Craig Morrison On Melee vs. Ranged Balance
Today, we ask Funcom's Craig Morrison about his philosophies on attempting to balance ranged and melee combat styles in an MMO.
Dev Journals By Guest Writer on November 09, 2009
Today, we kick off a new series of articles where we ask a number of different developers from a number of different companies to answer a question about MMORPG design. Today, we ask Age of Conan Game Director and Executive Producer Craig Morrison about balancing casting and ranged classes against melee classes.
MMO combat suffers from balancing casting vs. melee classes. What methods do you use to balance these two class types?
I think before you look at the challenges specific to MMO combat in terms of balance between any two sets of character types you have to define what we are usually trying to achieve in terms of balance.
You might think it was easiest to define it very straightforwardly as 'every time I fight I have a 50/50 chance of winning or losing based my skill and approach' but when you actually push players about what many feel about gameplay the reality is that they would feel balance was better when they have a chance of losing, but that they should win more than lose. Most seem to tend towards wanting something like a 75/25 mix of winning to losing...so they recognize the need for, and want, a chance of losing, but they generally feel that its more fun when they win more often than they lose, as long as it isn't too much.
So that is where the old 'rock, paper, scissors' approach comes in. Someone always has a chance to beat someone and lose to someone...but that isn't directly translatable into an MMO setting as you don't want to establish any situation where a player will lose every time. So we end up with systems where certain classes have advantages and disadvantages against others and thus can win more often that lose if they pick their targets correctly (and learn when to run away!), but with MMO titles often having up to a dozen classes that balance also has various pitfalls...is it fun to have classes you almost always have to avoid? Is that balance? That is not a fun scenario if the chances are absolute, you don't want any class to always win over another, so we as designers have to have a form of weighed chances. You might want Class A to have an advantage against Class B but you rarely if ever want it to be absolute, rather you want the various balances weighted in specific ways across the total number of classes you have.
In terms of controlling that there are three main elements that we as designers have to control. Maximum values, Availability and Mechanics.
Maximum Values
This is probably the most important element of all. In any RPG system you need to have a firm control over the maximum values possible for any given statistic or element. The system designer must know what the maximum health value for a character is or the maximum DPS output they can achieve. This means having good systems and records, be they spreadsheets or databases that track and monitor the possible contributions available to any give character, be it from inherent values, bonuses, buffs, armor or whatever elements exist in your game. You absolutely have to enforce maximums on your budgets or you have already lost any real chance of maintaining balance...or at best make it incredibly difficult for yourself. So method number one is establishing and then controlling maximum budget caps for every element of a character.
;)
Availability
Leading on from your budgets you then have to assess how available the bonuses and stats are to the players on average. A maximum budget can prevent you from breaking balance by having overpowered items, but it won't prevent a possible imbalance if there isn't a structured approach to how players get access to those stats.
So what do I mean exactly? Mostly it is about scaling and distribution. If for example your maximum value for DPS was 100 in your game, but 90 of that was contributed by a really rare item late in the game, then in effect your average player only have access to 10, which could become an issue if the mobs are balanced on a sliding scale. That is an extreme example of course, but it does illustrate the point. More likely what you run the risk of is an item being introduced that brings too much of a given stat into play too early, or it is available to one class and not another. Thus it is vital that the distribution and scale of how the stats are given out is vital. So method number two is tracking the distribution of where stats and bonuses are given out so that you can distribute them as evenly as possible, both across level ranges and across classes.
Good article but I suspect it won't have the slightest impact on the amount of 'balance' whining in any MMO forums. I assume Colin has already been well schooled in these areas, seeing as how his team is deep in the middle of a 'balance' overhaul?
That's one of the core problems of AoC; melee is fun and challenging, casting is boring but easy. This article emphasizes datamining which really has nothing to do with real gameplay. While he's touching on it slightly towards the end but kinda brushing it off as whining, open PvP is not about 1v1 or dueling.
Casters:
AoC is going down the bin more than ever anyway. Not even 5 ppl lined up for minigames on the top server, the zones are empty day around. Scrap half the servers and make a melee-only server instead.
Actually, he said " melee classes make up all of the top four most played classes in Age of Conan". Not casters, melee :) At least developers are sure about it and see no reason to believe in imbalance.
He probably has better information than Craig.
Fine, I stand corrected. Core problem remains.
I'm sorry, what is the core problem?
All right, and so the problem is what?
This is asymmetrical game system, there're always differences. Casters might be easier to play, but I still don't understand what the problem is. Did you read what this article is about or not? Or do you think that you are more competent than the statistics and balance item/spell/specs tables?
