Sandboxes. Why not?

[Falconeer]

Btw, who's cock do I have to suck for one of those shiny, red titles?

It depends on what you are developing, I guess. Sandbox? 
(not mine, by the way)

[IainC]

Right, so if you remove classes from said template, what do you supposedly have to balance?  Items?  Abilities?  Without classes, those items and abilities can be used by anyone so it obviously removes much of the dreaded balancing issues.

This is pretty much flat out wrong. Just because everyone can have a thing, that doesn't make it balanced. Balance means making all choices equally valid, if there's a choice which is clearly better than the others then the rest are obsolete and that is bad balance. Balance is not always about PvP balance. Try reading some of the previous posts where this is explained by Samwise and others.

[TheCastle]

I'm not 100% against quests in a sandbox, but for the most part, I like sandboxes in order to get away from quest grinding and do my own thing.

Do you feel this is a common opinion held by people who enjoy sandbox game play?

Right, so if you remove classes from said template, what do you supposedly have to balance?  Items?  Abilities?  Without classes, those items and abilities can be used by anyone so it obviously removes much of the dreaded balancing issues.

What is a bright wizard or a druid other than a pre-planned bag of skills and stats?
If I load up and play UO right now and specialize in swordsmanship, heavy armor, shield blocking and various combat skills would that not make me a knight?

People get so worked up about balancing and tend to forget to make the game fun.  Sandboxes are fun because of the opportunities presented; the less obstacles you put in the way of getting to said opportunities, the better.

I think you are missing the boat altogether on this one. With out balance fun will not last long because everything would be meaningless.

[Arthur_Parker]

Balance means making all choices equally valid, if there's a choice which is clearly better than the others then the rest are obsolete and that is bad balance. Balance is not always about PvP balance. Try reading some of the previous posts where this is explained by Samwise and others.

If all choices are equally valid then congratulations you just made choices meaningless for anything other than appearance.  Balanced isn't fun, shooting mutant Egyptian mummies with your Amazon warrior is balanced, shooting them with fire arrows is fun.

For a game, start with fun, make all options equally unbalanced depending on circumstances and then introduce counter abilities for pvp, for pve who gives a shit if npc mummies get murdered, just don't try fire arrows on the mud golems.

[KallDrexx]

Only one hole I would poke into this would be to say that old methods of increasing your skills could be made more interesting. Imagine if leveling your woodworking skill involved doing a series of quests instead of making 100 chairs. Then in this case the player would be progressing through content the developers made to be experienced even if it was leveling my fishing skill. I prescribe to the idea that all of the different skills you can level as being mostly the same as leveling different class archetypes.

While I'm sure a lot of people will disagree, I seriously think the Eve has the best skill gaining system out there.  The whole reason why I love it is because it allows the designers to focus on the actual gameplay without having to balance the gameplay based on how the characters might advance, so that there is no one "best" way to skill up.  Instead many options for gameplay can be provided and the player can pick which route he/she wants to go without having to worry if they are slowing down their character, and they don't have to worry about bullshit such as trading off advancement rate with waiting for an event (guild or whatever) to organize or even the travel time to get to such an event.  MMOs have already proven that people will do whatever it takes to take the fastest method to advancement, even if it sacrifices their fun of the game.

That's why I think that eve's skill system is a huge boon for a sandbox game, because then the gamer is not penalized for their choices of how they want to spend their in game playtime.  They can socialize, adventure, craft, trade, travel, etc..  Yes, it does get rid of one form of advancement, but there are other ways to provide active advancement inside the game as well.

[IainC]

Balance means making all choices equally valid, if there's a choice which is clearly better than the others then the rest are obsolete and that is bad balance. Balance is not always about PvP balance. Try reading some of the previous posts where this is explained by Samwise and others.

If all choices are equally valid then congratulations you just made choices meaningless for anything other than appearance.  Balanced isn't fun, shooting mutant Egyptian mummies with your Amazon warrior is balanced, shooting them with fire arrows is fun.

