Boards›Gameplay

You all should stop careing about "balance" (an argument for prioritising game health)

Kai Guy··14 votes·6,055 views

Blatant Clickbait title I know, but hear me out here. Way to many players seem to care about the game being balanced more then they consider what makes for a good game state. Look Balance > everything is a god awful viewpoint to approach a moba with. Imbalance is necessary to have a fun and successful moba.

Let me express my Bias, here is what I want to see in a moba. All champions in the game have a place, Some might only live in low mmr, some might only be good in premade, some exist as a counter pick, but every champion has a spot they do well in. I want all classes to be viable, not necessarily equally viable but all of them should be available in any meta. I want a decent # of champions to competitive picks across various mmrs. The champions don't have to be the same champs across them, but I want to see a semi wide pool in each elo. I want every pick to have counter play, I want all players to have options to deal with anything thrown at them, a lot of folks wont, after all if you don't own a strong counter, or you don't play any then you don't benefit from a counter existing but that's on you as a PLAYER and not the games fault. Overall I feel this makes for a more fun and healthier game.

One of the key issues, I think its entirely fair for me to claim that Balance is not well defined or agreed on, many players have a different definition. It can mean 50% win rates, It can mean all champions are on the same power budget, Some want it to mean all champions enjoy the same viability. None of the previous examples are good for the game.

  1. Matchmaker is not god, teams are not going to be fair. It can try to make a on paper match that's close, realistically your going to run into games that the teams are not remotely even. Regardless of champion picks, games will be imbalanced just off player skill.
  2. Mobas require learning, you need to have simple champions for folks to learn the game on. If everything's super complex it makes the game less accessible to lower skill or newer players.
  3. 50% on everything is impossible in a team 5v5 game, again its already impossible to have fair teams so disregarding kits your never going to get all champions at the same win rates. If your asking for this your being unrealistic.
  4. All champions on the same power budget removes any incentive to learn complex champions. If the best case usage of a hard champ is the same as the best usage of an easy champ, there's no reward to learning the harder one, and the lower your personal skill the worse your gonna preform on them so you remove complex champions as viable picks in a high % of games.
  5. Not every kit is going to have universal viability. Some require teammates, some have bad synergy with other kits, its entirely OK for this to happen. A strong kit with a lot of bad matchups is a bad FP, but it will do well when ya snag it into one of the matchups it does well vs. Its ok for things to not be good all the time into anything, because you always have other options. Your never forced to play X. You do it because you want to, and if your picks not the best, its got a lot of meta counters you can reasonably expect to see all the time, the games not better by making your pick good vs everything or OK vs everything. A lot of folks absolutely hate when a champ can mitigate its weakness, take a look at how folks react to Yasuo Zoe.

Often times there are posts about Champion X being imabalanced, theres a lot of debate in some of these threads. I don't think its a great way to fix game health. the discussions tainted by bias, not everybody views balance as the same definition, and it rarely accounts for MMRS. (silver player complaining about LB. Diamond player, LUL GET GUD NOOB) Adopting a stance of game health first, it means that all MMRs need to be considered, Excessive Outliers need to be addressed in any MMR. Arguments should not be built on skill discrepancies, the assumption should always be between 2 equally skilled players, not a master smurf vs bronze 4. You wanna talk about if Yii is broken in bronze, needs to be a bronze yii vs bronze players. Theres a lot of numerical ways to value balance that will not make for a better or more fun game. Id like to see it get back to a point folks used the boards for posts like, I hate dealing with X rather then OMG BROKEN OP GUT X. I wish folks could ask for help and get a response that's helpful rather then LuL GET GUD.

If you disagree with me, that's alright. I would appreciate it if you would take the time to comment however, Provide your definition for what balance is, and please touch how it makes for a better game. If you just cant get over the gut reaction to me calling balance not inherently healthy, take some time and think about it. If you think the point of this post its to say GROSS IMBALANCE IS GUD. BLATENTLY OP IS OK, im disappointed in you, that's not remotely the case and I don't know how the hell you got that view if you actually read this post.

