Less variety, Better balance?

[RZetlin]

While Dawn of War gave us a lot units and races to work with, I feel that the balance in the game is less than to be desired.

Personally I would like to see Dawn of War 2 focus more on limited number balance units than giving us a large quantity of unbalanced units.

[Mirage Knight]

If weapons and units are done using TT as a reference point (i.e. standardized according to types and such), you can have a diverse number of units and still have balanced gameplay :)

[Versian]

In all honesty, I only play Single Player, so I can tolerate imbalance to a certain degree. A solution however is to have units do more stuff instead of just adding more units to an army.

Of course, I would like to see ALL the 40k units in DoW2

[konfeta]

Because everyone knows that tabletop turn based balance automatically converts into real time RTS balance.

Yup.

Totally.

Oh wait...

[The Witchking]

:rant: yeah I agree with konfeta...besides everyone allways complains about unfluffy stuff, well inn the fluff not all races are balanced :rant:

[Ap0k]

It would actually be a relatively straightforward port once you established a baseline for weapon cycle times and movement rates to operate around. Throw in a sprinkling of thought-process to get round the trickier game balance aspects and you'd have a fairly solid foundation to build on.

The game isn't going to be a port from tabletop to PC though, so that avenue of discussion is largely futile.

[konfeta]

Not to mention balance of the game is completely and utterly independent of how much it is based on table top or fluff. It depends entirely on the Relic's ability to make it balanced.

[Mirage Knight]

Witchking, we're talking TT gameplay here, not fluff.

TT gameplay and TT fluff are two entirely different things and the point of translating TT to RTS has been argued to death - with a couple of mods for DoW proving the naysayers wrong.

Frankly I'm all in favour of giving players more choices, because choice is good :)

[CorsairX]

if a unit is inbalanced then there is no choice

you build "X" or die simple as that

[HiveMind]

Yes, taking 40K's system rather than the classic RTS combat would make the game WAY easier to balance (and already mostly balanced, because everything already has balanced stats in TT) and wouldn't lose any flavour or gameplay. It would be the best course of action. However, Relic wants DoW2 to be different, so they've decided to give everything health and DPS - oh, hang on, hasn't that already been done before? Oh yeah, some game called everyrtsevermade. Ah well. As for the original question, more variety. Of course, both would be better, but it looks like we might have a good single-player mode for the first time since Vanilla, so the loss of Automatch while I wait for a patch to come out would be bearable if it meant I had more cool toys to play with.

[LoRd KoRn]

Oh_my_god...That is just the way WA went and many people lost interest in the game very fast.
Perfect balance doesn't make a game enjoyable by default.
Besides, vanilla DoW had a pretty solid balance state in its last version and had more options than WA. Still, WAs balance wasn't any better, it was even worse than DoW ever was befor (with a whole race beeing imba and not just single units). That also needed fixing over several patches. And while not delivering better balance it also made the game less enjoyable on the long run. That is NOT the way to go. The Warhammer 40k universe is so rich and deep, cutting it down even more than now would be like raping the license.

[verybad]

If weapons and units are done using TT as a reference point (i.e. standardized according to types and such), you can have a diverse number of units and still have balanced gameplay

That's a fantasy. For one thing there wouldn't be 5 editions of the TT game (and all the Codexes) if it were perfectly balanced, for another, the TT game is turnbased, the video game, obviously, is not. I think DOW has been done using the TT units and numbers as a reference however, certain tactics and options are available in Real Time that simply knock down TT based numbers however. You always have to make adjustments for balance, and in some cases those adjustments have to be large.

[firestorm]

you know, it IS possible to have both high variety and good balance.

it's just not easy...

[KPMaker]

Totally disagree, this is not SC2, and the balance is not the same, nor is the overall tactical feel from what we’ve seen so far the same.

I personally would love to see each race actually get every single unit per TT listings, yet also see Relic take their time with each race they add to the series. There are a few exceptions of course, Chaos being one, just too many units overall. Though, the SM Devs, IG Ratling Snipers & Rough Riders, Eldar Swooping Hawks, and so on… You would basically just a few more units per race as compared to DoW.


