I mean WITHIN a role, I would absolutely say you are right, they still are (which people of course hate, especially the people in GM)
but between roles, they are absolutely not.
Nor can they.
Blizzard lying? Big surprise. Iâm sure nobody saw this coming.
I donât think theyâre lying. I think they lack the high level understanding of the game to be able to effectively balance it and thatâs why basically every balance patch ever is a massive miss even if they are targeting the right heroes.
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Balancing so heroes are reasonably viable in GM is one of the things the GM players keep complaining about.
Which is funny, to be honest.
From their financial reports they are gaining MAU, so, Iâm not sure they are misses.
They are not aiming at the target you want them to aim for, but it doesnât mean they are missing their target.
They are just not hitting the one you are pointing at.
Their targets absolutely include âkeep the heroes distinctâ which a lot of the things people keep asking for, would absolutely impact, and people remain shocked they donât do that.
I wouldnât say that this means theyâre balancing well. In fact financials largely come from engagement from whales and that has little to do with whether or not the people balancing are actually qualified to do so if weâre looking at balance. Since after all, whales do seem to be the opposite of high ranked players.
I get what youâre saying but itâs a completely separate point.
A lot of balancing is making sure you donât lose players to queue size imbalances.
If DPS gets to 20 minute queues, you know you are losing DPS players at this point, as not everyone is going to be willing to wait for that, and will play other games.
And that they got to 20 minutes meant they would rather play DPS over anything else, because of the balance.
Ow2 makes supports a LOT stronger, and in a move which shouldnât surprise you, more people are willing to play support.
They are absolutely trying to balance retention rates for roles, because, they lose MAU if they donât, which means losing people buying skins etc.
More importantly, they need to make the lower ranks more fun, and not bounce people off them, since that is how they get new players.
The results of these forces will give them WILDLY different targets than you would want them to.
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And I guarantee a lot less people are willing to play dps, making any gains in supports rather moot. People donât like being an underdog to heroes with braindead kits.
As much as I donât mind sitting in 20 minute queues I do get that. However, we need to acknowledge that if focused purely on revenue youâd balance for the heroes who are most likely to spend $$$ while maintaining the façade of trying to actually balance. That doesnât mean youâre good at balancing though. It means youâre running a business.
Blizzard will see the difference between MAU gain / loss rates between their OW1 balancing and OW2.
They absolutely will be making a call, whether to stick to this form of balancing vs the old one based on those. They like money.
The people doing the balancing are good IF they can hit the targets they are aiming for.
If that is the target, and they absolutely nail in hitting it, they have balanced the game the way they want - and there is skill in doing so.
From a business perspective, yes. From a game quality design, no.
TOTALLY agree.
Iâm saying they are balancing for business reasons, and they are good at it.
That doesnât mean they are garbage at balancing, it means balancing for successful commercial game, and balancing for game play are actually different targets.
And it sucks that they are.
It ALSO means if you want them to balance for game play, then suggestions the GMâs need to give SHOULD take into account their âsuccessful commercial gameâ targets, because that is the only way you can influence them.
Based on their financial figures I agree. I donât think that makes them qualified to balance the game as a player.
Theyâre making record revenue? Good for them, Iâm sure theyâre going to be handsomely rewarded. That doesnât mean the game is healthy for players and I view it as just another step in the wrong direction for gamers.
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Their job isnât to balance the game as a player.
Agreed, but⌠it ALSO means that GMs in general are garbage at balancing suggestions which Blizzard has a chance to take up, because they as a group donât understand why Blizzard is doing the balancing they are doing, and what âgoodâ even looks like for the Balance team.
If they did, they could make suggestions which were picked up.
They DO have more of a voice than most. It is that they donât understand the problem space they are working in.
I know and I think that will ultimately kill gaming as gameplay will deteriorate over time due to the pursuit of short term financial game instead of building games that are actually good.
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I donât think they are after short term financial gains. I think the balancing they are doing is to grow the player base.
Say you were Blizzard, and you had a choice of keeping an extra 5% of your GM players, or keeping an extra 5% of your gold players, every month.
For Blizzard it isnât a hard choice, and that IS with the long term view.
We just disagree on the motives for those who are in line for bonuses etc and thatâs fine.
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Seems fair.
Iâll agree with that.
If that were the case, they would be trying to make all roles fun to play instead of exclusively the role that is notorious for people with a weird brain chemistry (in all games).
Obvious answer is to bring 6v6 back and pretend 5v5 was just a hellish fever dream in which nothing ever felt good to play as or against.
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They need the queues balanced.
So they have to get Tank / Support players somehow. So yeah, they have to get and keep them.
You can be like âscrew themâ because instantly you are back to 20 minute DPS queue times, and you are losing players from all three roles.