Does anyone have hope?

Browsed this forum for over a year but only decided to make an account recently;

Does anyone actually have any hope left for Relic's balancing?

I like to think of myself a neutral kinda guy, I've been through Coh1 since its birth and saw some strange balance decisions but with CoH2 over the last few months its just been wierd.. best example being the katyusha. Yeah it was slightly under-performing but rather than slightly increasing its damage or lowering scatter, Relic literally just doubled each number they saw and committed it to the build.

Did they not even test it? This has been happening for a while now... katyusha, assault engineers, kubel etc.. constant patches only to revert the change and double some other numbers.. not to mention breaking new things each patch (MG retreat bug this patch which is borderline catastrophic).. they seem completely incompetent nowadays when you compare them to other industry balance teams.

The most healthy thing for the game right now would be to create a private test build for selected players of the community to TEST a patch/get feedback before they release it live.. (This apparently exists but is obviously mishandled and unused)

I have seen countless great players who I used to follow depart the game, along with avid posters on this forum who I enjoyed seeing their posts... a number still remain (Katitof, BartonPL etc) but it is getting to a stage where I am very worried.

What does everyone else think? Are your hopes high for this next 'patch' or are you worried?

Hope for the game yes. Hope for this forum no. Ressentiment.

Hope for the game? Nah.
It will be good if they dont bring new bugs, and problems with this patch. And that will be a progress from Relic, IMO CoH2 is in very very sad situation ATM.

Does anyone actually have any hope left for Relic's balancing?

Yes, of course.

The most healthy thing for the game right now would be to create a private test build for selected players of the community to TEST a patch/get feedback before they release it live

This exists already, and it has for a long time.

I have seen countless great players who I used to follow depart the game, along with avid posters on this forum who I enjoyed seeing their posts... a number still remain (Katitof, BartonPL etc) but it is getting to a stage where I am very worried.

Well hey I'm still here.

Yes, of course.

This exists already, and it has for a long time.

Well hey I'm still here.

But its unused for most patches..

Of curse there is hope. Its like a marriage, not every day is fun. There are some hard times and good times.
You should not get divorsed after 1 year and if you love your wife, you can make it work .

They should patch more frequently, but the intensity of the changes should be changed. They should really improve the stats of units by a small margin instead of what we are seeing now; Some units become OP or UP after one patch.

I think there is hope for this game, but these patches have made it quite frustrating to find that "sweet spot". Every patch is like a brand new game (I guess some may think this is good). I am all for a complete overhaul/meta-change, but this should be announced. The current patches create a situation where players gravitate towards to most OP unit. Small changes Relic, small changes!!!

This exists already, and it has for a long time.

Obviously it is not working

Compared to it's release, Coh2 has moved on leaps and bounds. Admittedly its beginnings were pretty "humble" (to put it politely, Coh2 on release was like a beta!).

I would not be a fan of some design decisions at the core of Coh2 or the new factions, but I love Relic RTS games for their uniqueness. If they managed to sort out the performance issues and bugs instead of new content, that would go a long way for me.

Balance is what it is, slowly improves with relic and then an expansion hits that fecks everything up, but such is life. Ostheer and Soviet match-up has its problems, but i'd say it is pretty enjoyable now after a year.

I'm more worried about some basic decessions that Relic made rather than balancing. I usually play 1v1s and some 2v2s from time to time, not interested in anything above that to be honest. The state of balance seems ok in 1v1 and a little bit odd in 2v2.

My main complaints are:


Design of certain factions

• In general: Playing allies feels extremely dull. It's either or. You mostly have only the half amount of units available due to the teching structure. Axis on the other hand are fun to play, especially Wehrmacht.
  
• OKW and USF promotes blobbing. Giving your basic infantry squad (Volks) good AT capabilities is ridiculous. It just asks for blobbing your units cause they can both take on Tanks as well as on Infantry. A good player's army should consist of a good synergy of support weapons and infantry with tanks. Not just basic infantry that you A move to victory.
  
• Support weapons: As the name already said, those weapons are used to SUPPORT infantry. Maxim spam is viable since day 1 (well because of the current bug not that viable, but you know what I mean). There shouldn't be more infantry than basic infantry. MG42 is doing it right in that regard.
  
• OKW vetting system: is just plain stupid. It automatically favours OKW in the later stages of the game, which makes no sense at all. While your concripts do fine early on, they are just getting eaten alive later on. The best part is that once your infantry reaches vet 3, your OKW opponent still gathers vet till the end while you stand still. This has nothing to do with balance.
  Giving units additional abilites once they reach vet 4/5 is fine with me, but not buffing their general stats.
  
