Just curiosity, what happened to all the criticals?

I think I'll start giving some context. I got the game a year or so ago, maybe a bit more, so I wasn't here to see cold tech and flamers combusting a killing squads, if what I have heard is truth, that is. So, earlier today I was messing around with Cheatmod, when I noticed the mud critical in vehicles.

Basically, the vehicle is stuck in mud and cant move so you need infatry to get it back in motion, besides other criticals such as two levels of stun crew and a heavy engine damage, engine fire, etc, there was a lot of stuff there.

But in game, you don't see some of these criticals, I know the mud one was never part of the game, because mud never became a gameplay mechanic, but how exactly vehicles got stunned back in the day, or loader injured, etc, and why they were removed from the game? I guess same question could be asked about cold tech.

Pretty sure they were all random, and as a result they were removed because they were frustrating. Mud is in the game currently btw, it's on the map "General Mud".

Pretty sure they were all random, and as a result they were removed because they were frustrating. Mud is in the game currently btw, it's on the map "General Mud".

They removed it.

There's literally 0 elements of deep snow, deep mud, or coldtech in the game anymore. The reasoning was that all it did was slow down the game for both sides and had no place in competitive play. (Honestly, I liked it, and I wish they kept it in automatch.)

The criticals were likely removed for similar reasons pertaining to competitive play and RNG.

They removed it.

There's literally 0 elements of deep snow, deep mud, or coldtech in the game anymore. The reasoning was that all it did was slow down the game for both sides and had no place in competitive play. (Honestly, I liked it, and I wish they kept it in automatch.)

The criticals were likely removed for similar reasons pertaining to competitive play and RNG.

They are still there, not in automatch.

Someone correct me if i'm wrong, but there was 0 attempt in order to balance cold tech. Mud was just brown snow. Cold tech could work if there was any attempt to balance it's mechanics, but what they couldn't do, was improve performance. RIP optimization.

Pretty sure they were all random, and as a result they were removed because they were frustrating. Mud is in the game currently btw, it's on the map "General Mud".

I know exactly what you're talking about.

It's not there anymore

I know exactly what you're talking about.

It's not there anymore

Does that effect the 4v4 variant of mud as well? Best part about deep mud was the 0.25 explosive modifier. You could stand on a penal satchel with a Non soviet sniper and not die XD

Like others have said, a lot of the criticals, environmental effects, etc. were removed because they really weren't that fun to play with in competitive. Random blizzards could massively change the outcome of a battle, slowing down units just resulted in fewer tactical options in a map, and the half-dozen vehicle criticals were far too random to be useful. In some cases, a vehicle at 1% HP could take several more hits, if each hit applied a damage critical.

They are still there, not in automatch.

There's still a few frustrating patches of deep snow on some of the maps in ranked; mostly in 3v3 maps.

There still is deep mud on one or two maps, as I do remember seeing the deep mud icon a few weeks ago. Can't remember what map(s) though.

There was also more extensive visual vehicle damage in the beta too. Looked really cool too, you could see large parts of the Ostwind turret being blown off an leaving holes in the turret for example.

But with most crits, they were cool, but a nuisance. For example engine fires on tanks. If you drove over a campfire setup during a blizzard, your tank would get an engine fire. Then you had the 2 annoying crew stuns, I believe driver stunned/unconscious and gunner stunned/unconscious. Happened random too, which was just annoying as hell.

Not to mention the stupid main gun crit, engine damage, heavy engine damage that would only go away when fully repaired (eastern front army repair times lol).

Also the fact that some crits kept stacking while you tried to kill vehicles. For example, my T34 got an engine fire due to driving over a fire. Then an enemy p4 shows up and starts killing it (back then p4 would laugh at t34s way more than it does now). My T34 is now at 25% health and bam crew stunned, followed by engine damage at 15% health followed by a random bounce. Surely he will get it with the next round! Wait, what?? A random main gun crit at 5% health?! You wot m8?!!

Annoying as fuck. Now if it were the other way around, we could also get the gunner stun/crit and the pintle MG man would die lol.



Edit: you also had transmission damage I believe lol

Like others have said, a lot of the criticals, environmental effects, etc. were removed because they really weren't that fun to play with in competitive. Random blizzards could massively change the outcome of a battle, slowing down units just resulted in fewer tactical options in a map, and the half-dozen vehicle criticals were far too random to be useful. In some cases, a vehicle at 1% HP could take several more hits, if each hit applied a damage critical.

I still don't see how a blizzard could really change an outcome of a match of two good players. You got informed before the blizzard, so you could prepare. And you would use different strategy while it is on that you would surely learn to use after some time if they didn't remove it. For example snipers were designed to work better in blizzard. Or you could attack with your vehicles without a risk of getting loitered to death. Some players just didn't want to adapt and pressured for the removal.

As for crits. I do agree that current system is better than the old one, but on the other hand coh1 still uses the old system and everybody seems to think that game is more competitive than coh2. Maybe in the end it is not as important as people have thought?

