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Modern Warfare 2′s Rock Paper Scissors

December 28th, 2009 at 7:58 pm · 15 Comments

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I know you’ve all probably played Rock, Paper, Scissors before and if you’re like me you can play that game for about a minute or two before it gets old.  Why does it get old?  Because it’s a game that’s largely up to chance (unless you’re really predictable and therefore suck at the game.)  Hold on a minute though… Rock, Paper, Scissors is perfectly balanced.  Yes, I said perfectly.  There’s no advantage to picking one choice over any other as they can all dominate or be dominated.  Where am I going with this?  If you’ve seen me online during the last month and a half you should know where I’m going with it…  Modern Warfare 2.

As a newcomer to the Modern Warfare series I was put off by the large array of classes, weapons, perks, killstreaks, etc.  I was repeatedly assured by everyone that it really didn’t matter what classes, weapons, perks, or killstreaks I chose because they were “all good” and could all be used to equal effect.  The sniper can kill from a distance but is useless up close, shotgun fiends are deadly in close quarters but can easily be dispatched from a decent distance, and there are thousands of various class/weapon/perk/killstreak combinations in between.  It’s not a great leap to assume that in the right hands virtually any setup is deadly and it’s absolutely true that any combination CAN be deadly, but equally deadly?  I’m not so sure about that.

I think there are definitely a few, maybe even a handful of, roughly representative classes that could almost be considered Modern Warfare 2′s Rock, Paper, and Scissors…  I’m not even going to attempt to flesh them out here, or count them separately depending on whether you use the M16 or the M4 as your assault rifle.  The point is, if a game is truly evenly balanced I think it would suck part of the fun out of it.

I think imbalances need to be there.  It gives some people a needed advantage and others a needed challenge.  I’ve seen it happen many times when members of our own community will get bored and intentionally change classes to something a bit more challenging just so they have fun.  If you play Modern Warfare 2 with the Sarcastic Gamer Community, chances are you’ve probably been stabbed by Darkwonders or ThoThexy a time or two… okay, a HUNDRED times might be more accurate.

Do you want your games to be absolutely evenly balanced?  Wouldn’t that seem to take some of the fun out of it?  Infinity Ward hasn’t been extremely forthcoming on details of their weapons and perks in a super granular way.  Sure, you get the rough weapon graphs showing some stats, but it’s pretty clear to me there’s a lot more that goes into the equation of who lives and dies than the stats on a weapon damage or range graph.

I’m sitting here telling you I don’t think all the weapon combos are evenly matched, but at the same time I don’t have the answer to which combination IS the best.  I’m sure there are thousands of people out there playing right now that will swear up one side and down the other that there’s is no such combo.  For those thousands of people, there are thousands more convinced that they’ve figured out the absolute best combination to use.  Then there are people like me… hopping around from class to class, trying out everything, looking, taking forever to level anything up… certain we’ve found really bad combination after really bad combination because we can’t… you know… suck.

So what do you think? Is Modern Warfare 2 evenly balanced or are there distinct “sweet spots” in the combinations?  I know; this sounds fun.  Leave a comment on to this article with your dream set of weapons/perks/killstreaks from Modern Warfare 2, then tell me your nightmare set of weapons/perks/killstreaks from the game that would cause you nothing but grief.  I’m curious to see if those horrible combinations really are that bad and of the great ones really are that great.




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Categories: Editorial · Featured Content

  • R3DN3CKT

    i dont think a a game should be evenly ballenceed but there should be incentives to use the more disadvantaged classesor it shouldn’t be onesided at least. with MW2 it all depends with what your preference is if you like to snipe then snipe if your good with the M4 use it.

  • Lokela

    Modern Warfare 2, to me, isn’t balanced, but I’m aight with that. Everyone has a different “fun factor”. Some might find enjoyment in playing perfectly balanced games, others might find it entertaining to dig around for in the imperfections of a “perfectly balanced game” and exploiting them.

  • http://pcmutiny.wordpress.com sink257

    Yea, well. After all the game isn’t balanced for lean anyway.

  • _strika234

    For killstreaks, predator missile into harrier strike into chopper gunner is the best for straight up kills.

    Also, rothbart of you’re looking for a cheap class that’s easy to use, just use a rifle mounted grenade launcher with danger close, any third perk and one man army. You can also substitute O.M.A with scavenger, in Which case you van add a thumper or rpg to your inventory.

    To use it, just fire away, and then when you’re out of ammo, switch with O.M.A to the same class, and you’ll have full ammo again. Rinse and repeat

  • http://www.sarcasticgamer.com Lono

    Eh, I don’t think the sniper class is over powered at all. The maps are small enough, except for wasteland that any sniper will have to move around to stay alive.

    I think the game is pretty balanced.

  • ClassicCarraway

    It also depends on what kind of game you’re playing. Certain classes/combos do well in standard TDM, but in Hardcore TDM, they don’t excel at all, and vice versa. Stopping power is almost a requirement for any non-HC match, while it is never used in HC matches.

    • Chubbaluphigous

      Stopping Power isn’t a requirement it is a crutch. I see it’s need with snipers, but that is about it. I would like to see Stopping Power moved to a death streak like Juggernaut was.

      • Rednblack3

        I dont play normal TD I’m more of a hardcore player but I did play TD when I first got the game and could not agree more with the you saying that it would make the game better to have stopping power be a death streak

      • Morris

        Stopping power is there to keep a lot of people from using cold-blooded. The mini map would be silly if nobody popped up. A perk should always also be a sacrifice by not having another perk.

  • Chubbaluphigous

    Like it has been said already. It depends entirely on the player. I love to run around with Cold Blooded and Ninja. On some of the small maps I break out some of the others. But I prefer to play stealthily.

    I just wish that those perks unlocked earlier. The first 30 levels of prestige suck.

  • viklove

    The game is certainly not perfectly balanced, due to secondary weapons, which can make a sniper deadly at close range, but it is extremely balanced, and sometimes I hate it, for example when I get sniped by an ACR when I have a WA2000 on Wasteland, where I should have the clear advantage, but die anyway.

  • Rednblack3

    The game is pretty well balanced but I agree that some of the Assault Rifles are a little to accurate and make them in some cases more useful snipers than an actual sniper

  • MikeyzeroG

    Here’s my tip:

    When I get frustrated and decide to just have fun, I break out the riot shield and throwing knife. It’s a thrill to kill people in an instant after they unload a clip into your shield, and you don’t feel so bad when you get killed. Try it :)

  • ph33r

    I feel like every game time has a very specific and deadly weapon/perk combination, which will be great for that game, but could be rendered useless based on the next game type/map you choose to play. For example, headquarters pro… The laptop is in a room 99% of the time on all maps, so what do i do to clean those suckers out? Assault Rifle + Grenade Launcher, Thumper as my Secondary, Perk1 = scavenger (to pick up more noob tube ammo), perk 2 = Danger close (because its in a tiny room) perk 3 sit rep or commando pro… put some semtex on him and ur an explosion machine… but change the map to derailed and game type to search and destroy, and that class is just plain useless.

  • jordie45

    its not lean anyway