WORLD'S END CHAPTER 1
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About the Game
World's End Chapter 1 is an isometric turn-based tactical combat game published by Mezzanine Stairs in 2013. The player controls a ragtag team of foulmouthed mercenaries, each with their own unique weapons and skill sets. The game breathes new life into a familiar action point system with the ability for characters to push each other, throw objects, and interact with a wide variety of elements in each combat scene. I challenge the reader to name another game in which the player can crush a guard with a bookshelf, then throw his corpse at a teleporting priest. As of February 2017, the game has a rating of 75% and over 450,000 plays on Armor Games.
Busted: Aggressive Speedrun
In most squad-based RPGs, optimal play emerges when each character is assigned a well-defined role in combat, then develops skills and equipment specifically to enhance that role. The challenge presented to the designer is to enable team synergies that are more powerful than simply having each character focus on dealing damage. World's End is the perfect case study for balancing such a system: I achieved the world record speedrunning time of 1 hour 25 minutes without ever healing, buying armor, or improving defensive skills.
The speedrun relied heavily on the use of one unusual character ability. Tevoran, the leader of the gang, can use "Mockery" to force all enemies to move to attack him on their next turn. Furthermore, enemies will ignore all other party members on that turn, even if those party members block the path between the enemy and Tevoran. Used indiscriminately, Mockery will cause enemies to quickly overwhelm Tevoran, and no benefit is gained. However, key squad formations will not only keep Tevoran safe from harm, but also clump enemies together, greatly improving the efficiency of environmental traps and the party's multi-enemy attacks.
Mockery is especially useful for the game's various boss fights. These fights ordinarily require working through hordes of enemy minions while enduring the boss's devastating ranged attacks. Instead, Mockery can pull the boss directly towards the party for a quick kill, while also neutering the rest of the enemy team.
In most squad-based RPGs, optimal play emerges when each character is assigned a well-defined role in combat, then develops skills and equipment specifically to enhance that role. The challenge presented to the designer is to enable team synergies that are more powerful than simply having each character focus on dealing damage. World's End is the perfect case study for balancing such a system: I achieved the world record speedrunning time of 1 hour 25 minutes without ever healing, buying armor, or improving defensive skills.
The speedrun relied heavily on the use of one unusual character ability. Tevoran, the leader of the gang, can use "Mockery" to force all enemies to move to attack him on their next turn. Furthermore, enemies will ignore all other party members on that turn, even if those party members block the path between the enemy and Tevoran. Used indiscriminately, Mockery will cause enemies to quickly overwhelm Tevoran, and no benefit is gained. However, key squad formations will not only keep Tevoran safe from harm, but also clump enemies together, greatly improving the efficiency of environmental traps and the party's multi-enemy attacks.
Mockery is especially useful for the game's various boss fights. These fights ordinarily require working through hordes of enemy minions while enduring the boss's devastating ranged attacks. Instead, Mockery can pull the boss directly towards the party for a quick kill, while also neutering the rest of the enemy team.
Once Mockery has been purchased, other character skills that buff allies, debuff enemies, heal, or boost defense can all be ignored in favor of pure damage output. In any given fight, trial and error can quickly reveal the optimal use of Mockery for safe and efficient gameplay. To further optimize the speedrun, I developed a specific build order for skills and equipment purchases, with emphasis placed on reducing the number of turns required to complete each boss fight.
Design Analysis: Preserving Uncertainty
There is little doubt that without Mockery, World's End would be a much more challenging and varied gameplay experience. The question designers should ask is: what is it about this ability that makes it so overpowered? There are several likely answers that are worth considering.
For an example of a similar ability that is balanced well, consider Suppression in XCOM: Long War, another turn-based tactical combat game. When a soldier uses Suppression, it reduces one enemy's aim and draws attention from all other enemies in sight. A common tactic is to build one soldier as a pure tank, place him in good cover, and Suppress the most dangerous enemy on the field. This tactic exhibits many of the same features listed above: it directly manipulates enemy AI, its utility scales with squad size, and it can mitigate enemy damage output.
What Suppression does not do is introduce certainty. The Suppressed enemy is likely to fire and miss, but they may use special abilities, or Hunker Down to increase defense. Suppression ends if the soldier takes damage, so if a high-aim enemy acts first, the ability may be quickly neutralized. Finally, the game's rare but dangerous melee enemies will ignore Suppression entirely.
Applying this example to World's End, a number of possibilities emerge for how to rebalance Mockery. The effect could be eliminated as soon as Tevoran takes damage. Each enemy could have a chance to ignore the effect depending on their distance from Tevoran. Perhaps if another party member has less than 25% health, enemies may choose to attack that party member instead. All of these preserve the core mechanic while also retaining the uncertainty that makes tactical combat exciting.
There is little doubt that without Mockery, World's End would be a much more challenging and varied gameplay experience. The question designers should ask is: what is it about this ability that makes it so overpowered? There are several likely answers that are worth considering.
- It directly manipulates enemy AI. This is true, but many other abilities in the game can manipulate the AI as well. The archer Ysabel has Limb Breaker, which forces one enemy to flee without attacking, while also dealing considerable damage. While certainly useful in a casual playthrough, the skill wasn't even purchased in the world record run.
- Its utility scales with the number of characters in combat. Also true, but moves with similar properties are used by both enemies and other party members. The mage Oksana and the enemy boss Otis can both use Multi-Heal to restore health to all allied party members. Again, seemingly effective, but irrelevant in the optimized run.
- It mitigates too much of the enemy's damage output. Mockery costs 10 special points to use, and Tevoran generates 4 special per turn, meaning that the ability can only be used once every 3 turns. More often than not, enemies are able to attack, and will always be in range to do so.
For an example of a similar ability that is balanced well, consider Suppression in XCOM: Long War, another turn-based tactical combat game. When a soldier uses Suppression, it reduces one enemy's aim and draws attention from all other enemies in sight. A common tactic is to build one soldier as a pure tank, place him in good cover, and Suppress the most dangerous enemy on the field. This tactic exhibits many of the same features listed above: it directly manipulates enemy AI, its utility scales with squad size, and it can mitigate enemy damage output.
What Suppression does not do is introduce certainty. The Suppressed enemy is likely to fire and miss, but they may use special abilities, or Hunker Down to increase defense. Suppression ends if the soldier takes damage, so if a high-aim enemy acts first, the ability may be quickly neutralized. Finally, the game's rare but dangerous melee enemies will ignore Suppression entirely.
Applying this example to World's End, a number of possibilities emerge for how to rebalance Mockery. The effect could be eliminated as soon as Tevoran takes damage. Each enemy could have a chance to ignore the effect depending on their distance from Tevoran. Perhaps if another party member has less than 25% health, enemies may choose to attack that party member instead. All of these preserve the core mechanic while also retaining the uncertainty that makes tactical combat exciting.