for every move a user owns and re-institute those things on the other side, which is what most users who race change want. It's a tedious amount of work and also has to be very closely monitored by admins without good ideas of what makes a race truly ahead.
The solution is comprised of two main parts:
1) Teach the system to know which race is ahead.
This basically means establishing several metrics of forms of measuring what gives a race an advantage. This includes things like: Number of bosses killed, Race Points gained, number of successful invasions, and a few other things as systems evolve and we get more in-depth. For right now it's obvious that the Shinigami are behind, but these numbers need to track it constantly. If things get to where the Shinigami are only say, 10-15% behind the Hollow in generating all of these metrics, then there's really no need for catchup mechanics. And if the Shinigami pass the Hollow by a large margin, the Hollow need to receive these measures to keep from falling too far behind the Shini. It's not about making both races perfectly equal though, it's about making the distance between them within fighting range, not an unsurmountable lead.
2) Provide ways for the race that is behind to close the gap
Right now this revolves around the boss, with the earlier notification and boss stronger against Hollow. However this is upsetting the Hollow who feel that they put in the effort to get their stats and Shini shouldn't be rewarded for "being lazy". While I don't completely agree that that's the case, I'm fine with making things more about effort, so I changed the notifications: Both races now receive them 10 minutes after the boss spawns. This provides the opportunity for whoever wants the boss more to get a head start. If one race always has scouts in Kyoto City patrolling and searching for the boss, they'll get the head start because they put in the effort. Otherwise if a race doesn't put in the extra effort, they'll get the standard 10 min notification.
That change was just made, so I'm going to see how it shakes out before seeing if adjustments to the boss's combat strength are necessary. The key concept behind the boss's combat strength is that he prepares more against whoever he views as a bigger threat. With Shinigami behind, they're seen as less of a threat so he prepares less. If both sides are an equal threat, his strength against both will be the same.
Summary/Conclusion
In short, it's not fun for either side when one side has a large advantage for a long time. In the past the reverse of this situation actually happened where Shinigami had a large advantage over the Hollow. At the time the only measure I implemented was a yen bonus for humans to choose Hollow when they ranked up, because the Hollow had much less population than the Shinigami. But now that I have learned more, I have a better idea of how to design things so that it won't be months or even years until the Shinigami catch up to a position where the game can be fun for them. Both sides should have a chance. The boss will get more rewards soon once I've got a handle on a good balance for catchup mechanics(handicaps) so that one side isn't given an unfair advantage.
If you're a Hollow reading this and you still don't think the Shinigami should be receiving any advantages: I'm sorry you guys didn't get this in the past when you were behind, but that doesn't make it not the right thing to do now. The catchup mechanics might be a little overtuned at first but I'm keeping the boss rewards moderate until I've got them tuned better, then I'll turn things up. You will have to put in effort if you want to retain your position as the dominant race, because the Shinigami are tired of being behind and they're starting to rally together, coordinating boss raids in Shinigami social and encouraging each other to all fight the boss. But when the Shinigami are able to put up a decent fight, things will be more fun for everyone because they'll be willing to fight you again. And when it comes down to it, isn't fighting what you really want to do?
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