Elite Mod COH - Download and Changelog

I don't like the concept of negative zeal either designwise but it is what was giving the 1 sniper (and other infantry units) a better chance vs the sniperblob. (Before CS went to full 100%)

It takes quite some skill to micro 2 snipers away from each other and like still be in a retreatable / safe position. If they are spread it's easier to get one, cut off his/their retreat path and jump onto them.

About upkeep, it's not a system that is meant as starvation, but as a tradeoff. A
small comeback mechanic (but not a too big one.) I don't like how it's / was worked out in COH2 where it was too big, so the losing team always had a chance to comeback easy or something. My personal idea was to increase it a bit, so snipers would be less of a preferable unit. But they should still be viable to use. They are really needed in certain situations.

The problem I have with upkeep is that it encourages using Snipers freely to get back the MP you're losing passively, rather than controlled/carefully.

The problem I have with upkeep is that it encourages using Snipers freely to get back the MP you're losing passively, rather than controlled/carefully.

Yup you need to kill higher priority targets to get your money back (in theory), that's what I am getting at. Use them as counters to Grenadiers, Weapon teams (especially ATG's) instead of Volks / rifles. "Maybe I'm not going to build them if i'm only facing volks or rifles?" 'Maybe I prefer full rifle upgrades or an extra MG42 to counter those types of units?'

This is what I'm trying to get at. I want to push snipers usage in that direction. But like start with small changes.

Now everything looks like the Tomitoma chart (where the answer was always Straff) and your best option is to get a sniper no matter what. xD

The difference between a Volks reinforce and a Gren reinforce isn't significant. What would be significant is your Sniper sitting on cd too often, which isn't something to penalize imo.

Explain to me why you would be more likely to buy a Sniper now knowing your opponent can CS with 100% accuracy. Because that makes no sense whatsoever.

Explain to me why you would be more likely to buy a Sniper now knowing your opponent can CS with 100% accuracy. Because that makes no sense whatsoever.

Isn't the whole point that you're less likely to buy a sniper?

You're more likely to buy a sniper now when your opponent has a sniper. Because CS is risk free now. And sometimes you just need a sniper to deal with grens/rangers, atg's, mg's ... etc. That's why i'm opposed to 100% A T2 Grenblob with 1 CS is so stronk.
You are trying to make Snipers invalid because of the fear/risk factor, I'm just trying to make them less cost effective. (Which they still are anyways)

And to go back on the upkeep system again; it's still not that expensive and the thing; you need to use unit A to get your cost back counts every unit.

Btw new bombing run, just drops 2 bombs on nearly the same spot most of the time. 6 Different landing spots is the most I've seen in a couple of tests. But I guess that's still a better spread.

I'm not too keen on changes to snipers that affect 1v1 sniper battles. I think it was great how it was.

The problem with changing snipers around is that sniper blobs are just an extrapolation of whatever snipers are. If blobs are a problem (which they are) and not the unit itself (snipers are great) then the best thing to balance are its counters: bikes, jeeps, or simply affect how non-snipers react/interact with snipers.

For instance, if units that are shot by a sniper are given a temporary defense against sniper fire (in the form of reduced received accuracy) that lasts, say, the reload time of the sniper rifle, then the barrage of sniper blob fire on a single unit would have to be staggered for maximum efficiency. (I guess simulating the squad getting hit moving and acting under the realization there is now a sniper shooting them.) Also, attack moving a sniper blob at charging squads to spread out the shots usually works out poorly for the snipers' survival.

As long as it is short enough to never affect a single sniper, it would promote more surgical single sniper strikes, and reduce the impact of the first barrage of a sniper blobs fire. (The whole point and click unit deletion thing.)

Another option would be to have the negative zeal (which is effective for short range blobs, different for long range snipers) affect the sniper cloaking mechanic. Perhaps by unifying the cloaking timers and/or being revealed for much longer when near other snipers.

Although I must always keep in mind, the most powerful counter to snipers is, and probably always will be, the "Unit Sniped!" button.

Moderate changes > drastic changes IMO. Pushing CS to 100% sounds pretty drastic to me.

For instance, if units that are shot by a sniper are given a temporary defense against sniper fire (in the form of reduced received accuracy) that lasts, say, the reload time of the sniper rifle, then the barrage of sniper blob fire on a single unit would have to be staggered for maximum efficiency. (I guess simulating the squad getting hit moving and acting under the realization there is now a sniper shooting them.) Also, attack moving a sniper blob at charging squads to spread out the shots usually works out poorly for the snipers' survival.

As long as it is short enough to never affect a single sniper, it would promote more surgical single sniper strikes, and reduce the impact of the first barrage of a sniper blobs fire. (The whole point and click unit deletion thing.)

