Team a la Cartetress

Awhile back at work we got into a water cooler balancing discussion, mostly regarding multiplayer and how elegantly a game such as Team Fortress 2 is balanced, even despite the regular updates to only a single specific class in the game.

The conversation started at a very high level, looking at how there’s a “fast” but “weak” guy (Scout), or a “slow” but “tough” guy (Heavy), and even the “stealthy” guy (Spy) and all sorts of classes in between.  Everyone pretty much gets how they work together to form a cohesive team, and how one class has strengths vs. other classes (such as how an Engineer is exceptional at Anti-Scout).  We certainly don’t need to go into that here.

But what got really interesting was when I threw out the suggestion about taking the discussion down a level.  Let’s examine not only how each class is balanced, but more importantly, if we can assume that each of his individual parts are balanced to make the whole of the class, can we remove them and re-distribute them without breaking the game?

While I’m pretty sure that (at least insofar as TF2 is concerned) this would break the game, let’s assume that since no character is overwhelmingly stronger than any other one character, that they are “evenly” balanced.  What this means is that while we can’t have true one-vs-one match-ups in TF2 (the Spy would be inherently weak in this situation, as would a Scout against a Heavy with nobody to distract the Heavy), in the team setting, they are all on equal ground.

So let’s say that they’re all worth an even 1000 points, and if you were to have a sort of Create-A-Team-Fortress-Class system, how could we go about it?

We could first break down the classes into their (default, not upgraded) components that make them tick.

For instance:

The Scout

• Small target volume
• Speed: +33% (100% = the default TF2 run speed)
• Double-Jump
• 2x Point Capture
• Health:  125 (default value)
• Scattergun:  6 shots, 32 ammo, 85-105 damage (180 crit)
• Pistol:  12 shots, 36 ammo, 20-22 (45 crit)
• Bat:  24-46 (105 crit) [about 2 hits per second]
• Can hit grenades back with bat

The Heavy

• Large target volume
• Speed: -23% (-73% when spinning barrels)
• Health: 300 (+175 over default)
• Sasha Minigun: 200 rounds, 50-54 damage per 1 ammo – 500/sec-540/sec (1080/sec crit)
• Default Shotgun: 6 rounds, 32 ammo, 80-90 damage (180 crit)
• Fists:  43-87 (195 crit uppercut) [a little more than 1 hit per second]

Just comparing these two classes (and peeking a bit more at the tf2wiki) we can start to see some default values spring up…

First, it seems that 125 is a “default” level of health.  Not only does the Scout have it, but the Engy, Sniper, and Spy also have it.

Second, it would appear that all shotguns (even the Scattergun) are a default type of weapon, as they do relatively the same amount of damage.  The Scattergun has some small differences, but ostensibly they are very similar weapons.

Third, the two melee weapons are pretty much identical.  Looking at DPS values for each, they come out roughly a wash.  They both do roughly the same damage per second, so they are mostly just an aesthetic difference, at least if you go by the numbers.

Using these items as a “baseline” to work around, we can start guessing at what the point values for each of these class characteristics might cost.  Keep in mind I don’t have any kind of equation for this; I’m basing point values based off of what makes that class successful and separates it from the rest.  And could you do me a favor and not spam the comments nitpicking point values unless I’ve made a horribly grievous error that is so awful it will murder your parents if left unchecked?  So maybe the point values would go a little bit like…

Scout:  1000 points

• 050 points – Smaller target volume
• 300 points - Speed: +33%
• 050 points - Double-Jump (seems like more, but it’s based on speed)
• 300 points – 2x Point Capture
• 000 points – Health (default value)
• 100 points – Scattergun
• 100 points – Pistol
• 100 points – Bat
• 000 points - Can hit grenades back with bat (points calculated in bat)

Heavy:  1000 points

• +100 points – Speed: -23% (you get points back for this since you’re slower than default)
• +100 points – Large target volume (you get points back for being larger than default)
• 500 points – Health: 300 (+175 over default)
• 500 points – Sasha Minigun
• 100 Points – Default Shotgun
• 100 Points – Fist

If we started using the ala carte system, we could maybe make up a custom guy who had some fun differences to him, just using these two systems, such as:

Quick Gun:  1000 points

• 300 points - Speed: +33%
• 500 points – Sasha Minigun
• 050 points - Double-Jump (seems like more, but it’s based on speed)
• 050 points – Health 150
• 100 points – Default Shotgun

Crazy, no?  You’d have a normal sized guy who could move just like the scout, double jump like the Scout, lay down fire like a Heavy, and not much else.  Would he be useful?  I imagine he would, especially if you had the Natasha mini-gun unlock (which if balanced properly should cost the same as Sasha, since it gives up damage for slowing down targets).  But why stop there?  What if we just created a guy whose sole purpose in life was to sap sentries?  What would he look like?

Super Sentry Sapper:  1000 points

• 200 points - Speed: +22%
• 000 points – Health: 125 (default value)
• 300 points – Disguise (from Spy kit)
• 300 points – Cloak (from Spy kit)
• 100 points – Sapper (from Spy kit)
• 100 points – Bat

Whoah, right?  Sure, he wouldn’t be able to interdict any other players (by and large), but man would he be impossible to stop with that extra speed to escape.  But maybe this isn’t the best example of the system.

What if we made a sniper who could get to points on the map we don’t expect snipers to stand?  Like say on the roof of the A-Side building in Gravelpit?

Fast Sniper:  1000 points

• 300 points - Speed: +33%
• 050 points - Double-Jump
• 500 points – Sniper Rifle
• 050 points – Health 150
• 100 points – Pistol

Or what if we just wanted to make the ultimate Sniper?  I seriously want to play this guy:

Grey Fox Sniper: 1000 points

• 500 points – Sniper Rifle
• 300 points – Cloak (from Spy kit)
• 200 points – Butterfly Knife (from Spy kit)

Now, granted, we’ve completely broken what Team Fortress is, which is a fun romp that depends on known character classes and identifiable silhouettes.  However, we’ve started to find some new kinds of fun.  While we lose the character silhouette we can still lean on the fact that the animation pose and the weapon silhouette themselves are recognizable, so it’s not like it would be a huge mystery as to what the Grey Fox Sniper up there does if you see him coming.  He stabs you in the back and he shoots at long range, and then disappears.

Suddenly, players are free to create whatever Red vs. Blu guy they want.  New team dynamics can be found, new “hybrid classes” are invented, and maybe, just maybe, I won’t have to stop playing a Scout and be forced to go Soldier just to bust that turret ahead.  I might have another tool to deal with it.

Additionally, with this fictional mod that I’ve got going in my head, you could do a “Go Huge” mode where servers could start allowing more than 1000 point characters.  What if we allowed 2000 point characters?  3000?  What if we allowed one guy to be a power level 9000 on one side and nine 1000 point guys on the other?  Would the gameplay be compelling?  Is this a game you’d like to play?

Tagged as: ala carte, grey fox, heavy, scout, sniper, tf2