Frustrated

The past few weeks I have been trying to pinpoint why this game seems so...lacking.

Beta, so much fun. Winning games with both sides was interesting EVERY game. Pity those glory days didn't last.

Forward, people start complaining. Fair enough, some kinks to iron out.

More complaining. No way! The game is great, what we need is moar GUNS, TANKS, UNITS!!!!

MAPS!

Panther is SOOO OP. SU IS OP!!

Flamers!

T34 useless? Germans, no way t34 is OP man! so cheap. Soviets, but it sucks, armour is shite!

Grenadier vs conscript analysis, Soviets can never win!

Soviet patch. SOVIETS OP!

MAPS!

New german units. GERMAN OP! Pay 2 win, ftw.

MAPS!

More patch, useless patch, oh now my shit doesn't do xx damage, fck this!

Amongst the din of OP this and OP that, I started to notice a pattern.

I refused to see it though, call it ignorance, what you will, I believed that the game would come good.

I am starting to doubt my optimism.

The problem is not the community, not maps, not OP units, not new units, not pay to win.

The problem, imo, is this game never seemed to have had a clear development process.

This game is like a tree in the wind. The devs seem to bend to whomever has the loudest and most annoying voices.

Appeasement. Never. Works.

Please make a plan and stick to it.

I would challenge the dev's to provide a plan for improvements and make it transparent.

Cheers.

I would challenge the dev's to provide a plan for improvements and make it transparent.

They keep talking about a roadmap for the future, so I have to presume there is one. However they also keep on telling us that they will not show it to the comunity to avoid getting cornered as some may think of roadmap=promises. Also, there are a select few who went to their HQ and from my understanding saw atleast part of the roadmap, still they are under NDA. So I dont think that they really will reveal what is going on and what is planned. Sadly.

I have no idea how the developement process looks like at relic, and what they have in their pipeline for this or other games. From my perspective I think they have a long term gameplan (say 2-3 major releases of features a year) with what to incorporate into the game. Alongside with that they have their tentacles out and listen to the community for patches and hotfixes at quite a semi-regular monthly basis. No idea if that is how it works, but to me it would make sense.

Dev teams virtually never share their detailed roadmaps with the community, and imho for good reason. Because they have finite resources, they have to prioritize things. Imagine complaining just because of the order of changes, to say nothing of the details of those changes. And if they have to put out any fires, or something changes in the development plan and requires reprioritization...

This community is already borderline toxic without having to worry about Relic's development pipeline for the future, imho.

Is this the first video game you've played or something? The devs released the game, they're listening to the community, and they're balancing the game. You people have really gotten to a point where you will complain about anything, even good things.

This game is like a tree in the wind. The devs seem to bend to whomever has the loudest and most annoying voices.

word.

Is this the first video game you've played or something? The devs released the game, they're listening to the community, and they're balancing the game. You people have really gotten to a point where you will complain about anything, even good things.

no, i agree with op. lots of balancing decisions have lead the game to be as posted in other treads. stupified. SU gots its speed nerfed and its rotation nerfed because german noobs could not drive straight into it. what did the russian players do? adapted and came with a new strategy.

then german noobs complained about ramming. because yeah lets be honest here. German is the majority and they are all vocal about it. now they cant ram, ram got nerfed. what did russians do, adapted and came with a new strategy.

some how russians still managed to win of couse germans noobs. so what do we do. buff tiger tank. right now people might say the units are balanced. but the armies as a whole are not.

each and every diferent russian strategy have been decidely crusshed. it pains me to see streaming russian players like von ivan, picking the 3 general that have pphss. going 4-5 conscripts and a fast t70. its very uncreative unvariable and boring. i dont know how you people can stand and do the same thing every Show Spoiler game.

while germas have a lot of gameplay options. because well Russian fanboys are not vocal enough.

word.

no, i agree with op. lots of balancing decisions have lead the game to be as posted in other treads. stupified. SU gots its speed nerfed and its rotation nerfed because german noobs could not drive straight into it. what did the russian players do? adapted and came with a new strategy.

then german noobs complained about ramming. because yeah lets be honest here. German is the majority and they are all vocal about it. now they cant ram, ram got nerfed. what did russians do, adapted and came with a new strategy.

some how russians still managed to win of couse germans noobs. so what do we do. buff tiger tank. right now people might say the units are balanced. but the armies as a whole are not.

each and every diferent russian strategy have been decidely crusshed. it pains me to see streaming russian players like von ivan, picking the 3 general that have pphss. going 4-5 conscripts and a fast t70. its very uncreative unvariable and boring. i dont know how you people can stand and do the same thing every Show Spoiler

game.

while germas have a lot of gameplay options. because well Russian fanboys are not vocal enough.

