Cruzz's fantasy patch thread

nice, +1

@cruzz, mortars don't heat seek nor do they predict movement. They simply take the target at its current location and randomly position their shell within the scattered radius. The mortar shell doesn't at any point home in on its target, its purely random when it hits or misses.

In purple.

I wish people cleared MG42s with clean flanking, most people just rush straight at it knowing that the unit can't actually deal with two units in the cone even with full vision.

This could be applied to the maxium as well, except with a narrow arc.

Where were these terminator squads?

As for less armor reducing blobbing, it has mostly had the opposite effect on me. I never have my PGs alone now, the more units surrounding them and taking fire away from them the better.

Previous to the 25th patch you could find them in the open. More than likely as a group of 4 moving with attack move, 2 Shreks and 2 G43's. PG's now are supposed to be used as flanking units with Mid range DPS. PQ posted this. I like the idea of Grens and PG's having different roles rather than PG's being better at everything and replacing Gren's late game.


there's no reason to have the 251 except the reinforcement.

Sounds great. Different units, different roles. Doesn't fit your play style? Don't build em!

"hard to counter" argument with the current battle phase 2 requirement on it.

It's at a good spot right now. I'm not complaining. If it was reverted to pre-patch levels the Germans would have a Scout car and Flame HT to battle with. The fuel costs of a T70 and SU75 have both gone up with the recent patch. Don't down play the advantage the Flame H/T has timing wise.

How do you bait a 100 range unit?

Without eyes the unit can't fire on anything. Range 100 does not give it a line of sight of 100. I've seen a ISU downed with three Pumas driving circles around it. Use a couple tanks, one to distract the gun and the other to go around. It's no King Tiger v1.

So is 200 munition artillery that never hits. I've seen this ability used a handful of times and gotten hit maybe once when I've failed to notice the sector color in the minimap. The only thing this ability does to anyone who notices that it has been triggered, is force them to move their units in that sector. For 200 munitions and 11cps I'd expect a bit more.

Btw. mortars "heat seek" as you put it, they predict movement.

Risk and reward. The damage output of sector artillery is staggering. If we are going to give it additional chances of hits, the damage should be reduced. Having an army completely wiped out for 200 munitions is meh.

@cruzz, mortars don't heat seek nor do they predict movement. They simply take the target at its current location and randomly position their shell within the scattered radius. The mortar shell doesn't at any point home in on its target, its purely random when it hits or misses.

Really? I find that a bit hard to believe. Whenever a mortar autofires at a unit that was already moving it tends to seem like the round will be centered around where the unit is rather than where it was when the mortar played the firing animation. I guess I'm just suffering from confirmation bias (or the point of time where the target is a bit after the firing animation so it ends up seeming like the mortars are leading their targets a bit even though game logic wise that's not actually happening) with this though.

When are you going to actually fix the bulletins instead of making them increase scatter?

This could be applied to the maxium as well, except with a narrow arc.

It could...except because the maxim arc is so narrow, any two units in it you can instantly switch targets and suppress both (and then get riflenaded if they're grens, but you know, atleast the maxim did something to both). With the mg42 the traverse is slow enough that so as long as your units are not right next to each other you can just run through because the mg42 can only suppress one at best. And while the maxim has the setup speed to reposition to a flank against things approaching from outside the arc, the mg42 doesn't

The way I see it, maxim requires a decent amount of microing, having weak control without it but medium (against grens) to high (everything else) with micro. The MG42 does not offer you the chance to micro it, in exchange for slightly better "setup and forget" performance. But the setup and forget type of use doesn't really fit well with the current coh2 meta.

Previous to the 25th patch you could find them in the open. More than likely as a group of 4 moving with attack move, 2 Shreks and 2 G43's. PG's now are supposed to be used as flanking units with Mid range DPS. PQ posted this. I like the idea of Grens and PG's having different roles rather than PG's being better at everything and replacing Gren's late game.

They NEVER replaced grens. There were a couple of abusers at one point (hi major) that tried to make PG spam work, and it never did. They were easy as hell to counter, always. The only "replacement" effect I ever saw was people making shrek blobs lategame, and this still happens because it wasn't based on their armor in any way, it was based purely on the awesomeness of the shrek, and that has not changed one bit.

Sounds great. Different units, different roles. Doesn't fit your play style? Don't build em!

It's a one trick pony with a trick done by cheaper command bunkers as well. Tanks are so lethal now, anything that costs fuel that delays your own tanks needs to have a pretty good reason to do that. The german halftrack generally doesn't.

It's at a good spot right now. I'm not complaining. If it was reverted to pre-patch levels the Germans would have a Scout car and Flame HT to battle with. The fuel costs of a T70 and SU75 have both gone up with the recent patch. Don't down play the advantage the Flame H/T has timing wise.

