Expanded Response to Jay Little's "Nerd Numbers: Terminal Outcomes"

This post is an expansion of my comment on Jay Little's article "Nerd Numbers: Terminal Outcomes" on the Gaming Security Agency's website.  Jay is the designer of great games like the Warhammer Fantasy Roleplaying Game.  You should seriously keep up with his "Painted Thumb" blog.  In this article, Jay describes how the dice pools in the new Edge of the Empire RPG (which he also designed) produce results on multiple axes, in contrast to dice mechanics of most classic rpgs that typically just produce results along a single axis.  You should read the article for the details, but the point is that results from a system that uses multiple axes provides exponentially more 'terminal outcomes' than uniaxial dice systems, which has implications on design outlook.  In the comments, we've started to discuss the implications of the design choice.

I'm not sure that more terminal outcomes are uniformly better.  Edge's dice system does handily produce a large variety of distinct/terminal outcomes, and this is an important feature of the game.  I still think there are some issues, though.  In his response, he refers to an "oversight", in that he didn't state that he wasn't referring to a single dice pool composition, but a generalization of the pool effect.  Further, he's somewhat dismissive of the need to understand the probability associated with the terminal outcomes, stating:

"This merely speaks to the potential for various Terminal Outcomes, not the probabilities of any single result."

I'm worried about these statements, because they do relate to design outlook, but, in my interpretation, not necessarily in the way I think Jay believes they do.  To explain my position, I need to take a little detour through decision making in games.  So keep reading, and please be patient, I'll get to the good stuff soon.

When making design choices, you are creating the way players interact with your game system, and players interact with a game system by making choices, such as "play a healer or a tank", or "Shoot the storm trooper or apply a medpack to my wounded friend",  or "Throw a frag grenade or thermal detonator", etc.  Now, how do players decide between these options? The same way we make any decisions as humans: We identify a goal, evaluate our options, and choose the option most likely to achieve the goal with the fewest negative consequences.  Simple right?

It helps to break it down into some discrete parts.  On a very micro scale, a player follows the following path when deciding what actions to take:

Action Evaluation & Selection (AES) -> Dice Roll (DR) -> Outcome Resolution (OR)

In the AES step, a player reviews the all (or a reasonable subset) of his available actions, and decides on one action or set of actions that are available.  It is in this step that the player has the most control.

In the DR step, he throws the appropriate dice that correspond to his selected options, and includes any modifiers.   This is where the terminal outcome is produced/determined.  The player has no control in this phase, since there is no way to roll the dice to manipulate the outcome.

In the OR step, any further decisions that are called for (possibly none) are made by the appropriate parties, and then the outcome of the roll, the terminal outcome, is applied to the game.  This is where EotE players decide how to spend triumph and advantage, damage is applied to targets, etc.  

So, back to the original point, "how do we make decisions?"  Exactly as I stated above, we choose the option that's going to get us closest to our goal with the least negative consequences.  But how do we know which option that is?  We rely on our previous experience (observed outcomes of previous decisions, rolls, etc) and intuition (unobserved results that can be reasonably expected based on our understanding of the rules) to compare these.  Using this information, players evaluate the relative probabilities of the possible terminal outcomes for each of their options, and choose the option that best suits their goals.

How does this related to the AES -> DR-> OR path?  Because our knowledge about the relative probabilities of each of the terminal outcomes is determined by the DR step, and our knowledge about the impact of each of the terminal outcomes is determined by the OR step, and it should be clear that our experience and intuition derived from DR & OR steps is absolutely critical for use in the AES step.  

Now, when evaluating options that lead to only a few terminal outcomes (say, four, like in Jay's first example), it is easy to evaluate the value of each on the terminal outcome on the game.  However, if there are over two hundred terminal outcomes, this because vastly more difficult.  Further, you need more rules to interpret all of these additional outcomes.  The latter is less of a problem if you can apply general rules, but there's no getting around the first: As you increase terminal outcomes, a players ability to compare the value of options increases.

