Community Patch Reception

[Ekamo]

It should be made clear that all the silly +/- 0.05 changes are basically completely irrelevant, are are more of an aesthetic choice to remove "hidden" mechanics, than actually a balance choice. Thus, please refrain from discussing these in-depth and focus instead on the changes that actually do matter.



LIST OF RELEVANT CHANGES

== Item Balance ==

:boundeye: Bound Eye
- Couriers: Can no longer carry Bound Eye at any point
* Whenever it is put on a courier, it immediately drops
- Dropping a Bound Eye now clears ownership
* You can no longer drop a Bound Eye before dying to make it unusable by the enemy

:hellflower: Hellflower
- Duration from 5 to 4 seconds

:pickledbrain: Pickled Brain
- Cost increased from 900 to 1000 gold. The following additional items are also affected:
* Icon of the Goddess total cost has increased from 3200 to 3300
* Ring of Sorcery total cost has increased from 1385 to 1485

== Hero Balance ==

:blac: Blacksmith
- Fireball: Damage increased from 75/125/175/275 to 100/150/200/275
- Flaming Hammer: Now has a constant AoE of 100 without Chaotic Flames
* Increases to 200/300/400 with Chaotic Flames
- Frenzy: Multicasts will prioritize Heroes correctly

:blit: Blitz
- Lightning Shackles : Cooldown reduced from 150/100/50 to 100/75/50

:chron: Chronos
- Curse of Ages: Damage increased from 15/30/45/60 to 40/50/60/70
- Curse of Ages: Damage changed from Physical damage to Magic damage

:cthu: Cthulhuphant
- Base Damage lowered from 56-60 to 52-56
- Base Intelligence lowered from 20 to 18

:defi: Defiler
- Unholy Expulsion: Movespeed of Spirits increased from 400 to 400/450/500

:deme: Demented Shaman
- Unbreakable: Cooldown increased from 15 to 45/35/25/15

:glac: Glacius
- Glacial Downpour: Manacost increased from 150/175/200 to 200/300/400

:hell: Hellbringer
- Death Boil: Damage per tick increased by 5 damage
* Max damage now 150/210/270/360 up from 125/180/245/320

:jere: Jeraziah
- Protective Charm: Cooldown increased from 20 to 24 seconds
- Sol's Blessing: Rescripted to prevents all Physical Damage instead of give 1000 Armor
* There should be no functional change to this ability in game

:kine: Kinesis
- Intelligence gain per level decreased from 3.0 to 2.7
- Statis Smash : Can now be ended early by using the ability again
* Damage and stun time are directly proportional to how long the affected unit has been in the air
- Telekinetic Control: Slow reduced from 25% to 10/15/20/25%

:krak: Kraken
- Release the kraken: Stun from being pulled to the center is no longer Superior Magic

:magm: Magmus
- Steambath: Radius reduced from 300/350/400/550 to 300/350/400/450

:ophe: Ophelia
- Ophelia's Judgement: Now a purgable buff

:pebb: Pebbles
- Enlarge: Base Attack Time increased from 1.7 to 1.9/2.1/2.3 seconds
- Enlarge: Attack Speed is no longer slowed

:plag: Plague Rider
- Contagion: Slow duration decreased from 4 to 2.5/3/3.5/4


:rhap: Rhapsody
- Starting Intelligence increased from 25 to 28
* Base Attack Damage lowered by 3 so her damage remains unchanged

:scou: Scout
- Disarm: Rebalanced so it now has a cooldown of 20/16/12/8 seconds that removes 1 second on attack. Disarmed now lasts 2 seconds instead of 1.
- Marksman Shot: Now gives vision of the target

:shad: Shadowblade
- Essence Shift: Cap of 40 stats removed

:succ: Succubus
- Movement Speed increased from 305 to 310
- Heartache: Damage increased from 75/150/225/300 to 90/160/230/300

:temp: Tempest
- Elementals: Attack Damage reduced from 16-24/24-32/34-42/43-51 to 20/27/34/41
- Elemental Void: Reveal radius reduced from 900 to 400
- Elemental Void: Clearvision radius reduced from 1000 day/700 night to 400
- Elemental Void: Outer Damage radius lowered from 500 to 400

:valk: Valkyrie
- Javelin of Light : Stun increments changed from 150 units at all levels to 225/200/175/150 units
* This means that it is much harder to get a full 5 second stun at lower levels of the ability

How will these changes affect the meta-game for the weeks to come? Which changes stand out the most to you? Which one do you feel went in the wrong direction, and most importantly, WHY?

Failure to adhere to the Balance Rules (http://forums.heroesofnewerth.com/showthread.php?393760-Balance-Forum-Rules) will result in infractions.

Let the discussion begin!

[foxmindedguy]

The 0.05 increase or decrease in stats and stat gain is to get the game to have only 1 point of significance after the decimal. So nothing too shabby there.

I like the changes in general. They might or might not have addressed the root problem but definitely did hit the problematic heroes and items.

[Brannock]

Crosspostin'.


30 heroes advertised to be patched, 22 get real changes beyond 0.05 stat gain cleanup. 73%. Eh, good job marketing.

Here are my opinions on patch changes because we don't have a patch reception thread yet.

Of those 22:

Buffs:
-Blacksmith: now one of the best level 1 stunners in the game with very efficient Fireball, QoL change with Frenzy.
-Blitz: Ult CD change sorely needed.
-Chronos: Significantly higher damage on Curse gives him a lot stronger early game presence, which is a huge buff for a hard carry. I believe they had a stronger version of this buff tested in SBT and it made him the best hero in the game.
-Defiler: Seriously, try out this change, it makes a very noticeable difference in her damage output later on, and makes her a great candidate to get early levels.
-Hellbringer: Revert to an old nerf that's become no longer relevant in today's game.
-Rhapsody: Meh. Slightly more casts early game.
-Scout: Kraken style Disarm helps his lasthitting slightly and gives him more reliability and predictability in dueling carries. Knowing for a fact that whoever you hit will be disarmed for two seconds indirectly helps his survivability. Vision of target on ult is also a change that shouldn't be overlooked.
-Shadowblade: Meh. Only relevant when you're ulting heroes with more than 100 in a stat. It's a buff to his hard carrying, where he was already really really good at hard carrying.
-Succubus: 305 to 310 moves her from same MS with a lot of solo heroes to slightly faster than them. Combined with a strong autoattack, self-healing, and buffed damage on Heartache makes her a bit more threatening in lane before level 6.

Nerfs:
-Bramble: This is more of a bugfix really.
-Buckley: Slight hit to his early game.
-Demented Shaman: Early cape was ridiculously good and made him one of the very best support picks in the game. He's still great but can't save someone four times a minute anymore with a single point.
-Glacius: There were a lot of 4/4/0/1 builds going around in competitive play because the mana cost buff to his ult and the ult reliability change made pure offensive Glacius really good. Mana cost nerf doesn't change his damage but will help encourage 1/1/4 builds to be seen along with 4/4/0.
-Jeraziah: Stupid ****ing magic immunity.
-Kinesis: Early nerf to on-hit slow encourages him to be put in a solo lane and pushes him away from dual lanes. Nerf to Int gain also makes levels more valuable for him. Stasis Smash change is a huge usability buff and should help encourage builds other than 1/4/4.
-Kraken: No longer a Shrunken Head counter!
-Magmus: Meh. More of a consistency-in-scaling change.
-Ophelia: "Buy Nullfire Blade, it's really good."
-Pebbles: Attack Speed items no longer nearly as effective on Pebbles himself - pushing him towards picking up aura items to benefit his team and less towards shifting into an one-man carry who can do it all. This nerf will have no real impact on Pebbles if you only played him as a burst damage ganker, only to the people who were transitioning into carry mode lategame (especially with his large Str gain and his debuff reduction).
-Plague Rider: Big hit to level 1/2 Contagion slow duration should make it less of a death sentence to be blasted by a Plague when you're out of position.
-Tempest: The bigger change here is the damage on his minions, which will affect his jungling a bit and his pushing power a bit. The nerfs to ult are mostly removing its huge secondary benefits that most people didn't even know existed.
-Valkyrie: Gotta work harder for that level 1 gank with the stun-arrow setup.

No real opinions on mana ring / hellflower changes. Necessary nerfs, really.

Bound Eye changes are great, stops courier ****ery and makes the item a lot less "safe" to use. Indirect buff to invis heroes!

The fact that many of the top heroes were nerfed either directly or indirectly makes me very excited to see how this will play out in the competitive scene.

Of all the changes the Defiler change stands out strongly to me. Her ult now does much more damage in a stationary battle, and is better during chases or switching targets. Excited to see if someone is gonna ball up and take Defiler in a solo lane and crush.

[SomethingOdd]

Icon got a nerf, one of the most useless items gets nerfed. At least no one uses it.

Blacksmith buffs are nice, The stun felt very weak at level one, but I think the added AoE might become a bit much

Blitz is S2 baby step, checking to see whether it's enough, and going from there.

For chono 40 magic damage at level 1 compared to 15 pys feels a bit high, and it might be a bit OP for only one level put in.

DS change feels a little extreme, thrice the cooldown early on, but it does encourage him to level it more.

Scout change is more of a remake than a nerf, 8 seconds, 4 attacks, 5 cooldown, invis cd is 6, fits quite nicely imo

Shadowblade Buff should help him late game, with over 3 times the old cap (charges cap at 127).

Finally a valk nerf, making the arrow less powerful early on is what she needed imo. Also -0.05 change on all three stats does add up.
Quite nice, other than the icon nerf, but S2 are reamking it Soon™.

[Ekamo]

This is not General Discussion. If you want to provide a one-liner such as "patch was good", or "patch was bad", all I have to say is: There is a poll function for a reason.

You don't have to cover all changes extremely thoroughly in your posts, but more so I am looking for the more in-depth analyses here, where we can actually review how the game will change due to these changes. Please refrain from one-liners, since that is why we have GD, right? :)

Thanks.

[ChillyWater]

I am interested in the Pickled Brain price nerf (900 to 1000). This increased the cost of Icon of the Godess and Ring of Sorcery and I am left wondering whether or not the previous nerf to Ring of Sorcery was necessary (increase in the mana required to activate the item). 100 gold isn't that much, and I don't know much about competitive play so I can only speculate on the effects it will have there. I can't see it stopping being core of strength casters (Midas, Behemoth and Pebbles) but I think it will limit the regularity of it being picked up by lesser mana intensive teams and int supports. Also, I am also curious on how much it will effect the regularity of REALLY mana intensive heroes being picked up (str casters) and the efficiency.

