The Great OKW commander balancing

I think the prevalance of Grand Offensive has a lot less to do with OKW than it has to to with the IS-2.

The IS-2 has 375 armour, which means only other heavies and the Panther are effective against it.

In a meta where the IS-2 has a habit of being the first built vehicle larger than a T-70, the Tiger is going to be favoured: for a relatively small premium over the Panther you get potent manpower bleed too. Nobody's going to go Panther against the IS-2 if they've got a Tiger.

The problem isn't OKW's nondoc roster, it's that the 1v1 heavy tank rush meta hasn't been successfully killed off yet and the best counter to a heavy right now is another heavy. Until it is, you're going to keep seeing Grand Offensive.

I am not sure about that since C.Panther is probably better at dealing with IS-2 than the tiger,
especially with the mark target. Yet the commander was not picked a single time.That is an indicator of much how more powerful a main battle tank (all around unit) is, than a "specialized" unit, a problem that also seems to exist in Ostheer T4.

And what happened if you didn't go Panic Panther in the last meta?

You'd get whacked in the face with a techless heavy.

My point was basically since OKW have been choosing specific commander for years it is difficult to talk about their balance state. Commander choice might be easily hiding balance issues like the one you mentioned.

It's the same problem we've had for a year: stalling for heavies works, so the 1v1 degenerates into heavy tank standoffs.

I'm starting to think the only solution is to make heavy stalling completely unviable. The very existence of that strategy kills off so many others.

Now that sound a bit too drastic.

Imo there other issues. There has been a trend of allowing continuously higher power level units earlier in the game and has been driving continuous buff to numerous units. Imo this a bad direction since the game pace has been faster and now as you say we have ended up in the strongest of this units (Super heavy tank) stand off.

At this point I have to point out that Super heavies did not only become available allot earlier as I had pointed out (the point most people focus in) but allot more lethal with the new AOE profiles.

But there are number of solution to this issue like:
Slowing the pace of the game
Allowing longer windows of opportunity for each phase of the game
Redesigning Super heavy (some other units) to have less shock value and more sustain impact by Moving their power level to veterancy instead of base stats.

For example one could move allot of the IS-2 armor to vet bonuses instead of a base stat. The unit would still keep its "character" but is would have less shock value and allow opponent more time to prepare to deal with it.

What worries me, are the leaks that MOD is actually considering going the opposite route and lowering the vet bonuses of these units instead of lowering the base stats thus they seem to want to keep the shock value of these unit high.

I am not sure about that since C.Panther is probably better at dealing with IS-2 than the tiger,
especially with the mark target.

It's not, because the Tiger's DPM and durability advantages easily outweigh the minor advantages (vet 0 range, slightly more penetration, slightly better mobility) that the (Command) Panther has, when looking at a fight with an IS-2. Coordinated Fire only lasts for two reloads (three if you'd time it absolutely perfectly) and only shaves off 1 shot (from 7 to 6). And on top of that, the Tiger will also kill infantry way more effectively while being only slightly more expensive.

In my opinion, it's the IS-2's needlessly high armor that's causing problems, and which is effectively forcing OKW and Ostheer into Tiger Is as that unit is the only reliable counter (with the Panther being okay, but only until the IS-2 hits vet 2 and Ostheer can not transition into T4 that easily in 1v1). If we'd lower the IS-2s armor, units like the StuG, JP4, Panther and ATGs and Shrecks will have an easier time dealing with it, which should hopefully mean that Grand Offensive will no longer be the only viable choice OKW has against Soviets.

Along with some minor adjustments to the Tiger I's (and all heavies') timing, we should see a decrease in GO picks after that. OKW has plenty of good commanders, but I think players simply didn't want to risk picking them in a tourney where the strong Soviet late game dominated with a 10k doller pricepool on the line.

