0:00:04.190,0:00:08.430
If you’ve spent any amount of time in a[br]multiplayer lobby, you’ve probably heard

0:00:08.430,0:00:12.030
words like overpowered, cheap, and unfair.

0:00:12.030,0:00:16.610
What these players are arguing about is the[br]game’s balance.

0:00:16.610,0:00:21.500
Balance is the art of making sure that all[br]options in a multiplayer game are fair: so

0:00:21.500,0:00:26.710
none are underpowered, and thus pointless[br]to use. And none are overpowered, and thus

0:00:26.710,0:00:28.550
dominate everything else.

0:00:28.550,0:00:33.660
Here’s the thing though: most video games[br]aren’t just striving for balance. But balance

0:00:33.660,0:00:36.809
among a wide range of distinctly different[br]options.

0:00:36.809,0:00:41.870
You don’t have to work that hard to balance[br]a symmetric game - which is one where all

0:00:41.870,0:00:47.350
players have the exact same starting conditions.[br]But most games are asymmetric - which means

0:00:47.350,0:00:51.390
players are facing off against each other[br]with completely different stuff.

0:00:51.390,0:00:56.159
And in a game where players can pick from[br]74 different fighters or 140

0:00:56.159,0:01:01.550
unique champions, the developers are counting[br]on them all being equally viable among players

0:01:01.550,0:01:03.659
of roughly the same skill level.

0:01:03.659,0:01:04.790
So how do they do it?

0:01:04.790,0:01:10.860
Now, I should say, balance is an incredibly[br]difficult pursuit. It can be an entire department

0:01:10.860,0:01:16.540
at certain companies, and Riot’s League[br]of Legends has had more than 200 balance patches

0:01:16.540,0:01:22.330
in the last decade. Plus it’s not just about[br]numbers, but player psychology, with Overwatch’s

0:01:22.330,0:01:26.800
Jeff Kaplan saying “the perception of balance[br]is more powerful than balance itself”.

0:01:26.800,0:01:33.240
So this is not going to be an intensive tutorial. Instead, Game Maker’s Toolkit presents

0:01:33.240,0:01:40.060
a whirlwind tour through the ways games are[br]balanced - and rebalanced - and rebalanced

0:01:40.060,0:01:42.310
- and rebalanced.

0:01:42.310,0:01:47.270
So how do developers go about balancing a[br]game in the first place? Well, the first consideration

0:01:47.270,0:01:53.300
is trade-offs. This is when you essentially[br]cancel out a character’s competitive advantages,

0:01:53.300,0:01:54.680
with drawbacks.

0:01:54.680,0:02:00.310
Think of Mario Kart characters, where heavy[br]racers like Donkey Kong have a high top speed,

0:02:00.310,0:02:05.140
but low acceleration, while featherweight[br]racers like Toad are the opposite. On the

0:02:05.140,0:02:08.630
right track design, they’ll be almost evenly[br]balanced.

0:02:08.630,0:02:13.550
You can think of characters as having a “power[br]budget” - at least that’s why Riot calls

0:02:13.550,0:02:19.870
it. Advantages are a cost, but disadvantages[br]are a discount. If all characters are just

0:02:19.870,0:02:24.500
about hitting the limit of the same power[br]budget, they’ll be closer to being balanced.

0:02:24.500,0:02:29.530
It’s rarely that easy, of course. I mean,[br]okay, sometimes you’ll get a card that does

0:02:29.530,0:02:36.010
1 damage to all minions and another that does[br]4 damage to all minions. That’s an easy one: just make

0:02:36.010,0:02:39.010
the second card cost a bit more energy.

0:02:39.010,0:02:43.680
But how do you calculate the power budget[br]for completely incomparable options like heroes

0:02:43.680,0:02:48.950
in Overwatch? Or options with dozens of stats[br]to tweak? Like, when Bungie was reigning in

0:02:48.950,0:02:54.150
the initially overpowered sniper rifle in[br]Halo 3, it had loads of stats it could tweak

0:02:54.150,0:02:59.050
such as clip size, time to full zoom, reload[br]time, and max ammo.

0:02:59.050,0:03:03.480
(It ultimately decided the best knob to tweak[br]was the time between shots, which it bumped

0:03:03.480,0:03:06.370
from 0.5 to 0.7 seconds).

