Finally some balance, what to do now?

Well, I can't speak for CS:GO, but Dota 2 just lends itself really well to the model Valve has taken. Heroes are unique with distinct styles, and their models are generally large enough that you can actually notice the cosmetics. It's also not a historic game, so there's more freedom to create interesting stuff. There are also uniquie game elements that lend themselves very well to cosmetics, such as wards and couriers.

The problem with selling maps is the CoH2 community is just too small. People won't buy maps unless they're reasonable certain that they will be able to play on them. When there's barely enough people automatching to find a game in a timely manner, maps that segment the community aren't going to be successful.

Honestly, I think if Relic had gone the cosmetics approach to DLC right off the bat, everyone would be a lot happier. Make interesting skins, give units custom animations or voice lines for certain skins, sell customized faceplates and base buildings so players can pimp their clans, let people sell custom HUDs. Hell, I'd buy a custom HUD if it fixed the terrible default CoH2 HUD, and I'd buy some cool-looking skins if they were worth the money and came with some cool extras. No way in hell will I buy a commander though. Not going to support a business model that's fucking a game that already has enough problems of its own.

Sigh... Inverse you remind me of so many other ways Relic could have made $$, but alas, they went with commanders. I would totally buy custom "real" skins for my units, get more unit dialogue, cool custom faceplates, etc... When I first started playing LoL I said, "man ill never buy anything". Then I realized I got some much enjoyment out of the game I figured I'd give back, so I bought numerous skins for my favorite champs.

Oh the possibilities if Relic/Sega just looked around them!

Lastly, Molotovs should probably be disabled during suppression. It's a bit silly that you can still Oorah into an MG 42 and have a chance at winning anyway if you have more than one Conscript doing it. As Soviets, I rarely bother to do a full flank, because I can just do a partial flank and then Ooralotov.

You can charge a maxim with 2 grenadier squads from the front and take it out from long range without taking losses thanks to rifle nades. Heck, even charging in with a single grenadier squad can do significant damage if you aim your rifle grenade well. With the help of light cover you won't even take a loss doing that. Try charging a mg42 from the front with a single conscript squad and see how well that does in comparison.

I can see WWII skins being more restrictive but there's still a lot to work with. Custom animations and voice lines could be interesting too.

Anyways, I see these as tools to attract and retain more players because nowadays it's not enough to just have deep and satisfying gameplay. COH often gets compared to the SC series when balance and strategic depth is mentioned but despite doing everything better, SC2 is still losing players now.

Well, if you look at it from Relic's point of view, they don't really have a big player base, and you need a big player base for cosmetic DLC to work because there's no gameplay incentive to purchase them, so a lower percentage of your players will actually purchase stuff. If you give a nice gameplay incentive for players to purchase your DLC (such as by giving them cool new units or making strong commanders), you're likely to convince a larger percentage of your player base to purchase your DLC.

The problem with the latter model, however, is you're discouraging growth. How many players do you think were interested in CoH2 before they saw all the DLC commanders and the DLC whoring/Pay2Win tags on Steam and in forum posts?

I think if Relic went with a cosmetic approach instead, they would've made less money in the short-term, but the game would be seeing a lot more growth than it currently is. In the long term, I think it would've been the better route to take. Unfortunately, they were probably forced into this by THQ, then SEGA probably came along and changed their policy some more. I would honestly be shocked if anyone at Relic actually thinks their current policy is good for the future of the game.

Well, if you look at it from Relic's point of view, they don't really have a big player base, and you need a big player base for cosmetic DLC to work because there's no gameplay incentive to purchase them, so a lower percentage of your players will actually purchase stuff. If you give a nice gameplay incentive for players to purchase your DLC (such as by giving them cool new units or making strong commanders), you're likely to convince a larger percentage of your player base to purchase your DLC.

The problem with the latter model, however, is you're discouraging growth. How many players do you think were interested in CoH2 before they saw all the DLC commanders and the DLC whoring/Pay2Win tags on Steam and in forum posts?

I think if Relic went with a cosmetic approach instead, they would've made less money in the short-term, but the game would be seeing a lot more growth than it currently is. In the long term, I think it would've been the better route to take. Unfortunately, they were probably forced into this by THQ, then SEGA probably came along and changed their policy some more. I would honestly be shocked if anyone at Relic actually thinks their current policy is good for the future of the game.

In January,a friend of mine, from school, (we can consider him a gamer) asked me about Coh2. I told him good words about the game, and that I only play this game (which is actually true).

2 days later, I asked him if he bought the game ( game had a 50% discount) he told me "no, I've just read in Steam forums that this game is pay 2 win and it has unbalanced units from dlc commanders" he was refeering mostly on Tiger Ace , which I told him that was going to be balanced soon. He still decided not to buy the game (It's not a money issue, that guy earns like 3000$ per month) and.. can you guess what? that guy played Coh1 with me.

