Power Creep - The Trouble with Expansions and Time - Extra Credits

[@andybarrett2455]

Skip to 8 years since this upload and League is now a prime example of how power-creep can make games feel terrible.

[@chaoslord914]

yeah this video has aged kinda bad

[@scootza1]

"This card is immune to the effects of cards from previous sets" Sound like YuGiOh

[@matthewsonguad3313]

+Chris Farmer majesters to be exact

[@Ricky-zc8qm]

+KnightThunder05 Xyz is how you play Yugioh. Yugiohs before Xyz and Yugioh after Xyz are two completely different games.

[@Ricky-zc8qm]

KnightThunder05 The mere existence of Xyz didn't ruin Synchros. Although Synchros probably did ruin Fusions until Fusions got REAL support. Point is Xyz's are an add on to the game. It adds more thought process, for example: Your opponent has 3 level 4 monsters, you have set traps and 700 LP, you know cowboy exists so you have to play around that using your head. You're always going to lose to new decks before they get their ban lists but newer mechanics have always made the game better, Synchros made the game better, Xyz's made the game better, and soon will Pendulums once enough cards come out to add creativity to them.

[@scootza1]

Konami spends more time on the ban lists then they do their PR. Fucking idiots.

[@tafadzwa_8585]

+KnightThunder05 I know I have a fucking babaroid the ultimate war machine with 4000 atk points but your baby tryagon with 500 atk points is xyz so you win its fucking dumb

[@jacksonbowns1087]

Power creep is actually what drove me out of Yugioh, after more than a decade of collecting and spending. I had already been slowly losing interest in the game, and once I found out my Six Samurai deck- that I had been trying to make since the original Six Samurai archetype had come out- was completely gutted by the new ban-list, and that Pendulum summoning had become a thing, I was out. In a twist of fate, I ended up going to MTG, a game I had scoffed at since I hadn't played it till then. I have to say that, even though my collecting has slowed dramatically, I don't regret getting those Magic cards as much as I do my Yugioh cards now.

[@ufukcangencoglu2279]

Except Pendulums have nothing to do with the power creep.

[@christianrasmussen1]

Damn. That sucks. Glad you found MTG.

[@vogelfaenger6830]

I had a similar way to mtg

[@Liliana_the_ghost_cat]

Pendulum summoning overhated. It didn't even see play when it came out witch accutualy makes synchro, xyz and link summoning far more problematic on that regard. The meta around that time was far more diverse in terms of summoning methods than the synchro, xyz and master rule 4 era. Pendulums were far from mandatory and the first pendulum deck to see play didn't see play because of pendulum summoning at all. It was because of it's insane stun and it took a whole year for pendulum summoning to accutualy be broken. And even then, pepe only lasted a few weeks... the remaining is pretty accutrate tough. I can't deny that part

[@Phlebas]

I couldn't agree more regarding "incomparables". I feel like that's the way any decent RPG (MMO or single player) should do equipment management. I like the idea of finding an item that has unique abilities, encouraging a new style of gameplay and which isn't going to suddenly become obsolete once my character levels up. The Baldur's Gate series did this well (okay, D&D 3rd Edition Rules did this well). Yes, you find better items the further you progress in a game, but a basic longsword is still just as viable in late game (against some enemies, anyway) as it was at the beginning. Rather than comparing damage between weapons, there was more of a focus on other magical properties that worked its way into general strategy.

[@cupriferouscatalyst3708]

+Phlebas i agree with this, and its why i usually prefer games with power-ups instead of number-based items and upgrades. to some extent, permadeath and item loss creates this effect, even though it might not be the best example. in any game where ive been able to lose my weapon permanently ive been much more thankful for the old weapons that may be weaker, but also more readily obtainable. its not the best way to do it, but it kinda works.

[@sophiejones7727]

Interesting that you bring up D&D because there is something about that game which I wish was incorporated into more MMORPGs. That is: your stats are not all tied to your character's equipment. That basic longsword is still effective at high level in D&D because your character has the feats to use it more effectively (such as "improved critical" or "mounted combat"). Even an extra point in Strength, say, causes an enormous difference in how well a character can use a weapon. The power creep is still there: but the character's innate power creeps up along with the weapon. Thus the power creep is equalized out. This neither addressed the issue of outmoded content, nor the issue of veteran players interacting with new players though. Outmoded content can be addressed in a variety of ways: a transmogrification system, or a scaling system. If players like the appearance of old equipment sets they will seek them out. If a scaling system can be implemented well, it would simply make all content completable at any point in the game: stopping power creep in it's tracks. The PvP issue seems a bit more difficult: and it may ultimately be necessary for the game to use different mechanics for PvE and PvP.

[@ZanathKariashi]

Actually if the game was properly adapted ANY weapon could be potentially useful, class depending. The 2nd edition high level rules caused warrior classes to begin to automatically ignore hit requirements above a certain level with any weapon, leaving only material requirements the same (though most of those only applied to non-magical weapons anyway such as needing Silver OR +1 to damage Werewolves.) And some kits like the Kensai (with their single weapon of choice in PnP that all class features required the use of) and Wizard Slayer (who couldn't use magical items at all in PnP) could do so innately at lower levels as special features of the class. Most spells meaningfully capped at around level 10 and largely stopped increasing effect based on level and instead simply gained static effects with specific niche uses. Characters also generally plateued around 10 ish, with most classes except casters only gaining a few new abilities and casters being constrained by the increasingly harsh penalties higher level spells had that made sticking to the 1-4 spells your bread and butter, with 5th+ being either niche spells or spells of last resort. BG actually suffers from extreme power creep due to how poorly implemented due to time constraints everything in BG2 onwards is. BG1 outside of a few poor adaption choices is actually solid and a good representation of non-creep (it was also designed to be more true to the setting in terms of powerlevel, which was completely abandoned in the sequel in favor of immersion breaking gamey mechanics and handholdings. In 2nd edition a 1-5 party is strong enough to beat content that in 3rd edition would be considered epic level stuff because the actual power scale is relatively finite and front loaded. The majority of your power comes very early on. Higher level simply means growing wider with additional options but the actual direct power barely moves and is simply mostly about strategy and smart use of resources. BG2 though... Kits were overpowered through the roof, +3 and above gear which is supposed to be extremely rare due to how it's made spilling out of every corner, while +1 and +2 have become vendor trash outside of a handful of specific exceptions. Several spells being ludicrously overpowered compared to what they should do, with every mitigating factor in the game removed due to poorly adapted spells, and pretty much everything related to Throne of Bhaal being a poorly adapted mess of bizarre decisions, programming errors, and just lots of rushed content to try and slap an ending on the game before their 2nd edition license expired.

[@gadellomagnollo1810]

Man I miss 2e@@ZanathKariashi

[@ManniGaming]

Brilliant summary of everything I'm frustrated about at the moment!

[@ritaprasad9248]

Manni-Gaming WR is going that way too.

[@justin9202]

Everyone: power creep is bad for longevity and will destroy a game. Yu-Gi-Oh: hold my beer

[@Liliana_the_ghost_cat]

Yeah... let's not even talk about master rule 4

[@mr_inconspicuous]

I got here from a Helldivers 2 subreddit and it's still the same fuss. Really well said even before the online era of gaming really took off.

[@Apex_Slide]

I started playing SW:ToR about 4 years ago now, and I quit shortly after the Hutt Cartel expansion was released and I level-capped at 55 with most of my toons. I do remember, and still have to this day, that Obroan War Leader PVP gear was the best gear available at the time for Jedi Knight's, and boy did I grind Ranked games until I got that full set. I went back to it a few weeks ago, just to see if my laptop could run it, after 2 extra expansions had been released, only to see that my beloved War Leader gear was all but obsolete, and had been removed from the PVP Vendor, my time-consumed and well-thought-out skill trees and abilities for both world bossing/raiding and PVP were completely removed, and new ones in their place. I instantly lost motivation to play again, and actually decided to sell my credits and rare colour crystals to a RWT site, because I was just that sad at the change. Sure, if I actually started playing again, I could easily reach that new pinnacle of power, but the fact I grinded for hours on end just to get the best gear, only for it to be shattered by an obvious power spike, lost it for me

[@Thenextworldwar]

Kinda surprised you guys didn't talk about Yu-Gi-Oh! Power creep is like punctuated equilibrium. You have long periods with little happening, and then a few sets that ramp the power up by such a huge margin that it bluntly crushes older cards out of playability. Invasion of Chaos, Cybernetic Revolution, Phantom Darkness, Duelist Revolution, Order of Chaos to some extent, Lord of the Tachyon Galaxy, and now we have The New Challengers.