For a game, start with fun, make all options equally unbalanced depending on circumstances and then introduce counter abilities for pvp, for pve who gives a shit if npc mummies get murdered, just don't try fire arrows on the mud golems.

Umm no. Again you're assuming too narrow a definition of balance when talking about game systems. Once again, read what Samwise said above. Balance does not have to mean that everything is the same, it simply means that all choices have the same weight - and once again this is not simply about combat balance it's system balance. If one option is vastly more powerful or more useful than others you have an unbalanced system. You absolutely can have diversity and keep balance - although it get harder the further you go.

[palmer_eldritch]

Balance means making all choices equally valid, if there's a choice which is clearly better than the others then the rest are obsolete and that is bad balance. Balance is not always about PvP balance. Try reading some of the previous posts where this is explained by Samwise and others.

If all choices are equally valid then congratulations you just made choices meaningless for anything other than appearance.  Balanced isn't fun, shooting mutant Egyptian mummies with your Amazon warrior is balanced, shooting them with fire arrows is fun.

For a game, start with fun, make all options equally unbalanced depending on circumstances and then introduce counter abilities for pvp, for pve who gives a shit if npc mummies get murdered, just don't try fire arrows on the mud golems.

Umm no. Again you're assuming too narrow a definition of balance when talking about game systems. Once again, read what Samwise said above. Balance does not have to mean that everything is the same, it simply means that all choices have the same weight - and once again this is not simply about combat balance it's system balance. If one option is vastly more powerful or more useful than others you have an unbalanced system. You absolutely can have diversity and keep balance - although it get harder the further you go.

Do they really need *the same* weight? Yes, every player wants similar things - to be able to progress in some way, to have an impact on the world, to be able to show off. I'm not sure that in a sandbox game, where people are doing different things, that they compare themselves to other people in the same way that they do in a DIKU.

If an activity is not fun or doesn't seem to matter - if other players are not at all impressed by what your character can do - then it's broken. But if dancing has fun gameplay and lets the player feel important in the gameworld, they're not going be too worried about whether the fisherman is having an even better time. At least, not to the same extent the sorcerer is going to compare themselves to the wizard in a diku.

[palmer_eldritch]

I'm not 100% against quests in a sandbox, but for the most part, I like sandboxes in order to get away from quest grinding and do my own thing.

Do you feel this is a common opinion held by people who enjoy sandbox game play?

Yes.

[palmer_eldritch]

What about your min/max players? Don't they deserve to have the option to be either a dancer or a fisherman if they so decide?

I think it's a mistake to say that having balanced and fully implemented game systems is only of benefit to min/maxers.  Then you end up with a false dichotomy between having a game that caters to "min/maxers" (Bartle achievers) and a game that caters to "roleplayers" (Bartle socializers).  Even someone who isn't a "min/maxer" and looking to "win" the game is going to appreciate their character being able to do something that actually impacts the game world on the same level as everyone else's, and to have the same variety of gameplay available to them. 

If being a fisherman gives you opportunities to see new game content, to interact with other players in the economic game, and to get new skills that let you do these things at progressively higher levels, that's going to appeal to everyone, even if they don't take advantage of all of those opportunities.  If being a dancer just gives you a couple of new emotes, there's just not enough gameplay there to make that class worthwhile, even to a really hardcore roleplayer who really likes the idea of playing a dancer.

I think Wasted really hit it on the head when he talked about being "socially competitive".  Even if you insist on dividing players up into Bartle types or whatever, you'll tend to find that they all want vaguely similar things, but for different reasons -- your socializers want to be able to do stuff that will cause other people to seek them out, your explorers want to be able to do stuff that will let them discover more of the world, your achievers want to be able to do stuff that makes them "win" the game by some measure, and your killers want to be able to strike terror into the hearts of other players.  In all cases, players want the ability to do things that impact the world in some meaningful way, and emoting in a corner isn't going to cut it.

There certainly has to be some gameplay involved. The ability to progress and, most of all, to have something to show off.

But you know, people didn't become dancers in SWG because they wanted to heal people's mind wounds. They did it mainly because they wanted cool emotes. And to give them an excuse to wear cool clothes too. And maybe to hang out with people who were playing musicians.

