Skip to Content
 

What to do to avoid POWER-CREEP?!

15 replies [Last post]
Mon, 01/30/2023 - 00:53
questccg
questccg's picture
Offline
Joined: 04/16/2011

Okay so I've playtested "Crystal Heroes" (CH) about like 100 times at home. And the results vary (in terms of time and scoring) but one thing that I am a bit concerned with is "POWER-CREEP".

This first Batch of "Humans" is one of the Nine (9) Ruling Houses in the game. I present the IDEA of some kind of "Chapter Decks" in which players get Game Tiles from another Race which in turn is a mixture of Units.

This (1st) Batch works GREAT. You can only have ONE (1) Unit of any given Game Tile unless there are differences in EXPERIENCE LEVELS:

Core, Veteran, and Elite.

Basically this is more-or-less IRREVELANT because you ONLY have ONE (1) set of Game Tiles in this First (1st) "Chapter Deck". So you can't CONFIGURE anything but the "Standard Deck" that has been pre-conceived for the Players.

All that is FINE and DANDY for the First (1st) "Chapter Deck". What worries me is the NEXT "Chapter Deck" and how to AVOID (if possible) any POWER-CREEP.

What's the problem???

Usually when you think "Chapter Decks" if there are Nine (9) Houses, you'd expect that all Nine (9) would OPERATE differently... But that's a TALL order. In fact, I worry that "POWER-CREEP" will be unavoidable at some point in the future lifespan of this Game. Given that the "Game Tile Pool" is limited (there are only 12 Game Tiles per Deck)... I wonder what can be done to MAKE Stronger Units but at the SAME TIME, ensure that there is SOME KIND of "Balance" and that even if there is some POWER-CREEP it is offset but some kind of penalty.

I'm just a bit worried that with Nine (9) Houses (and/or Races) it will be hard to give each House it's own Benefits (Advantages) and Penalties (Disadvantages) in order to ensure a more "Balanced" game... Not: "Everyone knows the Orcs are the biggest Bad-Asses ..." And so everyone plays ORCS!

Something like that too AVOID. Anyone have any ideas or comments they'd like to share??? POWER-CREEP may be somehow unavoidable... But striking some kind of BALANCE may (or may not) be possible... IDK!

Thoughts???

Top
Wed, 02/01/2023 - 22:35
#1
questccg
questccg's picture
Offline
Joined: 04/16/2011
Just bumping this thread...

Nobody have any feedback, comments or ideas they'd like to share???

I'm curious because many of you have a lot of Gaming Experience and I'm sure you all must have played 1 or 2 games in your lifetime that might have been affected with such an problem, no?!

Anyhow IF you have experienced this, what do you think are things that can help to mitigate against it...?

Any feedback would be greatly appreciated.

Top
Thu, 02/02/2023 - 01:16
#2
questccg
questccg's picture
Offline
Joined: 04/16/2011
Think about this...

In the 1st Chapter Deck "Humans", the average unit's Attack = 5 or 6 and the average Defense = 3 or 5... So this means that MOST without the need of XP Crystals can be defeated.

Quote:
But the STATS can go from 1 to 9... So a 5 or 6 Attack is about "Medium" for "Humans". And when I look at Defense it's 3 to 5 Defense and is rated as "Weaker". Lastly when I look a Loot, I see 1 to 4 Loot and WAS rated as "Stronger"... But "1" doesn't make sense in this particular case.

The problem is when some Units have "9"... Then what??? Isn't THAT "POWER-CREEP"???!!! So while a "9" Attack Unit will defeat ALL other units... The question is does one NEED "All that Firepower"?! And I guess the real answer is probably NOT REALLY... Unless you have units with HIGH Defense but most Races seem to have the "Weaker" rating which is similar to the "Humans".

So SAY a Future Unit is the "Red Dragon" called "Firelix" and it is part of "Chapter 9: Orcs". It would have a 8-6-3 (Maybe?!) as the initial STATS and would mean that SOME "Humans" that are "Medium" could Attack and DEFEAT the Dragon. And maybe a Treant called "Upp Root" has 6-7-4 (Maybe?!) could ONLY be defeated by the Dragon (for example).

Does any of this sound like there could be a WORRY for "POWER-CREEP"???

Please feel free to share your thoughts(?!)

Top
Thu, 02/02/2023 - 05:32
#3
X3M
X3M's picture
Offline
Joined: 10/28/2013
If the game has some sort of

If the game has some sort of threshold system.
A cumulative cost or limit should be applied.

You said, 12 tiles.
Is it possible to have a card occupy 1.5 or even 2 tiles?

Top
Thu, 02/02/2023 - 11:27
#4
larienna
larienna's picture
Offline
Joined: 07/28/2008
By "power-creep", I imagine

By "power-creep", I imagine you mean dominant strategy, or dominant faction?

