USSR OP vs Wehr

[IJoe]

Yeah I gotta say Katyushas are insane. They come really early and are dirt cheap, you get 3 of them for what, 1050mp and 12 pop cap? And the call-in timer also runs pretty fast so you don't have to wait long for them. With their high range the spread becomes a benefit rather than a problem because 3 of them just devastate the target area. At least they're not high on armor and hp like the calliope is, but still. I guess they could do with a slight price increase (100mp more?) and come 1 cp later?

Same question: why are you telling all this now, not a week\month\two months ago? What was that, which had happened just lately, that all you, people, got brightened up with all these revelations?
Don't mind my irony, really,- I don't intend to insult anyone anyhow. It's just that I am truly all that astonished by all these speeches.

[Wilson]

Same question: why are you telling all this now, not a week\month\two months ago? What was that, which had happened just lately, that all you, people, got brightened up with all these revelations?
Don't mind my irony, really,- I don't intend to insult anyone anyhow. It's just that I am truly all that astonished by all these speeches.

The other changes that have been made in the patch could well have lots of slight effects which make particular strategies more viable or likely to happen. Maybe it's just that people have been playing more games since the latest patch and these things were always there, but people only noticed recently.

Chancellor says that he has had these kinds of feelings for a while, but they've become stronger with this patch. I don't think I've been terribly clear in the first paragraph, but what I mean is that some small changes in this patch might have an unexpected effect on other units.

For instance, say Russian infantry are better in this patch, people might need to buy less of them to be competitive on the field. Because of this they have more MPP, so they can buy some Katyushas that they wouldn't normally have bothered with. Suddenly it seems that the Katushas are OP, because people can get them easier, in turn because of a seemingly unrelated change to Russian infantry. That was just an example, I don't think that actually happened, but hopefully it gets across what I mean a bit better.

[IJoe]

@Wilson
Well, your thread of logic appears to be flawlessly valid. Think, I am going to confide in it.
It's always strange, how some seemingly perfectly simple idea was capable of evading your mind for a while, after you've got a purely clear explanation of it by someone else. 

[Joshua9]

Tentative defense of katyushas here.  They aren't really that good out the box.  With vet, yeah they're extreme, and in groups they become effective...but when that first lone kat comes out, he's not something I stress about, and I don't even find myself having to run my infantry home. 

the kats are incredibly fragile, and can be hunted down by early mid game.  I like them at the moment as is...but its early in the testing,  and I could be wrong.

another thing I forgot to mention that I did find disconcerting though, was a t90(which thankfully has been drastically nerfed in the past) driving up to my pak, and decrewing it from the front in a split second.  I don't mind at all that these little bastards are great at flanking and decrwing at guns, but this didn't flank.  I'm just surprised that the armor modifiers for the soldiers manning the pak didn't seem to help them a lick.  It seems like in any other circumstance, with any other light vehicle, that damage to the squad manning the gun is pretty hard to attain from the front, and that circling to the back is neccesary.  Not sure that this actually qualifies as a balance problem, but it was surprising.

[SavageWorld]

Three months ago many people (including myself) agreed that the sharpshotter team needed to have less hp. I think this would have been a better solution than what we saw in 1.3. Althourgh the change to sniper armor, as Paciat suggest might have worked as well.
Many people belived this was a big balance problem in 1.23 and I can understand why Chancellor points out that this hasn't been fixed in the 1.3


I don't think that it is that hard to snipe the sniper instead of the spotter. just shoot the guy with the helm


They changed the command squad vet because people complained about, the global part of the Command Squad vet didn't  have enough of an impact on the game. I belive this argument was flawed becuase it didn't take into accound, how important it is to unluck the commanders special abilities. (In 1.2 he was one of the most important unit to get vet on.) But I never responede to the post.

[Chancellor]

lol the guy with the helm can be hard to distinguish when you are in the heat of the game, and frantically trying to countersnipe in those few seconds Mr Helmet reveals himself, while worrying about random katysha fire.