0:03:06.370,0:03:11.500
What’s important, though, is to celebrate[br]the big differences between choices. The sniper

0:03:11.500,0:03:16.380
rifle and the shotgun offer a more exciting[br]choice to players than two types of assault

0:03:16.380,0:03:19.900
rifle - even though the latter is much easier[br]to balance.

0:03:19.900,0:03:25.420
So I agree with ex-Blizzard designer Rob Pardo[br]when he warns designers against using the

0:03:25.420,0:03:28.716
maths to balance games into mediocrity, saying

0:03:28.716,0:03:31.510
ROB PARDO: "you’re gonna end up with a game where

0:03:31.510,0:03:35.489
everything kinda feels the same. And you can high[br]five each other and say it’s balanced, but

0:03:35.489,0:03:38.240
is it fun? Probably not”.

0:03:38.240,0:03:43.550
Another consideration is counters. This is[br]when we give characters the ability to negate

0:03:43.550,0:03:49.069
each other’s moves and strategies. For example:[br]a quick Zerg rush in Starcraft is all well

0:03:49.069,0:03:54.520
and good - unless your opponent is one step[br]ahead and has already built defensive bunkers.

0:03:54.520,0:03:59.900
And what we ideally want is for everything[br]to have a counter. So a defensive Starcraft

0:03:59.900,0:04:06.160
player can, in turn, be countered by a more[br]economical strategy, where you save up resources

0:04:06.160,0:04:10.480
to build units that can eventually crush those[br]bunkers into dust.

0:04:10.480,0:04:15.450
And we could make a counter to that counter,[br]and so on - but then we’d be here for forever.

0:04:15.450,0:04:19.780
There’s a more elegant solution though,[br]because how do you deal with someone who’s

0:04:19.780,0:04:23.360
sitting around saving up money? Well… a[br]rush.

0:04:23.360,0:04:29.520
And, wouldn’t you know it… it’s rock,[br]paper, scissors. This goofy game you play

0:04:29.520,0:04:34.440
to see who has to do the washing up might[br]be incredibly simple and lacking any strategic

0:04:34.440,0:04:40.680
depth, but it is perfectly balanced - because[br]everything has a counter, and everything is a counter.

0:04:40.680,0:04:43.880
EDDIE: Damn man, killed those scissors.

0:04:43.880,0:04:48.940
And that’s why it forms the backbone of[br]a lot of multiplayer games. Pretty much every

0:04:48.940,0:04:54.160
fighting game has a system like this, such[br]as Dead or Alive which boasts about its triangle

0:04:54.160,0:04:59.160
system, where strikes beat throws, throws[br]beat holds, and holds beat strikes.

0:04:59.160,0:05:04.490
In strategy games, it’s not just the strategies[br]that work like this, but the individual units.

0:05:04.490,0:05:08.480
And the different Pokemon types all sit in[br]a massive web of interlocking counters - but

0:05:08.480,0:05:12.250
starting, of course, with fire, water, and[br]grass.

0:05:12.250,0:05:17.690
Rock, paper, scissors is a great balancing[br]framework to start from, because you can ensure

0:05:17.690,0:05:22.650
that no element is overpowered - it’s countered[br]by something. And no choice is irrelevant

0:05:22.650,0:05:26.310
- it at least works as a counter to something[br]else.

0:05:26.310,0:05:32.460
And also, in strategy games at least, it encourages[br]mixed strategies, it makes you into a multi-disciplinary

0:05:32.460,0:05:37.470
player, and it forces you to switch tactics on[br]the fly in a really dynamic way.

0:05:37.470,0:05:42.520
And in class-based games, it’s a great way[br]of automatically making mixed teams.

0:05:42.520,0:05:48.660
Take Team Fortress 2, where seven of its nine[br]classes fit into a complex web of interlocking

0:05:48.660,0:05:54.190
and interchangeable triangles of rock, paper,[br]scissors. Here, teams must pick complementary

0:05:54.190,0:05:59.870
classes to protect each other from weaknesses.[br]If you’re an Engineer and Spies keep sapping

0:05:59.870,0:06:03.490
your sentries, then you’re going to need[br]to get one of your team mates to switch to

0:06:03.490,0:06:05.000
Pyro.

0:06:05.000,0:06:09.410
These counters are often described as hard[br]counters if they completely shut something

0:06:09.410,0:06:14.680
down - like a punch is a hard counter to a[br]throw in ARMS because it will nullify the

0:06:14.680,0:06:20.690
effect every single time. But soft counters[br]just mean one choice will have an advantage

0:06:20.690,0:06:28.190
over the other. McCree will outperform Tracer,[br]but his chance of winning is far from 100%.

