Senior Combat Designer

Responsibilities

• Work with the Combat Lead and Combat Team to develop and iterate on player abilities, enemy behavior, encounter structure, and player feedback loops
• Collaborate closely with Engineering, Level Design, and Art to bring combat from prototype to polished, shippable state
• Define and iterate on the combat feel — tuning timing, pacing, responsiveness, and difficulty curves to deliver satisfying moment-to-moment gameplay
• Build and maintain combat design documentation, standards, and best practices that scale with the team
• Playtest and analyze combat extensively, using both qualitative feedback and player data to drive iteration
• Partner with Systems Design to ensure combat integrates cohesively with progression, economy, and live ops frameworks

Requirements

• 5+ years of professional game development experience, including senior-level ownership of combat design on at least one shipped title
• Strong portfolio or shipped work demonstrating deep combat design craft — ability, encounter, and enemy design with clear design intent
• Hands-on experience implementing and iterating on combat directly in a game engine, ideally Unity
• Deep understanding of combat feel, player psychology, difficulty tuning, and how combat systems support broader game design goals
• Strong communication and collaboration skills, comfortable working cross-functionally in small, fast-moving teams
• Self-motivated and comfortable with ownership in an ambiguous, early-stage environment

Nice to Have

• Experience designing combat for mobile free-to-play games
• Experience with ARPG combat systems, including ability design, cooldown structures, and build diversity
• Experience designing combat for isometric, top-down, or strategy game camera perspectives
• Experience working within an established IP or licensed property
• Experience leveraging AI tools to accelerate combat prototyping, tuning, or documentation workflows

Pay

US$120,000 – US$145,000 depending on experience, plus health/vision/dental coverage, 401(k) matching, commuting benefits, and equity.