*Click*
*Cli-Click*
Flash!
Armed with an assortment of notepads, tablets and flashing cameras, rows of journalists sat attentively in their seats, arranged in a curve to face a semicircular podium in a small auditorium. Atop the podium stood a group of well-dressed individuals, headed by a main speaker who clutched a small lectern while addressing the audience with professionalism. Pinned to her jacket lapel was a large badge which read ‘Jessica - PR Team Lead’.
“Now I’ll get to the issue you’ve all been waiting for. Yesterday afternoon, Virtek issued a server-wide shutdown order, which persisted for nearly an hour. The cause of this shutdown was a sophisticated cyber-attack of unknown origin.”
Soft gasps and a series of low murmurs were heard, as an atmosphere of subdued shock filled the room.
“We believe that a number of cyber-criminals attempted a digital intrusion on our systems, with the goal of obtaining private user data. Fortunately, Virtek boasts some of the strongest cybersecurity technology in the modern world, so we were able to easily repel the attempt. While our personnel made the decision to shut down the game servers as a precaution, this was later deemed unnecessary. In other words, Virtek has the situation entirely in hand.”
The speaker took a moment to allow the words to sink in before continuing, “Unfortunately, as we are still conducting our investigation, I am unable to take questions today regarding the incident. Please note that we will provide further information in later communications.”
Waiting a moment, the speaker was surprised when no interjections or complaints were made by the reporters. She decided to quickly move on to the next topic before her good luck ran out.
“The other main topic for today’s press conference concerns the premature lockout experienced by many of our users during registration.”
Immediately, hands shot up from various journalists.
“I intend to answer questions shortly, but I will give an explanation first: Firstly, we at Virtek sincerely apologise to any and all users who were affected by the registration lockout. This was an inexcusable error on our part, and we strive to do much better than that.”
“The lockout error was fixed shortly after the game’s launch, though we have determined that over 700,000 accounts were created prior to that time. To rectify this issue, we will be offering free account name change tokens and avatar change tokens to all of those accounts, which will remain valid until one week from today, as well as a small EXP boost. Once again, we at Virtek sincerely apologise for this blunder.” The speaker looked up. “I will take a few questions.”
Immediately, one hand shot up much faster than the others. The speaker pointed to them. “Yes.”
“Hi, how much will the experience boost be and for how long?”
“The EXP boost will be immediately applied to the accounts and will last for one week. Its extent will be 10%.” Not waiting for a response, she pointed to another journalist.
“Hello. Will Virtek be opening extra name slots for those who became unable to choose their preferred username due to the lockout? Currently there are only 10 accounts allowed for each unique name.”
“Unfortunately, that is impossible at this stage due to database constraints. We will make an announcement if the situation changes. For now, we recommend that users add a numbered tag to the end of their preferred username instead.”
The speaker started to feel pressure as the questions became more difficult. Thankfully, most hands had gone down after the previous question. “Yes, over there.”
“Hi, Aisha here from GameWatch. We conducted a player survey yesterday and found that less than 2% of the playerbase have obtained the ‘Archer’ class as their specialisation. This is an extremely low proportion when compared to the other classes; especially the ‘Mage’ class, which constitutes nearly half of all players. Does Virtek plan to take actions to either increase incentive for choosing the class, or lower the bar for entry?”
“T-that...” the speaker was flustered for a moment. Unexpectedly, someone had asked a completely unrelated question; one which she had not been briefed on. “I will have to defer to my colleague for the answer on that particular issue, since I believe this falls under the domain of our game balance division.”
Stepping back from the lectern, she looked to one of her co-workers for assistance.
A rotund, middle-aged man at the back of the podium froze for a moment, before reluctantly stepping forward with a slightly pale complexion.
The cameras turned to focus on him. He wore an unbuttoned black suit with a white shirt and purple tie, as well as a badge which read ‘Derrick – Balance Team Lead’. Trading places with the previous speaker, bright lights reflected off his partially bald head as he approached the lectern.
“Good morning.” The man forgot to smile as he addressed the crowd. “My name is Derrick from the balance division. My team has been assigned the task of maintaining balance among the playable classes in World of Heroes, to ensure a smooth and fair player experience.”
“...Unfortunately, this is not a balance that can be guaranteed immediately after launch, as player choices are often unpredictable, and our foremost priority is to ensure player freedom.”
The reporter who asked the question waited for the man to continue, but unexpectedly, he did not, so she quickly asked a follow-up question. “Yes, but many players who wish to choose the archer class are unable to due to the high requirements! In another survey we did, we found that over 90% of players who attempted the archer class test had failed. Conversely, 85% of healer class attempts ended with success. Does Virtek not see this as an unfair imbalance in difficulty?”
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.
The man made an awkward expression as he scrambled to respond. “W-well, yes, we are certainly aware that many classes may be more difficult to use and employ a higher skill ceiling. In terms of the statistics you stated, we can assure you that Virtek will conduct its own investigation and make changes to the class tests if necessary.”
Before the reporter could speak again, the man quickly followed up on his words, “Unfortunately, that is all we can guarantee at this time. As for further questions, I will hand the spotlight back to our PR team leader.” The man quickly turned around and moved back to the rear of the podium, forcing the previous speaker to return to the microphone with hurried steps.
“Were there any other questions?” she asked cautiously.
More hands rose than had before the previous question. Frowning internally, the speaker secretly likened the gallery to a bunch of piranhas who caught the scent of blood.
“I should clarify; I meant questions not related to the balance between the classes. As my colleague stated before, we need to conduct our own investigation before we can announce any changes.”
