Is there any easy way to balance of a tower defense? I made a map that has like 50 levels and I don't want to play through all of them with all the units you can get. I was thinking of making some math formula or something but I really don't feel like doing that. Do I just have to play through all of the levels or is there some easy way to do this?
make math formula .. only real possible way to make it good.
Playing through all levels wont help, as other people may use a different build that will just dominate. First you need to balance your towers, then you can balance the levels.
@Karawasa
Why do you always let Mephs get to you(You dont need to answer that)..
Still looking forward to your TD.
That implies I responded out of anger, which I did not. I enjoy counter-trolling him. In fact, I am actually curious to see what kind of flames he comes up with once ETD is out. Glad you're still interested, alpha version was released not too long ago.
But, I do apologize for derailing the thread. So, I'll elaborate on my previous post;
Math formula is a good way to get a very rough base so that you mostly eliminate the extreme imbalance. However, it is not a way to reach balance. For that, you need testing (and opinions of other people). The reason is that it is nigh impossible to capture all the factors accurately in a spreadsheet (unless your towers don't do anything special).
Karawasa, when does ele TD come out? I loved it back in WC3.
On Topic: Karawasa is bang on. Balance is best started through mathematics and then ironed out through playing the game. There are too many facets of balance for mathematics alone to account for. For instance, upgraded towers should usually be less effective for the money they cost than their preceding tower, if space is a factor towards the end of the game. The upgraded form would already get an edge for being more power in less space.
It also depends on how your game plays. Generally you want to go for a DPS count, but if you look at something like Vexal TD you'll see that attack speed and splash are all that really matter; damage is completely taken out of the equation.
Generally, a good starting point is DPS vs cost, assuming it applies to your game.
As for feedback; it's important to listen to what your players (especially beta testers) have to say, but don't automatically assume everybody with an opinion knows what's best for the game. My only published title "Formation Defense" was bashed by tons of people for being imbalanced, but none of them could agree on anything. If somebody said one thing was OP, another would always say it was actually UP. You need people that know the entire game to give balance advice, not just somebody who's ticked off because their tower doesn't one hit kill everything.
In the end it turned out my balance was actually quite good (minus one or two little things) and alot of people simply didn't understand the game.
Further elaborating on the splash damage area :
When comparing the dps of a non-splash tower with a splash dmg tower, it'd be wise to make the dps of the splash dmg tower 1/4 - 1/3 the dmg of a nonsplash tower. If the damage is 1/3, then the splash dmg tower will only be more effective than the non-splash tower when it hits more than 3 units at once.
Is the said TD a mazing TD or one where the routes are already set? If it's a mazing TD, it'd be better to make upgrading the towers more worthwhile than a bunch of non-upgraded ones. Also, be careful with adding armor to the enemy units. Armor can easily make a game much harder than originally planned.
So with maths, the things that you need to balance are
-Raw damage (Every shot fired)
-Attack speed
-Splash
Don't want to be rude on you but it sounds more logical to maze in a mazing TD and thereby spamming 'level 1' towers ?
The point of mazing is to control the units and keep them occupied while all your towers deal dmg.
While a cliff +1 based TD is more about key-point focused upgraded nuking.
And yeah as ETD guy said, you should always start out by maths to get a basic balance going.
I guess you could look at how much dps/money you got. Then how much money/kill, and how many units.
Special abilities aren't balanced easy by maths though. Like 'freezing' is pretty annoying to consider in the maths.
If you put effort in making a whole map you might as-well put effort balancing it out I guess..
What he is saying is that you can use upgrades for balance in a mazing TD. You can make an upgraded tower a lot stronger in a mazing TD, because with upgrading it, you are sacrificing the opportunity to make a second weaker tower that you can maze with. It all goes back to balance.
And for the maker, just out of curiosity, why a TD? I mean this not as a troll but a serious question. There are so many TDs on bnet already, and to be honest making another one seems rather... unoriginal. However, I don't quite know what you TD is, because I never played WC3. However, it has to be something incredibly special for it to be noticed. You can't just be like "I have 50 towers!" and "100 full levels!", because that sounds so... boring. When I am looking for a TD game, I am looking for "Special Feature: Moving towers!" or "Special Feature: Randomly generated path" or "This isn't just a TD! Use units to fight off the incoming creeps, and start yourself a Tug of Towers!". (BTW don't steal that cuz I actually am making a Tug of Towers game)
But you get the point? Add some pizazz to attract attention. Don't make it just another TD. If you want a great example look at bloons. Bloons was (as far as I can tell) the first TD that didn't have units based off of health. Instead, they used the layering system. What makes bloons great is that once you kill, for example, a metal bloon, it is no longer metal and can be attacked by dart towers. In other TD ames that use health, that bloon would simply take damage and still be metal. You get my point? Add something unique! I have given enough examples to drive someone crazy enough to punch me over the internet, but w/e.
Also, like I said, I don't know anything about your TD except for that it is a TD, so you may have already done what I am saying. But, because it is a WC3 game, I am sure there is something identical or very similar alreadyon bnet, but then again idk.
Is there any easy way to balance of a tower defense? I made a map that has like 50 levels and I don't want to play through all of them with all the units you can get. I was thinking of making some math formula or something but I really don't feel like doing that. Do I just have to play through all of the levels or is there some easy way to do this?
@Demon4231: Go
make math formula .. only real possible way to make it good. Playing through all levels wont help, as other people may use a different build that will just dominate. First you need to balance your towers, then you can balance the levels.
