Patching is a vital part of every eSport. In short, it involves altering the dynamics or rules (for example by adding a new hero or increasing the strength of a particular skill) for the purpose of achieving game balance. Unlike traditional sports where the rules of the game are rarely altered, it is quite a frequent phenomenon in competitive video gaming for a number of reasons. These will be detailed later.
Two main ways to affect the meta
In eSports, meta is commonly understood as being the number of current game winning strategies established by the pro player base. It is most often influenced in the following manner:
- By adding or removing the player controlled units. Adding is used a lot more often and could be anything like the introduction of new playable characters (League of Legends, Dota 2), guns (CS:GO), cards (Hearthstone) or hero items (League of Legends, Dota 2). Meanwhile, a good example of a removal would be the deletion of the ability of the medivac to pick-up and drop Siege Tanks in Siege mode in StarCraft II.
- By increasing or decreasing the strength of the player controlled units. This is known as “buffing” and “nerfing” in the eSports world and could include increasing or decreasing the damage of a playable character, its number of abilities, hit points, etc.
How it works
The number of changes in a patch can either preserve the play style and strategies in the game or make them obsolete, providing the means for them to be gradually replaced with more successful ones over time. For instance, in a MOBA game, such a change could lead to teams preferring to focus on early game strategies including winning lanes, early tower takedowns and establishing map control whereas before the patch was introduced, a more late game farming style could have been the better strategy. Last December a major Dota 2 patch, version 7.00, introduced plenty of changes to the game and what could be defined as the “illusion meta” featuring late game play style mass illusion sieging became unreliable.
One typical example of a patch change is the introduction of a new playable character. This is typical for a number of MOBAs such as League of Legends and Heroes of the Storm. Usually a character is introduced alongside nerfs and boosts some of the already available playable characters as well. The powers of the newly added character must not be too high though or its individual impact on the game might be too significant. One of the big factors that can demonstrate this is its average win rate.
Make or break
New patches have the power to break individual players and teams, as well as encourage new ones to rise. In 2013, the Dota 2 team Alliance dominated The International with their split push tactics that consisted of specific hero picks. Apart from the final where the team dramatically won 3-2 versus Na’Vi with a split pushing final move, they were an unmatched force throughout the tournament, losing just one game in 21 en route to the Na’Vi clash.
Subsequently, the meta was punished heavily, with nerfs for both heroes and game mechanics, and once the next patch was released, Alliance lost their impetus and struggled to reach the lofty heights of their glorious past. While the nerfs could not possibly be the only reason for Alliance’s more indifferent form, it is notable that their split pushing style has never been utilized more successfully than in the era when they were dominant.
Another reason to release patches
While balance is certainly a desirable state, it is not the only reason to release game improvements. It’s a fact that there is fierce competition between video game developers in every genre. After all, even if the video games are designed with the intent of becoming an eSport, they must also be a profitable product.
The vast majority of the player base for each eSport comprises of non-professionals playing at home. By spending money buying in-game items (skins, locked playable characters, cards etc.) and having the numbers required to attract the sponsors that deliver a huge chunk of the prize pools in eSports, the average gamer is in fact the backbone of each successful eSport. And as hard to please as they are nowadays, they need to be supplied with fresh content in order for them to retain interest in playing the game.
eSports are in essence trying to appeal to both pro players and fans, as well as hoping to attract new ones. Patches are the creative tools for this purpose and can destroy old metas to make way for new sets of strategies. There has never been a perfectly balanced video game, but paradoxically, such a state would be detrimental to its existence because if left without innovation for too long, it would be overrun by its competitors.