Tldr. Making a game that's fun, with high champion viability, for players across every skill is a better priority then numerical "balance"

32 Comments

Jbels9 votes

Nobody is complaining that the game is unbalanced. Everyone is complaining that the game is made completely unfun by the sheer lack of care for game experience that Riot has displayed. The sheer apathy they have exhibited in regards to lowering damage shows that they no longer care whether or not the game is fun, but how short they can make it so that Chinese internet cafe patrons can squeeze 2 games out of an hour of computer rental time instead of 1.

Kai Guy5 votes

I have to disagree a bit, there's a lot of folks complaining about balance. However your feeling the game health suffers due to Internet cafes is entirely the kind of discussion I would like to see posted rather then Champion X imbalanced and killing the game!

I want to encourage discussions about healthy/unhealthy gameplay where the goal is to be unbias or if ya don't want to do that then have folks be clear in their bias from the start. Id love to see intelligent threads rewarded and less FOTM Tilt threads get attention. So many non constructive posts get rewarded just for throwing mindless rage out.

Far as the net café thing, yea it might be part of the problem. I also think the goal of hitting highest possible demographic contributed as well to the decision to make game time shorter. I'm OK with them reducing game time but I think it was definitely overshot, i'm a season 1 player so that does color my opinion on things. I think its reasonable to assume that even net café users would rather get in 1 really good match and have league be in a better game state then 2 mediocre ones when its unhealthy. I think 30-40 mins a good average game length overall for league.

I don't really enjoy Tank metas, so % global damage reductions some folks are calling for is not something I want. Haveing said that it feels like the defensive itemization does need some love and the current combination of Keystone (electrocute being the worst offender imo), Ignite, Damage items really does feel a bit oppressive to me as a player. Id personally like Riot to bring back some items with decent defensive Auras, That team fight durability for all resulted in more engaging fights imo.

Anyhow, Id appreciate a response from ya on the topic of Balance vs game health and to hear what you view balance as.

Cavesloth1 votes

The game length and is not the problem, I had a game early this season before everyone figured out runes that was a fun comeback, and it felt like a much longer game. The snowball is the problem. A player once ahead has to outplay themselves in order to lose, not their opponent, and that makes the game about as fun as a knee to the groin.

ModWulf Helhammer4 votes

Question: why do you believe that your view point holds priority over theirs? (Disregarding the fact that your central premise as to why we have the current game state is wrong, but we’re gonna run with it for this conversation)

If Riot was catering to players who wanted fast paced games, then wouldn’t that mean they outnumber those who want more drawn out ones? Shouldn’t they pay attention to the larger portion of the player base then?

Jbels3 votes

[{quoted}](name= Król Wilk Sam,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=xTHza5jd,comment-id=00000001,timestamp=2018-08-09T23:14:34.918+0000)

Question: why do you believe that your view point holds priority over theirs? (Disregarding the fact that your central premise as to why we have the current game state is wrong, but we’re gonna run with it for this conversation)

If Riot was catering to players who wanted fast paced games, then wouldn’t that mean they outnumber those who want more drawn out ones? Shouldn’t they pay attention to the larger portion of the player base then?

League of Legends and Esports are much more lucrative in China. Tencent, the owners of Riot games, are a Chinese company. It might not be the entire reason, but it is most certainly significant. I don't attribute China to being the reason the game state is total ass, but I do attribute it to being the reason Game Length only gets shorter as the seasons go by.

DearPear5 votes

{quoted}

Nobody is complaining that the game is unbalanced.

Uh? Do you even read the boards?

Jbels2 votes

{quoted}

Uh? Do you even read the boards?

Do you? The amount of nerf damage threads is staggering compared to anything else. People are sick of this shit and it isn't changing. It won't change until after worlds, and if it changes at all, all the players who were pissed off about it might not even be here anymore.

SpecterVonBaren1 votes

You don't think people calling for damage to be nerfed isn't balance related?

Jbels1 votes

{quoted}

You don't think people calling for damage to be merged isn't balance related?