Also, when we are presented with an option that has four terminal outcomes, and the generating method is relatively simple (e.g. roll a d20, apply a modifier), our minds have little trouble comprehending the relative likelihoods of the various outcomes by either intuition or experience.  However, in an exponentially more complex system like EotE's dice pools, our brains are NOT able to easily intuit the likelihoods of different outcomes, which leaves us to depend on previous experience.  But this method ALSO collapses because there are so many possible outcomes, we would need to have rolled an individual dice pool thousands of times to have a feel for how JUST THAT DICE POOL behaves.  Finally, Jay comments:

"And finally. I’m not a mathematician. That much should be clear. An understanding of math, probabilities and percentages is certainly helpful, but ultimately instincts, gut feelings, and intuition play as large a part as any other factor."

I think there are 2 possible interpretations of this: Jay is talking about either how he makes decisions while playing a game, or how he makes decisions while designing a game.  If it's the former, okay, that's cool if the game system behaves in the way that it intuitive based on its presentation.  Unfortunately, the EotE dice mechanic fails on this account.  This has been documented previously in the long thread on the FFG forums: The upgrade mechanism, which is portrayed as one of 'king' of the dice pool modification mechanics, provides little benefit.  This has been shown to be true using not only theoretical calculations comparing the two mechanics AND large numbers of simulated results, but also empirically at my game table and others.

If Jay is referring to the latter situation, that he relies on gut feelings and intuition as much or more than math when he's designing games, then... 

I'm speechless.  

No, seriously, when I typed that, I just sat here with my jaw hanging open for a few seconds making vowel sounds.

I don't understand how you can tweak and balance and appropriately design an intricate system like a role-playing game, even with huge amounts of controlled play-testing, without a very solid understanding of underlying dice mechanic.  I have HUGE amounts of respect for Jay because he's produced some of the best games I've played, and maybe he can write these rules off the cuff with an intuitive understanding, but I think we see examples of unforeseen, uh, hiccups in the system.  It also seems to me an odd sentiment to end a comment on after a math-heavy and self described "nerdy" article about multidimensional outcome spaces.

I think outcomes on multiple axes are fucking fantastic!  I have no problem with this mechanical concept in games!  They add depth to the game and remove the admittedly boring action resolutions we've seen in previous games.  I love the dice mechanics of WFRPG, especially they way the rolled results could be spent on:

• A few, clear options presented on the action card that varied between actions,
• A few, clear options presented in the book that were relatively constant between actions, or
• Narratively appropriate actions/effects

However, like any mechanic, it needs to be appropriately implemented in a game to live up to its full potential.  It's here where I worry a "go-with-your-gut" design method may have been a poor choice and created a situation where the mechanism may not be able to really shine.  The dice just don't seem to want to behave in the game, and frequently lead to some weird and game-slowing results.

Jay, if you're reading this, I hope this hasn't been too antagonistic.  I'm just being honest about how I see the dice mechanic.

Anyway, I think that's everything I needed to say to fully support my position.  This was way too long for the comment section on GSA, and actually gave me a chance to touch on a few upcoming subjects of future blogs, so it all worked out.  Hope to have the definition blog finished soon.

/endofline

EDIT: I mis-credited Jay as the designer of the second ed. of Descent: Journeys into the Darkness, which was designed by Clark, Konieckza, Sadler & Wilson.  It has been fixed above.

Flashpoint, in review

Well, its ended up being a busy week, but I'm finally able to post again.  As promised in my last post, I would talk about the Esseles flashpoint in TOR that me and some friends played through the last night of the server load beta.

Our group consisted of a Sage 10 (myself), a Gunslinger 19+, a Jedi Sentinel 10, and a Trooper 9-10.  I healed, the sentinel tanked.  Obviously, the difficulty of the encounters had to have been massively skewed by the high level dps from the over leveled gunslinger.

I am very, very impressed.  Overall, the tone of the flashpoint felt like it was something straight out of one of the movies (along the lines of the escape from the Death Star, or the attack on Jabba's sail barge).  There were lots of opportunities for wise cracks or serious lines from our characters, and plenty of action between social interaction scenes.  It felt that both sides of the encounter, the combat and social encounters) were important parts of the instance.

Starting the instance was a bit of a chore: it seemed that there was some glitch in the conversation to start the instance told us some members (and not which ones) were ineligible to participate in the encounter. 