One suggestion would be to playtest a portion of the game via a computer (simulate battles) or compute probabilities by hand. It will give you some content you can work with to know if some units/factions are better than other.

I made little experiments of this kind for my games yet (lack of time), but for my stock market game, it worked like a charm (I computed fortunes and victories).

Doing asymmetric factions is complicated, and one way to balance them could be to calculate odd via computer simulations.

Another similar idea would be to generate all possible units with a set of stats. Make them fight each other, and chose a set of units that have similar performance.

The most complicated portion is how to evaluate the performance of a unit.

Top
Thu, 02/02/2023 - 17:13
#5
questccg
questccg's picture
Offline
Joined: 04/16/2011
Let me clarify a bit...

X3M wrote:
...You said, 12 tiles. Is it possible to have a card occupy 1.5 or even 2 tiles?

No the area of play is 25 Tiles for 2-Players and 49 Tiles for 4-Players. And it's not as-if the Tiles can MOVE. So I guess having a Stronger Attack does not necessarily "interfere" with the other Tiles, only those that match the Attack Pattern.

larienna wrote:
By "power-creep", I imagine you mean dominant strategy, or dominant faction?

I guess I could wait until the LAST "Chapter" to produce the "Orcs"... But because the Tiles don't move, each Tile has a "local effect" producing a form of "Area Control".

What I have done is set-up a NINE (9) Point System. Each Faction/Race gets to have "9" Points in their "configuration":

Points Description Values Available
5 Strongest 5-6-7-8-9
4 Stronger 4-5-6-7-8
3 Average 3-4-5-6-7
2 Weaker 2-3-4-5-6
1 Weakest 1-2-3-4-5

And for example the "Human" Race/Faction has the following Points:

Humans: Attack = 3, Defense = 2, Loot = 4.

So 3 + 2 + 4 = "9" Configuration Points. What this means is that this Race has a "Average" Attack (3) and has values between "3" and "7" (and in the middle "5"). But in terms of Defense, they have only "2" with values between "2" and "6" (and in the middle "4")...

This means that "YES", the Orcs will have more powerful Attack ("5"):

Orcs: Attack = 5, Defense = 3, Loot = 1.

They also make the LOOT "dropping" harder as they are "Greedy" Orcs too! LOL :-)

I'm going to see IF I can "tweak" this for the existing cards ... Because not all Cards obey this "Point Configuration" System.

Is it fair enough to say that from one aspect, a Race can BE stronger in one aspect of the STATS but weaker in another??? OR is this still some form of "POWER-CREEP"???

IDK TBH. In my interpretation, each Race has NINE (9) Points so it should be FAIR that the Races are distributed with the SAME Point Configuration.

Thoughts??? Am I making any false conclusions?? Is there something that I am missing in terms of a method to AVOID "strict" POWER-CREEP?

Please let me know... Regards.

Top
Fri, 02/03/2023 - 01:54
#6
FrankM
Offline
Joined: 01/27/2017
If the deep rules stay consistent

If the "deep rules" stay consistent through the chapters, and the different point values are balanced, then I don't think power creep will be much of a problem.

You'll probably want to plan out what order you release chapters with varying strengths, maybe even put someone in a position to benefit from a future release (the ones with Loot 5 are followed a chapter or two later by someone with low Defense that makes looting even more useful).

Top
Fri, 02/03/2023 - 10:39
#7
larienna
larienna's picture
Offline
Joined: 07/28/2008
A flat point distribution

A flat point distribution between stats does not imply balance. Some stats could have a stronger ponderation than others.

By power creep you could be referring to the power curve that is used in many CCG to make newer cards always stronger than the previous ones.

This is more a matter of choice if you want to have such behavior. In a chapter based game, that could be something desirable to push the game forward as the chapter advances.

For CCG, as a player, I hate that newer cards makes your older cards obsolete. Because there are better cards that does the same thing + more stuff, or the same thing but cheaper. I am more a fan of the "What you pay is what you get" philosophy.

Top
Fri, 02/03/2023 - 11:47
#8
FrankM
Offline
Joined: 01/27/2017
Enforced obsolescence

Making older cards obsolete is definitely intentional. For the big brands, you’ll be explicitly limited to the N most recent releases to build your tournament-legal deck.

In that sense, power creep seems to be an attempt to make the “upgrading” players think they got something worth paying for.

A game with a closed, pre-planned set of releases shouldn’t have to do that.

Top
Fri, 02/03/2023 - 12:07
#9
questccg
questccg's picture
Offline
Joined: 04/16/2011
You make a good point...

larienna wrote:
A flat point distribution between stats does not imply balance. Some stats could have a stronger ponderation than others.

