It seems completely obvious to me that the real problem here is map imbalance, not mirror matches.
If mirror matches were in (and balanced,) then yes, the only problem would be the problems thrown up by asymmetrical maps. If they're not in, then those map imbalances become
glaring issues like we see in the majority of CoH maps. These map imbalances are put under a microscope when you force asymmetrical factions on them. Tiny things that would be inconsequential become huge problems that render entire maps simply unplayable. Allowing mirror matches would greatly reduce these imbalances.
so you want to force one of the two players in a bad starting position? or you want to force them into a mirror matchup that isn't balanced at all? how does that irrefutably alleviate balance problems? you simply can not, as in close to impossible, balance the same map in a way that would, for example, be balanced for us vs wehr, us vs us, AND wehr vs wehr. it is, however, possible to almost perfectly balance a map for a certain matchup, given enough time and resources.
so much for irrefutability. (i didn't even mention that right before you say that it is irrefutable that mirrors alleviate balance problems, you quote me saying that it's harder to balance 3 matchups than balance 1 matchup AKA mirrors vs. no mirrors, with mirror being harder to balance, and agreed with me)
Throughout the entire thread you have continuously misunderstood and misrepresented about half a dozen different people's posts (followed by "lol just read what i said :-P",) all based on a wild assumption on your part that "mirror matches are incapable of being balanced, but faction1 vs. faction2 will be absolutely fine in every way." (Despite taking nearly 6 years to balance in CoH with 2.602 - of which you yourself criticised in the post before last - you can't have your cake and eat it, chum.)
Yes, it's harder to balance mirrors in addition to the vanilla factions - again, literally no-one is disagreeing there, so please, stop waffling on as if you're saying something different to your last 2 dozen posts ITT. Nobody had ever said that. Ever.
However, just because it's not as easy as going "Mirrors? Nah lol, too hard" that doesn't mean it shouldn't be worked on for the benefits it would provide for competitive gameplay. I never said it would alleviate
all balance problems -
reading comprehension. It would 1.) rid us of having imbalanced factions being in an even stronger/weaker position on the inevitably imbalanced maps, which would in turn greatly reduce the map pool for tournaments, and 2.) get rid of the laughable VP lead system - I'd rather watch a mirror match and see who the better player is than watch someone win a tournament because they got to play US twice on Angoville,
any day of the week.
Being against having them in CoH 2 "because I have a feeling deep down in my heart that maybe the developers could possibly not get it 100% perfect, but are somehow going to pull half a dozen brilliant, perfectly balanced maps out of their arse on day 1" is almost as vapid as the realism/authenticity arguments.