I liked the flow of the instance: 

• an intro
• some combat
• a social encounter to establish the premise
• more combat
• a story path decision
• more combat
• a boss fight (Ironfist, or whatever his name is looks more intimidating WITH a beard)
• a slight change of location
• 2 big boss fights
• optional boss
• and a fInal light-side/dark-side choice to wrap things up

The combat felt pretty typical for what I would ahve expected out of an MMO "Dungeon".  Small groups of enemies with somewhat complementary abilities.  Usually it was one strong or elite enemy surrounded by a group of regular units.  I'm not sure what the other players were doing, or how aggro was being held, but as healer, my job was fairly straight-forward.  At level 10 I had exactly ONE heal: Benevolence.  I would typically start by running into combat, and downing a few of the minor enemies, while watching the parties health bars.  If anyone got to low, I would spam them up to 80-90% health.  A few times, their health bars got lower than I was comfortable with, but I don't think anyone died during an encounter. Having meditation/reload really helps to keep the pace fast between fights, and giving EVERYONE a revive prevents slowing the group down for a long corpse run.

I believe the entire flashpoint took about an hour, and I'd guess we spent about 2-3 minutes in combat to every 1 minute we spent in a social encounter, which is a good change up. I REALLY like a flashpoint/dungeon/instance of this length, it feels like you've accomplished something when you've completed it.  I really hated the "Speed run" 15 minute wrath dungeons, and I hope they don't bleed over into TOR.

THe lewt the bosses dropped seemed pretty standard "blue"/"rare" quality gear, better than random drops, close to what was produced by big group quests.  I really hope there are some more clever names for the armor in the final release, though.  Every boss drop was named "Esseles Counselor Gloves" or "Esseles Smuggler Jacket".  

Long story short, it's more than enough to keep me hopeful, as long as a they fix the few bugs at the start of the instance, and they actually give appropriate names to the gear drops.

That's all for now.  I expect my next post soon, either discussing the value of a guild charter (currently writing one for the new guild) or about some microtransaction/post-launch premium ideas I think TOR should implement.

/endofline

On Star Wars: Galaxies

With the impending release of The Old Republic, I've found myself thinking more and more about the SOE's previous (and, truly, failed) attempt at a Star Wars MMORPG: Star Wars Galaxies.  One reason this is on my mind is that I've been explaining the old system (especially the "one character per server" rule) to a variety of individuals; mostly players who were too young to have played the game.  Another reason is because of a recent a article about the loss of ingenuity and stagnation of MMORPGs, which mentioned SWG as one of the most ambitious launches to date.  This may indeed be true. SWG was indeed an ambitious game, and it expected a lot from its players.  Maybe too much.

Let me take an aside to make quick statement:  It is not my goal here to explain and dissect why SWG failed.  There were a LOT number of reasons and a LOT of places things went wrong.  I only intend to address line of thought here: The conflict between the game economy and story progression.

On the surface, these two concepts don't appear to be related.  

Story progression should occur when the character pursues in game quests and activities that progress a narrative that the player, at least nominally, feels they are playing a part in.  Typically, this consisted of hunting down troopers of the opposing faction, and bouncing around the worlds.  These missions almost always involved combat.  The story that was included in the game was incredibly sparse by these standards.

Game economy, in SWG, was nearly completely run by the players.  There were some NPC vendors, typically for the players to vendor trash to and make some credits.  Almost nothing of value was sold by NPC vendors.  Characters improved their crafting and learned to craft better items by crafting to gain crafting experience.  Characters could also become merchants in the same fashion.  Ground vehicles and even starships were crafted in this way as well.  Training was also intended to be done by players; to reach the master level of each class, you had to spend apprentice experience earned by teaching skills to lower level players of your class.  

In today's games, players can craft and gather materials while they progress the story via questing.  They may need to take time away from questing to return to a social hub to use a crafting station (an anvil, loom, or some other shit), but the pursuit of improving your crafting skills at worst minimally interfered with questing, and at best equipped with improved gear and improved your combat ability.  And really, your ability to pursue your crafting was independent of your combat abilities.  


However, In the SWG skill system, you had to choose to allocate your skill points (of which you had a limited pool of a fixed size), into abilities in different classes, meaning you could "spec" into being a merchant, or into improved combat abilities.  But not both at the same time.  This flexible skill system not only tied together a players combat abilities (used to pursue quest objectives) and their crafting abilities (used to power the economy), but made them mutually exclusive.


In retrospect, this reminds me of some problems that came into old pencil and paper systems, where the designers attempted to balance classes with weaker combat abilities by improving their non-combat abilities.  While this might seem balanced "on paper", it makes for fucking dull game play.  


