How the new Patch changed the flow and feel of the game.

this patch moved in the right direction, no more soviet gameplay without requiring micro. The cover system is great, feels more like vcoh now and thats the right step for coh2. I personally missed the tactical cover gameplay, like in vcoh you had to anticipate your opponents movement and find cover for whatever came next. This has made the game more fun and i might pick up soviets again, cause i love me some challenge!

The most conflicting opinions related to this patch!
Quite normal, the changes are too big.

I think we should hear the opinions of top 10 on both sides. In fact, I think Relic should open a topic to hear these guys' opinions. Their stats are visible for everyone on the ladder tab, and they all played manny games as soviets and as germans. I personally would take their opinions.

It is true that germans feel a little OP. I admit I was amused at first, because the first thought was that soviet players deserved to feel how it is when not playing "easy mode anymore".
In fact, before this patch, soviets were a little OP compared to germans. But a game needs balance in order to be challanging and pleasant for everyone.

Speaking about new tactical concepts, I like them very much, Relic goes into the right direction with this but now it's a little harder for soviets, and I don't really think it has to do with skill and micro. I mean people who played equal time with both factions said that.

I have a litle suggestion. In order not to ruin the new direction that game took - which is the right one by punishing mindless atacks, spaming and blobing, perhaps a little adjustment to german small weapons DPS will solve the problem. I mean, because of squad size, they still should remain superior to soviet ones, but if they would suffer a small decrease, I think suddenly everyone will be fine. No upgrade price changes, no unit price changes, no armor changes. Just that. That will solve the pio start problem, and so many others.

There is another thing nobody took into account. I know it seemed balanced but it wasn't. The decrease of start resources. I mean it's fine now, but before allowed soviets to bring troops into combat faster than germans (if no Tier was constructed in the first 5 minutes). It favoured spam. Now the verry little delay, creates frustration among soviets, but this is how it should be. If you remember, the amount of start resources in early game stages was even smaller.

I think this patch should have been implemented over about 3 patches. All the ideas behind the patch are good but the changes are too sweeping and have gone over the top.

Slowing tech means call ins run the day (I just played SageoftheSix and neither of us built a building all game).

Cover is too important. Grenades too powerful. Everything dies ridiculously easily and 2v2 is absolute chaos.

I second the posters who questioned why the game was patched so slowly and deliberately to being almost perfect balance wise, only to make massive sweeping changes and undo it all.

Your text.. This patch is the best thing that has happen to coh2. Infantery combat is fun and tanks are delayed by a bit. Its soooooo much fun to play right now. No more huge blobs of death running in the open killing all And i play 2vs2 both factions.

And were you on Dane's channel when Cruzz was being a 'Cunt'? No? Well then you don't know what I (Or you it seems) are talking about.

Literally nobody cares about this apart from you, try to stay on topic.

My problem is that Soviets dont have any true advantage early and mid game. The Germans got most of their useful core army stuff available at around 7 mins. T1 and T2. They have superior weapons with even waaay more superior weapon upgrades, MG's , Mortars , PAK's , Shreks, Scout cars and HT's. They can also bunker down and even scare Cons with simple Pios. Pioneers. Really.

What do the soviets have now? They have inferior Conscripts which get their range cut by half with PPSH, they have Penals (T1) and maybe Snipers (T1), and otherwise Maxims, Mortars and AT Guns ( all T2 ). And Guards and Shocks. Most of the described units need to get close to the enemy to do proper damage and this is punished in this patch. Dont you dare to move out of cover and make a semi - aggressive push because that LMG gren is just waiting for you.
All light armor for the soviets except the M3 comes in the late tiers which now cost 140 fuel each. That pretty much eliminates any shock value the T70, the M5 or even the SU76 had. Its not viable to build these anymore because your opponent will be armed to teeth with AT weaponry.

Thats my main problem with this patch. Its just a uphill battle with inferior weapons for the Soviets. They also get punished when trying to close in on top of that. Thats not balance.

I pretty much share the cruzz' opinion.

My problem is that Soviets dont have any true advantage early and mid game.

Well, your first phrase explained all your next words and your problem with the new march 25th patch. Soviets have no more advantages in the early game. Well, this is called balance, ya know? No faction having advantages.
I think that the small advantages german faction had, were fixed by the last mini-patch - 28th of march, except the one with pios.

