Why FAF has been progressing slowly (renamed)

[Tex]

Hey, I'm top 20 here, but gold in star craft 2. Can I make changes there that influence high level balance?

Also, change for the sake of change doesn't mean its good change. And as far as opinions go: Opinions are like assholes, everyone has one. But it doesn't mean an option is good.

[Voodoo]

I see a new shiny forum feature coming here. How about we add a rating limit to all threads. E.g. you need a higher rating than 1000 to have the glory to post something in the balance forum. We just need to link our ladder to this forum, sounds easy to me and then we can create an own forum for the holy top 10 players where even I couldn't post something. I mean I'm only rank 13 or so? Just too bad for FAF.

[speed2]

Hey, I'm top 20 here, but gold in star craft 2. Can I make changes there that influence high level balance?

Also, change for the sake of change doesn't mean its good change. And as far as opinions go: Opinions are like assholes, everyone has one. But it doesn't mean an option is good.

There arent changes just for the sakte of changing something. And just because our opinion is not the same as yours, it doesn't mean it's shit.

[Tex]

My impression on everything since I have been back after a long absence is that I have seen a ton of game play changes that don't make any sense to me or others I have talked with. Even after asking to why specific things were changed I have not gotten a good answer. Maybe if I could find a source to provide me feedback on what was changed and why (And not some 'for better balance' cop out answer) I could be more on board with these things. But most of the people I talk to are in the same boat with me. What we see is balance changes being made by people who are not as knowledgeable or active in the game. Granted, most of us are no lifers who spam games for 15 hours a day so that's an unfair comparison to make. However, this is the reality that I see. And while the truth of the matter is important, the perception of it is equally so. As much as I have looked into the matter this is all I see. And until I can find the truth of the matter, this is my opinion of it. Once I have contrary evidence to prove me wrong I will gladly change my stance. But until then all I see is a bunch of nonsense changes for reasons I don't have answers for made by people who are not as in touch with the game as other people I see who's opinions are being ignored. Meanwhile, the balance of the game seems to be taking a negative turn. Please prove me wrong and make as ass out of me because I really want to understand.

-Edit -
Mephi brought me up to speed on most of the changes and stuff, as well as administrative train of thought in development/balance. Most of the issues have been resolved, and the rest are 'agree to disagree' or 'its on the radar' So thanks Mephi for taking the time to chat.

[PsychoBoB]

...there are people who like the changes? People that don't want to have everything same for years.

I'm just an average joe. I simply don't have the time to practise to get better.

But i like the progress/development of the game, the lobby and the community because if there would be stagnation i'm sure the community would shrink.
With stagnation it would be the same in Supcom than e.g. in Starcraft where i have to train things over and over again to reach a higher rating. But Supcom is different than all other RTSs and it should stay different. (Keyword: Adaption)

If somebody likes stagnation then he/she should go and play chess...

[PhilipJFry]

can you specify what change/changes you want to have explained?
you can see a list of balance patches here
until February of this year Zock was the Balance Councilor and after him JaggedAppliance has taken over
not sure who exactly was in the Balance Team before but at the moment we have Jagged, Petric, Mephi, Nexus, Turin, Keyser, ZLO, Exotic_Retard and myself

plan for the next balance patch is to rework t3 land btw

[speed2]

My impression on everything since I have been back after a long absence is that I have seen a ton of game play changes that don't make any sense to me or others I have talked with. Even after asking to why specific things were changed I have not gotten a good answer. Maybe if I could find a source to provide me feedback on what was changed and why (And not some 'for better balance' cop out answer) I could be more on board with these things. But most of the people I talk to are in the same boat with me. What we see is balance changes being made by people who are not as knowledgeable or active in the game. Granted, most of us are no lifers who spam games for 15 hours a day so that's an unfair comparison to make. However, this is the reality that I see. And while the truth of the matter is important, the perception of it is equally so. As much as I have looked into the matter this is all I see. And until I can find the truth of the matter, this is my opinion of it. Once I have contrary evidence to prove me wrong I will gladly change my stance. But until then all I see is a bunch of nonsense changes for reasons I don't have answers for made by people who are not as in touch with the game as other people I see who's opinions are being ignored. Meanwhile, the balance of the game seems to be taking a negative turn. Please prove me wrong and make as ass out of me because I really want to understand.

I think we're getting bit offtopic here going full balance talk. Can you make a new thread in the balance discussion subforum with your concernts (if you havent yet, else link).

Write there what you dont like about current balance and why.

And the thing that you dont know why things got changed, did you read the changelogs in the website, the one with unit pictures, new stats and mainly explanations why the things are changing?
Also who you talked to about the new balance, have you tried someone from the balance team?

[Brutus5000]

How can I help?

You could:

• [Python] try to get the logic and test on this PR finished: https://github.com/FAForever/server/pull/307 (I have given up on it)
• [Python] help mazornoob and duk3 at implementing the new java api into the client
• [Python] start implementing the new bireus patcher in the python client (contact me on Slack if interested)
• [Java] tackle beginner issues in the java api
• [Java] Tackle one of the galactic war-backend issues (contact me on Slack if interested)
• [JavaScript] Move the website to the new api routes in the java api (contact me on Slack if interested)
• [JavaScript] Help with the galactic war frontent (contact gol0l on Slack if interested)

[JoonasTo]

plan for the next balance patch is to rework t3 land btw

These kind of lines only incite panic and frustration with their lack of information.

Please ask basic questions of Why, When, What, How and answer these when providing information.
For example, in this case we know What and When. T3 and next balance patch. But now Why or How.
Why is T3 being reworked? Towards which aim?
In what way is T3 being reworked? How does this show in game?

For example:
We are currently working on a T3 rebalance for the next balance patch because T3 is currently too close to T2, overshadowing T2 in most games so T3 is being scaled up to distance it from T2, thus prolonging the lifetime of T2 in most games.*

*Disclaimer: This is fully the product of imagination of the author of this post, who is not in any way associated with the FAF development team and, thus does not represent any official view on the matter.

[dstojkov]

Basically there is always 2 group in a community that have opposite view about the topic balance and their comprehension about the meaning of the concept adaptation

The first with the claim new balance change meta and force player to change continually with the perspective it will bring new game styles

The second with the claim learn basic and build up your strategy upon continually repeat same mechanism till you got better.

It is obvious that the first group is willing to disturb well know strategy in order for them to not learn the basic and thus with the disturbance factor hoping to win quickly. Basically they don t want to adapt and argue that the game is stacked because group two not ready/willing to adapt to something new.(everything that killed them is obviously OP: asking/crying for nerfssss)
The second in contrary want to build up something while testing what is rewarding what is not thus becoming better with games played and are not really happy when new balance tweak the strategies they have already learned and tested. ( they can bring good feedback on which strategy not enough rewarding and propose change/tweak to make it better : ask for buff )

If faf want to bring new players that will remain low skills for a long time and make older player leave strategy one

If faf want to consolidate and get better players strategy two. But it forces new players to learn ...

Not to mention that for competitive game play strategy one does not fit at all. Imagine every month chess got new pieces and change the way how the piece move ... in a competitive point of view this is not realistic