Is anyone concerned about Multiclass/Single Class Balance?

[Guest]

Well, the word that Josh consistently uses when discussing this topic is “feel”.

 

If you don’t believe me, watch a dev Q&A and make a drinking game out of it

 

EDIT: potentially helpful

 

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ZGv_-a8GBhY

https://kotaku.com/how-to-balance-an-rpg-1625516832

Edited April 5, 2018 by Achilles

[Lamppost in Winter]

Also drink anytime he says "cool"

[Guest]

Also drink anytime he says "cool"

smh

 

Man, you just killed someone.

[Gregorovitch]

 

If priests were bad ass and rogues completely suck, they would feel ripped off.”

How are you able to make that comparison when you are evaluating them by different metrics? What are the scales here?

 

 

The scale is effective contribution to the party's success. In PoE for example Durance was far more effective than any rogue. I haven't done a mathematical analysis to demonstrate that, I just know it from experience, but I have no doubt it could be proved. I would not be surprised if the additional damage output across the party from from just Dire Blessing casts alone amounted to more than a single rogue's damage output for the whole game.

[Yosharian]

 

 

If priests were bad ass and rogues completely suck, they would feel ripped off.”

How are you able to make that comparison when you are evaluating them by different metrics? What are the scales here?

The scale is effective contribution to the party's success. In PoE for example Durance was far more effective than any rogue. I haven't done a mathematical analysis to demonstrate that, I just know it from experience, but I have no doubt it could be proved. I would not be surprised if the additional damage output across the party from from just Dire Blessing casts alone amounted to more than a single rogue's damage output for the whole game.

Not to mention the DPS increases from protecting the entire party from Terrify, Confuse, Charm, Dominate, Paralyze, etc etc

[Mannock]

The scale is effective contribution to the party's success. In PoE for example Durance was far more effective than any rogue. I haven't done a mathematical analysis to demonstrate that, I just know it from experience, but I have no doubt it could be proved. I would not be surprised if the additional damage output across the party from from just Dire Blessing casts alone amounted to more than a single rogue's damage output for the whole game.

But then it's just down to everyone's "experience" and how they "feel" and whatnot. And thereby it's just down to subjective interpretations which will be all over the place since there are as many opinions as there are players. Some will say rogue is the best and some will say rogue is the worst. A discussion of balance becomes meaningless if there is no common ground to agree upon.

[bonarbill]

 

 

 

If priests were bad ass and rogues completely suck, they would feel ripped off.”

How are you able to make that comparison when you are evaluating them by different metrics? What are the scales here?

The scale is effective contribution to the party's success. In PoE for example Durance was far more effective than any rogue. I haven't done a mathematical analysis to demonstrate that, I just know it from experience, but I have no doubt it could be proved. I would not be surprised if the additional damage output across the party from from just Dire Blessing casts alone amounted to more than a single rogue's damage output for the whole game.

Not to mention the DPS increases from protecting the entire party from Terrify, Confuse, Charm, Dominate, Paralyze, etc etc

 

 

scrolls

[JerekKruger]

 

The scale is effective contribution to the party's success. In PoE for example Durance was far more effective than any rogue. I haven't done a mathematical analysis to demonstrate that, I just know it from experience, but I have no doubt it could be proved. I would not be surprised if the additional damage output across the party from from just Dire Blessing casts alone amounted to more than a single rogue's damage output for the whole game.

But then it's just down to everyone's "experience" and how they "feel" and whatnot. And thereby it's just down to subjective interpretations which will be all over the place since there are as many opinions as there are players. Some will say rogue is the best and some will say rogue is the worst. A discussion of balance becomes meaningless if there is no common ground to agree upon.

If a given class is obviously worse than others there isn't real debate. Everyone knows it. If there's heated debate like you describe then, for a single player game, balance is in a pretty good place (see PoE).

[Mannock]

If a given class is obviously worse than others there isn't real debate. Everyone knows it. If there's heated debate like you describe then, for a single player game, balance is in a pretty good place (see PoE).

