Company of Call-Ins 2 - An Argument for Change

Jump back to quoted post10 Nov 2014, 00:28 AMNapalm

I think the community is under estimating how important this issue is. Time for a bump for more discussion or are we all on the same page?

Jump back to quoted post6 Nov 2014, 02:04 AMCieZ

One thing I actually forgot to mention in my initial post - I could edit it in at some point.

I've also considered limiting the ISU, JT, Elefant and KT to one per game - just like the Tiger Ace is limited. Thoughts?

Jump back to quoted post5 Nov 2014, 23:46 PMCieZ

Hello everyone, I'll go ahead and warn you that this will probably be a long thread - one that has been on my mind for a while now. I think that I've finally managed to finish gathering my thoughts regarding the call-in system in Company of Heroes 2. I will be posting this in other places in order to, hopefully, get Relic's attention and I urge everyone to keep this thread constructive and on-topic. I'm not saying my ideas are perfect, nor are they all original but I think we can at least all agree that the call-in system in this game needs a major overhaul - at least if Company of Heroes 2 wants to have a healthy future.

We've suffered for too long under the meta revolving almost entirely around call-in tanks. Sure it was sort of cool at the beginning, to be able to skip tech and still be able to compete - and perhaps that should still be a possible and valid play style, however currently doctrinal tanks are being heavily relied on (mostly by Ost/Sov) becuase they're simply too efficient - especially when compared to non-doctirinal tanks. Let's crunch some numbers to get to the bottom of this issue, starting with the Ostheer faction:

Cost of a P4:

T1 + BP 1 + T2 + BP 2 + T3 + P4:
(80/10) + (200/45) + (120/15) + (200/55) + (160/25) + (350/125) = 1110 manpower/275 fuel

Cost of a Tiger: (I'm operating under the assumption that T2 is a necessity because of how strong it is)
T1 + BP 1 + T2 + Tiger
(80/10) + (200/45) + (120/15) + (740/230) = 1140 manpower/300 fuel

As you can see the resource cost difference is quite minimal. Sure the P4 has the potential to come out sooner but it is also a significantly more risky investment, which is why we see Tigers - and not P4s in most top level games. The Tiger is safer because it is *much* harder to kill, plus has a disgustingly strong main gun. Furthermore, on a deeper level, the Tiger is a safer investment because you do not have to invest any resources into BP 2 or T3 - instead you can put those resources instantly onto the battlefield and being saving once you're at 9 or 10 CPs. You know when your tiger is coming, you know when to save, which means you're able to pour resources into holding the map during the mid game.
The T34/76 falls into the same sort of traps when compared to the T34/85 and IS-2. There simply is not much, if any reason to risk teching to these T3 units when playing it safe and saving for a call-in is simply more efficient in numerous ways.

I'll go ahead and add here that the Panther is, thankfully, in a nice spot for team games for both Ost and OKW. I'd like to figure out a way for Ost to be able to field it in normal 1v1s, but that'll have to be a thread for another day. Back to the point.

Now let's look at the second major issue with these doctrinal tanks. Their power level relative to non-doctrinal tanks. The P4 and the T34/76 are relatively balanced - especially considering that the P4 costs more. The P4 will win most of the time, however good use of the T34 can swing fights in it's favor - Relic has done an excellent job of balancing these units against each other asymetrically, they both have their strengths and can be used against each other effectively. Now, let's compare the T34/76 to the Tiger. How many T34/76 is it going to take to kill a Tiger? My gut instinct tells me at least 3, and that's assuming that there are no PaK40s around. Maybe some one has run hundreds of simulations on this specific tank battle (although I doubt it). What I can tell you for certain is that it will take at the absolute least, two T34/76 to beat one Tiger - and that is being generous. When you factor in the cost of tech, the Tiger is actually coming out ahead in efficiency because two T34/76 plus the T3 tech would be 320 fuel - which is more than a tiger with standard tech costs taken into account. When you start looking at needing 3 T34/76 to counter a single tiger, it gets worse. This same principle can be applied to the IS-2 vs P4 or the P4 vs T34/85. Simply put, the non-doctrinal tanks cannot compete with doctrinal tanks efficiently, relegating them to fringe strats or punishing weaker players. The standard tanks are, quite frankly, more or less obsolete once doctrinal armor hits the field.

I'll go ahead and clarify here - I'm not trying to argue that stock tanks are not viable. Sure they are, kind of, but your resources will almost always be better invested in a doctrinal tank - especially considering any kind of even game.

Hopefully by now it has been made clear why something needs to change so let's get to some suggestions on fixing this problem. Please, I encourage everyone to share their ideas on how to help Relic with the problem at hand.

Solution 1 - Probably one of the most frequently mentioned solutions to doctrinal tanks is to force a tech choice from a player in order to "unlock" the ability to requisition them. For example a Soviet player would need to construct either T3 or T4 in oder to call-in T34/85s, or IS-2s, etc. By the same token an Ostheer player would need either T3 or BP3 in order to call in Tigers. (This would apply to all call-in tanks). OKW would need all buildings constructed. I think that USF could stay as-is with regards to their call-ins since they're not nearly as game impacting as other faction's doctrinal tanks - although E8s might need at least two of: Liet, Capt, Major. This is probably my personal favorite solution because I think that it would allow more of a transition between early game, mid game, late game and super late game. Right now what we have is early game, kind of mid game and then super late game since most medium armor is simply ignored. I would love to see defined transitions between the different stages of the game signaled by the arrival of medium armor and then later on the arrival of heavier armor. This would have the added effect of severely punishing people trying to camp for heavy armor, because they'd have to pay most of the cost of medium armor up front anyways.

Solution 2 - Push back call-in CPs even further. My gut would say something like... 14-15 CP for T34/85s, 16-17 CP for IS2/Tiger and 20-21 CP for JT/ISU/Elefant. I would hope that having to stall this long for doctrinal armor would encourage players to tech, but also allow for those players that want to not tech to be able to do so without being punished too hard. The actual numbers would need testing. Not a clever or elegant solution but maybe it would work.

Solution 3 - Increase the current cost of doctrinal tanks, but reduce the cost if a specific tech requirement is met (probably same tech requirement as in Solution 1). This solution would be quite similar in practice to Solution 2 in that it would, hopefully, encourage players to build medium armor because they're essentially paying an cost for not doing so - but it would still give players a choice - whereas Solution 1 does not. At the very least this would go towards addressing the efficiency differential between doctrinal tanks and non-doctrinal tanks.

Anyways, I think this thread is getting long enough, and I think I've said more than my fair share - as well as covered everything that I've been mulling over the past couple of days. I'm looking forward to hearing other ideas on this topic - or reasons why the call-in system is actually fine and balanced (perhaps it is?).