Balancing 3v3 and 4v4 without revamping factions

Preface: I prefer 3v3/4v4 coh2 due to the greater 'chaos of battle' element, as well as the 'real world tactics' aspect of having allied formations operating on your flanks, with the inherent conflict that you have to balance the need to assist in their offense/defense while also accomplishing your goals.

Goal: To suggest a solution to 3v3/4v4 imbalance without breaking the 1v1/2v2 dynamics that appear to work fairly well. (I do NOT suggest it is perfectly balanced in 1v1/2v2 - I'm only addressing 3v3/4v4)

Assumption: much of the discussion and expressed frustration with 3v3/4v4 derives from the overabundance of call-ins, armor of all types, and bolt-ons (schrecks/lmg's/BAR's/etc.) that can negate the need to play a solid early/mid-game with late game super efficient units that (when competently handled) present a lock for which the opponent has no key as well as just an overabundance of medium-heavy armor and gimmick units.

Proposal:
This proposal will assume the servers can recognize when the players are participating in a 3v3/4v4 game instead of a 1v1/2v2 and can adjust certain parameters accordingly.

1) Bolt-ons and armor: 'Inflation Per Instance' = for each instance of the chosen bolt-on that is already operational on the battlefield for this player (not the Allied/Axis team as a whole) then a cost multiplier will apply...the more you build the more expensive the item gets...example:
BAR/Flamer/Zook/MP40/Abilities+Upgrades/Light Vehicles: +10% per instance
Schreck/M1919/MG42/Medium Vehicles: +15% per instance
FJ/Para upgrades/Heavy Vehicles: +20% per instance
Armor popcap inflation: each instance of an armored vehicle increases the popcap cost of an additional vehicle by +5. (this is a placeholder number, as I don't yet have a crystal-clear picture of how this scales)

2) Super-heavy Armor: 'Unique Call-in' = only one of these is ever available to a single player in a single match.

Yes, #2 would only apply to the following: King Tiger/JagdTiger/Elefant...it is not meant to punish the Axis player, but to prevent the sort of 'multiple super-heavy call-ins' situation that just turns the remainder of a match into a 'waiting for death' scenario for the entire Allied side.

Finally, all of this is intended to create a situation where it is more economical to deploy a variety of upgrades across numerous units of the same type, rather than a monolithic uniformity toward a single super-effective type (schrecks/para's/etc.) and to limit the overall number of vehicles deployed by a single player at any one time.

I'd like to see more vanilla Volks/Rifle/Gren squads operating to screen/support the bolt-on enhanced squads to enable them to use their specialty weaponry effectively.

TLDR: change the upgrade/bolt-on/vehicle costs in 3v3/4v4 to encourage more vanilla play and limit the number of super-heavy call-ins to one per player per match to limit the heavy metal clown car parade of KT's etc.

A few of us have made this point before. I mentioned tweaking core rules / modes for larger games to Quinn Duffy during the CoH2 alpha. He said he wasn't going to make 'x' number of games, only one.

With respect to QD, I don't see where an idea like yours does that, but he's the boss.

Relic wont change anything.

sorry that u wasted ur time

I feel like the most simple change would be fuel upkeep. You call in a heavy, your fuel income is decreased while it is on the field. This would keep the late-team-games from the inevitable (and frankly boring) Tiger/Elefant, ISU/IS2 and KT/Panther standoff.

This has already been mentioned countless times in threads & streams (aka not my idea) but I feel like most discussions deviate to more convoluted solutions.

It is especially frustrating to throw everything you have at a tank to destroy it, only for another one to be immediately called in. No-risk all-reward mechanics are hurting this game.

Theres quite a fundamental issue with team games regarding resources and the maps.

On the 3v3/4v4 maps the amount of sectors is the same as on a 1v1 map, however unlike in a 1v1 where initially you are capping one sector in a 3v3/4v4 you can have three or four sectors being capped at the same time.

What should be done is reducing the amount of resources each sector gives in 3v3/4v4 maps and also increase the amount of sectors on 3v3/4v4 maps.

The other issue with the maps is that the distance to get to the action zones is much much bigger making it hard to get back into the fight after a retreat unlike on the smaller maps where you can retreat and create a counter push quite quickly.

^ IpKai is absolutely right, just fought a 4 v 4 on Lanzerath ambush and half the game was spent pegging it up and down the battlefield. I wonder if the WFA map armies have retreat points in mind for those factions, but with Ost and SU it can be a pain.

ive always thought the scaling resource income needs to be enacted that way more players don't mean more resources. (you get less resources the more players there are.)

as for limited call ins i don't like that if its possible id like to avoid it but at this point it might not be possible.