The fuel cost of them went up and the fuel cost of the building went down. Also the M5's and M3's armor penetration got increased quite a lot, they deal with a flameht extremely easy (even without the quad upgrade, that thing just shreds the 251 in a few seconds though).

I do not believe that the flameht has ANY kind of advantage timing wise now, and nor has anyone seemed to believe it has it either as I've yet to see anyone try make one against me. Or me against them, even the few times I've made a halftrack for riegels. Too much risk for too little gain.

Without eyes the unit can't fire on anything. Range 100 does not give it a line of sight of 100. I've seen a ISU downed with three Pumas driving circles around it. Use a couple tanks, one to distract the gun and the other to go around. It's no King Tiger v1.

3 Pumas win against an IS2 or Tiger as well, I'm not sure this is the comparison you want to make You don't actually even need three, two with stun rounds win this fight.

As for the other point, why on earth would the soviet player not have other units to scout with? Hell all he really needs for scouting is atguns and spamming Tracking, or spam tripwires, or use a T70 in scout mode, or just walk around with your conscripts. Flanking with tanks is also actually fairly impossible against anyone paying attention, because you can still see all terrain deformation and hear sounds through the fog of war so you always have a reasonable guess as to where vehicles are. But let's assume you do get a flank on it...then what? Any flanking force of remotely similar value to the ISU152 you can have in 1vs1 short of a Tiger is going to get completely destroyed by two atguns and the ISU. And I wouldn't bet on the Tiger even with 1/10 odds.

Risk and reward. The damage output of sector artillery is staggering. If we are going to give it additional chances of hits, the damage should be reduced. Having an army completely wiped out for 200 munitions is meh.

I'd like to give it A chance to hit. A chance. Even if it came at a cost of reduced damage that would be fine with me, because right now no decent player is ever going to get hit once by this ability, and it isn't even a deterrent for entering the territory, it's only a deterrent for fighting in it because you can't stand still for too long. To top it all off it's even a huge double edged sword because the german player is completely unable to chase any units in it, and has to move his own units away if the soviet player rushes in.

Really? I...honestly don't believe that. Whenever a mortar autofires at a unit that was already moving it always seems like the round will be centered around where the unit is rather than scattering randomly at where it was when the mortar played the firing animation.

When are you going to actually fix the bulletins instead of making them increase scatter?

I think the barrage of mortar can see through the fog, That's why he knows where this any unit

I think the barrage of mortar can see through the fog, That's why he knows where this any unit

I'm not talking about fog of war firing, but rather the very simple situation where you have say a gren squad in full vision that is walking towards your mortar, and your mortar fires. From my experience the round will never land behind the spot where the grenadiers were when it fired, even though this should happen half of the time due to scatter if it truly was aiming at that spot.

Peter, is there any chance at all you could hotfix ISU and Elephant?

Almost every team game is now absolutely dominated by these two units.

ISU counters everything. Elephant counters ISU.

I know you're focused on balancing the new armies and rightly so but this issue is really pressing.

Thanks.

This game is becoming a "company of heavy tanks call in".

I'd like to see that heavy call ins limited by 1-2 units at the same time per player.

p.e: 1 Tiger / 1 Elephant / 1 IS-2 / 1 ISU-152 / 1 kv-2
2 Kv8 / Kv1 /

That was working in Vcoh, atm it seems like any other tank that doesn't come from heavy call ins, are useless (except panther)

This game is becoming a "company of heavy tanks call in".

I'd like to see that heavy call ins limited by 1-2 units at the same time per player.

p.e: 1 Tiger / 1 Elephant / 1 IS-2 / 1 ISU-152 / 1 kv-2
2 Kv8 / Kv1 /

That was working in Vcoh, atm it seems like any other tank that doesn't come from heavy call ins, are useless (except panther)

+1 to company of call in. I'd also like to see a change to guards aim time so that they actually shoot their PTRS and changes to the commanders that are already out. It would be nice if many more of them could be used competitively and be a bit more unique. Also be great if it wasn't all the heavy call on commanders being the best ones.

I hope Relic read this thread Cruzz, good job.

Mines, isu and make all heavy tank callins require tier 4 building.

Mines, isu and make all heavy tank callins require tier 4 building.

Agree on the callins. Not mines, they need to be fixed so sov ones don't do squad whipes and fix teller. Mines are important early game against vehicles. I think the suggestions in op would help make them harder to lay.

The fundamental issue here is that tech units are not efficient at all for their cost compared to call-ins considering the length of an average game when you add in the sunk cost of tech. Currently I can spend 200+160+320=680 manpower and 55+30+115 = 200 fuel to get a PIV, or I can get a Tiger for 640/230 that is usually just as powerful as two PIVs and far less likely to die to being outmaneuvered than an individual PIV. If I go for the PIV and my opponent saves for an IS2, I'll in all likelihood lose unless I can gain a huge advantage with the PIV in the 5-ish minutes it gets to be on the field before the IS2 arrives. While if I go for the Tiger, I'll be evenly matched with my opponent once the call-ins arrive, or ahead of him if he decided to tech instead.

