Veterancy

Having played maybe 100 games now, I'm starting to question whether veterancy actually exists in this game in a meaningful way. Apologies if this has been talked about before. Issues I see so far.


1.) Veterancy bonuses appear to be extremely marginal.

Besides the ones that unlock abilities (which is fine), the rest of the vet buffs seem irrelevant to me. I don't get the feeling that a Vet3 gren is any real better than a Vet0 one despite having "signifcantly reduced damage" and "significantly increased damage." As veterancy is a huge part of what makes CoH what it is, I'd like to see the veterancy bonuses make a bigger impact.

Solution: Introduce either more abilities as veterancy options and/or bring back things like elite armor. Or heck, even the PE style veterancy system idea was great in terms of choosing to buff offense or defense (with appropriate values).

Ideas like "lockdown" for a tank that removes its ability to move but increases reload rate for N seconds would be appropriate vet gained abilities.


2.) Veterancy earning is favored the wrong way.

Why oh why does it seem like getting shot at / killed generates more veterancy than anything else? This is completely backwards and rewards being outplayed. I understand the whole idea of "rubber band comebacks" but the game needs to reward the better player to be interesting.

Solution: 1/2 the current rate of experience gain for taking damage. Slightly up the rate at which experience is gained by doing damage.

EDIT: Saw the patch notes, looks like this is already happening. GJ Relic!


3.) Tank veterancy is way too slow.

I've had a panther with 40+ infantry kills and still vet0. Nuff said on that I think. Obviously this was a test against the CPU, but come on. I understand vehicles and whatnot are worth a lot more, but in a 1v1 it's not uncommon if I never see vet1 on any heavy vehicles (other issues as well).

Solution: Tweak veterancy numbers to either greatly reward tanks killing other vehicles or decrease veterancy required for tanks. I'd like to see tank maneuverability scale with veterancy as well - right now most tanks seem to accelerate / decelerate / turn way, way too quickly. Even ones like the StuG.


4.) Veterancy is too hard to preserve.

These issues are all tied together, but one key issue right now is that unit preservation is extremely hard in some cases due to the current state of retreat bonuses. I find myself retreating squads far earlier than I would have in CoH1 because otherwise they're dead guaranteed. And the frustrating part is that often times they can still be chased and gunned down on retreat.

Solution: Greatly increase defensive retreat bonuses.


5.) Veterancy is hard to see being gained.

The idea of XP appearing only underneath the gaining unit seems backwards to me, though after thinking about it a while I guess it makes sense. The issue this introduces, though, is that it is hard to accurately assess who is dying (both you and enemy), which can lead to squads dying or not being retreated fast enough. This might be something that just needs getting used to from CoH1, but I've talked to enough people that agree with me to post it.

Solution: Make XP indicator of another color appear on killed enemy. Since the current one is grey for the XP gainer, bring back the green one for the XP giver. That way you get a nice clear indication of who gained and what died. Tweak size or font or whatever to make sure it's not just a giant popup number flashing war during big engagements.