Balancing PvP for multiple group sizes in MMORPGs

“You can’t balance 1v1 and 5v5 simultaneously”… the very idea, honestly. 
So short sighted, biased and disappointing.

It took me naught 2 seconds to recall from memory, a system that effortlessly solves the problem of group buff and AoE damage imbalance for multiple group sizes.

A scaling curve based on the number of allies and/or hostiles effected.

Allow me to pose a rough example.

When one target stands in an AoE DoT, within one or two ticks it deals damage comparable to a single target nuke. However these damage ticks are reduced by 15% for each additional target hit up to five, where the curve plateaus scaling evenly for all additional targets.

Buffs and debuffs would scale in exactly the same manor, all that ever need be adjusted (for balancing purposes) are the values that shape the curves of each individual skill. This allows for balancing multiple group sizes via variation of the skills numbers, without altering the way players use them.

And since each skill has it’s own scaling curve you can ensure no one skill scales better than another due to a difference in base numbers or skill mechanics.

This makes for an effective method of dynamically scaling the power of group or 1v1 focused abilities on a per skill basis. Which entirely prevents imbalance of said skills when used outside the context they were originally designed for, wither 1v1, anti-zerg, or anything in-between.