I saw people take part in dancing contests, and they weren't hardcore roleplayers. Actually, people used to try to min/max their dancing skill, buying clothes that gave a bonus to it (the bio-engineer or whatever it was called could make stuff you added to clothes to do this).

It's also worth remembering that a game, particularly a sandbox game, doesn't have to force you into just one role. You should be able to do other things as well as dance.

[Cylus]

This is pretty much flat out wrong. Just because everyone can have a thing, that doesn't make it balanced. Balance means making all choices equally valid, if there's a choice which is clearly better than the others then the rest are obsolete and that is bad balance. Balance is not always about PvP balance. Try reading some of the previous posts where this is explained by Samwise and others.

So who should define what's equally valid/viable?  You as the developer or me as the player?  Also, what choices?  Which ability to choose?  Why is there a need for different ability paths?  If everything is available to everyone, why can't someonel just choose what suits them or the enviornment the best?  In the end, any tools that you give me are automatically going to be tainted by what you believe is "valid" and it's even worse if you went out of your way to "balance" them.  Does that lead to a true sandbox where I can go wherever and do whatever I want?  Or does it give me a game where I can go wherever and do whatever you want?  Is your idea of a sandbox the former or the latter?  Mixture of both?  The less your grubby mitts are on my tools, the less you interfere with my ability to do whatever the hell I want.

I originally responded to the statement that said it's too difficult to fully implement an MMO sandbox game and I'll stick by my guns and say that it's only as difficult as the developers make it for themselves; spending man-hours attempting to balance everything was my example and whether it was a good or bad example is obviously up to you.  I'm probably now just arguing for the sake of arguing at this point but discussions are always healthy.

With out balance fun will not last long because everything would be meaningless.

To be clear, I never stated that "balancing" isn't required.  I merely stated that it shouldn't necessarily be a focal point in a sandbox; focusing on "balance" over "fun" leads to a lot of "not fun."  In the end, removing the variables that require balancing is a viable alternative.  Ask yourself, why was Crackdown fun?  Now, what prevents you from doing the same in an MMO?  The preconcieved notion that everything must be balanced?  The driving skill must be as good the explosive skill?  Bullshit! If I like driving, I'll take driving or vice-versa.  Yea, the min/max'r will probably take what they believe is the "better" skillset but who the hell cares (and the notion that everyone is a min/max'r is wacky)?  Give the player the tools to do what they want, not what you want, and they'll probably be happy as a pig in the mud.  Well, except for the vocal minority, like this board, which is probably why I'm preaching at an atheist's meeting   And it goes without saying that those tools obviously must be "balanced" against the enviornment; I agree, it wouldn't be fun to one-shot everything but that wasn't what I was driving at (I apologize if that's the notion that you got). 

It depends on what you are developing, I guess. Sandbox?

Am at Rockstar, San Diego.  Inquired about it because it'd be good to remind me to not be a douche like I was to Sam and Wasted (sorry again!)

[Falconeer]

Rockstar's sandbox-ish!

[IainC]

So who should define what's equally valid/viable?  You as the developer or me as the player?  Also, what choices?  Which ability to choose?  Why is there a need for different ability paths?  If everything is available to everyone, why can't someonel just choose what suits them or the enviornment the best?  In the end, any tools that you give me are automatically going to be tainted by what you believe is "valid" and it's even worse if you went out of your way to "balance" them.  Does that lead to a true sandbox where I can go wherever and do whatever I want?  Or does it give me a game where I can go wherever and do whatever you want?  Is your idea of a sandbox the former or the latter?  Mixture of both?  The less your grubby mitts are on my tools, the less you interfere with my ability to do whatever the hell I want.