So in the "ambitious and innovative" SWG system, to power the economy, some players were forced in to dull game play.  And while some individuals may enjoy a "free market, craft-and-sell" game, it never would have been enough to support a server.  


Ultimately, this was one of a number of failings of SWG that led to its ultimate demise.  There were problems at launch, and while some of the solutions to these problems were appropriate, other were very far from the mark.  I stopped playing some time between Jump to Lightspeed and Rage of the Wookies (yes, "Rage of the Wookies" was the actual name of the expansion), so I can't comment on everything that happened.


All this was a set of realizations that fell into place as some of the bits were floating around upstairs in random access.  Now its been compiled, and can be flushed from cache.


In other news, this evening we finally got a group together to for an SWTOR flashpoint.  I hope to have the impressions from that up soon.  The server load beta is done for this weekend.  Hopefully it'll go open beta soon, but really, 15.Dec big date we're looking forward to.  Good ol' early access.  

I think that's it for now.  I'll catch you all again soon.

/endofline

The little things

Instead of working on Landscape Genetics today, I kept playing SWTOR's beta.


My parents would be so proud.


Anyway, I've now leveled the following characters to the following levels:


Trooper 11
Conselor 10
Bounty Hunter 7


I loved the Trooper storyline.  Its got a great twist at the end of it that I can only assume sets up the REST OF THE GAME for the class.  Its great, and I won't ruin it for anyone who wants to play.


The play on the Bounty Hunter was a blast.  Literally.  One of your initial abilities is the classic Fett "wrist rocket".  When you hit a standard enemy, it can blow them over, knock them down, and stun them momentarily.  If you KILL someone with it, their limp body/chassis/bits fly 3 to 5 meters.


IT. IS. GLORIOUS.  The play style is endlessly entertaining.  The story line there is solid, too.  It also has some good twists you'd expect from the typical scum and villiany that inhabits Nal Hutta.


The Counselor play style is good, by comparison I suppose its a little bland compared to the others, but that not saying much, considering how flashy Troopers and Bounty Hunters are.  The big push back ability is fun, but with limited use without a lot of big damage ranged abilities to take advantage of it.  The end of the Tython story line was very satisfying, and the twist that came afterward I actually expected sooner.  


There are a few other points I want to touch on here tonight.


The Legacy system


I actually stumbled on this, and it sounds like its old news.  Your "Legacy" will basically be your character's last name or family/clan/house/whatever identifier.  From what I read, it will be unique, self-chosen, and game wide (Across any and all servers).  The name you choose can be listed as a last name, below your name, as "the xyz legacy", or hidden.  So apparently you CAN choose a last name in the game, and my previous post was wrong.  You have to finish the first story tier.  I'm looking forward to this.  This SHOULD allow an anonymous method for cross server, User-to-user communication, a proxy for what the "RealID system" provided us in WoW.  


The Social hub


This was very well designed.  The social hub for the Republic (and, I assume, Sith) is a large space station.  To speak in terms of WoW, This will be the Stormwind/Ironforge for the Republic.  Initially speaking, its VERY well designed.  The social "hub" is literally just that.  The entire station is laid out as a large wheel, with most of the utility areas (Crew skills, class training, auction house, transit) along the rim, connected in the center by a cantina: literally, a "social hub".  The layout should make it very convenient and accessible.  


Sharding servers


Apparently, all the zones are instanced, or "sharded".  Even within the servers.  This was used by STO to allow all users to play on the same super-server.  I was NOT expecting this.  The good news is this means that zones can be kept to reasonable populations by adding more instances to the zone ad hoc to support the population.  The bad news is this sharding can separate players and friends.  You can still communicate between shards with general chat and whispers, but actually joining your friends' instance requires an entire reload of the zone.  Personally, I have found these loads to be fairly lengthy.  In the long term, I worry that random grouping may be discouraged across shards due to the time involved in the load for the new players.  Time will tell how this plays out.


Group quests and world bosses


I simultaneously loved and loathed the group quests in WoW.  They were a pain in the ass during leveling, but I was surprisingly disappointed to see them go in Cataclysm.  In SWTOR, they called "Heroic" quests, and they seem to provide bonus gear, but haven't yet been required to move the story forward. 


