Conceptual Game Balance - Generals vs. Assassins

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Conceptual Game Balance - Generals vs. Assassins

What this thread is:
  With the Beta being likely started in early September barring any setbacks, gameplay balance is still a ways off for us players and testers.  As such, this thread will be for discussion of "conceptual" balance ideas; numbers and stat comparisons won't really be available, though you can make some hypothetical things up if you wish to illustrate a point.  My hope is that this thread will help us get some ideas about what we think may work and what we think won't when it comes to certain broad areas of the game.

This particular thread is about the balance of two fundamental types of units: General-style Demigods vs. Assassin-style Demigods.

What this thread is not:
  This thread is not about specific demigods (though you could give ideas to illustrate a point), specific skills (they may likely change even before the beta begins, from what we've seen in screenshots and trailers), or specific items / spells / maps.  Rather than fine tuning a system, we're looking at the broad overtones of said system.

A few more things:
  Examples from other games are good for helping to explain and illustrate a point, but such concepts may or may not mesh well with Demigod.
  Because this is a conceptual discussion, it's unlikely we'll reach a full consensus on such broad topics.  This should be useful for proposing and discussing our own views and others, in order to get a better understanding for how we all view the concepts.  This may also help the developers (if only to see how much we may have misunderstood what they've posted so far ;) ).  And finally...
  In this thread, the developer's words should not be taken as gospel.  Feel free to discuss ideas that they have already stated won't be how things work, if you've got a solid supporting argument for why it could work in such a fashion.   If you feel you've thought of something they (or the rest of us) haven't considered, or overlooked, ask about it.


So, I'll start us off with some questions to think on:

1.  How do you see General-style and Assassin-style Demigods match up in just fights involving the two of them; no other units involved?

2.  How do you see General-style and Assassin-style Demigods match up with equally sized armies?

3. a.  What are the primary advantages you see to playing a General-style Demigod?
3. b.  What are the primary disadvantages you see to playing a General-style Demigod?

4. a.  What are the primary advantages you see to playing an Assassin-style Demigod?
4. b.  What are the primary disadvantages you see to playing an Assassin-style Demigod?

5.  How would you try to balance the power between General-style and Assassin-style Demigods?


Feel free to contribute with questions of your own.  I've got to think about it for a bit myself.
demigod
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Reply #1 from Demigod Forums Top
If assassins are better than generals at killing the grunt units, I worry that assassins will have a substantial advantage in leveling-up.
Reply #2 from Demigod Forums Top
If assassins are better than generals at killing the grunt units, I worry that assassins will have a substantial advantage in leveling-up.


This can be offset by the general getting a small XP bonus (Less than normal XP since you could have your units all across the map) from each enemy his units kill.
Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion
Reply #3 from Demigod Forums Top
Well it comes down to the fact that the basic units have to be able to kill assassins (and generals), but an assassin has to be able to 'die'

1. Assassin hands down, what's a general with out an army?
2. Prolly general since their army will be better (can they even get units?)

3a. The ability to influence multiple parts of the map at once, advanced tactics by your self (i.e. pincer)
3b. Split forces, micro

4a. Only need to select one thing, power focused at one point
4b. Can only be one place at once (in most cases, meepo like demis?)

5. Make sure that a general with most of his army can kill an assassin 50% of the time
Reply #4 from Stardock Forums Top
For Assassins, the most likely skills they have would be single target, unlike generals which should have multiple targets or AoE skills.

And as the name assassins suggested, he should have better maneuver than generals. This make assassins moost likely moving around the battlefield freely and picking weak targets to be his pray.

To balance thing out, Generals should have aura skills, which influent the large area and buff up their troops.

There shouldn't be items which give generals ability to out maneuver assassins. That'd make the match an easy win with Generals ganking up together and split defense.

that said, i think the first thing to think about is, What will signify Assassins and Generals? How different could they be? And yeah i think i read that they maybe blending the gap of generals and assassins.
Reply #5 from Demigod Forums Top
As Zeneroth said, i think the main difference will be their skills. Generals should still be able to defend themselves but the difference will be seen with the OPs first two questions. Assassin vs General, the Assassin would win as they should have more damaging skills.
However, the question of equal sized armies, the General's armies should win hands down as the General can buff his armies and generally increase their strength.
I only worry that the battle will be essentially over for the General if his reinforcement gate is destroyed, whereas the Assassin can fight on and still have a chance.
Reply #6 from Demigod Forums Top
It will all get down to management.

