HOW MUCH SHOULD ONE CRANK UP THE DIFFICULTY BEFORE IT'S TOO MUCH? (GAME DIFFICULTY BALANCING)

Posts

Pages: first 1234 next last
The Background:

I recently found a Let's Try for my game Dungeon Crawl: Party of Four. It's pretty much my flagship game: the most effort I made went into it.

I'm a big fan of critique and comments, and the critique I got from the video was this: it's ok, it needs work, aesthetic clash, and the battle system is too easy.

That bolded part got me. I put a ton of work into that battle system, and hearing someone pass by it and say "it's a bit easy" was rather disappointing. I didn't want the game to be too easy, I wanted it to be challenging. At the same time, I didn't want to make every battle a headache, so some toning-down went on. But it seems I may have toned it down too much, didn't add enough challenge to the non-boss enemies, and in the words of the Let's Try-er, "The skills have a good idea going for it, but in the end they just don't matter."

So that made me think: how high do you crank up the difficulty to make it challenging yet not overwhelming?


The Question:

How do you balance the stats of your non-boss enemies? Amidst all of my random projects, I am working on a full length game: I'm learning from my errors and putting the efforts into another big project. I want the enemies to be challenging, requiring the player to think. I don't want it to be overwhelming to where the players feel they can't progress every two seconds without having to use an inn.

There's two common approaches I see to non-boss enemies: first is the version where the enemies are very hard, heavy hitting, and just short of a boss. This makes every fight a hefty challenge. The second common approach I notice, is the "wear down" type: that is, every non-boss enemy isn't meant to be a monolith of pain in and of themselves, but rather they are meant to wear the player's resources (health, mana, items) down over time.

So the question now is, how do you balance your non-boss battles? Do you have any rules of thumb? Do you find yourself taking any of the aforementioned common approaches, or do you have a different approach all together?
InfectionFiles
the world ends in whatever my makerscore currently is
4622
You could make some enemies glass cannons. Low HP/DEF but high ATK or powerful skills so that it is promised that the party will feel some pain but kill enemies quickly. And that would probably be part of the wear down option.
Then mingle high HP/DEF enemies with those that are basically turtles that have low damage but maybe a special skill for some variety.

My flagship uses a lot of poison like status that the player from level 1 have the ability to combat for cheap through required skills. Some statuses are stronger than others and require immediate attention. Others you could last the whole fight with and remove outside of combat. The "cure" spells are free so it doesn't hurt your MP but it takes a turn to remove and if left untreated can be devastating.
My games are survival games (feels like I just talked about this on RedMasks topic) so items are limited and there's not many shops or none at all and it's what you find is what you get. The latter is VERY easy to balance, at least for me. When you throw in shops and whatnot you have to consider the players options more. Will they have the healing or status removal item? And so on.

I never like for my games to feel too easy. I rather make them harder but doable and take the flak and have those seeking a challenge satisfied.
LockeZ
I'd really like to get rid of LockeZ. His play style is way too unpredictable. He's always like this too. If he ran a country, he'd just kill and imprison people at random until crime stopped.
5958
Depends how good the player is.

You just gotta figure out what difficulty you want your game to be, what players you want it to be for, and stick to that. And then - and this is vital - make sure you market it correctly so people who are challenged by that amount of difficulty are the ones who play it.

Or you can add difficulty settings, that works too. More work though. It's like balancing two different games.
Some players are going to breeze through most games easily. Others might fall on their ass during the first fight. It depends on skill, knowledge, understanding of the system and yes, balance.

If you play the game and it's a challenge then it might be a little too hard (if the creator has a hard time getting past something when they're the one who knows how everything works, the player is going to have a hell of a time!)

If a bunch of people are saying it's too easy, then you could adjust a few stats, maybe lock away some skills that might be OP until a bit later or add a difficulty setting for a harder mode (and then really bump up the stats a bunch/add skills to monsters to make them harder/reduce the amount of healing done/etc).
Ratty524
The 524 is for 524 Stone Crabs
12986
This is something that you can really only judge through play testing. Getting someone else to do an LP of your vid is a good start.

For your situation in particular, what do your skills do in your game? What situations or challenges are they designed for? If a player is not utilizing the tools you are giving them, it could be a sign of imbalance: where one tactic is just as effective and more comfortable to pull off.
Corfaisus
"It's frustrating because - as much as Corf is otherwise an irredeemable person - his 2k/3 mapping is on point." ~ psy_wombats
7874
In general, I've found that giving throwaway enemies roughly the same stats as the heroes balances it out fairly well. I'm sure that - given as everything functions off of a preset algorithm in RPG Maker - there's probably a "perfect" (I feel dirty just suggesting it) calculation one could use to balance certain stats and items out to give the best results when running battle simulations.

