@exselsior said in Pending Balance Changes Feedback Thread:
Multiplayer games need ongoing balance adjustments or they die
While I'm certainly not against balance changes, I think this is one of those 'truths' that gamers often accept, that just isn't true.
Tons of games turn out to 'self-balance' really well over the years. Starcraft would go months and years without balance patches, yet the metagame kept changing as players learned and adapted.
Streetfighter 2 was known for how overpowered Honda and Dhalsim were, until players learned to play, at which point Ryu, Ken, and Guile were OP.... Except until it was zangief... Then years later dhalsim... Years more, boxer... Years later, Sagat. Nowadays, claw is broken! This is all despite zero balance patches.
Chess hasn't seen a lot of changes in the last few decades, or even centuries (admittedly there are a few per millennium!)
big segue-anecdote upcoming - skip at leisure! :
- I often see players get angry when a game doesn't get a balance patch for a few months, and more often than not it annoys me. I remember playing 'league of legends', and a new character came out that the community considered 'OP' due to getting un-blockable damage every time she landed 3 attacks. There was also a character, then considered 'trash', that would dodge attacks randomly - so she would never hit the 3 'stacks'. I had a blast taking advantage of this for all of maybe 2 weeks, at which point the developers buckled to community pressure, nerfed the 'OP' character that I'd been enjoying beating, and also completely re-designed the underplayed character that countered it!
I'm not against balance patches, but for many games, particularly "strategy" games, I think it's important to give the players plenty of time to devise, refine, and adopt strategies. I think this process takes many, many times longer than the 3-6 months between updates.
Sorry if this sounded like 'erm actually'. I totally understand the desire for changes, especially to keep a game 'fresh'. I just wanted to offer the suggestion that, as strategy gamers, it's important that we try to, and have the time to, overcome things strategically, before the game itself is changed.
I think games can work fine without constant balance updates, and often the best games do better with fewer, rather than many.