It's not, because the Tiger's DPM and durability advantages easily outweigh the two minor advantages (vet 0 range, slightly more penetration, slightly better mobility) that the (Command) Panther has, when looking at a fight with an IS-2. And on top of that, the Tiger will also kill infantry way more effectively with only a small price difference.

According to stats and if I am looking at the right numbers CP has better DPS vs IS-2 than tiger at all ranges even without Mark target:


tiger_kwk36_88mm_wg_mp 14.4/13.8/12.8/10.1/7.7
correct weapon should be:
tiger_kwk36_88mm_mp 19.5/18.8/18.1/15.0/12.0


wg_panther_75mm_commander_mp 16.7/16.2/15.7/15.1/14.6/12.8

That is 14% the DPS at range 40 and that is without counting the 10 extra range.

C.P should be better vs IS-2 or at least equally good and that is an indicator that problem is not limited to "dealing" with IS-2.

OKW has plenty of good commanders, but I think players simply didn't want to risk picking them in a tourney where the strong Soviet late game dominated with a 10k doller pricepool on the line.

Win rates indicate otherwise. G.O. seem to be allot more powerful than most OKW commanders...

Not sure what DPS you're looking at, but the (Command) Panther has a 6.65s reload with only 20/30 more penetration at max range while the Tiger I has more than a 20% faster reload at 5.25s. That extra bit of penetration does not make up for the reload disadvantage, and the Tiger I can easily afford to get closer because of its higher durability.

If I'm calculating it somewhat correctly, the Tiger I has a ~45s TTK while the Panther has a 54s TTK, against an IS-2 at 40-50 range, counting from the first shot. Disregarding accuracy because scatter shots are too unpredictable to quantify.

Win rates indicate otherwise. G.O. seem to be allot more powerful than most OKW commanders...

You can't seriously want to take the tournament win rates of sample sizes of 1-4 games per commander, with the exception of Luftwaffe at barely 18 games, and present them as fact? That data is completely unreliable. OKW won 2/4 games with no commanders picked, would that make picking no commander almost as good as Grand Offensive?

That theory is not supported by stat:
Fusiliers where used only in half the games that they where available and even then only 2 per game average. And that even thou the are available from CP0 and they have the great AT grenade utility.

On the other hand FJ which come allot later where used 94% of the games that they where available and slightly above 2 per game average while being more expensive come later and having less utility.

Its the knowledge that your weaknesses are covered. Fussies are designed to be worse than volks before upgrade, snare not withstanding so it's wiser to get volks but if you see a flame car you can have fussies in no time. Combine that peace of mind with a Tiger and you have a really easy pick for a commander.

Comparing them to a commander centered around arguably the most over performing infantry in the game certainly skews things though.
You take fussies out of grand offensive and it's still a decent commander, take falls out of their commander... Not so much. Fussies + tiger. You have the safety of fussies early game and the power of the tiger late game (plus all the other things like off the arty and what not)

Yeah I’m sure the faction with a negative win rate despite crutching on an OP unit will be absolutely fine when that unit is taken away.

In what game mode?

You can't seriously want to take the win rates of sample sizes of 1-4 games per commander, with the exception of Luftwaffe at barely 18 games, and present them as fact.

The fact only 2 commanders were consistently picked, GO and Luftwaffe, with one leading to significantly more wins than the other actually speaks volumes.

In my opinion, it's the IS-2's needlessly high armor that's causing problems, and which is effectively forcing OKW and Ostheer into Tiger Is as that unit is the only reliable counter (with the Panther being okay, but only until the IS-2 hits vet 2 and Ostheer can not transition into T4 that easily in 1v1). If we'd lower the IS-2s armor, units like the StuG, JP4, Panther and ATGs and Shrecks will have an easier time dealing with it, which should hopefully mean that Grand Offensive will no longer be the only viable choice OKW has against Soviets.