As you know perfectly well, the SU-85 nerf and the ram changes came with a massive buff to the damage of the T-34, which has made it a *lot* more viable. Von has been doing that 5 conscript PPSH T70 strat since the Beta. Recently he's been mixing it up with the new Shock Motor commander. I don't entirely get the OP's point... imo, balance and the game has been improved with every patch with the exception of the new DLC commanders, which is cause for optimism. It's still not perfect but I think it's almost always going in the right direction, which is a good sign.

Hmmm... I've played in the alpha and i must say the balance was all over the place. Remember Stugs and Flamehalftracks back then? If the game was lacking anything, it was balance.

In that regard the developers did a good job ironing things out evenly. I don't support the statement "the devs seem to bend to whomever has the loudest and most annoying voices", because that would mean listening to the players in steam forums that play 4v4 compstomps.

Sorry to have to tell you that, but devs must also listen to the players in steam forums that play 4v4 compstomps (They also put money in). But they have to listen to all others too.

Devs must stay on the path that make that franchise unique.( Less spamming of op units and more thinking about strategies in a well felt WW2 setting).

We must also all remember that making a strategy game that will keep it's appeal for many years is not a small thing to do.

We must state our tastes while letting them do theirs jobs. This game is still young.

I'm very confident that the game (dev) will answer our hopes.

As you know perfectly well, the SU-85 nerf and the ram changes came with a massive buff to the damage of the T-34, which has made it a *lot* more viable. Von has been doing that 5 conscript PPSH T70 strat since the Beta. Recently he's been mixing it up with the new Shock Motor commander. I don't entirely get the OP's point... imo, balance and the game has been improved with every patch with the exception of the new DLC commanders, which is cause for optimism. It's still not perfect but I think it's almost always going in the right direction, which is a good sign.

+1

furthermore they nerfed the ram, predominantly for heavy tanks. Secondly they buffed the IS-2 as well. There are every time two sides, for balancing decisions....not only the germans

word.




no, i agree with op. lots of balancing decisions have lead the game to be as posted in other treads. stupified. SU gots its speed nerfed and its rotation nerfed because german noobs could not drive straight into it. what did the russian players do? adapted and came with a new strategy.

then german noobs complained about ramming. because yeah lets be honest here. German is the majority and they are all vocal about it. now they cant ram, ram got nerfed. what did russians do, adapted and came with a new strategy.

some how russians still managed to win of couse germans noobs. so what do we do. buff tiger tank. right now people might say the units are balanced. but the armies as a whole are not.

each and every diferent russian strategy have been decidely crusshed. it pains me to see streaming russian players like von ivan, picking the 3 general that have pphss. going 4-5 conscripts and a fast t70. its very uncreative unvariable and boring. i dont know how you people can stand and do the same thing every Show Spoiler

game.

while germas have a lot of gameplay options. because well Russian fanboys are not vocal enough.

Now, I'm not saying you're a Russian fanboy, but I didn't see you mention the stug nerf, the flame halftrack nerf, the assault gren nerf or the ostruppen trenches nerf. Ram is still completely viable, it just takes some skill now to use. Same thing with the SU 85. PPsh being really important yet doctrinal is an issue, I agree.


OP: Go play any 1.0 version of a game and then go play the last version of it. To me, the development process is pretty clear: they want to have a game where all the units are used and the game is balanced. It's not going to be a straight line to that goal, as every time you change one thing another problem will crop up. So instead of accusing the developers of everything from incompetence to German favoritism, just post suggestions without resorting to personal attacks.

As you know perfectly well, the SU-85 nerf and the ram changes came with a massive buff to the damage of the T-34, which has made it a *lot* more viable. Von has been doing that 5 conscript PPSH T70 strat since the Beta. Recently he's been mixing it up with the new Shock Motor commander. I don't entirely get the OP's point... imo, balance and the game has been improved with every patch with the exception of the new DLC commanders, which is cause for optimism. It's still not perfect but I think it's almost always going in the right direction, which is a good sign.

its just a matter of diferent opinions. i prefer the old t34 even if it had a low damage, its ram was a reliable shutdown. the small damage buff just made it into a standard cookie cutter tank. something new players can play with with little trouble. but wait there is more.

now ramming is a 200something 90~ something fuel skill that requires you to manually set the tank into position and that might do something.

before= cheap tank with low damage that you could sacrifice to get a tank disabled.
now= standard not so strong tank that you can sacrifice to maybe do something.

i could go on and on and on about my opinion on how units should be but that would be off topic. the changes there were made because winygerman players went vocal about their inabity do deal with those situations. so what did relic do? shut down those creative situations and made the game a standardized stupidified combat scenario.

the game is balanced. but at what cost? there is no strategy creativity in the russian game.