Too RNG for comp ppl lmao.

I see. Well, it's a shame some of this things were removed without an attempt at balancing them, specially Cold Tech, I think there is a lot of potential in weather changes in RTS. Just a dream for COH3 now, I guess.

When it comes to mud, is just snow with a different skin, but I think they had different plans for it, but never worked, I mean, the mud critical doesn't seem to have voice lines related to it, and infatry can't really do something about the tank to fix it, as the tool tip suggests.

I still don't see how a blizzard could really change an outcome of a match of two good players. You got informed before the blizzard, so you could prepare. And you would use different strategy while it is on that you would surely learn to use after some time if they didn't remove it. For example snipers were designed to work better in blizzard. Or you could attack with your vehicles without a risk of getting loitered to death. Some players just didn't want to adapt and pressured for the removal.

I would have preferred if they reworked blizzards, but the current implementation was awful. You had exactly 60 seconds to prepare, that's nothing. You had time to make some firepits and cry in a house for 5 minutes while the blizzard passed. Infantry play basically stopped for minutes at a time in a match because it was just too slow and risky to make any plays because your troops would freeze to death on retreat lol. Firepits even cost manpower so you would lose income by just moving around the map. It actively promoted just camping on the resources you had and gaining passive income with no action, and your opponent probably did the same thing.

They could have made the blizzards have a countdown from the start of the match, like 8 mins worth on a timer. That would easily have made the blizzards much more interesting tactics wise. They went with straight removal, which is kinda lame but still better than keeping them in.

I still don't see how a blizzard could really change an outcome of a match of two good players. You got informed before the blizzard, so you could prepare. And you would use different strategy while it is on that you would surely learn to use after some time if they didn't remove it. For example snipers were designed to work better in blizzard. Or you could attack with your vehicles without a risk of getting loitered to death. Some players just didn't want to adapt and pressured for the removal.

As for crits. I do agree that current system is better than the old one, but on the other hand coh1 still uses the old system and everybody seems to think that game is more competitive than coh2. Maybe in the end it is not as important as people have thought?

The problem was it basically forced a 'pause' in the game, which wasn't fun for anyone. If you're in the middle of some big push and a blizzard hits (it was only 30s or 60s warning, iirc), you basically had to stop, since your infantry became incredibly slow, could freeze, and (iirc) had lower view dist. That gave time for the defender to reinforce, get new units, heal, etc.

As for alternative tactics, like you listed, snipers are only available for 3 of the 5 factions, and pushing your vehicles in unsupported is just asking to lose them.

Basically, it introduced a random element that made camping easier, which no one wants in CoH.

I would have preferred if they reworked blizzards, but the current implementation was awful. You had exactly 60 seconds to prepare, that's nothing. You had time to make some firepits and cry in a house for 5 minutes while the blizzard passed. Infantry play basically stopped for minutes at a time in a match because it was just too slow and risky to make any plays because your troops would freeze to death on retreat lol. Firepits even cost manpower so you would lose income by just moving around the map. It actively promoted just camping on the resources you had and gaining passive income with no action, and your opponent probably did the same thing.

They could have made the blizzards have a countdown from the start of the match, like 8 mins worth on a timer. That would easily have made the blizzards much more interesting tactics wise. They went with straight removal, which is kinda lame but still better than keeping them in.

Same thing i say every time this theme pop ups.

-Limit the randomness on appearance and duration of blizzards.
-Free firepits. No xp associated with them. Just add a cooldown.
-Cold immunity was stupid, same as some units without heavy snow penalties.
-More player interaction with deep snow and ice. If you could permanently removed deep snow, at least until a blizzard pop up, through the use of vehicles or fire based sources (flamethrower, firepits, molotov) that would had been better as you could prepare "retreat routes".
-No model deaths during blizzards but heavy offensive/defensive penalties instead. Nothing worst than losing units on retreats
-Blizzard should make ice basically immune to destruction to allow for flanking maneuvers through frozen rivers.
-You should be able to conceal units on deep snow.

etc.

-No model deaths during blizzards but heavy offensive/defensive penalties instead. Nothing worst than losing units on retreat

This coupled with a view range decrease should have been the correct approach to blizzards. Soldiers freezing to death was a strategical issue IRL, not a tactical one and shouldn't have been in a game that portrays single battles.

Blizzards could have been fun if they changed the battle (turning it into CQC fights) for a short period rather than grinding all the action to a complete stop.

They removed it.

There's literally 0 elements of deep snow, deep mud, or coldtech in the game anymore. The reasoning was that all it did was slow down the game for both sides and had no place in competitive play. (Honestly, I liked it, and I wish they kept it in automatch.)

The criticals were likely removed for similar reasons pertaining to competitive play and RNG.

===========

they should just explode all HQs right at the start under rationale that it speeds up the game.
Everybody win, gets a medal, and is happy.

Isn't that a win-win ?
It would make for a much funner game. I vote for faster games

u got all the other crit that still ingame

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wWAouMAMi-c