TokOwa's Initial Impression of the Game
Atlas Feedback
Hello everyone. I am writing this feedback to Atlas on the 13th of July. I do this after having played and enjoyed Atlas for about a hundred games.
There has been much criticism directed towards the game that seems primarily based on mismatched expectations. I think many players expected a bread and butter RTS with basebuilding and large armies. I also expected something similar. In my view, the range of ways that an Atlas game can unfold compared to StarCraft 2, is a lot more limited. In StarCraft 2, the different aspects of the game are each able to tell the narrative of the game, the different openings, the expansions taken, the units created and the set of production facilities that the players choose. Atlas is more simple in comparison, remove the basebuilding aspects, now I am left with the units I choose to produce, and how I utilize them. The games will generally unfold in similar fashion, I will either attempt to contest a Titan, or when the Titan is live, I will attempt to capitalise on the arising situation. This is a simplification, but for newer players, I am sure that this would be a good description of how things seem to play out in every game of Atlas.
For most people and myself, becoming accustomed to Atlas is difficult. It is practically a new genre, and because of the RTS comparison, we are more easily able to point out things that bother us, than to actually understand and improve our ability to appreciate the game. After seeking out and watching Day9’s AMA for the 4th Test Weekend, I was able to enlighten myself with regards to the design of the game, and the motivations that drove decisions as to how mechanics would function. I will attempt to explain my understanding of Atlas, and what makes the game very beautiful and fun to me. A lot of this is heavily drawn from the AMA mentioned above. If you are interested in the link for the AMA, write a reply below or send me a message and I’ll PM you the link.
Atlas at its core is a Team-Oriented, Deckbuilding Unit-Battler. The emphasis of the game is the unit battling, specifically interacting with your opponent. Almost every game design decision has been made with this in mind. Why is there no basebuilding? Because the game wants you to go out and use your army and not need to focus on basebuilding. Why are there Titans? To create situations that encourage and incentivise players to head out and fight each other. What about jungle camps? They seem like arbitrary areas of PvE. While this is true to some extent, camps in Atlas are very flexible. On one hand they create lulls in the game, where one can rebuild his army. On the other hand, most of the camps are in areas that are easily contested by either side, and as the map opens up, every camp can potentially become a point of contention. In a sense, they add another dimension of manoeuvrability in addition to the regular PvP action.
I could go on forever about the intelligent design of Atlas, but I won’t. Instead, I want to highlight what I think is awesome about the game. Atlas is a game that at first, seems very simple and unexciting. However, if you become a true Atlas geek, and start to examine the game closer, you will find that the game is incredibly deep. Let’s take unit dynamics as an example. Every unit has a certain way that they interact with each other. Units have different range, different movement speed and different damages. A wisp might be weak in straight up combat, but their mobility allows them to quickly aid an ally. Raptors are weaker than most units straight up, but combined with Vela’s basic ability, they can outrange their opponents. As you add units to your army, your capabilities become different and the dynamics between armies become increasingly complex. As a player, how do you reconcile the capabilities of your army with your objectives, your adversaries and your teammates? Where should you position your troops, should you posture aggressively, or defensively?
Add the deckbuilding element, every player has their own decks, that will determine their potential armies, within the deck, their army can undergo transformations that will yield different capabilities and require different counters from the opponents. Multiply all these elements by three. Now you have three highly adaptable armies facing off against another team. How do we procure additional resources? How to we position ourselves to make the most out of our armies? How do we continually adapt our armies to create new challenges for the opposing team? How do we ensure that we have the right response to the enemy armies?
I feel like players will often fall into the trap of either being new and not having the time to appreciate these aspects, or being too familiar and take the aspects for granted, as it comes naturally. Hopefully reading this will encourage people to dive into the game and try to figure it out more. Atlas is a competitive game, so I think the game experience will improve as a result of a growing active playerbase.
I think the game achieves almost all of the design goals laid out in Day9’s AMA. As for my own criticisms, I currently don’t have any. There is some concern over the snowbally aspect of the game, however, I think a lot of it can be attributed to the fact that the team that wins in the opening stages tend to be the higher skilled team, and hence are able to maintain and improve on the lead throughout the game.
As a conclusion, I would like to encourage people to also keep talking about the game, keep asking the older players questions about whatever you’re curious about and hopefully we can give good answers that will succeed in maintaining your interest in the game.
Comments
Hey, I think that your post highlights a lot of great factors of the game. Many of these thoughts match my own and from the rather limited experience I have so far I believe the game - in a well-balanced state - will be incredibly deep.
As you say, my own slight disappointment with the game mainly rises from different expectations. Previous game development blogs made it sound like the game would be leaning towards the RTS genre. And I remember a lot of talks about creative solutions to oldschool RTS problems, like creating comeback potential. Atlas achieves a lot of its design goals, but I fear it does not do so by remaining an RTS game. Many of the solutions are copy-pastes from MobAs like the whole laning setup of maps to prevent steamrolling after winning a single combat, like neutral camps to create a bit of tactical tension, like heroes and ultimate abilities to create a focus on a single army and big moments, like lane-towers to prevent rushing, like forcing a teamgame which forces movement and action. All of that can be and in many cases are trademarks of great multiplayer (esport) games. But I personally get the bitter aftertaste that after years of searching for solutions to common RTS problems the team just settled on the same recipes everyone else is using and has thus created a game that is only as much RTS as any other MobA out there. Again, it is probably a problem with expectations and I have enjoyed DotA quite a lot in my life, so I can totally see myself getting into Atlas.