I'm also pleased to see that world bosses have been added.  They're scattered around, and I've found some as early as level 6.  Get a group together, and these can be fun.




Well, I think that's it for now.  I believe we'll be running a flash point tomorrow, we'll see how things go.


-Tris

Overall Initial impressions so far

I've been playing for about an hour and a half.  I've made it level 5 (I think) and then the game client stopped responding and I had to restart.  

While I'm waiting to get back in, I'll address a complaint that I think people will be screaming about the Old Republic: "It just a WoW clone with Star Wars".  

Well, it is and it isn't.

It's no more a WoW clone than WoW is/was a EQ clone.

The term clone, to me, would indicate that any differences were purely cosmetic.  I wouldn't call WoW "revolutionary", but WoW was a generational improvement over EQ, and TOR is shaping up to be a generational improvement over WoW.  

This game is almost EXACTLY what I would have expected if WoW and KotOR got piss drunk one night, and had a love child.  It looks just like both parents.

This isn't to say that there aren't a LOT of similarities between WoW and TOR.  TOR has certainly implemented a LOT of the improvements that WoW pioneered over the last few years (easy quest logs, quest markers, etc).  It also has some of the problems that I feel WoW developed during cataclysm, namely the way the zone (only played Ord Mantel so far) feels like its "On Rails".  It feels like there isn't much in the way of deciding where to go, your just directed from your quest hub, to the "wilderness" where your quests are, then go back and forth between them, each one at a time.  But these are still the early levels, and hopefully, things will become a bit less... linear as the game progresses. 

Here's hoping

-Tris

Looking forward to this weekend, and back at other MMOs

After months of waiting, we are finally getting a chance to get into the upcoming MMORPG: Star Wars: The Old Republic.  This weekend is my first beta for TOR.  I will likely be creating a republic trooper, a class I have little interest in playing in the full game.  Given the games proscribed emphasis on story telling as a core "pillar" of game play, I want to be surprised when I create my Jedi Knight.  Together with a group of friends, we should have an operation guild from day one.  I suspect that TOR will be replacing WoW as a primary MMO for me, my friends, and a LOT of other people.  [Yeah, I get this isn't news]


I am very excited.


I've been spending time in two other games.  Partly to kill time, partly because their mechanics have come to interest me.  The first is Star Trek Online.  At launch, I purchased a lifetime membership.  Many people said this deal was for suckers, but I feel I got my money's worth, its broken down $10/month to this point.  In January, the game is going free to play, and to encourage micro-transactions to continue revenue flow, they're adding two new, and linked, systems:  Dilithium and Duty Officers.  Dilithium will replace all of the emblems currently in the game.  Dilithium can be earned by performing daily quests, sending your DOffs on missions, and can also be purchased for C-credits from other players via the dilithium exchange.


The duty officers generate dilithium, specific DOff XP, Skill XP, Bridge officer XP, and occasionally other rewards.  And since the DOff's perform missions while you're offline, it allows you to level while offline.  While the underlying purpose of the DOff system is to generate microtransaction revenue (The fastest way to expand your roster of DOffs is to purchase "Booster Packs" from the C-store), it adds a great level of immersion.  Sending these minor officers on these missions and having them come back with materials, and sometimes even wounded, makes your ship feel more alive.  I'll admit, I'm one of those weird gamers that enjoys a certainly level of micromanagement, especially when it improves immersion.   


Taking the game F2P is a great idea, and it will broaden access to the game to any fans of the Star Trek IP.  Increasing the player base will be extremely beneficial to the game.  I really hope it leads to STO becoming a preferred, high quality F2P MMO as an option to other pay MMOs.  The way the dilithium system works allows people to substitute game time with money, but not vice versa, since players can't exchange the C creds in for actual $US.


The second game getting my attention is the Facebook game Heroes of Neverwinter.  I strongly suspect this game is the product of the what was supposed to be the Virtual Tabletop system we were promised with 4th ed, that was later canceled.  Its a good, albeit simple, interpretation of the 4th ed D&D we're all so familiar with now.  There's a lot of room to grow (additional classes, races, level cap, mechanics etc).  But the real gem in this game is the "asynchronous multiplayer" concept.  Adventures assume that you have four party members, only one of which is your own PC.  To round out your group, you may "borrow" characters from your FB friends, and they are under your control during the adventure.  Your friends characters have their gear and skills chosen by their owners, but the action during the adventures where you "borrow" them is up to you.  Its a neat inclusive system that allows for quite a bit of flexibility and allows players to use the time they have when they have it, instead of having to organize "raid night".


