The M36 actually takes work to unlock and actually costs something. The HMG42 is...not that way. It also doesn't get a hard counter until medium tanks hit the field but it's available righr off the bat. Some light vehicles can withstand it but they don't deal much damage to it.
The MG42 gets hard-countered by early units/abilities such as smoke, snipers, almost any kind of indirect fire, or attacks from different angles thanks to its incredibly slow traversal speed. Later on, it's hard-countered by Vet 3 infantry head-on due to their very high DPS, other sources of smoke (REs, for example), and as you said, LVs (or anything bigger).
As for AP countering vehicles; just don't sit in the cone-of-fire. It does a lot of damage, but it's still a low-enough DPS that you can easily react to it.
Also, it's been said many times; if you're having problems with early-game units (like I said, early-game is actually very balanced these days), post a replay. |
A crazy idea, if the balance team decides to change the werfer, is to make it like the CoH1 nebelwerfer in terms of rate of fire and damage, so that it can keep barraging continuously but slowly.
No idea if it would work, but if thy change the panzerwerfer this could be a possible avenue.
That, or call it something like "saturation barrage" and make it a vet 2 ability, similar to OKW's vet 4 flame-barrage on the W-stuka. |
Thats all this forum is dude. 80% of posters ask for nerfs to allied factions and then just brainstorm their dream axis units and tell balance team its necessary. It was eyeopening seeing the difference between the massive patch threads for each faction. The allies ones were filled with mainly axis posters asking for nerfs while there were almost no allied posters in their threads at all
This is only an "issue" if you see the community as 'axis vs. allied players'. Most players, at least at higher skill level, play both factions to some degree, and are likely at about the same skill level with each faction.
Maybe "80% of posters ask for nerfs to allied factions" because some allied units are simply over performing. |
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4v4, and to a lesser extent 3v3, is such a mess due to match-making that attempting to balance it is basically impossible. I've been in many games where the "skill range" between the highest and lowest player is over 2500 positions on the ladder. When the skill difference is that large, the M36/Panther/*OP Unit* over-performing, or some other unit underperforming doesn't matter at all.
If there was one change I could implement, it would be to the match-making: restricting the range of players that it could put into a game. Ideally, this would work off of a scalable formula, maybe something like "+/- 150% of the highest skill player, or +/- 1000 ladder positions, whichever comes first" (I'm sure someone can come up with a better one).
For example, say the highest skill player is at position #200 and queues for 4v4. With a +/- 150% range, that means +/- 300 ladder positions; so that means this OKW player would be in a game with players rank 0-500. For a player at 2,500, the +/- 1000 would come into effect, restricting them to 1,500-3,500.
This would fix a TON of problems, both in terms of "balance" as well as player satisfaction. No one enjoys being in a game with a skill difference of over 2,500: the high-skill players are bored/waste time, and the low-skill players are hopeless. |
So, who wants to setup a "balance" tournament: an obnoxiously long series where top-ranking players need to play a TON of games against each-other as every faction (and combination), solely for the purpose of getting win:loss statistics? I'd suggest a similar format WCS, except each player matchup needs to consist of a "best of 5" of every faction combination (5x USF vs. Ost, 5x USF vs OKW, 5x etc....).
Really though, considering the player base of CoH2, getting a complete statistical breakdown of balance that's as accurate as it needs to be is very unlikely. If the game had daily concurrent player peaks over 100k it would be possible, since top-level play would actually consist of only top players. Unfortunately, even with the free give-away a little while ago, its only reached 22k peak concurrent players, and that average is now down to around 7k (based on steamcharts).
Even so, I still think the WCS is a better source of balance data than Automatch. Players in the WCS were all in the top 150 for 1v1, whereas in automatch it's not uncommon for top 100 players to be matched against top 300-500 players, since that's the closest available.
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Thats because balance team is wehraboos lol.
Consider most players rate the current factions in 1v1 as USF/Sov > OKW > Ost > UKF, this is unlikely.
That said, the "Convert MedTruck to MedBunker button" suggestion from Elchino7 on the first page is really good, and should probably be considered. |
By the time COH3 will be out majority of the now dwindle RTS crowd will be in their late 30s and 40s. The new kids love that Fortnite BS these days.
Unfortunately, you're probably right (partially; the RTS genre is likely too niche to for CoH-type "$60" games to be profitable (but I'm no market analyst). While I do think there's some sort of new CoH game coming, I don't think it's going to be the "CoH3" many people are expecting.
I don't think it's an issue of "new kids" not being interested in RTS, though. It's likely just a naturally declining genre; "Arena Shooters" (Quake type games, etc.) have had similar issues in recent years, despite there 'supposedly' being a large demand for modern games in that style, and those are very fast pace 'twitch' shooters that many would expect to be popular.