Very true! It's for the time being the way that I structured my Chapter Decks in the hope that there is some EXCITEMENT for the "next batch".

larienna wrote:
By power creep you could be referring to the power curve that is used in many CCG to make newer cards always stronger than the previous ones.

This is more a matter of choice if you want to have such behavior. In a chapter based game, that could be something desirable to push the game forward as the chapter advances.

Indeed... I did not know this was by design. I thought it was just NATURAL (but not recommended) to follow this trend. I have studied a bit the HISTORY behind Pokemon and how players in the first edition learned what were the "strongest" cards and built decks around those to beat their opponents.

But the thing with Pokemon is that POWER-CREEP is a "real-thing". The game during each new iteration has introduced stronger and stronger cards to the mix and the result is that if you want to stay COMPETITIVE, you need to buy newer packs and in many cases buy aftermarket singles.

larienna wrote:
For CCG, as a player, I hate that newer cards makes your older cards obsolete. Because there are better cards that does the same thing + more stuff, or the same thing but cheaper. I am more a fan of the "What you pay is what you get" philosophy.

Yes so do I. It's like people falling ill: people send them away sometimes never to come back home. Obsolescence is the after-effect of POWER-CREEP. That's kind of what I want to AVOID. Personally, I would prefer CONTRASTS to my Chapter Decks. It doesn't mean that because you have the most POWERFUL units that you will WIN the game. The Tactical Layer of movement and collection is a "secondary" layer which involves a certain amount of additional randomization: you may get the "crystals" YOU need and your opponents may NOT get the ones they are waiting on.

I think the "9" point configuration concept will ultimately bring SOME "balance" to the Chapters (Races/Factions). I'm not saying that there will NOT be any imbalances ... But that's obviously the thing with a GAME: it is never 100% done/perfect. It's like 95% and the last 5% is too demanding in terms of resources to complete.

So maybe even though there is a Real "Bad-Ass" "Red Dragon" in Chapter #9: Orcs ... It's a beast that doesn't have the most "flexible" Attack Pattern (as a Beast). But it CAN attack in 4-Directions two-spaces ahead (and that's the caveat!) You need cards in-between to allow this bad boy to attack... It may make one or maybe even two conquests to occur... But I would strongly doubt any additional conquests... Just not possible with the game. Even "2" is a lot but could occur in a 4-Player game.

You nailed it SPOT ON! Indeed... I didn't think POWER-CREEP was an option... I thought that many games that suffer from it DON'T do it "intentionally"!

Best.

Top
Fri, 02/03/2023 - 16:17
#10
larienna
larienna's picture
Offline
Joined: 07/28/2008
An alternative to power curve

An alternative to power curve could be:

* More complex cards: More power potential, but more complicated to use. (Skill vs Power syndrome)
* New abilities and mechanics, but not necessarily more powerful.

Top
Fri, 02/03/2023 - 17:05
#11
questccg
questccg's picture
Offline
Joined: 04/16/2011
A picture can say 1,000 words

The Attack = 3, the Defense can be either 2 or 3 (depending on the path chosen) and if Defense = 2, Loot = 3 OR if Defense = 3, Loot = 5.

The extra BONUS +2 Attack can be upgraded and this results in a BONUS +1 Defense. So by choosing to upgrade the Attack, you additionally get the upgrade to the Defense too.

The Left-most side presents the "Attack Pattern"... How a Tile can conquer opposing Game Tiles in the area of play.

And so you can see, there is not much room for more "abilities", "options", "mechanics", etc. The Game Tiles are very "to-the-point".

The other ALTERNATIVE is "Penalties" (like a -2 Attack for a +1 Defense)... That could be a real possibility that some Races/Faction have more careful "choices" to make: "You want better Defense, it's going to cost you some of your Attack." Something like that could be reasonable.

I don't mind sharing this Game Tile, because it is in the Gamebook (aka Rulebook) too... So it's not revealing any additional content that has not already been shared.

So there is no room for an ABILITY. The Game Tiles are pretty functional ... But are already brimming with content and STATS.

I was thinking that maybe some STATS could rely on a DIE roll. So 1 to 6. IDK about this idea... The cards are fairly small and writing on the legibly may not be the more convincing option. Unless maybe I include a BLACK Dry Erase Marker too... IDK. Need to think about this further.

But if you have any comments or feedback concerning the Game Tiles ... I'm open to suggestions.

Sincerely.

Note #1: Another IDEA would be playing a Ex-P Crystal ("Orange") on an opponent's Game Tile, especially if there is a NEGATIVE result which can cause stronger units to be weakened. That too sounds a bit neat and is a bit different than the other ideas that I presented above.

Top
Mon, 02/06/2023 - 22:29
#12
Drion22
Drion22's picture
Offline
Joined: 04/20/2019
Hey! If you're worried about

Hey!