[@davidburnett3614]

Right? The power creep has really started to turn me off if YuGiOh. I've spent so much money on it and if Konami doesn't do something about it I might quit. It's just becoming a bigger and bigger money sink.

[@RichardDuryea]

I've encountered the same issue. I would spend so much time and money on a deck only for it to be outdated in a few months. And now they just introduced a new type of summoning, changing the field of play all for the sake of being able to put a bunch of powerful monsters on the field without having to work for them. It's gotten out of hand.

[@KamisamanoOtaku]

One of the reasons I've basically given up on Yu-Gi-Oh is that not only does it have power creep, but it seems like instead of getting the core mechanics all nice and balanced, they just slap on a new gimmick. Fusions and Rituals were garbage for so long then suddenly they got support to help them compete with the (admittedly) overpowered cards that made up the metagame... and then they got support that ended up being a bit too good so you'd get things like a Demise OTK, forcing the support that was good to get Forbidden or Limited, which would curb the problem deck but tended to erase the progress said mechanic had made... ...and then they'd release something that was a bizarre rehash, like Synchro Summons, XYZ summons, etc.

[@UBEChief117]

Let's not forget about Pokemon, too. The newer cards have gotten so powerful to the point that -EX cards can be played as "Basic Pokemon" despite several of them being 1st or even 2nd evolutions. They've also made old cards obsolete in the fact that they're not even tournament-legal anymore. The 700-odd pokemon cards I've gathered up since the first Starter Deck are, for the most part, worthless. the only cards I would even think are still viable in current decks, are the Basic Energy Cards.

[@KamisamanoOtaku]

UBE_Chief I didn't forget; I just talked about it as part of a separate comment chain under this video. ;) You bring up some valid concerns but first there are some areas where we disagree and I'd like to address them. I suggest not assuming that TCG cards are evergreen; this is one of Yu-Gi-Oh's *mistakes*. A good game requires almost constant re-balancing as time goes by which is why set rotation is a "thing". It took almost 10 years for the oldest cards to become almost totally worthless for "Unlimited" play, because too many broken combos between "new" and "old" emerged. That is actually pretty good, and thanks to set rotation this isn't plaguing tournament level play. Those of us that still enjoy playing with our old cards simply need to use the rules (and Modified Formats) from years past to enjoy them, or create our own. This is no worse than and sometimes better than what you could hope for with some video games in terms of "backwards" support. This game year (so starting in the fall of 2014) Pokémon finally added a second constructed format, Expanded. This is like Magic's Extended Format, though as Pokémon (regrettably) doesn't do standardized set blocks, it isn't as well defined. Right now it basically means the entire last generation of cards are still legal and high level, two-day events have the second day use Expanded while the first sticks to Standard. Some older cards are still around. Switch just got reprinted as a gold border "secret rare" (and not long before that, yet again as a regular ol' Common). It has had the same effect the whole time so all copies in your local language are legal for Organized Play. Double Colorless Energy (also released originally in the Base Set) is still legal. There are a few other examples. Also not all older cards are weaker. Trainers from before Neo Genesis (about 2000) are often *stronger* than modern cards. The reason Unlimited is not worth playing is because certain older cards comboed to create a "first turn win" deck. In games that use set rotation, the "safe to keep" cards are usually reprinted, with older printings remaining legal unless there was a significant errata implemented with the newest version. If it is a minor errata, the older versions are legal so long as you have at least one newer one outside of your deck for reference. As for game balance, yes Pokémon-EX are not the problem *but* many Pokémon-EX cause problems. The entire game has suffered from power creep and pacing being speed up to kind of dumb levels. The Pokémon-EX mechanic used to seem reserved for Legendaries, which seemed like a solid idea; get something that is supposed to be insanely powerful in the video games at the power level which it ought to have *but* it would give up two Prizes instead of one. Perhaps partially to accommodate Mega Evolutions into the TCG, they started releasing "regular" Pokémon as Pokémon-EX, including turning Evolutions into Basic Pokémon. Part of the issue is that the TCG is stuck trying to match the video games, and the video game designers are going in a troublesome direction. Still, the big issue is again "pacing" and "balance". While having periods where one of the "Types" is better than another is fine, it is the difference between the least and greatest that is troubling. Same for the Stages of Evolution; we've had formats where Basics were awesome and Evolutions were awful, formats where Evolutions were awesome and Basics were awful, and even different pairings so that maybe Stage 1s were dominant and the others suffered, or Stage 1s were ignored while the other two were dominant, etc. The short version (since this is so long) is that the designers (whether by their own will or executive fiat) seem to release a lot of "filler" and instead of designing all Pokémon to fill a niche there is a lot of "filler". Instead of an Evolving Basic Pokémon and Evolving Stage 1 filling a purpose, the entire thrust of getting the Evolution line played rests on the Stage 2 (with a few exceptions). Combine this with non-Evolving Pokémon being designed to be "too fast" and it causes problems; things like big, Basic Pokémon-EX really shouldn't have good, damaging attacks they can power-up before Stage 1 Pokémon hit the field, let alone Stage 2. And yet they do, which is why there is no time to Evolve. There are more specific issues but... this is a massive enough post. *TL;DR:* Yes the Pokémon TCG has some serious issues; I mentioned it in another post. Some of what you say is true, but there is a lot you don't seem familiar with. It is also good to not only know "what" is wrong but the "why" and/or "how".

[@dinobro5242]

I've noticed this problem in a mobile game I play called Jurassic World the game, the tier of creatures labeled "rare" are the ones I'm going to reference here. The carnivores had about 400 health and 150-200 attack. Then an update came adding in 2 new carnivores, ophiacodon with about 400 health and about 280 attack and monolophosaurus with about 700 health and 220 attack.

[@adventuresvdo9434]

I like how Scott's style here is simple yet expressive!

[@sonicrulez6916]

Who knew that Scott would eventually become a mainstay of the EC team?

[@BiggsBababooey]

Kind of amusing because now League of Legends has Mobility Creep instead of Power Creep.

[@deamon6681]

+Michael Concha And the skills can do so much more than just one thing. First it hits and after a short delay you recive the second half of the damage. and if it you 3 times in a short period of time, it deals bonus percentage-of-the-target's-max-health damage and restets the autoattack timer.

[@Steeks]

+Michael Concha Even then some of the older champions are still the most powerful. Morgana lux brand and malzahar all crank really high winrates for the midlane, despite getting out-mobilitycreeped.

[@BiggsBababooey]

Steekstar I said mobility creep not power creep, I never said old ones were worse, just that with every iteration the game becomes more and more flooded with high mobility options

[@TheAlfredo094]

+Michael Concha That doesn't make the immobile champions bad, though.

[@BiggsBababooey]

Alfredo Z. I never said that, like ever.

[@rogerwilco2]

I still don't understand why City of Heroes wasn't more popular. Every video I watch on this channel confirms to me that they did things right. They had no power creep in 8 years, building almost exclusively incomparable heroes and powers and abilities. I still consider it the greatest game ever.

[@Diraphe]

I agree; I loved that game and find myself missing it frequently. It didn't matter how long I had been away. I could jump right back in and have fun; even with a new character. Unlike say; Final Fantasy 11 which had horrible power creep. I tried to get back into it several times but always gave up frustrated.

[@DracoTheBlack]

Diraphe Realy? I did a quick search of the comments for FFXI to express the opposite sentiment. Part of the reason I played as long as I did is because, at least at the time, they did a good job of not obsoleting the content. For example, even after the release of the 3rd expansion, content from the first expansion was still actively played because people still wanted gear from it. Even with the shiny new items from the 3rd expansion some of the items from the first were still the "best" or at least still desirable.Of course it wasn't perfect and SE has since decided to flush their history of side grade expansions down the drain but for many years I thought they did rather well, better than other games like WoW at the very least.

[@dlfon99]

OH MY GOSH. I am such a big Retro Studios fan, and I am very happy for Allison (and hope to someday work at Retro too!).

[@supercow782]

I like your use of Magic as an example. Not only is it a great game, but for having existed for now 20 years, it has kept power creep very much in check.

[@BlackKyurem5]

Pokemon does this well too, IMO. Every new generation Pokemon have been receiving pretty powerful moves and ability combos BUT. The Old Pokemon get changed around a bit so they aren't worthless, from Abilities in Gen 3, Hidden Abilities in Gen 5 (though some are WAY TOO OP) and in Gen 6 we have Mega Evolution.