I do not think a single call-in unit is in any way cost-inefficient compared to base tech required units right now.

Ye, at the moment the call-ins are to cost-effective compared to the regular ones. But IMO the problem with company of call-ins is that the time between building tanks and callingthemin is to short. Maybe its better to just adjust the CPs again so the time between building and calling them in is longer? That would allow a bigger timeframe for medium tankbattles.
A need to tech/build isnt certain to change the meta, it could be company of call-ins with a building.

Maybe its better to just adjust the CPs again so the time between building and calling them in is longer? That would allow a bigger timeframe for medium tankbattles.

A need to tech/build isnt certain to change the meta, it could be company of call-ins with a building.

Company of call-ins with a building is fine with me. I'm not really interested in removing that type of style of play, I just want to make call-in cost better reflect their performance and through that make base units more competitive.

Another CP or two wouldn't necessarily make that much of a difference, medium tech vehicles do not have the damage output or survivability to take on a zis/pak(+schrek) wall without huge risks so camping out for a another CP or two after you reach a certain point with your army is usually not an issue. You don't really need much of the map when you're skipping tech so there's no reason to spread out. Artillery options in 1vs1 tend to be too inefficient to do much about this style of play except with luck.

Yes I have played it this patch and it had a fuel cost increase for its buff.

My point was that prepatch the Tiger was not very good, for cost, at any role. It was outranged by SU85 and ZIS, and it couldn't fill the role as a break the line unit because if you got close to the line to try and flank the SU85s or AT guns you would get AT naded and ensure it's destruction.

Now at least it can charge the line and have a decent chance of success and for its cost its worth it.

You can't have it both ways. You want to increase the range of the Tiger and make it a long range AT weapon, then fine. Otherwise keeping it in limbo where it can't fight from afar and can't get in close without certain death makes the unit untenable.

Have you tried using a Tiger this patch? Or had one against you? Compared to the IS2, which fires 30% slower, has 25% less health, and faces weaker AT abilities (though the armor value largely compensates for this part), the Tiger has pretty much equal squad wiping capability while fighting against the larger soviet squads. I don't know how you're managing to get at-naded so easily with your tigers because I can pretty much rely on my Tiger alone to twoshot any conscript squad that tries to get in close, it's only mines that are a danger and for that you have your pretty much mandatory sweeper army this patch anyway because of how the aoe on soviet mines keeps oneshotting infantry squads now.

This is in sharp contrast to the previous patches where the Tiger was clearly the more AT focused of the Tiger/IS2 matchup. This also leaves Panthers very little point in existing in 1vs1, though this is nothing new. The Tiger fills the exact same AT role while providing insane AI on top of that. Ram is also mostly gone now, so the old cheese counter to Tigers no longer exists, making it very difficult to deal with one on more closed quarters maps where ATGuns have a hard time getting firing lines without coming into range of the Tiger as well.

On a theoretical level if I wanted to optimize play as germans this patch in 1vs1, I'd never tech beyond T2, always just wait out for tigers. They're that good, against any situation you'll see in 1vs1.

+1 all suggestions are good, logical and nice.

The only thing I dont agree is reducing the panzerfaust range, the rest is totally spot on IMO, some fixes are really urgent, like mines and ISU/Elefant.

Nice work Cruzz.

It's not really balance related and probably it's so obvious that it hasn't even been mentioned yet. But here it comes...

Show Spoiler

So...can these just be the new patch notes?

Very well though changes Cruzz. I really hope Relic will implement this. I almost agree with everything.

With these I do not agree

German halftrack: cost down to 220/20 (from 270/30) **I think the ammo reduction for upgrade is enough**
Add 125mp/30f research for pioneer demolition charges for germans. **fuell cost maybe to high**
Soviet TM-35 mine: Damage far to 0.2 (from 1) **I think the damage is good but it should cost a little more**

Commander ability changes:

Fear Propaganda: Guaranteed suppress on every tick in AOE. Pin and Retreat chances unchanged. **maybe decrease municost from 100 to 80**

Unit veterancy changes:

Blitzkrieg Tactics: Increase speed max by 0.3 while engine not damaged.**30% is maybe a bit too high**

German sniper: incendiary rounds available at vet0, vet1 infantry awareness **I like the addition of inf awareness very much, but I think I would do vet1 inc rounds, vet2 inf awareness**

General gameplay changes:

Removal of heavy engine crit chance from faust/atnade **maybe an idea to still have a chance when getting hit in the rear**

Commander tree changes:

Soviet combined army: Replace AT gun camo with KV-1 call-in. **I think the commander is getting too good with this change**

Addition:
A small hp nerf for ISU-152 and Elaphant but maybe the range nerf is enough
Some kind of small nerf to 222 sc. Maybe range or something. (the sovjet scoutcar is also nerfed)