Valid in as much as you are able to affect the game universe to an equivalent degree. You as the player will always be the ultimate arbiter of what is more valid for your playstyle and objectives, as a designer you ensure that sinking X level of player resources into a system gives Y amount of reward - however you want to measure that. Fishing should be as rewarding as mining for the same level of buy in from the player. Combat path A gives players a power level in situation X equivalent to a player with combat path B in situation Y. You aren't as a designer assigning any value judgements and telling players how to play, you're just trying to make sure that players don't feel that they've been cheated because they made the wrong choice or that there isn't a system that way out of whack and any player who doesn't conform to the fotm spec is by default an idiot. Nothing in what I said implies making choices on behalf of the player, it's just about making sure that the players have a real choice and not merely the illusion of one.

[Cylus]

Valid in as much as you are able to affect the game universe to an equivalent degree. You as the player will always be the ultimate arbiter of what is more valid for your playstyle and objectives, as a designer you ensure that sinking X level of player resources into a system gives Y amount of reward - however you want to measure that. Fishing should be as rewarding as mining for the same level of buy in from the player. Combat path A gives players a power level in situation X equivalent to a player with combat path B in situation Y. You aren't as a designer assigning any value judgements and telling players how to play, you're just trying to make sure that players don't feel that they've been cheated because they made the wrong choice or that there isn't a system that way out of whack and any player who doesn't conform to the fotm spec is by default an idiot. Nothing in what I said implies making choices on behalf of the player, it's just about making sure that the players have a real choice and not merely the illusion of one.

Fine, but why require the player to make that choice between Combat Path A and Combat Path B?  Why make them choose between fishing and mining?  Why can't they, as a player, have access to it all?  The player will never feel cheated if they never are forced to make that decision.  The "real choice" should be whether I'm in the mood to fish, mine or put myself in situation X or Y.  While the argument may stand that the rewards for mining must be equal to the rewards for fishing, that's a much smaller task than ensuring that Build A with or without equipment [Y] is as viable as Build B without or without equipment [Z].

And last, if the player is having fun, does it matter whether they have a real choice or just the illusion of one?  Choice is great, don't get me wrong; I just disagree with forcing a choice on the player.

[IainC]

No-one's saying they can't have it all but if mining is more rewarding than fishing, why would anyone in their right mind fish? Like I said it's not about making choices for the player it's about making sure that the choice is there to be made. Otherwise 99% of your player base will end up doing the same thing because the design encourages them to do so, the other 1% are the players who believed the open world stuff on the back of your box and are too stubborn to quit yet.

[TheCastle]

If all choices are equally valid then congratulations you just made choices meaningless for anything other than appearance.

Achieving balance also includes situational effectiveness. Fire Arrows being very effective vs undead would not result in fire arrows being the most used arrow in the game. I have a feeling that some people have skewed or limited idea of what balance really is in this case. Not all options should be the same in a balanced system because not all options are going to work equally well in all situations. Think about it more like this. If the game world is a pie then every skill should get an equally sized slice. That doesn't make every slice identical in nature because each slice is a different part of the pie.

Lets try and replace the word balance and use the word depth. In this case they are easily interchangeable. If I am given 10 skills to choose from I should be able to pick the ones that cater to my playing style with out a single worry if those skills will leave me being basically useless simply because of the short sightedness of the people who created the game.

So who should define what's equally valid/viable?  You as the developer or me as the player?

Both have to work together and its usually a never ending task with lots of blood sweat and tiers spent by both sides.

I originally responded to the statement that said it's too difficult to fully implement an MMO sandbox game and I'll stick by my guns and say that it's only as difficult as the developers make it for themselves; spending man-hours attempting to balance everything was my example and whether it was a good or bad example is obviously up to you.  I'm probably now just arguing for the sake of arguing at this point but discussions are always healthy.

Ask yourself, why was Crackdown fun?  Now, what prevents you from doing the same in an MMO?

Well ignoring the obvious flaw in this comparison that Crackdown is apparently a single player or 2 player coop(No PVP?) game where balance is far less important. Lets take a look at some of its features for a moment.