This has been my favorite solution to mass-Snipers but it's very difficult to implement. But perhaps not impossible.

EDIT: Trying to figure out how to implement it and came upon something that would be pretty easy (though I don't like it quite as much): Upon firing a Sniper Rifle, all allied camouflaged units in X radius of the Sniper are revealed for X seconds.

It's the opposite idea though, instead of staggering your mass Snipers you'd want to use them to alpha strike, which I don't want to encourage.

What if snipers within a certain radius of each other (the range working the same way as anti-zeal) got decreased accuracy instead of an increase of received accuracy?

I liked the idea of staggering your shots, if you only shoot with 1 of your Snipers I don't know if you need to miss. Still good though, and much easier to implement.

I think this mod should be implented into vCOh

I don't understand why you have such a fixation on the sniper. With this change, you are castrating sniper play by making it too easy to countersnipe. And this is without mentioning the ramifications it will have with abilities like strafing run, bike/jeep drive by etc.

The problem, as I see it, is when one player gets the upper hand with regards to sniper superiority. When he has more than one and his opponent as the same time is forced to counter them with a sniper of his own (a grenspamming WM player vs US sniperspam, a fuel-starved/vehicle-countered US player who needs the sniper as anti infantry but is up against sniper spam, etc.). A reason to include the sniper in an early WM build was to already have prepared for eventual US snipers.

The above situations get fixed with the negative zeal effect, which helps a lone sniper when he is up against many. It will increase his chances of evening out the sniping field. And if he gets the countersnipe due to the negative zeal, there is still room for the spamming player to counterplay; after all, he still has a sniper of his own to make countersnipes with. For me, this is enough to alleviate any problems there were with sniper wars.

Think back to how sniper wars actually played out on high levels. Here, the game evolved around not necessarily getting the countersnipe, but instead of killing more troops with your sniper than his. This meant that it became a dance of death, trying to rack up as many kills as possible without being countersniped, using screening troops, los, range... It was micro intensive and rewarded active play.

With this change, we will instead have one player wait for his opponent to have the guts and courage to actually USE his unit, only for the passive player to be rewarded with a guaranteed hit...

I have to ask: Why this fixation on snipers, making them seem like a big problem that requires a redesign of the game mechanics? I can understand wanting to solve the problems of sniperspam... but instead you make such drastic changes that affect snipers in their entirety. Why make such a drastic change that, to me, reeks of wanting to "balance" the game in favor of your own playstyles?

I don't understand why you have such a fixation on the sniper. With this change, you are castrating sniper play by making it too easy to countersnipe. And this is without mentioning the ramifications it will have with abilities like strafing run, bike/jeep drive by etc.

The problem, as I see it, is when one player gets the upper hand with regards to sniper superiority. When he has more than one and his opponent as the same time is forced to counter them with a sniper of his own (a grenspamming WM player vs US sniperspam, a fuel-starved/vehicle-countered US player who needs the sniper as anti infantry but is up against sniper spam, etc.). A reason to include the sniper in an early WM build was to already have prepared for eventual US snipers.

The above situations get fixed with the negative zeal effect, which helps a lone sniper when he is up against many. It will increase his chances of evening out the sniping field. And if he gets the countersnipe due to the negative zeal, there is still room for the spamming player to counterplay; after all, he still has a sniper of his own to make countersnipes with. For me, this is enough to alleviate any problems there were with sniper wars.

Think back to how sniper wars actually played out on high levels. Here, the game evolved around not necessarily getting the countersnipe, but instead of killing more troops with your sniper than his. This meant that it became a dance of death, trying to rack up as many kills as possible without being countersniped, using screening troops, los, range... It was micro intensive and rewarded active play.

With this change, we will instead have one player wait for his opponent to have the guts and courage to actually USE his unit, only for the passive player to be rewarded with a guaranteed hit...

I have to ask: Why this fixation on snipers, making them seem like a big problem that requires a redesign of the game mechanics? I can understand wanting to solve the problems of sniperspam... but instead you make such drastic changes that affect snipers in their entirety. Why make such a drastic change that, to me, reeks of wanting to "balance" the game in favor of your own playstyles?

So you have a problem with 100% accuracy for moving snipers or the 2 shot requirement on retreat? Or both?

The major issue is in the randomness of countersnipes, most noticeably the following issue: you bait his sniper to shot preparing a countersnipe but it misses, you retreat your sniper but his other sniper kills it on retreat. This situation only encourages to have more snipers because the more you have the better the chance to get a Sniper kill.

A compromise between these 2 perspectives can be to restore 50% moving accuracy but have 100% accuracy on retreat (heroic_critical), but maybe raise the number of shot needed to kill above 2.