[@janamohr448]

BlackKyurem5 Other than Blaziken, none of the gen 5 HAs were OP

[@BlackKyurem5]

Compared to the original abilities, some are rather OP.

[@janamohr448]

BlackKyurem5 They are better, yes, but by no means overpowered.

[@BlackKyurem5]

I guess so, though Gail Wing Talonflame is some BS.

[@janamohr448]

Thats a gen 4 one and its easily dealt with by sneaky pebbles and/or E Speed

[@zachwhaley208]

Amazing video. Aspiring game designer here, just entering my initial play-testing and I am so happy I have come across these videos. Wow. This is some of the best design content I've seen yet, and I've been seeking out a lot. Great job!

[@isy5984]

Watching old videos is nice but... When they mention something like "League of Legends has managed to avoid powercreep". Sadly that is no longer true.

[@fatilumkins8730]

Crazy how far the animation skill has come for this channel

[@bobbobson7262]

COUGH COUGH forgot to mention TF2, solid gameplay since 07, best weapons + maps from original release, new weapons aren't better than new ones, power creep could possible never happen to this game COUGH

[@grubermeister6139]

I felt this had to be mentioned too. While some weapons are more or less better than others, Valve is very careful to make sure that new weapons open up new strategies and playstyles rather than simply being better than previous weapons. In fact, the stock weapons are still my most used weapons simply because they're solid choices for just about any situation.

[@dylanconnolly57]

I definitely agree. Design-wise, all of the weapons are fantastic because there are literally no direct upgrades to anything, there are side grades that have different pros and con's, and require different strategies. Spy is the best example of this, the alternatives to the invis-watch are the cloak and dagger, and the dead ringer. Both of them last for a shorter amount of time, so in the end, invis-watch is the "best", but the cloak and dagger can recharge while you're wearing it, letting you stay invisible indefinitely as long as you stand still. And then the dead ringer lets you fake your own death, which makes it much easier to disappear without anyone looking for you.

[@Haagaustin]

Is extra credits in bed with certain companies? It would explain why they mention LOL, but not a TF2, because TF2 is owned by Valve, owner of Dota 2. Coincidence? I think NOT!

[@oliverdevega]

Overwatch copied that good thing of TF2 too *cough-cough* :P

[@JK-zd3md]

take that sandvich out of your mouth while talking, sounds like some is going down the wrong pipe

[@PEDzzUK]

Been looking for this video for a while. Thanks EC :)

[@abyss3525]

This problem occurred in Oblivion before it was patched. The best characters in Oblivion were Level 1s because level 50s were almost completely invincible.

[@101jir]

3:54 absolutely! I was hoping this would come up. Come to think of it, most of my game concepts are based around limiting the numbers AMAP and making it more a minimally numeric pros and cons deal (i.e. trading off AoE for range, when all hits are very dangerous).

[@franciscomartinez-losaerec2532]

4:20 8 years later, powercreep is the dictionary definition of League of Legends.

[@Djhakin]

dissagree

[@franciscomartinez-losaerec2532]

@@Djhakin Yeah, because Sett having a literal ult in his W, Senna having like 4 different passives and Aphelios dealing unfair amounts of damage by spamming right click are all fine. Not to mention Yuumi being an untouchable Soraka and Sylas healing half his healthbar every few seconds. Oh, and the new Morde.

[@jampakdd]

Wow to think no one has really watched this video for 4 years is kinda crazy. Great content guys!

[@BenieTheDragon]

I could imagine the power creep in WoW currently, bigger than the game and all of its expansions.

[@AlexPope1668]

Thanks for the Warstorm/Zynga reference. I was there for that. I was one of those players who was on the fence about quitting, for that exact reason. But I had credits left over from the switchover to Facebook so I just bought some of the new cards and eventually worked my way back into it. If I didn't have those credits, I probably would have thrown in the towel. As it was, it didn't last for too much longer, the reasons for which may well be another discussion for another time. Fascinating reasons though. Cheers, and DFTBA

[@Lionheartwolf135]

I think most if all businesses that produce games are well aware of what "power creep" is, and they know exactly how profitable it is. What variable you forgot to mention in this video is that publishers have no interest in a long term investment for a single game. If power creep consumes a game then a publisher will cut the support for that game and move onto a brand new game where they can start all over. (In some cases even take their consumer base along with them.) There is no limit to how many new but similar games a company can produce, and the most profitable model for them is the one that exists today thanks to the contribution of whales. Although we used to be able to argue that video games are an art we often forget that not all video games are an art, and not all developers are artists. Conversely they are all businesses that know exactly what they need in order to make money. In short, they know what they are doing, and just because it appears to the average gamer that they are hurting themselves they are not. They are really just hurting you because you are way more attached to that single game than they were.

[@petersmythe6462]

One method of dealing with OP items added later on without changing balance is to manipulate levels. For example, if you add an accidentally-too-powerful level 40 item in, you can always buff other items by changing their level downwards.

[@Sforschondetta]

dont forget power creep in comic book universe's

[@mariophreak]

and television

[@ananthusarat]

Good example

[@HJ_Extravaganza]

Schon Fazio Same problem in a lot of Battle manga series, although generally less exaggerated today than it was in the past. Most authors today grew up with the Dragon Ball series, after all, and then try to write around that power creep. Though even with power creep there's possibilities there. A LOT of power creep can be accepted if the author *clearly* alludes to it from the beginning, but simply gates it off in the story in the beginning and instead slowly eases into it, all the while making sure nothing feels like an asspull.

[@ShouldOfStudiedForTheTest]

I am talking to you, Bleach.

[@sergiosegovia8079]

Any Shonen anime: Naruto, bleach, my hero academia... that’s why I can’t watch them 😔

[@GalvasPlay]

Wow coming back to this video after 3 years makes me realize how much the show has changed. I used to watch it on PA. Keep up the awesome work everyone xD

[@rafawillians7712]

Here we are in 2020. And Wizards of the Coast unlearned about it.

[@FunUpGaming]

I have learned more from this channel than I ever learned in school. Keep up the amazing work!

[@StefWillemse]

Runescape is the inventor of Power Creep

[@alconvin2334]

+Stef Willemse but what about HP inflation in Pokemon?

[@conroypearson5819]

That's exactly what I was thinking, power creep killed runescape 3, they just kept creeping up and up to unsastanable levels to the point where there was just way too much dead content in the game, previous milestones like reaching 99 in a skill meant nothing, old bosses meant nothing, and the only way to keep the game fresh was to keep creeping even further for the existing maxed out end game players

[@deadblasterjs]

Wow listen so many companies can learn so much from you. Publish your videos they are gold.

[@fireemblemaddict128]

Power creep is cute. I want a power creep plushie :3

[@chickeninabox]

I have one.

[@speshiled220]

amazing! the visual example of balancing all those different shapes made me emote with glee waaay too loudly.

[@MichaelLinkeMarketing]

Magic the Gathering has been around for over 20 years. This game is simply genius

[@billowen3285]

It's got power creep now :/

[@narutardkyuubi]

This is very good. One way I've noticed devs counter powercreep is by going back to older stuff and upgrading them so they stay competitive. In Fate/GO, older Servants tend to get Strengthening Quests to unlock new skills and NP power ups to stay competitive with newer Servants. Devs also enjoy developing enemies and bosses that can't be beaten with what's big in the meta, but can be trivilized with the right setup and skill.

