Dynamic Balance

Knight_actual

<div class="IPBDescription">Balance changing with server size</div>I read alot, and actually hear (during play) alot of people complaining about imbablances as the server size goes up. Can this be addressed very simply with a sliding scale that changes res/hp/damage/respawntime/upgrade costs/somthing mechanic as the server size grows and shrinks?

For example, the current complaint is that the game is balanced for 6v6 play, and that as the server size goes up, the aliens suffer in comparison to marines. A mechanic that reduces spawn time for aliens as well as increasing their res tick frequency, and/or upgrade costs for marines as the server size grows would simply address the (factor in play-test) IMBA no?

Just a thought

Buzzou

i think this is a good idea, something that addresses the issue that hasnt been mentioned before, but i'm worried that it would be very hard - if not impossible, to balance the dynamic balance....

for me personally i love to play in small servers 2v2, 3v3 etc, the game just feels a lot more "intimate", and you can muck around and try a lot more diferent tactics that you normally couldnt do in a full server. the only problem being that as the marines have 1 player allways in the CC, the small games always favour the aliens. even if theres 3 marines vs 2 aliens, the aliens still have the advantage. unless you relocate to a hive/dbl res node and lockdown another hive, your screwed.
once the server is 6v6 its balanced, if it gets any more full the game will tip in the marines favour, unless there's a nub comm, or really good alien players.
another balancing issue is if theres 9 marines vs 10 aliens, one of those marines is in the CC, threrefore theres only 8 marines out in the field fighting 10 aliens. sure there should be at least one gorge, but they at least can defend themselves, or even attack with bile or focus spit.

the dev's have my upmost respect for the fine work they have already done to get the game balanced to its present level, and i know a game like NS will never be perfect and there will always be issues like the ones described above. the sliding rule idea could fix a lot of these problems, but i fear it will just open a brand new can of worms...

Abaddon0

dynamically balancing the game has intrigued me, i was thinking not only for the number of players, but so we no longer have to balance the players when people leave, balancing the teams based on the number of players on each, ex if 3 marines leave a game, making it 8 on 5, the marines would get a bonus of some kind to make it fairer, more res, faster re spawn time, cheaper weapons... etc, or handicapping the alines

the_x5

This would be hard to tweak and playtest but I think merits a LOT of potential. Nice idea for a forum hatchling!

vote <b><!--coloro:#33CC00--><span style="color:#33CC00"><!--/coloro-->yes<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--></b>

UncleCrunch

My 2 cents:

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Avenger-X-2

<!--quoteo(post=1612854:date=Mar 9 2007, 05:53 AM:name=Abaddon0)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Abaddon0 @ Mar 9 2007, 05:53 AM) [snapback]1612854[/snapback]</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->
dynamically balancing the game has intrigued me, i was thinking not only for the number of players, but so we no longer have to balance the players when people leave, balancing the teams based on the number of players on each, ex if 3 marines leave a game, making it 8 on 5, the marines would get a bonus of some kind to make it fairer, more res, faster re spawn time, cheaper weapons... etc, or handicapping the alines
<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->

it would make getting good at the game hard since its allways changing and lack of consistency.

Sarisel

Solution is to dynamically adjust the res flow, if the res system will still be the same in NS2. IIRC, UW was thinking of changing it to something that works better.

Pikminwars

True, one of the biggest reasons aliens lose so often in bigger games is the fact that aliens suffer by everyone getting less res(and therefore it takes longer to get higher lifeforms), while the marines only suffer by having less guns and equipment. Commanders usually go for universal upgrades over equipment, so the marines usually suffer much less from sharing res than aliens.

BCSeph

lol dynamic balance....kinda like the DWP system in CS:S....what a joke

"Hmm im just gunna buy a deagl.....OMG $65535 WTH"

rsd

I like the idea of simply altering res flow based on player numbers. Simple and should be effective.

Svenpa

Voteing yes for ingenious suggestion.

Misere

Some sort of balancing is required and the res Idea could do that. What I would prefer to see is a low numbers balancing method. i.e when its 3 or 4 players it should be 1 alien vs 2-3 marines but its normaly 1 marine agaist a couple of aliens.

