Yet Another Balance Thread (June 2014)

Since Jon is asking us so nicely, I'll start a new thread for complaining about balance.

First, let's talk about goals. I interpret how the item formula works combined with this:

(source)
to mean that the power of a card increases an item's level while its complexity increases the item's rarity. This may not be exactly what BM means, but it is MY goal for balancing items: high rarity items should be more complex, not more powerful than other items at their level.

Another factor is having duplicates of a card on an item. Homogenous items (3 or 6 copies of a card) are either extremely good (Vibrant Pain,Heartripper,Slippery Shield) or extremely bad (Mindless Aggression,Hawlic's Surging Shield, Ulrin's Scuttling Socks). These items are almost never balanced. And it's clear BM saw a problem here, because the item formula looks at duplicate cards and raises the rarity by one for 3-5 copies, and by two for 6 copies. But this is backwards (these items are much simpler than items without duplicate cards) and it makes the most powerful items hard to get, pushing the game towards pay-2-win (or at least the appearance of P2W). Also, many of these items would have been Legendary without the rarity boost, so the rule isn't actually affecting them. I don't have a good solution for balancing the existing items, but I would like BM to promise "no more homogenous items".

The other reason we have balance problems is because many cards have poorly chosen values. BM is very hesitant to make any changes to card values, because that will change item levels, token costs, and rarities. But I believe it needs to be done, and we should look at all the cards together to see how everything compares to everything else, then test it extensively on the test server.

Official card table
My thread showing them in charts (does not include AotA yet)

 

I like what you're saying about rarity.

I also think that something very funny happens with card rarity, where rarer things are actually more common than they should be. Take Vibrant Pain, or Heartripper. These homogenous items are legendary because they have so many of the same rare. But when you look at the deck of a character using one of these items, the rare card is more abundant than basically any common or uncommon in that deck! I agree with you, Kalin, that homogenous items are just bad; they're sweet from a gear design and loot chase perspective but they end up subverting the whole point of rarity beyond the loot chase. Bleneth's Skull is another one—isn't Mass Frenzy supposed to be a rare effect?

 

Can we add Bewlin's Baffling Bauble to the list? Getting hit with Short Perp 11 times in a match is a bit absurd.

 

Perhaps, but on the plus side it surely decreased your vulnerability to Punishing Bolts.

Back toward the topic: How is card rarity determined? I've been checking out the vampiric cards and really don't understand why they're rated as they are.

Code:

                                                  # Cards
                                                     on
Name              Range Damage  Rarity  Quality   # Items
Sapping Touch       1     2       R      Paper    16 on 10
Draining Touch      1     3       U      Paper    12 on 10
Spear of Darkness   2     3       R      Bronze   30 on 18
Consuming Touch     1     4       R      Paper    17 on 12
Enervating Touch    1     5       U      Bronze   11 on 10
Invigorating Touch  1     6       C      Gold      9 on 7

Note: Duplicates (holiday items & Flax's Vial) are not included in the totals.

Invigorating Touch, the only common, shows up the least on the fewest items. The uncommons are the next least represented. Spear of Darkness, a rare, appears most often on the most items.

Complexity shouldn't be an issue. With the exception of range 2 on Spear of Darkness they all do exactly the same thing with different damage totals.

Quality rating for the last 3 entries:
Damage
4 = Paper
5 = Bronze
6 = Gold
What happened to Silver?

An enlightening revelation would be appreciated.

 

I think rarity on many cards is assigned based on what Blue Manchu wanted one or more items with those cards to be, rarity-wise. E.g. Able Bludgeon, is it any more complex than all the common Bludgeons? Not at all, but it shows up on rares and epics in order to keep those items rare/epic. :|

 

and yet Hawlic's Handy Axe has a common (Weak Chop) - a pretty underwhelming one at that. :I

 

Do you want most of the items remade..? I think balancing cards is good enough, don't really care about card colors.

 

As far as I know, Hawlic's Handy Axe is the only Legendary that has a common card among its card set. And it's not like the other five cards (save for the one Nimble Strike) are game-shattering.

 

I really dont think we need to balance card colors at all. The colors are just that, useful guide toward the card's power. It is helpful when initially starting out and balancing the game. BM probably used it to fit card on items based on spreadsheets etc.... Once we have reached the fine-tuning phase, there is no need to adjust card color. We will only need to adjust card deck (for Fixed deck enemy) and item card (for MP).

Now the solution seems easy, just take some Nimble Strikes out of Vibrant Pain and stuff in other card. How hard could that be ? It's actually very hard.

Jon has mentioned multiple times the hesitation he feels when attempting to change item. The last balance change touched upon was the nerf for drawing machine (Inspiration, Altruism). Even then, Jon feels like that would be the last major balance change he would like to make.