0:06:28.190,0:06:33.100
When it comes to counters, it’s really important[br]to figure out what are the hands and what

0:06:33.100,0:06:34.310
are the throws.

0:06:34.310,0:06:39.270
The hands are the things that get locked in[br]before the match even starts. You know, the

0:06:39.270,0:06:45.740
characters and the races. The throws are the[br]things you pick during the match. The moves,

0:06:45.740,0:06:51.320
the units, and the strategies. And in a team-based[br]game, like Overwatch, the entire team is the

0:06:51.320,0:06:55.190
hand, while the individual players are the[br]throws.

0:06:55.190,0:07:00.100
The throws are specifically designed to be[br]unbalanced against each other, to create that

0:07:00.100,0:07:05.669
back-and-forth counter-play and teamwork.[br]But the hands are supposed to be balanced,

0:07:05.669,0:07:11.240
and so they should have access to all of the[br]throws. If Zangief simply couldn’t block,

0:07:11.240,0:07:14.410
for example, he would be unusable.

0:07:17.320,0:07:22.040
So you’ve got a bunch of characters, with[br]trade-offs and counters, and you think you’ve

0:07:22.050,0:07:26.520
made them balanced. But how do you actually[br]make sure that’s true? Well this is when

0:07:26.520,0:07:31.560
we start collecting data - either from internal[br]play-testers, or the millions of people playing

0:07:31.560,0:07:32.720
your game online.

0:07:32.720,0:07:36.940
Now you might think that all you need to do[br]is track how often each character results

0:07:36.940,0:07:42.440
in success - i.e it’s “win rate”. And[br]if a character has a 50 percent win rate,

0:07:42.440,0:07:43.500
it’s balanced.

0:07:43.500,0:07:49.120
But, like all stats, this can be misleading.[br]Imagine a fighting game with three characters

0:07:49.120,0:07:54.660
- and if Ryu won every match against Chun-Li[br]and lost every match against Cammy, his win-rate

0:07:54.660,0:07:58.979
would be 50 percent. Perfectly balanced, though?[br]I think not.

0:07:58.979,0:08:02.979
That’s why match-up charts, where you where[br]you can see the win rate of a character, when

0:08:02.979,0:08:06.500
played against all other characters, are so[br]important.

0:08:06.500,0:08:10.729
But even that’s not going to tell you everything.[br]Riot had a problem with the League of Legends

0:08:10.729,0:08:15.939
character Akali. The numbers said she was[br]pretty balanced, with a 44 percent win-rate

0:08:15.939,0:08:21.789
- perhaps a tad underpowered. So how come[br]she secured a 72 percent win rate at the 2018

0:08:21.789,0:08:25.870
World Championship, and was banned more times[br]than any other champion?

0:08:25.870,0:08:31.361
It’s because while she was really powerful,[br]she was difficult to play effectively. She

0:08:31.361,0:08:36.080
had a super high skill floor, in other words.[br]So while top-tier players could use her to

0:08:36.080,0:08:41.340
wipe the floor with the competition, the low-ranking[br]players using Akali were getting killed left,

0:08:41.340,0:08:45.270
right, and center. Therefore, her win-rate[br]was being dragged down.

0:08:45.270,0:08:49.930
That’s why it’s important to look at a[br]character’s win-rate and match-ups across

0:08:49.930,0:08:51.370
all skill levels.

0:08:51.370,0:08:56.360
And finally, win-rate doesn’t really tell[br]you what’s actually going on in the game.

0:08:56.360,0:09:00.540
We need to know what characters people are[br]actually picking. People might be avoiding

0:09:00.540,0:09:05.300
a character who is otherwise well balanced[br]because that character is not much fun to

0:09:05.300,0:09:08.670
play, or is only useful in certain situations.

0:09:08.670,0:09:13.871
Blizzard found that Overwatch hero Symmetra[br]was a largely balanced character, but she

0:09:13.871,0:09:19.020
wasn’t being picked as much because her[br]use was highly situational. So in her first

0:09:19.020,0:09:23.370
complete redesign, they tried to make her[br]more popular by giving her two ultimates to

0:09:23.370,0:09:26.230
pick from: a teleporter or a shield generator.

