Relic Winter Balance Preview v1.4 Update

Ever since v1.0 Penals were found out to be a failure, we realised we need to give something back to them. Since we are not all-knowing and wanted to explore multiple options, we gave all of these options to see which ones (if any) could work.

Thus, without having to wait for the patch to update (every week), both the players and the balance team could try out different configurations.

Thus, as a result of Penals having access to this smörgåsbord of upgrades/options, we were able to address bugs and refine all 3 options: PPSh/Flamers, PTRS and AT satchel. We could do all of this within 2 weeks, as opposed to the 6+ weeks that swapping upgrades in/out would require.

You gave them PTRS, gave them more PTRS, and are now sticking with PTRS.

You've got to stop confusing testing and playing.

I can test the changes and see if the changes aren't bugged or broken.

I can play the game and see if the changes work for the game.

I can't exactly do both at the same time.

All factions, and all tiers now get appropriate counters for every single possible light vehicle. If you believe that any single vehicle/strat can shut down a particular opening tier, please let us know.

Was that the issue of the stale light vehicle meta? Ostheer has panzerfausts and teller mines leading into paks and panzergrens but somehow Stuarts and T-70s are just as apart of this stale meta.

Metagame comes after the maps, comes after the balance and design. Rushing a unit your opponent can't counter (yet) is, and always will be, a central strategy. It's better to reduce that impact than to remove its possibility.

[...]

Thank You for the answers. I really wish to see the G43's option as an alternative choice for the vanilla grens that will improve the overall variety of builds that are currently avaliable. Because as for now, wehr low model count on their mainline infantry and static nature of LMG as well rifle grenade discourages any agressive grenadier play, or even flanking.

As for the Jaeger Light Infantry I thought it could be grenade package that will switch rifle grenade for standard issue stick grenade (from fussilers) and Blendkörper (from Obers).

Some tweaks in the commanders then might be nessesary, since the JLI is avaliable in few of the most viable doctrines at the moment, but that upgrade might be an interesting idea to put in underpowered commanders that dont see any play at the moment.

And since they still will be "just" 4 man grenadiers squads they wont be able to push the highly agressive squads such as USF infantry etc.


P.S. I also would like to point out the the other changes in the whole WBP are definitely a step in good direction, although people just wanted the patch to be more wider in scope, hence so many hissy comments (from my side as well). Just wanted to give You thumbs up for the effort and communication here on forum, especially for the latter you deserve a medal.

95% community says "Remove PTRS Penal Idea", handful of modders adamantly defends it do the death, literally.

You guys are too emotionally invested in this change. It was interesting to try out but just let it go...

Thr goal of assgrens is not to take lategame closerange allied infantry head on. It is to flank tean weapons and dispose of them.

In that case, you can immediately scrap anything you people did to Assault Grens (because they worked better at the specified role before the changes). It also doesn't change the fact, that I can still simply produce a second Pioneer squad for less manpower and achieve the same goal even easier and cheaper - this holds doubly true with the buff Pioneers received to their offensive capabilities.

Then there's also the problem, that Assault Grens are too squishy to do even that single job you just assigned them to. Whenever they try to flank, they will inevitably run into other infantry along the way (unless you play against a blobber, in which case Assault Grens will never work out regardless of their changes). And SPLAT, the entire idea of trying to flank the enemy's team weapons goes down the drain, because any opponent worth their salt will now guard his flanks.
At the same time, two Pioneer squads wouldn't have a problem with that, because you could split them up, have one of them play meatshield (cost effectively) while the other goes on to assault the team weapon. Less manpower cost, better results.

P.S.: So everything I already said about Assault Grens a long time ago still holds true. They are still the worst assault unit in the game (sure, they are relatively cheap, but since they also offer nothing worth their cost, this is a zero-sum game) and there is nothing that redeems them. Their grenade ability still offers nothing against most allied team weapons, as almost all of them (the British ones are entirely excluded from this) pack up so fast that they are never endangered in the first place. Especially the unit that would most likely be targeted by such strategies (the USF mortar, which is still a brain-dead choice for any USF player because it has absolutely no drawbacks and severely limits any strategical freedom Ostheer may have had) is so fast to pack up and run home, that Assault Grens don't matter a single bit.

