The Goals of Balancing Rivens

[DrBorris]

Let's just start with a picture I expertly made in PowerPoint.

Going from left to right represents a weapon being more powerful. Purple boxes on the right represent the weapon equipped with a Riven.

This is what I am pretty sure Rivens are supposed to be. Weapon progression is a thing, the idea that "all weapons should just be balanced" is ridiculous because that takes all the wind out of a player initially progressing through the game. You know how weapons are all given a MR requirement? And how weapons generally get more powerful with higher MR? That isn't an accident, it is basic game design to encourage players to progress through the game.

Weapons being innately unbalanced is not a bad thing. The journey of finding new tools, making a goal of getting something better, that is the life blood of a new player.

 

Then we get to Rivens. Rivens are, in their own way, the most "endgame" endgame system we have. The purpose for Rivens that DE have tried to express is to add a massive amount of weapon diversity to the endgame. All of those intentionally "bad" weapons that are part of initial weapon progression are basically wasted content for DE. The art, mechanics, at base they all are useless to a veteran player if they are attached to a weapon targeted at lower level players. The goal of Rivens is to make it so every weapon in the game is viable in the late game. The goal of Rivens was never to be a form of power progression where you get better tools, it was a system to bring up bad tools and make them good.

This is why the changes to make weapon variants have different Dispositions was a great one. The whole point of Rivens is to make it so every weapon, non-Prime variants included, can compete. Rivens are the great equalizer. And if you are thinking "then why should I get better weapons", then you are asking the wrong question. Again, the point of Rivens is NOT to serve as power progression. Nearly every variant weapon has different characteristics from the base versions that make them feel different to use. The point of RIvens is to give players more choice in how they want to play.

Corinth for example. In a perfectly balanced system both Corinth and Corinth Prime, when equipped with a Riven, would be equally powerful. So then which weapon you would use would come down to taste. Do you prefer the buckshot mechanics of Prime, or regular? Do you prefer reloading single rounds or a whole magazine? Balanced Rivens add more player choice and greater loadout diversity.

And this... this is why Rivens need to be balanced. Sometimes they need to be nerfed, sometimes they need to be buffed, Rivens will only work for their intended purpose if they are balanced.

 

Rivens have a lot of issues. Their means of acquisition, their slot-machine nature, their cyclical progression (instead of linear), their current dispositions, they have some massive issues. But I think it is important to keep in mind the goal DE has set out for Rivens.

[kapn655321]

1 hour ago, DrBorris said:

Weapons being innately unbalanced is not a bad thing.

The degree to which they are, is.

Here's how:
When a weapon is vastly more overwhelming that it's peers, it will demand a challenging new enemy to counter it, else the game becomes boring and uninteresting to players. Once you've done everything you need to do and reach God-status, there's nothing to work towards. Players request new, more challenging enemies to offset this. Those new, more challenging enemies, Cannot be engaged with anything but that most powerful weapon.

An OP gun = a future nerf to everything that isn't OP.

Those players with that gun may once again hope to push that gun Even Further.. totally outstripping all other weapons.. then boredom, new enemy, more damage, boredom... etc. This is the danger of power creep, as it consumes and wastes the development of everything that isn't OP, in it's need to meet the demands of those who use it.

Edited April 10, 2020 by kapn655321

[Uhkretor]

If they stop releasing stupid stuff like Catchmoon, then this whole "unbalance is balance" ideal will actually regain its sense.

[DrBorris]

3 minutes ago, kapn655321 said:

The degree to which they are, is.

Here's how:
When a weapon is vastly more overwhelming that it's peers, it will demand a challenging new enemy to counter it, else the game becomes boring and uninteresting to players. Once you've done everything you need to do and reach God-status, there's nothing to work towards. Players request new, more challenging enemies to offset this. Those new, more challenging enemies, Cannot be engaged with anything but that most powerful weapon.

An OP gun = a future nerf to everything that isn't OP.

Those players with that gun may once again hope to push that gun Even Further.. totally outstripping all other weapons.. then boredom, new enemy, more damage, boredom... etc. This is the danger of power creep, as it consumes and wastes the development of everything that isn't OP, in it's need to meet the demands of those who use it.

Out of context, I can see how that statement could be interpreted how you did. But in the context of the rest of the post this is what you got out of it?

If I was for some reason advocating for OP weapons, wouldn't that go against basically every other point I made about Rivens? It would be completely illogical for me to make the points I made and also say that nothing should be nerfed. I agree with everything you said, and nothing you say here goes against anything I wrote in the original post.

 

What you interpreted by "Weapons being innately unbalanced is not a bad thing." is not at all what I meant by that statement (did you just read the bold and skip the rest?), what I meant by that statement is that not all weapons need to innately be "good", they just need to be serviceable for their intended role. Then Rivens serve to being everything up to equal.

[kapn655321]

1 hour ago, DrBorris said:

did you just read the bold and skip the rest?

Yes.

[Tyreaus]

1 hour ago, DrBorris said:

This is what I am pretty sure Rivens are supposed to be.

I don't think so.

I think that's how Rivens should be, but there's a few mismatches between this idea and their implementation:

1. Disposition is based quite a bit on popularity. If the goal is to make weapons more equally powerful, popularity shouldn't make a difference at all. It's only recently that they've stated they're making it based on power as well, but they seem to be factoring in popularity still.
2. Riven stats are based on base weapon stats. The old Fang Prime was a, well, prime example of how percentage-based Riven stats can only do so much to bring a weapon up to snuff.
3. Riven dispositions start out at neutral or below. If the goal is to bring a weapon up to a given statistical baseline, it should be possible to ascertain a disposition off the bat. Instead, they wait to let the proverbial dust settle.
4. Dispositions changes don't really follow patterns. If it were based on power, dispositions should change in two circumstances: when new weapons bump up the power scale and when balance passes occur. Dispositions are far more volatile than that should indicate, though.
5. I can't come up with five without really stretching things so ... have a kitty 😺

IIRC DE's stated goal was to encourage people to use less-used weapons, not necessarily to bring them up to an equitable scale. That's why it's based more around popularity and why the proverbial "baseline" isn't above the power curve, but within it. (Note how minimal disposition Rivens can be worse than dual stat mods and other equivalents. If the ideal baseline is like in the image, i.e. above the strongest weapons, none of those Rivens should be weaker than a regular mod.)

  

58 minutes ago, kapn655321 said:

The degree to which they are, is.

I think the important part about this point is the upper bound or lack thereof. If there is an upper bound, even a fuzzy one, content creep issues disappear.

FWIW, it seems that DE is starting to plateau on how much more powerful they want to make things: Baza Prime and Corinth Prime haven't been exceptionally more potent than their baseline counterparts, not compared to Lex Prime or Braton Prime for sure. So there's hope on that.

And at least for new content, there's also the option of alternative difficulty. For example: a more puzzle-based enemy / boss that tests the player's parkour skills largely nullifies the strength of their weapons. It's difficult yet stronger weapons don't make the content easier. (But alternative difficulty might not be up everyone's alley, I admit) 

Edited April 10, 2020 by Tyreaus