Much like other sandbox games, the player mainly uses melee attacks, guns, and explosives to fight the opposing forces, and can run, climb buildings, jump across rooftops, or use vehicles to navigate the city. Crackdown features a series of character-based skills that can be upgraded to increase specific traits that can be used in combat, driving, or on-foot agility.[3] These skills include: "Agility", which increases the Agent's ability to jump and run; "Driving", affecting how well he can handle a vehicle; "Explosives", which affects the power of explosive weapons; "Strength" that increases the Agent's strength, namely by increasing his ability to lift and throw, as well as how hard he can strike an opponent; and "Firearms", which improves the character's aptitude with weapons. Crackdown's skills make few concessions to realism: character abilities are similar to those of comic book superheroes or cartoon characters. This concept is further highlighted by the comic book-like, semi-cell-shaded graphics.[7]

So you are saying that balance was not a focus because all options were valid? 

Fine, but why require the player to make that choice between Combat Path A and Combat Path B?

And last, if the player is having fun, does it matter whether they have a real choice or just the illusion of one?  Choice is great, don't get me wrong; I just disagree with forcing a choice on the player.

You cannot get around this and I think that is what you are missing. Especially in a MMOG where it is a huge time investment your time spent playing is a resource. Standing around and doing nothing costs just as much time as running out to X cave to mine some ore. Naturally if I am a cook fishing should be a more valid choice for me. Likewise if I am a smith mining ore would be better. Either way if I am a cook mining ore so I can continue leveling my cooking something seriously went fucking wrong with the design.

[Yoru]

<edit: a bunch of wank. honestly, who gives a shit.>

The spirit of SirBruce is strong in this one.

[TheCastle]

<edit: a bunch of wank. honestly, who gives a shit.>

The spirit of SirBruce is strong in this one.

Ouch that is a particularly strong insult considering the huge Mechs vs Tanks debate in one of the other threads. Tough shit so ban me I dont care what you think.

[schild]

Judgement error, imo. Have a nice life.

[Cylus]

No-one's saying they can't have it all but if mining is more rewarding than fishing, why would anyone in their right mind fish? Like I said it's not about making choices for the player it's about making sure that the choice is there to be made. Otherwise 99% of your player base will end up doing the same thing because the design encourages them to do so, the other 1% are the players who believed the open world stuff on the back of your box and are too stubborn to quit yet.

As I said, the argument that you'd need to balance the rewards for fishing with the rewards for mining stands.  Spend the time that you would have spent balancing combat paths A and B on balancing those rewards.  You'd be freeing up a ton of resources by freeing up that time that would have been required for class balancing.    

Well ignoring the obvious flaw in this comparison that Crackdown is apparently a single player or 2 player coop(No PVP?) game where balance is far less important. Lets take a look at some of its features for a moment.

So you are saying that balance was not a focus because all options were valid? 

I used that comparison because it's considered a fun sandbox where the player is pretty darn powerful (which makes it fun).  It being a single player game didn't matter in that aspect (how many people play WoW as basically a single-player game?).  And what's an MMO other than a 6/10/25/40+ man co-op?  Alas, I have no idea how much time they spent on "balance."    Look, the whole point about the balance thing is that you can remove a lot of the time required to balance by removing the variables that require said balance (ie, classes).  It's just an example of a way of tackling the "sandbox MMOs are too difficult to flesh out completely" obstacle.  Rather than trying to fix the problem, you just remove the opportunity for the problem to rear it's head (as much as possible, of course).  Not enough time to balance 10 classes?  Remove them, allow everyone to level up what they want, and focus the time that you would have spent on class balance to make fishing/cooking/mining/etc... fun.  Granted, it's a drastic step but I'm just trying to make a point, albeit perhaps poorly.

Either way if I am a cook mining ore so I can continue leveling my cooking something seriously went fucking wrong with the design.

Well, of course.  Never said otherwise.

[Wasted]

How you tune a players power level in relation to the pve is separate to how you balance a mmog to give equal enjoyment to most people.  You can have everyone become god like harbingers of destruction and kill 100's of mobs at a time, thats all part of the aesthetic and game feel you want.  That's separate from making sure every game feature you have is enjoyable on its own merit and doesn't unintentionally ruin or make irrelevant other players achievements. That is the challenge in basically stacking a lot of different games together to give a sandbox world vs a combat focused diku progression one.