If you have reading comprehension problems with my post, go read the article again as I'm augmenting those statements.
Why would I react to your bullet point mambo jambo. Half of your arguments are just non-true, and half of them are just silly. What is so surprising that casters are able to run off, you have to chase them and they can hit you from distance?
That's ridiculous. I asked you, why do you think you are more competent than an exact and precise balance item/spell/spec tables? It is usually a simple math. Just because you percieve it as being unfair doesn't mean it is so. Additionally Craig's statement is supported by the fact that casters are least played and top 4 most played classes are all melee. So again, what is the core problem you keep talking about?
Damage parsing means squat in actual gameplay. It's easy claiming something to be mumbo jumbo on the internet, so if you want to disprove me, lay forth the proof or your words are null and void and mine persist.
I've been playing AoC since November of 2007 and I'm a good friend of the former AI coder, I believe I know what I'm talking about, along with hundreds of guildies and the rest of the AoC community. If there wouldn't be a problem, there wouldn't be a PvP problem-survey out as well as this article.
Ta-ta.
Do you realize, you're just another forum-poster whining about certain subjective imbalance between classes? There's nothing to be disproved. There's some sort of weirdos that have a dream that everything must be perfectly balanced, and they keep their own flame wars on respective class forums. For the rest of the gamers, this is just way too irrelevant and has nothing to do whether they enjoy the game or not.
So before you go again all doomy and gloomy, please think twice about your attitude.
He screwed up ao so bad and aoc will see just how he did it. He listened to whoever whined, bitched moaned and complained on the forums until they got what they wanted. Its a practice that still continues to this day even with his successor. Whoever trolled the most got what they wanted when it came to class balance and its no different now.
Golly. Do ya' think?
What a thought-provoking look into the process of balancing a computer game.
its all you need to say. its one of the big imbalance in the game... Im an assassin with 5k stamina! AN ASSASSIN! ROGUE CLASSE! but demo and necros have more stamina than me and can run more. They dont need stamina to attack so the stamina bar is only to sprint and they do it better than rogues.. damn casters!
"They may want some classes to be more newbie friendly to allow less skilled or experienced players to participate, likewise they might design a class to be rewarding if you get into the complexity of their skills, and one may not have a higher maximum output than the other.
We face this issue all the time in Age of Conan for example as the game was designed to have the casting system to be inherently simpler to help support players who did not want to deal with the faster paced melee combo system. This makes an inherent imbalance that is supported to some extent by the original design. For us in some way it works, and achieves its objective without slanting the players only towards casters (most players in Conan still play melee classes despite the mechanic imbalance) in other ways it does frustrate experienced players who would prefer everyone was equal."
This is the BIG problem.. fix it and 60% of the balance will be done.
Haven't played a caster yet. I'm happy with my fragile, yet hard hitting Barbarian atm. Yep, I tend to die fast at the slightest mistake, there is a good challenge and it keeps me on my toes so to speak. Sometime in the future I may get tired of my character and will reroll a different one, a caster maybe, and try a different approach to the game.
In my other game I fly different ships with different attributes, some are close range, some are faster, some are armored behemonts. Each class and ship that is different enough posses a different challenge to the player and requires a different approach to game play. Sure, some classes in AoC may be simpler to play and will appeal to some players, others prefer the more challenging ones. In AoC classes are different enough to be worth trying several of them.
Balancing is overstated, keeping the different classes different and interesting is more important in my book. As such, AoC is doing a great work. Jm2c.
Craig Morrison read it 2 times please:
forums.ageofconan.com/showthread.php
got it?
no?
read again!
I am pretty sure he has read it since he has actually replied a couple of times in that very thread you link
That article was the biggest..
"Working as intended"
....statement I have ever seen come FC's lips.
(and Ive seen alot)
It's Monday morning at Funcoms' office, AoC's Director Craig Morrison's secretary gives him a cup of coffee.
CM - 'What's on the agenda today Helga?'
H - 'Nothing much boss, did you have a good weekend?....Oh, yes, it's been a while since you last posted rubbish on teh interwebz MMO sites, you'd best get cracking'
CM - 'Didn't we post 3 screenshots recently? surely that has appeased the naysayers?'