That's it for tonight.  I hope to have TOR updates in the next few days, and hopefully a post on my thoughts about WoW, its future, and my future relations with it.

-Tris

The Heroic Class dilemma, Part II

In my previous post, I discussed what I believe WoW's heroic classes should be, and how the Death Knight measured up. Today, I'd like to share my ideas about how the classes can be designed to meet these criteria, and changes to the DK that can bring the class into line with what it should be.

Lore and Play mechanics

The first two points are not difficult to succeed, and the second point has little effect on game play. Blizzard has done an excellent job introducing new mechanics to the game and revamping old ones to keep the game fresh and interesting to play, and the DK's runic power and runes were no different. However, the sheer number of cooldowns the DK can spam in a few seconds, especially with the help of a macro may be a bit OP. In addition, Blizzard has an EXCELLENT creative/lore team, and their games have always FELT as if lore is their primary focus. The back stories are deep and rich, their characters are well developed and typically act as would be expected.

You gotta "pay" to play

There needs to be an in game cost to play a Death Knight or other heroic class. I'm sorry, but there REALLY needs to be a better way to gate the number of hero classes being played. Blizzard needs to reverse their policy of being granted a heroic class of equivalent level as the level required to unlock the class. This means you would have to be some level greater than 55 to get a level 55 DK. Personally, i believe it should be AT LEAST a 10-15 level cost, e.g. you are required to have a level 65-70 to earn a level 55 (really 58) DK. Under this system, the the number of heroic classes per account across all servers should be limited by the number of characters that have reached or surpassed the "unlock" level. The purpose of these gates are obvious: If there is no cost to play the classes, everyone will create them, flooding the realms with heroic toons, and defeating the purpose of the heroic toons

Power Balance

A heroic class' power, while solo (this is important as you'll see below) should be balanced to be equivalent to a vanilla class of equivalent level, or equivalent level + 1. If the equivalent level +1 is used, it should only persist until max level, at which point the class should be as powerful as a max level vanilla class, e.g. If a level 75 DK is as be balanced to equivalent level of a 76 vanilla class (e.g. warlock), then at max level a DK should have equivalent an equivalent power level to a max level warlock, or hunter, whatever.

If instituted, this would mean an overall nerf to the DK class since they currently out power other classes (except, potentially, the Paladin) of equivalent level by a level or two. They will, however, recieve a different kind of buff, discussed below.

Powering up as part of a group

Leadership bonuses are my idea for a new mechanic for making a heroic class feel heroic, and feel like leaders again, instead of just OP Mary-sue solo classes.

Heroic classes will have the ability to gain bonuses when they are the leader of a group, and grant bonuses to the other group members. This system goes directly back to how the hero units in WCIII worked: they were leaders that led groups of regular units. Here, the hero classes will lead groups of play controlled units. They will finally feel like leaders.

There are a variety of ways to implement this plan: There could just be a toggle (DK's a group leader, so they get a static bonus to some attribute), or the bonus could scale with party size (the DK group leader gets a 1% bonus in a group of 2, 2% bonus in a group of 3, etc). The hero class bonus could be different based on the characters build (Blood DK's get a regen, Frost DK's get an armor bonus, unholy DK's get a damage bonus). Not only would the hero class gain bonuses from being in a group, the group would also gain a small static bonus for having the hero class as a group leader (e.g. a small increase in dodge, damage, armor, threat reduction, etc). ALL classes should derive some benefit from these bonuses, e.g. a bonus to block would be a poor choice since the bonus would be useless to any non-shield using classes.

NOW look at how you feel about that guy playing hero class. When you get him or her in your party, hey, we get a boon. We WANT you in our party, and we WANT the hero class to be the leader, cause EVERYONE gets something. If the frost DK is the party leader, and the tank, the bonuses to the DK should help him tank better. Forcing the DK to group to get his hero bonuses would hopefully help encourage more responsible game play by the hero classes, because if they act like asshats in a group, the other party members will not want to group with the DK/other hero class anymore, and if they don't get to group, they don't get the bonuses, and then you're just another class.