So I started to feels like what we have to do is to convince Jon otherwise. We need to convince Jon that changes is needed. Without it the game might be daed soon (daed emphasized)

AotA is really good and provided many different cards and scenario to the games. It provided several counters to annoying cards currently in the meta. Wings Of Faith counter Wall of Stone, Stone Feet Counter Whilrwind. I have a feeling this is Jon's intention when he introduced these card. Simply because he wanted to balance the game without changing actual existing item. But simply put, it doesnt work. A counter must be made cheaper and at least as widely available as what it is countering. And it's simply not the case with some of these new cards. It changed the meta very little.

The major hurdle toward balancing a loot-based game is the fact that you are changing items people have worked very hard to acquire. I agree with this. Game like Diablo or Path Of Exile change item all the time but still allows "legacy version" of these items which are unchanged. This is unacceptable for CH. I guess a compensating system for changing someone's items is the only solution here. It might take some dev time, but it is really worth it since it allows items to be changed freely.

 

In no way does it change your point, but wanted to clarify that fly does not allow one to go over blocking terrain (like Wall of Stone).

 

Balance is best achieved not by removing powerful items/cards, but by both keeping them difficult to get AND varied. If there were 25 weapons all legendaries that were all as (or nearly as) desirable a Vibrant Pain (VP) it would be fine. But when there are so few items that are truly "All-Star" items it becomes a have or have not.
Designing a build is similar to constructing a sports team (I will use basketball since each player has approximately equal responsibilities but it could work the same for Football (minus the QB) or soccer or hockey (minus the goalie/keeper). Just having all of the best is impossible because of a limitation of resources (either salary in sports or tokens for Card Hunter) and even if you could it doesn't always work because the parts need to work together. Taking financial concerns aside while you would be unlikely to trade the best (e.g. VP or LeBron James) but in the case of the NBA you would still consider trading LeBron for Durant or Chris Paul, but there really aren't any other weapons that you would consider trading a VP for and that is the issue.
So then the decision is do you create other items that are equally OP therefore making an entire tier of OP items or do you bring the top items down so there is a tier of top items that are strong but not overpowering everything else. Either way would work, more OP is fun, no OP makes being a top MP player available to those who aren't "hardcore" players. But since I see making a group of new OP cards difficult below are my balance suggestions.

 

I do like that many of the new AotA cards are helpful in dealing with some of the balance issues, but unfortunately fall short. Pushback Parry is a great idea to help against step attacks, but on many maps a Nimble Strike can get around a player to make the attack unblockable. I wish there was a card "Hearing Footsteps" that the card is triggered no matter facing if some uses a step attack. I haven't checked but there still seems to be no counter to a Wall Of Stone, it would be nice if there was a handful of weapons/ divine weapons that have a card let's call it "Jump" allowing you to step over any over a space of any terrain type or "Crush Wall" that gets rid of a single blocking terrain. I know if you have Greenguard Boots you can have Teleport Self but it is one card on one item (that has a drawback) when there are 21 items with Wall Of Stone, with the potential for 16 Walls of Stone per Wiz.
As for Whirlwind I don't think it is as OP as everyone says, but I think for WWE Line of Sight (LoS) should be required since it is targeted not global. The issue with WW is not so much the effect as the ability to do it again and again drawing blocks and movement each time. Someone else wrote in a different balance thread that if any block was successful for a WW it should block the spell dead which I think makes sense, especially when Duck makes it possible for 1 card to turn into 2 or 3 (which I have never seen happen due to the rarity of Duck). There are many good suggestions otherwise, but it is the spamming of it that I think is the biggest issue.
For step attacks (over 2 steps) if you really want to have a balance that makes sense there should be an exhaustion penalty. For each step beyond the base racial movement, adds 1 of encumbrance. Meaning if a Dwarf used a NS they would then have Encumber 2, Human Encumber 1 and Elves would not get penalized, but otherwise still be a normal card attachment. IMHO this would be balance out the races (from a Warrior perspective) and would not take away the power of the cards, just the ability for hardy Dwarven warriors to fly around (again and again) and attack in a Blind Rage. Of course you could do a simpler Encumber 1 (preferably stackable, meaning you could have more than 1 of the same card type as an attachment) but I like the racial component.
For Impenetrable Nimbus I don’t think a change is needed, but I think reducing all damage from a single source to 1 would be more realistic (at least in MP, it is very hard to do 1 HP quests w/o nimbus). For Winds Of War I think the range should be shortened, and/or the number of targets should be reduced to 1. I would propose a range of 3 (equal to the slide distance) forcing wizards to be more vulnerable to use.
Last card I will call out here (because I have spent way too much time typing this) is SPR Short Perplexing Ray. Like Whirlwind I don’t think the issue is the card itself but the fact that wizards can be stocked with so many of them. It is a very basic 2-1 card advantage that makes Dwarven Wizards too hard to kill (especially without a wiz of your own), but in general gives a distinct advantage to the caster, which once or twice a match is annoying but when it becomes 4+ times it becomes dominating. Yes it is block able but it just becomes potentially the most powerful card in the game for MP. A moderate nerfing would be to have it only discard 1 card up to 5 range and 2 cards is only for touch (or maybe 2 range) and when used at touch range it can be blocked be melee blocks. If it were possible to have only up to 4 per wizards (e.g. only on Arcane items and no more than 1 per) it would be fine but the fact that you could have up to 15, granted I don’t think anyone has 4 Bewlin's Baffling Bauble it is fairly reason able to have 6-8 which is still very hard to overcome (since it is really tough to have 6-8 blocks that would trigger for SPR) and just winds up meaning that the player with the most SPR wins.