The number of hands lowered significantly, and the speaker went on to swiftly answer the remaining questions, which covered a variety of topics.
...
...
BANG.
“Damn!” Derrick smashed a desk with anger as he returned to his office. Hearing the loud sound, his co-workers swivelled around in their chairs to face him.
Despite it being morning, the office was dimly lit with no windows. It was a spacious room, reminiscent of the control room from a doomsday movie, with split rows of desks facing a set of three large wall-mounted screens on one end. Derrick’s desk stood on a slightly elevated section of flooring by the entrance, separated from the rest of the employees by a black steel handrail. Derrick pressed his hands onto the railing, leaning into it as he looked down over his subordinates.
“Why the hell did none of you tell me only 2% of players were archers?!” Derrick’s voice bellowed across the room. “Did none of you even think to check?”
“Sir, we received numerous emails from the support team regarding the issue; we assumed you had seen them.” One junior employee spoke up.
“And you only tell me this now?! Useless!” Derrick raged as he tore off his suit and threw it roughly at his desk. “You were all watching the press conference, right? What are your solutions? We need to take action immediately!”
“Team leader, I already sent you an email with proposed solutions last night” An employee with ginger hair spoke up, his expression unimpressed. “Would you like me to give a brief outline now?”
“Good. Go ahead, Clyde.” Derrick nodded. “But the next time something urgent like this arises, I expect that you call me immediately.”
“Right.” Clyde responded simply. “Firstly, there are many people claiming that the archer class is too weak. As a response to this, and arguably as a form of damage control, I suggest that we post a commendation on Virtek’s socials for the current speedrun world record holder of the starter dungeon, who just so happens to be an archer player.”
“Speedrun record... it’s held by an archer?” Derrick scratched his chin. “Good, very good! Haha! Send a link of it to the PR team immediately!”
“Sure thing.”
“What about the archer class test? Why is everyone failing it?”
“Unfortunately, the failure rate is just as bad as that reporter stated, and it’s our fault too.”
“Our fault? What do you mean?”
“The archery test being experienced by the players is the same as the one previously trialled in our closed beta.” Clyde made a regretful face. “The beta found that the archery test was too difficult for average people, so the development team reduced the distances by 20%, with the minimum target distance to pass being reduced from 25 metres to 20, and the furthest target reduced from 100 metres to 80. Most crucially, the number of attempts permitted to hit each target was increased from 1 to 3.”
“Oh.” Derrick raised an eyebrow. “So... why did we use the old version for launch?”
“The development team forgot to change it over.”
“...What?”
“They forgot to switch to the new model before launch.”
“...”
“They sent an email last night, informing us that they had made the mistake, but decided not to switch it over and fix it immediately, because then the players would find out that we blundered. They want it to look like a balancing patch instead.”
“Ugh.” Derrick facepalmed. “What a bunch of f*cking idiots.”
“Regardless, now it falls to us to decide how to compensate existing archers when we switch it over.”
“Compensate? Why would we need to compensate them?” Derrick didn’t follow.
“The existing archers were required to complete a harder test to obtain their classes, which isn’t really fair and might have restricted their class bracket,” Clyde explained. “The four main class brackets are [Novice Archer], [Archer], [Expert Archer] and [Master Archer], which give boosts of 25%, 50%, 75% or 100% extra bow damage, respectively. As things stand, only a few dozen people have reached the 2nd bracket, [Archer], and there are no expert or master players yet. There is one player who-”
“Alright, I get it, I get it,” Derrick interrupted. “Then how should we compensate them?”
Clyde frowned at being cut off, but continued nonetheless, “I propose we give them a 40% bonus to their class effect until their next class bracket promotion. So then, a [Novice Archer] with a 25% damage bonus would have that percentage increased to 35%, and the [Archer] bonus would be increased from 50% to 70%. There is one issue with-”
“Great! That’s a perfect idea.” Derrick clapped. “But that alone won’t bring the proportion of archers up by much will it?”
Clyde felt annoyed. “No, it likely still won’t exceed even 10% of players, which is half of the class average.”
“Then, I have a solution for that. You said that even the best scorers on the archery test are only getting a 50% boost, right? Why don’t we just double those boosts entirely? That way we can increase incentive to choose the archer class, as well as snuff out those assholes complaining archers are too weak!”
“No, wait, that’s too much. The class boosts were carefully considered by the development team to not give too much-”
“You mean the development team that just screwed up?” Derrick chortled. “They can get stuffed; our job is to balance the classes, so that’s just what we’ll do.”
“But Derrick, that’s a really big change to make. Plus, I’m pretty sure the scope of our work here is to balance the power between the classes, not the number of players. We should at least consult the directors before implementing something like that.”
“It’s nearly the weekend already; over a million more people will create accounts before then. We don’t have time to waste with unnecessary-”
“We can’t rush something like this!” Clyde protested. “There could be huge ramific-”
“Don’t interrupt me!” Derrick yelled with irritation. “I’m your superior and I have been given the authority to make the final calls when it comes to game balance. Do you have a problem with that?”
Clyde shot Derrick a reproving glance before replying, “...Alright, your call.”
“Good. Does anyone else have any objections or input?”
Derrick looked over the rest of the staff, who had remained quiet throughout the discussion. None of them made any attempt to speak up.
“Alright then. Implement the changes we discussed; I want the patch to be out by evening. I’m leaving to grab a coffee now, but I’ll come back to check on your progress later.”
The employees watched as Derrick exited through the doorway.
‘...Oh well, it’s not me who’ll catch the flak for it.’ Clyde shrugged and went back to work.