If there ever is a CoH sequel, I'd expect it to be an F2P "CoH2 relaunch". This would mean recycling a lot of the underlying assets (art, UI, code, etc.) to keep costs down, but then adding a bunch of new features/modes/"Cosmetic MTX" to drive interest and profit. Basically, I'm expecting another attempt at 'Company of Heroes: Online'. |
Sadly, I'm going to find myself agreeing with CODGUY somewhat. The HMG42 because of timing, stats, power level etc etc IS the most OP unit in the game. But because of design flaws, the unit is necessary very much like the Jackson is necessary in the spot its in to keep USF from collapsing. So in essence, learn to smoke and play around them because youre right, its not changing or going anywhere.
It's strong, but nowhere near M36 "oppression" levels.
The MG42 does very, very little actual damage - especially against anything in cover or garrisoned; compare its damage output of that to the .50cal or Vickers, and you'll see that it can't really drain any MP, it just forces retreats (hard or soft). It does suppress incredibly quickly, but that's the only area it's truly exceptional in (AP rounds seem in-line with other MG-AP rounds).
Even then, its suppression isn't insurmountable; get some Double-Bren-Bolstered-Vet 3 infantry sections or Vet3 rifles w/ M1919s, and you'll be able to melt it head-on. It also has the slowest traversal rate in the game (for MGs), making it very vulnerable to simply having two units attack in from slightly different angles. Another counter is that due to the 3 second pack up time, it is exceedingly vulnerable to Penal-satchels; if the throw animation is started, the MG is gone. This means that OST players will likely move/retreat the MG if penals even get close, regardless of the satchel being thrown or not.
It's a very solid unit, but by no means is it OP. There are simply too many ways to counter it for it to be "oppressive", many of which are available quite early on (having 2+ infantry squads, mortar smoke, MHT smoke, RE smoke, penals, flamer UC/M3).
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I think i have to correct some aspects which had been mentioned before. The data mentioned and some of the analysis of it is from an incomplete pool of games.
-UKF: They were used at least 8 times, having a 25% WR.
-OKW: the match up against both USF and SU was fair.
-SU/USF: their match up against OH was highly favoured. OH won 6/18 games (33%) against Soviets and 5/16 games (29%) against USF.
SU mostly went with IS2 doctrines against OH (11/18 armored assault and twice with Shock Rifle).
-OH: T4 has been the bane of diversity for OH, mostly on 1v1. This gives them troubles when we live in a heavy meta. Their is no Puma to save them this time neither for when they are behind in light vehicle phase.
-THERE WAS NO LACK OF OH NOR USF.
OH=40
OKW=67
SU=50
USF=49
UKF=8
That's really interesting new data; but it still seems slightly incomplete. I just tallied up the round of 32, 16, quarters, semi, final and 3rd place rounds, and got 113 games total - your list is 107. That's still FAR better than the 84 we were discussion earlier; if you're the source for this new data, great work.
I also don't understand where the "There was no lack of OH" conclusion came from; by your new revised data, OKW saw 67% (27 games) more play than OST, compared to USF and Sov being only 2% (1 game) apart.
That said, it's interesting to see that these 'newly added' games absolutely trash the USF vs. OST matchup, to the point where their win-rate against USF was actually worse than the already terrible Sov vs. USF matchup.
As for your comments on future balance changes, I think you're pretty much correct about everything. My only changes to your suggestions would be regarding TDs; the M36 and Su-85 are incredibly dominant vs. medium tanks, to the point where they become essentially irrelevant once the TDs hit the field. Reducing their pen w/ vet wouldn't really change this at all. Delaying them slightly or lowering their RoF, and in the case of the M36, lowering its moving accuracy, might be other viable avenues for change.
As for OST, perhaps giving the 222 an 'AT' upgrade could be looked into, similar to how the OKW Elite-Armour 221 "upgrade" works; paying some MP/Fuel in exchange for more armor for that specific unit. Additionally, it could give an "AP Round" toggle, similar to the M4A3 AP/HE toggle, which could give it more pen and damage in exchange for a lower rate of fire.
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While it isn't "the most OP unit ingame", playing against 4x MG42 backed by 2x mortar and bunker spam on rails and metal certainly makes me want to uninstall as any faction, especially brits though.
It's annoying, but not necessarily that tricky to beat. USF's MHTs make short work of it, as does a well micro'd M3+Flamer (at least to start), or just heavy use of smoke. UKF is kind of in a rough spot if they lose their flamer-UC, though, but that's mainly because of (bad) faction design.
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Doomlord52
Relic Entertainment
cblanco ★ 
