Profile of Blovski

Used to be everyone's gameplan as Soviets was T1-T4 until the Ostheer scout car change (so countering an M3 no longer requires you to spend the 70 munis to get something that won't vet and is borderline redundant).

Since that change the Soviet T1 has seemed pretty balanced but pretty unforgiving of mistakes. M3 scout cars have really caught me out recently a couple of times. They can still do good work. Penals - I really don't know what needs to be done about them. With the abilities they have (nuke satchel + flamer of death), they can't really be made cheaper but they're still a bit too weak to really be viable. Maybe getting 1.25 armour or something like that for a little more durability.

Snipers are still pretty awesome. Think T1 will be better once they fix the riflenade warning again.

@Thunderhun - that's kind of the point of it, though.

lol people whine about things that are on the internet. i think if you are bothered by racism on the net then you are actually a racist yourself cause its bugging you and your sitting there thinking how dare they. let them sit there and say that shit, just ignore. it doesn't affect anyone.

That sentence makes no sense at all.

su 85 had its speed reduced to the point it cant chase a p4 reliably, double it if you go for the focused looking ability, t34/76 are not reliable. even their ram is not a sure gun damage (i understand that you have a possibility of engine damage. but to me gun damage should be 100% of the times. that's it those are the options soviets have vs tanks. not counting the at gun, what are you going to suggest, to reduce my commander options? because you need doctrinal tanks to beat non doctrinal tanks?

to stay in topic. i think this is caused by German wining. and them being the majority.

The SU-85 was blatantly too good at chasing and reversing and basically just about everything before the changes. It still has really good AT, frontal armour and range, just needs to be backed up properly.

T-34 ram has a 100% chance of gun damage on a P-IV or anything smaller. Against bigger tanks, it depends on whether you flank with the ram. The higher damage and penetration is a huge (over 50%) net buff to it's AT capabilities.

I don't have a problem using either SU-85s or T-34s right now. Certainly both of them are much better than StuGs normally are. More or less every Soviet doctrine features some sort of other AT thing right now, if you want different options excluding the AT gun. You also have mines, which I think are really underused by Soviet players at the moment.

I think 'German whining' was right on the SU-85, which is in a much healthier spot. The T-34 has had a really substantial buff to its AT. Every other AT option in the Soviet arsenal (mostly doctrinal) except AT nades has either been buffed or kept the same.

NOTICE: This thread is exclusively for discussion of the design and balance of the new 0 CP call-in units; there are several threads already for discussion of the DLC model or 'P2W' elements.

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The new DLC commanders have introduced a new element to COH-2 in the form of 0 CP call-ins. This is more or less unique in the series (the only other 0 cp ability I can think of are the PE ketten abilities but those seem almost accidental).

I have a few concerns with this

1) it unlocks all commanders at 0CP, encouraging people to select their commander before the game starts rather than organically as the game progresses. Indeed, to use these abilities, you're more or less obliged to select them at 0cp.

2) By introducing call-in units to the game so early, these new call-ins are forced to strike a really fine balance between early game effectiveness and mid-game cost-effectiveness.

Hence, assault grens, which would be reasonably priced at 280mp a few minutes in, were blatantly too good against early game conscripts. The solution was to stick on a muni cost, which is OK as a delaying method, but that messes with another design principle and kind of makes them too expensive for someone calling them in in the mid to late game.

Similarly, being able to make 6 Ostruppen with your first 720 mp gives insane amounts of capping power, and allows the Ostheer player to occupy a huge number of key buildings on a map like Semois very quickly while also capping all over the place. Ostruppen for 120 mp might actually be reasonable after the first few minutes, providing you with a lot of quick capping power, building blockers, very cheap reinforcement and recrewing units, but if they come in right off the bat, they just need to be more expensive to be balanced on a map like Semois.

3) it seems to mess up the design principles of the early game Soviets vs early game Ostheer. The Soviets having a T0 combat unit that can be made more flexible by doctrines and upgrades as opposed to the Ostheer having to put up T1 (or skip it, as is actually viable even in high level play) to field a wider range of units more quickly, and slightly better-scaling units.

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So, that's my issue with them. I kind of think that the Ostruppen and Assault Grenadier doctrines would both be easier to balance and a better fit with the rest of the game if they were 1cp call-ins rather than 0cp.

No I don't think they should have the Merge ability. Their spammability and reinforce cost is already enough, being able to constantly reinforce an MG while it's fighting with 6 Osttruppen squads is a bad concept and should not be allowed.

The whole idea you can have 6+ squads on the field in the first minutes is so far from COH mentality

Yeah, absolutely.

They're so cheap it messes up the unit preservation and the capping vs. building camping dynamics in the first few minutes. They're not that strong, so they're not a problem on some maps but Ostruppen spam on Semois, for instance, is ridiculously good compared to the skill required to pull it off.

@Hans... I think it might be OK on the reserve infantry Ostruppen but on the buildable ones it'd be ridiculous.