[@Tortferngatr]

League is interesting, but it seems that from a 2014 perspective, the game is seeing some power creep issues that might have been less obvious back in 2012. The main issue I think of is "incomparables/creep." Namely, making a large number of bruisers that did *everything* (i.e. sustain, damage, utility, mobility) with maybe one or two unique fruits in the bunch typically given to a bruiser (usually ultimates--like Shen's ult, Nocturne's ult, and Olaf's ult, but also sometimes things like Lee Sin's absurd mobility and early game or until recently Elise's early game and powerful damages.) This is actually rather pernicious because it becomes HARDER to make new things interesting (or for that matter unique) WITHOUT resorting to just giving someone a shitload of apples to compensate for the fact that unlike everyone else, they have no oranges in their kit--i.e. traditional power creep. It also means that eventually, the incomparables start to have actual mathematical meaning for a champion, as strengths and weaknesses from incomparables start to override each other. Mid Zyra's absurd lategame damage/utility means nothing if she's gank-weak and Orianna provides lategame damage+utility without being gank-weak. Sona's ult and superior utility means nothing if pre-a-recent-patch support Annie brings stun-primed Tibbers and AoE burst damage to the party. You then have to balance the other classes and new champions around this increased level of "semi-comparable power," making for more "incomparables creep." It leads to situations where the champions people actually pick are the ones who have such EXTREME incomparables that they'll never go *quite* out of fashion unless their weaknesses are too crippling to compensate (like Shen's ult during season 3) or are the incomparable-overloaded champions who are strongest at the time (like Vi.) The designers initially did "incomparables creep/toolset creep" as a way to make melee in League viable. They didn't realize until they reached Volibear (one of the last champs of 2011) how unsustainable that path actually was. They actually ended up having to *keep* overloading new bruisers' kits (so they'd be viable next to all these other bruisers) while slowly pruning away excess power through nerfs and reworks (you might have heard some squabbling on Reddit over some proposed Lee Sin changes). For example, Xin Zhao's rework still left him a "does it all" bruiser, but at least he has a truly incomparable ult (as opposed to literally *nothing* that other bruisers couldn't do either better or worse than he could). DotA 2 arguably does a better job in that it has also kept incomparables creep out of the equation (or so I've heard), at the cost of having little counterplay outside of prevention of an enemy's actions (which it admittedly has in abundance), high arbitrary complexity (a boon if you aren't mentally engaged enough by League, a negative otherwise), and an infamously high burden of knowledge. Whew...so much text...

[@music79075]

What is this large knowledge needed?

[@qwawazellasonyer7183]

Lmao, 2012 talking about how LoL has no power-creep problems. 2012, people.

[@ShiniHLaser]

Nefpoltenrqwn Powercreep in WoW has been detrimental due to the fact that the longer they go without a complete re-balancing of the system, the worse it gets. The Wrath of the Lich King expansion was a prime example of said power creeping becoming stupid. In Wrath of the Lich King, the biggest power creep was the explosion of other stats compared to Stamina. Stamina in WoW is the primary determining stat for how much health a given unit has, which effects how PvE and PvP is both processed. In PvE, because of the power creep, healers were able to have near infinite mana pools (due to the fact they had so much Spirit and other things to improve their Mana Regen Per 5, or MP5 for short), which forced Blizzard to combat said mana pools by making the bosses hit harder to the point where even the best equipped tanks in the world were being nearly one-shotted by normal attacks of the most powerful bosses of the time, which essentially made keeping the tanks alive just one giant game of "How much healing I can spam and how fast can I do it?" Spells that weren't near instantaneous? They became irrelevant, which meant the whole game became balanced around such instantaneous spells. That actually leads into the PvP portion, since as the game was so balanced around those instantaneous spells, PvP combat was more focused on how fast you could blow up an opponent instead of finding ways to bypass the enemy team's strategy to win. Yes, crowd-control had its place still in PvP, but crowd control essentially gave the time limit a character had to blow up the opponents. Since WoW had to be balanced around PvE and PvP simultaneously, their attempt to balance it around both actually kinda of ruined both experiences near the end of the expansion when the power creep was at its maximum. When did a complete re-balancing, combat became much more strategic, where both larger and shorter heals both had their place and ultimately it wasn't about raw power as it was about outmaneuvering your opponent. Cataclysm was a complete disappointment for a number of reasons, but combat was not that reason and if Blizzard had not screwed with so many of the things that people actually enjoyed of Wrath of the Lich King (like separate 10 man and 25 man raid lockouts), Cataclysm wouldn't be viewed upon as essentially the worse expansion of the game.

[@ShiniHLaser]

***** Think you mean Wrath. :-P And still, TotC/S7 did show enough that power creep, even if it was an accelerated path. It just wasn't as evident in PvP, merely because the plate cleave didn't have access to Shadowmourne. But the fact that legendary weapons are allowed in PvP is a totally different subject for a totally different video (probably the Balance video).

[@sirswampert9194]

MoP has had one of the worst Power Creeps too. We have gone up ~100 item levels from the start (460s Item level was heroic gear!) and now we have 580s heroic raiding gear! Crazy how power creep has affected WoW now!

[@ShiniHLaser]

***** Yes it has. If you only PvE, it isn't as noticeable as if you only PvP or do both PvP and PvE. And Blizzard does such a piss poor job balancing both at the same time, it is saddening. Season 8 (during ICC) was completely dominated by PvE groups. You know why? Plate cleave. Take 1 part Warrior, 1 part DK, 1 part Pally, add two parts Shadowmourne, mix in the legendary from Ulduar, and you had the mix for an instant Gladiator team. Ignore the fact that any sort of "attempt" (I think Blizzard stopped trying to be honest brokers in terms of balance a long time ago) of balancing PvE or PvP tends to completely screw up the other in balance, like the beginning of Cata, giving mages Time Warp (the equivalent to Bloodlust for those who stopped before Cata, you are lucky) made shamans essentially the worse in PvP and the only spec that was viable PvE was enhancement due to some extremely high damage (albeit their CC potential was minimal).

[@3R45U5]

The moment I quit wow after 7 years was, when they made the gear you acquired earlier, to be mere dungeon gear whenever they introduced another content patch. so the power creep not only took place between the addons, but now between every new content patch, rendering all the hard work you put into that essentially worthless after only a few months. By just farming gear for the new content doing heroics and being able to skip last months content entirely, it broke the "narrative cohesion" as I would call it. Before you had to aquire gear 1 to be able to participate in raid A, aquiring gear 2 in order to advance to raid B. You then experienced a cohesive storyline and also a feeling of "accomplishment" as you beat your way level after level. Now with every content patch rendering the previous items useless in a much faster pace as before, I just did not feel the need anymore to go through all that hassle because a couple months later I`d just farm my gear in dungeons and beat the last tiers raid in tourist mode. The raid finder amplified the problem with a lot of people just going the casual route and the population of the server I was playing on dying off quickly. Also the reduction in difficulty of the heroic mode dungeons in cata really got to me. Someone once said in a podcast: WoW now is a lot of candy, but no nutrition. And I agree. a lot of easy to beat stuff, but nothing to sink your teeth in and chew on for a while.

[@3R45U5]

3R45U5 I just finished the video and I wanted to add: Wow! I just wish Blizzard would introduce the Ultima online approach, mentioned in the end of the video, implement into wow! I would so go back to WoW in a heartbeat!

[@LiBrizziTV]

This was brilliantly presented! Nice touch with the Ice Cauldron joke xD

[@NoteWiseMusic]

This will be an interesting video to re-visit with Destiny's Taken King expansion not having the old legendaries upgrade with the new ones

[@zyyps]

I had the exact same thought.

[@phinix250]

this actually explains one of the design decisions I was reading about in the upcoming Star Citizen. Their plan was to actually have items wear out, become less reliable overtime and more expensive to maintain, forcing players to continuously (over a decent period of time mind you) update their ships equipment so they can maintain effectiveness. Chris said this was to allow new content to be introduced (and earned by players) without having to make it more powerful just so the player strives to get it. At first I was not sure about this as a good design decision but now after this episode of EC I now see that it could be a very good idea that might actually help the game. As a secondary thought it might also make antique equipment and ships become more valuable (to the player that owns them) then their later replacements because people might pick a model, keep it running for a couple of years bear the heavy expenses of maintaining an out of date ship just so they have a status symbol that "hey I have an old ship in awesome condition, I can afford to keep it running while you can barely afford to keep your modern ship running." this would be a nod to all the players who started early on in the game but would not give them a massive advantages over a player who has just joined.

[@duelmastershideout278]

Power creep is bad for business Yugioh: i’m still here😎

[@Nuisance_Bear]

A great, concise video explaining a concept I'd never even heard of.

[@yellowsh4rk]

League used as good example of anti-powercreep... Y I K E S

[@SarahET]

That's what 200 years of collective game design does to a mf

[@thenerdbeast7375]

Gw2 I feel has dealt with power creep very well because it has great sideways progression in expansions so that old content and builds don't become obsolete.

[@Armaggedon185]

I can't stop watching Extra Credits... Heeeeelp.

[@woodrot110]

I am also stuck in the infinite cycle of video watching too.

[@noyz-anything]

Imagine a warlock teleporting through a wall, and finding that his theif-type teammate had stunned the guards on the other side to get to the same room.