However, this system should NOT be taken to an extreme. It should of minor benefit to the group and more pronounced benefit to the Hero class; Something that's nice to have, but not necessary. A situation should not develop in which a raid boss can't be beaten w/o a certain hero-class at the helm.

Blizzard is making a lot of changes to the system, including giving rewards to group leaders. Granting bonuses to group based on who your leader is shouldn't be much of a jump and I think will help (and I have more ideas on expanding this system to other classes, and RACES, and will blog more on that in the future). This system would solve the issue of hero classes being woefully unbalanced in solo play, but still let them stand out in the leader role that we would expect them to play. Adding the cost to their play (requiring the repeat of several levels) will hopefully discourage power-gamers from taking these classes and encourage REAL leaders to take the classes and bring the benefit to everyone else.

The Heroic Class dilemma, Part I

So when I said the announcement of a hero class was omitted in one of my previous posts, it got me thinking about what I expect from a hero class. The concept of the hero class in WoW comes directly from the hero units in WCIII, e.g. Human Paladin, Night Elf Priestess of the Moon, and the Undead Lich. Hero classes were very powerful units which were limited in quantity, expensive, leveled up with experience and "led" other groups of less powerful/valuable units into combat. The heroes also often granted bonuses to the units under their command. Since the first announcements about WoW (this is hear-say now, i wasn't interested in WoW at this point), the concept of the hero class was planned for the game, but wasn't included in launch. The concept of what they would be remained nebulous until the second expansion.

One of the most anticipated features of the Wrath expansion was addition of the WoW's first hero class, the Death Knight (DK). In my mind, there have been several versions of Death Knights in lore, but our PC class DK is based on the most recent version: the corrupted hero. Our prototypical hero here is Arthas, after his fall from the light in Northrend (If you're curious, the other prototype would be Teron Gorefiend, the soul of a shadow council orc warlock in a decaying human knight's body). A whole spectrum of feelings about DK's as a class exist, so saying "Everyone either loves them or hates them" is an oversimplification. But despite my feelings on them, I feel that Blizzard straight up FAILED when they released these DK's as a hero class.

Oh, if anyone was wondering what MY feelings on the DK are, then I'll state this for transparency: I hate them. I. Fucking. Hate. Death. Knights. But that's not to say I don't think that the class can't be salvaged and that's not what this post is about.

After some thought about what I would expect a hero class to be in WoW, I came up with the following list:

1. Most importantly, their play style and abilities should be unique and they should bring new mechanics to the game.
2. They should be appealing to the players and add new chapters and concepts to lore and improve game immersion.
3. They should be powerful, however the power differential should NOT unbalance the game play for OTHER players who choose not to play hero classes.
4. As with all power, there should be a COST to playing a heroic class. In WCIII, the units were expensive, but you got your first one free.
5. Hero classes should feel like group leaders, or bring buffs and/or abilities to their group, much in the same way the WCIII hero classes did, and THIS should be primary reason they are sought after in a group, instead of raw power.

Meeting all these criteria is a difficult chore. Points 1 and 2 aren't that difficult to accomplish, and not surprising, a good job was done here for the DKs. The rune/runic power system was brand new to the game, and the story line concerning the Ebon Hold is fairly well done (I don't think its Blizz's best story line, but it seems to be popular in the community as a whole).

However, the OTHER 3 points are where Blizzard failed the DK.

Addressing point #3: This is possibly the most difficult point to balance. The WCIII Heroic Units were MUCH more powerful than the non-heroic counterparts they led. This system works very well in an RTS, when one player controls all of these minions, but becomes VERY problematic in an MMO, when every unit is controlled by a player. In WoW, and EVERY MMO for that matter, everyone is playing to feel heroic. Should the original 9 classes now feel NON-heroic, because they're not playing DK's? No, of course not. But I feel this is exactly what happened with the DK: they're so powerful, the question becomes not "Do I want to play this?" but "Why would I want to play anything else?". However, a heroic class SHOULD feel more potent than a base class, because players need to feel that the cost they pay (see addressing point 4 Below) should be worth it. I believe that the solution to this shortcoming is found it point #5.

