TD balance thread

Discussion about the game and its default mods.
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SoScared
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Post by SoScared »

Mesacer wrote: So do anyone have a suggestion how to make the best of it?
Constantly moving stuff around will loose you oversight and makes for high risk of introducing unwanted results once the changes goes live.

Find a set of changes you're comfortable with and play it to death for at least 2-4 weeks. You'll be well equipped to analyze the changes and bring with it some conviction in the post-discussions. As a bonus you'll build up some immunity vs strong-minded theorycrafters.

Mr Cloudy
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Post by Mr Cloudy »

I recently saw about a few weeks ago that the vision range on the APC is 7. Scouters (Buggies/Hummers) have 8 and tanks have 6. Knowing this I had plans to reduce the vision of APCs to 6. However, as the discussion went on we soon found out that APCs have a range of 7 for AA.

This is insane and explains the reason why aircraft is getting decimated seeing as Orca's have a weapon range of 5 and Apache's have a range of 4.

APCs ground range is 5.

Another closer look following with the Devs input is the turn speed. With a speed rate of 8 and the buggies/bikes/hummers being 10, medium tanks being 5, mammoths being 3, its a bit more clearer that a reduction for this may be needed.

So the listed idea for the APC is as follows:

APC movement speed reduced from 8 to 5.

APC AA attack range reduced from 7 to 5. (Try 6 for testing purposes.)

APC vision range reduced from 7 to 6.

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OK I can see this helping for the AA but that's hardly the main problem here with the APC's, I do not see this helping with all the other problems, and I don't see the problem with putting the price up to 700 or low as 600 depending, I don't understand, you increase the price of the mcv from 2k to 4k, making it useless in anyone 1v1 situation to build and don't seem to think that's outrages, yet you seem reluctant to change the price of a unit that is clearly OP.

I personally would have said 650 or 700 would be a good starting point. I don't have time to test at the moment due to work, but talking to other players I am not the only person who thinks this would be a good fix for this problem.

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AoAGeneral1
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Post by AoAGeneral1 »

Because when the MCV was 2k players like Zypress would mass up MCV armies and place them around the map. Since in TD you have multi queues you were able to army up a defensive wall and be unstoppable. Shifting the price to 4k prevented that from happening completely which is why changing the MCV price makes me paranoid.

Changing the APC price doesn't fix the problem. It makes the unit useless and extremely hard to build instead as tested before. That is the main problem with 700 pricing point.

People have mentioned nerfing the unit more so to make the price equivalent would help so im not sure why having these nerfs wouldn't help if even the Mammoth Tanks AA is a range of 5 in compared to the APC.

The only error I made was the movement speed. I actually ment turn speed and not movement. Changing the APCs turn speed will enable them to be sniped more by infantry and bikes as it will be harder for them to turn around to run or make another attempt to crush.

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ZxGanon
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Post by ZxGanon »

AoAGeneral1 wrote: Changing the APC price doesn't fix the problem. It makes the unit useless and extremely hard to build instead as tested before. That is the main problem with 700 pricing point.
Love to tell you that you are wrong again. APC that cost 700$ is still out of this world. If you want the replay and modded map mesacer can provide you with them. :D Also on a side note our APC does not only cost 700$ he also has 10% less health and its buildtime was set to 18 seconds and it still rofl stomped Nod completly. GDI mirror didnt change that much as Medium Tank transition is a normal flow.

After we surrendered to try balancing the APC with this broken weapon we just gave him the Humvee Gun and that feels super good.

APC:
From 550$ to 650$
Buildtime set to 15 seconds
Reduced health by 10%
Now has Humvee gun against ground targets
We keep the old AA gun for now

On the next step we are gonna cut the turnspeed in half so this thing finally has manouver issues so that it doesnt instant crush everything and we are also gonna remove its AA gun to see how GDI mirror changes.

Also we gonna increase Apache attack range against ground target to match it with the orca.

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ZxGanon
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Post by ZxGanon »

Also removing the AA gun from APC is a very bad idea since it ruins GDI mirrors so we gonna reintroduce it in update 7 but reduce the attack range of APC aa gun by 2.