Why would he even ask you if he values the opinions of Steam users more? :/

I would like mod support re-enabled for different HUDs, audio and the camera.

The whole idea of game reviews is kind of outdated if you ask me. Games evolve drastically past release and a review from 2 months ago doesn't reflect the current state of the game.

People also tend to be overly critical of games because it's always cool to be high brow.

Interestingly enough, a good number of those bad reviewers have over 300 hours of play time.

The fact is that this kind of comments are doing people to refuse buying this game.

As Inverse said, making money in short term (DLC commanders) will make loose money in long term (players reading about the game that may buy it)

If a good number of those bad reviewers with more than 300 hours played are posting bad feedback about the game, is not their problem, It may be that as a customers, they are not fully satisfied, and this is Relic/Sega fault..

In my case, I am not fully satisfied with this game but I still love it and I have the hope in a near future that the game will be fixed. It have still a high potential to become a great game with small balance changes.

I think they underestimated the word of mouth effect. COH1 wasnt only "the highest rated RTS of all time". Whenever I read through threads on gaming forums where people were asking about what RTS they should buy I would always find noumerous post reccomending COH1. It was such a good game that it provided its own PR by simply beeing godd, and pretty much sold itself.

COH2 has gotten a reputation for being P2W, in addition to being a dissapointment, compared to the original. I dont see people on forums reccomending the game, and contrary to COH1, the design provides itself with bad PR.

My point is, even though the game is improving and getting much better, I think whatever they do it will be to little to late. Simply changing the DLC model now isnt realistic, as the dammage is already done, and putting that much work into the game probably wouldnt be worth it. Hopefully they have learned, so they dont repeat the same mistakes when COH3 hopefully will be made.

The fact is that this kind of comments are doing people to refuse buying this game.

As Inverse said, making money in short term (DLC commanders) will make loose money in long term (players reading about the game that may buy it)

If a good number of those bad reviewers with more than 300 hours played are posting bad feedback about the game, is not their problem, It may be that as a customers, they are not fully satisfied, and this is Relic/Sega fault..

In my case, I am not fully satisfied with this game but I still love it and I have the hope in a near future that the game will be fixed. It have still a high potential to become a great game with small balance changes.

There is also the vocal, bad part of playerbase, the ones who rage and give bad reviewes while they themselves are bad and blame their failures on doctrines they go against instead of them. Not a single commander can not be beaten by starting set of commanders.
Some are more suitable then others, but all will do.

After reading some of the "reviews" I'm quite certain its this type of "players", the forever noob types that give the game the lowest note. Its easy to blame the game when in face they are bad and that can be even checked with their ladders as you can see their profiles and search for them.

You can quickly find that reviews are directly connected with how good/bad the player is and see that most bad reviews come from players who might have many hours played, but they are still 50.000 ladder 4v4 noobs.

That's beside the point though because Relic depends on noobs for sales.

Relic ignored the effect of pay-to-play turning into a perceived P2W and they'll forever loose potential buyers to shitty noob reviews.

yeah, the most of the bad reviews come from. HMMMM you know what the way to victory is by starting off by making 5 mortars and then one extra engineer squad!
10 minutes later
Support roles impossible to win with unbalanced game only way to play is conscript spam.

Now that we achieved balance please fix Penals....

Broken record I know....

That's beside the point though because Relic depends on noobs for sales.

Relic ignored the effect of pay-to-play turning into a perceived P2W and they'll forever loose potential buyers to shitty noob reviews.

Well, then thats also potential customers fault.
I will never rely on reviews only, its important, but not deciding factor.
Gameplay with commentary is what makes or breaks it for me, because no matter how good/bad the review is, it will not show you the game.

If the gameplay seems enjoyable despite the reviewers qq, I will get the game.

Hell, I've got the infamous WarZ and got my fun worth of money out of it and that game was horribly reviewed mostly for good reasons, but had pretty enjoyable gameplay.

Well, then thats also potential customers fault.
I will never rely on reviews only, its important, but not deciding factor.
Gameplay with commentary is what makes or breaks it for me, because no matter how good/bad the review is, it will not show you the game.

If the gameplay seems enjoyable despite the reviewers qq, I will get the game.

Hell, I've got the infamous WarZ and got my fun worth of money out of it and that game was horribly reviewed mostly for good reasons, but had pretty enjoyable gameplay.

In that case Katitof can I interest you in this awesome copy of Aliens Colonial Marines?

In that case Katitof can I interest you in this awesome copy of Aliens Colonial Marines?

