Rock, Paper, Scissors Design in Strategy Games

In this video, we discuss rock, paper, scissors design, what it is, and why it has been adapted as the main system in which we balance units and other things in our strategy games. We look at games like Total War Warhammer, Civilization, and others.

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Music:
Asrial - Comet Of A Legend
“Comet Of A Legend (house)” by Asrial is licensed under a Creative Commons License.
The audio was cut and merged to fulfill video length, other than that it was not edited in any way.

[WayOfHaQodesh]

Thanks for the breakdown. I'm very interested in seeing more detailed breakdowns of how such systems are developed and how such tiered systems work mechanically to balance the game.

[GameDesignThinking]

Great approach to the rock-paper-scissors system. I think it's the first time that I see the system expanded adding counters and tiers. Amazing video as always!

[aronjaeger]

it's a great way to understand the mechanics in a simple way

[sooooooooDark]

also important to note: it doesnt have to be both ways
usually rock beats scissors and vice versa, but it doesnt have to be
for example in pokemon's element type system (which in essence is rock papers scissors) water is not effective against water, whereas in the case of ghost type: ghost is super effective against itself - being the defender or attacker determines the effectiveness respectively

[JachymorDota]

The tiered RPS approach is very smart and I never really thought about it, but it actually makes sense. Thanks for that.

Seven Kingdoms had an interesting approach, where all Human factions had basic infantry, one researchable elite unit and siege later on. The infantry was largely the Same, with some getting bows with sufficient levels. I think economy was much more important there so You could field more units than the enemy.

[WintermuteDigital]

super interesting analysis! I've never thought about counters this way and I think this was a really insightful and excellently produced video. I look forward to seeing the rest of your content.

[crito]

I actually hate rock, paper, scissors design in strategy games. It makes the gameplay feel like a dog trying to bite its own tail.

[pelicano]

Just found out recently your channel, and I'm really liking the videos. Quick, concise, to-the-point, about broad aspects. Later on you may want to delve deeper into each mechanic. RPS is a great way to start to balance a combat system. Fire Emblem until recently used the Weapon Triangle (RPS but Sword-> Axe -> Lance -> Sword), but allowed for a "Lancebreaker" sword that excels against lances, instead of being defeated by them. The Melee/Ranged/Cavalry is also a good analysis, and we see that in Civ 6 with melee units being better against anti-cavalry units. And there's also the idea of a hard counter or a soft counter. How hard does the rock break the scissors? And how paper deals with paper? Is it the "default" value, or it nullifies the strategy altogether (fighting fire with fire)?

You're making great videos, keep it up.

[LordGame]

Interesting that you choose to focus on Warhammer 2 for a discussion about the importance of a balanced army composition, given its current state.
The game basically requires one to spam the most powerful units if they wish to succeed at higher campaign difficulties.

[iestudios]

Oh god I need to play total war again!! Great video!

[vicwaberub]

"Rock, Paper, Scissors" are the base values, but real strategy is based on PoI, PoA, PoD, ZoC, unit morale (and not hitpoints!!), reserves, support, movement and tactical maneuvers like surprising, flanking and concentration... - and there is much more!
There are only a few games based on that.

[MrCostantinho]

Nice analysis, I'd like to see it applied to turn-based fights in rpg. I'm "playing" with the idea of designing one, but I'm a bit stuck on how to design the combat system

[MasterKnightDH]

RPS is useful, but should be used as a tool rather than a straight up crutch. I can cite Battalion Wars as a good example, where the basic RPS triangle of Tank beats Grunt, Grunt beats Bazooka, Bazooka beats Tank can actually be subverted by both the Tank AND the Bazooka, but this works because the Tank's role is to survive for extended periods in a hotzone, while the Bazooka, the anti-armor option, promises reward for skill that entirely shows. Battalion Wars even shows that unit traits help with the make-up of unit variety, most notably with the Flame Vets who actually can work in that same RPS triangle in the Grunt's position, but with the distinction of close range rapid hitting to zone infantry instead of chipping them like the Grunt does.

I think what BW does there is a sound general approach: avoid gimping armor units unnecessarily, mostly making the maintenance the gameplay to make sure that the player makes the defensive power instead of the other way around; and make the anti-armor rewarding enough to foster risk assessment. We do want to make sure the resulting gameplay becomes coherent, after all, because that is what encourages creativity.

[stevenmcqueen]

And there is age of divinity, cc lock until you win lol. Also rock paper scissors in itself is fine I think. It allows a lot more people to quickly and easily understand the basics of a game inviting more people to try it. Like fire emblem heroes on mobile (dubbed down version of normal fire emblem) is just a completely basic version of rock paper scissors for the most part, red beats green, green beats blue and blue beats red weapon types.

That all being said, having something go a little more in depth, certain counters and such is also important to reward players that take a more avid interest in the game and allow for better planning but shouldn't really be necessary to play/enjoy the game imo.

[RapThorX]

Is there a game that uses the „chess“ System? And i dont mean like a copy or something lile animated chess with different pieces. But like an Rts that uses the rock paper scissors system but with chess

[adams]

I am confused by what you are referring to when you say "Rock paper scissors balancing." Are you referring to what's also known as hard counters, where a unit will be massively outmatched by the unit that is good against it, instead of only a little? Cause I could see that working with many units as well, the various categories of them would simply be less good against their targets and less bad against their counters. Or are you referring to each unit having different abilities and attacks? Like Dawn of War an rts, where units have a melee and ranged attack? Thing is Dawn of War has most units be barely able to scratch its vehicles even with the multiple attack types. Is that hard counter or is it not? Calling it "medium" seems too simplistic, because it isn't in the middle on everything; instead it has two aspects that are opposing one another.
As for alternatives, I don't see how you could have any sort of alternative to "unit A is better in some way than unit b, which is better in some way to unit c" etc. Otherwise the units would all be the same, since any change in stats is going to cause some unit to be better than another. And then it's basically a die roll as to who wins. Not very exciting. In short I wonder if the terme RPS is too generic and refers to several different things, in turn, making it more hassle than it is worth.

[Levantez]

I'm developing a strategy game and I actually made a research in to this.

Personally, I deemed it to be stupid.



Example of games that do this well are ones that do it "mechanically" like Royal Clash.
Area Damage => Horde => Powerful Singular Attack => Area Damage.
because you can sort of "instinctively" understand why one is stronger than the others.



In case of most Japanese Games, they're simply there because they can't provide the mechanic in their Game Design, and have to do it via "Pseudo relationships" instead.

For example,

In Chinese astrology,
Earth => Water
due to the property of Solid being able to trap liquid.

But in Pokemon, it's Water => Land, Rock, or whatever you want to call it.

In most strategy Game
Spear => Cavalry
but the Weapon triangle override it in Fire Emblem.

There are historical studies of how Polish Hussars can beat Pike because their Lances are longer.
And in The Battle of Cynoscephalae, Roman Gladius defeated Macedonian Sarissa due to Physical circumstances.

So, due to the discrepancies,
Players have to remember how Pseudo relationships work for each game.
Which is just way too counter intuitive.

[lateralus]

CRT; what do you think of the 'Perfect Imbalance' design concept as described by Extra Credits in his YouTube video?

[christiandelao]

Idk if total war is a good example of rock paper scissors system, there's too many factors involved in deciding combat, I think fire emblem is a better example, swords are weak against spears witch are weak against axes witch are weak against swords, rock paper scissors, it's simple but also consistent, paper shouldn't beat rock

[jmortier]

im sorry bro, rock paper scissors is lazy balancing.... its why fire emblem < FFT