I agree on this. However, at least for larger team games, I have the feeling that sight range does not matter as much since tanks do not operate on their own as often. To put it easily: Unit density is so high that there is always an infantry squad in front of your tank, rendering the tank sight less important.
To be honest, that's at the very heart of how CoH is supposed to work. Unless there will be special code for "after two misses the next shot is a guaranteed hit" or so, all RNG based games will have occasions of the game itself screwing you (or your opponent) seriously over. These games are not about who was able to precisely estimate the power discrepancy between two armies, but who was able to estimate the most likely outcome by gut feeling.
Too much RNG will never feel rewarding. On the other hand, it adds an additional layer of constantly being forced to re-evaluate your situation based on single events within that fight. Unfair outcomes will always happen, but their frequency should be minimized. In your example, a Jackson failing to penetrate a P4 even twice is less than 0.4% even on max range. It WILL happen if you play often enough, but if this system really bugs someone then CoH is probably the wrong franchise.
To what it's worth, CoH2 does a decent job of balancing out RNG and tactics. Because the scale is so small and tanks worth so much, there will always be issues with games being decided by just "that last shot" penetrating or not. Sometimes I knew that I was being screwed over or actually my opponent was being screwed over by the game itself, but we shouldn't forget that people will always attribute a great move and won fight to their own great tactics, whereas that loss of a tank is always due to shitty RNG. This in the end leaves everyone with the assumption that they are a good commander but the game screws them over regularly, forgetting all the times they were a shitty commander but the game got them the victory (which is also bad), and most of all forgetting all the times where they played well or badly but regardless got what they deserved.
Jackson fails a lot vs mediums, or I'm curse with RNG maybe.
USF ATG, well... a video can explain it better
I agree with you in general but at the moment the state of balance is rigged. Some factions are much more dependent on RNG than others, leading into more micro requirement to overcome it while some other faction can simply a-move their army because RNG plays in their favor.
To put it clear, when I play Axis I always estimate the risk to see my Tiger or Panther or Brumbar to be damaged at each shot. So every time they bounce a shot, I see it as an extra life, I see this RNG as rewarding, if there are no favor in RNG, that's not a problem because I didn't count on it.
On the other hand like in the video when my Atgun fail to penetrate twice in a raw a stock medium tank (and that's not unusual) and lead into having to retreat all your army because RNG doesn't like you at this particular moment, I feel helpless, what can I do more? That a true question. Because It would have been a KT, ok I can understand the situation, but that's just a Pz4 which in return has no problem to rampage anything around it.
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