Teamgame dominant meta

Interesting picture, it also show that USF didn't reach OKW current pick even with the OP mortar. And the pick is directly followed by a return to normal level. OKW is going up since the patch and while Ostheer is back to normal level, OKW stays over the top.

Imo, the explanation is rather simple
1- OKW has the best early game momentum allowing them to quickly win matchs. This is as per design.
2- OKW has the best late game momentym, so they have a second chance to win the match. This is also as per design.
3- OKW has an average, not better but not worst, mid game momemtum which profit from early game advantage in some cases and let OKW prepares late game advantages on the other half of cases.

On top of that, mid game momemtum is rather poor in 4vs4, what count is early and late game.

I agree with you, okw is the main reason teamgames, especially 2v2s are so hard. OKW early game with sturmpios open is too strong because on some 2v2 maps like kharkow they can block leftside fuel forever and win early game for free. OKW player does not only get an advantage but sometimes gets a free early game win. The reason is simple. In 1v1 maps are designed in such a way that you either have a one safe fuel or ammo or have 2 fuels or 2 ammos on the map. 2v2 maps have 2 fuels and 2 ammos like 1v1 maps, which means that you cant avoid early game okw power because you wont get any fuel you do so. You are forced to contest most important resources for for snowballing the game early on when its impossible for you to win against a semi-intelligent player. Even if you fuck up early-mid game you still have 5 veterany levels and heavy tanks that will help you win late game if necessary.

I think OKW elevates and carries ostheer because OST needs to survive early game when its most vulnerable. OKW takes the pressure of OST. On the other hand 3v3s and 4v4s are mainly late game oriented and both OKW and OST late are really strong af. My proposition is simple, for starters make early game equal for both sides so allies dont get muscled out from vital resources on 2v2 maps.

While I agree with that, the coh2charts reference is, hm, misleading. Indeed, the current spike indeed indicates that apparently the last patch favored axis, I give you that. However, the rebound that you describe only very partially has something to do with players adapting, it's actually more an expression of the ELO values and thus the matchmaking adjusting to the balance. If you are interested in the details you can check out this article.

Thanks for the response and the link. The ELO matchmaking catching up and always trending towards a 50% win rate, regardless of relative power of factions, makes sense. The problem then becomes player numbers, wait times, and an ultimate death spiral. In larger team games search percentages have definitely shifted back towards the 70% axis : 30% allies (despite there now being 3 allied factions, including an Ostheer clone) that was ever present prior to the March Deployment patch in early 2014. That means wait times are up for the majority and a smaller pool of allied players are available for matchmaking, degrading its quality. Unless players slowly shift back to the allies as they adapt to the new patches, that search imbalance will be the start of a death spiral like we saw when the game seemed to be on its last legs in the winter after release.

If coh2charts are inaccurate as ELO matchmaking will always be working to suppress evidence of a stronger faction, and the average player is either very slow to adapt or entirely disheartened by perception ("my tactics don't work anymore because they unbalanced the game," "everyone is saying Axis are OP so it's not worth playing anymore"), there's not much to work with when trying to assess balance other than the opinions of a small caste of top players (a situation which will almost certainly miss the experience of the majority). Surely it would be in a developer's interest to write an algorithm that samples players who play a roughly equal number of games with each faction, then compares their ELO brackets in order to approximate where the current balance stands? Of course it still be a hugely difficult trade off in terms of trying to balance wildly different game modes, but it would at least be some attempt at a base consensus to work from.

Purely anecdotally and in terms of team games, I don't see many people complaining about Ostheer; it's all about OKW and their hugely powerful opening (coupled with the Ostheer's ability to defensively lock down behind them before the enemy can repel the OKW's forward blocking tactics) and snowballing vet from forward HQs that are difficult to destroy at an efficient cost.

Absolutely give a couple of months for the effects of the new patches to be absorbed by the player base, but I hope if there is still a widely held reasonable perception (again, difficult to measure) that the game experience has got worse for the majority of average players, that their voices will be heard.

I appreciate the community balancers are doing their best and volunteering a lot of time.

Personally I see that pretty even and not extream bias, strictly going off own opinion and not numbers, Seems to me he plays both reasonably, but has a favorite as do most people on this game.

I think this thread has pretty much run its course now the squabbling has started.

Invissed some off-topic back and forth.

Come on people, you're better than this.

I also dont know why the elefant would need a nerf. Its easy to swarm and siriously misses half its shots.

Because in 3v3 and 4v4 games, the space required to flank is choked up with support units (paks/ratekans/other heavy tanks), or the map provides the choke points so you can't flank, or takes too long to flank.

