Profile of WhiteFlash

My beleif is it would be a case of it fits well for the vast majority of players, and if it doesnt fit for that player, simply dont use the hotkey to have the predictive retreat appear, job done

Option 1 is best and really would solve the one major aggravation with retreat paths even for people who know the maps and possible paths well - if your unit is in front of an obstacle and has to go east or west to retreat south and you are near the middle of it, it's very hard to guess which way it's going to go. One way = squad wipe, the other, you save the unit. Most of the time people won't even need to use it I think.

Option 2 is just prima facie unfeasible. The murder stuff on retreat meta is already aggravating as hell and this would just raise it to silly new levels with camping of retreat waypoints.

Option 2: after a lot of thought that idea is likely not tenable. Agreed w all players on this one, trying to think abstractly about how to make it possible to make wider maps.

Option 1: is a no brainer to add to the game for new players and veterans alike

New players: The retreat mechanism is unique to the COH franchise and compared to other RTS games it is down right foreign. Showing the retreat path gives the players rationalization for the direction units go on retreat. When highlighting more than 1 unit they can retreat in different directions depending on their location and the relative location of the base, its important to see this before actually committing to a retreat. This also allows players to learn the inherent retreat paths on a given map.

Veteran players: Lets say a veteran player understands everything that I outlined above and they know everything about the inherint retreat paths on every map perfectly. This feature would still be useful because as the map changes and objects get destroyed or added the retreat path changes.

In conclusion: Relic, if your reading this you will want to seriously consider adding this feature to the game. It would be relatively simple to implement because the calculation for the retreat path is already done (but not shown to the player on the in game screen), the dotted line or graphic to show the path can be implemented in a variety of ways (think tactical pause dotted lines but perhaps a bit thinner?) and most importantly it would benefit the entire community without diminishing skill caps. I see it as a very helpful tool to improve the game.

Cheers

Would have to know more about the part of the developement cycle they are in to make an informed decision.

Depends on bug severity, if there are no obvious brutal ones send it.

Otherwise bugs will interfere with the impression of the multiplayer and will stifle the kind of first impression that is above a normal level of importance.

Gut impression is wait and let them get it squared away.

I want to draw special attention to some ideas that I beleive will permanently solve bad retreat pathing for COH3.

These two items and much more were talked about on Elperns podcast if you want to see some live discussion on this retreat path topic, check it out here. https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1152274446?t=03h23m52s

If you support this, please say so in the comments. Relic needs to see support for good ideas in COH3. Cheers.

1. Implement a new feature that I call "Predictive Retreat"

This feature is explained in my last COH3 Pre-Alpha article but I will reiterate here.

"Retreating in Company of Heroes is an absolutely fundamental part of what the series is about. It is a great change to normal RTS games wherein conservation of units is all important. There is a problem.... When the retreat button is activated, there often isn't a clear idea as to which path the unit will take to return to base, which often unintentionally puts units in great danger. Generally speaking, players rely on the map designers built in “good retreat pathing” to see the job done. This is tricky to accomplish and many games would have a different outcome if a different retreat path was surmised by the player before they retreated. I propose to solve this issue with a new mechanism which combines the tactical pause dotted line graphics (or something similarly suitable) with an in-game graphically illustrated predictive retreat path. This mechanism would be called “Predictive Retreat”.



I'm talking about having players hold a button (default alt, ctrl or the like) while a squad, or group of squads, is selected. While this button is held down a path pops up and shows the player, in real time, where the unit will retreat if the retreat ability is activated. This would be an amazing piece of tech that will give players a ton of power over their units survivability and they would identify retreat issues ahead of time if they are smart enough to engage the “Predictive Retreat” feature. More depth, more control, better COH."

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2. Give mappers the ability to place a "waypoint retreat" object in the worldbuilder that only the mappers can see and are invisible to players on the map.

This object would be a retreat location that units retreat to first (if its closer than the base) and as soon as the unit hits that retreat point they continue retreating back to the main base. This will give mappers much more flexibility when designing maps that are wide. Currently maps are forced to be square or rectangular in the long direction, think rails and metal. There may be better ways to implement this "waypoint retreat" feature so think abstractly how to empower mappers to improve retreat pathing. There may be many ways to do this, this is the best ive come up with thus far. We want to give mappers as much flexibility to create the very best maps possible, this will aid in that effort.

Keep in mind units would only retreat to this "waypoint retreat" object if they are closer to it than they are the main base.

Below shows an undesirable retreat path (red) and a desirable retreat path (green) and the "waypoint retreat" objects placement (blue).



Please note: There may be issues with units that are near the waypoint that go TO the waypoint and then the base because they are technically closer to the waypoint retreat than the main base when not intended. This idea needs to be thought about more.

Maybe players have options for retreat paths when combining this with "Predictive retreat"? Maybe you hold down ALT or another key to see your retreat path then you scroll wheel to select the waypoint retreat path or the main base retreat path? Something more elegant than this??

This idea isnt perfect, but some version of this idea may be fleshed out more to put it in a place where some form of this idea functions in a hugely powerful way in the mappers hands.

Retreat paths are a foundational part of COH and its critical that they work as intended. Its possible Item 2 doesnt go anywhere because of its complexities, but Item 1 is a no brainer for COH3.

Cheers

The portrait system, generally speaking, is a garbage way to identify which commander is which. But given we are stuck with it in coh2 new commander portraits are welcome for sure