Umm... But what about the definite German advantage in the late game Heini?

that is something I hear often (German lategame advantage). But only because something is said often its not true

Well, your first phrase explained all your next words and your problem with the new march 25th patch. Soviets have no more advantages in the early game. Well, this is called balance, ya know? No faction having advantages.
I think that the small advantages german faction had, were fixed by the last mini-patch - 28th of march, except the one with pios.

No balance would mean that Soviets have no advantage early game and Germans have no advantage mid to late game.


Currently Germans enjoy their advantage while the Soviets lost theirs. Plain and simple. Cruzz is correct.

Soviets we known for what? Superior infantry and an early game advantage. Thats gone now.

Soviets had inferior support teams that need to get close to the front but were hard to kill. Now they arent hard at all to kill need to get close to the front and yet receive no other kind of buff.

There was one single nerf to Ostheer and that was reduction to armor of Grens and Pgrens. Everything else was a buff. Everything. If you call that balance you are smoking some good shit my friend.

Hmm... I beg to differ, the Germans have a massive advantage in the superiority of their non-doctrinal tanks compared to Soviet equivalents, if there are any. German Vet appears to be superior as well as abilities such as blitzkrieg and the like which allow german armour to dominate Soviet armour...

Do I really have to continue, just look at the differences between the two sides, the only advantage the Soviets have is the SU-85 which has terrible mobility and is even worse than the Panther at killing infantry...

Literally nobody cares about this apart from you, try to stay on topic.

Someone's character, or lack thereof, has a greater impact on the weight of respect their opinion carries - not how high they are in the leaderboard. Thats my point.

Back on topic. Late game does slightly favour germans, I don't know what they realistically want though. After a never ending number of squad wipes from the IS-2 I maintain it's the best all round heavy tank in the game, the ISU-52 and KV-2 are great heavy artillery and the T-76/85(The doctinal medium tank, I forget its name) is stiff competition for the panzer IV.

Soviets, with the right doctrine pick, can get a late game advantge so if you are to give the Soviets a late game Armour boost with their base units then the doctrines should need to be looked at again.

Well, your first phrase explained all your next words and your problem with the new march 25th patch. Soviets have no more advantages in the early game. Well, this is called balance, ya know? No faction having advantages.
I think that the small advantages german faction had, were fixed by the last mini-patch - 28th of march, except the one with pios.

What he obviously means (and I'm sure you understood as well despite playing dumb) is that pretty much every choice for soviets early game is inferior to the equivalent for germans. Which is pretty damn bad balance. And this isn't just limited to the early game, because later on they have the exact problem when combating tanks because their vehicles are way too focused on killing infantry and their infantry is not nearly as good at combating tanks as the germans.

Without having played the hotfix (hooray for backseat gaming), I can tell you it will solve approximately none of the current issues. Riflenades will be slightly weaker again, but still stronger than they were pre 25th. Cons will still be useless compared to grens. ppsh will still be the worst weapon in the game due to range issues. Grens will still reign king at range against all soviet infantry. Penals may be able to fight against grens with a single weapon upgrade at short range, but will still lose at the most common combat ranges.

The only real change will be that you can now choose to do T1+T2 play to call-in tanks more realistically. Which is very nice for variety but really doesn't make any difference to the german side of things because grens are the counter to all of these units.

I'm sorry, but when you all (I hate calling you fanboys I hate that word)let's say soviet faction sympathizers will be happy with a patch? When the soviet buffs will be so obvious that they'll hit you in the eye? That was before the 25 march patch. I think is not right just for a faction to try to adapt adapt and adapt again. Yes it is easyer for german faction players to adapt to these last changes, because they were forced to play that way by soviet spam and crazy walking-around-shooting -everything playing style.

I said it before, I say it again: they could use a minor adjustment to german small weapons DPS, while letting them still superior to soviet ones, to compensate the different squad sizes, and everyone would be happy. Probably.

I'm sorry, but when you all (I hate calling you fanboys I hate that word)let's say soviet faction sympathizers will be happy with a patch? When the soviet buffs will be so obvious that they'll hit you in the eye? That was before the 25 march patch. I think is not right just for a faction to try to adapt adapt and adapt again. Yes it is easyer for german faction players to adapt to these last changes, because they were forced to play that way by soviet spam and crazy walking-around-shooting -everything playing style.