H - 'Yes, we did, but 2 of the shots were less than inspiring, and the 3rd was crap'
CM - 'Aw well, best get to it I suppose, wait...what am i going to say? Can't talk about RotG since no-one's working on it atm. I know, i'll annoy the existing userbase with some drivel about class balancing, that should get them talking'
H - 'hehe, good one boss'
CM - 'yeh, as we all know Funcom care not for melee classes, we want more casters before renaming to Age of Casters, best not admit that though'
H - 'How about we give casters double loyalty points, and half melee's allocation'
CM - 'Good one Helga, we'll pencil that in for the next patch, when's that due again?'
H - 'stop teasing me boss, you know as well as I do no-one's working on that either'
CM hastily scribbles a few hundred word of gibberish onto a notepad and passes it to Helga.
CM - 'There you go, send that to MMORPG Helga, always good to bump our cause everynow and again'
Actually this joke you made would rather apply to Lord of the Rings Online, which you play. Age of Casters (runekeepers?) how about Age of Goats. Noone's working on Lotro's free content updates, because well there weren't any. Last year Vanguard (4 devs) got level cap increased, raid dungeon, 16 unique looking mounts, long quest lines for all the 15 classes for their epic-level spells. Lotro last month, got a half-baked raid, and 3 instances.
And right, they are adding free goats to everyone now right at level 25. Steefel made it the Lord of the Goats and Harry Potter Online Parade.
Don't know about LOTR but it certainly applies to AoC lol
There are SO MANY things wrong with this interview it's scary. If you DO care about what the players think about it though, check the big long thread on the official forums (which you don't need to be a member to read).
Personally, out of the million things I would like to say and comment, I pick the last sentence of the interview
Down the years I have watched many great PVP players and the one thing they all share most of all is the ability to pick their fights and see their opportunities and their almost uncanny ability to know when to chase and when to run away.
I just wanted to say, I guess that's why you say great pvp players go AFK during minigames, or AFK at duel spot in epic, or AFK at rez pad in keshatta, or HIDING THEIR BK for massive Battle Keep sieges.
Basically, in almost every case of PVP you suggest great pvp players to pick their fights and only fight when they are sure to win???????? ARE YOU KIDDING ME??
They will attack lowbies with low HP, they will run to the guards, they will zone out from fight, they will only duel against classes they are sure to beat, or people think are noobs because they ahve a "bad Kill / Death" ratio, they will ruin minigames for others (who have balls) and they will ruin the end game pvp content for guilds that have the balls, the skill and the organisation to siege.
AND YOU DARE TO CALL THAT AN UNCANNY ABILITY? How dare you !!!
You have ruined the game for many great pvp players that I know who have played a melee class since launch, more than mastered evrything there is to master, become highly respected pvp players, but on some nights almost cried at the injustice that they faced in pvp combat and ended up suspending the subscription to the game even though that meant leaving their friends. I will never forgive you for that.
If I had one thing to conclude is you should push people to grow balls rather than pick their fights, especially in a MMORPG called Age of Conan, it's one of the must huge paradox of the game that the violent and brave barbarian theme is drowned in noob harry potter clickers who pick their fights.
Everyone knows this game is called Age of Casters for a reason.
I had high hopes for that combat revamp patch back in spring. Did a lot of testing and feedback on it back then to help.
But in the end they did NOTHING against casters. And they stayed pretty much OP even after the patch.
Only because these so called Hardcore PVP'ers he so seems to adore all play casters and have the biggest mouth and whine the loudest. So Funcom just doesn't have the balls to kick their teeth in, shut them up and just nerf the crap out of casters to bring them in line with melee.
That's why after that famous patch in Spring I gave up on this game. It was either rerolling a caster yourself or not bothering with PVP at all. Or just quit the game.
I did the latter.
Cheers
Melee has more players because melee in the game is rather fun and playing a caster is boring in comparison. That isn't justification for making casters ridiculously powerful in comparison.
Now granted I didn't play the game for very long, but after the billionth time I got absolutely mauled by caster classes while leveling I got fed up with it. It's too bad, as I was enjoying the melee aspect of the game and may very well have continued playing. Now I'm not sure what my experience is worth in the grand scheme of things, but I can't help but imagine several other players left the game for the same reason.
I honestly think the game would have been much better off if they removed the mage classes altogether.
sorry, I forgot to add the following
www.youtube.com/watch
it is a trailer for AoC in which you see epic and massive PVP battles.
PLEASE NOTE THE FOLLOWING WHICH APPEARS IN THE VIDEO :
- no lag
- no mages
- mounted combat
- no crashes
- epic battle
1 year and a half later in every point mentioned above, the opposite is true in most massive pvp situations (including outside of BK sieges where entire zones crash or lag like crazy)
This is why I bought the game, not to click huge AOE fireballs and hop around shouting L2P
Casters are indeed imbalanced in Age of Conan and mostly because of their incredible ability to cast instant ccs and sprint like athletes. Also because the hide isn't working perfectly, casters the biggest nemesis archetype rogues are having hard time catching them.