But for something to be "obviously worse" there have to be some common metric to compare classes against. But so far, everyone here has stated that such thing either doesn't exist (it's more than just damage output) or is not applicable (the priests priest and the rogues rogue).

 

And this is the Internet. You can be very sure you will never reach a point where everyone agrees on something.

[JerekKruger]

There doesn't need to be an objective metric (though they can be useful in discussion). If a large majority of players agree that a class is under/overpowered (by their own internal metrics) then it's with the devs looking at. If there's healthy debate about a classes power is probably not. We don't need everyone to agree.

Edited April 6, 2018 by JerekKruger

[Yenkaz]

 

If a given class is obviously worse than others there isn't real debate. Everyone knows it. If there's heated debate like you describe then, for a single player game, balance is in a pretty good place (see PoE).

But for something to be "obviously worse" there have to be some common metric to compare classes against. But so far, everyone here has stated that such thing either doesn't exist (it's more than just damage output) or is not applicable (the priests priest and the rogues rogue).

 

And this is the Internet. You can be very sure you will never reach a point where everyone agrees on something.

It's very much a qualitative judgement rather than quantitative thing. If you can look at a character and not mention a *useful* addition they add to the party by the grace of their abilities, then that needs to be addressed.

 

Balance between each class isn't so important, unless it's extreme skewed. If you can point to your cleric and go "they buff and heal my party which increases outcomes directly" or "my Herald does significantly less damage than my fighter/rogue, but they buff the entire party with passive AOEs and provide meatshield summons in difficult battles, so they're still really useful" - then there isn't a problem.

 

If you you have a pure rogue and it isn't at the very least *situationally* more damaging than a fighter even if you do positioning and status debuffing well, and it has no other additions like the Herald, then the devs will notice players noticing that their characters are basically glass pea shooters, not that most players notice a specific DPS.

 

This is role playing, and people want their characters able to fulfil a palpable role in combat.

Edited April 6, 2018 by Yenkaz

[Mannock]

There doesn't need to be an objective metric (though they can be useful in discussion). If a large majority of players agree that a class is under/overpowered (by their own internal metrics) then it's with the devs looking at. If there's healthy debate about a classes power is probably not. We don't need everyone to agree.

When do you reach the critical mass of a majority? When 5 people vs 2 people says so in a thread on this forum? People writing on forums are not respresentative of the entire player base.

 

My point is, you will never get anywhere near any sort of consensus on this.

[Mannock]

It's very much a qualitative judgement rather than quantitative thing. If you can look at a character and not mention a *useful* addition they add to the party by the grace of their abilities, then that needs to be addressed.

 

Balance between each class isn't so important, unless it's extreme skewed. If you can point to your cleric and go "they buff and heal my party which increases outcomes directly" or "my Herald does significantly less damage than my fighter/rogue, but they buff the entire party with passive AOEs and provide meatshield summons in difficult battles, so they're still really useful" - then there isn't a problem.

 

If you you have a pure rogue and it isn't at the very least *situationally* more damaging than a fighter even if you do positioning and status debuffing well, and it has no other additions like the Herald, then the devs will notice players noticing that their characters are basically glass pea shooters, not that most players notice a specific DPS.

The initial discussion revolved around the "average monk player" saying his class sucks compared to wizards (or whatever). And from there it evolved into how, and on what basis, you compare the classes and determine how one class sucks compared to another class.

 

But I agree with you that it is meaningless to talk about balance between classes in a single player RPG (balance in the sense that they should all be equally good and/or counter eachother). They should have somewhat distinct functions (with a lot of classes, some will be variations of eachother of course) and they should all be viable as to complete the game on normal/classic difficulty option. That's all you really can strive for.

[Guest]

 

There doesn't need to be an objective metric (though they can be useful in discussion). If a large majority of players agree that a class is under/overpowered (by their own internal metrics) then it's with the devs looking at. If there's healthy debate about a classes power is probably not. We don't need everyone to agree.