 

Finally Dwarven Wizards are OP 25 HP plus 2 Toughness for a ranged character is simply unbalanced. I know this is a part of the fundamental game design, but it is literally out of balance. With the exception of few racials there is almost no reason to play an Elven Wizard and few to play a human wizard. I do not expect this to change, but I would see wizards with 17,19, 21 HP; Priests and Warriors there is no reason to change (from what I've seen).
I do not think I have a monopoly on good ideas or reason. I know Stexe has been looking into this much more than I have and there are others who play much more than I do (at a higher rating) that might have a different view, but I thought I should share what I believe to be reasonable and logical changes to offer balance and I hope this gets read and replied to. I broke this up into three posts to make it easier to reply/quote if desired.

 

I really would welcome to bring fly on the same level as teleport, regarding the possibility of passing a stonewall. Teleporting remains the domain of the mages, while AotA added flying to the support a priest can provide. Flying aura was just too fragile to impact the matches and an adjustment to bring Fly further into play would be nice.

Some short check-ins on other topics: I feel...
That dwarf hp could indeed be reduced.
Whirlwind Availability could be reduced globally or both cards should demand a discard. 2 WWE a round and still movement to evade? Now unlikely.
The most easy step in the right direction would be to change it from "magic arcane" to simple "magic", so the hard-to-block-boni of traits wouldn't apply.
Mass Frenzy needs to be toned down, be it duration or damage bonus.

I don't care about other cards like nimbus, spr or ns, they just don't have the same consequence as the whirlwind cards.

 

I'd hate to see mass frenzy get nerfed if for no other reason than it's pretty necessary for a decent vamp build, and while vamp builds can be strong, I don't in anyway see them as overpowered and would hate to lose them. Just one guy's opinion though.

 

Vamp builds could get buffed by there being decent vamp gear that's more than level 8. Maybe in the next expansion.

Just want to point out that it's usually a really bad thing if you block a whirlwind effect... card disadvantage wheee.

 

I like your comment, I just disagree in two minor things:
1) I don't think more OP is fun, I will just go with nerfing the really OP items
2) While it's true that Vibrant Pain inflates your rank by 50-100 points and helps a lot in terms of consistency, you don't really need it to be at the top, you just need a competitive build and good skills.

 

I loved the idea of SPR having x range and discarding only 1 card unless target is next to you, then it would discard 2 cards. SPR simply with 2 range would still be mega-good although a little less broken than at the moment
And I have to add that if multiple chars Duck a WW, only 1 of them gets to keep it.

 

I meant fun in the terms the excitment of getting a really powerful item.
Name another weapon you would trade a VP for?
Oh and if you like my comment give me a like... I really hate the idea of being aa wimpy lil' Kobold

 

My bad. Hasn't experimented much with Fly so I can't really tell the difference between Fly and Teleport on a whim. I do agree here that Fly and Teleport needs more varied function. Buffing Fly to be identical to Teleport isnt the only solution

-- Warning: Wall Of Text casted below --

About Mass Frenzy, I dont think they need to be nerfed. I think the problems lies in all the card with a 2 or 3 to 1 relationship. Card Hunter is a game rely very strongly on luck of the draw. And you only draw 2 card per turn, except for the first turn when you draw 2. The fact that certain card can 2 v 1 makes it very strong in this game, since it basically negate an entire character's turn. Case in point: SPR, Toughness or Parry. SPR seems to get lots of hate since its mechanics discard the other player (which is an unfun mechanics) rather than draw 1 for yourself. Parry is situational and requires block mechanics, so it isnt that much hated. Toughness, while very strong, is limited in availability (1 or 2 per deck). Some other drawing-related card that create 2v1 situation are also limited by racial slots.