Though with the added functionality that comes with the more recent RPG Makers, you could just apply some sort of wacky mathematics behind the scenes that scales enemies damage multiplication algorithms in reverse (whoa) to factor for the hero's rise in strength and access to balance-breaking equipment. Perhaps low level enemies have a higher percentage-based multiplier where later enemies have a more consistent 1:1 calculation? Just throwing that out there.

Might seem counter-intuitive, but if it's one thing I've learned with RPG Maker, it's that sometimes those are the best answers.
Of course, Final Fantasy VIII did such a thing, to varying degrees of effectiveness. Although, the increasing enemy power only scaled to a certain point; i.e., early-game enemies were still pitiful to late-game characters.

I think that's a good way to go about it, though. Otherwise, just keeping pace with the enemies throughout the game will never give the player a sense of growing power. Sure, all the numbers go up and up and up, but their relative meaning wouldn't change.

Having a system like Corf suggested would make encounters interesting for longer periods of time, as long as enemies have a reasonable cap on their power level, such that players can eventually surpass it.

And I say interesting instead of challenging because the latter is really a subjective term, which I suppose is the meat of this topic.

If your game is played by people who play RPGs all the time, then of course it's going to come easily to them. Your battle system might be unique and fantastic, but it operates on principles that define the genre, that veterans understand very well.

Take Dark Souls, for instance: a series that is objectively very challenging and hated and lauded alike for its brutal punishment of players. Veterans of the series can make it through any of its games in a few hours without more than a handful of deaths, though. People get better at things they do a lot, so, unfortunately, I don't think you can expect to deliver a major challenge to RPG veterans without at the same time presenting insurmountable obstacles for novices.

On a more specific level, I would say that having a mix of "trash" and "elite" enemies populate your areas is the right way to go. Not every battle should take huge amounts of time and resources to overcome. A few definitely should. Running around an area killing a bunch of weak enemies, with an occasional encounter with a very strong one that might require unique strategies to defeat, is good pacing to my mind.

If every battle is too easy, it gets boring. If every battle requires significant thought, it gets tedious. A balance of the two leaves a satisfying feeling after conquering an area.
author=InfectionFiles
You could make some enemies glass cannons. Low HP/DEF but high ATK or powerful skills so that it is promised that the party will feel some pain but kill enemies quickly. And that would probably be part of the wear down option.
Then mingle high HP/DEF enemies with those that are basically turtles that have low damage but maybe a special skill for some variety...


I like this idea. On my new major project, I began experimenting with the enemy's damage a bit. The early level enemies, rather. I simulated a couple battles with increased stats to make them a bit more threatening, and at the end of the first round, all three enemies decided to gang up on my caster, and he dropped. Part of me wanted to knee-jerk and lower the damage, but another part of me really liked it (considering there are taunt abilities in the game that I intentionally did not use for the test). I lowered their HP as well, and that seemed to make them difficult enough without being overbearing.

I also like how you mentioned items later on in your post: that's another issue I always struggle with. How do I get the price just right for items in my shop? How many gold do the enemies drop? That sorta' stuff.


author=LockeZ
You just gotta figure out what difficulty you want your game to be, what players you want it to be for, and stick to that.


This is good advice. I think one of my mistakes was lowering the "entry" difficulty. It made the first area of enemies in my game pushovers, and I could see how that would really disenfranchise those looking for a challenge.


author=Liberty
If you play the game and it's a challenge then it might be a little too hard (if the creator has a hard time getting past something when they're the one who knows how everything works, the player is going to have a hell of a time!)


Like The Shore, part 1! I remembered that comment early in the SWAP event. Because of that, I think the pendulum swung in the opposite direction for me, and I started toning down any enemies that presented me with a challenge. Of course, the whole resource-issue is dealt with, but I think I still made the enemies too weak all together (in Dungeon Crawl:PoF).


author=Ratty524
... If a player is not utilizing the tools you are giving them, it could be a sign of imbalance: where one tactic is just as effective and more comfortable to pull off.


I think this is the case: my skills are imbalanced. As the Let's Try-er indicated, he could just blow through the enemies using the basic "barehanded" (80% max damage) attack, not even equipped with weapons. While many of the skills on all of my weapons are useful (e.g., a skill that will normal deal damage and lower agility), it just goes to show that the enemies were not challenging enough to wear the skills were actually required outside the boss fights (and even then, it's iffy).


author=Corfaisus
In general, I've found that giving throwaway enemies roughly the same stats as the heroes balances it out fairly well... Perhaps low level enemies have a higher percentage-based multiplier where later enemies have a more consistent 1:1 calculation? Just throwing that out there.


I'm going to have to try that idea, too. Right now the enemy stats are pretty close to the party. I'm also trying to keep defensive stats fixed at a low number (very few items raise it), so as the player raises in strength, they see they deal more damage, yet the enemies gain health.


author=StandardFiend
On a more specific level, I would say that having a mix of "trash" and "elite" enemies populate your areas is the right way to go... Running around an area killing a bunch of weak enemies, with an occasional encounter with a very strong one that might require unique strategies to defeat, is good pacing to my mind.