No, I don't. A balance issue implies that one side is way too heavy on the balance scale while the other side is too light. I cannot believe I have to explain why an issue that affects the majority of the roster and game isn't a balance issue, but a gameplay issue. Most people aren't complaining that damage is too strong in relation to other aspects of the game, they are complaining that damage is everpresent and that too many champions are reaching near one-shot status with an abusive combination of runes and items.

DearPear1 votes

{quoted}

Do you? The amount of nerf damage threads is staggering compared to anything else.

Yeah. So care to explain why you said

{quoted}

Nobody is complaining that the game is unbalanced.

?

Jbels1 votes

{quoted}

Yeah. So care to explain why you said

?

We now return to A Day on the Boards Part 4: I explain Hyperbole to someone with no actual response to my point other than to lampoon my hyperbolic use of the word nobody to describe a minority of people complaining on the boards. If I had said literally nobody, you would have something.

DearPear1 votes

{quoted}

If I had said literally nobody, you would have something.

Well, it's literally written "nobody"

SpecterVonBaren1 votes

{quoted}

Nobody is complaining that the game is unbalanced.

[zombie-brand-mindblown]

AirKingNeo4 votes

except a more balanced game means you have better game health.

Kai Guy2 votes

Im not sold on this. Hit me with your definition for Balance. I should clarify that Enjoyment and fun are factors of game health for me. As a game that's 100% balanced but is unfun is not healthy and will die. I think its possible to have balanced games that are unhealthy, I think its possible to have imbalanced games that are healthy. I may have a completely different definition of balance from you thou and that's part of the problem.

AirKingNeo2 votes

nothing overpowered as all fuck

Kai Guy1 votes

I think a healthy game state inherently implies nothing is overpowered as all fuck, it also would mean that things that are anti fun but balanced get looked at. If we make health the priority your issue of things never getting overpowered as all fuck is covered. Do you have any good argument for why Balance > Gamehealth?

A good state of game health to me implies nothing can be OPAF, that although acceptable to allow for some imbalance is never game breaking. Balance just for Balance sake is a mistake imo, plus theres so many different ways it gets defined by players its kind of a rubbish catch all term. I just don't see any reason to set a state of "true balance" as a good end goal for a moba and I think a huge # of veiwpoints on what is balanced are horrible for the game. 50% win rates on all champions as an example of a garbage view of what makes "balance"

Meep Man2 votes

Fun should be above everything, not balance. Balance should be a close neighbor still however, since fun and balanced are often closely connected. It's not fun to play against an unbalanced champion, so you have to at least have a minimum for what is and isn't balanced.

The real issue is no one knows how to have fun while losing anymore, and the game itself has been harder to have fun while losing lately due to how punishing the game is as of late due to an overall increase in damage.

Kai Guy1 votes

Gross imbalance is unfun. Imbalance here being any one champions power comparative to others. For further elaboration we do not need a SSBB Meta knight tier champion in the game.

It might not just be that no one knows how to have fun when losing but that its increasingly unfun for various reasons to lose.

Tormentula1 votes

The problem with your vision is players will complain either way.

to throw an example; A melee champ's playerbase into Pantheon

In your vision, Pantheon being a counter pick early to a lot of melee sounds decent and healthy, it means he's got a strong niche and reason to pick him as either a low elo stomper, or a counter pick to melee lanes regardless of his general statistics.

But on the other hand, you got the melee player that complains about feeling powerless against him, and the vast majority of other similar melee mains complaining. This results in panth getting toned down, either ruining his niche or making him just a little weaker at it.

Then you got the panth mains that will either feel powerless since his niche is weaker, or desire a better reason to pick him (OTPs feel shitty if they're only situationally good), and because there's a lot of champs in the game, you can see a competition between picks which can cause FOTM problems.

This results in several areas riot has to find a middle ground to please. This is part of what "balancing" is, finding that middle ground where everybody is happy, because if nobody or somebody isn't happy, then overall the game is still making people unhappy, add that situation to the other classes/champ players and you see the mess we're in.