I said it before, I say it again: they could use a minor adjustment to german small weapons DPS, while letting them still superior to soviet ones, to compensate the different squad sizes, and everyone would be happy. Probably.

When each side has a clear advantage to be leveraged at some stage of the game or neither do. Simple.

Soviet right now have no advantage early game and are disadvantaged late game. And are also less flexible due to faction design and tech cost.

If relic wants Mirrors fine. Make them equal in all things.

I think this patch should have been implemented over about 3 patches. All the ideas behind the patch are good but the changes are too sweeping and have gone over the top.

QFT.

Relic are definitely headed in the right direction, though. Giving the Soviets a slight non-doctrinal infantry boost would help. I'm thinking maybe PPSH for combat engineers or an upgradable AT nade organic to the penals.

These options would keep me on my toes as an Axis player who likes light vehicles and happy as a Soviet player facing stronger early Axis infantry.

Now all need play safe...

I cannot stress enough how much I love the new infantry combat.

Gameplay-wise its simply amazing. No "Run straight at the enemy with shocks/assault grens" anymore. Cover deciding who is going to win the engagement. Its great. And I dont feel that there is too little movement, not at all to be honest. Its tactical movement from now on. The gameplay still is very dynamic but now you have to think about HOW to move your units and in certain situations its truly better to have a squad stand still behind instead of a blind rush into enemy lines. In my opinion: Exactly as it should be.

Balance-wise I cant really say anything though. Sometimes I felt that Cons were little too weak but then in another game my team and me got utterly destroyed by vanilla cons (superior skill involved aswell though). There is currently so much happening Im surprised that so many players already seem to be able to pinpoint what is OP and what isnt. Let the meta game evolve a little, soviets seem to be more reliant on tier 1 or tier 2 now.

Flanking pios are a little bit hilarious though...The pioneer squad does seem a little too strong but then again it also doesent scale well. That might need some tweaking but the important part is not to fuck up the Combat Engineer vs Pioneer balance at the same time. But then again I always thought that CEs should be a bit superior to Pios anyway.

Umm wtf you talking about no run into infantry with Assgrens because thats all i see the Germans doing and not only with ass grens but pioneers as well and there isnt a fuck of a thing a soviet player can do about it. It is completely sickening unfair bullshit and clearly relic is completely incompentent on what makes for good balance im fed up with this shit its fucking pathetic.

So I played some more games recently + watched some games of better players and frankly I don't notice problems mentioned in this topic.
I mean, yes Pios can dish out some serious damage now, but they still die as easy as they were + as Relic said they scale badly late game. Grenadiers being too strong? Conscripts dying like flies? I don't know, for me a lot of the issues described are a result of the small arms changes. I think if you're struggling after new patch you are really struggling to adapt rather than something is unbalanced.
Lets be honest last couple of months it was extremly easy to play as a Soviet. All you needed was a blob of Conscripts equipped with PPSHs roaming around the battlefield and destroying everything. I only started to be able to deal with it after implementing some heavy Sniper play and there was this issue with Soviet snipers as well.
Now everything depends of how you approach the engagement and how you utilize cover. If you do it right Pios will die, so will Grenadiers and Panzer Grenadiers as well. You need to think more strategically in this game now. Its less casual player friendly now but not by much and I am pretty sure everyone will adapt after a while.
Of course your rank as a Soviet will drop but it shouldn't be there in the first place do to the advantage you had over couple of last months. It is basically almost the same situation that happend when MG42 was overpowered at the beginning of CoH cycle.
I really can't stress enough how more enjoyable this game just became.

Of course your rank as a Soviet will drop but it shouldn't be there in the first place do to the advantage you had over couple of last months. It is basically almost the same situation that happend when MG42 was overpowered at the beginning of CoH cycle.
I really can't stress enough how more enjoyable this game just became.

Err... how can it drop if everyone is dropping with you?

Personally, I'm still trying to work out where the Con PPSh spam story came from... It seems to me it has originated after the patch was released, prior to that everyone was complaining about Shocks.