One of my projects I was experimenting with did this: you had a low chance to encounter a mini-boss with some insane skills, but conquering it resulted in a rare item of sorts: seen maybe once every 20 or so battles, roughly.

I like the idea. I'll have to see if I can use Infected's idea with the trash enemies: heavy hitting, but drop fast.



Thanks for the feedback all.
LockeZ
I'd really like to get rid of LockeZ. His play style is way too unpredictable. He's always like this too. If he ran a country, he'd just kill and imprison people at random until crime stopped.
5958
author=Gredge
I think one of my mistakes was lowering the "entry" difficulty. It made the first area of enemies in my game pushovers, and I could see how that would really disenfranchise those looking for a challenge.
This is a really common problem in RPGs by major developers also. The first parts of the game are really simple and boring.

One of the problems you face when making an indie game, especially a free one, is that you need to hook the player much more quickly, because they're far less invested in your game. However, one of the benefits that's alloted to you when making an indie game, especially a free one, is that you don't need to provide something for all different types of players, you just need to provide something really good for a small subset of them. It's better for an AAA game to be something to everyone, but it's better for your game to be everything to someone.

Both this problem and this benefit suggest the same thing - start your game off with not just real difficulty but also real depth. Showcase what's best about it and drop the player straight in, instead of working them to it gradually. They already know to play this type of game, that's why they sought yours out. You don't have to start them with 100% of your game's depth, but you will kill your game if you put in an hour of dungeons with only one ability per character before the class system is unlocked, like FF5 and FF13 did. Or, heaven forbid, twelve hours, like FF6 and DQ3 did.
I'm going to have to try that idea, too. Right now the enemy stats are pretty close to the party. I'm also trying to keep defensive stats fixed at a low number (very few items raise it), so as the player raises in strength, they see they deal more damage, yet the enemies gain health.


I plan to do the very same. I think that offers a very salient way for players to track the minute growths in their power. Normalised defense stats also make it much easier to control special enemies who utilise unique defense stats, such as a foe with extremely tough armour, and these special cases are more obvious to players, as well.

For instance, if a player happens to encounter such a unique enemy as his first battle in a new area, he will be able to immediately ascertain that physical attacks are inferior, rather than wondering if or assuming that such is simply the new area's baseline power level.
iddalai
RPG Maker 2k/2k3 for life, baby!!
1194
Tricky question, it really does depend on your target audience.

Some players will want to grind even if they don't need to and that will make the game too easy for them.

Other players will play from the get go and never grind and just use what they have at the time, if the game is too hard these players will have a considerable challenge.

Some like the battles to be crazy hard or challenging, and others don't like the battles to be too hard.
The secret is that there is no perfect difficulty. Even if a game is designed and marketed as intentionally difficult, there are still going to be people who power through it. Nothing stopped Dark Souls 3 speedruns from popping up in a matter of days.

I would say don't judge your game's overall difficulty from one opinion. If you have the ability to, try to get at least several different opinions from players, playtesters, etc. There's a difference between 1 person finding it too easy, and 9 out of 10 people finding it too easy.
Corfaisus
"It's frustrating because - as much as Corf is otherwise an irredeemable person - his 2k/3 mapping is on point." ~ psy_wombats
7874
I think we could be doing more for melee strategies than simply dismissing them in favor of magic. While it is true that magic costs something and should therefore see higher returns, I think the precedence it sets distracts us from thinking about combat in a more robust fashion. The same could probably be said for the numbers game that most RPGs rely on as a baseline for player feedback.

I've been experimenting with ways to keep the combat open and viable from multiple stances for the player, such as certain weapon types inflicting certain debuffs to lend credence to their usage. This gives weapons that would otherwise fall out of favor at the first sign of a heavier, higher strength weapon a secondary and consistent use throughout the game (something that we've seen also affects magic between the early and late game).

Sure there's no way to escape the greater numbers game when it comes to RPGs, but at least make each venue of the numbers game significant in its own right.

Having elemental magic that decreases an enemy's resistance to that element and certain elemental spells (in my case, the single target ones) inflicting status ailments relevant to their element adds more to the combat system in ways some might not bother with.

Say you have an enemy that's strong against (absorbs) an element. With the system above, you now have a choice to decrease their strength to the element either to completely null or even a positive damage agent while also taking advantage of a certain special status ailment that the enemy might otherwise be immune to if roughly the same affect were to be inflicted by a name-brand ailment like Blind or Poison.

This also increases the strength of lower costing spells that are used repeatedly, so you may save some mana in the long run if you use them instead.
All of that is good stuff, I like it.