Moving_Target0

This is a good idea. For NS Classic maps, increased res flow should go to the aliens, and perhaps for Combat type maps, the aliens could gain a bit more EXP per kill. (Their main disadvantage in those maps is the amounts of focused fire they have to take.)

XenoMorF

I'm pretty sure this has been suggested before but ignored; but adjusting the tick rates would probably do it for balance. Getting the right adjustment is the key. Since marines arn't affected by more players less res per tick the marines don't need to be adjusted. Hey maybe if it was done perfectly we'll see some decent 3v3 games? That'd be sweet

Of course we're bound to get someone saying, "well what should it be ? Work it out using maths! "... How about a bit of common sense and trial and error. Implement a common sense guess to adjust the res per tick and if it doesn't work. Well we'll eagly await a MB patch to get another adjustment. I'm sure people don't mind small updates to fine tweak a balance issue thats giving grief (besides this could be done with server side patches couldn't it?)

EDIT: Actually Marines get a disadvantage of having to spend more on weaponary - Oh but RFK .. nevermind, ignore that. The issue about higher costs for weapons 'should' balance itself out with the RFK

Kassinger

On a side note, NS2 launched through Steam means automatic and simple updating. No need to worry about balancing tweaks being a hazzle to download.

Eclipse

Larger games need more than tweaked res-flow for a relatively balanced game, although that is a large portion of it.

You have to consider a lot of things in regards to why large games tend to suck for the aliens:

Marine Strengths:

<u>Combined firepower</u> In a 6v6 environment a 3-man hunting team is considerable amount of firepower for the aliens to contest against while the other 2 marines run around capping nodes. Now multiply this. In a 10v10 games, with just a moderate amount of communication you could keep your 2 man cap team, and have a 7 man squad raining fire and destruction down on the alien team. 7 vanilla marines can take down a hive with just their lmgs. Spawn camping is easy, it takes a fade or an onos to survive that kind of firepower. (or an extremely talented lerk) This, unfortunatley, is hard to fix.

<u>Combined Resource Pool</u> Boiled down this is the res flow problem. Using standard plan of holding between 3 and 5 resources, the marines will be able to tech up consistently. The same does not work for the aliens as it becomes distributed across so many lifeforms. My idea? As the alien team increases in size, adjust their resflow accordingly. For my example I'll use a rule of 2, moving up from 6v6 up to say, 12v12

<u>Example</u>
6v6/7v7: Standard 1 res from each node every 4 seconds.
8v8/9v9: 1.5 res from each node
10v10/11v11: 2 res
12v12/13v13: 2.5 res
etc. etc.

No matter how big your team is, there will still be the fundamental problem of being unable to hold territory to far from where you spawn. With an idea such as this, aliens will be able to hold similar territory as in a 6v6 environment, while each player getting res more consitently. Marines would remain unchanged because it is my own belief that it doesn't really breakdown regardless of players, you just might hand out less equipment.

<u>Spawn Rate</u> In a 10v10 situation if the entire marine team get's wiped out, maximum downtime will be 30~ seconds. That's with 3 IP's, which is pretty standard for a large game anyway. For Aliens, it's dependent on the hive, which in smaller game's is fair, but in a larger game, at 1 hive, total downtime for single player could be well over a minute, possibly even 2. Along the same lines as the adjusted alien res flow, as alien player count increases either:

A) Their spawn rate decreases
B) Multiple spawns become possible (2 or even 3 at hive one, and scale up from that)
C) Eliminate spawn queue, and a player spawns after their set downtime, regardless of the number of dead.

I think B or C could become the most problematic, however also making the final stand as a hive 1 alien a bit less irritating.


Just some food for thought...

Ballisto

Edit: What Eclipse said <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/tounge.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":p" border="0" alt="tounge.gif" />

Gaidan

shameless bump for an amazing topic.

Kassinger

If I recall correctly, one of these suggestions is already implemented in NS.

Aliens respawn faster in larger games in NS already. When aliens still have one hive and a large team, it takes shorter time to respawn. When they get a second and third hive, the bonus is removed. Correct me if I'm mistaken.