I've said gameplay videos are deciding factor for me, I've seen ACMs gameplay and I'd rather stick to my AVP2

I think they underestimated the word of mouth effect. COH1 wasnt only "the highest rated RTS of all time". Whenever I read through threads on gaming forums where people were asking about what RTS they should buy I would always find noumerous post reccomending COH1. It was such a good game that it provided its own PR by simply beeing godd, and pretty much sold itself.

COH2 has gotten a reputation for being P2W, in addition to being a dissapointment, compared to the original. I dont see people on forums reccomending the game, and contrary to COH1, the design provides itself with bad PR.

My point is, even though the game is improving and getting much better, I think whatever they do it will be to little to late. Simply changing the DLC model now isnt realistic, as the dammage is already done, and putting that much work into the game probably wouldnt be worth it. Hopefully they have learned, so they dont repeat the same mistakes when COH3 hopefully will be made.

This sums it up well. Maybe if they just focused on making a sweet game that everyone would want to play instead of clever ways to nickle and dime their customers there wouldn't be an issue, and they might actually have a sufficient player base that they could turn a profit on skins and other stuff that doesn't piss people off.

The fact is that this kind of comments are doing people to refuse buying this game.

As Inverse said, making money in short term (DLC commanders) will make loose money in long term (players reading about the game that may buy it)

If a good number of those bad reviewers with more than 300 hours played are posting bad feedback about the game, is not their problem, It may be that as a customers, they are not fully satisfied, and this is Relic/Sega fault..

In my case, I am not fully satisfied with this game but I still love it and I have the hope in a near future that the game will be fixed. It have still a high potential to become a great game with small balance changes.

Well attitude reflects leadership.

The reason alot of players are posting bad reviews is not just because of p2w and balance issues, but because to many "popular" players are NOT leading by example and helping new players feel welcome.
As a new player you only have to play the game for a few hours before you are faced with a wall of negativity, antagonism and disdain. Many players both high and low ranked will comment how much you suck at the game or bitch about balance or what not etc.
Only a small handful of top players like StephennJF show some class, maturity and try to be constructive.

Company of Heroes? Seems more like Company of Villains.

But most players are just selfish so thats normal? I can tell from experience that in "mature" games such as EVE Online I have seen literally thousands of players act as ONE team rather than a bunch of solo players only looking out for themself. EvE online is a very team oriented game and solo players are usual doomed to fail in pvp.

There is a big attitude problem within the COH community, thats reality. A bad attitude is also contagious. To quote "Remember The Titans", it shows the beginnings of acceptance and teamwork.

http://theinnerwildkat.wordpress.com/2012/11/15/attitude-reflects-leadership-and-other-life-lessons/
Big Ju: Well, what I've got to say, you really don't wanna hear 'cuz honesty ain't too high upon your people's priorities.

Bertier: Honesty? You want honesty? Honestly, I think you're nothing. Nothing but a pure waste of God-given talent. You don't listen to nobody, man! Not even Doc or Boone! Shiver push on the line everytime and you blow right past 'em! Push 'em, pull 'em, do something! You run over everyone in this league, and everytime you do you leave one of your teammates hanging out to dry, me in particular!

Big Ju: Why should I give a hoot about you, huh? Or anyone else out there? You wanna talk about the ways you're the captain?

Bertier: Right.

Big Ju: You got a job?

Bertier: I've got a job.

Big Ju: You been doing your job?

Bertier: I've been doing my job.

Big Ju: Then why don't you tell your white buddies to block for Rev better? Because they have not blocked for him worth a blood nickel, and you know it! Nobody plays. Yourself included. I'm supposed to wear myself out for the team? What team? Nah, nah what I'm gonna do is look out for myself and I'ma get mine.

Bertier: See man, that's the worst attitude I ever heard.

Big Ju: Attitude reflects leadership, captain.

Personal, I consider myself a mature teamplayer. I have no desire to socialize with immature players that are only looking out for themself. I love COH2 as a game but the community is not very mature, not as bad as LoL but still shit tbh compared to "mature" MMO games such as EvE online. I played COH2 since closed beta but gave up on the community 4 months ago. Then I started playing EVE online again which I have played going back to closed beta in 2003. COH2 is a fun game more so than SC2, but to many players with a bad attitude and this is going all the way to the top.
I have seen alot of good teams die in EVE online because the team got hijacked by leaders with a bad attitude. You can tell alot by how good a team or community will become by knowing the attitude of the popular players/leaders.
Remember good leaders are not necessary good 1vs1 players but good team players that LOVE helping other players and will do ANYTHING for the community to thrive both ingame and outgame.

If the leaders and popular players in COH would start leading by example then I would do my part to also help other players, but why should I care about a Company of Villains?
I think most popular players in COH only care about themself and that attitude problem reflect both ingame and outgame in bad reviews. Few plays as good teamplayers in COH, let alone as a community. I'm gonna do like "Big Ju" and only look out for myself because thats what everyone else seems to be doing.