I doubt this nerf will effect the competitive scene to a massive degree because they can last hit and know what situations call for what items. However, I think that this is a backhanded nerf to Midas and that crew, as it will take them just a tiny bit more time to get their RoS, allowing for more time to get shut down. (like I said, I don't know much about competitive play) I think this nerf will be felt the most in lower tier games where farming is less paramount and alot worse.

[PzKw]

Patch did not have enough content. Also sorely missed remakes on long time retarded heroes. My position is fairly well known.

[man_guy]

I think Bound Eye could use some "unowned" property or a benign active (new bound eyes would be purchased as inactive) that allows it to be on a courier so that it could be delivered once. It's kind of a pain in the ass for every item in the game to be deliverable except this one and seems like an unintended consequence of making couriers unable to pick it up.

Save for Valkyrie, Pebbles, Ophelia, Plague, and Chronos I feel the changes are nearly irrelevant. Valkyrie and Plague might see less play, but I don't see anything else changing competitively due to the changes in this patch (heroes picked up from now would have been good without the nudge).

I don't think this will slow Tempest's GPM down at all. He has downtime moving from camp-to-camp as the Elementals have their GPM bound by their move speed moreso than their damage. This will impact how long it takes him to down a tower and his ability to turn around being ganked solo in the forest however.

[Skyve]

-Bound Eye: A step in the right direction to put the "risk" back into it. Still wondering if its enough though.
-Hellflower: Something had to be done to prevent it from being strictly better than Sheepstick in most situations. Not sure if it was enough/the right thing though. And then there's the problem that it's also extremely strong.
-Pickled Brain: I guess this was implemented because of someones dislike for cheap early mana. Which is fine, I guess. I still think this needs some manacost adjustements for certain heroes as a follow up to have a more visible impact.

-Blacksmith: The fireball scaling has been normalized a bit more (no more "jump" of 100 damage on the last level, instead it's 75 now). Not sure what the Flaming Hammer change will actually achieve, but I guess it makes him better as a solo (mid) hero, since it allows him to push the wave when he needs to. Frenzy thing seems like an optimization that was long overdue.
-Blitz: Basically something pretty much everyone can agree upon was needed.
-Chronos: More early power to a hardcarry. Somewhat needed due to shorter average game lengths. Also allows for him to transition better into the lategame, and it makes maxing his second skill early more viable because he misses out on less damage.
-Cthulhuphant: Basically addressing what Nova has been saying from the start: The hero has too high base stats.
-Defiler: Definitely a more interesting change. Wonder how that'll work out.
-Demented Shaman: Feels a bit much. Unbreakable is no Shallow Grave after all. Might need further adjustement in the future.
-Glacius: Doesn't really seem to deal with the bigger issue here. I doubt it will affect his pick-rate in competitive games too much, but his ultimate was too good to be that cheap, so it's a fine start.
-Hellbringer: Not sure what the goal (and further, the result) of this change is, but I think he'll still need more than that.
-Jeraziah: Was actually expecting to see much more impactful changes. This change primarily affects the recasting of the shield, which can be huge if the enemy dispells it, but it still feels like it's merely a minor change to the effectiveness of the hero.
-Kinesis: Seems fine, haven't seen him enough to really say.
-Kraken: Something that was long overdue.
-Magmus: More smoothing out the scaling than really nerfing him. Doubt it'll do too much.
-Ophelia: Meh, at some point people will have to realize how useful Nullfire is, with or without that change.
-Pebbles: Not sure if that was the thing wrong with him, but he certainly needed to be less effective at something.
-Plague Rider: He seems to have seen a decline in pick-rate lately, but it seems fine.
-Rhapsody: Not sure what the reasoning behind that was. I wasn't really aware she needed more mana, but I assume it's to improve her harass potential compared to Glacius?
-Scout: Feels like it puts him a bit closer to Gondar. Being able to get a disarm procc where needed and have it last long enough to matter is good. Might need further crit damage modifier adjustement in the future depending on how well he ends up doing. Might even want to consider upping it on lower levels, since it scales so much in cooldown per level (making it a better 1-off, and improving his early ganking capabilities just that much more). Vision on ultimate seems fine.
-Shadowblade: Interesting but problematic. I expect some nerfs to his overall damage in the near future, hopefully not to his ultimate, but rather reducing the damage on his 3 other skills somewhat.
-Succubus: It's just a bit, but she didn't need much anyways. Hopefully someone will realize that now.
-Tempest: Fine. He did too many things too well, from jungling/pushing/ganking, so adressing at least one aspect of it is good.
-Valkyrie: Doesn't make her any less "safe", but makes her lane dominance less guaranteed, so good overall.

[fenrixx]

Scout got nerfed and buffed at the same time. His disarm got buffed, but his crit got nerfec as it is connected with the disarm now(cannot crit when disarm is on CD)

[Mr`Imperator]

I do not see the logic behind buffing andromeda. The hero was seeing action in the competitive scene, don't understand why they buffed her even more.
except from that, pretty decent.

[PrestonLee]

:blac: Blacksmith
- Flaming Hammer: Now has a constant AoE of 100 without Chaotic Flames
* Increases to 200/300/400 with Chaotic Flames

:deme: Demented Shaman
- Unbreakable: Cooldown increased from 15 to 45/35/25/15

:scou: Scout
- Marksman Shot: Now gives vision of the target

:shad: Shadowblade
- Essence Shift: Cap of 40 stats removedBlacksmith - didn't like the change as now it makes his flaming hammer push the lane unnecessarily if used near creeps at low levels, still lowering his usability early on (this is a fail); I think the damage buff on stun was enough.

Demented - I think 45 second cooldown was overboard as keeping Unbreakable at low level isn't very efficient anyway. With that said I agree with the nerf, just 45 seems really long and quite a big hit in lower levels :p

Scout - Don't know why vision on Marksman was necessary. You actually want this hero to be viable? :p just kidding but now pubs are gonna have to deal with more Scooter noobs running around :(

Shadowblade - WOW this is a huge buff to him; I don't really agree with it because I personally felt he was just fine before, but we'll see how it plays out. Hopefully people will actually try and learn him now and figure out how much of a potential monster he is :p

Indifferent about the Pebbles change as I don't play him much and would have to actually get into late game with Pebbles to see how much of an effect it really has on him (dragging it out to late game with Pebs is sort of a fail in itself)


Other than those, I pretty much agree with and like the other balance changes. I'm really happy about the Hellbringer reversion and like the Boundeye changes in particular. :)

[Ekamo]

Scout got nerfed and buffed at the same time. His disarm got buffed, but his crit got nerfec as it is connected with the disarm now(cannot crit when disarm is on CD)

Are you sure (http://forums.heroesofnewerth.com/showthread.php?425814-Scout-Vs-RNG-better-or-worse&p=15132454&viewfull=1#post15132454) about that?

[SomethingOdd]

Every single time you invis and get all 4 attacks off, you will have another Crit ready by the time you invis again. (How many time do people have to hear this before in sinks in)
Also mega buff for the super unlucky.

I was playing with SB and I got 48 Agi. Just at lvl 16 not with full item and man he hit like a truck. But down side is that not everybody get full stats items sometimes they just get damage items or simple support. So he can not be ass strong has he likes in every type. I wish he could buff any type stats of his ult at will. So if you want to be a str hero just stack str and your ult bost your str without having to wait to some other hero stack str to be good in that type.

[Demonwing]

Let's assume an average attack time one 1/1 second. Note that this increases as the game progresses.
Assume disarm is off cooldown when you initiate.

When you initiate on an opponent, you open with a flurry that takes 4 seconds off of the disarm cooldown bring it to 4 seconds total cooldown. You may then attack twice more over the course of two seconds, bringing disarms cooldown down to ~0.

I'm no macrohard, so I won't be making a graph to show it, but you will find that, depending on attack speed, you will reasonable always have either 6 or 7 attacks before flurry goes off cooldown again.


Using simple binomial distribution:

Over the course of 6 attacks, there is a:
~83.3% chance to crit at least once with the old disarm.
~46.6% chance to crit at least twice with the old disarm.
~16.9% chance to crit at least three times with the old disarm.

Over the course of 7 attacks, there is a:
~86.6% chance to crit at least once with the old disarm.
~55.5% chance to crit at least twice with the old disarm.
~24.4% chance to crit at least three times with the old disarm.

In any given flurry, scout had a ~70% chance to crit at least once with a ~26% chance to crit at least twice.
use these numbers as you see fit.

[ElementUser]

http://stattrek.com/online-calculator/binomial.aspx

My best friend for binomial stuff :D.

Note that when farming, Scout can get to creep camps/waves much much faster when using Flurry as a movement tool rather than as a burst tool. With the old Disarm you have a good chance of finishing the creep wave off fast, use Flurry to move to another camp.

Right now you either have to wait until you do more attacks and thus take longer to transition between farming locations or use Flurry to quicken the process of killing but slowing down the rate of actually moving to another camp.

My opinion, anyway (in regards to farming). Remember that I don't balance for S2!

[SomaZ]

I voted no but I'd like to explain. I do think that the patch was "good" for the game as the name of the poll implies because overall most of the changes are steering the game in the right direction but I was disappointed with the patch since it didn't have that many significant changes for how "hyped" it was and some of the changes I really didn't agree with (would like to hear an explanation but don't think I'll get one).

[ikir]

why didn't pebbles get touched at all? he is always picked up in competitively play and always dominates...

[Jeroz]

why didn't pebbles get touched at all? he is always picked up in competitively play and always dominates...

:pebb:
- Enlarge: Base Attack Time increased from 1.7 to 1.9/2.1/2.3 seconds
- Enlarge: Attack Speed is no longer slowed

[`11411181]

Reading is apparently hard.


I voted no but I'd like to explain. I do think that the patch was "good" for the game as the name of the poll implies because overall most of the changes are steering the game in the right direction but I was disappointed with the patch since it didn't have that many significant changes for how "hyped" it was and some of the changes I really didn't agree with (would like to hear an explanation but don't think I'll get one).

What changes would you like a pseudo-explanation for?

[SomaZ]

Kinesis nerf (just why? coupled with the mock DoT nerf) and Pebbles nerf to his carry potential (was his carry potential a problem?).

[GregerMoek]

****ing moron shitters who made this patch, srsly nerf Tempest? Most balanced hero in the game for a LONG TIME and even in DOTA.

Valkyrie also one of the best balanced heroes, only scrubs don't know how to dodge arrows. THE TRICK IS TO NOT GET DISABLED IN THE FIRST PLACE, IF YOU DIDN'T KNOW! OK!