When do you reach the critical mass of a majority? When 5 people vs 2 people says so in a thread on this forum? People writing on forums are not respresentative of the entire player base.

 

My point is, you will never get anywhere near any sort of consensus on this.

And yet somehow we do.

[JerekKruger]

That's for the developer to judge, and it's pretty clear that, at least, Josh read other forums (SA and Reddit, possibly others). Sure, the whole online community for Deadfire won't be representative but I suspect that those who don't discuss the game online aren't all that bothered about balance anyway.

[Mannock]

And yet somehow we do.

Yeah, except for all the nerds that disagrees.

[Guest]

 

And yet somehow we do.

Yeah, except for all the nerds that disagrees.

Yeah, there are always a handful of holdout that bear grudges because their overpowered favorite class got “nerfed” (*ahem*), but I think Josh accepts that he’s never going to make everybody happy.

 

I also think he accepts that “tuning” is something he could spend another year doing and never get 100% right. At some point “good enough” has to be good enough.

[flazeo25]

Im suppose that take a while for them to be balanced with each other given singleclass now have more ability points.

[SonicMage117]

@Mannock

 

Exactly right.

 

It's safe to say that the Obsidian community will always be divided, that isn't to say that one side is any more discredited than the other. In most cases, the less popular is treated as so but oh well, this is one of the lesser trafficked forums among gaming communities so if one is looking to have their vouce heard to the public, it's not exactly the best place.

When do you reach the critical mass of a majority? When 5 people vs 2 people says so in a thread on this forum? People writing on forums are not respresentative of the entire player base.

 

My point is, you will never get anywhere near any sort of consensus on this.

Correct, it's silly for any side to believe that their side is correct, especially when it's the same 5 or 6 people arguing on every thread on any given subject. There's never a "victory", it's usually a mess of a thread going on for pages and ultimately winding up in petty insults and blind fire when one of the sides runs out of ideas.

 

If a group of passionate people feel like they have to gang up to defend their point against one of two people, it doesn't mean that they are the majority (since this part of the forum doesn't have many active members anyway)... Despration calls for act.

 

The scale is effective contribution to the party's success. In PoE for example Durance was far more effective than any rogue. I haven't done a mathematical analysis to demonstrate that, I just know it from experience, but I have no doubt it could be proved. I would not be surprised if the additional damage output across the party from from just Dire Blessing casts alone amounted to more than a single rogue's damage output for the whole game.

But then it's just down to everyone's "experience" and how they "feel" and whatnot. And thereby it's just down to subjective interpretations which will be all over the place since there are as many opinions as there are players. Some will say rogue is the best and some will say rogue is the worst. A discussion of balance becomes meaningless if there is no common ground to agree upon.

As always, the rpg crowd is hardest to please. Everyone's experience is different, nobody will agree 100% because ultimately they have their own idea of what "balance" should be. And these threads is a great example of that.

 

There are so many threads right now about how screwed up the balancing is, then there is the opposing force who are doing everything they can to justify it.

 

Realistically, if there are that many complaining about, Obsidian will see this as something turning out wrong. The devs are going to read the thread by the OP themselves, but smart enough to stay away from reading the comments to avoid the atrocious comment wars.

Edited April 6, 2018 by SonicMage117

[Boeroer]

I have 50% wrong-to-correct conversion. But it only lasts for 20 secs so I try not to write too lenghty posts.

[rjshae]

 

 

And yet somehow we do.

Yeah, except for all the nerds that disagrees.

Yeah, there are always a handful of holdout that bear grudges because their overpowered favorite class got “nerfed” (*ahem*), but I think Josh accepts that he’s never going to make everybody happy.

 

I also think he accepts that “tuning” is something he could spend another year doing and never get 100% right. At some point “good enough” has to be good enough.

 

My expectation is that the system will start to achieve a decent balance and some level of stability by the time PoE 3 comes out. The first two are experiments in new system design, and we're the beta testers. But hey, as long as it's enjoyable, I don't mind.

[SonicMage117]

I just like to write a lot lol