Class Balance

[Nerual]

The true point to class balancing I think is to give everyone a bone, but to let everyone find something that plays how they like it. I also think that classes should have jobs, tank, nuker, etc. But that for fun diffrent classes can do it in diffrent ways. I applaud Vanguard for trying to make diffrent tanks, rather than just being tough, some combine tough and scary, or tough and damaging, they have one primary ability, toughness, and one secondary, damage, scary debuff, etc. These abilitys help define that class, but shouldn't overpower classes that may use it as a primary, I.E. a warrior shouldn't do more damage than the DPS characters, but should do more than other tanks, thats what his area is. I see balance as finding a main job, and a secondary to help define your character, and help you find one that fits your style. That would seem to be the best balance to hope for.

[Flagg]

yeah the way thier classes all sound hecka fun right now I can't think of a class that I don't want to try for at least a little bit. As far as balance goes I just hope everyone has a place in a group unlike eq where you HAD to kite if you where a druid/necro/wizard bl and shammyies are ultrapopular late levels, but you have to solo mages have to solo bards have to solo again becoming killer in late levels. The only clases that are popular thoughout that game are tank cleric maybe enchanter but I heard it was hard to get to level 25 but after that its a brezze no pun intended. Although a big part of that was people being all we must be as effective and fast as possible which was the lamest thing ever even when I was healbot 2000 err a cleric I just cared about people listing if they listened to instruction they where always welcome even if another ranger would have done slightly more dps over 2 hr period.Doh sorry off topic rant thier for a bit...

[Greymain]

I want every class to be unique and fun to play. Each class should be able to give a group an edge in certain circumstances. Should they all be balanced? no, but no class should be so good that a disproportionate number of players choose it.

[Strokke]

If there was perfect balance and a class is for some reason more popular than others should it be weakened to encourage diversity?

[Arctic_Slicer]

When they are designing the classes I would prefer that flavor takes precedence over balance. Balance is good but if you have to sacrifice flavor to achieve that balance then you end up with a bunch of uninteresting classes that make for much more boring game.

[Greymain]

Originally Posted by Strokke

If there was perfect balance and a class is for some reason more popular than others should it be weakened to encourage diversity?

Not weakened but enhanced by changing some features to make it more fun to play.

[Nabren]

Originally Posted by Strokke

If there was perfect balance and a class is for some reason more popular than others should it be weakened to encourage diversity?

No because as stated there is "perfect" balance. Can't really help this situation as the class is probably more popular based on things that don't affect gameplay anyway. Let things work themselves out, however, I may suggest doing something small(and not to the classes) to encourage other classes to be played.

[Strokke]

Its unfortunate that popular opinion and percieved balance can cause developers to make changes.

[Arctic_Slicer]

Balance is indeed important but when designing any game flavor should always be perfected first. After you got flavor down you should then try achieve better balance without sacrificing the flavor. The problem area is caused when the developers try to achieve "perfect balance" which is virtually impossible without crippling the flavor.

The goal in class balance should be:

"Everthing is useful but nothing is broken"

[Nabren]

Well, first off, it's hard to define balance when everything is different.

A warrior does 1000 damage but can't heal.
A cleric heals for 1000 damage but can do a little bit of damage.

Basically the only way to do it would be to assign things arbitrary values and make sure everything adds up to the same in the end.