Detailing my thoughts for each move/resource/passive for each character would be way too much text so I’m writing one big blurb here about my general approach (albeit ever-evolving as I continue working and learning from new feedback), instead of trying to detail it out for each class I’ve worked on.

I’ll try to capture the main pieces and structure it. A lot of these don’t cleanly land in just one section, but hey structure helps legibility so here we are!

Forming the Foundation

The initial creation of my classes have started from one of several angles:

• Target Audience
  • Is there a hole / underserved niche out of the hero roster?
  • Do we have specific targets like “This character will be the tutorial character” to drive specific goals from?
• Narrative Inspiration
  • Characters with pre-defined narratives often lead to a lot of inspiration either through gameplay ideas or synergistic identities
    • e.g. Karim was a suave villain fire mage, naturally inspiring a destructive-but-stylish playstyle
• Gameplay Inspiration
  • Sometimes I’ll have an idea for a resource, ability, or otherwise mechanic that seems like such a great core/”glue” for a character, that it’ll drive other areas

And regardless of the initial inspiration, the other 2 need to be met, so I work backwards from there, and e.g. if a good gameplay idea doesn’t also mesh with narrative and target audience needs, then I stash that away and look for new inspiration.

How it plays

Once I’ve got a good foundation of what the character’s core identity is, I fill in the rest with cohesive ideas. I also like to work with the rest of the team to source cool ideas, and overall I work at the kit until everything is cohesive and meshing really well together.

Below is a big list of stuff I deeply consider / iterate on as I work away at a class. I’ll endeavor to come back and add to it as I remember or learn things!

