There are ones who defend them, they praise the destroyed engine crits, the squadwipe mine, the t34 ram.The unpredictability is exciting they say. Adapt they say. Don't get in range of AT grenades they say.
Heretics, i spit on thee i say.
Don't they know the greatest joy is crushing your opponent, not by coincidence, but cunning and a sharp witted mind?
Nay... they surely must be oblivious.
On a serious note, lately i've been watching more shoutcasts in the evening than i should (thanks, Imperial Dane)and in many games, the RNG just happens.
Sometimes subtle, a lucky mortar hit here and there, nothing big. Sometimes a mine kills a squad. A heavy tank gets a engine critical. And it starts to snowball, opportunities arise and suddenly the whole outcome of the game stands on the line... all caused by what exactly? By a roll of the dice.
Games that play out like this doesn't give my any satisfaction, and i can't stop to think what if?.
What if:
Soviet TM35 Mine
-reduce the AoE Damage Far value
-remove the chance of destroyed engine critical on undamaged engine
As rofltehcat explained in the One-shot-wipe-potential thread, mines deal as much damage in the center of the blast as they do on its edge, resulting quite often in squadwipes depending on a dice roll.
AT grenades and Panzerfaust
-remove the chance of destroyed engine critical on undamaged engine
-100% chance to stun target for a few seconds (similar to target weak point)
-100% chance on damaged engine crit on rear armour hit
-0% chance on damaged engine crit on front armour hit (only on (heavy?)tanks)
This one grinds my gears especially. The difference between a deflected AT grenade / Panzerfaust and an destroyed engine is day and night and has absolutely no correlation to player skill.
With the proposed change catching a tank out of position is always rewarding, especially on heavy tanks.
The 100% stun chance makes combined arms necessary - you can't expect to disable a well microed heavy tank from the front with luck by a single squad and pulling your AT guns afterwards to finish it off anymore.
The stun would give time for the rest of your army, a flanking second squad for the engine critical for example. But if you manage to do that, you will be rewarded 100% of the time. Not because the game decided so, but because of your unit control and positioning alone.
Think about that for a second.
T34 ram
-100% chance on destroyed engine and gun on rear armour hit
-on front armour hit only engine damage OR destroyed gun possible
Against heavy tanks like the tiger, positioning currently plays almost no role. (300 front armour, 250 rear armour - ram from the front yeah whatever)
Similar to AT grenades and Panzerfaust, i want to see flanking being rewarded heavily, while diminishing the potential on frontal rams.
Flamethrower for CE/Pionees
-chance of exploding only on squadwipe
Skillplanes
-remove the ~0,1% chance of pintle mounted machine guns to destroy airplanes
-increase the chance of ostwind and quad halftrack to destroy airplanes
-reduce the damage of shot down planes drastically
Bringing down airplanes by pure coincidence because you payed for a no-brainer anti-infantry upgrade on your tank is just dumb luck. Dedicated anti-air units should reliable bring down planes on the first pass.
I've seen a game were one crashed airplane destroyed two full health tanks. Even if it's rare, it should not do that much damage and decide games that way.
These were the biggest offenders i can think of. I secretly hope Nullist approves this, wherever he may be.