Anyhow, I think theres a problem where if you attack click on the sniper squad, Konig doesn't automatically shoot the sniper instead of the spotter, its more like a 50 50 chance or something

Finally, you're putting 340 manpower on the line, and he's putting 120.

I suggest making the sniper a higher priority target, and reducing the shared sniper team's health to that of a normal sniper.  As it currently stands, you'll rarely kill both members with a bike before they retreat to their base.

Finally, I'm not allowed to release any confidential information, but lets just say none of this is really getting fixed in the next coming patch.  There have been attempts with the Katyshas, but it fails to address the main problem that it comes to early and basically makes T2 Wehr useless.  Also, correct me if I'm wrong, but the current infantry armor that the sniper team has is actually weaker than sniper armor.  The problems are not going to be directly addressed from their main problems.

[Venoxxis]

You can always move your troops away from the strike area, since there is a smoke warning, and, I think, the delay of the strike is greater than that of the Command squad.
The area of the strike is really small (about a bunker size), and the strike itself doesn't destroy any structure  in one barrage. Besides, correct me if I'm wrong here, sniper team does become visible for some time, when it aims the strike.
Yes, it's a one time upgrade, but sniper team are an infantry unit, easily killed by pumas (practically on the fly), chased down by motorbykes, etc.
So making such sufficient spending also binds you to keeping them alive, which is not as easy at all times.
[...]

what i was doing, was comparing the sniper art strike to the wehrmachts def. art strike. Just like you did it before. For every art strike its always all the same, there is always a warning sign. There is nothing special about the soviets here. The delay of the strike is way to short. Usually after retreating and coming back to the front again i can call the next one in. When he comes visible, (if needed) simply press retreat. Same counts for pumas etc. a well watched sniper team (again the same prob) will never get caught by these.

Anyhow, the question that keeps emerging in my mind over again is: where were all these complaints before the patch 1.3? How come, that it is now, when the sniper team is actually somewhat weakened, they became OP all of a sudden?

Thats a pretty good point IJoe. Reading the last balance threads i was thinking exactly the same.
I am following this mod pretty long already, and i downloaded the 1.00 the first day it was out. And rushed into the first matches. The first version were unbelievable unbalanced. It was horrible. But the dev's recognized that (actually they did know it already before the first release, at least most of them) and tried to fix the main balance issues very fast. With these being fixed in about a half year, the real balance work started.

What i mean to say, is, that after the outstanding balance issues have been fixed, the finishing touch on the balance and the soviet gameplay can be tackled finally.
Actually, there will be more and more thread like that showing up for right the same reason.

I hope that answers your question


best regards

[GodlikeDennis]

Katyushas are perfectly fine IMO. They're very easily destroyed and you need at least 2 to be effective.

Snipers ARE a problem. They're simply run and gun and destroy. There's not really an art to using them like there is for normal snipers. I agree that a health nerf is in order, like we have been suggesting since the 1v1 tourney. The FOO actually has quite a long cooldown on it already but since it's free it should probably be even a bit longer. It's very easy to dodge though.

The command squad vet is also too good now. Perhaps scale up the bonus so vet 1 gives 5%, vet 2 10% and vet 3 15% (for 30% in total). That way you're more rewarded for getting a vet 3 command squad at a stage where it's far more likely for the squad to get gibbed while nerfing the early bonus.

[Paciat]

The command squad vet is also too good now. Perhaps scale up the bonus so vet 1 gives 5%, vet 2 10% and vet 3 15% (for 30% in total). That way you're more rewarded for getting a vet 3 command squad at a stage where it's far more likely for the squad to get gibbed while nerfing the early bonus.

30% is still a lot. Since the CS squad gets defensive bonus (-15% recived accuracy) at vet 2 and barrage and charge abilities I believe that 5% bonus at vet 1, 5% at vet 2 and 10% at vet 3 is enough.

[Chancellor]

I agree with both you (Dennis / Paciat) on most parts.  Perhaps I was a little too critical about the katyshas, but as Wilson said, its probably effected indirectly by the OP snipers and vet atm.  I still think a slight nerf to the katyshas wouldn't hurt though.