I don't understand why you have such a fixation on the sniper. With this change, you are castrating sniper play by making it too easy to countersnipe. And this is without mentioning the ramifications it will have with abilities like strafing run, bike/jeep drive by etc.

The problem, as I see it, is when one player gets the upper hand with regards to sniper superiority. When he has more than one and his opponent as the same time is forced to counter them with a sniper of his own (a grenspamming WM player vs US sniperspam, a fuel-starved/vehicle-countered US player who needs the sniper as anti infantry but is up against sniper spam, etc.). A reason to include the sniper in an early WM build was to already have prepared for eventual US snipers.

The above situations get fixed with the negative zeal effect, which helps a lone sniper when he is up against many. It will increase his chances of evening out the sniping field. And if he gets the countersnipe due to the negative zeal, there is still room for the spamming player to counterplay; after all, he still has a sniper of his own to make countersnipes with. For me, this is enough to alleviate any problems there were with sniper wars.

Think back to how sniper wars actually played out on high levels. Here, the game evolved around not necessarily getting the countersnipe, but instead of killing more troops with your sniper than his. This meant that it became a dance of death, trying to rack up as many kills as possible without being countersniped, using screening troops, los, range... It was micro intensive and rewarded active play.

With this change, we will instead have one player wait for his opponent to have the guts and courage to actually USE his unit, only for the passive player to be rewarded with a guaranteed hit...

I have to ask: Why this fixation on snipers, making them seem like a big problem that requires a redesign of the game mechanics? I can understand wanting to solve the problems of sniperspam... but instead you make such drastic changes that affect snipers in their entirety. Why make such a drastic change that, to me, reeks of wanting to "balance" the game in favor of your own playstyles?

+ ONEHUNDREDTHOUSANDBILLIONMILLION^9001

Thank you, somebody (high level) actually saying the same thing as I am

This situation only encourages to have more snipers because the more you have the better the chance to get a Sniper kill.

No this is offset by negative zeal.
People are way too focused on just the (counter)snipers, forgetting the box around it.

What Aimstrong is saying, with the dance of snipers, is you pick of targets each time, you are still taking a risk, but you can still trade in kills and actually USE your investment.

Sometimes you just need snipers (vet gren spam) if the Wehr player gets a sniper, you can't use the US sniper anymore because the risk is too great. So with 100% countersnipe, each sides snipers nullify the other one, there is no more talk of trading. And your 340mp investment just sits there.

You wouldn't care about negative zeal either anymore because it's a 100% anyways, so the one with the biggest amount of snipers does indeed win in this situation.

You do realize you can still easily use a sniper in a ggren spam situation easily all you need to do is take 1 shot, wait for the reload, then wait a little bit more if you know he got a sniper, and snipe again, because the initial decloak time doesn't take enough time for the sniper to CS.

No this is offset by negative zeal.
People are way too focused on just the (counter)snipers, forgetting the box around it.

What Aimstrong is saying, with the dance of snipers, is you pick of targets each time, you are still taking a risk, but you can still trade in kills and actually USE your investment.

Sometimes you just need snipers (vet gren spam) if the Wehr player gets a sniper, you can't use the US sniper anymore because the risk is too great. So with 100% countersnipe, each sides snipers nullify the other one, there is no more talk of trading. And your 340mp investment just sits there.

You wouldn't care about negative zeal either anymore because it's a 100% anyways, so the one with the biggest amount of snipers does indeed win in this situation.

So you risk 340 mp for 24/27/35/etc mp every time you gamble, which investment was negated as you said in scenarios "Sometimes you just need snipers (vet gren spam) if the Wehr player gets a sniper, you can't use the US sniper anymore because the risk is too great." , so what does 100% accuracy vs moving snipers change on that? Who would risk that much mp(the sniper itself) for that less(for a single infantry kill) with 50% to lose? As Oktarnash said (you can still "dance" as before, calculating heroic armor retreat into the equation too which although enables snipers to reliably escape but giving free reign to enemy snipers to go ahead in kills) is whats the case and was even before 100% accuracy change was implemented and still is the way "dancing" would work now, but hey I am in for adding even more choices to the player, so the moving accuracy can be restored to what it was, but the retreating countersnipes must be addressed (predictability on retreating sniper), which I described in my previous post:
(""The major issue is in the randomness of countersnipes, most noticeably the following issue: you bait his sniper to shot preparing a countersnipe but it misses, you retreat your sniper but his other sniper kills it on retreat."")
Negative zeal does not really remove this from happening.

Yes it sucks you had the odds in your advantage, but got behind. But that can happen a lot over the course in the game. Arty barrages, lucky mortars, 5%, dat one crucial zook that misses. (I remember a game Seb vs Aimstrong(?), where Aimstrongs rangers ate pumas for breakfast, but Seb his Zooks missed a low health Puma.)

