-I've played NS2 but I had no idea about what you said! It's sounds interesting, but I'm not sure about the outcome (whether the community like the changes or not). But still, I think NS is far more easier to balance than CoH. NS2 is also not a competitive game (as far as I know), but CoD is. People on the balance team would then be unable to participate in Tournaments and arguments. They would also be the target of hate and rage, I don't know if anyone is willing to do that. Look at the amount of unconstructive criticism (hate) aimed at Miragelfa and Cruzz, and all they did was release mods!
The outcome has actually been very good, at least from what I've seen; and the community seems to agree. They've changed/added things such as new UI scaling, a new server browser, hit-box fixes, new maps, new 'alien vision' modes, as well as a large amount of well-deserved balance changes. I can't speak about the NS2 competitive scene, but playing on a standard server is much more competitive than something like CoD, and arguably even COH2's 3v3 and 4v4 modes (team-strategy is required, as are knowledge of counters, certain tactics, etc.)
There is definitely a problem in getting people involved with a 'patch' team, though. I'm really unsure as to how things would be handled regarding tournaments, debates, etc.
I meant both How to select and Whom to select. Is it even up to us?
Community vote? I'd say have a minimum bar of entry: top-20 with ALL factions in 1v1, and/or an existing and maintained balance mod. They can get added to the list of candidates, and from there the community can vote on it. I would say limit it to about 8-10 people total. Of course, the devs would end up having final say on who is in, but I would hope they would be reasonable.
We would never have consensus, that's why the team should have a tie breaker (Odd number). But again, a lot of good players contradict each other on the forums left and right. Their play style, the meta, and a lot of other factors affect balance (Duuuh), and the players perspective and play style should be counted as an important factor. Based on what I've seen, I think (simply an opinion not a fact) that we would not have consensus.
I would have to disagree; consensus, at least among the team would almost be required. These players wouldn't be "one faction" players - they would be experts with all of them. If Player A thinks A is OP and B thinks it is fine, A could demonstrate how it is OP. After several trials (as well as consulting other team members), a decision could be made fairly easily as to if the thing in question as OP or not. In essence, a top-tier player won't be beaten by the same strategy over and over again, provided that it is balanced.
A great example is 'PioSpam' from CoH1. When it was first mentioned on a forum, people said "yea, easy to beat it". IIRC the creator (Mags? Something like that) then beat every single challenger, and went on to play auto-match, announcing "I'm going to PioSpam" at the start of each match... and continued to win.
Of course, not everything is going to be as insanely overpowered as PioSpam, but in those cases, the team can trial SMALL changes (+/-10% type changes) in a balance mod.
Don't completely agree with this. I don't wanna name anyone, but we have top 50 players who are good at the game, but their discussions regarding balance are illogical and biased.
Unfortunately, since COH2's competitive community is so small, top-50 isn't all that amazing (IMO). It's definitely good, but I can't think of a single time when a top-50 player won a tournament over a bunch of top-10 players; there's just too big of a skill gap.