My balance concerns - Not really about balance but how it's done.

The original plan was to have the commander drop to the surface with a 'POD' that would automatically deploy a starting base. I think this is still in the works, and agree that it will be the best way to start a game. (and even to send these PODs to new planets to begin your base there)

Technically you could claim that the HQ buildings are an addition.

I'm not sure if I completely agree with this whole statement. Part of me says you're ignoring the people that play casually that affect none of the balance variables (dps/ move speed/ timings). Even though those variables are important for tangible balance in the game it isn't a complete definer of how a game will play out. Casual players are the ones that play the most and are the fan base of the game (which support the top players in the game).

Outside of your observations
Its incredibly hard to balance a game completely from start to finish in beta since its just a small sample of the player base. Really this phase is to just make sure there isn't glaring bugs and issues that break game play and that the game is at the bare minimum fun to play, not completely balance the game top to bottom for competitive action from the bounce.

I'm not ignoring them, but casual gamers don't care much about balance in general.
If the game is good for competitive play, it's also good to casual play.

That's something I'm quite happy with FA (and it was the case before FAF took over) : Team games are as interesting than competitve 1v1 & 2v2.

I feel like you are saying that casual players play the game differently, and in a way that is incompatible with competitive player. It's not true.

It's nice to have some input from pro-players, but at the same time it can be equally shitty outside of games literally designed for eSports (i.e. StarCraft 2, Dota 2). More often than not pro players want to focus on niche copycat friendly builds, min-maxing, time optimization, etc. This is all stuff that most of the player base won't concern itself with, unless something unstoppable comes along, at which point there will be complaints. Most consumers want to be able to have fun regardless of what they build. More importantly, it would be a huge mistake to start vetting feedback from pro players right now when not everything is plugged in yet. This is not the time for true balancing.

Experience with popular mods is great, but we shouldn't be so quick to dismiss Uber's ability to balance on their own. This is all stuff that would be better to discuss a month or two prior to launch, when balance will matter far more.

We are two months prior launch.. It's in december.. Why do you think I'm starting to worry?

You can't compare the balance of games like TA/FA/PA and games like Starcraft or dota 2. They are not revolve around the same mechanics at all. You can't "min-maxing" in FA.

Also, what is important is not how top players are playing the game, but how top player understand the game.

You are right that most consumers just want to have fun building whatever they want. And that's why balance is so important : Everything must be potentially useful (was not the case at all for FA a while ago). And you need a deep understanding of the underlying mechanics to achieve that goal.

I'm not dismissing Uber capacity to lead the balance, but I'm sure they can't balance it correctly. It's normal. I've never seen any developer remotely good at their game, and by extension, knowing the metagame (god I hate that word, sorry) enough to tweak the game.

Supcom balance was horrible, FA balance was a huge improvement. Why? They've listened to top players.

(FAF is not a mod btw).

just realized I horribly supported my casual player balance argument.

I was going towards if the focus is on top level play and they define the balance in the game. it doesn't flow down very well to casual play.

It may seem to be good to have top level play balance but then again its just their opinion of how the game is interacting at their level. Sometimes not all units in a strategy game get fully utilized because most top level players use the "best units" for each situation. Casual players use all the units at their disposal to do anything.
Having the game majority balanced towards what the Top level players use makes the rest of the game ignored and boring.

SC2 has it bad with specific builds of units that it makes is pointless to build a unit outside of that strategy. Sometimes its better to just go two units in some pro games.

Forged alliance has its flaws in a small example of setons clutch always having the same standard of 1 Air 2 naval 1 rush towards center. It can get a little boring if every game of Setons is like that since it is the superior "build" on that map. It can be debated that of course it is due to the map but i'm trying to just draw on "majority view". (not trying to start a balance discussion war)

I have my doubts about a December release given the current state of the game, I personally think they should push full release back to early 2014. Regardless, I still think we're at least a full month out from needing to have deeper balance discussions. December could mean December 31st for all we know, leaving a fair amount of time for tweaks during the polish phase.

Lu_Xun, arguably the best faf player, has started playing PA. Ill be worried if more 'pros' from supcom or TA are not playing on release, but not from what it is currently.

