Most cards in Hearthstone are very simple and can be decribed with a couple of numbers, it shouldn't be very difficult to exist an objective way to measure their strength and be able to balance them properly.
I'm a Physics student and know the power of mathematical models, with just some simple afirmations you're able to make incredible predictions. In 2016 I played a lot of Hearthstone, I even got 1 star away from Legend :( , and on my free time just for fun I made a mathematical model to describe Hearthstone.
Since then I lost intrest on the game, mainly because it costs a lot of money to keep playing and because I hated the balance (I'm looking at you Mysterious Challenger), but in this year I remembered that mathematical model, and I wanted to share it with you all.
But all of the results can be sumarized in those 3 fundamental Equations.
I) Value(V) in Mana of a card with cost (C):
V = 2(C+1)
II) Value(V) in Mana of a minion with attack(A) and Health(H):
V = sqrt(5*A'*H)
where:
A' = A , if A<3
A' = A - (A-3)2 /12 , if 3<A<9
A' = 6 , if 9<A
III) Value (V) in Mana of dealing (n) damage to enemy hero:
V = 12*(ln(12)-ln(12-n))
Let's take the example Antique Healbot, to calculate the strength of a card we can calculate it's efficiency by dividing it's effect value by the value of a card with the same cost:
Antique Healbot :
Cost=5 , V = 2(5+1) = 12
Minion = (3,3) , V = sqrt(5*3*3) = 6,7
Heal(negative damage to heroes) = 8 , V = 12*(ln(20) - ln(12)) = 6,13
Card's effect value = Minion + Heal = 12,83
Efficiency = card's effect value/card's value = 12,83/12 = 107%
With this method we can estimate that the Antique Heal Bot is 107% efficient and therefore a strong card, wich makes sense considering it's strength at the time it was played.
You can try this method with every card in the game an check for yourselfs if it works, if there is an interesting case or a card that the method just doesn't work please let me know, but probaly most edge cases where already been addressed on the article above, so it might be worth taking a look.
What I would like to see is the developers taking an approach similar to what I did, not necessarily the exact same thing, but at least a method that balances the game and makes it fair and fun again, at least on my opinion, I bet there is a lot of people that are happy with the game right now, but I beleve that it could be mutch better.
Love the extensive work you put into this. Very well done!
I'm a math noob, but this seems like something even I could use to check card balance. Will be interesting to use this on future cards and see if the result matches with what we eventually find out while playing the game.
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yea, you can't evaluate the average value of those cards easily, but you can always calculate the value of the card in a specific case, because eventualy all cards change the cards in yout hand, the minions on the board and the hero HP. Thats the power of those equations, because everery card eventualy effect one or more of them.
If you like you can look at the end of the article the is a part that I talk about Game State and I talk about that.
I don't know, but do you think they knew how Dr. Boom was so OP that changed the meta and how bad Purify was?
Either they have subjective idea of card beforehand and then play test them, and some times stuff slips under their radar, or evil Blizzard have perfect control over the game and relase those cards unbalanced on purpose.
"What I would like to see is the developers taking an approach similar to what I did"
What makes you think they didn't? I would be astounded if they didn't have predictive models that they rely on for initial card designs.
Demon hunter does. Take Glaivebound Adept for example, this has an efficiency of 130%. That is quite high when compared to other cards. Priestess of Fury only has an efficiency of 142%, which is reflected by it being a ridiculously good seven drop. However, they decided to print Raging Felscreamer which can make this card a 5 drop. This makes the card have an efficiency of 190% when played on curve with cost reduction. This is an insane amount of value, reflected by the efficiency.
There are other strong cards that each class will have huge value with, Reno for example, but they are most often situational, later game and legendary. The combo I mentioned is very easy to pull off especially with all the card draw DH has. This leads me to think blizzard either doesn’t have these metrics or doesn’t care about them.
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Most cards in Hearthstone are very simple and can be decribed with a couple of numbers, it shouldn't be very difficult to exist an objective way to measure their strength and be able to balance them properly.