Since a team with more generals will have more units than a team with less generals, it will all get down to how effective will the assassins be in taking out the surplus of units/heroes.

I think that a part of the game isn't clear to some of you : there will be units spawning continuously for both sides, that will be controlled by the AI.

So, I don't think it will be so hard to balance the 2 types of demigods, since the units will make the difference in a balanced match between 2 powerful teams.
Reply #7 from Demigod Forums Top
As Zeneroth said, i think the main difference will be their skills. Generals should still be able to defend themselves but the difference will be seen with the OPs first two questions. Assassin vs General, the Assassin would win as they should have more damaging skills.

On the other hand, the General wins in sheer number, every hit made on the Assassin will be one step closer to death, while every creep killed will just be a downsizing in power for the General.

I'd say the General would win, but it's very much dependant on how good the players are.

Reply #8 from Demigod Forums Top
On the other hand, the General wins in sheer number, every hit made on the Assassin will be one step closer to death, while every creep killed will just be a downsizing in power for the General.I'd say the General would win, but it's very much dependant on how good the players are.

Sorry, i meant Assassin vs General with no other forces, 1 on 1.

Reply #9 from Demigod Forums Top
1) With no other units, Assassins should win significantly. They shouldn't survive with 99% of their health left, but they should definitely win.

2) With equally sized armies, it depends. If it is Assassin+normal creeps versus General+normal creeps, the Assassin should probably win. Not by a lot, but he should win, since the General didn't bring any of his stronger special units with him. If it is Assassin+creeps vs General+creeps+special units but still same-sized armies, I expect the Assassin to win since he has probably destroyed more enemy creeps than the General did (otherwise they wouldn't have equal sized armies). If it was Assassin+creeps versus General+creeps+special units with the General having a larger army (he is a GENERAL, after all) then the General should probably win, since overwhelming the enemy is how he works.

3)a)You get big, somewhat controllable armies so you can attack on multiple fronts or try to swamp the enemy Demigod.
b) The enemy Assassin can wreak havoc if you don't bring a really large force on him. Kind of like ACU's in FA - it takes a big force to actually finish one off.

4)a)He needs a big force to kill you.
b)You can't attack in several places at once.

5) This requires too much careful thought :P
Reply #10 from Demigod Forums Top

So, I'll start us off with some questions to think on:

1. How do you see General-style and Assassin-style Demigods match up in just fights involving the two of them; no other units involved?

2. How do you see General-style and Assassin-style Demigods match up with equally sized armies?

3. a. What are the primary advantages you see to playing a General-style Demigod?
3. b. What are the primary disadvantages you see to playing a General-style Demigod?

4. a. What are the primary advantages you see to playing an Assassin-style Demigod?
4. b. What are the primary disadvantages you see to playing an Assassin-style Demigod?

5. How would you try to balance the power between General-style and Assassin-style Demigods?

Just my opinion here:

1. No other units? Assassin wins. Generals are about making use of the minions (creeps) and is a strategist.

2. Depends on the situation and the player. 

3. Generals are about strategy, Assassins are about tactics.

5. LOTS of play testing. ;)

Reply #11 from Demigod Forums Top
Balancing this asks for several maps with automaticly playing demigods. (Maybe get them walking around with a predefined route.

Then a test can be started x times and the outcome can be displayed in win loss %

Example:
Assassin + creep against General + creeps wins 33% of 1000 games

The balance can be changed to get to the 33%.
Many different maps and routes are needed to make sure that balance is not depending on a strategy that has a advantage for one of the types.


I think automatic tests are a very important tool to get the balancing right. And to make sure re-balancing has no side effects.
Reply #12 from Demigod Forums Top
1) Assuming you mean a General and Assassin battle with the generals minions out, I'd say they'd be evenly matched, Depending on the players and how general's minions are affected when the generals die (IE: do they just lose auras or do they poof into nothingness)
If none of the general's minions are out, then the Assassin would probably win.