If you just ignore that, then who is really getting happier? Leave panth the state he is, but everybody else is unhappy. Make everybody else happy, but then the panth players feel betrayed and leave. This is why they look for that 'balanced' middle ground. The state of the game is beyond just the champs, yes the state of the game needs fixed but that's a macro issue, what goes on with the champs are micro issues, with maybe some being so high of an issue they look like macros.

Zoe is a big problem in riot's champ design lately, but is she a macro issue with her doing too much damage? Or is the game a macro issue with damage sources being too high? She's a micro issue that needs fixed/reworked, the macro issue is the game itself. Most you could say is riot's philosophy change in champ designs is a developer macro issue.

I don't mean this post as a panth bias, i reserve my own opinion on him. You could probably just use any champ for this scenario and it'd fit for this example.

Kai Guy1 votes

Every champion in the game has a few dedicated OTPs, I don't think the game should be built with excessive consideration to them in mind. Constant compromise on game health to keep everybody happy is a mistake.

In my vision, in his current state panthy would see some # changes to be a beginners champion for a lane bully. He should be a bit weaker then options that require higher skill caps, he should fall off in team fights, and he should never be oppressive to the entirety of melee players to the point they all feel powerless. He should be a mix of a hard and soft counter, never just a hard counter to an entire class. He is pretty simple, his place pros and cons should be simple. If his kit proves to be problematic for the game health it needs to change. I realize this is literally doing what some people would call balancing the game. For him to be a healthy counter pick early to melees he would need to fall off and not be inherently a super hard counter.

Anyhow that's just my opinion on Panthy, Over all what I really want to say if any Niche or Meta champion is not good for game health it needs end. It could be "balanced" and its still shitty and unfun. Toss it out if it benefits health and enjoyment.

You cant make every champion good everywhere with every kit into all the things, its awful for the game. You cant cater to OTPs, their decision as a player to only do 1 thing because they enjoy it, that's their call. They shouldn't expect to be rewarded for it every game. If we value the OTP for one champion we have to do it for every champion. That's a mistake, that's a compromise that cant be made for a moba.

This results in several areas riot has to find a middle ground to please.** This is part of what "balancing" is**, finding that middle ground where everybody is happy, because if nobody or somebody isn't happy, then overall the game is still making people unhappy, add that situation to the other classes/champ players and you see the mess we're in.

Im a bit perplexed reading this last bit, I bolded the key points but it kinda sounds like your saying a focus on balancing the game from riots end has created a mess out of gameplay? If that's what your saying I feel that it supports my point that game health > "balance"? I would appreciate some further clarity on this.

ChargeItDownMid1 votes

[deleted]

Kai Guy1 votes

Break down "Balance" as something that is variable across elos then always target outliers. Get to a point community can Be ok with not every champion being good all the time in every elo. Most my issues the way folks define balance. To many folks demand 50% win ratios, the same max power in all kits, or that all champions need to be good in every mmr. For me, I feel that it hurts wider champion pool viability when you demand things are good in every mmr regardless of skill cap and skill floors. A bronze 5 skill player should not have mechanics required for a mechanically complex champion, this needs to be accepted as OK and not have that champion dumbed down to make them more accessible. "Beginner" Champs need to be fine to not see pro play on the flip side. Rule of thumb, exceptions can and should exist, a counter pick can be a beginner champion and this is ok. I just dislike a demand to make bland the champions kits and skill caps Or the belief that something balanced = healthy.

My issue is that to many folks treat balance as if its global, as if it makes for a healthy game state, and as if mobas benefit from true balance rather then perfect imbalance.

I don't want Gross imbalance, Im trying to be clear on this point. What I want is a focus on gameplay and to build first and foremost a rewarding game state. I don't want a compromise to make everything good into anything and for all champions to be a solid option in every comp/mmr.