[@noyz-anything]

Extra Games FPS note: use these classes

[@iso_lierung]

#Runescape

[@CrystalsRandomVideos]

Despite the fact I hate hashtags and everything associated with them (please, can we start calling then num or hash again?), you sir, have described my feeling of the downfall of runescape so well. I remember when dragon was the most impressive armour. Now it's worthless. This is worthy of my upvote.

[@rrbyn]

Shadonyx Dev Have you played 2007?

[@CrystalsRandomVideos]

rrbyn Um, no? I do believe I was playing Runescape back then. Is it a non-updated version of the game?

[@CrystalsRandomVideos]

***** Neckbeard at its finest. ;)

[@jcnot9712]

Shadonyx Dev Good sir. Any chance ''Pound Sign'' is the term you're looking for?

[@talongreenlee7704]

I think a better term would be power inflation. After a while, it just increases numbers without making it more difficult. For example, the monster has 10 hp and you deal 2 damage. It takes 5 hits to kill. After a year, a similarly common monster has 100 hp, and a similarly common weapon deals 20 damage. It still takes 5 hits to kill, but because there are higher numbers, and it takes more time to get to that point, it seems more powerful, without really requiring any amount of skill to make

[@paulmcdougald4953]

That happened to me in WoW. Left right after 4.3 tried to come back in Pandaria, my Firelands armour that took me AGES to get was BS because of tier 90 gear.

[@grodon909]

Well that's a whole xpac; that's expected.

[@paulmcdougald4953]

still power creep grodon909

[@rogerwilco2]

You should have played a Druid with a Badge of Tenacity and you would have seen the opposite effect. A blue item that was the best in the game for an entire expansion. I think in vanilla there were even green items that worked like that.

[@paulmcdougald4953]

i wish i could have had a chance to play vanilla :/

[@Terestrasz]

Paul McDougald As someone who played during Vanilla... honestly there's a lot you would have hated as a Cataclysm player: -40 man raids. They were way WAAAAY harder to coordinate, and less people walked away from a raid with an upgrade. Now, to be fair, they started this in Classic with the tokens, but the "Tier" gear? It was just a drop. So you'd go through a raid, and maybe 25% of the raid got AN upgrade - and we'd have to constantly shard repeat drops because we'd get warlock drops that none of our warlocks want. At least in MoP and Cataclysm, you'd get something. -The 40-man raids led to all sorts of elitism. No cross-server instances, so you'd find a few servers where if you weren't part of the three or four guilds who ran content, then you wouldn't raid - at all. And all o these guilds wouldn't help you get geared enough - you had to do it yourself. And good luck with THAT - you need 39 others. Wrath at the very least let you get ready so you had to learn the strategies for boss fights, which is something waaaay better. (Not only that... 25 and `10 mains are just way better to organize. People constantly burned out organizing 40 mans.) -In Cataclysm, sure you had a "Best" spec, but at the very least, you HAD three builds. You had three specs in theory in Classic... but in practice, you really only had one, MAYBE two if you were lucky. If you were a Shaman, Paladin, or a Druid? You had only one build: Restoration and Holy. Most gear only helped you heal better. Sure warriors had a feasible DPS build, but if you wanted to do PvE, you had to go protection - most gear was made for protection anyways. Mages couldn't roll fire because everything was immune to fire. And while Destruction was always the highest DPS build for warlocks, they were gimped because again, a lot of stuff was immune to fire. And they were also gimped for affliction because they would get powerful DoTs but they got knocked off all the time.. and they could knock off sunder armour and pull aggro. This got changed eventually, at the least. -Intellect was broken. It remained such for awhile - if you played a mage, you only looked at one stat: Spell damage. THANKFULLY they changed it - seriously, why wasn't it that way at the start, where intellect made your spells deal more damage. UGGGH. -The questing in the old world was just... yeah. Honestly, while they had the "Every zone has a story arc", it was way WAAAAY better in Cataclysm. It was all full of bottlenecks - everyone would get sent through Ganklethorn Hell, pretty much everyone in the horde got bottlenecked into the Barrens. Once you hit 30, you'd have Desolace, but Ganklethorn Hell is that much bigger and has that much more things to do. At 40, you pretty much had to go to Ganklestan/Tanaris because again, another bottleneck. Now all the zones have their own 'story arcs', and they often lead you to another place in the world, usually the next zone, but even then you can always go to another zone and find out what's going on there. You can level from 1-60 without even leaving Kalimdor these days - you couldn't in Classic.

[@matthewsawczyn6592]

Magic is the best example of balancing this. So glad they mentioned :)

[@Vypren]

Sounds familiar *cough* VEGA Conflict Tier 6 ships

[@sakari_119]

theworldofpain1 lol true :(

[@Vypren]

Sakari Kontiainen so sad

[@Biggoron100]

oh yeah thats a great guest artist you got there, i wonder if he'll ever show up again...

[@glsilux]

in all honesty yugioh has all but died because of power creep. the fact that konami even goes as far as banning old cards to make the new ones sell makes it horrible to make a collection valuable for more than a year

[@JustAnOldGeezer]

Im' glad you brought it up, penguin brother.

[@WingCap0]

Tell me about it. I've lost the motivation to play Yu-Gi-Oh! a couple of times just because of how broken some of the cards have become. Even with all the banlists they've made, it still depends on how good a player's deck is.

[@kakianyx]

This guy is great at explaining things

[@cainfern]

LEAGUE OF LEGENDS WITHOUT POWER CREEP LMFAO

[@tenebrisscarrow3140]

Oh look it's Scott's first episode!

[@BlueMountain1992]

what about making old items NECESSARY for obtaining new ones, like in a crafting system or something

[@ufukcangencoglu2279]

But then wouldn't new players suffer and lose interest in the game?

[@SpeedyDePalma]

Looking at you WoT, this came about a year into your official release life and they called it.

[@umegadarkstar2657]

6:30 Blizzard need to do this for WoW!!

[@incorporealnuance]

The picture he used for the example of "Scripting" was the Ruby RGSS editor from the Enterbrain product RPG Maker XP

[@Steven_T_R_Rowland]

I caught that too, actually.

[@TheRayny]

And this is why i struck with Guild Wars 2 after World of Warcraft. Got reeeeeeally tired of all the expansion power increase bullshit.

[@ruzzyshuya4832]

+Enrico Boccardi Yeah I liked GW2's system a lot. Still miss GW1 mind you... haha

[@jdawgdabeast]

+Enrico Boccardi what do they do differently?

[@TheRayny]

For your health well, with the latest expansion they added new maps that grant different gear ( each gear has a nomeclature of its own and is used by a wide range of classes ), raids, a new class and one new specialization for each class and other stuff. This did not increase the level cap, and the new gear has the same raw power of the old one. However the content is very concentrated and there are only 4 maps, nut this because there is no necessity to grind levels like wow. Also there is only one raid, which is very short, and they still have to add other 2. Things could be discussed further, but this is the core stuff :)

[@jdawgdabeast]

Enrico Boccardi interesting, but I dunno if wows system is worse. I think the game its self is shit, but the system is what you'd expect from an MMO. They could possibly rescale dungeons and put a item lvl cap on old content, so farming for transmog will require you to farm old gear and work on up.

[@Arinacat]

GW2 made things differently TILL the expansion hit (I'm playing since beta..). The new "sub classes" called "Elite Specializations" are in fact a big, BIG power creep that ruins the game's already subpar balancing. So, if you want to play competetive, you have to buy the expansion, or you have to play double as good as anyone else to have the slightest chance to win against Elite Specs.

[@lol101lol101lol10199]

How MOBAS deal with power creep: Step 1: Release new hero and make is just a little bit stronger than all the other ones so players feel they have to buy it. Step 2: Let it reign for a month or so. Step 3: Nerf it. Step 4: Nerf the best old heroes too while you're at it. The downside is that this really frustrates the efforts of new players to settle on a main and get into the game. First you have to research which heroes are considered strong, have good winrates, and don't require pro-level skill to pick up and feel good at. You look up statistics, tier lists, etc. From among the top-tiers you pick one that looks fun and fits your aesthetics, role and playstyle. Next you have to grind thousands of in-game currency or spend real money to unlock the character you settled on. And then thousands more to buy the appropriate stat-boosting runes. After that, you have to actually learn how to play the character decently. Expect to get flamed by a-hole teammates during the learning phase, while you feed kills to the enemy laner. And when you finally feel like you've found a main that works for you, you read the patch notes of the next update and find they're nerfing that hero into the ground. You check the online statistics and find she is now considered D-tier instead of S-tier and her winrate dropped from 53% to 44%. Then you either rinse and repeat with a different "strong" character, stick to playing a low-tier that can't do the awesome things it could before, or give up and quit the game.