Along with some minor adjustments to the Tiger I's (and all heavies') timing, we should see a decrease in GO picks after that. OKW has plenty of good commanders, but I think players simply didn't want to risk picking them in a tourney where the strong Soviet late game dominated with a 10k doller pricepool on the line.

That's the crux of it, yeah: you're not going to risk going for anything but the heavy in case the opponent goes for the heavy. In automatch you might because it doesn't matter if you win, but a tournament? Heavy every time.

On the timing issue, what do you think of switching from CPs to an AEC-like sidetech instead? That shouldn't be much of an impediment in resource-rich teamgames, but should blunt the heavy rush in 1v1.

Heavies at the moment are a bit like putting the Luchs and the Panzer IV in the same tech building: the timing gap is too small to justify the Luchs. They play like Tier 5 vehicles now, so putting a teching barrier in front of them relative to mediums could help a lot.

If stalling for a heavy is advantageous over building mediums (as it is now), that's what's going to keep happening.

Not sure what DPS you're looking at, but the (Command) Panther has a 6.65s reload with only 20/30 more penetration at max range while the Tiger I has more than a 20% faster reload at 5.25s. That extra bit of penetration does not make up for the reload disadvantage, and the Tiger I can easily afford to get closer because of its higher durability.

If I'm calculating it somewhat correctly, the Tiger I has a ~45s TTK while the Panther has a 54s TTK, against an IS-2 at 40-50 range, counting from the first shot. Disregarding accuracy because scatter shots are too unpredictable to quantify.

I am checking DPS according to Relic spread sheet vs IS-2 for the weapons I have written. What i am not surer if is am looking at the correct Tiger weapon.

If your number are true then this is simply bad design since the specialized C.Panther (and thus the Panther)are far less cost efficient in its intended role as a counter to vehicles than the more all around Tiger.

You can't seriously want to take the tournament win rates of sample sizes of 1-4 games per commander, with the exception of Luftwaffe at barely 18 games, and present them as fact? That data is completely unreliable. OKW won 2/4 games with no commanders picked, would that make picking no commander almost as good as Grand Offensive?

I took all the games without G.O. vs the game G.O.

In 34 game OKW won 14 which is 42% while G.O won 21 if 34 games and that is a good indicator that the commander is OP.

I am pretty sure similar number will be available for Special OP before G.O. thus the faction performance in tournaments is heavily affect by the performance of specific commanders.

Its the knowledge that your weaknesses are covered. Fussies are designed to be worse than volks before upgrade, snare not withstanding so it's wiser to get volks but if you see a flame car you can have fussies in no time. Combine that peace of mind with a Tiger and you have a really easy pick for a commander.

The design might be ok but the implementation is bad, PF are weaker at start but become as good as Penals while having to invest a ton of munition on them.

Comparing them to a commander centered around arguably the most over performing infantry in the game certainly skews things though.
You take fussies out of grand offensive and it's still a decent commander, take falls out of their commander... Not so much. Fussies + tiger. You have the safety of fussies early game and the power of the tiger late game (plus all the other things like off the arty and what not)

I brought up the only other doctrinal infatry used in enough games. The comparison would be far worse if did with with JLI that where used 100% of the game their where available and above 3 times per game.

As for the flamer M3 that is simply cheesy tactics that should be removed. VG should have access to faust when the truck is built and not set up.

On the timing issue, what do you think of switching from CPs to an AEC-like sidetech instead? That shouldn't be much of an impediment in resource-rich teamgames, but should blunt the heavy rush in 1v1.

That's how I remember Blitzkrieg mod did it in its vCoH overhaul, and that was my personal originally proposed and preferred option too as it would've allowed to finetune heavies' arrival individually and down to the second, but ultimately the CP/tech hybrid was put in place and we'll have to try to make the best of that with some minor adjustments. Switching to a sidetech system at this point would be a lot of work in itself and it'd basically mean we'd have to start over from the beginning.