I'm a Physics student and know the power of mathematical models, with just some simple afirmations you're able to make incredible predictions. In 2016 I played a lot of Hearthstone, I even got 1 star away from Legend :( , and on my free time just for fun I made a mathematical model to describe Hearthstone.
Since then I lost intrest on the game, mainly because it costs a lot of money to keep playing and because I hated the balance (I'm looking at you Mysterious Challenger), but in this year I remembered that mathematical model, and I wanted to share it with you all.
There is all of the details and demostrantions on this article: https://sites.google.com/view/laws-of-hearthstone/p%C3%A1gina-inicial
But all of the results can be sumarized in those 3 fundamental Equations.
I) Value(V) in Mana of a card with cost (C):
II) Value(V) in Mana of a minion with attack(A) and Health(H):
where:
A' = A , if A<3
A' = A - (A-3)2 /12 , if 3<A<9
A' = 6 , if 9<A
III) Value (V) in Mana of dealing (n) damage to enemy hero:
Let's take the example Antique Healbot, to calculate the strength of a card we can calculate it's efficiency by dividing it's effect value by the value of a card with the same cost:
Antique Healbot :
Cost=5 , V = 2(5+1) = 12
Minion = (3,3) , V = sqrt(5*3*3) = 6,7
Heal(negative damage to heroes) = 8 , V = 12*(ln(20) - ln(12)) = 6,13
Card's effect value = Minion + Heal = 12,83
Efficiency = card's effect value/card's value = 12,83/12 = 107%
With this method we can estimate that the Antique Heal Bot is 107% efficient and therefore a strong card, wich makes sense considering it's strength at the time it was played.
You can try this method with every card in the game an check for yourselfs if it works, if there is an interesting case or a card that the method just doesn't work please let me know, but probaly most edge cases where already been addressed on the article above, so it might be worth taking a look.
What I would like to see is the developers taking an approach similar to what I did, not necessarily the exact same thing, but at least a method that balances the game and makes it fair and fun again, at least on my opinion, I bet there is a lot of people that are happy with the game right now, but I beleve that it could be mutch better.
Love the extensive work you put into this. Very well done!
I'm a math noob, but this seems like something even I could use to check card balance. Will be interesting to use this on future cards and see if the result matches with what we eventually find out while playing the game.
If you see a bad post on the forum use the report function under it, so I or someone else of the moderation team can take care of it!
Reno would hit the ceiling with this formula.
Even more!!!!
Because the formula asumes that the hero is at 12HP, the value of using Reno at low HP is even higher.
for example: Reno at 5HP
V = 12(ln(30)-ln(5)) = 21Mana
if represents reality tends to you to judge, but a Reno at 5HP is indeed a game changer
And Reno is weaker than Zilliax or Zephrys which we can't properly evaluate.
Nice, gonna try it on shudderwock
yea, you can't evaluate the average value of those cards easily, but you can always calculate the value of the card in a specific case, because eventualy all cards change the cards in yout hand, the minions on the board and the hero HP. Thats the power of those equations, because everery card eventualy effect one or more of them.
If you like you can look at the end of the article the is a part that I talk about Game State and I talk about that.
"What I would like to see is the developers taking an approach similar to what I did"
What makes you think they didn't? I would be astounded if they didn't have predictive models that they rely on for initial card designs.
I don't know, but do you think they knew how Dr. Boom was so OP that changed the meta and how bad Purify was?
Either they have subjective idea of card beforehand and then play test them, and some times stuff slips under their radar, or evil Blizzard have perfect control over the game and relase those cards unbalanced on purpose.
Pick your poison.
Demon hunter does. Take Glaivebound Adept for example, this has an efficiency of 130%. That is quite high when compared to other cards. Priestess of Fury only has an efficiency of 142%, which is reflected by it being a ridiculously good seven drop. However, they decided to print Raging Felscreamer which can make this card a 5 drop. This makes the card have an efficiency of 190% when played on curve with cost reduction. This is an insane amount of value, reflected by the efficiency.
There are other strong cards that each class will have huge value with, Reno for example, but they are most often situational, later game and legendary. The combo I mentioned is very easy to pull off especially with all the card draw DH has. This leads me to think blizzard either doesn’t have these metrics or doesn’t care about them.