[@cheese98god]

Power creeping is awful in yugioh. Card from the original show are now all useless and only cards what are like a year or two old can be used even a little.

[@cheese98god]

***** by many you must mean about 10. I exaggerate of course but i mean only a few of those spells are useful now. Its around 5-10 old spells are staples now. (also intergalactic space typhoon that's funny)

[@magicalfeyfenny]

J Barwick Either old cards are so weak that they're mostly useless (unless some deck uses them as combo pieces, like normal Harpie Lady with Rescue Rabbit), so strong that they're banned from tournament play (Change of Heart), or right in the middle where they're useful (Swords of Revealing Light, Call of the Haunted, Mystical Space Typhoon) You really can't expect vanilla 4 stars with 1200 attack and defense to hold up 15 years later when there was a fine 1900/1600 vanilla 4 star (Luster Dragon) made in the exact same set. Or for Dark Magician with his heavy tribute cost to hold up nowadays when Summoned Skull with the same power but easier summon conditions was released in the same exact starter deck. Weak cards must exist to provide some scale for how good powerful cards are.

[@mrapplegate4065]

Yu Gi Oh is a broken game by default because of its design. The whole tribute system can't be scaled up and down too well, which limits the variety of cards a designer can create. If a designer shoots even a little above the median, it might break the game in half - and if they shoot even a little below, it'll fade into obscurity and never be heard from again. So the designers of YGO created multiple ways to summon things that were easier than tributes like fusions, rituals, synchros and XYZ, but overall they scaled pretty similarly to how tributes did without the "once per turn" limit. Unfortunately this allowed the game to devolve into players ripping through their decks on turn 1 and getting out a winning board. Or, I dunno. Maybe this is just my way of deconstructing the design of the game.

[@cheese98god]

Jason Applegate My main problem with the game is that they will bring out archetypes what are clearly broken but also be able to bring out balanced decks like the Ghost tricks. Its not as if its hard to tell whether a deck will be overpowered you just don't make a archetype where all the monsters can take more monsters out of your deck or be put back into the deck. As that gives the player way too much control and speeds up the game to ridiculous levels. XYZ's, Synchro's and the new pendulum cards don't break the game. Archetypes such as Wind-Ups and those Elemental dragon cards either break or over exploit the usefulness of the XYZ or Synchro summon

[@Dice12K]

Oh hey! There you go! I was prepping myself to type up a paragraph or essay on this subject, but people have already done it for me! xD I will use 1 specific example though: "Seven Tools of the Bandit" vs "Wiretap" Anyone who has heard of these two cards can instantaneously figure out the Power Creep. For those who don't understand it: Seven Tools of the Bandit: When a trap is activated, pay 1000 life points (not really cheap); negate the activation and if you do, destroy it. Wiretap: When a Trap Card is activated: negate the activation, and if you do, shuffle that card into the deck. Not only does Wiretap NOT have any cost, (the 1000 life points) but it also doesn't "DESTROY" the trap that activated AND it puts it back in the deck. Not "destroying" something makes it harder to counter. How much harder? Well, it IS a counter trap (both of them are, actually) so there is little to be done about them in the first place, and since there's no "destruction" effect, it's even harder. A card like "Musakani Magatama" which reads: "When your opponent activates a Spell Card, Trap Card, or monster effect that destroys a card(s), while you control a face-up "Six Samurai" monster: Negate the activation, and if you do, destroy it." is made to specifically to counter other counter cards, but only if they "destroy." Since Wiretap doesn't, Magatama is rendered useless. In short: Yugioh's Power Creep is over 9000 and I kinda wonder how the game hasn't died off yet.@_@;

[@justynh1321]

Mario seems to have cept power creep at bay while still adding new, more powerful items

[@redrounin1440]

How about the practice of making op dlc content in a pvp game only to nerf it after enough people have bought said dlc?

[@redrounin1440]

Monzer Short answer? Smash 4. Long answer? It's extremely difficult to balance dlc. Especially when introducing brand new, unique elements. I remember when the ice rapier was introduced in one of the ds2 dlcs, that thing was op af. I don't know if it was ever nerfed, though it probably should have been. In smash 4, bayonetta, ryu and cloud were all top tier characters upon their release. Bayonetta had a 0-death combo for a lot of characters. This spawned the saying that 'for only $5.99, you too can win tournaments'.She was later nerfed, but not before her op status inspired tier whores everywhere to shell out six bucks for her. Of course, Nintendo claims this was an honest oversight, a simple mistake in balancing on their part. But some remain skeptical. Nintendo wanted people to buy their dlc. That's a fact. Would they have developed shit characters that nobody wanted to play? Of course not. Is it so hard to believe they would err on the side of op so that people would actually want to buy their dlc?

[@redrounin1440]

Monzer I'm not jumping to conclusions. I'm just skeptical. All I'm saying is they released op dlc, then later nerfed it. A, then B. We're left to draw our own conclusions as to intent. Frankly, I'd like to agree with you. I'd like to think Nintendo wouldn't purposefully put out 'must buy' dlc just to line their pockets. But you can't put anything past executives these days. Perhaps it was just a simple oversight. Though I think a zero to death combo is a little much to make it past beta. but that's just my opinion. What I do know is that it's a precedent that other, less scrupulous companies may follow in the future, perhaps with not so good intentions. Only time will tell..

[@nottherealpaulsmith]

They're not strictly DLC, but the CZ-75 Auto and the R8 revolver in CS:GO.

[@spinnirack3645]

You have said something is good and then you gave an example of how to avoid it. I applaud you.

[@chrissmith-kr2oz]

Until more recently if felt like the last few years in league of legends. The new characters were extremely strong when first released and about two weeks later when the price of in game currency drops and most of the people who would spend irl currency to buy it had already done so, they would nerf them to the point that some were balanced and some were just not seen. Luckily with Jhin, Aurelion sol, and Ivern that were recently added it feels more like they have been undershooting rather than seemingly intentionally making them too strong. Also while someone else mentioned mobility creep in league the amount of invulnerability creep has also increased countering a lot of the early characters more.

[@geckoo9190]

This makes me remember the game armored core, in that game you assemble mecha robots and battle with them, now one of the pieces was the legs, and there were a set of hover legs, the first level was good but it didn't allow you to carry much weapons,the next levels had more strength and allowed you to carry more stuff, but it happened that the first level were the only legs that allow you to avoid missiles, so in all my battles I was using those first level legs regardless of being short on weapons.

[@Dinjur]

Destiny has this problem big time.

[@VivaLaBloke]

+Liam Hubbert the thing that pee'd me off the most was that they sorted that problem with the prison of elders when you could use etheric light to bring forward year 1 stuff, then they took it out if the game with the taken king. Why go backwards destiny ? that's why your games dead now lol

[@3p1c_Mustache]

Thank you for posting this series. As I watch, I find me asking myself "why do I enjoy gameA?" This video got me wondering g what went wrong in my LARP group. A lot to think about.

[@Skystarry75]

It's funny... Power creep occurs in even Pokemon, though it's not as bad... Actually, one of the gen 1 Pokemon (Mewtwo) was the most powerful until gen 4, which introduced a more powerful Pokemon (Arceus)... And then gen 6 introduced mega-evolution which put Mewtwo back on top... And then ORAS came out with more megas and suddenly we needed a whole new tier just for Mega Rayquaza. Not only that, but Pidgeot was a great flying type in gen 1, but, due to its balanced stats, isn't actually that useful anymore. Not even with it's Mega...

[@Roboshi2007]

Skystarry75 True, but pokemon has so many components to what makes a pokemon good that a well raised pokemon with a decent moveset and the right held item can bring down the most powerful pokemon. Hell, just look up the FEAR strategy for an example of a lvl 1 pokemon taking down an arceus.

[@Skystarry75]

***** Point taken.

[@undergroundmonorail]

***** your point is valid but fear isn't actually good

[@Roboshi2007]

***** No it's not, but it's just an example of using the wide range of variables and items to your advantage.

[@undergroundmonorail]

***** Yeah, I think it's cool that a strategy like that is possible and can catch people off guard, but I wanted to point it out because it's frustrating to see people think that it's good, haha.

