4 things that would make CoH2 instantly better

Interesting discussion going on here, have been following this thread for a good while now! I'd like to throw in my two cents on two points:

1. Cut-offs are still there. They are NOT taken out of the game. SNF had some 2v2 games with very effective cut-off strats, where one team had literally zero strat points for one - two minutes. While this might not take away all the MP, it does limit your Muni/fuel income severely, limiting teching and the use of special abilities that improve your general fighting strength. I agree that cut-offs are not as brutal as they were in vCoH, but saying that they are "taken out of the game" is polemic and plain wrong.

2. Come-backs are over-rated in this conversation. I've had plenty of games where I had the whole map capped after 10 - 15 minutes and had the dude pinned in his base, and I knew I had won the game. Some tried to fight on, but two or three T34s would always be the end of it. You are making it sound as if your opponent is getting a stronger army by losing, which is simply not the case.

Both the cases you r giving are more due to the side balance rather than the importance of either cut offs or comebacks .

1 In SNF the games were the ones with the mixed teams ,which were literally some of the most onesided games ive seen but that is due to the other side not knowing really how to conter the synergies of the mixed team since they had less experience on that and on the game design which really gives mixed teams both versatility and strenght in early mid and late game .

2 On come backs if you have the map within 10 mins it is possibly due to you being vastly superiorr than your opponent or your doctrine being vastly superior ( IS2 doctrine come to mind )

So what your cases do say is that if you have everything on your side you ll win , well thats not so big a deal Kappa

Hi guys,

New here I know, but i've played alot of VCOH and COHF, and am hoping to rekindle my love of COH by playing COH2, but i'm in a mixed bag.

The thing I loved about COH was that there was always something happening. Early game, playing as Ami, you had to flank, capture territory, micro rifles all over the map. For the Wehr, you had to think ahead. "Where will I position my MG?" "what's my overall stratey?" "What's my opponent doing?". It was great; felt alot like chess. The introduction of OF sort of kileld this, but it was still there.

There are a few things that COH2 is missing for me.

First off, sure, in the early game there is still stuff happening, but with the current maps, it doesn't matter where the opponent is, you know he's going to have to come back to the VP's (that Kholodny map) or over one of the bridges on (Spring pripyat?? -the non winter ma). It's quite stale. And getting old fast. Different maps will fix this. However, they HAVE (HAVE to HAVE to HAVE to) have community maps. Langres' was the best map in Vcoh, and it was a community map. Please Relic, please!

Second thing is the upkeep, as stated before. I remember playing a game against Say No to Stim's Whermact, and he dominated my rifles in the early game. The game lasted not very long, because I was spending so much MP on reinforcing my rifles, and not capping the rest of the map,(i.e the ratio of time & MP spent re-inforcing v capping and building new units was completely wrong) that he had a puma out before I even had a supply yard. I knew it was downhill from there. GG.

Now, if you lose the early engagement/s it just doesn't matter. There seems to be no penalty for losing early on. You're going to be getting so much MP, you can just build another. If you lost an early rifle, that was pretty much it; you were a full squad down. Same goes for an MG. But if you lose a rifle now, you don't even care. It's a shame really.

Leading on from that, I believe it's just to easy too tech. As Soviets, you can lose early game, and still get a T34 out. (T34 is pretty shit, but it does allow you to get back a bit of the map). I've been experimenting, and playing against the PC (3 expert PC v me and 2 PC's on easy). I can take the map, but there will still be a stug3 coming out, even with the Stug3 being so ridiculously overpriced.

Which leads me to my 3rd point, which is the "staleness" of the game at the moment. Once you have the map, what do you do? In COH, you would have a superior unit out, and could probably harrass his base , pick off any remaining units. For the soviets, there is no real use going above T3 (T34 gets owned by PAKS, as it should be). I'd rather go back to T1 for the Infantry. However, then you suffer more of a MP loss. I've got the entire map, but no MP. What!!??

For the Ostheer, T3 isn't hard to get, but the Tanks are sooooo expensive, you've got time to go away and make a cup of tea. So all you end up doing is making paks and MG's, and camping outside his base. Boring.

Then there is the Blizzard. Fuck Cold Tech. All it does is promote camping. You can't move your units, because they freeze. I'm probably not doing something right, but all I do is put my Conscripts in a building , or around a fire and leave them there. You either retreat them, stick them in a fire, or stick them in a house. That VP on the left side of Moscow Outskirts, there is no house or fire pit there. So if it's blizzard, and it's not your,you have to send a vehicle over to get it. But heavy snow means it takes forever. WHY!!?? It does nothing but slow things down. Why can't I use my fuel for a "warm jumper" upgrade?? DO i have to make a conga line of fire pits so my dudes can move anywhere?

