How To: Making better balance posts

I see a lot of poorly constructed balance posts so I thought instead of moaning about it like I usuall do i'd try and offer some guidelines to making what I feel would be considered a constructive balance post.



Making a constructive balance post.


You need to understand from the off that what you're posting isnt going to be popular.

To mitigate this I recommend the following.


1) Do your research.
-Dont just paste the text of the ability out of wowhead and scream "nerf!"
-Try to see it from that classes point of view as a whole, not just from your own personal perspective.
-Try to articulate that you understand the ability as a whole and the effect it has on all classes and matchups.
-Remember that there is more than one talent tree spec out there and non talent changes will affect them all but perhaps not equally.
-If you are looking at something which is devastating against your class but you can see why it might be needed vs other classes, say so. This illustrates a thinking poster and this is a good thing.

2) Provide examples of what you're discussing
-Dont use extreme examples, aim middle of the road. Extreme examples are tempting, however they dont help illustrate "typical" situations which people face.
-The more examples the better.
-Cross class ability comparisons are generally a poor route to take since taking abilities in isolation doenst examine the class synergy as a whole.
-Examples of how you've tried to counter given abilities are also good.

3) Post a suggestion
-There's no point in complaining about something if you're not prepared to make a suggestion on how to fix it.
-In your post consider the wider ramifications of your suggestion across all aspects of the game.
-Acknowledge that your suggestion may cause issues if these are present.
-Post the outcomes you can envisage from your suggested change

4) Try to avoid using emotive lanugage and tone
-Avoid game unrelated acronyms and memes as much as possible.
-spell check your post, there are abnough online available and it adds credibility.
-Block caps are also a bad idea.


As an example of one I see regularly would be this:


Bad:

Q u o t e:
Crippling poison 70% snare! ZOMG so unfair unstaobble. nerf to leik 40%!!11

Good:

Q u o t e:
Crippling poison feels too strong at a 70% snare with the other various tools a rogue has at his/her disposal.

However given that rogues have a number of positional attacks I can see why it is needed somehow for rogues to have the best snare in the game; so to this end I would suggest dropping the snare x% and adding an x% boost to a deep assassination talent. This way positional builds are not adversely affected whilst at the same time toning down the snare capabilities of non-positional builds. I cant see any PvE ramifications to this change

Many of these can be applied to buff suggestion posts as well.



Really the most important thing is to actually consider the ability as a whole in the game setting, not just in the isolated situation where its affecting you. If people can see that you're thinking beyong the little picture then they ought to appreciate your ideas more as clearly you've thought about it and its ramifications.

Hopefully this helps improve the quality of posts we see here, thanks for your time.

/zips up flame suit.