Addressing point #4: There is virtually no cost or sacrifice required to play a DK, or other heroic class. Currently You must have a toon of one of the base classes to level 55 to unlock the DK, at which point you can create as many DK's as you like on other servers, with a limit of 1 DK per server. This was changed from launch when you could only have a DK on THE SAME SERVER as your 55+ toon. In addition to having as many DK's as you like amongst the servers, you start the DK at level 55, and then are almost GRANTED the next 3 levels to get to Outland, where you level VERY quickly.

Addressing point #5: I think this is where Blizzard really dropped the ball. Based on the hero unit paradigm, the hero classes should be leaders. They should be strong buffing classes and even derive bonuses from being a member of a group or leading a group. Currently, the DK doesn't feel like a leader in the group, nor does it feel like the DK brings substantial buffs to the group (Horn of the North is too short lived, and Path of Frost is a gimmick). Instead, the DK just feels like an overpowered melee Tank/DPS class with a bunch of other tools that it doesn't need.

In my next post, I'll discuss some ideas I have for fixing the DK to make it a truly heroic class, and maybe pave the way for future heroic classes.

Dealing with the Plate-wearing Elephants in the room

For starters, I'm NOT talking about you warriors out there. You guys are fine the way you are.

And EVERYONE who's played WoW, especially players on the PvP servers, should know what I'm talking about.

Since the release of the 3.0.2, 2 classes have ABSOLUTELY DOMINATED the servers: DK's and Ret Pallys. Look at the server censes (Censuses? Censii?) and you should see an OBVIOUS trend, ~30-40% of players are DK's or Paladins (Numbers supported by various census sites). Anecdotally, I don't think i've been in a 5-man dungeon that hasn't had at least one paladin and one DK in it. I even ran ramparts once with my mage, a priest and 3 DK's. The VAST majority of these Paladins are Retribution build. I think its also the reason we see so very very many Horde players popping out BE's these days. I haven't started a Horde toon in over a year, but I'm betting a stroll around Org would show a LOT of BE's. On the plus side, the players who are sitting behind the screens on these toons are good role-players: The BE's in lore have a strong proclivity for douche-baggery, and these players are no different.

The Paladin problem showed up when they "Fixed" the retribution tree in 3.0.2. I don't know why they did this, I've never played a Paladin past level 15, so I have no idea what the talents there were like. I suppose they wanted to make a leveling build, maybe? Whatever the reason for the "Fix", this is half the reason that the PvP AND PvE environment has been such a pain in the ass. Ret Pallies are so powerful, no one wants to play anything else.

The Death Knight problem I think is a little more complex. Again, my experience PLAYING the class is very limited: I have one DK, she's level 58, and barely leaves SW and IF. To me, shes a mule and a blacksmith. That's it, and I'm okay with it. I personally HATE The way the class plays, but lots of people love it. The way the class plays is not what this post is about, the sheer NUMBER of DK's is.

The DK is a hero class. My next post has a set of guidelines about what that should mean. I won't enumerate them here, but The DK succeeds on counts 1, 2, and the first half of three, and fails on the later points. See more about my ideas for the heroic classes in the next post.

Like I'll mention, I think its okay for these characters to be marginally more powerful at levels except level 80. I can understand that, it makes the Hero class FEEL heroic at those levels. Also, I can even understand making them MUCH more powerful for a set time (e.g. a few weeks or months), at ALL levels, THEN giving them a planned nerf. This would get players to roll DK's initially, then rope things in later and let the classes normalize themselves again. If this was the plan, it hasn't happened. They remain OP'd almost 9 months following the release of the patch.

The problems DK's and Ret Pallys cause is that it has become very difficult to put a group together. DK's can tank, and Pally's can tank and heal. There are HORRID shortages of players playing these roles. If these DPS build weren't so popular due to being so damned OP, some of these players may play tanking builds, or maybe even healing builds. Hey, i know its a longshot, but every little bit helps. The players behind these screens may not give a shit about healing well, but they may make at least passable meat-shields to park in front of my DPS.

Essentially, this post is doing what the community of Non-plate wearers has been clamoring for months: NERF RET PALLYS. DO IT NOW! They're the single biggest problem here. I don't care how, just fucking DO IT.

As for DK's, I have a set of possible solutions, but they should be balanced to the rest of the classes, maybe a level above, but thats ALL!!

The developers know about these problems, the developers joked about these problems at Blizzcon. I just pray they get to it soon.

More to come soon.

-FrozenVoodoo