If you're worried about deckbuilding becoming stale because there is a dominant strategy, you have to restrict optimal card choices somehow. If there is a smaller group of powerful cards, you could limit that maybe only 6 of those are allowed per 12 tiles in any combination. Otherwise you could try implementing synergies, like having a couple of spellcasters that are stronger when adjacent to each other, you could give them a symbol that would say [wizard symbol/adjacent tile: +1 attack]? (of course with icons instead of words)
Hope these help!

Top
Mon, 02/06/2023 - 23:54
#13
questccg
questccg's picture
Offline
Joined: 04/16/2011
Well from my own conclusions...

Having a HIGHER "Attack" doesn't really matter if you have WEAKER "Defense" Tiles and what this means is that some conquests are like "Overkill" like:

6 Attack vs. 4 Defense or 8 Attack vs. 5 Defense...

And it's not as if Tiles MOVE. They are fixed in place once a player puts them into the Area of Play. So in reality MOST Tiles will only COMBAT ONE (1) other Game Tile.

Having a STRONGER "Attack" means very little (as I have seen from my own analysis)... If the Average "Defense" is small in comparison... Well the higher rate of Attack doesn't mean much but simply that IF the "Attack Pattern" is satisfied... In most cases, an overkill unit will defeat the opposing Tile.

Anyhow for the moment, neither here-nor-there ... But I'm thinking that maybe there could be different "Abilities" (other than Attack, Defense and Loot)...

We'll see... Thank you for your feedback, I do appreciate it!

Top
Fri, 09/08/2023 - 22:08
#14
Taavet
Taavet's picture
Offline
Joined: 08/15/2008
Maybe try player balancing?

I read through the thread and not sure I understand what you mean by Chapters. Are Chapters similar to further expansions of the game or are Chapters more like to successive quests?

For the former, power creep, as mentioned with TCG/CCG is intential to get players to pay more money and stay competitive. MTG has toned this down a little by just making new abilities and phasing out old abilities. So all cards are still relitively playable together you just have to make a cohesive deck with beneficial abilities.

The laters seems natural in most games as the further in you get the stronger you are and the stronger are your opponents/game.

If you are worried about power creep throwing off the balance in the game maybe create some way for the players to self regulate the balance. Similar to 'I cut - you choose'. So the players could assign abilities/stats to races but then the player who assigned the stats doesn't get to choose. So they are self balancing all the races because they don't want to make one OP and be stuck with a trash race. In that way you don't have to worry about balance because the players do it themselves and can even change it form game to game making it more of a meta, and self regulating.

Top
Mon, 09/11/2023 - 15:04
#15
questccg
questccg's picture
Offline
Joined: 04/16/2011
Let me clarify a bit...

Taavet wrote:
I read through the thread and not sure I understand what you mean by Chapters. Are Chapters similar to further expansions of the game or are Chapters more like to successive quests?

The game is EXPANDABLE, one "Chapter" at a time in the "evolution" of the game. So initially the 1st Chapter will focus on cards from Humans (primarily), High-Elves (Secondary) and a single Wood Elf. Those "Decks" are NOT random, they are preset with twelve (12) cards each since there are twelve (12) Rounds in the game. So yes, "Chapters" are FUTURE "expansions" of the game.

Taavet wrote:
For the former, power creep, as mentioned with TCG/CCG is intentional to get players to pay more money and stay competitive. MTG has toned this down a little by just making new abilities and phasing out old abilities. So all cards are still relatively playable together you just have to make a cohesive deck with beneficial abilities.

Well that's sorta my "angle". I was concerned a bit about HOW to HANDLE stronger cards later in say the 7th, 8th or 9th Chapter (Expansions). But I have some newer ideas now (in the last couple months now) which will probably work.

To explain, you can use "Ex-P" Crystals to give a "Bonus" to a Hero/Tile. And you would do so to your OWN Heroes/Tiles. But I came up with the idea that the OPPONENT could use "Ex-P" Crystals AGAINST you by "Cursing" a Hero/Tile with a NEGATIVE PENALTY (Say something like "-2 Defense & +1 Loot" as an example).

So it's a bit different, in that you can "Buff your own Heroes/Tiles" and "Curse your opponent's Heroes/Tiles"...! So this is a WAY to BALANCE the "power creep" in the game in Future Chapters. And this makes sense because all the later Races/Factions are "Evil" by Nature and so "Cursing" them sounds reasonable too...

Thanks for commenting and posting a few replies and suggestions. Hope you return to BGDF.com and that you share with us some more of your wisdom and experience in TableTop Gaming!

Always cool to have a NEW member who might become a regular!

Cheers.

Top
Syndicate content


forum | by Dr. Radut