I see it the opposite, yet with the same end result; my formula is as follows:

More Variety, Longer Development (or more devs), Better Balance…

The 40K universe is just too diverse to limit it in a way that is similar to a game like SC2. Also, from the looks of things Relic is trying to go closer to TT as possible and make the series more tactical than DoW, thus my reasoning for the above mentioned formula.

Let’s face it, everyone’s dream would be all 10 races with expansions, pretty much fleshed out, and balanced really well.

[Mirage Knight]

That's a fantasy.

Try telling a ton of mod fans that they're just fantasizing about being able to enjoy better balance while having a lot more units to play with when compared to vanilla DOW.

I can easily pull up download figures for the people that have downloaded TTRU and DOW40k:FOK. Hint: the number exceeds 10,000.


I think DOW has been done using the TT units and numbers as a reference however, certain tactics and options are available in Real Time that simply knock down TT based numbers however. You always have to make adjustments for balance, and in some cases those adjustments have to be large.

So what exactly is your point? In the modding community it's an accepted fact that some elements of TT do not translate directly to RTS. Yet despite this limitation, several mods have worked at bringing TT to an RTS format and have proven rather popular as a result of using TT stats as a basis for core balance. Sure there's a lot of fine tuning involved, particularily with regard to build and research times, tier avalibility for units and weapons, etc. That's a given. But with proper adjustments and allowances, the result is superior gameplay, balance and far more units per race than vanilla DoW can ever offer.

[Win_Imperial]

Having a large number of races and many different unit types definetly complicate things as far as balance goes. I've never played Starcraft before, but I hear the game is very balanced and that may very well be attributed to the fact it has only three races.

[Mirage Knight]

So you're suggesting that DoW2 should only have 3 races based on rumours about a game that isn't out yet?

No thanks.

I'd rather Relic based unit and weapon stats and costs on an existing system that's been around for years and have as many races and units as they have the time to work in.

[Embrance]

First of all,a turn based game can turn to RTS like.See how Knights Of THe Old Republic worked for instance.It was actually turn based(dice rolls etc)but could be played in a real time manner.Also by limiting the choices and races players have you dont make balanced games.You make crappy games.Let alone that we are missing already like 60-70% of the TT choices already...

[TheLoneKnight]

I would rather have ridiculous variety rather than absolute balance. However, there is no reason that we cannot have a suitable level of variety combined with only minor imbalances.

That being said, using the tabletop as a base line and then modifying it as necessary would be an extremely convenient thing for Relic to do. All your units would be more or less as powerful as they should be starting off and whichever ones are wonky can be modified bit by bit until they're suitable.

It would be a heck of alot easier than simply arbitrarily coming up with all the statistics such as accuracy, range, movement speed, health, armour type, damage, how much randomisation, rate of fire, etc. all on the spot without anything but a guess.

[Mardhyn]

This question will definitely differ from group to group. There are the players out there who only play with friends, single player, and skirmishes. So to them if something is unbalanced(at least in their favor and not God mode, though that depends on the person as well) it doesn't matter much.(i.e. The SoB bug wouldn't bother a offline person)

Then there are the players who enjoy the multi player scene and want good balance.(Except when you include people with power trips or who like big win records) Catering towards this group would definitely go a long way towards a professional community.(which I fully support)

Now, both of these play styles could be catered too, there is a very slim chance its going to happen. As I mentioned above, seeing the professional scene prosper even at the cost of other things would be the better choice in my opinion.

It also brings up the discussion of, "do I have too many units". Because lets face it, not every unit is going to be the best. So if you have 100/100 SM units chances are in Multi-player(and lets face it, this is where the RTS gets its longevity) no more then 30 of those units will be used in a even match. And having units in but not being used is worse then having them not in.

(Sorry if this is a bit incoherent, I'm a tad tired at the moment)

[Joker1661]

I would rather have ridiculous variety rather than absolute balance. However, there is no reason that we cannot have a suitable level of variety combined with only minor imbalances.

That being said, using the tabletop as a base line and then modifying it as necessary would be an extremely convenient thing for Relic to do. All your units would be more or less as powerful as they should be starting off and whichever ones are wonky can be modified bit by bit until they're suitable.

It would be a heck of alot easier than simply arbitrarily coming up with all the statistics such as accuracy, range, movement speed, health, armour type, damage, how much randomisation, rate of fire, etc. all on the spot without anything but a guess.