[@DarkTider]

1:13 - Really bad example to lead off with saying the issue of lvl 60 dungeons being obsolete is a question of power creep, when the really issue is that 10 whole levels were added to the game in a subsequent expansion and so the items and dungeons that appear at lvl 70 are not even remotely tuned to be competing with lvl 60 dungeons and loot, not are they tuned for players having acess to or using items which are 10 levels lower and from a previous expansion to the current content and power level relative to the tuning of current content. What expansions in wow do (the big ones, not the mid expansion cycle expanding of content) is the opposite of power creep´: its power resetting.

[@AvangionQ]

When it comes to card games, I prefer to avoid any system which uses a `pay to win` model ... if rare cards are significantly more powerful than common cards, making them drastically more expensive, for me its a non-starter ... better yet, I much prefer any such game which uses a shared deck ... When it comes to multiplayer video games, I prefer a slow gradual buildup to power creep, where if you miss a year or two and come back, you'll notice a difference, but not so much that your old equipment is completely overshadowed ... as for single player video games, for me power creep is a non-issue ...

[@Molandria]

I'm glad this is such a well known problem. Drives me crazy!

[@thinkingofreality]

Bungie needs to watch this video and take notes (in reference to Destiny).

[@yoloswaggins3353]

Allison's working for Retro? AWESOME!

[@joncalvert4690]

I know this is 4 years old, but dota 2 is a better example here.

[@trebacca9]

MTG still has some creep issues, but they're mostly release creep. New sets come out before the previous ones have been explored. You're quite right about combinations of incomparables in Magic, though. My friends and I had a mantra about that: "There is no combo so great that no other combo can beat it."

[@RedShirtGuy96]

Kixeye for the love of all that is decent please watch this video.

[@SaviorSix]

This happened in Ragnarok Online 2 to the extreme. They introduced a Master Class system, and once you hit level 50, and went to whatever your Master Class was, you killed everything in one shot. Previous dungeons you can run by yourself, so no one helps low level characters run them anymore., because they alone are five people.

[@spacecadet1393]

So many people talking about League (Which is still my main game).. I think LoL is fine for now, the developers obviously are making more specific champions with higher skill caps, but they are not OP unless you have the skill to bring out the best of them. A good example of Power Creep would definitely be Runescape (Remember that game which we all used to play for hours on end?) if any of us were to start playing on our old accounts, all of the days/hours we amassed beforehand would be useless. Everything we worked for beforehand would pretty much be rendered useless, the game has become not only too easy but all the new content means old players don't want to come back and start again. This would work if they were able to attract new players, but RS relies on a certain market (Back in the day, not everyone could afford a decent PC and people played it due to the low red and browser based gameplay) and since that market is all but deteriorated, Jagex's answer was to simply make new powerful items again and again... at one point it had 7 million players concurrently (30+million P/M) now you'll be lucky if it has 50k players at any given time.

[@XBlueM0ndayX]

Runescape can't compete with other games around these days. It's not exciting, and as far as a timesink goes all you do is repeat the same action to watch your exp grow and eventually watch that level number tick up one.

[@CrystalsRandomVideos]

The thing that I originally loved about runescape was the story and atmosphere. I played the game with no friends, and with all the chat options on mute. I did not engage in any multi-player experience, and I was happy. Every NPC felt like they were denizens of Gilleniour (or however you spell it), and each had there on backstory. I also loved going to new places, exploration was a blast, especially when there was no one else there and I felt like I had found a secret.

[@Wylade]

LoL frequently goes back on previous decisions in order to keep power creep under control. The only reason Riven isn't played more often is cuz she got kicked in the gut so hard. Jax's lore is one big joke about limiting his weapon to a lamp post, but that seems to be the only way to keep champions with limitless mobility, durability, and damage under control.

[@Shadednecros]

A good example of trying to prevent power creep would be creating "side grades," weapons or items that buff some stats and lower some others.

[@cuberandgamer]

Pokemon has insane power creep

[@TheBluestflamingos]

How so? A lot of older Pokemon survived the test of time. Garidos (can't spell that), Slowking, Alakazam and Mewtwo still are going strong. In fact, Gen 1 had the worst inbalance in power. Bug was useless. Ghost had, what, two different pokemon (more if you count their evos). Psychic was insainly OP because it's only weakness at the time was bug. Special Defense and Special Attack where lumped together as Special, making a high Special stat = unbeatable Pokemon.

[@cuberandgamer]

Julia Martines Look at all the pokemon that used to be OU. If you told someone who played generation 5 that Jellicent would be RU, they would probably laugh at you. do you know why UU looks a lot like gen 5 OU? because OU is full of new threats that completely outclass old ones. also RU=gen 5 UU

[@mrapplegate4065]

I think he's referring to the card game, not the video game. The card game really does have insane power creep though.

[@cuberandgamer]

Jason Applegate the video game too. If you play competitive battling and new the smogon teir system, you would know what im talking about.

[@TheBluestflamingos]

cuberandgamer The video mentioned that in any evolving metagame some things eventually will be outdated. Power Creep is unchecked inflation of power. If Gen 6's mons where indisputably better then the early Gens, that would be power creep.

[@MagnusCattus]

Great video. You hit the nail on the head.

[@Ormbunken]

League of Legends is the goddamn champion of powercreep and really can't be pointed at as a good example for a game without powercreep

[@NinjaFireProductions]

How so?

[@ShiniHLaser]

Not really. Currently, the top three champions in ranked play are champs created in 2009. Of course, if you follow League, you might say, "Oh, but Sivir has gotten a rework." With that, I present to you the fact if you look at the most recent champions in the game (say since June), they have mixed results on where they fall on people's desired tiers. Now, if you were to make the claim that too many champions tend to be more powerful/overpowered on average, I would concur. That is for a multitude of issues, two of which I'll list - first off, most champions are initially tuned for competitive play and then later tuned for everyone. A low skill curve champion (one that can easily be picked up and played) is typically decried as overpowered because the appropriate counter play strategies are not formulated or practiced against said champion and the fact their abilities are low skill tends to mean they are more independent from each other, meaning they all tend to have higher base power. Since Riot tends to develop champions across the skill level, it is easy for a champion, even after going through the Public Beta Environment (PBE), to be a bit overtuned. That being said, while Riot's PBE is a great idea in concept, unfortunately too much of the data that is available in the PBE is useless - occasionally there will be a lot of consistent data pointing out a problem, causing changes before the champion is released (see Lucian and his ult during the PBE), but due to the amount of people on the PBE who are more than willing to troll or do other things that might render the data invalid (after all, one champion feeding intentionally can easily ruin a game's data), the developers have to choose between putting forward what might be a risky fix to a champion before they go live or leaving in place the current champion stats. They usually opt for the latter, which in return actually fosters the former issue. So, I can only hope you are willing to take a moment and two and read what I said and you aren't just a person who is a DotA fanboy or whatever that will immediately shut off your mind to that League of Legends has been and still is a pretty good game and honestly the only part of it that is really a grand turnoff is it's community (albeit it is not a unique community, is popularly highlighted because League of Legends is one of the largest games in the world currently).

[@Ormbunken]

ShiniHLaser Actually, I find new champs more powerful usually because of Riot finding new ways to make champions. If we compare champs like Garen to champs like Rengar or Darius, the difference in structuring of the abilities and so on is huge. older champs usually have simpler abilities with one special purpose, instead of newer champs often having abilities with almost everything in them. Rengar for example then, Q boosts one autoattack, gives AS steroid and can be chained using the rage-meter. ususally, these new spells, which are created to be more fun to players, often lead to newer champs having more complete kits than older. Now that doesn't necessarily mean they are stronger, but that's what powercreep is. Riot has no uniform champ design, and that has led to this current state of the game.

[@ShiniHLaser]

Orbiter144 www.lolking.net/champions/ Of the top 10 winning champions in ranked right now, 2 are from 2012, 1 is from 2011, everything else is from 2010 or prior. In fact, of all the champions released in 2013, the most winning champ at the moment is Jinx, who is behind Taric, who is considered one of the laughing stocks of the current (well, now former due to the fact Preseason 4 is to start soon) of the support metagame and at a 51.26%, one can make a clear case that Jinx is "well balanced". Also, your example of Rengar is kind of a piss poor one. While a good player can do well with him (and I know a few who can), on average he is pulling up a friggen 47.26% win rate, which is 2.74% below average. Newer kits does not per say mean stronger kits. Newer kits are more likely to force interaction between skills, causing a higher skill cap for a lot of more recent champs, but newer kits does not equal stronger. Again, if you wanted to make an argument for how quite a few champions are seemingly overpowered upon release, I already agreed on you on that front. But you really don't have much of an argument to imply that newer characters are stronger, which means there is a power creep (as older content is not being dwarfed by newer content).