Magmus... do I even need to share my thoughts on this? Okay so his farming got nerfed a bit, it's also makes more sense with the same gaps between each rank, but one could achieve that in other ways. Also his PK cancel is now nerfed...

So what else? Yeah some shitty stat changes, but we're told to ignore them so I guess I will too (already failed that).

Pickled Brain - Seriously? This is just a nerf to 2 items, and one of them is underpowered as ****. Nerf the item that is the problem instead of 2 items and two are problems in different ways.

Blitz... Not good enough, ult should be 30sec or something... Can't do anything with it, GG.

Chronos, phys do magic.. Okay so it doesn't go through Shrunken Head anymore, well that's a cool buff everyone! And people get vestments anyways these days, an item that already counters all magic damage regardless of your health. In some cases it will be better I guess though. Numbers buff I -DEFINATELY- agree with.

DS - Huge nerf again, why? He was only fitting into the current meta too well, we're seeing a shift so he'll be used less. HE works with tanks well, it's just a strategy pick not an OP abuse pick.

Hellbringer buff, good now we got our retarded harrasser back, we all wanted that I'm sure. Good that he counters the overly nerfed Tempest though I suppose. Another buff would be better, maybe longer range instead.

Kinesis, GOOD CHANGE! That one I love, must be an S2 change and not communisty change.
Pebbles also good nerf, that one I like, it could be done better maybe but it was solid still. No more Geometer's abuse.

Ophelia... This was just one of those changes that won't do anything, but it was a nice try of saying "we don't want this hero touched" in a subtle way! VERY SUBTLE!

Kraken... Oh boy, after all previous nerfs and now this. What can I say? More communisty patching I guess, take from the poor and give to the rich.

BS was already OP just not discovered, remember that game when TDM randomed BS and won hard? That's how good he is.

[`11411181]

Kinesis nerf (just why? coupled with the mock DoT nerf) and Pebbles nerf to his carry potential (was his carry potential a problem?).

If you mean the .3int gain nerf and slow nerf, you may or may not have missed the gigantic buff to his stun. .3int was to somewhat counter-address the gigantic stun buff he gained - and the slow scaling is also to counter-address his unquestioned mid lane dominance. He can win a 1v1 lane by just liftthrowing his archer every wave at the other hero, and this was suggested by the people that felt his dominant 1v1 laning should be addressed a little (without just removing the ability to lift creeps wholesale).

[skeloperch]

Can someone explain to me why they buffed WB this patch? I know it made **** all of a difference, but did he need anything more? Did -1 damage on RotT warrant him getting a buff?

[Gyros_Pita]

To be honest , that was the MOST dissapointing patch that they ever made.
Not because there were no REAL big changes , or because i dont like the nerfs / buffs but because they made a BIG BIG BIIIIIIIIG hype about it and then
they made nearly nothing.
Scout and Kinesis are the only heroes , where u really feel the changes.
Wouldnt be a problem ofc. if they just handled this patch like every normal balancing patch , but NOOO with this hype they did , the most people ( inclusiv me ) thought , OH YEAH some reaaaaaaaaal big changes are coming , maybe even some reworks of outdated heroes that became useless or not fun anymore.
Well I like the small change of kinesis ( and think scout should just get deleted out of this game just like nh , but w/e ) but still , it was just dissapointing with this big hype.
Next time they should just shush their mouth and handle the incoming patch like a normal patch , then there will be noone that is dissapointed because the result is so small.
But still , i like the most of the changes and balancing on this patch.

[EvilChuck]

the only thing I didn't like was that they added all those +0.05/-0.05 under "hero balance" and also used some of those changes as fake publicity.. so it created a hype and then was kinda dissapointing to see that many of the heroes "going under the knife" got literally nothing done to them.
at the same time it was a relief to see that they didn't try to balance 30 heroes at once.
Most of the changes pointed to the right direction I guess... they finally touched valk and buffed a bunch of heroes that have competitive potential I think (1450 scrub talking btw :D)

[PzKw]

Let's assume an average attack time one 1/1 second. Note that this increases as the game progresses.
Assume disarm is off cooldown when you initiate.

When you initiate on an opponent, you open with a flurry that takes 4 seconds off of the disarm cooldown bring it to 4 seconds total cooldown. You may then attack twice more over the course of two seconds, bringing disarms cooldown down to ~0.

I'm no macrohard, so I won't be making a graph to show it, but you will find that, depending on attack speed, you will reasonable always have either 6 or 7 attacks before flurry goes off cooldown again.


Using simple binomial distribution:

Over the course of 6 attacks, there is a:
~83.3% chance to crit at least once with the old disarm.
~46.6% chance to crit at least twice with the old disarm.
~16.9% chance to crit at least three times with the old disarm.

Over the course of 7 attacks, there is a:
~86.6% chance to crit at least once with the old disarm.
~55.5% chance to crit at least twice with the old disarm.
~24.4% chance to crit at least three times with the old disarm.

In any given flurry, scout had a ~70% chance to crit at least once with a ~26% chance to crit at least twice.
use these numbers as you see fit.


http://stattrek.com/online-calculator/binomial.aspx

My best friend for binomial stuff :D.

Note that when farming, Scout can get to creep camps/waves much much faster when using Flurry as a movement tool rather than as a burst tool. With the old Disarm you have a good chance of finishing the creep wave off fast, use Flurry to move to another camp.

Right now you either have to wait until you do more attacks and thus take longer to transition between farming locations or use Flurry to quicken the process of killing but slowing down the rate of actually moving to another camp.

My opinion, anyway (in regards to farming). Remember that I don't balance for S2!

I want to take the time to comment on the Scout change, and a little about the patch in general.

The general theme of both of them is that the patch got watered down a lot due to risk aversion. As a team, we had incredible trouble articulating our ideas to S2 in a way where they wouldn't disregard them out of hand. The Scout change, for example, was primarily read to begin with as a buff to his last hitting and laning with the overall intent of nerfing him. This wasn't the intent at all.

The original Disarm remake was intended to also Perplex on hit. There were several reasons for this, and several reasons why I think the ability should have retained it.

Firstly, when you disarm someone, it stands to reason that you knock it out of their hand or disable them from using it in some way. What this logically implies to me is that you shouldn't be able to use it for any active purpose. The idea of it perplexing was actually the first step in the remake and everything else followed from that, including the new cooldown scheme. I am also generally of the perspective that perplex is not used enough as an effect in the game; where it exists, it is normally tied to other things that completely overshadow it (with the exception of Hellflower, which was an excellent change from my perspective).

Secondly, if the ability is going to perplex, it is now strong enough as a concept to warrant it being a reliable effect that you can plan around. If this is the case, it requires rebalancing to reduce other aspects of it since it isn't an inherrently weak ability at the moment, it's just that other aspects (damage lol), dominate the ability. Since as a general rule, abilities which produce a reliable effect are better for the overall flow of the game and usability of a hero, this point complete seemed like a good idea.

Thirdly, the ability Disarm should inform Scout's gameplay for the unique effect it provides (Disarming someone, which ties in with his general theme of scouting, sabotage and hit and runs), as opposed to the generic effect that exists on many heroes (steroid crit, almost identical to several others). In addition to this, Scout already has a steroid (flurry) which effectively grants him a 4x crit when he attacks out of invis, so a second straight steroid (which is how %chance crits should be viewed) is redundant from a design perspective, and forces the hero into a hard carry role which detracts from his actual theme and flavour. While damage is not inherently at odds with Scout's theme, Scout's theme was neutered to accomodate the amount of damage that he could do with farm, and that was a bad thing from my point of view.

Fourthly, if you view disables as a spectrum which defines what a hero can and can't do under the effect, Disarm is one of the weakest in the game on its own. There are very, very few heroes that don't have an immediate action mechanism if they can't attack. The most common disable in the game is a stun, which is essentially all the other status effects rolled into one (disarm, perplex, stop, silence). Scout also brings Silence to the table, but at most points of the game Silence Disarm is also a weak offensive combination since the two instant reactions on the defensive early game are retrograde movement to reduce time on target and using bottle/consumables/battery to survive long enough to get out, while lategame, a myriad of options to reduce melee time on target exist through items (Storm Spirit, Hellflower, Hex, BKB, Tablet, Ghost Sceptre, Geobane). In this context, the only reliable way for Scout to create time on target is for another disable to be used (normally a stun) which renders his disables largely obsolete. Giving Scout a stun or a slow would make him too teamplay independant, however having his disable combination forced into being used redundantly is also unacceptable from my perspective additionally, since by reducing the damage to make the ability more unique overall reduces the offensive power, adding an additional disable to bridge the gap and produce a proper offensive disable combination seemed a fair and worthwhile compromise. Finally, the overall theme of Scout with these changes would favour him being a ganker/anticarry - in this context, the more farmed a hero is, the more they suffer from the Disarm/Perplex combination, which fits Scout's theme of asymetrical advantage/sabotage/super Special Forces/tever much better than instagibbing supports (which most heroes can do these days anyway) - Perplex is utterly necessary to countercarry, since it allows follow up by your team before a BKB can be turned on.


(Counterarguments to the fourth point were raised. It was felt that giving Scout every disable short of the stop on stun would be undesirable. I wasn't present for this conversation, and never really agreed with it, but got taken out of the picture by some pressing work commitments).

Fifthly and finally, closely related to the third point, I have always detested the fact that the ability Disarm is split into two completely seperate abilities. A crit, and a pseudo-disable. It is clumsy and awkward design that is a dead givaway that the ability wasn't designed with a clear intent. Scout as a hero suffers from this all over the place - Marksman shot not giving sight is another example at odds with his theme, Invis/Flurry where two completely independant and unrelated effects exist and preclude any kind of real intuitive scaling and ultimately discourages any kind of play IAW a healthy theme, and finally Eye, which again suffers from the same problem where it has two completely independant effects - free wards, and also an AOE silence - the use of it in one capacity completely precludes its use in another. Scout as a hero has always sat in a state of limbo from some really questionable design decisions - ultimately, his incredible scaling burst out of flurry made him semi viable, and so despite it being the most unhealthy part of the mish-mash of competing priorities on the hero, it was allowed to dominate the others. This should never have been the case, and adding reliable Disarm/Perplex while removing the stupid damage potential from multiple crits in flurry was the best way of sealing him into a better defined role.

The gigantic issue that I have with the way the Scout remake, and the patch in general rolled out, is that aversion to risk has produced a product that doesn't really meet its original intent. The patch itself is probably half the size it was intended to be, and misses several things that at the start we decided were high priorities - a BH remake, a SW remake, a Gemini remake. The visibility buffs and nerfs that people have harped on about were intended to be stocking fillers that slightly adjusted the majority of the hero pool around some key remakes, and some substantive design/balance changes. I don't want to sound too negative about it, mostly because I think there's a lot of value in keeping the lines of communication open so we can revisit the project and finish what we started, but if we were to do it again agreeing on a defined left and right of arc before we invested a huge amount of time and effort into areas S2 weren't game to look at would be the first priority.