The snipers need a good solid nerfing (they honestly need to be punished more if they get countersniped), and the vet should be reverted back to 5% each level.  At vet3, 15% not counting individual vet is still a lot, but since Soviets earn their vet, it should be just fine.  Anything global over 15-18% is really too much.

[SavageWorld]

Anyhow, the question that keeps emerging in my mind over again is: where were all these complaints before the patch 1.3? How come, that it is now, when the sniper team is actually somewhat weakened, they became OP all of a sudden?

Thats a pretty good point IJoe.
[/quote]
No it is not a good point.
After the 1 vs 1 tournament most people agree that the sniper needed a hp nerf. the devs said they were working on it, so every time someone brought it up the respons was "the devs are working on it." After 1.3 it is clear that they tried to fix it the wrong way. So the problenm still remains, thus Chancellor brings it up again.

Anyhow, I think theres a problem where if you attack click on the sniper squad, Konig doesn't automatically shoot the sniper instead of the spotter, its more like a 50 50 chance or something

It is not a 50% change. If you press the guy with the helm you kill the sniper and if you press the guy without the helm you do not kill the sniper. The same is true for all other factions. If you press the US sniper he will die, but if you press on a rifleman the rifleman will die. You can place your US sniper in between riflemen to make him harder to kill, but if you are skilled enough to press the right guy, it wouldn't help. I like that my sniper shoot the guy I press on.

Does anyone know why Russian infantry and the shapshooter team gets airborn armour at vet 1? I have not seen anyone ever sugesting this change? Can someone please inform me about the rational behind this cahnge?

[Zerstörer]

Does anyone know why Russian infantry and the shapshooter team gets airborn armour at vet 1? I have not seen anyone ever sugesting this change? Can someone please inform me about the rational behind this cahnge?

1) We have given higher priority so that the Soviet sniper and not the spotter gets hit. The only time where this will not happen is when the spotter is in range and the sniper isn't. But by all means if you can show me otherwise we'll have a look at it again.

2)Airborne armour is because they lack the survivability of normal sniper who cloaks and walks around armoured cars/tanks/MGs like no care in the world. You always know where the soviet snipers are which actually makes targeting them far easier than it is vs US. At mid late game a unit with sniper armour, visible for everyone to shoot at, will get obliderated in a split second.
However, as many people still find them too much of a problem we'll make a compromise and give them the sniper armour to begin with and see how that goes.

[Chancellor]

Guys I think sniper armor is actually stronger than the infantry armor they start off with right now...if I recall, infantry armor was the worst armor type in the game.  Giving these guys sniper armor is actually a buff...

Also, regardless of armor type, I still think they need a good HP nerf.  For all you nay-sayers, I challenge any of you with USSR.  Its honestly not that hard to survive with the sniper team.  Put them in a house (they are much stronger than regular snipers in houses due to their extreme HP; flamer pios will die in seconds before they can even hurt them), jump from cover to cover after engagements, or just simply retreat after being counter-sniped.  It takes minimal micro to use them; and honestly, bikes aren't gonna cut it.

I also think they used to have an issue where the spotter was critical shotting like crazy, making it like a second sniper.  Not sure if this has been fixed.  If it hasn't it definately needs to be looked into.

Finally, please revert global vet back to 5% per level.  It was perfectly fine before.  I honestly don't know which noob whined about this to make a change all the way to 10% per level.

[GodlikeDennis]

The spotter's crit chance has been lowered but is still rather high. It'll take more testing to see if it needs lowering further. Sniper armour is weak to bikes and things is it not? The traditional sniper counters might be more effective that way.

[Chancellor]

Bike is useless against a good player.  He'll use mines and AT guns to protect.  Only way is to countersnipe or quickly dispose the sniper with concentrated infantry fire.  This is why I am arguing for lower health and higher manpower penalties for getting counter-sniped.

And no I don't think sniper armor is worse than infantry armor.

Anyways, I'd like to sandbox the sniper team counter-snipe scenario with you sometime.  I want to see if I click on the sniper squad Konig automatically shoots the sniper in the squad all the time.