My fourth point is the overall predictability of the game. Every soviet game I play is 4 Conscripts, molotovs, heal, Get the "Hit the dirt" commander, T2 build, T3 build, T34 (I'd love to use the T70, but it gets owned by an armoured car) force back germans, build 2 paks, camp. I know my t34's are uselss afterbout a minute thanks to their paper thin armour, and the availability of PAKS.

Every German game is Rush flame HT, build PAKS, tech for armour. My point is that every game goes up towards armour, and lots of it. Old COH encouraged you to go backwards. Wehr player has a medic bunker? Go back to T2 for mortars + snipers. T2 Terror, Crocodile Sherman, or snipers. He's going T3? Just user your T3. There was a counter for every game style, and you had to adapt. Now, it just seems to be "I'll get T2, because I know there will be enemy armour, and eventually i'll need PAKS. I'l build my T34 and.. yeah".

My final point is the voice acting, and the sounds. I remember moving a vCOH greyhound, and getting greeted by a friendly "Greyhound is rolling!". Even the sound of it's MG firing was nice. Same for selecting the volks, or an MG. "Stupid Americana" or "Gass it! Can't you drive any faster Klaus" it was hilarious, and added a great side to the game. Now, I get "For the Motherland", "Do not fuck with ze t34" and "Orrah!". It's just bit too serious.

Sorry for the long rant. Just my experience so far.

1 In SNF the games were the ones with the mixed teams ,which were literally some of the most onesided games ive seen but that is due to the other side not knowing really how to conter the synergies of the mixed team since they had less experience on that and on the game design which really gives mixed teams both versatility and strenght in early mid and late game .

I haven't followed the whole topic so I'm not going to discuss the points you guys are making, but this is just wrong. While I could agree that the second game was one-sided, the first one clearly wasn't. Just watch it again: in the early game they almost completely pushed us off the map and took us down to 34 VPs (against their 485), and both our strategies revolved around getting the opponent's cut-off; they pushed for our cut-off early, we pushed them off and then took their cut-off. And their loss is more due to the fact that they relied on a single piece of heavy armor to deal with our whole army than anything else. Had their IS-2s been supported by a couple SU-85s and conscripts to prevent rams (and T-34s of their own?) things wouldn't have gone that way.

I haven't followed the whole topic so I'm not going to discuss the points you guys are making, but this is just wrong. While I could agree that the second game was one-sided, the first one clearly wasn't. Just watch it again: in the early game they almost completely pushed us off the map and took us down to 34 VPs (against their 485), and both our strategies revolved around getting the opponent's cut-off; they pushed for our cut-off early, we pushed them off and then took their cut-off. And their loss is more due to the fact that they relied on a single piece of heavy armor to deal with our whole army than anything else. Had their IS-2s been supported by a couple SU-85s and conscripts to prevent rams (and T-34s of their own?) things wouldn't have gone that way.

Had the ridiculous upkeep not been there you guys would have lost the first match.


Not to say they didn't fuck up when you guys came back. Because they did. Badly

For me it feels like you get much less rewarded by playing better than your opponent, in nearly every aspect.

I agree with this, and I did say things needed to be a bit tuned. But I still disagree about the pace of the coh1 games, (they were not quicker than coh2's games as far as I can see) DevM's quick wins were that astounding precisely because they were that quick. I'm not arguing for the system as it currently is, i'm just saying that imho, fundamentally it's good and it'll reach it's full potential with a bit of tweaking.
I feel also that some want things to be exactly as they were in coh, which would defeat the purpose of having a sequel....

I feel also that some want things to be exactly as they were in coh, which would defeat the purpose of having a sequel....

And what do you think the purpose of a sequel is?

Either to re-invent the series, which CoH2 isn't trying to do. It's not that different.

Or improve and build on the predecessor, which CoH2 doesn't seem to be doing either.

It's just changed for the sake of change from my view.

And what do you think the purpose of a sequel is?

Either to re-invent the series, which CoH2 isn't trying to do. It's not that different.

Or improve and build on the predecessor, which CoH2 doesn't seem to be doing either.

It's just changed for the sake of change from my view.

I don't feel it's as bad as you make it out.. a lot of the new features are pretty clearly improvements or attempts at improvements.