I think the community feedback generally indicates that most people would have liked the realignment patch we originally envisaged, and there are even tonnes of specific posts asking for changes that we actually sued for. Revisiting this project clearly has a lot of potential benefit for all parties involved.

[PzKw]

Tl'dr:
It was meant to lose damage potential, and should have picked up more utility than it did in my opinion.

Scout has been a laughing stock forever, and there were always going to be people who cried when the silly parts of his awkward design were tamed to make him a reasonable hero. I don't see any of this as a bad thing.

There is also no reason the extra utility can't be added to it in a subsequent patch.

[Tupimus]

So now that Scout's crit isn't random any more, does it stack with item crit? If not, why not?

[Skyve]

So now that Scout's crit isn't random any more, does it stack with item crit? If not, why not?

Because all crits don't stack with other crits in terms of being able for both to procc on a single attack (look at Puppet).

[PzKw]

I can't believe that question was actually asked. Wouldn't it just be great if scout procced a crit on his crit and suddenly did like, 12870621032x damage >.>

I'm actually enjoying the new scout a lot. Still think it needs perplex, but it's great at the moment. Experimenting with phase-->RA-->shroud-->sh which makes a nice change from my old treads --> ra--> ra--> ra--> ra--> ra--> ra--> ra

[Skyve]

Do you also think the damage multiplier on lower levels of the skills is a good idea? Still seems to me like the hero would benefit a lot of he could contribute more damage early on.

[PzKw]

It could stand to go to a flat 2x perhaps as well, but I'm not fussed.

[PzKw]

Also throwing in phase ra ch SH bash shroud

[Rkey]

Icon got a nerf, one of the most useless items gets nerfed. At least no one uses it.
I'm pretty sure a bloodstone rework is just around the corner.

[Demonwing]

Before I say anything else, I would like to remind everyone that balance is balance. Whether or not one believe a skill "does not fit the flavor correctly" or "is ridiculous" or "isn't cool enough" is irrelevant. Changing skills and numbers arbitrarily based on what one believes is "fun" or "logical" is ludicrous. One cannot simply go about remaking and crossing out heroes based on his or her subjective opinion.

If at all possible, only change numbers. The next step would be a slight tweak to a skill while retaining as much of its original function as possible. There is no hero in the game off the top of my head that I believe cannot be balanced by these first two steps. Reworks are desperate, last ditch efforts that should only be used in dire situations and should only be made AFTER many efforts to balance the hero have failed. Reworking a hero is not balancing the hero. It is essentially deleting and starting over again.

I have noticed that many of the community members particularly interested in HoNs balance have a tendency to want very, very, very, very radical changes with the impression that it will somehow balance a hero more quickly. This is not how any game should be balanced. One must be content with what, to him or her, may seem like a very small numbers change every patch. Maybe just one change that makes the hero a bit more survivable in lane is enough. If not, it isn't an issue. Just buff the hero a little more in a similar fashion next patch.

Balancing a hero is done over the course of several patches. Large all-encompassing one-shot hero balancing just simply does not work no matter how knowledgeable of a team is working on it.

I will reiterate that this is not a design discussion. It is a balance discussion. While design is an important part of the game as a whole (with the most prominent examples of gameplay-effecting design being RNG and hard counters), it should only be considered after a hero is already in a balanced state. Arbitrary design changes to an already weak or strong hero is very destructive to balancing efforts and only makes it take even longer to balance the hero.




Now as for Scout's change, his sustained (carry) DPS was nerfed. In exchange, he recieved a nominal but functionally inconsequential buff to Marksman's shot. He also exchanged a more frequent crit with a more reliable crit that disarms for slightly longer. This is an example of an already weak hero that may have been fixed by numbers changes who was instead subjectively changed (and probably for the weaker).

Instead of being able to objectively look at changed numbers and going from there, we now need to subjectively measure the value of reliability versus frequency . That is, the reliability of knowing exactly when you will crit versus the frequency of the crit.

Fortunately in this case it is rather obvious that the change was a nerf despite all of the unknowns that have been introduced. Scout's carry role was nerfed (less total sustained dps) while his "ganking" role was buffed kind of (more reliable break damage and vision on his ult).

The actual issue that made Scout weak was not addressed. That is, he has literally no lane presence primarily due to how harshly his abilities scale up. All of his skills are useless in a lane at level one and even level two. This means that Scout isn't even remotely useful until level 5 (and even then he's not that great). Now, I'm not saying that he needs monster early game potential, but every other hero with a similar role (Madman, Chronos, even Sandwraith and TDL) has at least one skill that gives it some type of laning ability. There are some other smaller issues that could be addressed as well, but that is the big #1.

So now, with this nerf, Scout has either

A. become a weaker carry
or
B. become a slightly stronger ganker who needs a dedicated babysitter (or two), cannot gank at all until midgame, and even when he does try to gank does not have any hard disable or immobilizing skill.

Either way, the change clearly did not even take a step in the right direction (that is making Scout more viable).


Despite what someone might like or hope for, Scout is a carry. The more "utility" is forced upon him in haphazard on-the-fly design changes, the weaker he will get. He only has a few very well-known and time-tested problems making him weak.
I am addressing Scout because it is a good example of an otherwise very simple balance problem that has not been addressed because people always want to mess with it instead of fix it.


One more time, because I can't stress this point enough: in this forum we are balancers. we are not designers nor is balancing a field in which one should go waving his or her artistic flair around. If you (the reader) don't personally like the "theme" or "style" of a hero or think "It just doesn't make sense to me", well. . .there are a hundred other heroes that you can worry about. You probably just aren't qualified to discuss the balance of that particular one. Let those who do understand the hero give balance comments instead of giving remake suggestions in an attempt to warp the hero into a role that you, personally, can relate to more easily.

[Kainiet]

Demented nerf was way to high. Just looking at the numbers it wasn't even necessary.

Ability Level Cooldown Mana Heal (1 target) Heal (5 targets) HPS HPM

Unbreakable 1 45 85 125 2,78 1,47
Unbreakable (old) 1 15 85 125 8,33 1,47
Healing Wave 1 12 80 80 400 6,67 1,00

Compared to Accursed. The by far best healer ingame.
Ability Level Cooldown Mana Heal (1 target) Heal (5 targets) HPS HPM

Cauterize 1 6 75 100 16,67 1,33
Fire Shield 1 18 100 110 6,11 1,10



Here is a list I've made of all heroes that have healing abilites. Except for Marty and Ophelia.
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/38368099/HoN%20Heal.xlsx

I cannot realy figure out how to upload something and attach it here thats why I use dropbox. Feel free to correct me.

[Skyve]

^ How does that have any bearing on anything? Unbreakable is not exactly your "standard" heal.

[Kainiet]

The point of unbreakable is to keep your teammate or yourself alive. The question is, how much are heals and unbreakable compareable.

E.g.
Accursed can use his cauterize two times and heal 200 health. In that time unbreakable is still on cd and heals 125 health and no, that tiny little bit extra damage isn't an excuse.

[Gorb]

Cauterize doesn't help if the hero is already dead.

[Reldnahc]

One more time, because I can't stress this point enough: in this forum we are balancers. we are not designers nor is balancing a field in which one should go waving his or her artistic flair around. If you (the reader) don't personally like the "theme" or "style" of a hero or think "It just doesn't make sense to me", well. . .there are a hundred other heroes that you can worry about. You probably just aren't qualified to discuss the balance of that particular one. Let those who do understand the hero give balance comments instead of giving remake suggestions in an attempt to warp the hero into a role that you, personally, can relate to more easily.

Please tell me one remake that wasn't for balance purposes. If a hero's design is problematic to the game and has become an issue of balance, it is remade. Who better understands what is possibly balanced better than someone who knows balance? Remakes happen because by design, a hero can never be balanced. Heroes who are remade have issues with their design that is somehow affecting the balance of the game. Designers and balance most certainly go hand in hand. I'm sure we all remember who else designed a boat load of heroes who didn't do balance nor gave a thought to it.

[Demonwing]

Please tell me one remake that wasn't for balance purposes. If a hero's design is problematic to the game and has become an issue of balance, it is remade. Who better understands what is possibly balanced better than someone who knows balance? Remakes happen because by design, a hero can never be balanced. Heroes who are remade have issues with their design that is somehow affecting the balance of the game. Designers and balance most certainly go hand in hand. I'm sure we all remember who else designed a boat load of heroes who didn't do balance nor gave a thought to it.

You cannot justify a remake that is made without thorough investigation throughout several patches. Five patches worth of tweaks is a good estimate of the least amount of effort required before an overhaul. Almost no heroes ever need a remake for balance purposes. Most reasonable concepts can be made fair and beatable. Whether a hero is "too annoying", "a huge pubstomper", or "not very fun to play" is not relevant to true balance at the highest level.

Of course, a compromise must always exist between interesting/casual friendly gameplay and technical balance. The two sides must always exist, of course. They should, however, be acknowledged as very distinct aspects.


As to your question: most remakes should, in fact, not necessarily be for balance purposes. Vindicator was an example of a hero that could actually be very nicely balanced as an anti-meta drafting tool. The "hard counter for no particular reason" part of his design, however technically fair and beatable it was, would always be present, however. "Hard counter" drafting mechanics are generally not very interesting gameplay-wise, though, so it was reworked.

I'm just seeing a lot of:
-"This hero can NEVER BE BALANCED EVER FOREVER"
--"But you haven't even tried once to change numbers around or try to balance him. How could you know this?"
-"I'm an expert noob. JUST TRUST ME I KNOW."


Who better understands what is possibly balanced better than someone who knows balance?

Who is anyone to claim a hero is unable to be balanced without going through any type of balancing process? I have over twelve years experience with high-level competitive games (not to mention having played DotA/HoN ever since they have existed) and I would never even dream of being able to confidently make changes as large as people are frequently suggesting.

Balance is made in baby steps. I simply used scout as a hero that has essentially been left untouched for over a year that now, suddenly, "absolutely 100% no doubt about it needed a rework". Same with Sand Wraith. The hero hasn't been touched for a very, very long time. Nobody even remotely considered number tweaks? No, he definitely needs a rework. Let me guess: people want to make him into a ganker too. Of course I can't forget Gemini. Clearly a hero that hasn't even been out for a year that has literally had one relevant balance patch ever in history needs a remake. These aren't even tremendously difficult cases to balance either. They are actually very, very easy. All three of those heroes have some very well defined aspects that need to be looked at and all can most likely solved with some number changes.

