Earning Equilibrium

Let’s talk about balance.

Not the Zen kind. Not the tightrope kind. I’m talking about PvP balance, the bloodsport of spreadsheets, patch notes, and flame wars. The sacred, cursed craft of making sure your game doesn’t devolve into a one-button win-fest or a YouTube-tier list simulator. It’s one of the most argued, patched, and misapplied concepts in competitive gaming, and I’ve got thoughts. Plenty of them.

Because here's the thing: balance isn't just about fairness. It's about identity. And when your idea of fairness punishes someone for playing the way they love, congratulations. You’ve just balanced your way into blandness.

Balance is Not Neutral

We’re living in an era of games where metaplay is the game. PvP titles especially have leaned hard into the idea that there’s a best way to play. One build, one loadout, one path to dominance. And sure, it feels good to win. But after a while, what are we even winning? A game of who followed the wiki the fastest?

Games like Elden Ring offer a glimpse of what it looks like to escape this. In a game where you can dodge anything, there's room to express yourself. Dark is not evil, dragons can be worshipped, and magic can be wielded up close with a sword in hand. Even if the meta doesn’t smile on your style, you can still thrive if you know what you’re doing.

But that’s rare. More often, we see balance become a pruning shears. "Oh no, too many people are using this weapon. Time to nerf it." And while I get the intention (diversity, fairness, challenge) it too often misses the bigger picture. Balance is supposed to support identity, not erase it.

What Balance Should Actually Do

Here’s my philosophy, plain and simple: every strategy should be viable if executed properly.

That doesn’t mean perfect parity. It means respecting different playstyles by giving them room to breathe. If I choose a sniper, I’m signing up for range and precision. Not agility or spray-and-pray. If I run a shotgun, I’m expecting to live or die by my positioning. Let those choices mean something. Don’t make me regret having a preference.

Balance should reward mastery, not conformity. A high skill floor should be balanced by a high skill ceiling. A low skill floor should offer quick accessibility but taper off at a reasonable plateau. High risk should come with high reward. Low risk should yield low reward. That’s the only equation that makes sense to me.

If you want to solve balance without killing the soul of your game, it starts with understanding that fairness isn’t sameness. It’s giving players the freedom to play their way and making sure their way has a shot.

The Hidden Cost of Nerfs

Let’s talk nerfs.

A nerf is when you take something and deliberately make it worse. Doesn’t matter how you do it. Shrink the hitbox, slow the animation, reduce the damage, it’s all the same. You’re taking something people use and telling them, “You don’t get to be this good anymore.”

That’s punishment, no matter how you slice it.

Now, I get it. Sometimes it’s necessary. Maybe something is truly busted. Maybe you’ve created an ability so dominant it leaves no room for counterplay and no space for variety. In those rare cases, sure, a nerf is a scalpel. Use it precisely. Use it sparingly.

But let’s be honest. Most nerfs aren’t that. Most are after-the-fact corrections for things the developers didn’t catch in testing. And every time you issue one, you're punishing the players who found something strong and enjoyed it. You’re saying, “Thanks for investing in this. Now we’re taking it away.”

Balance shouldn’t feel like a betrayal.

The Buff Mirage

Then we’ve got buffs, the seemingly nicer sibling. A buff is when you take something underused and give it a glow-up. Stronger stats, faster execution, tighter impact. And on the surface, that sounds like a win. But it’s not always.

Buffs carry two big risks. First, you’re still punishing players, just indirectly. If you buff something that wasn’t being used and don’t touch the popular picks, you’ve just shifted the meta without honoring the people who mastered the old tools. Remember: if someone else gets a reward and you get nothing, it still feels like a loss.

Second, unchecked buffs lead to power creep. If every underused thing gets made stronger, eventually everything is strong. That sounds exciting until you realize the game becomes a whirlwind of overkill. Fights are too fast, too binary, too volatile. We lose nuance. We lose pacing. We lose identity.

Buffs should be strategic. They should offer new options, not force a new direction. And if you’re not careful, the players who once loved your game for its structure will suddenly find themselves in a theme park of chaos.

Reworks: A Different Beast

Reworks are where things get interesting.

A rework isn’t just stat-changes. It’s a redesign. A rework says, “This thing doesn’t need to be stronger. It needs to be different.”

This is your move when something is fundamentally flawed. Not underpowered, but redundant. Maybe it's just a worse version of another option. Maybe it doesn’t have a real niche. Maybe its entire play pattern is misaligned with what the game needs.

You could buff it. But then you’ve just got two similar things, one still a little better. Or worse, now the weak one is dominant and the cycle continues.

A rework lets you say, “Let’s give this a new identity.” Same name, maybe the same visuals, but a new way to engage. You’re not patching a hole. You’re building a new bridge.

That said, reworks come with their own danger. People do get attached. Even if something’s objectively weak, there’s always someone who loves it. Usually for aesthetic reasons, or lore, or sheer stubborn loyalty. So tread lightly. But if the thing has no meaningful role in the current game, and you can make it exciting without betraying its flavor, that is a win.

Balance in Action: Know When to Use What

So let’s put it all together. You’ve got three tools for post-launch balance: nerfs, buffs, and reworks.

Use nerfs only when something is objectively toxic. When it is unstoppable, uncounterable, and disruptive to the game’s core loop. And even then, treat it like an admission of failure. You should have caught it in testing.

Use buffs to breathe life into forgotten tools. Just know that every reward given to one player can feel like punishment to another. Buff with intent.

Use reworks when the old shape of a thing no longer serves its purpose. When done with care, they can be the most elegant solution available.

But none of these tools should be your first line of defense.

Balancing Starts Long Before Launch

Real balance, the kind that preserves identity and encourages variety, starts well before the game ever sees a patch note.

You need a team whose job is not just to squash bugs, but to break the system. Think of it as a meta-bounty program. Invite the players who love to find the cracks. Let them go wild. Encourage them to dominate. And when they find something game-breaking, fix it before your players ever see it.

Balance is not something you bolt on later. It is something you build for from the start.

Final Word

There is no perfectly balanced PvP game. But there is such a thing as a game that respects its players. A game that lets people express themselves through strategy, skill, and style. A game that doesn’t force everyone into the same mold just to compete.

Balance is not about flattening differences. It is about earning equilibrium. And when you get it right, every player gets to feel like themselves and still have a shot at victory.