DAK Redesign

Your wish is my command! Yeah so re the Recover Halftrack, I don't really like it because basically everything in Dak repairs or can repair itself. However, the economics of the unit make no sense whatsoever. As far as I can tell, the repair rate is the same as a standard pioneer, yet the cost difference is substantial and you need more pop cap, so as a late game repair vehicle it makes no economic sense. As a recovery vehicle, sure, does the job, but its not often that you actually have fields of wrecks to recover or salvage, once in a rare game. This is exactly the problem the Bergetiger had and that was barely used, good players just didn't leave wrecks.

And yeah, the design is so much more fun to play! I can't really go back now. I've raised Support cases with Relic and posted on their website, but any extra publicity I can get would be great. If anyone has connections or wants to use the publicity of their YouTube channel to promote it, I would be greatly appreciative. I'm a relative outsider to the scene!

In terms of recent changes, I managed to get the deployment system to deploy an individual MG34 rather than with the halftrack. I also had a play with Panzergrenadiers and back balanced them. I usually don't make balance changes but this one was just too glaring. I have some other minor things I want to change which I will report back on sooner or later.

The Recovery halftrack has only the regular repair speed ability, really? I thought it had an advanced one, or at least that's what I assumed because of it's cost as you said and I didn't bother to even check in the files.

As far as YouTube goes, I got a channel and thought I'd make a small video about it but now that you mention it it might be better if it was a short interview sort of thing where you can explain why and what it is exactly with the changes because you would probably do it better than I ever can. I'll keep in touch if you're interested.

The Recovery halftrack has only the regular repair speed ability, really? I thought it had an advanced one, or at least that's what I assumed because of it's cost as you said and I didn't bother to even check in the files.

As far as YouTube goes, I got a channel and thought I'd make a small video about it but now that you mention it it might be better if it was a short interview sort of thing where you can explain why and what it is exactly with the changes because you would probably do it better than I ever can. I'll keep in touch if you're interested.

I can check verify it through testing but as far as I can tell from the gamefiles, it's the same rate.

And yeah we should definitely do that! I'll message you directly.

This will ideally be my last update for a while, here are the changes I made:

Removal of Free Abilities

A lot of abilities in Coh3 that would have had a cost in Coh2, have now had a cost added to them.

Adding Tow

I gave the medical truck tow, seems to be just a bug that it didn't have it before.

Passive Bonuses from Upgrades Rework

So having more or less fixed the tech structure issues, I went into the fine grain work of the actual abilities of the units. One of the elements of DAK that I really don't like are the passive abilities that most vehicles get as upgrades become unlocked. I think having utility abilities unlock from upgrades is fine, but my issues with it are 3 fold:

The first is the smoke abilities on a variety of the light vehicles. This the same as the Panzer Tactician ability in Coh2 and really should have been one of those abilities that didn't make it into Coh3. It often amounts to a get out of jail free card, takes no skill to use 95% of the time and relative to the smoke barrage ability, its not not as skilful, versatile or interesting. I basically replaced its usage in DAK in all cases except for:

- Utility Truck
- Medical Truck
- 254 Recon Vehicle.
- 250 Mortar Variant.
- Kradschützen.

Adding it to the Kradschützen was too much to resist, its incredibly satisfying zipping across an MGs arc and dropping smoke, only to zip through the other side. It really helps with its survivability too into the late game, when it can be basically 1 shot, so I feel this is an exception to the rule.

The second the fact that most of the abilities are passive. Passive abilities basically take no thought to use and do not act as a player skill differentiator. Skilled players have the thought of mind to make use of abilities you must activate whereas less skilled players do not, but if they're passive it takes away that skill factor! You also end up with a weird situation where in the late game you basically don't need infantry anymore as your vehicles capture territory and can repair themselves, have a look at this game:

https://youtu.be/duZBCVo5yck?t=2077

Note how the DAK player has 6 vehicles and only 1 squad of infantry, but they are still fine.

The two changes I made were to make the self repair ability a timed ability that you pay munitions for and I also separated the Rapid Advance passive abilities (ie territory capture and speed buffs) into 2 separate abilities. Territory capture is still passive but requires the vehicle to be out of combat. Ideally it should function like the territory capture mode on T34s in Coh2 but I wasn't able to get that to work in. The speed buffs are moved into a Blitz ability which the player must pay munitions for and the passive elements of the upgrade are removed.

Finally, one more experimental change I made was to actually make the abilities mutually exclusive on a vehicle by vehicle basis. So once you have the tech upgrades, which give their usual health and scaling bonuses, you have to decide of all the utility abilities you want each vehicle to have:



This is not only more interesting from an opportunity cost perspective, but it also makes vehicles for the DAK less 'all singing, all dancing, do everything' units in the late game. Relative to the MG and Side armour upgrades that most vehicles in Coh have, these are significantly more interesting. I also removed all these abilities from the Italian tanks so that they scale less and discourage players from relying on call-in meta. This one I'm a bit more on the fence about.