Also I would be very happy if you could link me that AMA, always love clever insights on gamedesign.
While I agree that they have diverged from the traditional RTS by a lot, I think that to a certain extent it was inevitable given the criteria that they had set for themselves. For example, they want the game to be able to be played at a "competent" level, having only 20-50 APM. They want the game to be accessible to newer players. This is really irreconcilable with a base-building RTS where the order of build-up has huge impacts on your capabilities. In a game like SC2, up until high master, 80-99% of your improvement is going to come from improving your macro. While there are many tools you can use to win from brilliant tactics, there are an equal amount of situations where your micro didn't even matter, because you didn't have enough stuff compared to your opponent. These are just one or two of the criteria or restrictions laid out, there are many more like game length, comeback potential, 3v3, etc. I ended up accepting their design decisions as I couldn't really imagine a way that they could meet the criteria using a traditional RTS model.
Yes and this is actually not so much what I am critizising. I think there could have been solutions if keeping a minimum amount of basebuilding had been desired but on a strategical level this would probably turn out similar to clicking some upgrades in existing buildings. Though I guess it would give a little bit of nice feel if instead of upgrades you had some visually developing township and maybe even open up one or two interactive gameplay elements like building harassment. But basebuilding is not so much of the essence for me to begin with. The biggest deal for me is simply that it feels like a MobA due to how all the solutions to the RTS-problems you are talking about were chosen.
Anyways, I don't want to spread negativity. I really love parts of the game and I have high hopes that with additional content like extra units and heroes for the existing colors and maybe fleshing out the one or other detail the game can become something I heavily enjoy digging into deeply.
Atlas Feedback II
The Elephant in the Room
Large skill gaps between teams detracts from game quality.
I have tried very hard to think about where Atlas is struggling from a game design perspective. This is one of the reasons that I think makes it hard for Atlas to stick new players and entice them to stay and play regularly. The essence of the issue is that when one of the teams is more skilled than the other, games become one-sided due to the skilled team winning along all the different aspects of the game. They will win trades and proceed to get ahead economically. They will play better strategically, so their lategame will be superior almost regardless of the early game outcome. They will perform synergistic movements better, which will lead to repeated destruction of the losing team's armies. In these situations, the game feels futile.
This issue is inherent to all competitive PvP games. I don't think this is solvable, outside of expanding the playerbase and opening up for playmodes revolving around arranged teams. This will happen in due time. This is not a call to action, or a complaint about the development and\or game. And I am sure that developers are aware of the issue brought up. I'd like to take use this post to describe why Atlas has dealt with this problem much better than many other games.
How this affects Balance
The more I play, the more I think the game is very well balanced. A lot of seemingly imbalanced can often be attributed to differing skill levels. I have gotten closer to this view as a result of seeing all the heroes being capable of having high impact in games. It is very hard to judge the game's balance when players have yet to accrue the knowledge of how to counter various units, and a lot of the units strength comes from misplay. In a future post I'd like to further discuss aspects of balancing such as strategy, counterplay and synergies. In that post I'd also like to pose some questions that will help us, the players, to understand the unit and race design goals so that we can provide better feedback. Currently, I encourage players to think about unit 'identities'. Rather than balance, do the units actually 'feel' like they occupy the niche that they are supposed to?
Thanks for reading!
Atlas Feedback III
Balance Introduction
I want to preface this discussion with a few words of caution. The main purpose of this post is not to critique the game balance of Atlas, rather, it is about explaining upon an elementary understanding of balance, as well as trying to facilitate a discussion which will lead to players becoming more understanding of exactly how game designers wish to balance the game, which will hopefully lead to us being able to provide more constructive feedback. Please keep in mind:
With that in mind, let us proceed on!
Balance Main Part
How do I define the notion of balance within this discussion? I would say that, I do not use a notion of imbalance that means that the imbalance will break the game. Rather, I think we should use a notion of imbalance that roughly means: This unit\colour\hero is excessively strong in this situation. In other words, things are disproportionately strong in certain contexts, or many contexts. Next I want to discuss the different axes in which units exist and how they relate to balance.
I think these are the main aspects that are brought into the game through game design. In addition there are also factors such as how easy units are to play against. Some units are very simple in design, while others have abilities that require an active micro-based response that might not be as intuitive. I think these are related to game knowledge and people just have to realise that some units will impose restraints on certain areas and movements, and that this is part of the game. The question is rather, do these benefits come with appropriate costs, either through resource costs or weaknesses? Nevertheless, misunderstanding the capability of certain units might make one reach the conclusion that they are imbalanced, based on narrow anecdotal evidence fighting that unit in situations that specifically benefit it.