[@Poetabrasileiro]

Orbiter144 This is very incorret to assume. =/ The most played champions with huge winning ratios are not those who just were launched last month. They are champions who are in the game for two, even three seasons allready. Take for example, Annie. A Simple, but yet, powerful pick in solo queue. With heavy CC and high ap scalling, this makes her a very viable pick even in platinum. New Champions often are considered OP because the player base yet doesn't know how to counter play it. I Remember people considering Lucian OP, but any form of CC, expecially BLIND from Teemo and Quinn counters him heavily. Now, he's not that OP Guy that we heard. Just a regular champion.

[@ugxsan]

Allison is working at Retro, now?! :o Way to go! Congrats on the awesome job! Late as this may be, I look forward to seeing your work in one of their new games!

[@AleksoLaĈevalo999]

I know that probably a thousand people already said this, but you are completely wrong on MMO's. In MMOs gear don't have to and shouldn't be balanced. It's power is increasing to keep players playing the game with the reward of gaining better gear. In MMOs the classes should be balanced, not the gear. The gear doesn't affect what you can do nor how you can do things like champions in MOBAs or cards in CCG games do. Making some pieces of gear absolutely better than others doesn't take away options from you for gear is just yours power up, and there is nothing to it than that. The problem of power creep in MMOs exists only with new abilities and new classes, because when one is superior then others became obsolete which practically takes away choices from players and choices are fun.

[@Mostlyharmless1985]

I counter argument with one of the longest lasting mmos on earth: Eve Online. Gear is quite balanced, and there are pages upon pages on how you can fit a ship (class) in such a way to counter certain set ups and ships. But, at its core a piece of gear on one ship behaves exactly the same way as it does on another. Quite a bit of Eve's longevity is owed to the fact that there can be some horribly unbalanced setups that dominate until someone rigs up a counter to it.

[@RedShirtGuy96]

Aleksy The Pony yeah no. sorry. Former Vega Conflict player for over 2 years. Power creep indeed ruins MMOs. They kept releasing newer and newer content that had no real differences in mechanics, but just had better numbers. They started out with 3 basic tiers of ships. The tiers were based on ship mass which allows you to place more weapons, armor, etc. Then the main antagonists of the game The "Vega" Federation were suddenly made obtainable, and took the spot at tier 4 having stats that reflected their position. fast forward a bit. and we see the introduction of the Iron Star Company. Which was now classified as tier 5. They currently put Vega and the starting tiers to shame. Fast forward again, and we now have a new faction called the Demon Corps that, while technically still tier 5, are still considered better than even the Iron Star. And in the present meta. Yet another Faction consisting of aliens is planned to come. As well as a Rebel Rouge faction. They just will not stop releasing new content. And yes while you said releasing new content keeps players playing the game, if implemented incorrectly it absolutely ruins them. Basically it creates this barrier to new players who have to start from scratch. even the best tier 3 tech makes it still hard to grind to obtain tier 4. For the players who have been there from the start, they certainly have no problems with this, and why would they? They're the top of the food chain. But this goes beyond simple levelling up, it creates an insurmountable barrier. you take a step forward and suddenly the endgame meta takes 3. you take another step, and it takes 2 more. Continuously releasing more and more powerful content is terrible in any game.

[@AleksoLaĈevalo999]

RedShirtGuy96 That can be easily solved the way blizzard is doing with WoW. Every expansion there is new easy content with easily obtainable gear which is better than the hard-girded gear from the previous expansion and there is even better gear which requires you to grind. It works like this: (greens are easy to obtain, blues are harder and purple are even harder to get) Basic game- greens

[@RedShirtGuy96]

Aleksy The Pony Vega events had a system like this. There were different levels of the same tech offered in an event. That's also something that should be mentioned, is that any new content in vega aside from the vanilla is only obtainable through event participation. But anyway. An event would offer some kind of weapon or tech, and a hull. There would be the level 1 weapon which was usable on tier 1 through 2. Level 2 which was the exact same weapon in every respect with just upscaled dps and weight, used on most ships save for the highest tiers, and level 3 which, depending on the weapon and ship was used either very sparingly or not at all, unless they were highest tier ships or regular ones trying to go for a glass cannon build. Then the event hull itself. Which was the hardest item to grind in the event and only endgame or near endgame tech was able to even have a chance at grinding efficiently in the time alotted for the event. The amount of grind for each level of an event was; level 1 ~50,000 points, level 2 ~250,000 points, Level 3 ~500,000 points, and the hull being ~1,500,000 points. The problem with this is while in theory, it sounds like a good way to balance out power creep by making sure the new content is downscaled and made obtainable to lower leveled players, is that on paper the low levelled new tech is still just as inferior and useless as the older tech in the game. And the endgame levelled new tech is the only viable option to stay even remotely competitive. Which again puts us at the problem where the new tech is far superior to anything else. And eventually even that will too be surpassed. When I was playing, the Aurora Ray was one of the best weapons to use in the game, it had high dps, decent range, and a damage bonus to shields. It replaced the vanilla game's Disruptor Ray which filled a similar role, but lacked the shield buff, and was essentially a downscaled Aurora Ray, Now there is something new replacing the Aurora Ray, and in the future something new will replace that. But the weapons themselves don't really kill the game it's the ships. They always release a new ship in every event. And refitting lower tiered ships with whatever high tiered weapons are coming out is a viable way to stay competitive...... at least until a new tier of ships gets released that absloutely has the capability to blow your ships out of the water, even with your good weapons. www.vegashipcalc.co.uk/index.php?ship=7&l=1 Here is the basic tier 3 cruiser that was widely considered the staple of cruisers to use for even high level combat. Pay attention to how much mass it has and the variety of slots it has to work with. www.vegashipcalc.co.uk/index.php?ship=193&l=1 Now here is the latest cruiser in the game. Notice how may more weapons slots it has, and how much more mass it has. It can potentially carry all level 3 weapons as well. It's just ridiculous. And at some point even that will get replaced. This is why I hate power creep so much, and prefer games like world of warships that have strict set tiers. Yet still can release new content, that doesn't violate those tiers. Ships in the Tier 10 line that are just being released are competitive with the others that have always been there. They just play differently and make great use of skill and incomparables. While games that suffer from power creep tend to run like, "this has bigger numbers so it will probably win regardless of skill", and yes skill did matter in Vega once upon a time, but now if you aren't totally endgame you have hardly any chance. I apologize for the wall of text btw.

[@akaiappears]

Extra Credits Amazing video! thank you. You create great content guys, keep it up! i ll be stickin around

[@Trancecend]

Blizzard looooooves power creep

[@zackp2879]

I really hope this type of thing doesn't happen to Hearthstone.

[@Guts_Brando]

Zack OOSIWAEONWS Well, 4 years later....how do you feel?

[@jwil4286]

one easy way to avoid this would be to put in a checks and balances system. if each new type checks an old one, and is checked BY an old one, then power creep would be less risky

[@flamepan]

I dont know of league was balanced when this came out, but bringing it up now as an example of good control of power creep is hilarious considering how awful the game is at either making sure every one is decent or making sure every one isnt ridiculous.

[@xelasneko]

I believe in the context of the video, it means that every new champion that was added into LoL does not immediately overshadow all the other champions just by stats alone, because they're using incomparables as a power creep control. "Balanced" is another separate issue, since Riot constantly making changes to address that.

[@kyle54312]

Leagues in one of it's most balance states right now. There also hasn't been a OP new champ since Zyra

[@DougieFresh475]

kyle54312 Who is Yasuo?

[@kyle54312]

Taco de Smello Yasuo was strong, never broken or OP . He was also slightly nerfed a week later

[@DougieFresh475]

kyle54312 Yasuo IS op. Sorry to say.

[@MercenarySed]

This video aged like milk. League is now the definition of POWER CREEP

[@hothstorm]

Any warframe players feeling the love for this episode?

[@kaisburg2450]

Loved the Ice Cauldron reference!

[@dragden851]

omg this sounds just like alot of my stress with bungie's game destiny!!!

[@otisthecan3112]

I feel like Tetsuro Araki completely mastered the control of power creep with Stands in Jojo's Bizarre Adventure. Each Stand is essentially its own incomparable, so instead of stupidly flashy shows of might, it's a tough, intricate chess match of powers (which I personally love).