Balance Patch Part 2 Poll

[Zock]

Zock, these are great explanations of the thoughts and reasoning behind these changes - but I don't care about any of that stuff.

What about the Billy changes?

Icedreamer linked the patchnotes, but they were actually WIP and not done. I'll update them when i find time (read as: when i stop answering so many forum posts and chat questions), and especially billy is very likely to change several time during the beta, there are more ideas how to change it rather than thought out concepts at this point. And same thing, best to create an own thread if you want to discuss a specific change.

[biass]

Zock, these are great explanations of the thoughts and reasoning behind these changes - but I don't care about any of that stuff.

What about the Billy changes?

how much bp in drones will it take to fire off billys as soon as one is allowed to fire them AND is this an attainable level of billy in a 10km ladder game

if yes is the answer to question b im maining uef again

[Zock]

However if adjusting the nerfs based on % or flat values is the better way is, at least for me, really hard to tell, both kind of works.

If i was Mr. Balance President and i wanted to nerf ras, i'd just make all factions rases then same with nerf. Perhaps i'm missing something but it seems like an almost completely irrelevant and uninteresting faction diversity. I've probably accidentally memorized quite a few tree groups but despite rasing hundreds of times i still couldn't even tell you the order of e and mass income by faction.

I actually agree, while i find keeping and increasing faction diversity very important, this is a kind of faction diversity thats more cosmetic/passive advantages than anything else. Having different output does not allow for any different kind of strategy or anything else for the different factions. But opposing to what i have to read a lot i'm actually not just changing things because i personally prefer them (else we would have the t3 patch, and not this one, e.g.), and the question is, "would equalizing them make the game significantly (subjective, just in case i still need to mention this) better to warrant a change, which will definitely upset some people, no matter what kind of change it is?".

Does equalizing RAS costs add enough improvement to warrant upsetting some people that won't like the change in specific, and some other people that just dont like change in general? The obvious upside is that it makes the game a bit more accessible, but not too much, since, as you mention, you don't need to learn the differences anyway.

I could already quote you the reactions that this change would provoke (want an example? "Wow you go on all day about increasing faction diversity and THEN YOU REMOVE IT, STOP TALKING ABOUT FACTION DIVERSITY EVER AGAIN", is it worth it?

If either enough people like it, or there is some decent upside of it that i missed, i'm totally up for it though.

[Mel_Gibson]

Does equalizing RAS costs add enough improvement to warrant upsetting some people that won't like the change in specific, and some other people that just dont like change in general?

I'd only equalise it because, and ofc i could be way off on this, i suspect it would be easier to nerf without people complaining that this faction has too much e or this faction has too much mass. But yeah, total speculation.

But first, i'd remove all incidents of current ras values from the internet so people don't know which faction they should be upset about with the changes.

[Morax]

This is not wrong. The numbers are indeed not optimized, after changing them based on HZHs and others feedback, they have seen pretty much no testing and not too much feedback in theory either. Thats part of the reason why i moved them from the first to the second part of the patch.

Zock, last time around the holidays you hosted MANY balance games with a lot of good players involved. Why can't you host these games yourself to be tested? We even discussed how that was one of the most effective ways to get good testing data.

This is the core of why I am heavily-opposed to your changes: you are admitting to playing with the #s and not being patient for good testing. What is worse you ignored negative feedback and stockpiled the positive.

Are you simply going to release this change regardless of feedback? What kind of criteria are you looking for to say "Okay the community agrees, let's do this" or "Oh, that's bad, we should wait or change things."

[Zock]

Zock, last time around the holidays you hosted MANY balance games with a lot of good players involved. Why can't you host these games yourself to be tested? We even discussed how that was one of the most effective ways to get good testing data.

Didn't have access to internet that can handle teamgames, and most of my time went into trying to explain the changes rather than playing. I can't do everything by myself. Though in hindsight, writing less forum posts and testing more myself might have been a better idea, but thats impossibly to confirm or falsify.

I'd only equalise it because, and ofc i could be way off on this, i suspect it would be easier to nerf without people complaining that this faction has too much e or this faction has too much mass. But yeah, total speculation.

But first, i'd remove all incidents of current ras values from the internet so people don't know which faction they should be upset about with the changes.

Yes, no one will complain this or that faction has too much mass, just that this or that faction got removed its rightfull and super important advantage/disadvantage, and then that it either removes faction diversity, or is a pointless change without purpose and shouldn't be done. I'd like to hear some more opinions on it so i can give it a try since i personally like it though.

However, not for the reason to make people less upset about changes. While this can be a reason to prevent change, it should never be a reason to actually implement a change that has no purpose except this in my opinion. Though i do see a purpose in reducing useless complexity a bit.

[JoonasTo]

Would be nice if we had a playable beta to test these things in. Currently the beta just loads 3655.

[Lieutenant Lich]

ooh... 3655... no increased HQ cost...
/me hosts a beta game

[IceDreamer]

BETA is just 3658 minus the hotfixes. Pointless until I untangle the github mess.

[Bittered]

Cant dig through all the post now, so will just ad a wild remark hoping that its not a duplicate:
Cybran t3 hq hass the least hp amongst factions, thus 12000. So it dies in 2 tacs ... The point is that it does not: regen will save it, just as it saves damned uef t1 coms from tacniping with just 2 silos. Is it intended? Or was it ment to die in 2 tacs but regen was added and value didnt get revised?