[Cylus]

That's separate from making sure every game feature you have is enjoyable on its own merit and doesn't unintentionally ruin or make irrelevant other players achievements. That is the challenge in basically stacking a lot of different games together to give a sandbox world vs a combat focused diku progression one.

Well said.  The question remains though, what is your priority?  Balancing every one of those games in relation to each other or making every one of those as enjoyable as possible?  It's not always possible to do both so you're going to have to choose at one point or another.

As the saying goes, opinions are like assholes and mine may stink to most people but I've seen the fun sucked out of a game because we felt obligated to try to make everything balanced.  More often than not, the game became less fun because of it; granted, that may have been because the solutions were rushed and/or retarded but whatever   Designing something to make sure the game is healthy in the long run doesn't matter if there's no one playing your game in the long run.  Again, it's just my stinky opinion, which I'm entitled to.

[tazelbain]

> doesn't unintentionally ruin or make irrelevant other players achievements.
That's exactly what balancing classes in diku is for.

[Slyfeind]

I have a feeling the word "balance" may have taken on a negative connotation over the years. It's kinda sad to think that since balance isn't fun, I'm not allowed to like how well balanced Diablo 2 was. :(

[Arthur_Parker]

Umm no. Again you're assuming too narrow a definition of balance when talking about game systems. Once again, read what Samwise said above. Balance does not have to mean that everything is the same, it simply means that all choices have the same weight - and once again this is not simply about combat balance it's system balance. If one option is vastly more powerful or more useful than others you have an unbalanced system. You absolutely can have diversity and keep balance - although it get harder the further you go.

Having the chance to make bad decisions is almost as important as the ability to make good ones.  Feel free to ignore that and keep banging on about one overpowered option, how many times do you want to make that point?

[Wasted]

Umm no. Again you're assuming too narrow a definition of balance when talking about game systems. Once again, read what Samwise said above. Balance does not have to mean that everything is the same, it simply means that all choices have the same weight - and once again this is not simply about combat balance it's system balance. If one option is vastly more powerful or more useful than others you have an unbalanced system. You absolutely can have diversity and keep balance - although it get harder the further you go.

Having the chance to make bad decisions is almost as important as the ability to make good ones.  Feel free to ignore that and keep banging on about one overpowered option, how many times do you want to make that point?

Probably as many times as people will ignore the point and insist a sandbox mmog doesn't need to be balanced.  There is a difference in an 'acceptable' bad decision such as selling an item on the market for too little or wandering into a zone that you can't compete in versus a bad decision which is caused by a poorly designed game feature not living up to reasonable expectations.

[palmer_eldritch]

A poorly designed game feature not living up to reasonable expectations != unbalanced. That's a bit of a straw man, as of course a crappy game system which is not fun shouldn't be in the game. It's down to you to show that anything which is unbalanced must be poorly designed and not live up to reasonable expectations.

On, I hope, a more constructive note - I think one of the assumptions the pro-balance crowd are making is that the systems must interact. They don't have to.

If a game let's me fight giant robots and also take part in vehicle races, it really doesn't matter if one system is a bit better than the other, as long as they are both fun. And as long as I can do both.

[IainC]

A poorly designed game feature not living up to reasonable expectations != unbalanced. That's a bit of a straw man, as of course a crappy game system which is not fun shouldn't be in the game. It's down to you to show that anything which is unbalanced must be poorly designed and not live up to reasonable expectations.

On, I hope, a more constructive note - I think one of the assumptions the pro-balance crowd are making is that the systems must interact. They don't have to.

If a game let's me fight giant robots and also take part in vehicle races, it really doesn't matter if one system is a bit better than the other, as long as they are both fun. And as long as I can do both.

Fun is subjective, good luck trying to quantify that ina game design document. Systems don't have to innterconnect to require balancing. It's my experience that if a player has two choices in a game, one which maximises fun while providing a moderate reward and another which maximises reward and is no fun at all then players will invariably spend all their time on the second one. They will also complain the whole time about how unfun the game design is even though a more fun option is provided. See encounter camping, crafting, powerlevelling, faction grinding etc as examples.