Depending on how your equipment system works, the numbers game could be made irrelevant entirely by normalizing stat gains (or removing them), instead giving equipment unique properties that don't rely on numbers, such as elements and states. As long as stat growth from levels is adjusted to compensate, this offers a deep customization system around which engaging encounters can be built.
Just a warning since I've seen several posts about the low health high damage enemies: Be careful not to dip too much into rocket-tag gameplay (Gameplay where everyone tends to go down in one or two hits). That will make it extremely hard to balance bosses and enemies, since players will want to take enemies down as fast as possible, and bosses as well, tending to pull out nukes at the drop of the hat. I have a bit of a problem with that right now in my game, but its tempered by the fact that long term, recovery between missions is limited (once that is implemented anyway).

Also, enemies with really high damage and low stats tend to just grind away character HP and resources. If you want encounters to be fairly lethal, make sure you give the player ample resources to deal with it without just nuking every random encounter (tank characters with recovery mechanics, useful buffs that last for multiple fights, etc).
piemunch
i desperately need for everyone to know that i hate Undertale
0
author=LockeZ
you will kill your game if you put in an hour of dungeons with only one ability per character before the class system is unlocked, like FF5 and FF13 did. Or, heaven forbid, twelve hours, like FF6 and DQ3 did.


Aside from the fact that these four games are hugely successful, this sentence proves you haven't actually played any of them.
InfectionFiles
the world ends in whatever my makerscore currently is
4622
poor piemunch
iddalai
RPG Maker 2k/2k3 for life, baby!!
1194
author=piemunch
author=LockeZ
you will kill your game if you put in an hour of dungeons with only one ability per character before the class system is unlocked, like FF5 and FF13 did. Or, heaven forbid, twelve hours, like FF6 and DQ3 did.
Aside from the fact that these four games are hugely successful, this sentence proves you haven't actually played any of them.


That's one thing that bothers me, big game devs can do that, but we can't.

Those games are fun, but ours suddenly aren't if we do the same?

It just confirms to me that enjoyment depends on your mindset.
LockeZ
I'd really like to get rid of LockeZ. His play style is way too unpredictable. He's always like this too. If he ran a country, he'd just kill and imprison people at random until crime stopped.
5958
@piemunch: Uh, piemunch, dude

I, uh

Did you only read every other word or something

@iddalai: For better or worse, it's pretty much necessary to make a different type of game when you're trying to get positive reviews from major review sites so you can sell a copy to every single Playstation owner than it is when you're trying to get a few thousand free players to play and enjoy the entire game to the end. I personally consider it a blessing, since when you're forced to put in things to attract every single type of player, most of that ends up being crap that you as the designer don't actually care about.
The strategical aspect in combat is much more important than the general difficulty. If you just make the game harder by increasing monster stats, then it's still same boring battles, just you need to grind more.

But if you create battles that are easy with the right strategy, but deadly with the wrong strategy and you create enough diversity so that each encounter formation only appears 2-3 times, they that's more interesting and you can worry less about difficulty balancing too.

I'd actually say more than 98% of the RPGs here just don't get it right. Either I just keep using normal attacks on the mob that's auto-selected and still do quite well. Or the game gives me a huge grind already at the very beginning of the game. Not to mention that most games just put 2-3 different encounters per area. ZzZzZz.

Even games that advertise themselves as having "highly strategic" combat, I never felt that it mattered all that much what kind of skills I used. The penalties for using the wrong attacks and the rewards for using the right attacks are often just too low. In fact, conversing MP for healing spells only and then just using normal attacks proved to be the best strategy in over half the RPG Maker games I've played.

Likewise, games can also feel unfair. Like in some games you get to a point where suddenly the monster difficulty ramps up, but it doesn't seem like the game gives you any means to overcome it other than by grinding or using your rare healing items. Since my playing skills still aren't really challenged I'd even hesitate to call it "too hard".

What's interesting however, is when there's a high variety of encounter formations and each formation has its own small trick to it. Requiring me to select a different target than the default selection one (sometimes of course the default selected one should also be the correct one). Or requiring me to use a specific skill first. Or requiring me to use the Defend command at a certain point (that point needs to be in some way visible to the player).

Finally, in terms of general difficulty, you need to be careful about some other factors. Like if you have a fully linear game, you can predict quite well how hard it is for the player by playing it yourself. But if you put in a lot of secrets of optional stuff, you might end up much stronger or weaker than an actual player that doesn't know the game. For example you shouldn't assume that the player has actually found the secret chest with Flame Sword two dungeons earlier, just because you always get it when testing because you know where it is. But of course you could make a boss that requires a certain item to defeat if you give the players hints that this is the case (like NPCs in town talking about a legendary sword in that one cave, that is said to strike down any plant-type fiend).

tl;dr
Worry less about the difficulty and more about how to make combat interesting.
Pages: first 1234 next last