ChargeItDownMid1 votes

[deleted]

Kai Guy1 votes

I think the game can be healthy and imbalanced, there's a lot more to lol then just on paper. Things fall apart across various mmrs for balance. This is why the priority needs to be healthy gameplay. Imbalance can be healthy, balanced can be unhealthy. To provide clarity For me Balance is related to equality in power curves and power budgets on paper, its about the way you go about building in game mechanics and stats with out consideration for player skill with the end goal of getting everything on similar state of power. Frankly I feel the term it self does not work in mobas,for me its not a style of game game that's balanced as to many random variables have a large effect that the on paper approach cant cover, you cant build a balanced moba with early game mid game and late game champions, the synergy and interactions between kits, the decisions available to players, all this matters a great deal more for engaging gameplay then balancing on paper.

Reading your reply's it really seems like your using Balance as a measurement of game health. Your definition of balance is probably closer to my definitions of healthy game state then it is to my definition of balance. It doesn't seem like your asking for everything on the same curve, or to have the same power caps, your not asking for win %s or pick %s, Is it accurate to say that you want a game that's rewarding and not unfair?

I am not trying to promoting imbalance as a inherent positive for game health, just as balance is not related neither is imbalance. Its just that there is a happy area in between unhealthy imbalance and true balance that a moba should live in to have good gameplay. I really feel that by almost every definition of "true balance" we get a un-fun Moba.

What i want to say is that the devs priority should be on a healthy game state over hitting true balance, and as a community I think we would have much better discussions if there was less arguments on balance or imbalance and more focus on is this healthy? Does mechanic X regardless of balance make for a better or worse game for players interacting with it?

flyingpeanut2501 votes

balancing around w/l rate is very bad. popularity/mastery on a champ fluctuates which makes w/r unstable. eg if a server only have OTP nunu players playing nunu, u can bet w/r will be higher than 50% for nunu in that server. atm they have linearized alot of gameplay in the name of balanced which making the game stale. damage is high but it is through runes and keystones. they scale on items so adds to snowball effect. Champ becomes vehicle for these keystones, u play keystone more than the champ. this leads to less skill expression and less diversity in style. you are only playing thunderlords rather than XXX champ.

for me balance is when a champ will shine when playing by its strengths and do bad on its weaknesses(counterpick or shortcomings). imo the definition of weakness has changed over the years. now its just defined as one shot or stun to death. A few occurances is find but if it is the only answer than game becomes very linear and very stale

Kai Guy1 votes

I agree W/L % is a AWFUL measurement for balance.

Linearization is also a negative in my book for game health.

I'm not quite sold on we play keystones not kits, but they do affect viability strongly and have to be watched for game health. Current game state with defensive vs offensive itemization options I think stuff like Conqueror and Electrocute are shaping the game a to much, thou I feel its more of a symptom then the cause of it myself.

I don't mind some cases or Rock Paper Scissors in matchups but not to any extremes. I think that the way league is set up it suffers if this is the way the game gets designed cuz lane phase matters, gold is needed on all classes to an extent, and jungle locks down a slot so lanes have to deal with their counters as best they can. I agree shortcomings are good aspects of a kit, but there should also be all rounders who make for fairly skill reliant lanes to prevent situations the games decided in a lobby between equally skilled players.

Thanks for taking the time to respond mate.

flyingpeanut2501 votes

rock paper scissor for champs was the old way. adc kill towers/tank, mage can wave clear/kill adc.... etc.... paper would have a hard time dealing with scissors before. Now the idea is lost nothing to fill the void, reworks and new champs only have solo plays concepts and do not have any big picture direction. there is no clear identity of whos rock or whos paper.

all rounders vs shortcoming is fine. you just need a number balance but riot lacks quality in this area. this is why we have a small viable picks pool/ require constant rework. overpowered all rounders promote 1v5 solo play mentality where as having obvious shortcomings can promote a team play aspect. teammates would cover your weakness.

for the playing keystones. base stats and dmg does matter, but the ease of utilizing the popular key stone has also become deciding factor. You will also play to maximize the usage of such keystones/runes. This will linearize a type of style or combo due to efficiency. runes/keystones should not be defining ur playstyle but only serve to supplement a person's unique style. When riot balance a keystone/rune to a specific range of champs, they are linearizing the playstyle of the those champs. And If I can't equally choose between keystone A and keystone B than they are not balanced and choice is just a illusion, should just pre-set the keystone to champion.

