I think the most important thing when it comes to balance is choosing the right scope for your mod. If you're balancing new weapons, new terrain, new items, new classes, new whatever else, you're taking on too much. This is doubly important. As a designer, you can only tune so many knobs in so many ways before things start falling apart from taking on too much. More importanly, players can only try so many new things before their heads explode from uknown possibilities, particularly in a pvp environment where players who have mastered the games' balance can dominate new players and destroy your player base.
My suggestion is to start small. DOTA wasn't made overnight, it started with simple hero's straight out of warcraft III. Over years of time items were added, classes were added, gameplay mechanics were added and items were added all the while all of these were refined. The players were inherently involved with all of this so gameplay could grow in complexity over time without leaving the community behind. Pick a battle, be it adding cool new weapons to simple characters, or creating a skill tree at first. Don't try to add everyone all at once or you create a mountain neither you or the players of custom games can climb.
I think the most important thing when it comes to balance is choosing the right scope for your mod. If you're balancing new weapons, new terrain, new items, new classes, new whatever else, you're taking on too much. This is doubly important. As a designer, you can only tune so many knobs in so many ways before things start falling apart from taking on too much. More importanly, players can only try so many new things before their heads explode from uknown possibilities, particularly in a pvp environment where players who have mastered the games' balance can dominate new players and destroy your player base.
My suggestion is to start small. DOTA wasn't made overnight, it started with simple hero's straight out of warcraft III. Over years of time items were added, classes were added, gameplay mechanics were added and items were added all the while all of these were refined. The players were inherently involved with all of this so gameplay could grow in complexity over time without leaving the community behind. Pick a battle, be it adding cool new weapons to simple characters, or creating a skill tree at first. Don't try to add everyone all at once or you create a mountain neither you or the players of custom games can climb.
I learned all this the hard way ;)