Blood Hunter is a more difficult case but even he hasn't been explored very much. He's had maybe two relevant balance patches in two years. He is another hero I am confidant can be balanced with numbers changes and just maybe one very subtle skill tweak.

Huge balance changes on individual heroes is what sets the balancing of this game back the furthest. Regardless, the community seems to be promoting exactly that time of balancing.

Just take things slowly and be patient. That is all. It will save more time in the long run and balance things out much more nicely.

[Cyber_Kun]

Who is anyone to claim a hero is unable to be balanced without going through any type of balancing process? I have over twelve years experience with high-level competitive games (not to mention having played DotA/HoN ever since they have existed) and I would never even dream of being able to confidently make changes as large as people are frequently suggesting.

It could be that you are just bad at balance and game design. In fact that is what I think it is. The idea everything can be balanced regardless of design is true so your very core idea is correct. The fact that every design is good is wrong. If a design is bad then it should be changed.

[Skyve]

It could be that you are just bad at balance and game design. In fact that is what I think it is. The idea everything can be balanced regardless of design is true so your very core idea is correct. The fact that every design is good is wrong. If a design is bad then it should be changed.

To reiterate: If a hero/skill proves to not be worthwhile being picked over extended periods of time, you _can_ keep buffing him, but you might as well just rework him and yield better results. As a good example (imo) compare DotA's Axe to Legionnaire. Basically Battlehunger has been buffed to insane levels, whereas Legio received a small rework that actually adressed his issues.

[suddenfs]

I feel that Scout's third spell should have a constant cooldown with the levels only increasing the Crit. Or atleast not be 20 at lvl 1. 11/10/9/8 would work

[PzKw]

@demonwing

Design and balance are not two separate entities, and they overlap significantly more than you allude to in your first post when they are viewed as a component of an overall product. There are countless examples of design changes that purely affect balance, from Valk’s arrow getting darker to Ra’s passive not being triggered by creeps. Ultimately the overlap that exists between the two makes attempting to develop the game purely by “balancing it” a shallow and futile endeavour which results in a mediocre product.

Scout is a perfect example of this, mostly because he could never be a positive part of the game while his old mechanics were intact. Is the game overall better or worse off with a hero who has a small chance to deal an 8xCrit out of invis? More importantly, given that the crit’s final damage is an aspect that as a designer you have very little control over (as the items that it is derived from are common to all heroes, and can’t be balanced for just Scout), and the total item pool contains options which can amplify this effect even further out of proportion, how can you mitigate the potentially highly undesirable effects that this capability can have on people’s enjoyment of the game? The answer is simple, and is a common threat amongst poorly designed heroes – you make them bad so that the chance of an overall win is lower if they choose to play the hero at all, and thus mitigate the overall damage the bad concept can cause. This is true all over the place – BH has been left knowingly trash tier for years because buffing him would make the game worse, SW was banished to trash tier because making her viable with a strong Dissipate makes the game worse, Gemini ended up on the receiving end of it because having a strong Fire/Ice form as it is currently was so unhealthy for the game. The lists go on. In the case of Scout, having the potential for silly things to happen, like stacking Runed Axes, so that Scout has the potential to deal 16x his damage in an AOE around a primary target was unacceptable. In fact, most of Scouts builds emphasised increasing the chance of something undesirable for the game happening.

While you criticise the idea of making alterations that can only be compared subjectively, you placidly ignore that by this definition all balance (which you claim to be objective) is in fact subjective since it involves comparing dissimilar capabilities. Of course, this isn’t the case, since dissimilar capabilities can still be compared with test cases. It’s harder, but not impossible. In fact there’s entire fields of study that look at this. I happen to be quite well qualified in one of them: Tactics. This is actually one of the very first things taught in tactics; asymmetry vs. overmatch, how they are compared, and how they relate.

To illustrate why attempting to oversimplify balance into an incomparable but plain area distinct from design leads to terrible outcomes, consider this thought experiment. Hero X gains ability Y at level 1. Ability Y, when used, ends the game, allocating a winner at random between the two teams with 50% probability between them. This hero is flawlessly balanced, but horribly designed. In the long run, all design and balance is aimed at altering the rules of your game to produce a product that meets an intent (usually something to do with profitability or fun or something). In the case of Hero X, the rules of the game are so fundamentally changed that it no longer meets the intent of HoN. The entire point of hero design is to create heroes that break rules in acceptable ways – that do something better/worse or just outright differently in a way that develops the game while meeting the intent. To varying degrees all heroes alter the rules of the game – the well designed ones are the ones that do it in a creative, intuitive, fun and original way.

Arguments work the other way around as well. For example, pure numbers (ie. pure "balance" changes in your simple little dichotomy) can drastically alter the overall concept of a hero, and thus their design. Consider for a moment if you dropped Pred's Str growth back to 1 and increased his agi growth to 4 (a la old Naix). Consider the implications, of increasing the cast time, cooldown and range of Blink to make it an operational (in your terminology "macro") mobility tool instead of a tactical (in your terminology "micro") mobility tool and what that would do to the "design" of a hero who was altered by it. By the yard stick that you have proposed, "balance" is effectively anything minor that only makes something straight out better or worse in a tactical, operational or strategic sense, with no regard at all for changing an ability over more than one axis. This is woefully simplistic and clearly ignores the reality of how you really make changes when things aren't quite working the way you want them to.

Let’s be clear – Scout is not Hero X, but they share some similarities in that both rely on unintuitive mechanics which are both beyond the control of users and which are vastly out of proportion with inputted effort. In Scout’s case, the relative lack of control over Disarm/Flurry’s potential output made the possibility of making his overall “balance” (ie. winrate at a given level of play) not impossible, but highly undesirable.

This is the same problem that faces Gemini in his current form. It’s the same problem that faces SW as long as she has Dissipate. It’s the same problem that faces BH. All of these heroes have something very silly or unintuitive in their design that means that balance plays second fiddle to design, and keeping them below 50% winrate to keep their pickrate below Hero Pool/10 is better for the game as a whole.

So why is this the realm of “balancers”, as you neatly describe people with an interest in balance? Even if we took your false dichotomy of “balance vs. design” in a vacuum as true, these heroes are underpowered because they’re poorly designed. Achieving balance is not deemed acceptable as long as they’re poorly designed (nor should it be, if you have a shred of perspective about you). Therefore there’s a clear imperative for people who’s primary stated interest is balance to vest an enormous deal of care into fixing poor designs.

I am firmly of the belief that anything within a simulated environment can be objectively described. Players’ actions included - many developers use very sophisticated tools to quantify, measure and analyse player reactions to game elements, and then use them to inform development of games in accordance with their design intent.. If it has an effect on the game, it can be measured. I have always firmly been of the belief that resorting to claims of “subjectivity” simply belies a lack of willingness to properly investigate the matter. There are many useful tools that can be used to make this much easier, and the most important of those is a design statement that outlines measures of “good” in the game. S2 has never seen fit to publish one of these, but most of them can be intuited.

As for the qualifications you claim were lacking in making these decisions, perhaps I should go and pay for a 3 year B/Video Game Design from Bond University, since having a shred of paper will apparently improve the quality of my judgement in your eyes, however I assume you don’t have one of those either, so perhaps we’ll call it even at DotA and HoN since RoC (what, nearly 10 years now?) with stints in high level IH and comp play, some nebulous positions on mod teams, a tenure in the DotA Beta team, and hell, most recently one on the HoN Community Patch team. If it’s worth anything at all to you, evidently DogKaiser, who does, in fact, have the exact qualification you seem to think is necessary for sound decision making in the area, seemed to agree broadly enough with the change to put it through.

[Hsssh]

Five patches worth of tweaks is a good estimate of the least amount of effort required before an overhaul.

Why five? Why not 3 or 10 or 15? Sounds like a very random number.

Anyway we can look at this thread http://forums.heroesofnewerth.com/showthread.php?299813-Cyber_Kun-s-Patch-Tracking-Changelog-Thread-Currently-2-5-19 and notice that after his remake Scout had ~9 patches with significant changes. So i guess "community" was right to suggest rework even by your standards.


As to your question: most remakes should, in fact, not necessarily be for balance purposes. Vindicator was an example of a hero that could actually be very nicely balanced as an anti-meta drafting tool. The "hard counter for no particular reason" part of his design, however technically fair and beatable it was, would always be present, however. "Hard counter" drafting mechanics are generally not very interesting gameplay-wise, though, so it was reworked.

Eh, in my humble opinion game starts when you connect to the server and picking phase is actually part of the game and balance. Reworking heroes that can counter line ups too much in picking phase can be considered "unbalanced" and have too big of an impact on other parts of game. Personally i don't agree that Vindicator was hard countering someone too hard and he wasn't changed for these reasons at all, his rework just showcased some problems with S2.


I have over twelve years experience with high-level competitive games (not to mention having played DotA/HoN ever since they have existed) and I would never even dream of being able to confidently make changes as large as people are frequently suggesting.

So how do we decide who is allowed to make changes? I think calculations and sound reasoning is most important thing here, not years spent playing something or degree gotten from some irrelevant studies about copying call of duty games.

[Gorb]

Easy. Ekamo and I ban all of you, and then ourselves.

Problem(s) solved.

[Demonwing]

@demonwing

Design and balance are not two separate entities, and they overlap significantly more than you allude to in your first post when they are viewed as a component of an overall product. There are countless examples of design changes that purely affect balance, from Valk’s arrow getting darker to Ra’s passive not being triggered by creeps. Ultimately the overlap that exists between the two makes attempting to develop the game purely by “balancing it” a shallow and futile endeavor which results in a mediocre product.
etc
etc


I agree with 99% of what you wrote. Interestingly enough, I even included my own version of your Hero X analogy in my original post before I deleted it for concision. It perfectly demonstrates the difference between "what is fair" and "what is fun". I agree that there is a very foggy distinction between the concepts I portrayed as "balance" and "design" to the point where each can easily be argued as the other. They were merely concepts with which to explain (to anyone for that matter. Not only those with experience) one of my main points:


The idea everything can be balanced regardless of design is true so your very core idea is correct.

although "everything" should probably be remedied to "nearly everything"


The framework within which I wrote may have been simplistic in your eyes, for I write on this forum to all audiences. Vast theoretical knowledge is good, but when speaking in any type of public forum (and not necessarily just the internet kind), I tend to believe discussion should be carried out in an easily understandable and thoroughly detailed manner.






