Doesnt punish winning players. Just changes the dynamic so that the impetus of strategy changes from early to mid game.
Meaning games are no longer won or lost, necessarily, in the first 5mins.
You can garner advantage in the form of Vixtory points and resource control, and take favorable ground, and your units are more vetted.
I can understand that people "want it" to be like it was like in vCoH, but Relic have decided to implement the more recent DoW2 system over the antiquated vCoH model.
I think whats really bugging people, is not the upkeep model, but rather the vet changes.
Meaning Allies no longer achieve dominance by unit preservation and vetting, and Axis by teching.
I meqn this is the real change that everyone is sidestepping, and what I think this upkeep debate is really about.
Its inane to think the losing player is "rewarded" for losing units. Yes, his resource income increases proportionately, but he has stillmlost map control and units. That is the primary setback. Having more money in the bank doesnt help until you actualise that liquidity into eeal assets, which the winner at that point has retained.
Another thing people are not understanding about this upkeep model, is that it rewards and supports progression and teching. Ifnyou choose to overexpend in a particular teir, and pump out a ton of units thereby gaining a temporary and seeming advantage through sheer spamming of a given tier over your opponent, younare punished for that with less resource income to continue teching. Younhave to take into account your tech peogression as an inevitqble impending cost, and therefore be careful to not invest too heavily in a given tier, because thereafter you will be starved to progress.
I agree armor is not working well in CoH2. I attribute this primarily to a too narrow light vehicle window.
Progression to armor, and especiakly super armor, is too flat. Secondart to this, are the axtual armor stats, which I agree are not well optimised. Frontal armor engagements are onesided, and the range of supertanks is atleast 1/2 screens too far considering the map sizes in CoH2. Ram is supposed to mitigate the early PIV dominance, but its situational. Many want improvement to T34s, vut I think a better solution is naturalising the PIV to the T34, rather than the othrr waynaround. This would help draw out the escalation to super tanks.
Ideally, as others have stated, escalation should follow be from infantry, to light vehicles mixed with light tanks at the tqil end, to medium tanks (ie T34 vs naturalised PIVs and the associated tier Tank destroyers, and only then at great expense, thempossibility of endgame super tanks. As it is now, due to the upkeep system and progression being so flat and cheap, people skip 1-2 tiers when underdog and start spamming higher tech units with their flooding resource pool, putting the naturakly progressing and winning player onto an automatic backfoot and unable to tech in response due to smaller resource income until he loses units. Losing territory is automatic in this situation, but its onlynlosing units that will supply the resource flow necessary to tech to respond.
TLDR: Teching is too flat and too cheap. Winning players, who are losing resource income to a larfer force, are not currently able to tech proportionately in order to respond to the losing players resource income. Currently a losing player can tech and pump out several tactically superior units which counter the opponents force composition, too wuickly for the winning player to respond. I think its great that the loser has a breakout potential, and that the larger force winnernshould have less income, but the rate of income is currently off. I want to see the winning player able to tech and put out atleast one pre-emptive unit choice from the next tier, by the time the opponent has teched and is producing two. Currently, the winning player is forced into a reactive and defensive posture, first of all because he has to extend his fronts acrossnthe map with out teched units, and secondly because he cant push advantage by teching himself to be prepared for the enemies next gen units.
@Basilone: With all due respect, you are talking about unit/xommander balance changes. Those indeed are dhanged because they arw relqtively auperficial and isolated, ans therefore can be changed indivisually without cascading balance effects. But the upkeep system? I see zero chanxe of it reverting to vCoH.
Id instead encourage those people disgruntled by the new upkeep system, to brainstorm solutions that can be implemented within the new upkeep system, so that the game better matches their wishes for it. Know what I mean? Find ways to suggest changesmto upkeep rates, thresholds, individual unit upkeep costa, tedhing costs etc.
Workmwithin the current system to offer solutions.