• I want players to think like the character
  • For example, Soren was a skilled swordsman but a showboat that would sometimes fumble it and embarrass himself
    • So his kit really thrives on pulling off daring “block frames at the start of certain moves” to keep his combo going, and his combo meter leads to really flashy moves, BUT it’s easy to mis-time those block frames and get your whole combo meter reset to 0. Embarrassing!
  • Another example, Viren was a villainous Dark Mage character who would sometimes push his dark magic too far even for his own good
    • So his kit had regular access to remarkably powerful spells, but they would cause Corruption, and if he kept using those spells while at high Corruption, he’d take significant damage… but sometimes that was worth it for the immediate results!
• Good spread of difficulties, roles, complexities, playstyles
  • Mentioned in the target audience section, but even when the target audience needs aren’t especially strict, I’m thinking about how this class ( / spec / weapon) fits into the greater pool, and how it will provide value to players
• Playing “as” or “with” or “against”
  • Speaking of providing value to players, it doesn’t just come in the form of people playing that class, it also comes in the form of them being present in your game (“with” or “against”). This can largely be thinking about synergies and counterplay, but also informs things like “Will players be annoyed or confused by this spell? Will this make intuitive sense to allies/enemies who don’t play the class?”
• Rhythm
  • I always endeavor to build good rhythm into my classes, both in the individual abilities (e.g. a basic attack string having a nice rhythm to it), and in how the kit plays altogether, like how a bread-and-butter combo sounds, or how it’ll sound to interrupt basic attacks with a special attack -> go back to basic attacking.
  • I also make sure to differentiate rhythm between characters. I think it’s a big subconscious element of keeping characters feeling different
• Resources
  • In Xadia I had the luxury of giving each character a unique resource, which made them feel especially unique. But even short of that, just looking at cooldowns, ability charges, health, common resources like mana — how can this character interact with resources in a cohesive, often differentiated way? And how does it all come together for a good play experience (e.g. good-feeling rotation, or “no bad conflicts, only good conflicts” when playing by priority order)
• Button placement
  • This moreso applies in games with limited abilities where most players will play with a given default (e.g. MOBAs “QWER” setup, or default gamepad setup, or positions of touch screen buttons), and it tends to fall into patterns like “1st ability is their bread-and-butter, 2nd ability is their defensive or offensive cooldown, 3rd is their other utility”, but is still considered for each class individually.
  • Based on how the hero plays, what buttons will typically be hit in what order, what buttons need to be easy for a quick reaction-based hit… how can each ability be mapped to where these actions feel fluid?
• Satisfaction / Gamefeel
  • There’s a whole lot to this, and a lot also falls on anim/vfx/sfx (though I work with them on this too), but as a designer I can design and implement a lot of satisfaction in myself.
  • Namely, a lot of this is classic “juice” stuff like well-tuned camera shake and haptics. But also things like building anticipation, cool combos like “a 2s cast with an instant cast follow-up”, and playing well to the camera’s position, are all similarly important.
  • Also, the amount of satisfaction should be relative to the ability, to intuitively convey ability strength and make the big powerful stuff feel all-the-better due to relative judgement.
• Strengths and Weaknesses
  • Another big part of differentiating characters, but also just making them more interesting to pilot: giving them well-defined strengths and weaknesses. I’ve primarily worked on games that support playing solo and wanted to be welcoming to more casual gamers, so I haven’t gone SUPER hard on this, but I still design a lot of this into each kit.
  • A lot of this lives at the role level (e.g. a tank doesn’t do as much damage as a DPS but can withstand more and control enemies more), but there’s flexibility within roles as well to push in certain directions. Like a mage may be more AoE-oriented, or another might have more control but pay for it in damage or difficulty
• Solo vs Duo vs Trio
  • How does this character succeed solo? What leaves them wanting/appreciating others? Relates a lot to the strengths and weaknesses above, but also impacts playstyle. E.g. a mage that’s having to spend time kiting isn’t going to have the same rotation as one casting on a tanked enemy. I make sure to design/tune for each resulting playstyle
  • This also varies depending on whether teammates are synergistic or not. How does a team of 3 mages play? 3 tanks? 2 melee dps and 1 ranged? or the full ideal spread in Xadia, 1 tank 1 melee 1 ranged? Make sure ideal feels best, but unideal is still fun!
• Combos with other characters
  • Relating to multiplayer play and synergies, some moves should lead to awesome combos!
  • For example in Xadia, Karim’s ultimate deals the most damage to enemies in the center, and casts a set distance from him. So he’d love it if someone kept enemies still for him to ult them, especially a tank that can get multiple, and ESPECIALLY a tank like Zeph that can pull many enemies into one spot!
• AoE vs ST, Fodder vs Elite vs Boss
  • Another consideration, beyond just strengths and weaknesses, how does this class play in each of these scenarios? For low-difficulty characters, these should be somewhat similar, but for many higher-difficulty characters, these can be differentiated for an opportunity to keep the game fresh minute-to-minute.
• Progression experience
  • How does this character unlock their kit? What pieces can be given as level-up rewards, or even temporary buffs like roguelike mission-scoped buffs or set piece bonuses in a region?
  • Sometimes this has informed the kits themselves, as sometimes a kit had TOO many synergies required to feel good, and it was making the first few hours of playing the character (with limited abilities) betray what the character would become.
  • Ideally (and nearly a requirement), the character should already be giving the player a sense of what they’ll be like from very early on in progression. It sucks for players to get many many hours in just to find out that the class becomes something they don’t enjoy.
• Early gameplay vs Late gameplay (10hr player vs 100hr player)
  • Beyond progression itself, why does this character stay engaging? Not as necessary for low-difficulty characters (since they draw less high-engagement-centric players), but I look to provide ways that many hours into play, players are still learning little details about the kit, better ways to optimize, interactions with specific enemies or other classes, etc.
• Movement
  • I’ve primarily worked on action-combat games, so movement has been absolutely core to every move, even if it’s just that the move itself locks them in place or slows their movement down. Movement provides a lot of gamefeel, balance, and interesting options for players, so I’m sure to fine-tune the crap out of it
• Animation / VFX / SFX
  • And just a quick blurb here about working with others. Overall, my role in the team tends to be the glue that brings all the other disciplines together, and the person that drives a lot of the iteration, feedback, and ultimately the quality bar of the character.
  • My direct ownership is the gameplay and implementation of said gameplay, so my needs of other disciplines isn’t “make this animation,” it’s “make an animation that has X and Y gameplay properties.” I work to align the team on the whole vision of the character, such that they understand the context of their work, can contribute ideas, and all work together meaningfully and efficiently.
  • And just as a matter of experience and close relationships with my teammates, I’ve picked up a lot of knowledge in those spaces to better aid my communication / feedback and get them the info they need faster, or know where juniors may trip up ahead of time and provide extra information up-front to help them.

Ultimately, making a class full-time leaves a lot of opportunities to iterate and learn, so I’m sure there are various bits that I’ve left out. I tried to keep it relatively concise (I think each of those bullets would be a whole chapter in a book)