• Useless doctrines: There are way too many doctrines that are not beeing used and never will be. If you don't pick a doctrine with a heavy tank call in, you are bound to the regular teching and limit your options (especially with Soviets). I'd rather go for a fast T34 and wait for an ISU or an IS2, than just beeing stuck with T34 all game. Especially with the T4 cost of extra 120 fuel..
  

bug fixing priority

Where should I start?

• squads getting supressed on retreat
  
• squads with camouflage getting cloaked on retreat
  
• maxim retreat bug
  
• mines with no effect on target
  
• commands get interrupted by explosives, flames, etc.
  
• ...
  

The list is too long (I'm not suprised that Sib's bug counter reached the 100 mark), and some of these issues are gamebreaking, they can turn the tide of the game against you.

Some of these Issues even got fixed, but found their way back into the game. Most of them are known for months.

It should be Relic's top priority to get rid of these bugs, but first, let me release a single player DLC.

randomness

I like the fact that tank armor can deflect incoming projectiles, but some thing are just too random.

It's 100 % RNG whether a squad gets wiped out by a mine, or just a model of it. A little bit of consistency wouldn't hurt.

game performance

Game runs like ass. I get constant freezes every 3-5 min on a regular basis. It speeds up afterwards. After each match I gotta restart it due to frame breaks. #Esport

Compare the Input delay of automatch to custom games for example.

It's not enough throwing a ton of money into tournaments, if you have a game that doesn't run smoothly. Especially if you think of the upcomming ESL tourneys.

EDIT

DLC policy

I might be a bit old-fashioned in that regard, but what's the deal with Ardennes assault? Paying 40 EUR for a single player DLC? I expected something like this beeing released alongside with WFA.

For example: Warcraft III got realeased and then the Addon The Frozen Throne with included both Single player (for each faction btw) and Multiplayer (good times). I wouldn't be suprised if Relic excluded the main menu and offers it as a DLC for 2,99.

I would have bought WFA with campaigns for both OKW and USF and the multiplayer content for 40 EUR. But I'm not willing to pay additional 40 EUR (!!) for something that should have been part of WFA.

luvnest speaks the truth regarding the OKW faction. I'm not entirely sure it can be balanced in way that can close the W/L gap in the 3v3 and 4v4 game modes. It seems a bit odd that a faction has been given an non-doctrinal heavy tank...

Hey good post luvnest!!! +1111111

I've still got faith, but i ask less, i'm just asking to bring the fun back into 4vs4. Just do what you must do to achieve it.

Thanks

+ 923928392822748278 to all Points from Luvnest!!!

Game was well balanced before WFA came out, and that took, what, nearly a year after release.


I am looking forward to AA and I am looking forward to this patch

Basicly what Luvnest said.

- Cheapest mainline infantry and mg for the OKW and best vet + hand held AT...WTF?!
- OKW and USF has ZERO sniper counters...even in a balanced game they'll be fucked by Sov and Ost.
- Company of Call-ins...
- "Super units" --> KT, Jagd, Obers, ISU-152...not a good design element.
- RNG Gods >>> over the game...(vehicle left abandoned)
- Retarded abilities --> Target Weak Point, Blitzkrieg, Capture Territory with Is-2...
- Too much Squad Wipe Potencials...
- Some units are overperforming to their cost (Kübel, PAKs)

Guys,

Have a simple question. Do you know someone from Relict(t) I can give some simple MATH class so match destructor will be more statistics based not random as it is now.

Romeo - pls do stop kidding with us or me at least....

Matches I saw this days, after some new players arrived were even not jokes - these were a total failure thanks to match destructor developers !!!

What makes you think I'm kidding? There really is an alpha, and there's going to be a public beta this week too.

Game runs like ass. I get constant freezes every 3-5 min on a regular basis. It speeds up afterwards. After each match I gotta restart it due to frame breaks. #Esport

I was having the same problem. Unclear whether it was caused by Nvidia driver update or the release of WFA. Either way, I had to lower my graphic settings, unwillingly so, but this did fix that issue.

At the rhythm the patches have been going out lately and their quality, I have little hope. I have stopped playing and it will take a lot in order for me to come back. I guess I have dreams now more then hope since I am still reading these forums from time to time.

Relic had a hard time balance 2 armies but before WFA, it was almost there. Now with 4 armies + all these commanders, at their speed, I think the game will need another year of patching and testing.

"THERE IS ALWAYS HOPE!" - Gandalf