0:09:26.230,0:09:31.250
That’s why player feedback is so important[br]- as well as pick-rate, which tells you how

0:09:31.250,0:09:37.300
often a character is actually getting used.[br]For Rainbow Six Siege, Ubisoft uses a matrix

0:09:37.300,0:09:41.720
to cross reference both win rate and pick[br]rate -with different considerations needed

0:09:41.720,0:09:45.450
for operators who fall into these four buckets.

0:09:45.450,0:09:50.480
And the pick-rates help tell you the state[br]of the meta - which is essentially just the

0:09:50.480,0:09:54.910
characters, cards, strategies, and so on that[br]the community at large have found the most

0:09:54.910,0:09:57.470
effective and are currently using.

0:09:57.470,0:10:03.910
This is often shared through forum posts,[br]fan-made tier lists, YouTube videos, and eSport

0:10:03.910,0:10:08.740
victories. When a kid called Jason won the[br]Clash Royale tournament in Helsinki, his chosen

0:10:08.740,0:10:12.160
cards suddenly became massively popular.

0:10:12.160,0:10:16.600
The meta can actually act as a self-balancing[br]force. Let’s say everyone discovered that

0:10:16.600,0:10:21.810
a certain character was overpowered, and everyone[br]started using it. It’s now in everyone’s

0:10:21.810,0:10:26.920
best interest to try and discover strategies[br]that can counter or out perform that favourite.

0:10:26.920,0:10:29.960
And if players find it, the meta might change.

0:10:29.960,0:10:34.480
This rolling meta keeps the game fresh, and[br]gives the players who found the counter a

0:10:34.480,0:10:39.910
real sense of satisfaction. Overwatch’s[br]Jeff Kaplan says “regarding the meta changing

0:10:39.910,0:10:44.960
because players have innovated a new strategy[br]– well – this is the best-case scenario.

0:10:44.960,0:10:48.220
We’ve seen this happen time and time again.”

0:10:48.220,0:10:52.910
Of course, that’s not always going to work.[br]Sometimes the designers will have to go in

0:10:52.910,0:10:58.380
and change things. If a strategy is overpowered,[br]if a character is never getting played, or

0:10:58.380,0:11:02.519
if a play-style is proving annoying then it’s[br]time to swing the hammer.

0:11:02.519,0:11:07.370
First, the devs need to figure out the exact[br]reason why that character, or strategy, or

0:11:07.370,0:11:11.820
whatever is unbalanced. It’s easy to see[br]that a character is dominating the match-up

0:11:11.820,0:11:14.850
charts, but can be harder to pin-point why.

0:11:14.850,0:11:19.250
So for a character like Meta Knight in Super[br]Smash Bros Brawl, it was mostly because of

0:11:19.250,0:11:24.380
his extremely fast attack speed, and an ability[br]to cancel his momentum in mid-air and avoid

0:11:24.380,0:11:28.910
being KO’d. He had lots of advantages, and[br]not enough trade-offs - and other characters

0:11:28.910,0:11:31.580
don’t have the tools to counter him.

0:11:31.580,0:11:36.269
Once the source has been found, you’ve got[br]to figure out what to nerf and what to buff.

0:11:36.269,0:11:40.680
Nerfing means making something less powerful,[br]like reducing their speed, limiting their

0:11:40.680,0:11:45.470
range, or cutting down their strength. Buffing[br]is the opposite: making it more powerful.

0:11:45.470,0:11:50.730
You don’t necessarily have to buff the weak[br]characters and nerf the strong ones, though. You could

0:11:50.730,0:11:55.000
leave an overpowered character alone, but[br]buff the characters who counter them, and

0:11:55.000,0:11:59.970
still solve the same problem. Make sure you[br]watch this Core-A Gaming video on why buffs

0:11:59.970,0:12:02.579
are, generally, better than nerfs.

0:12:02.579,0:12:06.649
Balance changes can be anything from a tiny[br]tweak to a character’s movement speed, to

0:12:06.649,0:12:11.149
a complete overhaul of how a character works.[br]It might be a fundamental change to the rules

0:12:11.149,0:12:15.730
of the game - Rainbow Six Siege made attacking[br]and defending more balanced by changing the

0:12:15.730,0:12:19.839
match time to three minutes. And sometimes[br]you’ve just to pull things from the game

0:12:19.839,0:12:25.730
entirely, like when Epic scrapped the overpowered[br]infinity blade in Fortnite.