Math formula is only a start point.
TDs dont need any logic behind them.
Can't wait to see you try and continue talking shit once I put out ETD.
@Karawasa: Go
@Mephs: Go
Guys, Need I remind the two of you to NOT de-rail a thread?.
@Karawasa
Why do you always let Mephs get to you(You dont need to answer that)..
Still looking forward to your TD.
@Mephs
Funny pic. I think I`ll save that for future use, but enough with the derailment and trolling of the TD threads please.
That implies I responded out of anger, which I did not. I enjoy counter-trolling him. In fact, I am actually curious to see what kind of flames he comes up with once ETD is out. Glad you're still interested, alpha version was released not too long ago.
But, I do apologize for derailing the thread. So, I'll elaborate on my previous post;
Math formula is a good way to get a very rough base so that you mostly eliminate the extreme imbalance. However, it is not a way to reach balance. For that, you need testing (and opinions of other people). The reason is that it is nigh impossible to capture all the factors accurately in a spreadsheet (unless your towers don't do anything special).
Besides its a TD?
Karawasa, when does ele TD come out? I loved it back in WC3.
On Topic: Karawasa is bang on. Balance is best started through mathematics and then ironed out through playing the game. There are too many facets of balance for mathematics alone to account for. For instance, upgraded towers should usually be less effective for the money they cost than their preceding tower, if space is a factor towards the end of the game. The upgraded form would already get an edge for being more power in less space.
It also depends on how your game plays. Generally you want to go for a DPS count, but if you look at something like Vexal TD you'll see that attack speed and splash are all that really matter; damage is completely taken out of the equation.
Generally, a good starting point is DPS vs cost, assuming it applies to your game.
As for feedback; it's important to listen to what your players (especially beta testers) have to say, but don't automatically assume everybody with an opinion knows what's best for the game. My only published title "Formation Defense" was bashed by tons of people for being imbalanced, but none of them could agree on anything. If somebody said one thing was OP, another would always say it was actually UP. You need people that know the entire game to give balance advice, not just somebody who's ticked off because their tower doesn't one hit kill everything.
In the end it turned out my balance was actually quite good (minus one or two little things) and alot of people simply didn't understand the game.
Further elaborating on the splash damage area :
When comparing the dps of a non-splash tower with a splash dmg tower, it'd be wise to make the dps of the splash dmg tower 1/4 - 1/3 the dmg of a nonsplash tower. If the damage is 1/3, then the splash dmg tower will only be more effective than the non-splash tower when it hits more than 3 units at once.
Is the said TD a mazing TD or one where the routes are already set? If it's a mazing TD, it'd be better to make upgrading the towers more worthwhile than a bunch of non-upgraded ones. Also, be careful with adding armor to the enemy units. Armor can easily make a game much harder than originally planned.
So with maths, the things that you need to balance are
-Raw damage (Every shot fired)
-Attack speed
-Splash
@Shad0wsEdge: Go
Don't want to be rude on you but it sounds more logical to maze in a mazing TD and thereby spamming 'level 1' towers ? The point of mazing is to control the units and keep them occupied while all your towers deal dmg.
While a cliff +1 based TD is more about key-point focused upgraded nuking.
And yeah as ETD guy said, you should always start out by maths to get a basic balance going. I guess you could look at how much dps/money you got. Then how much money/kill, and how many units. Special abilities aren't balanced easy by maths though. Like 'freezing' is pretty annoying to consider in the maths. If you put effort in making a whole map you might as-well put effort balancing it out I guess..
@Dresnia: Go
What he is saying is that you can use upgrades for balance in a mazing TD. You can make an upgraded tower a lot stronger in a mazing TD, because with upgrading it, you are sacrificing the opportunity to make a second weaker tower that you can maze with. It all goes back to balance.
And for the maker, just out of curiosity, why a TD? I mean this not as a troll but a serious question. There are so many TDs on bnet already, and to be honest making another one seems rather... unoriginal. However, I don't quite know what you TD is, because I never played WC3. However, it has to be something incredibly special for it to be noticed. You can't just be like "I have 50 towers!" and "100 full levels!", because that sounds so... boring. When I am looking for a TD game, I am looking for "Special Feature: Moving towers!" or "Special Feature: Randomly generated path" or "This isn't just a TD! Use units to fight off the incoming creeps, and start yourself a Tug of Towers!". (BTW don't steal that cuz I actually am making a Tug of Towers game)
But you get the point? Add some pizazz to attract attention. Don't make it just another TD. If you want a great example look at bloons. Bloons was (as far as I can tell) the first TD that didn't have units based off of health. Instead, they used the layering system. What makes bloons great is that once you kill, for example, a metal bloon, it is no longer metal and can be attacked by dart towers. In other TD ames that use health, that bloon would simply take damage and still be metal. You get my point? Add something unique! I have given enough examples to drive someone crazy enough to punch me over the internet, but w/e.
Also, like I said, I don't know anything about your TD except for that it is a TD, so you may have already done what I am saying. But, because it is a WC3 game, I am sure there is something identical or very similar alreadyon bnet, but then again idk.
Great to be back and part of the community again!
My defense doesn't really have "towers", but you mostly use units. The units can be upgraded but not the towers.
For the units I kind of went by DPS, some units have splash so I'll have to work on them a bit.
I don't know how to balance the levels though, there's so much that effects the balance like Unit Speed, Health, Armor, Shield, and Shield Armor.