2) The general in this case probably has the advantage simply because they're designed to pwn with their armies with the power of Auras and such. So the General would probably win the confrontation and kill the units/advance the lane,

3)A.Generals will have the advantage in terms of numbers, in that he can go anyplace where his allies are and be helpful while also bringing in further support with his own personal units
B.Depending on whether Generals summon units out of nothingness or if they have to build a barracks of some sort to make them, I imagine the General has very low killing power on his/her own, kill their units or their unit-making ability, and the general is fucked.
4)A. The assassin's advantages will obviously vary from demigod to demigod, I see rook as a tanker, drawing firepower to his rough, rocky ass. But for the most part I see assassins as being capable Demigod killers and unit killers.
B. Assassins probably have to be very careful or they can be overwhelmed, seeing as they're out on the field all by their lonesome, an assassin would be vulnerable to being ganked up the butt.

5)One step would be to make it so that a general would want to protect every single unit he generates, if they're basically free (excepting the NPC units running around) then killing general units would result only in less damage output for the general A general's units need to be balanced to be effective, be worth protecting, and be worth killing, but not overpowered. Furthermore, make it a point to kill the general and not just farm units.

Then again, if the General has to use the money he gets from kills to build/train units, then things should be balanced so that the Assassin and general have roughly equal disposable income for getting Items and such.

Another thing to keep in mind is that we're unsure about the NPC-units running in lanes, how powerful they are,whether their health and damage scales with the level of demigods in the game.
Also, does anybody know whether body-blocking is possible ?(I.E. Making a circle of units around a demigod so they can't move and proceeding to pwn them)
Reply #13 from Demigod Forums Top
It feels like, to me at least, the idea is that an assassin versus a general who has no player-controlled units (assuming equal level, same number of ai controlled creeps involved, etc.) should end with the assassin winning that fight, whereas an assassin versus a general who has all his possible player-controlled units (assuming a limit on player controlled army?) should end with the general winning that fight; the stalemate area would be somewhere in between, where the assassin is capable of killing the General and his PC-Units while barely surviving.

This doesn't really include things like special items or strategic points, or the downsides of having distributed attack force (i.e. decreases as units die); or the downsides of being unable to control the AI-Units if this factors in.
Reply #14 from Demigod Forums Top
1. How do you see General-style and Assassin-style Demigods match up in just fights involving the two of them; no other units involved?

The assassin should win, no matter what. If the assassin player made it to this point, he should basically win in my opinion.

2. How do you see General-style and Assassin-style Demigods match up with equally sized armies?

Ok, let's say we got 2 armies consisting of 200 units (just picture some units). We got the assassin walking in front of his army, charging into the enemy army. Because of the assassin in the army, the general's army is slightly losing, lets say 190 (a) vs 170 (g). The general could use a healing spell, healing his units while the assassin keeps pounding on his troops. Even though the general is still losing troops, he's starting to get to equal numbers again: 140 v 140.
The general now uses a freezing attack, freezing all units that are near the general and his army. The assassins troops are now on the losing side: 80 vs 110.
Knowing that his army is losing, the assassin now rushes forth to kill the general and has succeeded in doing so. Still, his army is still losing, although without their leader, are now equally powered in terms of 1v1. The stand is 50 vs 75.
The assassin quickly uses a couple of strong Area of Effect attacks, slaughtering the army: 30 vs 0.


3. a. What are the primary advantages you see to playing a General-style Demigod?
Crushing my enemy with the help of huge numbers of units that I'm trying to keep alive and support.
3. b. What are the primary disadvantages you see to playing a General-style Demigod?
Most likely missing the WOWZORS effect.
4. a. What are the primary advantages you see to playing an Assassin-style Demigod?
BRAAAAAARGH, ME BIG, ME STRONG! And the RPG and tactics part :P
4. b. What are the primary disadvantages you see to playing an Assassin-style Demigod?
Both using the assassin and still giving orders to your troops.

5. How would you try to balance the power between General-style and Assassin-style Demigods?

Read the answer of question 2, basically, make it so that the general needs his army to kill the assassin, while the assassin needs to get a chance to kill the general.
Reply #15 from Demigod Forums Top
4. b. What are the primary disadvantages you see to playing an Assassin-style Demigod?Both using the assassin and still giving orders to your troops.