As for the qualifications you claim were lacking in making these decisions, perhaps I should go and pay for a 3 year B/Video Game Design from Bond University, since having a shred of paper will apparently improve the quality of my judgement in your eyes, however I assume you don’t have one of those either, so perhaps we’ll call it even at DotA and HoN since RoC (what, nearly 10 years now?) with stints in high level IH and comp play, some nebulous positions on mod teams, a tenure in the DotA Beta team, and hell, most recently one on the HoN Community Patch team. If it’s worth anything at all to you, evidently DogKaiser, who does, in fact, have the exact qualification you seem to think is necessary for sound decision making in the area, seemed to agree broadly enough with the change to put it through.

You misunderstand me. I do not mean "qualifications" as in degrees or even anything necessarily subjective. I merely stated that if a person does not have enough experience to understand how to balance any particular (reasonable) concept, they most likely do not fully understand the concept and are not entirely qualified (in a general sense of the word) to give sound input on it. Just because one is knowledgeable enough to balance the concepts of 98 heroes doesn't necessarily mean he/she is an expert on the last two. I'm not saying I'm infallible in this regard and was not claiming to have any more or less expertise than anyone else. It was probably a mistake to include the part about myself because it, of course, triggered all kinds of belligerent reactions.


Now for the part that you missed and the point I want people to take home (or I guess off of their computer chair):

Let's take your hero X analogy. Take a hero with one skill at level 1: "the game immediately ends. Your team has a 50% chance to win and a 50% chance to lose."
Understand we are speaking with the simplest terms possible and that an actual hero is infinitely more complex.
Allow me to change the ability to "the game immediately ends. Your team has a 25% chance to win and a 75% chance to lose."
Hero X is now undoubtedly underpowered.
Now my main message is the following:

While I believe you would take the hero and remake him in the next patch, I do not think such an action would be proper. Instead, I believe that the ability should FIRST be changed to 50%/50%, thus balancing his original concept. AFTER that is done, I would be more than happy to consider a rework with the understanding that the hero is already a strong, balanced base to work off of.

Of course, the obvious rebuttal to my above suggestion is the "I am so good that I just know" type of thinking that justifies cutting what I believe to be necessary steps from the balancing process. This type of position is simply erroneous. Even the most knowledgeable and expert professionals go through all of the steps necessary to complete a process.

To put it very dramatically, I'm sure you don't want your doctor, no matter how top-of-his field he is, cutting tests from your treatment because "he just knows what the problem is". You don't want your lawyer skipping through documents because "he already knows what they say. These cases are all the same".
In this same way, poor Hero X doesn't want you, the balancer, to skip fundamental balancing steps because "you just know how to fix it".

Now I don't want to move away too offtopic from the purpose of this thread, so if anyone feels like discussing this (or anything for that matter) further, you can always contact me via PM, HoN IRC, Skype, or Vent.

[trout0x]

@demonwing
This is the same problem that faces Gemini in his current form. It’s the same problem that faces SW as long as she has Dissipate. It’s the same problem that faces BH. All of these heroes have something very silly or unintuitive in their design that means that balance plays second fiddle to design, and keeping them below 50% winrate to keep their pickrate below Hero Pool/10 is better for the game as a whole.

I'm glad not everyone shares your opinion... funnily enough you mention three of the more unique heroes in the game. I have high hopes these 3 heroes can be balanced with just adjustments to their numbers. I have very little experience in using Gemini but those who could use him adeptly even in his "too strong" state appeared to have a good level of micro (since in ult form your essentially playing 2 heroes) and a solid understanding of the hero, anything which promotes a higher skillcap and unique game play I am all for. SW is a unique HARD carry (people compare him to Zeph but whilst they both have strong AOE components and are both candidates for MOCK the way they do it differs greatly). Dissipate is only an issue VERY late in the game when SW has the survivability items required to pose a threat in reflected damage. If 16% isn't enough but 20% was too much much what is wrong with trying 18%? If that's close then close the deal with either buffing his weak nuke (early game +) or buffing his stat gains (late game +). BH I am not a fan of (despite his unique nature) considering his strongest suit is picking people off who are out of position, but this can be countered by TP/good warding, still many people love playing him and I'm sure a common ground can be reached. He may never be a competitive pick, but not every hero needs to be.

[`11411181]

"He may never be a competitive pick, but not every hero needs to be."
This is the antithesis of what we're trying to do: create a product that doesnt have an inherent tier list that isn't mostly personal opinion. By this reasoning, it's not worth putting in effort to analyze things because 'someone needs to be bottom tier'. it's lazy and defeatist.

Also, the most game-changing part of dissipate isn't the damage: a sand wraith hasn't carried through that since damage type got changed to magic. there's a rather large hole in your understanding of how that hero works if you think dissipate does anything but just generate simple numbers to compare and contrast - they also don't max it by level 9 in preparation for when you eventually pull in 11k+ of items.

there are heaps of 'unique' things in the game but preserving 'uniqueness' of a hero in defiance of proper balance (note: this doesnt include taking the easy way out and homogenizing the pool to a vast degree) is not only wrong, but i feel is almost entirely a childish backlash based on perceptions of s2's new hero releases within and without EA as being bland, uncreative and rehashed concepts of heroes that already exist.

[SomethingOdd]

Easy. Ekamo and I ban all of you, and then ourselves.

Problem(s) solved.
Working on my alt already.

[trout0x]

"He may never be a competitive pick, but not every hero needs to be."
This is the antithesis of what we're trying to do: create a product that doesnt have an inherent tier list that isn't mostly personal opinion. By this reasoning, it's not worth putting in effort to analyze things because 'someone needs to be bottom tier'. it's lazy and defeatist.

Also, the most game-changing part of dissipate isn't the damage: a sand wraith hasn't carried through that since damage type got changed to magic. there's a rather large hole in your understanding of how that hero works if you think dissipate does anything but just generate simple numbers to compare and contrast - they also don't max it by level 9 in preparation for when you eventually pull in 11k+ of items.

there are heaps of 'unique' things in the game but preserving 'uniqueness' of a hero in defiance of proper balance (note: this doesnt include taking the easy way out and homogenizing the pool to a vast degree) is not only wrong, but i feel is almost entirely a childish backlash based on perceptions of s2's new hero releases within and without EA as being bland, uncreative and rehashed concepts of heroes that already exist.

I didn't say this, don't put words in my mouth. I said I hoped a common ground could be reached, then added a personal comment based on my realistic knowledge of gaming balance, inevitably some things are used less than others. In a utopian HoN every hero would be competitively balanced, Good luck with that. Perfection in reality is VERY rare without over homogenising everything, and I'm a realist. Don't get me wrong, it's great you have high hopes/standards and I would love to see every hero viable at the elite level.

As for Sand Wraith, I have never seen one in comp play since I have followed the scene, also rarely are any hero builds static so I can't imagine it was a hard rule. So dissipate got changed from true damage? to magic damage how does that mean the numbers can't be tinkered with? I realise damage reduction is just as much a part of the equation but people seem to focus on the reflection part of it, since I was trying to be brief I didn't mention reduction.

"this doesnt include taking the easy way out and homogenizing the pool to a vast degree"
This is very important, although I realise WHY the changes were made, vindicator was effectively homogenised by his rework (and I have seen maybe 3 vindi's post "remake" and once again none in comp games). I realise I likely won't get any changes I will want in the future, but as long as there are unique (unique things seem inherently hard to balance) and interesting mechanics to play with I would have to be satisfied that you all have done well to balance/rework yet preserve the game. Another factor in your job is understanding people can get quite attached to certain heroes, if you rework them you will alienate those people (There was pages upon endless pages of vindi whine, and I'd love if you could check but I'm sure his popularity has plummeted).

TLDR

Courtesy of DemonWing

While I believe you would take the hero and remake him in the next patch, I do not think such an action would be proper. Instead, I believe that the ability should FIRST be changed to 50%/50%, thus balancing his original concept. AFTER that is done, I would be more than happy to consider a rework with the understanding that the hero is already a strong, balanced base to work off of.

I just want more of this style balancing BEFORE a remake is considered.

[Hsssh]

What makes you think that stuff doesn't get tested in SBT or at least on paper with numbers and graphs before rework is considered? Do you think that DogKaiser or "community" just **** out random thoughts and push them into game? There are plenty SBT leaks, you can see that lots of stuff is tried out in SBT and lots of stuff is never pushed to live servers, even more stuff never leaves "drawing board" since numbers and simulations show them to be stupid/undesirable. In essence you are arguing that someone is at fault for not doing something despite having close to no knowledge if they actually did it or not.


This is very important, although I realise WHY the changes were made, vindicator was effectively homogenised by his rework (and I have seen maybe 3 vindi's post "remake" and once again none in comp games). I realise I likely won't get any changes I will want in the future, but as long as there are unique (unique things seem inherently hard to balance) and interesting mechanics to play with I would have to be satisfied that you all have done well to balance/rework yet preserve the game. Another factor in your job is understanding people can get quite attached to certain heroes, if you rework them you will alienate those people (There was pages upon endless pages of vindi whine, and I'd love if you could check but I'm sure his popularity has plummeted).

As far as i know every member of "community" hates Vindicator rework, few think that old aura should have been removed but probably nobody thinks that current iteration isn't banal **** boring.
BH and SW reworks were not finished due to time constraints but i can assure you that they were unique, both had skills with mechanics that no other heroes have but as i said due to time constraints and other problems they were not finalized. If S2 goes for second round then they probably will get finished.

[trout0x]

What makes you think that stuff doesn't get tested in SBT or at least on paper with numbers and graphs before rework is considered? Do you think that DogKaiser or "community" just **** out random thoughts and push them into game? There are plenty SBT leaks, you can see that lots of stuff is tried out in SBT and lots of stuff is never pushed to live servers, even more stuff never leaves "drawing board" since numbers and simulations show them to be stupid/undesirable. In essence you are arguing that someone is at fault for not doing something despite having close to no knowledge if they actually did it or not.

Where did I say any of that? Seems as everyone involved in this process is over-sensitive and full of rage.....

"What makes you think that stuff doesn't get tested in SBT or at least on paper with numbers and graphs before rework is considered? Do you think that DogKaiser or "community" just **** out random thoughts and push them into game?"

Didn't say anything of the sort.

"There are plenty SBT leaks, you can see that lots of stuff is tried out in SBT and lots of stuff is never pushed to live servers, even more stuff never leaves "drawing board" since numbers and simulations show them to be stupid/undesirable."

Fabulous where can I see this?

"In essence you are arguing that someone is at fault for not doing something despite having close to no knowledge if they actually did it or not."