Questions for the Game Designers @Treisk
I don't think there is a right or a wrong answer to these questions. I am super curious about the opinions of the game designers on these matters. I also understand that it is easy to give an answer like "we will go in the direction that feels best for the game, from a gameplay perspective". Even if this is the official stance of the team, it would be awesome to hear about some of the current leanings of the team on these questions.
Thanks for reading!
Wanna pop in here and at least answer these questions really quickly :D
I think it'll be healthy for every faction to have some level of support, it's just a matter of how that support manifests itself. I also think blue will traditionally have the most support-y stuff by their nature. In terms of being dependent/independent, right now blue's lack of independency is simply a matter of content volume. We have a CC-heavy hero and a defensive/healer hero. There's lots of room in blue for there to still be a damagey hero. The important thing for us has been making sure everything has a very clear identity.
We like there to be some counterability, as long as everything has a reasonable answer. For example, Deadeyes are incredible against Purifiers; but if you soak Take Aim with a smaller unit, you offset how devastating that might be. Similarly, things like Plate exist to be a very hard counter (to things like Take Aim or Destructive Prophecy). And as long as that has an answer (thinks like fast-ticking DoTs, Conduits/Wisps, other continuous damage effects), it creates healthy relationships between units.
In some cases, we've lacked healthy answers. In those cases, it's often pretty likely that we have a balance problem where what's meant to be good against something simply is not, or the thing is so good that it overpowers its intended counter. One recent example of this was the Pyrosaur, which was meant to deal with large waves of units well but struggle with larger units. Its damage was so high (because of the Ability Power bug) that nothing really stopped it and it was just a god-lizard.
I think most of our specialized units still need work, but we believe they can exist in a healthy spot in the game. Toxin Alchemists, for example, have a great place in the game as a tank-buster. However, the unit is quite imperfect at this stage. In some of these cases, we also end up missing the mark a little bit in terms of a unit representing its fantasy. A great example of this was the Batterhorn, a massive unit that would show its massive strength by charging into battle and trampling units into walls. And then..... It would just unceremoniously die. So it succeeded in filling its role as an initiator, but failed in being the beefy tank he was meant to be.
You named the Kingpin as an example. The Kingpin is a very high-variance unit that we get very polarized feedback on. Some people think it's way too strong and breaks the game. Others think its reliance on Transports makes it bad, and too feast-or-famine or high-risk when paired with Transports. The thing is, that level of variance is almost our goal. That is to say, the outcomes should have extreme highs and lows. That said, they might be too extreme right now, and that's what we intend to investigate and resolve.
I think we will likely not add any additional colors to the game. Adding new units and heroes routinely is going to be a big part of what keeps our game fresh, and, as far as I know, are fairly even on the agenda. Units may be slightly closer, as we probably want to add some new Mercs to the game fairly soon, but nothing is explicitly planned right now.
I think You made pretty nice points, sir. I agree with almost everything but couple points:
1)20-50 apm is enough to play this game on decent level. While this might be true, with (let's say "special") pathing currently implemented full 3v3 battles are more about pre-positioning and the battle is usually decided by miss-position of one player in the beginning of engage
2) Games are uneven because new players are matched against way more experienced team. This is what happens when the game is new.
3)New colors, heroes, units: At the moment, the balance is broken and while there are some counters, you don't see your opponent's pick until it is too late to change units anyway. Couple very powerful lvl 8 abilities aside, heroes are not doing too much of difference in the big battle anyway and my opinion is that's totally ok!
I've got one more topic to talk about since I decided to write to Your post because it seems to be well structured. And that is COUNTERABILITY. In current state of game, that thing does not exist. With higher tier units build times and costs, once your army is down, there is literally nothing to do. While I understand higher tier units have to be built longer times, there is need for implementing way how to get rid of units you don't want to have in next battle other then feeding them to enemy for no cost.
Hey @Uuuux ! Thanks for replying.
First of all, I don't think 1) or 2) is contradicts or is different from what I've brought up.
3) I think you've been very quick to the conclusion that balance is broken, because personally I generally don't feel it. We might have different definition of balance though. If you build your deck in a way that only have one composition to tend towards, then yeah, there will be stuff you can't deal with. But if you have a deck that can deal with multiple kinds of stuff, then you will at least have a soft counter against everything you face. I think Ultimates are significant, but you can't just throw them out and expect significance. There is a huge difference between an ultimate used well and an ultimate that completely misses, and that's good because there is skill involved.
4) I think we're not really talking about the same thing when we are talking about counterability here. I was more talking about unit counters, regardless of the macro situation. Not about how they are fielded.
About your issue though, I think if the enemy fields a tech unit, and is capitalising on the timing of getting it out, then hell yeah, you're going to have a hard time trying to figure out how to deal with it. That's part of the game. You wouldn't want the enemy to instantly have a counter out when you build a good tech unit.
You're right though, that the game is super punishing lategame. But I think that's awesome! Decisive losses being punishing is equivalent to decisive victories being very rewarding. In the beginning, the stakes aren't that high, and losing a few units is okey. As you more towards the latter parts of the game, it becomes very punishing and volatile. I think that's good, it increases the pressure and makes the game more exciting. This is also what drives the game towards an end.