I agree totally! i was thinking that one difference that might be hard to imitate from TT to RTS is fog of war. when it comes to ranges and such in TT, you dont have to worry about Fog of war. i'm just guessing that DOW2 will have fog of war tho...

[TheLoneKnight]

TT has fog of war as well, in a way. Line of sight and range both function more or less the same way as fog of war does in-game. If you were converting this, of course, you might have normal units' vision end shortly beyond their range while giving "scout" units like Scout Marines, Rangers or Deffkoptas dramatically increased visual range.

[Shakrith]

I would be all in favour of only three races if they were all implemented very well. I want to play DoW 2 and for it to be exactly as I imagined it would be in 40k, and this means depth, realism, and very well fleshed out features. In this sense, what I want is less variety in terms of races and settings, perhaps, and more variety in terms of detail.

[Mirage Knight]

Shakrith:

Fleshed out? You mean in terms of representing each race's units properly?

[Shakrith]

That's exactly what I mean. If races' units were all different, had a range of options for customisation both aesthetically and tactically, and the races themselves had a variety of such options. A game like that with more strategic and artistic intensity would be far better than lots of cast-iron identical races.

[ricolikesrice]

to please both the variety and balance crowd you could simply do it like this:

give a faction only (for example)10 different units in MP, but have 10 more for a total of (for example)20 in SP.

keeping the numbers of different units/upgrades/whatever low for multiplayer makes it a whole lot easier to balance to please the "competive" crowd.

having lots more units available in SP pleases the "variety" crowd who could care less about balance for e-sports/ladder/etc.

and as icing on the cake i simply hope DoW2 will feature easier/better mapping/modding tools/editor like starcraft/WC3 does.

in SC/WC3 it was all about opening the mapeditor and you could change the units specifics or invent whole new gamemodes via scripts.... it was easily possible for even the average gamer while DoW requires quite some skill with modding, i.e. a lot less players can do it. heck i personally havent seen a single SP campaign yet but maybe i missed something. for SC there was 1000s including SC RPGs and all other kinds of spinoffs.

if it would become easier to make your SP campaigns or MP modes with a good editor then the variety crowd could also in a matter of few hours simply make the game with the units they like for them and their friends to play online/LAN.

despite looking forward to SC2 i havent followed its development too much (too much hype turns me off) but from what i know thats exactly how SC2 will roll: balanced MP with fewer units but tons of extras in SP. just hope the SC2 editor is as good as the one that came with the original (or even better, like WC3) and even more so hope that DoW2 will be similar in that aspect.

[Shuma]

Try telling a ton of mod fans that they're just fantasizing about being able to enjoy better balance while having a lot more units to play with when compared to vanilla DOW.

You're fantasizing MK :p. Just kidding, aniway 'bout balance it is possible to have good balance and variety, y'know what i'm talking 'bout, WH40k races, most of them are very varied and i can already see DoW 2 attempting this, so far we have 2 races that are completly diferent one from another, Marines and Orks, relic can balance they just need to stop making expansion after expansion, after expansion, balance one game and THEN add another race. I have faith in relic that DoW 2 will be balanced.

[Avykins]

I would rather have variety however I dont think balance should be too much of a problem by now. If indeed they are starting with the basic races Space Marines, Chaos, Orks, Eldar and its a pretty safe bet that the first 3 are must haves. Well then this will be the 5th game of the series. After all the mods and patches and stuff if they still havn't got it figured out then I will be very surprised indeed.

[cannonfodder]

If I had to choose, I would pick balance. Variety is nice to look at and all such, but frankly, for actual gameplay, balance means a lot more.

Of course, variety is always welcome!

[Win_Imperial]

So you're suggesting that DoW2 should only have 3 races based on rumours about a game that isn't out yet?

Where did you get off that I was suggesting the game only have three races? I was simply stating what affect variety has on DoW compared to another gamwe that doesn't have much. I would much rather have more variety than balance because I'm not really a competative online player.

[RZetlin]

One approach to this is to have few races and several factions inside.

It can work like the Tau tech tree in DoW 1 - where you have to choose one unit over another.

[Mirage Knight]

Win_Imperial:

Sorry - misunderstanding there :)