It’s fascinating to me what an incredibly difficult process it is to balance multiplayer RTS games.
What does “balance” mean? For the purpose of this discussion, balance means every unit is useful in the right circumstances. Balance means there is no one perfect strategy, or one perfect unit mix, that works all the time.
I know Warcraft 3 like the back of my hand, since I’ve played it so much, and even after five patches-- we’re at 1.05 now-- the balance is still being significantly tweaked to address the numerous min-max exploits that 50,000+ players beating on the game non-stop have slowly but surely developed.
Based on the real world experiences of the RTS games I’ve played extensively online, balancing your game is evidently a herculean task. I mean a task that can take OVER A YEAR after the game is released! Holy… crap. That puts “when it’s done” in perspective, doesn’t it?
It’s gameplay darwinism-- you tend to use (and abuse) strategies that other players use to defeat you. Over time, this process guarantees “ideal” unit mixes which cover the majority of the games you’ll play. This runs counter to the design directives of any RTS game. Why have units in the game that nobody uses? Why have “uber” units that guarantee victory 90% of the time? Clearly no game designer wants this. Heck, as a player, I don’t want this!
I don’t want this to turn into a WC3 specific thread; I can cite examples of this from Total Annihilation as well. The big difference in that case is that Cavedog didn’t do a very good job of balancing their game-- they provided some cursory, lackadaisacal balance “patches” in the form of new units, for example the flakker anti-air cannon. But that was about it. Whereas Blizzard has a sort of implicit company policy that they will do whatever it takes to balance their games. Sometimes this means sweeping fundamental changes or “nerfs”.
Anyway, I encourage any other RTS online players with significant experience (read: 50+ games under your belt) to chime in on this topic.
Here’s the specifics on the WC3 changes coming in the expansion. Current balance problems with WC3 involve massed spellcasters, which are WAY too effective. And they eat level 3 melee units for breakfast courtesy of focused fire and pierce attack bonuses.
Looks like there are some MASSIVE changes coming, which almost rewrite the rules for how the game is played at even the casual battle.net level:
http://www.warcraftreplays.com/forums/showthread.php?threadid=6359
BALANCE OVERVIEW
Most spellcasters (Sorceress, Priest, Shaman, Witch Doctor, Necromancer, Banshee, Druid of the Talon) have been re-balanced and given new armor and weapon types. All of these casters, as well as Dryads, now have “Unarmored” type armor, which means they take additional damage from Piercing and Siege attacks. Additionally, all of these casters (but not Dryads) deal Magic damage, which works much like Piercing, except it does additional damage against Medium armor instead of Heavy armor.
Most advanced technology structures have had their build times reduced. This reduction ranges from 20 seconds for especially underused structures, to 10 seconds for less underused structures. For instance, the Slaughterhouse builds 20 seconds faster now, while the Arcane Sanctum build time was only reduced by 10 seconds.
Units can become ethereal in certain situations. Ethereal units can only be damaged by Magic attacks (from casters such as Sorceresses, Banshees, etc) and by spells. Ethereal units cannot attack, but can still cast spells.
Magic-immune units cannot be attacked by units with the Magic damage type, such as Sorceresses, Banshees, etc.
Gold bounties given for killing creeps have been SIGNIFICANTLY reduced, especially on lower-level creeps.
The gold costs of all units and buildings have been reduced by roughly 15%.
Auto-cast buffs have been rebalanced with new mana costs, and in some cases such as Curse, have been slightly upgraded.
Night Elf Ancients now have Heavy armor when uprooted.
Thunderclap slow duration and strength have been tweaked so that the slow effect lasts 5 seconds at all levels, and decreases attack speed and movement speed by 50% at all levels.
Entangling roots, ensnare, and other immobilizers no longer prevent units from town portaling.
Many more minor tweaks to units and abilities…