Coh2 and Future Games (Design philosophy debate)

Hello, Our fine game is aging, and with limited recent communication on new content it is reasonable to guess Relic is working on a new game. Will it be an RTS? Maybe, but for sure if it is there are plenty of things to learn from coh2. This thread will tackle my opinion on design of an RTS from an engineers view point by addressing what makes an RTS good, fun, challenging, and easy to balance.

Starting with what I believe to be good design for an RTS, there are a few key things I think should be considered heavily. The number one thing that Relic has wrong is its opinion of asymmetric balance. Currently their idea of asymmetric balance is giving clear advantages during certain time periods, as well as making factions excel at different roles, as well as ranges. I think that this is entirely wrong. There are plenty of ways of giving every one strengths and weaknesses at every stage of the game, as well as the same tools that differ in minor ways. While this seems boring, and bringing more symmetric appearances to the game, let me give a relevant example:

The Pak 40 vs the Zis Field gun. These guns differ in abilities, and penetration, but fill the same role that they are both relevant at. The asymmetric side comes from the Zis Barrage, trading a little bit of AT for utility in a different role. This is the perfect example of how every basic tool that all factions deserve should function. Frustrations arise when this is broken. We have had plenty of threads over how useless the US AT gun has been, as well as the raketen werfer. If they had the same design bases the Zis and the Pak had, there would be less dependence on our current blob mentality and hurry get an actual tank out.

The second part of how in my opinion Relic failed at asymmetric balance is that they created factions with early game / late game dominance in mind. This is a completely skew agenda, because in every game the early game can be mitigated / sped up by player skill. The late game literally lasts from a short in game time like 8 minutes on to hour plus. Anyone remember at release of Western Front Armies where USF was pretty much dead after 12 minutes? Why the hell would anyone want to play 30+ minutes at a disadvantage because of design? That is why no one was playing tournaments with USF at the time.

The third part of Asymmetric balance I think Relic has wrong is short vs long range factions. They created a game that spectacularly uses true sight, directional cover, and indirect fire to give deep meaning to positioning. However, they ruined this concept by creating factions designed around being close. I have two examples of how this makes balance impossible to reach. The first one is the first march deployment patch. Soviets vs Ostheer was an awuful place, grenadiers literally beat everything due to the fact they had to leave cover to close the distance in order to have superior dps. This was a patch where they made small arms deadly, but forgot only one faction had to actually get close to win. The second example is the M1919. These lmgs are still really strong, but the use faction is designed around being close and by having this awesome upgrade they got around an entire design idea and created a huge problem for Axis factions.

There is a fallow up problem created by long range vs short range faction design. The map pool is literally impossible to fix. with this set up, there will always be maps, even the perfectly symmetric ones where either the close range faction has the upper hand, or more open ones where the long ranged dominate. Now not only are there regular balance issues, but the maps amplify the problems.

I want to point out something that should have never of been done, but we have. There should never be a point in the game where you have to rely on absolute RNG to kill stuff. My example is when OKW came out, there was nothing anywhere on par with the super soldiers that Soviets had so mines and demos and indirect fire were the counter simply because they had nothing else to deal with it. The reason this is painful, is that you have to literally rely on your opponent to win you the game by walking into your RNG, and it feels like the game is not really in your control anymore.

The game is incredibly frustrating at times due to RNG, and asymmetric balance. I believe a lot of it comes from Relics incorrect design philosophy of Asymmetric balance. I think that asymmetric balance means same tools but different flavors. What I mean is we shouldn't have basic rights locked away by tech or design simply because they are different. Using our game as the base, all factions should have early access to a machine gun, at gun, mortar, and basic infantry section. This means no matter the map or situation, there is never a time of "fuck I have to have grenade tech because my mortar was never put in the game" or "I lack snares so this light vehicle is literally going to force me off the map until I get tech out". Fallowing this up, all factions should get close range, and long ranged infantry. This means that all maps are valid, and makes them a hell of a lot easier to balance because one faction is not forced to run at the other.