But on the other hand, if you look at the games like Champions Online, Aion Online or dozens of past mmorpgs, they are in fact way more closer "Age of Ranged"-title than aoc. Not sure about the other bigger mmos like wow/lotro but both of them have had years to polish pvp balance and still I have heard that there are some serious imbalances there.
They bought this a spot/ front for this article from MMORPG for some buzz and to lend some credibility to AOC. Facts are pretty clear when it comes to Age of Conan the majority of players have flat out given up on the team, on the game, on the company. Those that remain, the vocal few, hoping, praying, perhaps offering sacrifice, and "willing it", the changes the game has needed from the onset, one major change which is the imbalance between casters and melee.
Most recently this very mechanic and existing imbalance between the stamina pool and mana pool between casters and between sword carriers is a working as intended by product of their game design. Craig admitted such in the ongoing discussion thread about this on the general forums now up to 334 posts. He said that both pools were designed to be finite, i.e. run out at some point, and then the evidence showing that casters essentially never run out of mana, while melee will run out of stamina in all situations and become unable to execute their attacks, at which point victory for the caster in 1v1 is assured.
Though this is evidently not the way it is supposed to be in the game, just like hundreds of other examples there are no plans to make changes to the situation. At least not in 1.06 which won't be out before X-mas. Will there even be a population of players playing in 2010? I mean seriously, is AOC going to be around for a 2nd year anniversary if the expansion has not been released.
With populations under 100k and even peak times, unable to support mini-games on many servers we are right back where we were in 2008 at this time of the year, empty servers, declining populations and no immediate solution.
Try as they might, until they make game design and mechanics changes their top priority instead of adding fluff, or fixing things over the course of 3-6 months fixing them in 2-3 weeks needs to be a priority. My X-mas wish is a new game director because frankly Craig is the least qualified person on Earth to give advice on balance, or priority of which implement and change needs to come when. The only real victory he can point to is, a relatively stable client, DX10 beta, and some new content for the higher levels, and a stats system that makes at least some sense but not a whole lot. That is basically all that has changed since the launch, and his takeover, and since free trials. Were it more, were it better, were it substantial, there would be tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands more players playing.
There are not. On the 12th we find out just where Funcom is at with AOC because their quarter report comes out. Expect it to be sugar coated.
The last time there was a huge exodus of players in mid 2008, it was due to the rampant griefing and ganking. Players either moved to a PVE server which they found to be incredible boring an dull or quit. Then there was an exodus. Now with casters the way they are the majority of quitting are either sick of the bullshit, or its a balance issue again. Personally if I was still playing the pace of change would be the big sticking point for me but imbalances are for sure something AOC should have been working on from the beginning in terms of individual and group mechanics.
And from what is the great LordBonezy basing his exaggerating claims again? On some people's exaggerating opinion on official forums? Tough talk from a guy who played the game like an year ago and is now so obsessed with the game that reads all the information of Aoc even though the game has been that bad according to him for a long time already.
The truth is, casters aren't that overpowered as many people might demonstrate. Not even close. Sieges are the only place in the game where casters are really what people tell them to be. They aren't overpowered in world pvp, especially in low level pvp they are more like easy kills for rogues and even for many soldiers if they are skilled enough. Why? Because caster players are usually notably worse players than the players playing melee classes due to the fact playing melee class requires more skill and it evolves players to better players. Players who play melee classes have in the most of the cases more eye for the game, better reflexes and better understanding of the game mechanics, classes and pretty much everything else.
In equal skilled hands Casters maybe have a leverage over melee but because the game has been build on an engine where skill actually matters, the skill differences between melee and caster players' skill eventually balances the whole system. The whole balance in Aoc is a tricky one. The most of the Caster whine comes from the PVE-servers and it is mostly due to the fact that there the melee - caster balance is in fact lots of worse than on a normal pvp server! All going pvp on PVP servers forces most of the melee players to improve their skills and learn pvp to deal with all kinds of situations and classes. This is not the case on PVE servers, there where noobs collide, casters are the last standing because they are easier to play, master and success.
EPIC IRONY!
Grasp them straws FunCom, grasp them hard. Seeing how even your most devout fans and class advocates disagree with your thoughts, I really don't see a bright future here.