95% community says "Remove PTRS Penal Idea", handful of modders adamantly defends it do the death, literally.

You guys are too emotionally invested in this change. It was interesting to try out but just let it go...

We will also try a PTRS-free idea for Penals we have been hatching for a while. The reason why we haven't done this yet is because want to test the two versions under the same circumstances.

The reason why we have delayed it this long is because we had a second batch of changes for vehicles coming all along, scheduled for v1.5 (now v1.4). Obviously, we need one more cycle to finetune the new changes we have introduced in v1.4.

If everything goes as planned and Relic respects that decision, v1.5 will be the last PTRS Penal version you will see in the mod for a while. Following that, I am sure there will be a survey for people to vote on the WBP changes in general (light vehicles & vehicle scaling, infantry scaling, etc), and one of those questions will be about which version people believe fits better into the game.

The feedback we have received for Penals up to so far has already been incorporated into improving the particular pieces of the unit. Many of these improvements will make it to the alternative version. Finally, there is one particular post in this thread that precisely predicts what the alternative PTRS-free design looks like, down to the very finest details.

This is not the case of "us" being emotional about it. This is a case about being conservative and trying to present all options in the best possible light, so that an objective decision can be reached.

95% community says "Remove PTRS Penal Idea", handful of modders adamantly defends it do the death, literally.

You guys are too emotionally invested in this change. It was interesting to try out but just let it go...

How you know that 95% of community is against it? All i see is the same 4-5 players sayiing it is bad while the mayority of players probly like the idea, but just don't post.

95% community says "Remove PTRS Penal Idea", handful of modders adamantly defends it do the death, literally.

You guys are too emotionally invested in this change. It was interesting to try out but just let it go...

Small correction 99%. Esp. ones with single digit iq., and those who didnt bother calculating even basic stuff.

How you know that 95% of community is against it? All i see is the same 4-5 players sayiing it is bad while the mayority of players probly like the idea, but just don't post.

How do you know that mayority of players probly like the idea, but just don´t post??

i think it's hard for them to rework those unit in doing so require some relic help such as weapon effect otherwise mostlikely it's going to be a same unit as another faction have had before

penel might find a way to sovle the problem if there is a new weapon for them such as PPsh-41

alright here what i think 2 mosin scope at vet 2 work like pathfinder or maybe 2 SVT-40 automatic version and they can dig a trench and use ptrs only while in a trench (work like RE),so they can only Push off enemy light tank but did not hunt them down and maybe tone down their rifle little bit right now seem like they good than riflemen and paratrooper which feel like somthing need to tone little bit

dude above give an oppinion that Asgren still can't stand late game ,so any of us ever think that MP40 should work like medium range weapon just like in VCoh ? but if we had that STG-44 should work like BAR good at medium to long but not that trigger happy like it is just doing their brust fire like BAR what i'd think is let them get MP40 once Tier 1 or 2 had been upgraded on early game they can fight with Kar98 but got sprint ability like rifle company to get them to cover or get away from those semi auto weapon faster this sprint ability really do help riflemen when face again strumpio toe to toe so it will help Asgren survive early game i guess

when upgrade tier 1 or 2 they will get 2 MP40

but after all that just my oppinion and im no top player so what do you think people

I my self always didn't build AT in early game but get tank from eiter tier 3 or 4 instead and seem to be no troble at all that why i think PTRS in trench might be a good idea.

but with my respect im really like those 3 PTRS unit but if another player whom might know shit better than me said it's not so maybe we might need to rework again.

Thank You for the answers. I really wish to see the G43's option as an alternative choice for the vanilla grens that will improve the overall variety of builds that are currently avaliable. Because as for now, wehr low model count on their mainline infantry and static nature of LMG as well rifle grenade discourages any agressive grenadier play, or even flanking.

As for the Jaeger Light Infantry I thought it could be grenade package that will switch rifle grenade for standard issue stick grenade (from fussilers) and Blendkörper (from Obers).

Some tweaks in the commanders then might be nessesary, since the JLI is avaliable in few of the most viable doctrines at the moment, but that upgrade might be an interesting idea to put in underpowered commanders that dont see any play at the moment.