You could make Caches only share half resources with team-mates, or something to that effect.


And add Pershing doctrine

You could make Caches only share half resources with team-mates, or something to that effect.


And add Pershing doctrine

This
Other then the heavy tank dominance which is a problem that all game modes suffer from (4v4 just feels it a bit harder). The only real problem is that mode is the huge resource boosts that teams get from four different players boosting the entire teams resource income. It's especially noticeable in the OKW who are balanced around their lower resource income.

Other than caches and lacklustre USF late game, I feel like much of team game imbalance will be solved if 1v1 becomes better balanced. E.g. fixing the heavy call-in meta / making teching more attractive.

You could make Caches only share half resources with team-mates, or something to that effect.

You'd have to allow one point to hold up to 4 caches then, otherwise you'll just have friendly AT Guns and Mortars killing friendly caches so they can set up their own cache.

You'd have to allow one point to hold up to 4 caches then, otherwise you'll just have friendly AT Guns and Mortars killing friendly caches so they can set up their own cache.

Well they can sabotage their own teams if they want but that seems about as likely to happen as killing your teammates squads so their weapons drop for your guys, and any idiot can see it would be a big boon to the opposing team. Big team games are heavily weighted towards OKW, who can't build their own caches anyway.

You could make Caches only share half resources with team-mates, or something to that effect.


And add Pershing doctrine

full income with huge mp penalty

like industry

for usf

Pershing

with crews disabled

These are all cool ideas, but for the 100th time, they are not gonna change the whole game. Keep these things in mind for CoH3.

Well they can sabotage their own teams if they want but that seems about as likely to happen as killing your teammates squads so their weapons drop for your guys, and any idiot can see it would be a big boon to the opposing team. Big team games are heavily weighted towards OKW, who can't build their own caches anyway.

They can make their own team weapons, but caches can only be built once per point. You're in denial if you think players won't harm their allies to give themselves a boost.

You're letting your imagination run wild. It's extremely obvious that you're crippling your own team effort (of which you are a part of) by blowing up caches because you not only destroy 200mp of your teammates, but you then sink 200mp of your own into the cache. Why would they sabotage their team-mate for a small increase in resources? Would they spend 200 manpower and piss off the person whose cache it is (as well as their whole team because they're wasting time with units that could be killing the enemy) to increase fuel income by 1?

You're letting your imagination run wild. It's extremely obvious that you're crippling your own team effort (of which you are a part of) by blowing up caches because you not only destroy 200mp of your teammates, but you then sink 200mp of your own into the cache. Why would they sabotage their team-mate for a small increase in resources? Would they spend 200 manpower and piss off the person whose cache it is (as well as their whole team because they're wasting time with units that could be killing the enemy) to increase fuel income by 1?

I've seen Soviet players steal USF tanks, people tank-trapping off their ally, indiscriminate artillery fire hitting friend and foe, and even an OKW player blowing up another player's medic truck because the truck's owner lost a KT. I've even seen an incendiary strike on an Ostwind that was drove right next to a USF Major, the US player killed the Ostwind but lost most of his forces to his teammate's indiscriminate firebombing. If you think 4v4 players won't destroy another person's cache in order to make one that actually benefits them, I think you're giving them too much credit.

I've seen Soviet players steal USF tanks, people tank-trapping off their ally, indiscriminate artillery fire hitting friend and foe, and even an OKW player blowing up another player's medic truck because the truck's owner lost a KT. I've even seen an incendiary strike on an Ostwind that was drove right next to a USF Major, the US player killed the Ostwind but lost most of his forces to his teammate's indiscriminate firebombing. If you think 4v4 players won't destroy another person's cache in order to make one that actually benefits them, I think you're giving them too much credit.

Spot on

OP's suggestions will not likely ever see the light of the day.

However, most of the problems in 3v3/4v4 would/will be eliminated with revamp of heavy armor meta.

Right now, super heavies trump everything else on the field but are practically impervious to anything other than opposing super-heavy armor.

Running into 5 At guns with super-heavy should be the end of it. Sadly it is not uncommon to take on 5 AT guns, destroy 2-3 of them and retreat for repair. Come back in 2 minutes with full health and stronger due to Vetting up.
Not to mention having blitz and smoke to make situation even worse.

OKW resource starvation has to be carried on into team games however.

Just making default tech armor useful and super-heavies less impervious to default units would go long way to fixing 4v4...

The last time I played 2v2 random as soviets (last time for a reason), my teammate started shooting one of my buildings with an AT gun because he didn't like my tech choice and thought we were gonna lose. If players can troll with something, eventually some will.