To go on and support my asymmetric balance, to keep flavor of the factions involved utility and abilities should be tweaked. Price can also be played with here, but not too drastically. For example, lets say we make penals great in close range, and Ass grens not terrible. Both are close ranged squads, but the ass grens are a little better at just strait up fights where as the penals get more utility of building control.

Edit: Ran out of time typing this earlier, forgot some things.

Commanders were a cool idea, implemented not so well. The idea of choosing a commander to differentiate each game is awesome. For some reason there is a terrible inconsistency with what each commander brings. For example, who thought Jaeger Infantry, a doc with 5 munition sinks and nothing really late game oriented or means of using the abilities was a good idea? Then you have glaring Pay 2 Win commanders like release Elite Troops and Windustry which got nerfed later on to keep players in the game. The glaring failure of the great idea is that we have a guide for Commander Tiers. It Commander abilities should have been tiered, and thought out well to bring in useful abilities all through out the game. They should have NEVER have had to bring in things to make up for core faction deficiencies. they lead to huge power gaps and boring meta commanders.

The Cardinal sin of the game is resource affecting abilities. They are a totally fine concept, but it was blundered so hard I still to this day do not understand. Who the hell thought it was fair to come out with Opel Fuel trucks and not give any equivalent to the other side. not only that, but the oversight to allow these bonuses to stack to team mates, as well as to a faction designed around having less resources was ridiculous. Ill give an example why this is silly. In todays world, there are two types of companies, Non-For-Profits and Profits. Both can take donations (in this game build caches), but non profits are not allowed to re invest into themselves to grow and be better companies. Profits are, and with their re investments grow tremendous, and continue to far outpace ethics programs that even non profits can do. Here is an interesting TED talk of which I am getting this comparison from: Your text..

For whatever reason, Relic decided to give Axis far more ways of increasing their incomes, while leaving Allies in the dust. This issues has not been as bad of the late with commander changes and nerfs, but it should have always been a no go.

What should have been done is what games like SCII do, where each race gets something to help out on the income side, not just one. Even if they are different, you should never allow someone to invest in their faction to later outproduce their opponents without either substantial counter play or a way of doing it themselves.

TLDR to end the post, Lesson to be learned from coh2 is to give everyone the same access and tools, but different styles and appearances.

I agree OP.

I disagree about the AT gun point, I think people just complain about those because they are different and don't try to use it to the advantages, because they are pretty good.

Otherwise, these are some great points. Factions need to have both short and long range squads in the future in the core army to promote unit diversity. I wish they would have done something like this with the US weapon racks, but there is no reason to ever unlock more than one weapon type or to not kit all your units out with identical weapons. This is one point I actually like about OKW, the volks have a clear long range focus while the Sturmpios have a clear close-mid range design. It promotes flanking and thinking tactically to support your other kinds of units better. (OKW is blobby and doesn't accomplish this for other reasons, but I think you understand what I mean.)

Most of the faction asymmetry should come from things like tech differences, different upgrades, and different forms of veterancy.

something i wish for future Relic games is being able to fight insight houses:

when entering a building, the roof becomes transparent and you can move insight there --> new tactical options

something i wish for future Relic games is being able to fight insight houses:

when entering a building, the roof becomes transparent and you can move insight there --Y new tactical options

relic hire this man

Artillery abilities still target base. Love having some Brit Spam 3 AEC's then follow that up with a sniper near my base and Artillery cover destroying everything I have, in my base. And yeah, and aec is broken.

Artillery abilities still target base. Love having some Brit Spam 3 AEC's then follow that up with a sniper near my base and Artillery cover destroying everything I have, in my base. And yeah, and aec is broken.

Does a design thread, this guy brings a unit unbalance

Does a design thread, this guy brings a unit unbalance

What unit did I mention.