And since they still will be "just" 4 man grenadiers squads they wont be able to push the highly agressive squads such as USF infantry etc.


P.S. I also would like to point out the the other changes in the whole WBP are definitely a step in good direction, although people just wanted the patch to be more wider in scope, hence so many hissy comments (from my side as well). Just wanted to give You thumbs up for the effort and communication here on forum, especially for the latter you deserve a medal.

Smith and his team will NEVER do something that good for Grenadiers.

Fact of the matter is, they have this strange notion that the Soviets/Other Allied Factions should have tactical flexibility tied to there organic, non-doctrinal units, but HEAVEN FORBID Germany has any tactical flexibility without having to choose a doctrine.

IB4 "but-but-but the Conscript vs Grenadier matchup -sniff-"

How do you know that mayority of players probly like the idea, but just don´t post??

becouse humans work like that only mad people post everyday! but ok u are right we don't know!

This is not the case of "us" being emotional about it. This is a case about being conservative and trying to present all options in the best possible light, so that an objective decision can be reached.

So, when someone accused the changes of being too complicated, and you responded with some pithy, backhanded remark sarcastically asking them if they found Panzergrenadiers too complicated too, insulting their intelligence, that wasn't you getting emotional?

Give me a break man. Do you think we're stupid?

So, when someone accused the changes of being too complicated, and you responded with some pithy, backhanded remark sarcastically asking them if they found Panzergrenadiers too complicated too, insulting their intelligence, that wasn't you getting emotional?

Give me a break man. Do you think we're stupid?

You play the victim well. If you were to go back to the last time you quoted me in which case you spouted off and literally danced around my points by insulting me, I think you will find Smith is following the old saying that what is good for the goose is good for the gander. However, I don't think either one of you should be snarky, but you should definitely stop acting like you are a complete innocent caught in the cross fire.

I don't really understand the level of vitriol on a balance mod. This is a testing mod, a platform to try things out. If you hate them, and penal PTRS are definitely hated, you can say so here without insulting people and get feedback. My goodness we complained to high heaven that Relic never talked, now you have modders talking directly to us about balance and everyone is attacking them. Leave off the personal crap and focus on the game. If you hate something, by all means share that and why. If you love something the same, but stop making the modders out to be some evil boogey man. They are doing us all a service, and we can help them by giving good feedback.

To be clear, I am not saying everything about this mod is great, or even good, only that the way in which we can interact and offer advice is the first time this has ever happened for COH2. Let's use that opportunity to improve the game, as I don't know how many more chances we will get.

So, when someone accused the changes of being too complicated, and you responded with some pithy, backhanded remark sarcastically asking them if they found Panzergrenadiers too complicated too, insulting their intelligence, that wasn't you getting emotional?

Give me a break man. Do you think we're stupid?

The other troll was using outdated points to launch an ad-hominem attack.

The points that the other troll was making were perfectly valid feedback for WBPv1.3. However this is WBPv1.4 and we have already addressed all the issues the other guy was using as an excuse to make a post.

In short, if you haven't bothered to launch the mod and if you haven't even invested the time to read the changelog, you don't belong in this thread.

PS: Anybody who claims they know whether the "majority" or the "minority" players loves/hates PTRS is only bullshitting themselves. The only entity that has any clue about it is Kyle. We're still waiting for the results of the survey.

You play the victim well. If you were to go back to the last time you quoted me in which case you spouted off and literally danced around my points by insulting me, I think you will find Smith is following the old saying that what is good for the goose is good for the gander. However, I don't think either one of you should be snarky, but you should definitely stop acting like you are a complete innocent caught in the cross fire.

I don't really understand the level of vitriol on a balance mod. This is a testing mod, a platform to try things out. If you hate them, and penal PTRS are definitely hated, you can say so here without insulting people and get feedback. My goodness we complained to high heaven that Relic never talked, now you have modders talking directly to us about balance and everyone is attacking them. Leave off the personal crap and focus on the game. If you hate something, by all means share that and why. If you love something the same, but stop making the modders out to be some evil boogey man. They are doing us all a service, and we can help them by giving good feedback.