(""The major issue is in the randomness of countersnipes, most noticeably the following issue: you bait his sniper to shot preparing a countersnipe but it misses, you retreat your sniper but his other sniper kills it on retreat."")
Negative zeal does not really remove this from happening.

Yes but then you get to the argument again where:
* Recon run = wasted munitions
* Suicidal jeep = 220mp loss

+ You can still miss on retreat. (?) + Heroic critical type is a bit of a very safe choice to stay alive.

I could imagine living with it if the retreat shot would be 100% accurate for example. Although It'd be a bit of a weird mechanic.

Strafe is still a nerfed version;

Acc increment should be on 2x instead of 1.225x

And this is without mentioning the ramifications it will have with abilities like strafing run, bike/jeep drive by etc.

Those are accounted for already

Think back to how sniper wars actually played out on high levels. Here, the game evolved around not necessarily getting the countersnipe, but instead of killing more troops with your sniper than his. This meant that it became a dance of death, trying to rack up as many kills as possible without being countersniped, using screening troops, los, range... It was micro intensive and rewarded active play.

With this change, we will instead have one player wait for his opponent to have the guts and courage to actually USE his unit, only for the passive player to be rewarded with a guaranteed hit...

Why has any of that changed? Screening, shotblockers, range, they're all just as important if not more. This isn't redefining the mechanics of counter-sniping, only changing the odds. You trade kills in exactly the same situations you do now - when you can account for the exact position of the enemies Sniper but don't have a CS angle on him. Then you settle for a kill on a less valuable target and reposition for the next dance.

"But you can't even take the first shot for fear of being counter-sniped!"

If you told me that you seriously expected your opponent had a shot on you, but took the shot anyway hoping the 50% miss chance would bail you out, you deserved to lose your Sniper. You got outplayed but lost nothing because of one diceroll. Your opponent did precisely what he should have done and was rewarded with nothing.

I have to ask: Why this fixation on snipers, making them seem like a big problem that requires a redesign of the game mechanics? I can understand wanting to solve the problems of sniperspam... but instead you make such drastic changes that affect snipers in their entirety. Why make such a drastic change that, to me, reeks of wanting to "balance" the game in favor of your own playstyles?

This isn't reinventing the wheel, it's adjusting one outlying RNG that had too much impact on the outcome of the game. It has nothing to do with playstyle, if you really feel that's the motivation then please question these players as well:

12azor-
Snipers are so critical in the current meta-game and have been for such a long time that counter-sniping and even revealing the fact you've built a counter-sniper is absolutely game-changing and can have a massive impact on the game at any stage.

Snipers should have a 100% chance to hit an enemy Sniper regardless of movement and the only reason they should ever miss is from an accuracy modifier on retreat.
...
I think the Sniper thing is such a massive issue in terms of the meta-game that it should be changed and the 5% thing is a feature and critical hits are random but rarely game-changing in the same way counter-sniping almost always is.

0mar-
Considering how quickly a bullshit dice roll can change the game when it comes to sniper vs sniper battles (basically a 680 manpower swing), sniper vs sniper needs to be 100%.

Using a sniper aggressively should come with a risk, that is, you get one-shotted by his sniper. That's the whole point of counter-sniping. However, when you introduce dice rolls, what often happens is that the counter-sniper misses his shot and now the opponent knows (or worse, kills your sniper) you have a sniper and can act accordingly. This happens disproportionately to the WM sniper.

Sepha -
While i'm hesitant to change something that's stayed the same way for so long, the only thing i'd change is making accuracy 100% between snipers. But I would also make this the same change for a moving sniper, or not change the moving accuracy at all. Why should anyone have such a large bonus simply by moving their snipers around? It would be impossible to counter snipe.

SayNoToStim -
100% sniper vs sniper regardless of situation would be my opinion.

fatebomb -
100 % hits except on retreats

Kashll -
Agreed, 100% except retreats. A sniper versus sniper battle has too much of a manpower swing to leave anythign up to chance (it can decide an entire game).

Budwise -
In CoHO it is 100% except during retreat or at very close range and its wonderful. Sniper v Sniper should be about micro, not luck. Often an entire game can be decided by a counter snipe.

Seb -
Well, I think it is a lot more interesting to reward knowing where and when to use the sniper carefuly, and being able to read the other player to know when he will try to counter snipe (lack of 400 manpower that early in the game for us is rather easy to spot as wm in your example).

To be clear I'm not attached to the current implementation, if it doesn't work it doesn't work (though no one has tested it yet). I'm only in favor of 100% CS in some form, to remove an outlying RNG element that trumped skill and micro on too many occasions. Which sounded right up the alley of this mod.