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AoAGeneral1
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Post by AoAGeneral1 »

ZxGanon wrote:
AoAGeneral1 wrote: Changing the APC price doesn't fix the problem. It makes the unit useless and extremely hard to build instead as tested before. That is the main problem with 700 pricing point.
Love to tell you that you are wrong again. APC that cost 700$ is still out of this world. If you want the replay and modded map mesacer can provide you with them. :D Also on a side note our APC does not only cost 700$ he also has 10% less health and its buildtime was set to 18 seconds and it still rofl stomped Nod completly. GDI mirror didnt change that much as Medium Tank transition is a normal flow.

After we surrendered to try balancing the APC with this broken weapon we just gave him the Humvee Gun and that feels super good.

APC:
From 550$ to 650$
Buildtime set to 15 seconds
Reduced health by 10%
Now has Humvee gun against ground targets
We keep the old AA gun for now

On the next step we are gonna cut the turnspeed in half so this thing finally has manouver issues so that it doesnt instant crush everything and we are also gonna remove its AA gun to see how GDI mirror changes.

Also we gonna increase Apache attack range against ground target to match it with the orca.
It sounds like in this post you did not test the turn speed with the price or vice versa.

It was also mentioned in the Discord channel yourself that all the adjustments made no difference even with a 700$ suggestion its mainly a weapon problem. Again though, without the ranges and turn speed changes testing.

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ZxGanon
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Post by ZxGanon »

Weapon and turnspeed change, hp decrease and cost increase paired with aa gun nerf finally fixed the apc.

It not only feels more like the original but also pairs better in the GDI arsenal.

Air battle in GDI mirror seem to party a comeback after the APC change but we gotta test if Air is now performing too good. Atm it doesnt seem like it but we need to keep an I on it.

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AoAGeneral1
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Post by AoAGeneral1 »

In the games I had seen prior there were still a lot of APCs roaming the map. Originally, it was said that there were to many APCs on the map causing air units to be impractical because of a large amount of AA. Attached to that complaint was its weapon being the problem.

In those games as well I witnessed APCs taking over the role of the hummers since they had the same weapon. They were able to now both crush and shoot infantry easily preventing drops. Originally in the complaints, it was said their mobility was an issue because they could crush. Now with the hummers weapon that mobility in terms of crushing is made up with shooting the infantry. Im personally not quite convinced this is a good solution in two reasons:

1) Kills infantry easily.
2) Takes the role of the humvee

Another test that can be done playing some of Unano's old school CNC95 gametypes is remove the turret from the APC making it the flak. Since doing this the APC relies on its turn speed to do the damage and with a nerfed turn speed would make this unit immobile.

The issue I can see (Which needs testing) is its AA as it would now have to turn to take out air units. This of course could be played around with in its AA range bringing it from 5 to 7 to see if it makes a difference if the AA performance is bad.

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Major Kusanagi Motoko
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balance of minds

Post by Major Kusanagi Motoko »

it finally happens ... TD is being balanced !

great intertwining and inter-correcting ideas from all, good job guys !

keep on spirits high n confident, see into each others ideas and

look, think, edit, test, feedback, think, test, release, feedback, look, think, edit, test, feedback, ...

CatGirls420
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Post by CatGirls420 »

Flame tanks and flame soldiers seem to do very little damage to buildings, and almost don't even hurt infantry at all.

Also, the GDI MLRS barely hurts buildings. It's almost not worth it buying flame units or an MLRS, unless you're playing against a total noob.

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AoAGeneral1
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Post by AoAGeneral1 »

CatGirls420 wrote: Flame tanks and flame soldiers seem to do very little damage to buildings, and almost don't even hurt infantry at all.

Also, the GDI MLRS barely hurts buildings. It's almost not worth it buying flame units or an MLRS, unless you're playing against a total noob.
Flame infantry,

Do you mean they do very little in AoE? Or single target? Because single target they kill in two bursts. AoE is about three bursts (Unless against E3 then its two.) If they are standing it takes two to kill 5 in one cell. If they are prone it takes 3 to kill 4 in one cell.

If you are talking about their range in terms of engagement then that is something that can be looked at. But their damage output is really good. Its getting to the target. (Since they have the highest HP much like the chems that being except Commandos essentially a bit tankier infantry.)

Flame Tanks,

These units do damage to both infantry and buildings. Specially if the flame tank explodes and that they can crush infantry. Their double burst fire is extremely strong and their explosion is rather large doing damage. Sometimes beneficial to do a chain reaction explosion while crushing infantry.