To be clear, I am not saying everything about this mod is great, or even good, only that the way in which we can interact and offer advice is the first time this has ever happened for COH2. Let's use that opportunity to improve the game, as I don't know how many more chances we will get.

Great post. I feel exactly the same way. Players say coh2 isnt balanced, maybe it is their fault to. They got the tools now to make it more balanced, stop the whine and post good feedback.

You play the victim well. If you were to go back to the last time you quoted me in which case you spouted off and literally danced around my points by insulting me, I think you will find Smith is following the old saying that what is good for the goose is good for the gander. However, I don't think either one of you should be snarky, but you should definitely stop acting like you are a complete innocent caught in the cross fire.

I don't really understand the level of vitriol on a balance mod. This is a testing mod, a platform to try things out. If you hate them, and penal PTRS are definitely hated, you can say so here without insulting people and get feedback. My goodness we complained to high heaven that Relic never talked, now you have modders talking directly to us about balance and everyone is attacking them. Leave off the personal crap and focus on the game. If you hate something, by all means share that and why. If you love something the same, but stop making the modders out to be some evil boogey man. They are doing us all a service, and we can help them by giving good feedback.

To be clear, I am not saying everything about this mod is great, or even good, only that the way in which we can interact and offer advice is the first time this has ever happened for COH2. Let's use that opportunity to improve the game, as I don't know how many more chances we will get.

It is the entire notion of them giving things to certain units, that was NEVER asked for by the community, under the guise of Penal's being within the "scope of the changes." Penal's were brought up and voted for to be looked at in the Balance Survey, not because the community wanted them to have MORE utility, it was because they are overperforming in their role. You'd have to be completely out of touch with reality to see it in any other light.

And when this community, that never asked for that type of a change responds with "We don't like it", and the mod creators most frequently used line is "Have you even tried the MOD", yeah, we're allowed to be a bit vitriolic. That's beyond insulting. It's incredibly arrogant.

I've tried the balance mode a few time in 4vs4 and it was fun, the game feel fresher !!!

Only the Okw's Walking Stuka still seem too powerful for my taste and it's still too much overused because of it's great game changing nature...
-Just add a 5 sec delay before it can move after it fired, so it'can be counter. (add the same delay too all mobile arty of that kind if necessary)

Great job balance team.

It is the entire notion of them giving things to certain units, that was NEVER asked for by the community, under the guise of Penal's being within the "scope of the changes." Penal's were brought up and voted for to be looked at in the Balance Survey, not because the community wanted them to have MORE utility, it was because they are overperforming in their role. You'd have to be completely out of touch with reality to see it in any other light.

And when this community, that never asked for that type of a change responds with "We don't like it", and the mod creators most frequently used line is "Have you even tried the MOD", yeah, we're allowed to be a bit vitriolic. That's beyond insulting. It's incredibly arrogant.

Sorry, AT weapons for penals were asked since the beginning of Coh2. They are a must.
The conscrits main task is to reinforce other squads.

Bye.

I don't really understand the level of vitriol on a balance mod. This is a testing mod, a platform to try things out. If you hate them, and penal PTRS are definitely hated, you can say so here without insulting people and get feedback. My goodness we complained to high heaven that Relic never talked, now you have modders talking directly to us about balance and everyone is attacking them.

Right. So after literal years of community members effectively producing and delivering content and analysis to deaf ears, a mod team if formed to produce a mod that has seems to serve as a buffer of communication. The mod was already made and released for what is considered fine tuning, not testing, before the community was even informed of their efforts.

They are doing us all a service, and we can help them by giving good feedback.

Are they though outside of qol changes and bug fixes? It seems more apparent that the only items they will consider from the community without like sixty replays are bug fixes. There is no community engagement on balance design.

To be clear, I am not saying everything about this mod is great, or even good, only that the way in which we can interact and offer advice is the first time this has ever happened for COH2. Let's use that opportunity to improve the game, as I don't know how many more chances we will get.

This is the second time this has happened for coh2. The first time this happened we saw okw be broken by removing volks schrwcks without actually redesigning anything and giving USF the turbo mortar without redesigning anything.

The game saw a whole lot of problems as a result and spawned the exceptionally stale light vehicle meta this patch is pretending to address.