Nope I didn't blame anyone for anything, nor did I argue anyone was at fault.

You can all keep talking past me, there is no one else standing behind me. However it seems no opinions constructive or not are wanted here, why not just say public/unofficial opinions which differ to those of SBT/s2/CommunityPatchers are not wanted here, this would have saved plenty of time. Brilliant PR here, commendable!

[SomethingOdd]

If we knew what the heck is going on in SBT, it'd make it so much clearer what S2 are testing, and how to balance it.

[Hsssh]

Where did I say any of that? Seems as everyone involved in this process is over-sensitive and full of rage.....

It was directed at demonwing, probably should have quoted him but decided against since he posted same thing in 2 or 3 of his posts. My mistake.


Fabulous where can I see this?

Reddit or DRD usually has SBT leaks. I think giving direct links to leaks might be against forum rules.


However it seems no opinions constructive or not are wanted here, why not just say public/unofficial opinions which differ to those of SBT/s2 are not wanted here, this would have saved plenty of time.

Interesting conclusions. "Community" had i think 2 people from SBT, everyone else was picked from this forum and IRC chat room. So no, constructive opinions are very welcomed here.

[Rocko]

I can't constructively add much to the patch - except that it felt like it was in the right direction. I played 6 years straight of a game similar to this, where balance and teamwork and top level play makes or breaks the game. Eventually after many years of what felt like decent balance, the community grew stale. Then reworks, overhauls, etc., were put into place. Before long the game was up for grabs, broken on all ends, and eventually it got such a hard rework that I couldn't even bare to play it anymore.

There were a lot of nice things addressed. Bound eye being one of the biggest in my opinion. Which is honestly a direct buff to invis heroes, who (though I doubt for lack of intuitive team builds these days) may see more play. A very subtle hint that nullfire is one helluva an item, will still be overlooked...maybe one day it'll shine like it should.

Scout rework is exactly what should have happened. He feels exactly where he should be, a 2 second disarm is indeed stronger than some people probably realize. Especially since you can control it's proc. This can reduce SH time, SoR time, etc. Making him a viable ganker-anti-carry. He was slowly worked to this place. Rather than just redone on the fly into something that could have ruined him. But with slow tweaks over time we've achieved a useful hero who *may* not get so much ridicule anymore.

I mean the patch really addressed (keyword) some good areas. Heroes that were totally problematic were addressed for the right reasons. It may not be enough yet, but we can't just take leaps before we make a few steps.

My only instance is Blitz, who in concept is incredibly strong. Dropping movement speed to its lowest is insanely strong for numerous reasons (that I don't want to have to get into detail over). But his ultimate was justified by its long cooldown for it. It was too much, it's been reduced to see where it will put him, and then from there we can hopefully find a balance for him.

[Demonwing]

What makes you think that stuff doesn't get tested in SBT or at least on paper with numbers and graphs before rework is considered?

Nothing. Of course I am aware of this. SBT primarily addresses bugs and can only test balance to a very limited and broad degree. There is a very small and homogenous player base. It is rather unreasonable and ignorant to believe any type of fine or competitive balancing can be reliably tested with such a tool.

[`11411181]

FORGOT SMILIES! SMILIES MAKE POSTS ALL HAPPY FOR EVERYONE! YOU ARE A BEAUTIFUL AND UNIQUE SNOWFLAKE!

:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D :D:D:D:D:D


I didn't say this, don't put words in my mouth.
It's your exact fallback excuse in the post I quoted! Which stands to reason because...


I said I hoped a common ground could be reached, then added a personal comment based on my realistic knowledge of gaming balance, inevitably some things are used less than others.
...you're stating an opinion as being more valid than the years of information we already have on the 3 heroes, which you'd need a copout excuse for. How convenient!


In a utopian HoN every hero would be competitively balanced, Good luck with that. Perfection in reality is VERY rare without over homogenising everything, and I'm a realist. Don't get me wrong, it's great you have high hopes/standards and I would love to see every hero viable at the elite level.
Does this invalidate aiming for the end goal at all? Again, lazy and defeatist - "it's unlikely we'll ever reach it, so why bother aiming for it?"


As for Sand Wraith, I have never seen one in comp play since I have followed the scene, also rarely are any hero builds static so I can't imagine it was a hard rule. So dissipate got changed from true damage? to magic damage how does that mean the numbers can't be tinkered with? I realise damage reduction is just as much a part of the equation but people seem to focus on the reflection part of it, since I was trying to be brief I didn't mention reduction.
You clearly don't, that's part of the problem in the first place with your assumptions.


"this doesnt include taking the easy way out and homogenizing the pool to a vast degree"
This is very important, although I realise WHY the changes were made, vindicator was effectively homogenised by his rework (and I have seen maybe 3 vindi's post "remake" and once again none in comp games). I realise I likely won't get any changes I will want in the future, but as long as there are unique (unique things seem inherently hard to balance) and interesting mechanics to play with I would have to be satisfied that you all have done well to balance/rework yet preserve the game.
I hope you're not expecting anyone to defend the Vindicator rework. Flawed basis, flawed analysis and flawed outcome by Nome. On the same note, that doesn't preclude remakes being good just because one was bad.


Another factor in your job is understanding people can get quite attached to certain heroes, if you rework them you will alienate those people (There was pages upon endless pages of vindi whine, and I'd love if you could check but I'm sure his popularity has plummeted).
People are also endlessly attached to no blink dagger on vengeful spirit and pudge, or used to be to unexplored minimap fog preventing blink into those areas. Straight impediments to the game are still impediments, irrespective of whether or not people like them or not.
See: Valkyrie.


TLDR
Courtesy of DemonWing
I just want more of this style balancing BEFORE a remake is considered.
This assumes that design cannot ever be identified as flawed before tweaking values, as though the same process for how to tweak a value can't just simply be applied to map out the skill and see that there is sharp variations in power that detract from the hero overall. herp derp.

It's pretty easy to ***** out blanket statements. When push comes to shove however, there's a lot more going on beneath the surface in terms of analysis - and you and demonwing seem to want to see the gradual working out and that's just a waste of everyone else's time when you can just fix the outliers outright and then attune. Join SBT or even ask the design team if you want to see that.

EDIT:

However it seems no opinions constructive or not are wanted here, why not just say public/unofficial opinions which differ to those of SBT/s2/CommunityPatchers are not wanted here, this would have saved plenty of time. Brilliant PR here, commendable!
You mean, you're trying to play the martyr once you get called out for flaws in your posts, throwing around subjective bullshit statements and even outright lies around to try and cover yourself. Yeah, good one.

FORGOT SMILIES! SMILIES MAKE POSTS ALL HAPPY FOR EVERYONE! YOU ARE A BEAUTIFUL AND UNIQUE SNOWFLAKE!

:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D :D:D:D:D:D

[GregerMoek]

Where did I say any of that? Seems as everyone involved in this process is over-sensitive and full of rage.....


You can all keep talking past me, there is no one else standing behind me. However it seems no opinions constructive or not are wanted here, why not just say public/unofficial opinions which differ to those of SBT/s2/CommunityPatchers are not wanted here, this would have saved plenty of time. Brilliant PR here, commendable!

First off, you are too imaginative, you think people are raging at you when they are not. Would a bunch of smileys make your day better? :D:D:D

Second, if you write something somewhere in a discussion forum, chances are that someone disagrees and feels like responding, this is not "hate" or someone displaying that they do not want other opinions in the forum, they are simply replying to your opinion with their own. It's nothing to worry about, don't take it personal. :pand: <-- here's a talking panda to get you in a better mood. =D Pandaaaa! :D:D

Public/unofficial opinions are not something we hate, we will however reply to them if we don't agree. That's part of a discussion after all, a discussion in a discussion forum. The use of " **** " does not have to display rage either, or hate, it can simply just be so that someone likes using curse words to strengthen their points. ;) :v


Lastly, you are suggesting that S2 should try number changes or minor tweaks to heroes before they rework them. Or you are at least saying you want that. When someone points out that they are in fact doing that, although behind the scenes. You are all "I didn't say they didn't! Just said I wanted it". It is fine to now know things, no need to get attached to it. =) :D ^_^



To adress the point someone was making about "well, the testing there is mainly for bugs". They still get somewhat of a clue if a hero is OP or not, or at least they get feedback. If they decide to listen or not is up to them. Moreover, if a nerf is going in SBT, they will likely get somewhat of an idea if the hero is playable or not. Ultimately they will "test" it in a real-game patch, if they feel like the change has potential to do what they want to achieve. I don't see much wrong with this, the only thing they could do to improve this is to get more SBT's in there.

[PzKw]

^_____________________^

[Renegateor]

Didn't like scout/valk change and eye change.

Liked pebbs change, rest is meh

[Hsssh]

This thread became ultra gay.


SBT primarily addresses bugs

I believe RCT does that.


The use of " **** " does not have to display rage either, or hate, it can simply just be so that someone likes using curse words to strengthen their points

Thats just my limited vocabulary :(

[Skyve]

There are teams in SBT who primarily focus on bugtesting, and RCT is more of a 'safety net' to try and catch anything that may have slipped through SBT. At least from what I know.

Also Renegator: As good as it is to have an opinion, what would be really, really great and also really helpful would be to add some reasoning to it. It's not going to make anyone rethink anything if you don't/can't tell them what the cause of your dislike is.

[Death_Rattle]

Anakha posting smiley faces is one of the most disturbing and unexpected things I have ever seen.

[LordTroll]

Anakha posting smiley faces is one of the most disturbing and unexpected things I have ever seen.

This.

I puked a little.

[trout0x]

This is getting fairly tedious but here we go.


By this reasoning, it's not worth putting in effort to analyze things because 'someone needs to be bottom tier'.

Whatever you want, I never inferred such a thing, ongoing balance is of course worth putting effort into. If you think I'm saying otherwise your wrong.


...you're stating an opinion as being more valid than the years of information we already have on the 3 heroes, which you'd need a copout excuse for. How convenient!

Call it an opinion if you want. Dota was never PERFECTLY balanced when I played it. LoL isn't PERFECTLY balanced. Heroes of might and magic 3 was never PERFECTLY balanced. heroes of might and magic 5 was never PERFECTLY balanced. Total annihilation was never PERFECTLY balanced. Company of heroes was never PERFECTLY balanced. All of these games were/are massive in there time, and all of them had heroes/unit/doctrines/whatever that were less used than others it's the nature of the beast to suggest otherwise is purely antagonistic. Since you LOVE circular arguments; I AM NOT SUGGESTION YOU DON'T TRY TO BALANCE THE GAME, IN FACT I APPLAUD SUCH ONGOING EFFORTS. My POINT was that inherently some things are used less than others.