For the reason there are SO many complaining, you just have to look at the player population and the win percentages.

The average ratio of total people in-game between each mode (1v1 : 2v2 : 3v3 : 4v4) that I find based on counting the automatch numbers on observer mode at several points over the last week is
1 : 1.2 : 1.5 : 7.5

So there are 7.5 times as many people playing 4v4 than 1v1 at any one point, and 10 times as many people playing teamgames at any one point than 1v1.

Then you look at the win percentages for players outside the top 500 (i.e the average guy trying to enjoy the game) since the last patches (courtesy of coh2chart).

1v1
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2v2
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3v3
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4v4
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Look at how pronounced the shift is since the patches for the average player. OKW has long been the faction with the highest win percentage amongst average players, but since the patch it has become a faction that performs miles ahead of everything else in every mode for average players.

Absolutely I agree that the average player, particularly in teamgames, is going to have a tiny fraction of the ability and game knowledge of a top 100 1v1 player, but there's something wrong when the vast majority (10 : 1) is being completely sold out as being irrelevant.

I completely agree that the feedback from the best players who fully understand the game mechanics should be most applicable when designing balance changes, that 1v1 is the mode which is easiest to balance around, and that teamgames have inherent problems with map design, but coming into the 4th year of the game we shouldn't be moving backwards from a situation where the game was roughly balanced enough for most players to turn a blind eye to it, to now the experience for most players being that there is a huge and obvious advantage for one side. By all means make changes that benefit the 9% that play 1v1, but not at the price of dragging the game backwards for the majority.

The win percentages DO show that allies are slowly trending upwards, hopefully as players adapt to the new arrangement, but from the average player's point of view there is a big gap (12% in all modes but 1v1) between Soviet / USF and OKW.

Regardless of where you stand on balancing priorities and approach, you can't be surprised that so many are complaining and whining when for the majority (i.e players outside the top 500 playing teamgames, who paid the same as everyone else) the game has got noticeably worse since the patches.

This. Even look at the searching percentages, Axis is usually 70% searching, which means the talent pool leans toward that side as well (getting good players as teammates).

IMO, when you see more people play an army heavily, that indicates its easier to play and easier to win with, because the casual player WANTS TO WIN, not play for the "experience". And worse, they don't want to get berated as "noobs" because they lost to players playing that OP side. The fact that Axis gets these wondrous behemoth tanks at the end only wets the palate more. "Oh, you mean if I can hang in there, I get a tank that can one-two shot a tank, and it takes 10x that to die, meaning I can easily win games? Count me in!"

When a bulk of game matches indicates 80% win rates for one side, something is amiss.

You all want better team game balance? Make maps bigger and more balanced. That's a good start, what you cant fix with unit balance can be fixed through map layout. Everyone seems to forget that map layouts make a huge impact on how factions and units play out.

You all want better team game balance? Make maps bigger and more balanced. That's a good start, what you cant fix with unit balance can be fixed through map layout. Everyone seems to forget that map layouts make a huge impact on how factions and units play out.

+1

I mean seriously, every analysis of every tournament shows how important maps are to a balanced matchup.

Every aftermath of every tournament comes with a laundry list of nerfs and buffs without respect to faction design, let alone map design.

It's never 'Hey, maybe this shotblocker needs to be moved' or 'change this yellow cover wood fence to a green cover stone fence' or 'adjust the territory sector/point so it can be cutoff or contested more/less easily.'

I mean, the Map Contest that occurred last summer should've been a reality check. (By which I mean the kinds of maps that were submitted, not just the maps that won.)

I hope no balance decisions are made from this thread. Considering most people here ranks are like a phone number. This all started because of an elephant/brumbar issue from another thread. Personally I think In all fairness rocket artillery/sim city needs to be looked at and go from there. That's what is poisoning every game

Oh,yes. OP stuka and Axis simcity are poisoning every game. Especially the lefh is seriously overpowered when compare to the ML120 since there isn't any dirt cheap Stuka diving bomb with munition drop implemented in every commander on ally side.

P.S. Team rank top 10

Oh,yes. OP stuka and Axis simcity are poisoning every game. Especially the lefh is seriously overpowered when compare to the ML120 since there isn't any dirt cheap Stuka diving bomb with munition drop implemented in every commander on ally side.

P.S. Team rank top 10

OP stuka? Lol every month something is different

OP stuka? Lol every month something is different

Loll Just pay 30 MP and 10 fuel more to get a non-doctrinal rocket artillery that better than katyusha at all aspect while arrive more early and pay less tech cost and have a more accurate barrage and devastating power shell and more durable hull and still not considered as op? Probably only Axis fanboy will think it is fine because it's their favorite toy in team game.