You actually proved my point

"Pro" are able to tell what units are useless, so you can tweak them to have more units useful.

Your Seton problem is a great example : We've tweaked the game a lot, and there is not a single good strategy on that map for a long time.

Being able to turn conclusions of pro players into good balance decisions is the work of Uber, but they need them to begin with.

for now, you forget the "egg" that will come. This will probably speed up early game a lot.

For the rest of your post: I agree with you, top players need to be heard for balance, but a basic balance needs to be done first by the devs. And they cant seriously start on that before most of the units are implemented. And btw, I find the game already quite playable. The balancing seems already good, compared to SupCom Vanilla, where the major problem was the faction diversity. Not to speak of SupCom 2.

Only a best of 25 can decide this

i think, if it was necessary right now, you would find 25 players that already now can discuss balance on a high skill perspective. There are even players who may not play on high skill level, but still could contribute to the discussion, because they have a good enough understanding of the mechanics but lack the speed and reaction ingame to play it out xD

You kind of lose your argument there. Min/Max isn't just about one resource, it is also about time. The simple fact that your earlier example stated base build order - and then you described how to minimize your time to maximize your chances of winning in FA.

Pros understand that the build order for a good game is pre-set. Casuals feel that build order is essentially random (Oh, I feel like starting with a mex first... now how about a bot factory? Naw... I want an aircraft plant...)

If you balance a game around an ideal build order - or any specific mechanic - the game isn't actually balanced at all. It will simply favor that specific build order and none other. So, you want pros playing the game to find the exploits (of course) but you want casuals playing the game to find the fun.

Agreed.
Balance needs to be lead by the top players.
If there are exploits and imbalance to be found, you can bet they will find it.
(and that will never be me...lols.. )


"Lowest common denominator" balance is best done by the devs.
The can maintain the fun level.


I do want to point out that
balance at high skill != low skill
Some game mechanics have a really high skill floor (zerg) while also having a very high skill ceiling.
Newbs don't play zerg because there is a lot to juggle and lots to micro.
But so while it may be balanced at the upper tiers, it might not be for casuals.
It's relevant dependent on the mechanics and *gasp* the UI.

Well said.

Mike

Can we hold off on proclaiming the game DOA if perfect balance isn't achieved by the release date?

In my experience, the vast majority of RTS games are NOT competitively balanced on release. It's been acknowledged on the thread that Supcom and FA both had balance issues on release. Going back further, Starcraft and TA had VERY serious balance issues initially, and TA was never properly balanced; the expansion and add-on units actually made it worse. Yet, all of those games were critically acclaimed and developed healthy online communities (and I'd be willing to wager that your favorite RTS is one of the games I just mentioned).

The Devs' top priority right now needs to be making sure that the game is bug-free, fun, and easy to pick up and play. Balance will come eventually. It doesn't have to be perfect on release.

Its a double edged sword.
Balancing the top only balances the units in question. I haven't seen a pro use a Ghost unit in SC2 for Zerg or against a terran. Probably not designed to handle those two races but the fact that a unit is obsolete in a match up eliminates it from possible balancing and lack of play. The only units that pros balances are the already unbalanced units, and nothing else.

I mentioned Setons in an example of predictable game play. The same strategies always play out since they are built by the "pros". Yes they are strong, but it doesn't mean they are balanced.

I view balance as all units have a chance to be a valid strategy if done right. Like a game of chess. If only two units are balanced. then the game is lopsided, pretty much checkers.

Again, you are just proving what I'm saying.

If pro are not using Ghost, it's probably that the unit is broken to some degree. Then it's up try to balance it so it become useful, at least in some cases.

Pro doesn't balance anything, they give direction and point out flaws in the game, directly or indirectly.

Problem is that there is no solo, unlike all the games you've cited.
So online multiplayer balance is probably the only focus the game will have from the players.

Also, TA & Starcraft were created when online multiplayer wasn't a thing : It wasn't that important they are balanced.
We are in 2013, and online multiplayer is a thing. So much that a game can go out with only a multiplayer component.

The supcom balance almost killed the game. Probably hurt it a lot in the long run.
FA balance was not perfect, but it was a huge improvement, and if PA could be as good as it was, it would really be good. We are really far from that currently.