Are players capable of giving commands to units if they aren't general-style demigods? I thought the generic type of units were AI-controlled and thus only the general-style demigods get the ability to manipulate special units they build (i.e. in contrast to the items assassin-style demigods buy to buff themselves).
Reply #16 from Stardock Forums Top
More Questions, If the Generals have extra units, do those unit give out money when they die? If so that'd give like a whole lots of money into the opponent side. And in opposite playing Assassins will give the opponent less money than playing Generals. I think this concept apply for Experience points as well, leveling up faster and getting more cash seem to be a big downside of playing as Generals.
Reply #17 from Demigod Forums Top
Such could be scaled by simply allowing the General to need less experience to level up, I would imagine.
Reply #18 from Demigod Forums Top
I think that with the full arsenal of skills and units given to both Assassins and Generals the general should win the engagement, based on the fact that with correct micro he can probably escape alot easier while using his minions to block an assassin. of course thats probably why you'd keep a Spell in reserve or something. i just think that with good micro the general will at least live longer or to fight another day
Reply #19 from Demigod Forums Top
I think that it is possible to somehow influence the ai troops, as hinted in posts by devs, if this is as simple as point based (i.e. three points to pick from) voting system, out right control, items, abilities, generals only(mixed with a previous example), or small portions of the main army is unknown.

(by the way devs:
an item/ability that let you control a group of the ai troops would be useful, it would make a great general item...

damn now you got me thinking,

an item which allowed you to set targets for certain types of ai troops (like with a 5 sec cd) would be a great early game general item,

or an item which allowed you to control units inside a certain radius of a leader (unit cast on, not taken control of) unit would be awesome for people with good micro (i.e. control one wave at a time),

hell you could make an entire demigod based on controlling ai units... I'm bored I think I will make a concept, and I'll post it tomorrow!)
Reply #20 from Demigod Forums Top
Maybe capturing strategic points on the map is what will influence the creeps lanes rather than yelling at teammates to "vote" how you want.
Reply #21 from Demigod Forums Top
Maybe a better way to look at this is in terms of a "Scale of Power" if you will. For instance:


Demigod | Weakest Demigod Status___| Strongest Demigod Status
Assassin | No items, injured, no skills ready | Multiple items, uninjured, all skills ready
General | As above, but with no units either | As above, but with lots of units ready.

(To note: Units in the above would be PC-units, not AI-units.)

Those would be the two ends of the scale. The problem it seems is that the scales when compared are offset slightly. At the Weakest point on both, so far it seems most people expect the Assassin to win. At the Strongest point on both, so far it seems divided; some feel it is a draw, others feel the General should win.

To put it visually:



So basically, it feels to me like the General has a lower weakest point and a higher strongest point. Thoughts?
Reply #22 from Demigod Forums Top
Maybe a better way to look at this is in terms of a "Scale of Power" if you will. For instance:Demigod | Weakest Demigod Status___| Strongest Demigod StatusAssassin | No items, injured, no skills ready | Multiple items, uninjured, all skills readyGeneral | As above, but with no units either | As above, but with lots of units ready.(To note: Units in the above would be PC-units, not AI-units.)Those would be the two ends of the scale. The problem it seems is that the scales when compared are offset slightly. At the Weakest point on both, so far it seems most people expect the Assassin to win. At the Strongest point on both, so far it seems divided; some feel it is a draw, others feel the General should win.To put it visually:So basically, it feels to me like the General has a lower weakest point and a higher strongest point. Thoughts?


Not necessarily true. We've yet to see the items, there could be specific items for a certain class. It could potentially sway one way or the other. But I hope it's more balanced.
Reply #23 from Demigod Forums Top
More Questions, If the Generals have extra units, do those unit give out money when they die? If so that'd give like a whole lots of money into the opponent side. And in opposite playing Assassins will give the opponent less money than playing Generals. I think this concept apply for Experience points as well, leveling up faster and getting more cash seem to be a big downside of playing as Generals.


I think you're forgetting that the general most likely gets experience and money from the kills that his units make.

Otherwise it's just unit and demigod management, You never want the enemy to kill your demigod or they'll get moneys and experience, the same would probably apply for a generals units, obviously they wont be worth as much per kill as a demigod is, but the General shouldn't be able to summon/build a group of units and send them into the fray, especially if the enemy doesnt get a reward for killing them.
Reply #24 from Demigod Forums Top
I really dislike threads like this. We know nothing about the balance of the game yet. Chances are much of this will not apply to the real game.
Reply #25 from Demigod Forums Top
Yea but it gives something to argue about while we wait, and you never know, it may produce ideas for the devs.