BestPudgeNA1 votes

[{quoted}](name=Kai Guy,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=xTHza5jd,comment-id=,timestamp=2018-08-09T22:40:15.156+0000) 4. All champions on the same power budget removes any incentive to learn complex champions. If the best case usage of a hard champ is the same as the best usage of an easy champ, there's no reward to learning the harder one, and the lower your personal skill the worse your gonna preform on them so you remove complex champions as viable picks in a high % of games.

So to sum this one up, Riot should balance around fun. But people wouldn't play harder potential more fun champs because Win rate?

K

Kai Guy1 votes

Not quite. its that putting all champions into the same budget where they have the same best cases is flawed. In checkers, all pieces are the same. In league, not all champions in their classes are the same, for example there are situationally stronger Bruisers, Some Adcs have a better best case so on paper they are superior options to other picks.

League is at its core is unbalanced. To give all classes the exact same best case, makes harder to use champions undesirable. They are inherently weaker picks, it requires more effort to get the same end result. When You have to make 5 or more inputs, to do what the other can do in 2 for the exact same best cases then its a disadvantage to play difficult champions. Its not really about win rate, the fact that your going to lose more often on hard champions Is just a side effect, If you subscribe to this style of balance then they are weaker picks. Standardizing the ceilings removes the reason to master difficult champions, plus factor in community response to you picking what is well knowen to be a inferior option? Its gonna suck a lot of fun out of the game. teamamtes gonna tilt if you underperform, even at your best your only as good as literally every other option.

Its less about fun more that its about being a handicap. There is no benefit to complexity when simplicity is just as good when played because simple champions are harder to screw up on. I truly feel that Gutting the skill ceiling to enable all basic champions to do just as well as complex ones is unhealthy for the game but some folks argue that it would be a better balanced game for it.

The compromise should be reliability vs best case use when building an individual power budget but there should be a reasonable level of not letting that gap get to big.

Thus I feel Game health should be the priority. Building a healthy game state with some imbalance, even with some rule breakers, its totally fine when its done right. Standardizing the entire champion rooster and its power budget to build a balanced game state does not make for a better game. The more you Cap the skill ceilings the less reason there is to play champions with high skill caps, if you think this is how you balance league your balanced game is killing skill expression.

Can you give me any benefits to trying to balance league around standardizing the skill cap and power budgets for every champion?

HJTBB1 votes

There is nothing fun about being removed off the game against Zoe, dying level 3 to Talon, or being killed by ignite 5 seconds after someone attacks you.

Kai Guy1 votes

Let me take this to an extreme. If everybody can one shot easily then the game is arguably balanced, how ever it would be unhealthy. Do you have anything relating to this discussion? That the games health should be the #1 priority even over the various styles of balance.<- That's my stance.

edit for clarity.

More from Gameplay

3 Refunds per season, upvote if you want 3 refunds per season.
Gameplay764 comments
7,167
votes
3 Refunds per season, upvote if you want 3 refunds per season.
Gameplay156 comments
3,510
votes
UPVOTE FOR URF
Gameplay606 comments
2,440
votes
Yes plz.
Gameplay456 comments
1,721
votes
3 Refunds per season, up vote if you want 3 refunds per season.
Gameplay114 comments
1,716
votes
When is ANYONE at riot going to address the awful new player experience?
Gameplay634 comments
1,383
votes

More by Kai Guy

Yo boards, lets talk balance
Gameplay142 comments
44
votes
Honestly, the playerbase trys to enforce a meta more then riot does.
Gameplay48 comments
41
votes
Lets try consolidating the ADC discussion.
Gameplay107 comments
39
votes
I feel shiv is a bit to strong, would like to see community and red feedback
Gameplay77 comments
36
votes
Add an EXP to Little legends that grows with getting 1st place.
Teamfight Tactics17 comments
22
votes
No disrespect intended but my main frusturations in lol come from players.
Gameplay33 comments
21
votes