# Finding the right balance

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Hi, I'm programming a fairly simple MMO that is 85% done. I'm now tweaking the last bits so it will have an enjoyable gameplay, so I begun to balance the game and it's really the hardest task so far :-) I want to make it the same difficulty throuhgout the game, never mind what the player's game-experience is. This is for advanced players, that they will not be bored of the game. A bit about the parameters in my game (I simplified it as much as I could): 1. Experience - Experience is balanced: all players, new and senior have the same progress in experience. As the player gain more experience, his oppurtunities to make more money (2nd parameter) are growing, so the bigger his experience is, the bigger is the player's income. 2. Money - Money in the game is just a mean, you're not better if you have more money, it's a mean to achieve more of the 3rd parameter, mass. 3. Mass - mass determines how good you are in the game. Your goal in the game is to have as much mass as you can. Mass & Experience determines who will win when combating other people in the game. Mass has a bigger weight in the battle equation. Now I want mass gain in the game to be linear and practically new players will gain the same mass as senior ones, it will just be harder for the senior and they'll have to spend more money (their income is bigger). that's it, it is simple. so what function do I use to balance the mass gain???

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I am not sure if I got you right. But if you want to make a linear progression. Then balancing should be really easy. Just an example with some random numbers.

Lets say your player should get 500 mass per hour of playtime.

At level 10, gaining 100gold / hour, he has to pay 0,2 gold per Mass
At level 50, gaining 500gold / hour, he has to pay 1,0 gold per Mass
At level 100, gaining 1000gold/ hour, he has to pay 2,0 gold per Mass

And formulas (for this example):

Income: Level*10
Mass-Price: Income/aspired-mass-per-hour-rate

Hope it helps!

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Thanks for the replay mate,

I wish it was so easy...

1. I cannot determine the income since it is a free market. right now I defined a constant that you get $1000 when you join the game. Income may be determined by the players since it is an MMO 2. Benefits such as 5% mass gain for every action is given for$400

3. Mass The player mass gets without paying. I need to make mass harder to achieve as a function of your current mass / average income / experience. Then you can buy more pricy benefits to have a linear growth in mass.

So I need to make up this function, I'm not sure what constants to throw, I thought about using matlab for that... I can estimate his income, and have a function written by trial & error. More over, I don't know how much money players will have after 1 week of playing or 10 weeks of playing. I don't want them to have huge amounts after a month and doesn't have what to do with it.

So I guess I can let them buy other things, so they'll feel they still progress.

Basically, levels in the game are 1-10. I want them to reach level 10 after a year of playing.

How do you suggest me to approach this problem?

Thanks!

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Simplifying game mechanics takes the strategy out of games.

Who needs to plan ahead with one stat?
Now i can concentrate all my time on killing beetles for 3 exp.

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Do you suggest to publicize the game without taking care of this?

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Quote:
 Original post by ByronMan1. I cannot determine the income since it is a free market. right now I defined a constant that you get $1000 when you join the game. Income may be determined by the players since it is an MMO Perhaps you can tie the cost of mass to the in-game economy. If people are buying mass like crazy, up the price. Quote:  2. Benefits such as 5% mass gain for every action is given for$400

Sounds like a killer deal to me, especially if I had a lot of mass. It certainly does not make for linear mass increase.

Quote:
 So I need to make up this function, I'm not sure what constants to throw, I thought about using matlab for that... I can estimate his income, and have a function written by trial & error. More over, I don't know how much money players will have after 1 week of playing or 10 weeks of playing. I don't want them to have huge amounts after a month and doesn't have what to do with it.

Sounds to me like constants alone won't cut it, given the dynamic nature of your income system. I'd make some estimates if I were you - some edge cases, some average cases - after which I'd fiddle with various approaches that take care of the expected situations. Then, well, you'll have to get it tested somehow. Call it a beta release if you want, but it's likely that you'll need to keep tweaking the game, at least for a while. Still, I think it's a good idea to do at least some rough estimates beforehand, so you're not totally working blind.

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