Profile of Big Chungus

What it do folks, back on my crusade to see the OST Tiger VI buffed (again). I won't make this longer than it needs to be, so my question is simple;

After the recent nerfs to the Tiger, does it's performance match its cost?

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Personal thoughts on the current state of the Tiger;

No question the Tiger was absurdly OP prior to the nerfs, with its broken scatter and 9cp requirement. However, OST has struggled to fill the vacuum left by the nerfs. It has significantly weakened many of OST's best commanders (Mechanized, Spearhead), without any decent replacements.

I feel punished for not picking Jaeger Armour or Strategic Reserves, thus I'd like to see the Tiger buffed to return more variety to OST's meta commanders.

I'm sure few of us want to return to the heavy meta, nonetheless I'd still advocate for a significant buff to the Tiger VI. It just misses too many shots against both infantry and armour, often making it feel like a complete waste of resources.

Thanks for reading

I'm not good enough to make any sort of conclusion here, so I will simply speak from my experience as OST main.
Even a minor nerf to MP cost (let's say 280mp), would be hugely detrimental to OST early game, for the following reason; a common strat is to rush an MG42 into a building on your opponent(s) side of the map, usually next to their closest fuel point.
By increasing the cost of the MG, it further delays your first gren squad. Resulting in less map control and leaving the MG unsupported longer. I don't want to repeat what others have said, but I tend to agree that the over-performance of the MG42 is a necessary crutch to keep OST viable before doctirnal weapons/ugrades hit the field.
Combine this with a heavy reliance on fuel and weak early game infantry; frankly I don't know how OST would remain competitive.
The only MG that really seems to be under-performing to me, is the maxim. Though as I'm sure we're all aware that does not make SOV a weak faction. To buff the maxim you'd have to sacrifice something, though that's beyond the scope of the post.

Let me preface by saying I'm a mediocre (as you can tell by my winrate ), but passionate player. More so as of the December 2018 patch. I think the community dev team has done a better job balancing the game than Lelic has in the last 5 years.

With that out of the way, I'd like to hear the active communities opinion the Tiger. Personally, it comes down to a matter of cost efficiency. For 640 manpower and 230 fuel, it's AT capability feels lackluster compared to its closest competitor, the IS-2 (640mp 230f). Granted, it has significantly better AI due to the superior dps of german pintle/front MG's, but I find it plainly inferior as an infantry support tank to the base Churchill. It has far less surviveability (unless you're rocking Panzer Commander), whilst the slightly better AT doesn't make up for the extra 70 fuel cost. Why save up for a tiger when you can just get a panther and have resources to spare? In my experience the Tiger's greatest value comes in it's utility as a comeback tool in 1v1 or 2v2's. Even then, the decision to delay a Panther in favour of a Tiger will put you at the mercy your opponent for as long as you don't have it.

From a design perspective, I understand the role of the Tiger as a heavy generalist tank, and that to bring it's gun in line with the IS-2's AT whilst potentially reducing its AI may make it feel as though it lacks an identity of it's own. It may simply be a product of the current meta, where soviet SU-85's and to a lesser extent Jacksons and Firefly's are both ubiquitous and effective. Thus, I propose a small buff to it's frontal armour, or a slight decrease to fuel and mp cost (600mp 215f?).

In the right hands I have no doubt the Tiger can be effective, and I fully acknowledge this could purely be a l2p issue, which is why I want to hear what everyone else thinks.

* I wish I had some updated unit values to be more scientific about this, but I can't find a full list on this patch, and the Extractors on the "extracting statistics" guide (https://www.coh2.org/guides/11637/extracting-statistics-guide) are dead links. If anyone has a full spreadsheet or a different method lemme know in the comments, cheers.

** Playercard should be visible, linked my steam ID to my profile but if it's missing lemme know, cheers again.