However, the "change for the sake of change" point is a good one; the removal of field defenses for the allied faction, the complete removal of tank traps, and the lack of global upgrades for either faction are all unexplainable.

Some things were changed so that it's easier for players who are losing to keep fighting for a while. The resource + upkeep system, specifically.

Langres' was the best map in Vcoh, and it was a community map. Please Relic, please!

Langres isn't the best community map IMO, it's good, but there's a better one.

Duclair

Had the ridiculous upkeep not been there you guys would have lost the first match.


Not to say they didn't fuck up when you guys came back. Because they did. Badly

I was curious about if this was true or not, so I went and checked out the MP income for g1. I started around 7 minutes because that's when we were at our lowest unit count (although I didn't watch it twice to make sure or anything).

7:22 NKVD - 563 Dawnstar - 540 (here Twister had max Mp income)
10:00 NKVD - 523 Dawnstar - 519
11:22 NKVD - 487 Dawnstar - 594
17:00 NKVD - 406 Dawnstar - 391
20:00 NKVD - 419 Dawnstar - 514

And what do you think the purpose of a sequel is?

Either to re-invent the series, which CoH2 isn't trying to do. It's not that different.

Or improve and build on the predecessor, which CoH2 doesn't seem to be doing either.

It's just changed for the sake of change from my view.

The purpose of a sequel is either/both of those things you described, and they both mandate change from the prequel. Imho, people to a certain degree are being a bit reactionary to said change in their treatment of coh2 and comparing it to a perfect coh that never existed.

It doesn't even matter how good CoH was, although that influences how much outcry there is.

The problem is that rather than saying "how can we make this better", Relic seemed to be thinking "how can we make this different" or at worst "how can we make this easier."

There's some innovation to be found in CoH2 certainly, like Cold Tech and Trusight.

There's some improvement too, like capture points.

But none of those innovations or improvements depend on messing with the core vCoH formula to the degree that CoH2 has. The rest is just change for change's sake, or deliberately trying to make the game more forgiving with a lower skill cap.

But none of those innovations or improvements depend on messing with the core vCoH formula to the degree that CoH2 has. The rest is just change for change's sake, or deliberately trying to make the game more forgiving with a lower skill cap.

Do you really believe that a team of well-seasoned game developers like relic just sit down and think "oh man coh1 is great but we need to change something here just for the sake of it, uh, well, let's change the upkeep, uh, and have weapon crews have 6 guys, cuz that'd be fucking kewl". No. They have their reasons. While I totally understand your reservations on the given points, I think you can safely assume that it's NOT relic's mission to fuck up the CoH franchise.
Also, I don't think that CoH2 is that much more forgiving towards lower skilled players. From what I've seen so far, I can say that I've always seen the better players win. I remember this discussion from the time before SCII came out and people where complaining that multiple building selection would "ruin" the game and lower the skill ceiling, which turned out to be wrong (although Idra would certainly debate this ).
I'd say give the game some time, learn it, get used to it, and you'll beat lower skilled players the same way you did in vCoH because you'll know HOW to do it.

Do you really believe that a team of well-seasoned game developers like relic just sit down and think "oh man coh1 is great but we need to change something here just for the sake of it, uh, well, let's change the upkeep, uh, and have weapon crews have 6 guys, cuz that'd be fucking kewl". No. They have their reasons. While I totally understand your reservations on the given points, I think you can safely assume that it's NOT relic's mission to fuck up the CoH franchise.
Also, I don't think that CoH2 is that much more forgiving towards lower skilled players. From what I've seen so far, I can say that I've always seen the better players win. I remember this discussion from the time before SCII came out and people where complaining that multiple building selection would "ruin" the game and lower the skill ceiling, which turned out to be wrong (although Idra would certainly debate this ).
I'd say give the game some time, learn it, get used to it, and you'll beat lower skilled players the same way you did in vCoH because you'll know HOW to do it.

Though i agree that when we get accustomed to the game defeating lower skilled players will become less of an issue than it is now , its not going to be as easy as vcoh, cause the system favors comebacks and since the skill is less relevant now , what becomes more relevant ( in relaation always ) is gamebalance .