A Sturmtiger damage buff - as proposed by the thread starter - will NOT make the Sturmtiger useful. Doing more damage does not help when the problem is that it actually can not hit anything fast enough. The range needs to be increased, so it can fire beyond the fog of war. Make it inaccurate or nerf the wipe potential so it does not get OP.

The AVRE works, because it has a turret and the other player can't as easily predict where the AVRE player is goign to aim the shot. The Sturmtiger moves the whole hull into the targeted direction so is easily dodged. Thus imo the only way to make the Sturmtiger usefull is more range.

That's how I remember Blitzkrieg mod did it in its vCoH overhaul, and that was my personal originally proposed and preferred option too as it would've allowed to finetune heavies' arrival individually and down to the second, but ultimately the CP/tech hybrid was put in place and we'll have to try to make the best of that with some minor adjustments. Switching to a sidetech system at this point would be a lot of work in itself and it'd basically mean we'd have to start over from the beginning.

Is sticking a sidetech on the HQ building that complex to implement?

The design might be ok but the implementation is bad, PF are weaker at start but become as good as Penals while having to invest a ton of munition on them.

Is say that's a decent implementation as well. Flexible but resource heavy so it's better to incorporate them in with Volks than replace them entirely. I still take issue with a 5 man dual Shrek squad but I'll admit it's not as big of an issue as I had thought it would be (in part because of the g43s I assume) but I still don't like it..

I brought up the only other doctrinal infatry used in enough games. The comparison would be far worse if did with with JLI that where used 100% of the game their where available and above 3 times per game.

I think you are misunderstanding me. Fussies are a big part of grand offensive due to the peace of mind, but not the star like JLI or falls are for thier commanders. You build your play around falls and JLI and pick the commander based on them alone, but fussies are there if y ou need them. You pick for the tiger, but knowing you won't be flamed to base or t70d to base or having a more durable replacement if you lose a volks squad ect gives the commander flexibility that puts it in the S tier where falls and JLI do so through raw power know what I mean?

As for the flamer M3 that is simply cheesy tactics that should be removed. VG should have access to faust when the truck is built and not set up.

I believe okw infantry needs a redesign making sturms more accessible and more flexible and most importantly having some of the power from volks moved over to allow for such a change. Volks have been the subject of "okw needs x so now volks have x" for too long and have overgrown their role to become rifles lite and are the cause of most of the okw related balance matchup issues imo including basicly all the infantry buffs Soviet have got since okw was released. Id soonerwe see some variation from volks solve all of OKW's problems with no effort or investments like we have now.

A Sturmtiger damage buff - as proposed by the thread starter - will NOT make the Sturmtiger useful. Doing more damage does not help when the problem is that it actually can not hit anything fast enough. The range needs to be increased, so it can fire beyond the fog of war. Make it inaccurate or nerf the wipe potential so it does not get OP.

The AVRE works, because it has a turret and the other player can't as easily predict where the AVRE player is goign to aim the shot. The Sturmtiger moves the whole hull into the targeted direction so is easily dodged. Thus imo the only way to make the Sturmtiger usefull is more range.

I'm inclined to agree with this. You could make it do 10,000 damage and it would still be trash because it takes SO long to shoot, it's aoe isn't great and even then it's going to miss. It needs all of its last wave of nerfs reverted and it's output revised. Make it 80 79 damage a cross its AOE if you have to but make it bloody well hit and hurt its target. RNG all or nothing is garbage design.

Is sticking a sidetech on the HQ building that complex to implement?

Well, yes.
- Add sidetech to every faction's tech structure;
- Add new UI and descriptions;
- Debate and decide on whether or not heavy TDs, assault gun and semi-heavies like the KV-2 and Churchills need this too;
- Debate and decide (well, basically guess) the prices for said tech;
- Add build time and decide on how long for each vehicle;
- Do all this with a multinational crew that works on a voluntary basis (a simple decision can sometimes take days);
- Adjust all ingame commander cards;
- Adjust all menu commander cards;
- Test all this and adjust/fix where needed;
- Probably do all this for a custom mod so people can test the new timings, which would probably have to run for several weeks with some adjustments and updates, and then all of it would have to be re-done on Relic's side.