0:12:25.730,0:12:31.210
Any change is going to affect players - especially[br]those who are very used to the way a specific

0:12:31.210,0:12:35.279
character, or its counters, work. So when[br]the game gets patched, it’s important to

0:12:35.279,0:12:38.820
communicate the changes through patch notes,[br]videos, and so on.

0:12:38.820,0:12:43.740
In fact, patch notes are so important that[br]Riot once put out of a note saying a champion

0:12:43.740,0:12:49.060
was nerfed, but forgot to actually implement[br]the nerf in the code. Even so, the character’s

0:12:49.060,0:12:54.140
pick rate plummeted, and even his win rate[br]decreased a bit. Didn’t I say that player

0:12:54.140,0:12:57.260
psychology was an important factor?

0:12:57.260,0:13:01.980
Now, at the beginning of this video, i said[br]that balance was about trying to make characters

0:13:01.980,0:13:07.120
equally viable among players of roughly the[br]same skill level. But what happens when players

0:13:07.120,0:13:09.160
aren’t at the same skill level?

0:13:09.160,0:13:12.480
Well, a lot of highly competitive games use[br]matchmaking

0:13:12.480,0:13:15.340
systems to pair up similarly skilled players.

0:13:15.340,0:13:20.080
But for more accessible, party-style games,[br]we may want to build in negative feedback

0:13:20.090,0:13:25.529
loops, or catch-up mechanics, where players[br]who are doing poorly get a helping hand. Examples

0:13:25.529,0:13:29.910
are the deathstreak mechanic in Modern Warfare[br]2 where you get a special bonus for dying

0:13:29.910,0:13:35.000
a whole bunch. And the item system in Mario[br]Kart where powerful items - including that

0:13:35.000,0:13:39.950
pesky blue shell - are only given to players[br]at the back of the pack. These are pretty

0:13:39.950,0:13:42.980
contentious, and must be used sparingly.

0:13:42.980,0:13:48.710
We can also reduce the value of skill by adding[br]in more luck. We see this in most family board

0:13:48.710,0:13:53.110
games like Snakes and Ladders and Monopoly[br]which are heavily based on the luck of the

0:13:53.110,0:13:58.320
die roll. But in video games, you see this[br]in games like Apex Legends, where your chances

0:13:58.320,0:14:03.209
of winning are shifted, based on what goodies[br]you find when you drop into the map.

0:14:03.209,0:14:09.230
Game can also offer handicapping modes. And[br]in team-based games, we can give players alternate

0:14:09.230,0:14:14.110
play styles that allow them to contribute[br]to the team without needing to do highly-skilled,

0:14:14.110,0:14:18.990
front-line action, like being a medic or an[br]engineer.

0:14:18.990,0:14:24.230
So balancing a game is a really challenging[br]job. The more you make characters distinct,

0:14:24.230,0:14:28.350
the harder it is to put them on an even playing[br]field. And that’s not taking into account

0:14:28.350,0:14:30.670
players of unequal skill level.

0:14:30.670,0:14:35.170
We can try to design in trade-offs, to ensure[br]characters don’t have too many advantages.

0:14:35.170,0:14:39.089
And give characters counters, so they can[br]keep each other in check. But even the best

0:14:39.089,0:14:43.160
designs won’t stand up to scrutiny when[br]put in front of millions of players.

0:14:43.160,0:14:48.329
So we need to constantly determine the balance,[br]by watching win-rates, match-ups, pick-rates,

0:14:48.329,0:14:52.889
and player feedback. And while hopefully the[br]meta will naturally shift in response to imbalance

0:14:52.889,0:14:57.050
- sometimes devs have to go in and make the[br]hard changes.

0:14:57.050,0:15:01.550
And then you introduce a whole new character[br]and everything breaks again. Sigh. I said

0:15:01.550,0:15:06.230
this wasn’t an easy job. So let me know:[br]what do you think is the most balanced game

0:15:06.230,0:15:11.050
around, and have you ever played a game where[br]the devs just got it oh so wrong? Let me know

0:15:11.050,0:15:15.420
your experience with balance in the comments[br]below.

0:15:15.420,0:15:19.560
Thanks for watching! I had a lot of help on[br]this one, from people who know multiplayer

0:15:19.560,0:15:24.720
games really well to developers who have worked[br]on games like League of Legends, Dirty Bomb,

0:15:24.720,0:15:28.589
and Rainbow Six Siege. There’s definitely[br]more to talk about - like balancing multiplayer

0:15:28.589,0:15:34.100
maps in shooters. But we can get to that in[br]the future.