Missing Changes

In terms of what I can't change which I would like to change, these include:

- Giving the 250 a 37mm AT upgrade. This would enable yet further build order flexibility and give you a light vehicle counter that is available from the HQ.
- Giving Panzerjägers a Schreks upgrade once you have T3.
- Swapping the Bolster ability for Bersaglieri for something a bit more interesting and merging this into the Squad Leader Upgrade as part of standard tech. The battlegroup bolster is just boring.
- Finishing the deployment system, due to mod limitations it lacks half of the call-in layers.
- Giving the Utility Truck that comes with the Flak 36/Italian 105 a medical conversion. So if you lose the weapon you can still make use of the tow truck.
- Giving the P3 E a 50mm Upgun upgrade once T3 is unlocked. This upgrade exists in the game files but doesn't have the effect you'd expect it to have. This would allow this unit to scale into the lategame and basically be the equivalent of the same tank in T3.
- Giving Panzerpios some buildable garrison. As a builder unit, they don't really have an interesting structure they can build that isn't tied to a battlegroup. I was thinking something Watchtowers:

So when I say watchtower, I’m thinking the tall wooden structures that are somewhat of a WW2 cliché. I’m thinking around 100-150 manpower. Garrisonable but also vulnerable to small arms. It would allow players to take advantage of the COH3 ‘verticality’ mechanics by allowing garrisoned squads to see over short buildings and shoot over walls etc. Upgrades you could have would be:

- Crow's Nest. This would basically increase LOS in all directions and be useful for seeing incoming attacks.
- MG Nest. This would outfit the bunker with an MG. However, unlike MG bunkers, you would be able to manually change the direction of the MG. 360 degree area denial but vulnerable to small arms.
- Sandbags. No longer vulnerable to small arms and has more health. Basically becomes a hardpoint. The ideal would be to put an MG in a watchtower with sandbags, but that would obviously be more expensive.

These are basically all the changes I would like to make but can't. If the mod tools get better I will have another go. Its in Relic's hands now!

I actually think DAK as a faction, design wise isnt that imbalanced, just a couple of units needs buffs (pgrens, cmd p4 and p3) and the obvious nerfs (8rad, stug cost wise)

I actually think DAK as a faction, design wise isnt that imbalanced, just a couple of units needs buffs (pgrens, cmd p4 and p3) and the obvious nerfs (8rad, stug cost wise)

My proposals are not really aimed at correcting imbalances, they're more about making the design more interesting and flexible. 'Interesting' is ultimately a subjective term but if you try out the mod, you'll find that in terms of tech paths there are 30+ unique ways of approaching teching and the deployment system is significantly more flexible.

I agree that the 8rad and Stug D could do with nerfs and that PGs could be buffed (I actually make an exception in the mod and implement the latter), but really its a proof of concept for a new design. Its not to say that the current design isn't 'functional', but in my view, the mod shows that you can rearrange the pieces to make a better jigsaw.

If the recovery HT is intended to be primarily a repair vehicle, I wonder if giving it a "deployment" ability where it becomes immobilised and sends out repair pioneers to all vehicles around itself would be an interesting niche to fill.

And/Or consider giving it the ability to permanently deploy into a dedicated repair station that has no population cost, somewhat like the OKW mech truck.

Adding Tow

I gave the medical truck tow, seems to be just a bug that it didn't have it before.

A bug? I think it's probably balance related. Being able to tow an AT gun off the field, recrew it, then reinforce it? I think that the devs probably thought that was a bit too much.

A bug? I think it's probably balance related. Being able to tow an AT gun off the field, recrew it, then reinforce it? I think that the devs probably thought that was a bit too much.

You can already do this with tow trucks? The difference being healing. The reason I say bug is I think I seen it in the game files.

You can already do this with tow trucks? The difference being healing.

You can't reinforce them. Only recrew. Med trucks are plenty good without being able to steal teamweapons anyways.

You can't reinforce them. Only recrew. Med trucks are plenty good without being able to steal teamweapons anyways.

My good sir, you are mistaken:



Then I looked at all the other med vehicles, they all have tow:



So to me its a bug, why would all the other med vehicles have tow but this one specifically doesn't. I agree with you, DAK med truck seems fine, its not a hill I want to die on, but it seems inconsistent to me.

My good sir, you are mistaken:



Then I looked at all the other med vehicles, they all have tow:



So to me its a bug, why would all the other med vehicles have tow but this one specifically doesn't. I agree with you, DAK med truck seems fine, its not a hill I want to die on, but it seems inconsistent to me.

Their abilities should all be equal to each other. In my opinion, it's a good call to remove the tow after upgrading to med truck, but if the others have it, then it should too.

Healing/reinforcement/recrewing trucks are bad design and should change.

Changes could include:

Healing/re-forcing bonus in base so that it is balanced separately

Trucks able to "load"/tow decrewed support weapon but not re-crew them

Adjust prices accordingly

Increasing CD on abilities and base/truck provide CD bonus.

This is another great example of how bust the DAK endgame design is: https://youtu.be/ggpfAuTH9rQ?t=2270.

The passive repairs, free smoke etc make infantry completely pointless in DAK and vehicles capable of doing everything. I'm more convinced that ever that these not only should not be passive but also mutually exclusive at the squad level.

In keeping with my suggestion regarding global upgrades here: https://www.coh2.org/topic/111232/aftermath-s-feedback-wishlist/page/2

I would argue that DAK need to improve the UI of a bunch of their global upgrades. For AP Rounds, a box of shells on the back of the vehicles that benefit from them would do the trick. For the halftrack upgrade, some sandbags draped over the bonnet of the 250. For advanced repairs, having a Panzer Grenadier model with a backpack of tools would be nice. For the Smoke Dischargers and Vehicle Survivability, this is an interesting one. Currently there's no indication that these upgrades improve the health of the vehicles they upgrade, without looking at the portrait, so I would again make some visual change after these upgrades are done, like actually having the smoke dischargers modelled on the vehicle, a box of tools for or again using something obvious like sandbags draped over the vehicle.

Moreover, I would actually argue that the health buffing component of these upgrades should be extracted in its own upgrade, as currently the health buff component inflates the cost of these upgrades out of proportion to what the upgrade is ostensibly about. If there was a third upgrade for the health buffs located on that final upgrades row (or in Tier 3 in my version), then the upgrades could be more finely priced and balanced. The visibility indicators could also be tailored to more accurately reflect the advantage they provide.

Its a fine grain change at the end of the day.