On the current relic team , yes they are seasoned and good and all that and they made dow2 which was good , although most people agree DOW was better . But on COH they are responsible for the OF so they are not beyond doing big mistakes . An example of change for change or rather differentiation is the new UI which is simply less good than the old

Do you really believe that a team of well-seasoned game developers like relic just sit down and think "oh man coh1 is great but we need to change something here just for the sake of it, uh, well, let's change the upkeep, uh, and have weapon crews have 6 guys, cuz that'd be fucking kewl". No. They have their reasons. While I totally understand your reservations on the given points, I think you can safely assume that it's NOT relic's mission to fuck up the CoH franchise.
Also, I don't think that CoH2 is that much more forgiving towards lower skilled players. From what I've seen so far, I can say that I've always seen the better players win. I remember this discussion from the time before SCII came out and people where complaining that multiple building selection would "ruin" the game and lower the skill ceiling, which turned out to be wrong (although Idra would certainly debate this ).
I'd say give the game some time, learn it, get used to it, and you'll beat lower skilled players the same way you did in vCoH because you'll know HOW to do it.

This.

Thank you bro.

It doesn't even matter how good CoH was, although that influences how much outcry there is.

The problem is that rather than saying "how can we make this better", Relic seemed to be thinking "how can we make this different" or at worst "how can we make this easier."

There's some innovation to be found in CoH2 certainly, like Cold Tech and Trusight.

There's some improvement too, like capture points.

But none of those innovations or improvements depend on messing with the core vCoH formula to the degree that CoH2 has. The rest is just change for change's sake, or deliberately trying to make the game more forgiving with a lower skill cap.

Agree 100% with this. I was hoping and still am for a game that is challenging and fair, both to a skillfull player and to a noob. What I mean by this is that the skillfull player gets rewarded for playing better, and the noob get's rewarded for improving.

But now it seems the game is catering the noob player with the thought that it's too hard for a noob player to improve so that he won't quit the game we will just make that the system will allow him to still play it easily and we will do this by handicaping the skillfull player.

If this were chess to me it seems like the loosing player gets off board reinforcments after bad plays just because he would still be all happy and in the game. While at the same time, the better player as soon he is in the better position he get's handicaped.

And this is noob vs skilled player, but what if it's two unskilled players, then it's even worse when a winning player can't capitalize on his position and the loosing can just come back. This system takes almost all the skill out of the game and throws you in fake enviroment where the path of the game is influenced by design rather then by competition and skill of the players playing it.

And lastly I would like to say what multiplayer CoH awesome to me. Apart from all the other cool stuff that has been mentioned I loved the most how your skill mattered, and after time playing it you could see improvement in your game, how your better or worst decisions realy mattered to the outcome of the game. If you're shit you won't have any chance against 3-4 level higher player, he will eat you alive. But if you improved you could take that player on on level terms. Now it just seems that the playing field is rigged.

Invest money in a better matcmaking system and this cop out way to please the masses.

Sorry for the rant

Do you really believe that a team of well-seasoned game developers like relic just sit down and think "oh man coh1 is great but we need to change something here just for the sake of it, uh, well, let's change the upkeep, uh, and have weapon crews have 6 guys, cuz that'd be fucking kewl". No. They have their reasons. While I totally understand your reservations on the given points, I think you can safely assume that it's NOT relic's mission to fuck up the CoH franchise.

And do you think that seasoned veterans are immune to a big lapse of judgment.

Honest question, do you think that the UI guy is a newb who is doing his practice while still partying at the college? Because to me this UI seems done by a totally incompetent people.

The UI should have been improved on and not made something new and cool just so it would be different from the first game. Why even change the collors? Because the battles take's place on the different side of the compass? How retarded can that be? This simpliest thing is even retarded from marketing point of view. Why the hell it was done both on the design and decision level is beyond me.

Kolaris, please change COH 2 for OF and this post would have been relevant at the launch of OF.

I still can't understand why they made the exact same mistakes as OF.

To think, they had a perfect case study in EF as well. They tried change for the sake of change and end up changing it back more towards the COH formula and the game was heaps better.

My god, relic, why didn't you watch how they launched SC2? The community there is far more picky that the community in COH yet they successfully created a great sequel.

then it's even worse when a winning player can't capitalize on his position and the loosing can just come back. This system takes almost all the skill out of the game and throws you in fake enviroment where the path of the game is influenced by design rather then by competition and skill of the players playing it.

Again - if you are the better player in CoH2, you will win. This game is competitive, and while the MP system is more forgiving towards the player with the smaller army, it does not break the game. If you have your opponent outcapped, you'll have more muni and fuel income. You'll have tanks, off-map, stukas, what have you, whilst your opponent can't do anything but spam vanilla infantry. You make it sound as if you are on even ground even when he is pinned inside his base, which is wrong. Beta noobs just don't know when to leave a game, thats all

I hope this game does cater to noobs as much as you say. A player base bigger than CoH would be great.