You should of course try to add in fun where possible and identify the players who are likely to want to take part in the element you are designing so that you can tailor it to their expectations but trying to achieve balance via fun is not ever going to work.

[Arinon]

Dikus are games (i.e. something you play), sandboxes are toys (i.e. something you play with).

I think this definition works very well.  And the reason you don't see much sandbox is because that type of play doesn't lend itself to multiplayer nearly as much as Diku.  How often did you play Monopoly or Scrabble with buddies vs. something like Legos or Etch-a-Sketch?

[Falconeer]

Balance.

I keep thinking that, after all, the sandbox worked very well in UO and SWG and what's there is working in EVE.

Would you like to try and apply all the things you all just said about balance to those three titles?

Was it fun, or rewarding, or balanced, to be a miner or a cook in Ultima Online? Or a fisher and treasure hunter? Or an interior decorator?
Was it fun, or rewarding, or balanced, to be a dancer, a tailor, a creature handler in SWG? Or a makeup artist?
Is it fun, or rewarding, or balanced, to be a miner, a refiner, I don't know what else maybe an explorer and a cartographer (!?) or something in EVE right now?

For what is worth, I think it is/was. Fun, rewarding and don't care about balanced but let's just say it worked so to a degree it definite was balanced too.
Try applying your previously expressed criteria to such games and examples. What do you think?

[Malakili]

Balance.

I keep thinking that, after all, the sandbox worked very well in UO and SWG and what's there is working in EVE.

Would you like to try and apply all the things you all just said about balance to those three titles?

Was it fun, or rewarding, or balanced, to be a miner or a cook in Ultima Online? Or a fisher and treasure hunter? Or an interior decorator?
Was it fun, or rewarding, or balanced, to be a dancer, a tailor, a creature handler in SWG? Or a makeup artist?
Is it fun, or rewarding, or balanced, to be a miner, a refiner, I don't know what else maybe an explorer and a cartographer (!?) or something in EVE right now?

For what is worth, I think it is/was. Fun, rewarding and don't care about balanced but let's just say it worked so to a degree it definite was balanced too.
Try applying your previously expressed criteria to such games and examples. What do you think?

I am very heavy into industry in EVE and I find it to be very fun.  Its not the same KIND of fun as flying around shooting people, but it is fun none the less.  It is very rewarding in terms of in-game rewards, but I also like having characters that make things, in general.   My one worry about all these sorts of games is that the people who are in love with combat (which is no problem in itself), will convince the developers that combat is way more fun and that the crafting industry is boring, and so they will somehow change the crafting to make it more "exciting" (Exciting and fun aren't necessarily always the same thing).  The segments of gameplay cater to people who get enjoyment out of different things. 

In this thread a lot of people have mentioned that every path in a sandbox should all you to be rewarded and have fun, but I think its important to realize that fun isn't the same thing to every player.  The reason I chose an industrial path in EVE is because I LOVE that I don't need to have a combat oriented character in order to feel like I've made an important impact on the game world.  So, I guess my point is that while everything should be fun and rewarding in a sandbox, that doesn't mean every single system needs to be fun and rewarding to EVERYONE.

[Slyfeind]

Fun is subjective, good luck trying to quantify that ina game design document. Systems don't have to innterconnect to require balancing. It's my experience that if a player has two choices in a game, one which maximises fun while providing a moderate reward and another which maximises reward and is no fun at all then players will invariably spend all their time on the second one. They will also complain the whole time about how unfun the game design is even though a more fun option is provided. See encounter camping, crafting, powerlevelling, faction grinding etc as examples.

You should of course try to add in fun where possible and identify the players who are likely to want to take part in the element you are designing so that you can tailor it to their expectations but trying to achieve balance via fun is not ever going to work.

The rewards are subjective too. In pre-NGE SWG, entertainers grossly overpowered characters that were maximized for PvP, just because PvP wasn't very fun for me, but singing and dancing were. All the rewards were given to entertainer classes, and PvP characters got nothing. By "reward" I mean of course the ability to sit with a bunch of people and chat all day. That's more valuable to me than a kill count, or badges, or buffs or awesome weapons. Those are meaningless numbers to me.