MLRS,

I wouldn't say barely hurts buildings. But both MLRS and Artillery have been under some debate between players and as such left this for later for other importances. (Such as the ongoing APC testing.)

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Beans
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Balance

Post by Beans »

Balance was great in 2014/15, I cant remember the specific builds but many people agree with me that this time period produced the best games. Why not start testing rolling back the balance to how it used to be, see how the player base responds? For one, the power changes that forced choice of men or vehicles early game really changed gameplay that has branched off causing a lot of other issues. i.e a mildly effective rush means you win.
T1 is just too strong generally and have become an effective fighting force all game rather than a bridge to T2. APC buffed to balance out bikes but t2 stays the same. Lets just all calm down, go back to the days when it worked great and go from there? Obviously some will say it wasn't great back then, but the lobby numbers speak for themselves.
Very few people can micro as fast as a player like Ganon, so I think its unreasonable to balance a game based on one persons skillset rather than the general player base, and better micro should always tip the balance anyway. So from that perspective I think the APC at overpowered but its not really a problem for most opponents spamming APC. The best solution in the short term is just severely reduce APC damage to all ground units except light. a few bikes still annihilates poorly managed APC.
Sometimes its best to cut losses, start fresh and work together to make things better, I think the dogma of the constant tweaking is causing more damage than any other single thing in TD. A select few players will always want to tweak the game, but the never ending balancing is just plain annoying to the average player.
Any changes in core mechanics should be purposefully a long a drawn out process with checks and balances throughout the process I know that's difficult with a small player base but even I have noticed many drastic game changing things develop over the last few years. TD is a timeless classic that should be preserved as well as possible.
At the end of the day, although there may be many technically good reasons for changing things up all the time, there is no point in making a game nobody wants to play, and this is the bi-product of the volatile and often unpredictable effects of constant balancing.

Roll back, go from there. IMHO
I would like to test the rebalance of the build just prior to the power changes, i.e you could build 1ref, 1 hand/rrks 1 strip/wf on the first pp.

But since none of this this will happen just nerf bike/apc damage! you cant just keep putting up the price of APC's they can't be more expensive than a light tank ffs. The fact that this is suggested proves they do far too much damage to buildings and t2 units. Armour is fine, after all its an APC.


Beans

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AoAGeneral1
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Re: Balance

Post by AoAGeneral1 »

In the older 2014/2015 builds power on refineries were 50 and the airstrip/weapon factories were 30. Barracks were 20 power. This means you can build two refineries and then need a power plant OR a refinery and then get an airstrip/factory.

Going double refinery is a huge strategic mistake and you end up falling behind because you could get the factory and get harvesters from it while producing structures. This meant rush tactics became far more greater. However, if you were careful and really good at the game, you could pull off the following:

Power > Refinery > factory > barracks.

This would equal 100 power and you would end up with both options much to quickly. This allowed harvesters to be built and queue up a defensive structure.

So what im getting at is when you say "For one, the power changes that forced choice of men or vehicles early game really changed gameplay that has branched off causing a lot of other issues. i.e a mildly effective rush means you win." When it was much worse leaves me a bit confused. Please elaborate further.

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When you say that the APC was fine back in the day, it was mentioned before about team games by 010010 that mass APCs would come in and wreck bases and vehicles. This was an issue, it was an issue that was brought to my attention but fell of radar due to distractions (I was also rather new and learning how to use github). it also was never discovered (except 010010 to my knowledge) about the APCs damage until the TDGL rolled around. So this issue remain present even in 2014/2015.

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I agree with you about not thinking about just the pro players. That is my mindset and I think a lot of people don't realize that or disagree with me on this. I think of the casuals, pros, and team games (2v2 is a limit. Very little from 3v3.) when doing balances. So I agree with you on this.

The problem is when I made that recommendation to nerf the damages (Which happened in the current release) there has been some disagreements on how to approach this. So while I see your point about the damages and could test making them lower, I get a sense that people are going to disagree with this and end up with another solution.

I do want to put in that reducing its turn speed is a valid motive to nerf crushing. I also think reducing the turret movement (Meaning the APC has to turn to fire) is another damage type nerf to be done. But those are the issues I face.