So, among the drawing-related 2 v 1 card, SPR is valid for receiving a lot of criticism since a char can stack up to 10+ of them. They also cause unfun mechanics by discarding your opponent (and random one at that)

Next, we move onto the category of Step attack, a sub category of 2v1 cards. Nimble strike is basically a Dash + Trained Bludgeon (6), with a bonus of, you guessed it: Cantrip. While the damage seems low compared to Obliterating Bludgeon (17) or the more commonly available Powerful bludgeon (11), the problem most warrior face are getting into your target's face in order to hit them. Having Dash attached to every attack you do basically allow you to pick and choose target at will, removing almost all tactical defense your opponent set up. Let's consider the scenario of your warrior having only 2 card: 2x Mighty Bludgeon (14) VS 2x Nimble Strike (6). While landing at least 1 mighty bludgeon gets you more dmg than both nimble strike, you'd be very lucky to get 1 hit in before your opponent escape or parry another. Nimble strike will always guaranteed you 2 hits every time, it might even bypass block, and let you choose the target (less overkill dmg). Naturally this leads to Mass Frenzy being king for multiple hit low dmg strategy such as massing Nimble Strike.

(tl:dr for this paragraph: The problem isn't MF, it is the reliability of NS)

The last category for 2v1 cards are cards that can target more than 1 things at a time as well as global target. Example include Winds of War, 2 Whirlwind card, Firestorm. Improved Telekinesis might get a honorable mention here but its availability is quite limited. I would rather see more of this card than Winds of War.

Why is Firestorm good? It allow global targetting. You don't need line of sight and positioning, negate a huge chunk of game mechanics. The problem, however, isn't its damage or global range. FS increase the HP difference between dwarfs and elfs, turning dedicated elf build less of an option in any meta that includes a FS build.

Why is Winds of War good? It target 2 things at a time with a strong effect. If we consider Dwarf moves at 2 and Elf at 4, 3 would the average of a move card. WoW is 1 for 2 card with very strong flexibility. Want dmg ? got some. Want to move enemy ? or your ally ? Sure. Let's look at a quite similar card: Team Run. It slide 2 more char at 3. It also ignore encumber. What Team Run differ is that it isnt available on many items. The most you can stack is 2 Team Run and you have to take it with some "pretty dead" card.

And finally Whirlwind Enemies. Now this things has both the global targeting of firestorm, and the target of 3 things at a times. It can even move character more than what Winds of War can. And it is also as widely available as Winds of War. If this doesnt scream OP to me I dont know what does.

Conclude:

Looking at the pattern of my post, it seems like the problem has always been availability. Some cards can be stronger than other. Some card can have the power of 3 cards combined, it doesn't matter. What matter is that you cannot stack too many copies of these strong card in a single deck. The token system ensure that you cannot stack too many of a strong item. Therefore, the item system must also ensure that you cannot stack too many of a strong card. I'm proposing some solution to address this.

• Reduce the availability of these strong cards. Basically, cards that easily 2v1 with strong reliablity OR flexibility. The lists start with SPR, NS, WWE and WoW. This tool by Joyce shows some possibility of extreme stacking. Even if you think stacking this much is acceptable, the deck must come with some extreme handicap card as well. So some of the items in these build should have some major handicap.
• This solution is in addition to the above solution, due to the fact that: Weapon slot (3x), Arcane item slot (4x) and Divine Item (3x) enable extreme stacking of some cards, even if the card is quite limited in papers. This solution involves limiting the ability to equip multiple copies of legendary (or epic) items. The limit can be adjusted as you see fit (as well as whether epic is included). Basically, this allow BM to use the first solution to even fine tune the legendary. Legendary/epic can be the only place where you can find multiple copies of strong cards. Though one should avoid the situation of (Staff of a Million Embers + Staff of Embers ) as they defeat the purpose of this limit. (Not that I'm saying Ember Burst is a problem after its nerfed)
• Nerfing these cards, replace existing copies with the nerfed one and reintroduce the unerfed version in new items (like what we did with Fireball). This is the solution I do not like, as I personally like the effect of strong cards, which is very fun for the game. I'd rather see them less often instead. There are so many ways to nerf them that finding a solution around this forum shouldn't be hard. I'm proposing just one more that specifically target the ability to stack these card: Keyword: Fatigue: When you play this card, discard all remaining cards with the same name in your hand.

These are sweeping changes and it will affect a large portion of the item database. Seems like this should goes with an expansion pack like AotA like I have hoped. Nevertheless, if we dare to go for it, it will be worth it in the long run.