Now, I'm not saying you're a Russian fanboy, but I didn't see you mention the stug nerf, the flame halftrack nerf, the assault gren nerf or the ostruppen trenches nerf. Ram is still completely viable, it just takes some skill now to use. Same thing with the SU 85. PPsh being really important yet doctrinal is an issue, I agree.


OP: Go play any 1.0 version of a game and then go play the last version of it. To me, the development process is pretty clear: they want to have a game where all the units are used and the game is balanced. It's not going to be a straight line to that goal, as every time you change one thing another problem will crop up. So instead of accusing the developers of everything from incompetence to German favoritism, just post suggestions without resorting to personal attacks.

i mostly dont complain about unit stats because i mostly dont mind about that. my main problems are gameplay mecanics. for that you can check my previous post. about the ram becoming an unreliable skill now it cost too much and have a high chance to do nothing its cost efficiency is extremely low. you basically give a tank away for nothing. ive had tanks explode on rams and the enemy tank walk out unscratched. (what a rewarding skill!!! is screams use meee!)*irony*

the same with the SU, i understand its speed nerf when active makes sense, its rotation nerf not so much. add again the newly reduced rotation and speed on the su. and its stacking makes the tank as slow as the elephant. but instead of being a neat trade off is mostly like using this aint worth shit. you cant use it offensively (im ok with this) you cant use it defensively, because the base speed and the skill speed reduction makes flanking not a player mistake, but an assured event in case this skill is used.

again skills that are suposed to be used. have fallen out of flavor in pro of a more streamline tank, with no skills needed to use just plain cookie cutter shooting AKA German tanks.

You're tearing me apart Li- Undostrescuatro!

You prefer not only the performance of the "old" t34, but the way ram was designed? You call it a "creative situation" to disable every tank undodgeable without the need of positioning or a little foresight?

With a little bit of skill, the ram still disables a P4 or Stug from the front 100% of the time, which "might do something".

Sincerely, a winygerman Player.

You probably are not having success with your rams because you are hitting front armor. Rear armor rams penetrate 100% or something close to it.

You probably are not having success with your rams because you are hitting front armor. Rear armor rams penetrate 100% or something close to it.

That is true except for the Tiger.

T34 ram penetration 160

P4 armor 160/80
Stug 160/80
Panther 270/112,5
Brummbär 200/87,5
Tiger 300/250
Elefant 400/150

Show Spoiler

what really frustrates me is that a lot of the game play mechanic that where supposed to be the different strategy choices the soviet had, have been progressively Over nerfed1 to the point that soviets right now only go for 1 commander and a t70 rush. in the desperate need to end the game early or keep the German player down for as long as possible.


*1(they needed nerf but the results are not as i consider they should be)

A mechanic like ram working from the front was not fun to play against and required no skill to pull off. There was also very little a German player could do to dodge it. Now it requires skill to pull off, and is dodgeable, which imo also made it more fun to play against.

The T-34 changes were made because Soviet players were complaining that the T-34 was massively underperforming, especially against P-IVs. Not because Ostheer players complained about ramming. It's effectively changed it from Soviet T3 hard countering Panthers, Tigers and Elephants and being useless against Panzer IVs, Ostwinds and Stugs to making T3 viable against both Ostheer tech paths while not being excessively strong against either of them.

Currently ram is a 100% chance on Tier 3 vehicles, and a better than 50% chance on pretty much everything short of an elephant, even frontally. If you don't want to risk having a ram do nothing, don't frontally ram a tank which costs 600mp and 200 fuel and expect it to completely disable it every time.

Edit: and yeah, DanielD's post above sums it up.

Is this the first video game you've played or something? The devs released the game, they're listening to the community, and they're balancing the game. You people have really gotten to a point where you will complain about anything, even good things.

The point was not about listening to the community, which regardless I think they need to do less of, it was about showing us a clear plan for development. It has been too higgledy piggeldy up until now and that is why there are reams of threads on how everything is unfair and unbalanced.

I think balance changes of T-34 were spot on.
Previously you could basically only go for T4 SU if you wanted a fair chance of winning, going for T3 was a risky move. This made meta so stale that it wasn't funny.

Now you can go either T3 or T4 and have good odds.
And as a bonus, T-34s are no longer cheesy Elephant-rammer.

All is fine with T-34 changes imo.