[palmer_eldritch]

A poorly designed game feature not living up to reasonable expectations != unbalanced. That's a bit of a straw man, as of course a crappy game system which is not fun shouldn't be in the game. It's down to you to show that anything which is unbalanced must be poorly designed and not live up to reasonable expectations.

On, I hope, a more constructive note - I think one of the assumptions the pro-balance crowd are making is that the systems must interact. They don't have to.

If a game let's me fight giant robots and also take part in vehicle races, it really doesn't matter if one system is a bit better than the other, as long as they are both fun. And as long as I can do both.

Fun is subjective, good luck trying to quantify that ina game design document. Systems don't have to innterconnect to require balancing. It's my experience that if a player has two choices in a game, one which maximises fun while providing a moderate reward and another which maximises reward and is no fun at all then players will invariably spend all their time on the second one. They will also complain the whole time about how unfun the game design is even though a more fun option is provided. See encounter camping, crafting, powerlevelling, faction grinding etc as examples.

You should of course try to add in fun where possible and identify the players who are likely to want to take part in the element you are designing so that you can tailor it to their expectations but trying to achieve balance via fun is not ever going to work.

If the game is about experience, levels and loot, then yes.

I was a tailor in SWG. Being a weaponsmith was more "rewarding" in the obvious gameplay sense - you got more money from it. I didn't care, as I enjoyed making clothes for people. I enjoyed the social aspect of it.

Cooking in UO was less rewarding than alchemy, in terms of making something useful. Potions were useful in fights, cooking just let you produce things that looked interesting when you put them on a table (food regened stamina too, but I don't know anyone who ever used it for that as it was rubbish). I enjoyed the odd bit of cooking.

Maybe I'm just a weird player.

Encounter camping, power-levelling and faction grinding aren't examples that would apply to any decent sandbox game.

[IainC]

You missed the point. Those examples I gave were to illustrate that players will do dull things that reward them highly over fun things that give an average reward. Try reading the  post for context before you reply to random fragments of it.

[palmer_eldritch]

You missed the point. Those examples I gave were to illustrate that players will do dull things that reward them highly over fun things that give an average reward. Try reading the  post for context before you reply to random fragments of it.

I did read the post.

You used examples which led to a clear reward, as you said, which is inherent in the design of the game. The reward in the examples you gave being xp and loot. If a game is set up so that there is a clear goal in mind - level and get loot - then players will indeed do whatever they see as the most efficient way of obtaining that goal. That is why they camp spawn, grind etc.

But this does not apply to a sandbox game. As I said, it applies to a game which is about xp and loot. It could also apply to another game with a set goal (eg be the best dancer, be the best fisherman). When a clear goal is set for players by the designers, players will do whatever they think is best to achieve that goal, even if they think it is boring. And yes, they will then moan about it being boring.

But it does not apply to a decent sandbox game, as it would not have a set goal to aim for.

You can have a cool reward for killing a dragon and no reward at all for holding a dinner party, and players who want to hold dinner parties will not care. It won't enter their heads to compare the two and go kill a dragon instead (and moan on the forums). Even better, though, if they know they can go kill a dragon after their party if they want to.

You are taking the way players behave in DIKUS and assuming they will behave in a similar way in sandbox games. They won't. And they don't, as such games exist and you can see that they don't.

[IainC]

There are always set goals to aim for, the difference in a sandbox game is that the player largely chooses their 'win condition' themselves instead of having it flagged up by the game design. And, yes, players do behave the same in sandbox games as they do in DIKUs as far as trying to maximise the rewards that help them achieve their self-assigned goals. As long as there is a game then there will be ways to measure yourself against other players of the game. Whether you're measuring the amount of gold you've collected, your tradeskill, the number of customers your interior design bod has, the number of PvP scalps you've racked up or whatever. Goals are goals regardless and players tend to work towards them in the same way regardless of the type of game.