And that's just the initial implementation. It'd be mostly a complete guess what the costs of such tech would be per heavy and it'd surely have to be adjusted afterwards, which would then probably take another period of 3-6 months to get right.

Maybe it would've been better to use a sidetech system instead of the hybrid system, maybe it wouldn't have been. We'll probably never know as right now I'm afraid it's too late to change it.

Is say that's a decent implementation as well. Flexible but resource heavy so it's better to incorporate them in with Volks than replace them entirely. I still take issue with a 5 man dual Shrek squad but I'll admit it's not as big of an issue as I had thought it would be (in part because of the g43s I assume) but I still don't like it..

I do not agree the implementation is bad since they are allot less cost efficient than Penal because they are more expensive and about equal power. The unit is simply not cost efficient.

(That is partially have to do with Penals which should follow the same design as PF and start weaker but having an access to SVT as upgrade is one want to follow their current role)

I think you are misunderstanding me...

And problems with that is that only need 1 to protect you from the flamer clown car that should actually is cheesy and should be removed as tactic vs OKW. The AT PZ are not really that great dealing with T-70.

I believe okw infantry needs a redesign making sturms more accessible and more flexible and most importantly having some of the power from volks moved over to allow for such a change. Volks have been the subject of "okw needs x so now volks have x" for too long and have overgrown their role to become rifles lite and are the cause of most of the okw related balance matchup issues imo including basicly all the infantry buffs Soviet have got since okw was released. Id soonerwe see some variation from volks solve all of OKW's problems with no effort or investments like we have now.

I agree with that and I post about the problem with ST44 VG repeatedly.

And that's just the initial implementation. It'd be mostly a complete guess what the costs of such tech would be per heavy and it'd surely have to be adjusted afterwards, which would then probably take another period of 3-6 months to get right.

Maybe it would've been better to use a sidetech system instead of the hybrid system, maybe it wouldn't have been. We'll probably never know as right now I'm afraid it's too late to change it.

What about jacking up the prices on heavies? That'd have a similar effect, except it'd be paid on every call-in rather than just the first.

So what can be done about them?

You do what I’ve been saying the past week should be done and Sander93 disagrees with me on: You place a +30 to +50 cost and a 10min cooldown timer on the call in when the unit dies.

.... We'll probably never know as right now I'm afraid it's too late to change it.

Imo that is not a good argument. The balance team seem has developed of mentality of "sticking to its guns" once they have decide on direction even when there plenty of proof that the direction is wrong and when it is clear that is easier to roll back some.

Classic example of that is Penal/ST44 VG and the insistence of continuing down that path ending up to have to power up the majority of infatry in the game instead of rolling back.

Even in this case of Super heavies the it seem that they are moving in wrong direction. Super heavies got a combination of major buff becoming available and becoming more lethal although the patche's target was to make "stalling for a heavy tank call-in too rewarding" and "certain heavy tanks came too late in team games"

Heavy Tank Call-In Changes for all Factions
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According to what has been said:

Heavy tanks at 13 CPs came way too late for teamgames, where resources are inflated and CP gain is deflated. This meant that they arrived at a time when there were already 1-2 vet 2-3 TDs around per every enemy player, making them mostly unviable to use. Moving heavies back to 12 CPs may benefit 1v1s, but it would not benefit 3v3s and 4v4s.

So in order to make Super heavies more effective in 3vs3 and above ended up making heavy tank stalling worse. When in this case making TDs less effective and lowering the CP by 1 would actually give some breathing room for super heavies in 3vs3 and above.

Imo this is beyond who is right or wrong or what looks "easier" is about finding the best solutions even if in the sort run they look more difficult". In the long run better solution are proven to be easier.