Does this invalidate aiming for the end goal at all? Again, lazy and defeatist - "it's unlikely we'll ever reach it, so why bother aiming for it?"

Please, I'm begging show me where I suggested such a thing? No, you are being antagonistic.


You clearly don't, that's part of the problem in the first place with your assumptions.

Just because I don't have access the same information/studies/graphs/data that you are referencing leaves me at a severe disadvantage when it come to arguing my hopes/fears for future balance, no need to be rude over with your extra information carefully/meaningfully/necessarily hidden from the public!!?!?!? Once again you are being unnecessarily inflammatory....


I hope you're not expecting anyone to defend the Vindicator rework. Flawed basis, flawed analysis and flawed outcome by Nome. On the same note, that doesn't preclude remakes being good just because one was bad.

Great. Please do better. Can you at least understand my apprehension at upcoming "remakes' after such a debacle? Or is it blind faith in the process your more interested in, shut up and be happy with the results?



This assumes that design cannot ever be [U]identified as flawed before tweaking values, as though the same process for how to tweak a value can't just simply be applied to map out the skill and see that there is sharp variations in power that detract from the hero overall. herp derp.

It's pretty easy to ***** out blanket statements. When push comes to shove however, there's a lot more going on beneath the surface in terms of analysis - and you and demonwing seem to want to see the gradual working out and that's just a waste of everyone else's time when you can just fix the outliers outright and then attune. Join SBT or even ask the design team if you want to see that.

Flawed or unique/different/inherently difficult to balance, I guess we just agree to disagree here, I just don't think my opinion is infallible (of course I am on the outside looking in, without much of the purported information you refer to. A small disadvantage.). [insert petty meme here]

I seriously have to ask you (as such I will accept your answer on face value, I'm not looking to bring this farcical debate any deeper down its hole):

Is dissipation IMPOSSIBLE to balance to any acceptable level?
If it were left underpowered [post balance] could the entire hero not be then balanced by tweaking/changing other things? Such as the 3 other abilities or stats gain?


You mean, you're trying to play the martyr once you get called out for flaws in your posts, throwing around subjective bullshit statements and even outright lies around to try and cover yourself. Yeah, good one.

FORGOT SMILIES! SMILIES MAKE POSTS ALL HAPPY FOR EVERYONE! YOU ARE A BEAUTIFUL AND UNIQUE SNOWFLAKE!

Please. That was in reference to the deprecating tone that seems to greet anyone with a differing opinion [well me and at least one other person]. Maybe you guys hear the same thing over and over again, and your sick of it, I don't know? Still seems altogether unproductive. All those mocking smileys/smilies really press this point home, not to mention the backup needed to hammer the cliques agenda home.

Since these people seem to recognise the peculiar nature of this situation; I can't imagine I have misinterpreted things.


Anakha posting smiley faces is one of the most disturbing and unexpected things I have ever seen.


This.

I puked a little.

[trout0x]

First off, you are too imaginative, you think people are raging at you when they are not. Would a bunch of smileys make your day better? :D:D:D

Second, if you write something somewhere in a discussion forum, chances are that someone disagrees and feels like responding, this is not "hate" or someone displaying that they do not want other opinions in the forum, they are simply replying to your opinion with their own. It's nothing to worry about, don't take it personal. :pand: <-- here's a talking panda to get you in a better mood. =D Pandaaaa! :D:D

Public/unofficial opinions are not something we hate, we will however reply to them if we don't agree. That's part of a discussion after all, a discussion in a discussion forum. The use of " **** " does not have to display rage either, or hate, it can simply just be so that someone likes using curse words to strengthen their points. ;) :v


Lastly, you are suggesting that S2 should try number changes or minor tweaks to heroes before they rework them. Or you are at least saying you want that. When someone points out that they are in fact doing that, although behind the scenes. You are all "I didn't say they didn't! Just said I wanted it". It is fine to now know things, no need to get attached to it. =) :D ^_^



To adress the point someone was making about "well, the testing there is mainly for bugs". They still get somewhat of a clue if a hero is OP or not, or at least they get feedback. If they decide to listen or not is up to them. Moreover, if a nerf is going in SBT, they will likely get somewhat of an idea if the hero is playable or not. Ultimately they will "test" it in a real-game patch, if they feel like the change has potential to do what they want to achieve. I don't see much wrong with this, the only thing they could do to improve this is to get more SBT's in there.

Thanks for this, your post is streets ahead of everything else so far whilst still managing to be deprecating. I'm not actually a overly sensitive person, I barely raise an eyebrow at in game trolls, it's all part of the deal. Whilst it is hard to gain tone from a wall of text things such as "****", "herp derp", spamming smileys and the use of mainstream ironic phrases such as "you are beautiful and unique snowflake" are not something you'd say in an email to your grandma, parents, boss, prospective employer, prospective partner or professor for example... But your probably right, I'm sure I misinterpreted everything, fear not I won't pollute your clique again, no more posts required.

[Storslusken]

did miss a keeper nerf, ells rly nice

[skeloperch]

Didn't like scout/valk change and eye change.

Liked pebbs change, rest is meh
Why not? I thought all 4 of those changes were fantastic, especially the Scout one. Better laning (albeit very slightly), better mid game, and better team fighting ability. New Scout is awesome.

[PoLarizatioN]

Is it intended for Scout's illusions to proc the Disarming portion of Disarm?

[PzKw]

Geobane with godly micro anyone?

[Alten]

You can just sic a geobane scout's illusions on the enemy carries and let hilarity ensue.

[skeloperch]

Scout confirmed for agility hero?

[Imjelly]

I'm actually interested to see how Geo scout works, potentially 6 seconds of disarm

[PzKw]

Or micro it to get 6 seconds straight up (once the animation cancelling bug is fixed).

On that bug, wtf. The ability has two separate pieces of code to work out when to adjust Cooldown because a hit has occurred (one to trigger Cooldown, one to trigger Cooldown reduction), one works when the animation starts, one at impact point. Why? Dat sloppy code...

[`11411181]

Blame raz.

[triplej]

****ing moron shitters who made this patch, srsly nerf Tempest? Most balanced hero in the game for a LONG TIME and even in DOTA.

Valkyrie also one of the best balanced heroes, only scrubs don't know how to dodge arrows. THE TRICK IS TO NOT GET DISABLED IN THE FIRST PLACE, IF YOU DIDN'T KNOW! OK!

Magmus... do I even need to share my thoughts on this? Okay so his farming got nerfed a bit, it's also makes more sense with the same gaps between each rank, but one could achieve that in other ways. Also his PK cancel is now nerfed...

So what else? Yeah some shitty stat changes, but we're told to ignore them so I guess I will too (already failed that).

Pickled Brain - Seriously? This is just a nerf to 2 items, and one of them is underpowered as ****. Nerf the item that is the problem instead of 2 items and two are problems in different ways.

Blitz... Not good enough, ult should be 30sec or something... Can't do anything with it, GG.

Chronos, phys do magic.. Okay so it doesn't go through Shrunken Head anymore, well that's a cool buff everyone! And people get vestments anyways these days, an item that already counters all magic damage regardless of your health. In some cases it will be better I guess though. Numbers buff I -DEFINATELY- agree with.

DS - Huge nerf again, why? He was only fitting into the current meta too well, we're seeing a shift so he'll be used less. HE works with tanks well, it's just a strategy pick not an OP abuse pick.

Hellbringer buff, good now we got our retarded harrasser back, we all wanted that I'm sure. Good that he counters the overly nerfed Tempest though I suppose. Another buff would be better, maybe longer range instead.

Kinesis, GOOD CHANGE! That one I love, must be an S2 change and not communisty change.
Pebbles also good nerf, that one I like, it could be done better maybe but it was solid still. No more Geometer's abuse.

Ophelia... This was just one of those changes that won't do anything, but it was a nice try of saying "we don't want this hero touched" in a subtle way! VERY SUBTLE!

Kraken... Oh boy, after all previous nerfs and now this. What can I say? More communisty patching I guess, take from the poor and give to the rich.

BS was already OP just not discovered, remember that game when TDM randomed BS and won hard? That's how good he is.

Was this really necessary?

[`11411181]

I thought it was funny.

[PzKw]

I had to check to see whether he was on the team or not.

9/10.

[LordTroll]

I had to check to see whether he was on the team or not.

9/10.
Nah, far too obvious.

[PlayeroJ]

I had to check to see whether he was on the team or not.

9/10.

"Numbers buff I -DEFINATELY- agree with."

I'm sorry you can't basically advertise that you're spelling wrong on-purpose and get higher than a 6/10

As for the patch, I'm not so sold on the Scout change being that great? I'm confused because I see a decent buff to his carry potential vs other carries, but honestly I don't think beating an equally farmed carry has ever been much of an issue for scout as much as staying alive and on equal farm as the opponent carry. Did like the ulti buff on him, disarm change I could care less for. Can't believe S2 ballsed-up and nerfed valk, though. +2 man points to them for that one...

[Aust]

Bound eye should be activatable, in the sense that an unactivated bound eye can be delivered by courier and won't see any invis but the moment you click it, it can no longer be picked up by the courier and can see all the invis

[PzKw]

So you can deward and then send it away so you get the main benefit of the item without the risk?

Hurp.

[Skyve]

I think he ment to only have that deactivate/activate thing happen once. So you can ferry an eye to you but no longer ferry it back to base. Otherwise such a change would make no sense as it'd be basically a reversal of the courier change.

So I guess you woulnd't need the 'deactivate' part, or rather it'd be default.

[SirVH]

Bound eye should be activatable, in the sense that an unactivated bound eye can be delivered by courier and won't see any invis but the moment you click it, it can no longer be picked up by the courier and can see all the invis

It's that hard to read?

[PzKw]

Oh, right, my mistake.

Don't really care either way. I miss the secret shop too. I think there should be barriers other than gold to getting some items tbh. Things like the courier change and the secret shop have a nuanced, but clearly present influence on patterns of usage.

[Farosarg]

I believe the portion of actually going to base to pick up the Bound Eye (the opportunity-cost) is not an intended part either way. The point of the change was that carrying the eye should be more risky instead of it just being flown around while counterwarding. So it would make sense to be able to transport it with the 'inactive' mode until it is turned on and then can never be transported via courier again.

[man_guy]

Another unintended consequence of the courier being unable to pick up an eye is that you cannot sell it if you miss-buy with the courier being selected or just plain forget or haven't been confronted with it before.

[Ekamo]

Will leave it up for awhile cuz no shady moddin' here.

Thread closed.