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I agree about the balance changes should be limited to selective testing. Again, the problem is disagreement with how the balance is to be done. People prefer to have this tweaked, while others believe to want to have this tweaked. (Much like yourself about tweaking the damages as the prime solution while others disagree).

It used to be that I stick with an approach that is best suited and fitted but it does require other players to test and make sure they don't end up out of set.

-----------------------

I agree about the price.

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anjew
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Re: Balance

Post by anjew »

AoAGeneral1 wrote: it also was never discovered (except 010010 to my knowledge) about the APCs damage until the TDGL rolled around.So this issue remain present even in 2014/2015.
I brought this up ages ago. I distinctly remember showing you that APC's could fuck up harvesters and from what I remember, you said something along the lines of "nah, only when they are in numbers." So either the problem is the damage, the numbers or both...

Also I agree with beanz on buildings powers. The change kind of made things less dynamic overall but allowed double ref to be buffed. The problem now, especially the smaller the map gets, is that if someone chooses WF first, you are actively choosing to have no defences and no units until about 2 minutes. This is especially bad in Nod rush situations for GDI as you have to rely on humvee spam when you should be making harvesters.
Personally I use double ref on small type maps (16:9, deterring) and pull off an early rush. It's the same thought process as in RA. No point going double ref if you dont push the $ advantage.
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Beans
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Balance

Post by Beans »

@AoA,

Thanks for the response,

Having a more deifnite choice beetween men or vehicles early game has made things more of a guessing game on small to medium maps. And as has been mentioned in 1v1, one mistake is crippling as things stand. You can do everything right but just choose the wrong building depending on your opponents choices. It just feels more random to me. Its used to be much more realistic to counter the enemy and more skill based that way, rather than trying to guess the enemy strategy. You can be the best scouter on the planet, but lets face it, the vast majority if guessing what the enemy might do, then responding. This responding has become more difficult with the power changes that were made and has restricted early gameplay. I for one don't enjoy or play very much 1v1's since this change. as for 50% of games you may as well quit in the first 3 minutes as theres little chance of coming back.

As it stands, if I think Anjew may build a barracks, I'll build a barracks too, to get my gt ready and wipe our his inf rush, but if he goes wf and I don't rush, fug, im dead. The delay now between getting both buildings up and its effects is too devestating early game in some circumstances. Too much guessing makes games no fun. Yes I can scout ( but by then its often too late as you have to resort to selling or cancelling WF build that also screws you up anyway) and yes its my fault for doing the wrong thing, but TD had far superior and fluid games in the past, when you could more dynamically respond.


I recall the APC getting buffed a couple of releases ago, IMHO this was a mistake, a damage reduction to bikes and APC would have balanced t1 out alot better. T1 Should not be viable end game or even late mid game IMHO. I believe the reasoning at the time was that T1 wasn't used enough, I believe it was, as effective scouting, bikes for nod have always been great for harv destroyers and for getting your enemy in low power early game, APC for some rockets to take out the early pp's or harvs worked great too. T1 shouldnt really be able to wreck bases this easily. A long standing consensus between many players has been to make Bikes t1.5 like APC, so both require hand/rrks. They are effectively the counterpart unit so it seems logical to be same tech level, and nerfing the APC damage only would like would just make bikes stronger otherwise.


With regards to changing other mechanics, I.e flak and rotations, ect. I would strongly object to anything of this sort, furthermore its just not required, like many things in life, the simplest solutions is often the best, and will offend the least amount of people. I think you often (with good intentions) find convoluted and complex reasons for changes to the game. Given the community's response to things that have happenend over the last few years, I think its fair to conclude that we want fewer changes, not more, before the game becomes unrecognisable from it's former glory. Simply the APC does WAY too much damage vs everything but light units, but bikes will need to be moved to 1.5 and a small damage nerf to balance this out APC should also be unable to crush men. These are my opinions, I dont normally come on the forums, I think I've made one post in four years before this, so... I'm really scared for the game at the moment. We have lost alot of regulars I.e (EchoOf Damnation, one of the best map makers, OxdeadBeef, the Finnish guys,) just to mention a few, I feel like holding a memorial everytime someone goes these days. People leave for varied reasons, not only balance, but it's often somthing thats niggling at them, and they simply are not getting replaced with new players.

Anyway those are the thoughts that came to me this morning regarding TD and ofc I would be happy to get on the playtest for testing any changes asap.

Beans

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