Comments on Balence Options

[Genmotty]

Disclaimer: These are my own personal thoughts and you devs can feel free to ignore them or take them onboard as you wish .

I’d like to make some comments about ROTR balance. While I can appreciate the fact that the full score of units and abilities is yet to be included in the game, certainly there should be some standards of damage and armor ratings common to all units, as well as a ‘corresponding balance of key units’.

In playing the 1.5 Version something that struck me particularly was the inefficiencies of machineguns mounted on vehicles, and the large damage infantry did to all forms of structure and many vehicles. This I believe is not indicative to good gameplay. If you want an example use 6 or 7 Redguard in rifle mode against a Sentinel. You should find that the Sentinel dies far too easily.

As a rule in real life there are three (general) types of machinegun; an automatic rifle, a fully automatic machinegun and chainguns. In ROTR, we have all three types.

At the lowest form we have the bog standard infantry, infantry machineguns are almost ineffective against any type of structure, or armored vehicle. This should be correspondingly integrated into this mod. Perhaps small arms fire should only do like 20% damage to light vehicles (truck, humvee, (unarmored AAvehicle)), and 10% to base structure, 8% to tough base structures, and 5% to actual base defenses (well, perhaps just the bunker/tower forms. That would include the Kashtan and US missile defense system, but not the Chinese Gatling turret, as to get infantry that close to do damage is quite amazing). Against other infantry 100% damage should be the norm, with perhaps the Chinese Redguard getting a little less ‘bang for there buck’ on each shot.

The second type of machinegun I believe I would need to separate out again into primary AP (Anti-personel) MGs and secondary MGs. Where, the Primary AP MG is a weapons system like the Humvee turret, or the BDM armored transport, these in general have alright balance across the board at the current time, however they should be more effective against infantry units who still can damage these specialist Anti-infantry units rather too effectively. Perhaps an infantry amour downgrade by 80% against these weapons needs to be in order? This would include the US helicopters in this.

Then there are the secondary systems. These currently are far too weak on the Russian tanks. But almost perfect on the US tanks. The little machiguns here should have all the capacities of a standard infantry automatic rifle, just the fact that it doesn’t have to reload (and perhaps just a little 2%-3% bonus to damage for effect).

In this way, once a tank armor is upgraded against small arms, then one tank should be capable to deal with a large horde of basic infantry (say 12 in a one on one *shooting* contest).

Likewise something that irks me a tad is that tanks still fire their shells at infantry. Mindyou, it’s not a major problem. Furthermore I wonder if China’s battle master tanks would get a machinegun upgrade…Having said that, infantry and Gatling tanks far make up from any lack in that department.

Finally we have the chaingun section of machineguns. Gatling weapons, Beruik aircraft Gatling gun, Tunguska, Littlebirds, and Hokum. All of these weapons I believe need there own separate niche in the weapons game. Let’s start with the big guns;

The Hokum
Essentially this is an AT autocannon. Slow ROF (rate of fire), but high damage, as it stands, it’s just a very poor AP weapon, it should be more effective against infantry. Perhaps an increasing of whatever damage type it is against infantry is in order of about 10%-15%. At the end of the day, the Russians have got the Hind for AP helicopter gunships.

Gatling guns
It appears that all damage has been already adjusted by ROF for one or two barreled versions of the weapon, am I correct? However it is my opinion that universally the damage against light armored vehicles should be upped, perhaps by as much as 40%, but certainly by about 20%. At the end of the day it is a ‘cannon’ and the model has big beefy barrels, hence it should be capable of more damage, against infantry. Spot on already. Kudos.

Tunguska and Littlebirds
The Tunguska in particular needs an upping of damage against infantry, but not by too much, perhaps just another 5%, as for an AA vehicle those bullets are going to be packing some punch. For both, they need to do much less damage against buildings, currently they can raise buildings to the ground far too quickly. Perhaps 5%-10% adjustment here?

The Russian Jet Fighter
I think that it’s MG quality is awesome, but I’d like to see it applied to the Chinese Jet fighter (not the bomber variant), too. This is because infantry are far too effective at tying up aircraft on strike missions that don’t actually kill anything. However this isn’t that important at the end of the day, just need to apply some micro at some point.



Right that’s the first lot of little comments I’d like to make about balance of units, there are more on both tank damage vs other tanks. However I’m sure that the mod team have their own ideas about how much damage each vehicle should do against each other. Hence my comments will be more orientated at my personal thoughts that they might or might not want to take on board. Then finally artillery (China and Russia, on range of guns and AI, and finally in particular the nuke cannon being…well…weak, for a nuclear explosion. ) and buildings armor against certain weapon types.

Gen

[Destiny]

Unfortunately Genmotty, this is C&C...and a game. Infantry are already so weak, they'd be useless if MG weapons got boosted. Then there's also a faction's uniqueness and their advantages, disadvantages. Realism spoils things, especially when it's related to weapon damage. For someone who's firmly entrenched (turtled wouldn't be a good word now...) in the classic C&C tank-shells-can't-kill-infantry-in-one-shot and superheavy tanks taking tens of missile and still live to tell the tale, give a thought to those poor little guys who are massacred by the hundreds by base defences, tanks running over them, gunships raining death on them...

Oh, and you're not supposed to use a single tank to engage 7 or 8 people.

[Genmotty]

Hey I'm not looking for a 'realistic game' hell no, but certainly the way things stand; to have your tanks blown away by normal infantry (not even talking Tank Hunters or Missile Defenders here), and to have your helicopters and Anti-personal troop transports destroyed far to easily really makes infantry overpowered in this current installment of the game.

Some units already are well balanced such as the Gatling tank and the Russian Jet fighter for dealing with infantry, but others such as the Sentinel, Kodiak, Golem, Humvee and various structures appear to very vulnerable to infantry. Furthermore there appears to be little point in giving the US access to decent Anti-infantry drones for their tanks, but not to bring Russia's up to speed as well.

Gen

[Destiny]

Then it seems you're using only a single type of unit rather than mixed groups of units like you're supposed to, no?

[ultimentra]

Tunguskas and gatling tanks pwn infantry. Just combine those with tanks and add some gunships and your good.

[Balizk]

I prefer the infantry of ROTR than the normal ZH, it's much more usefull and fun... at least to me

[Frostyarmy]

Hardly anything wrong with with balance few tip toes here in there , but im ok with it , theres a new "meta game" to be discovered for multiplayer and thats why i play it.

[Pickysaurus]

I can understand your point - I took down an entire AI base with infantry alone (+helicopter transports)
But infantry is underused in vZH because it's too weak and useless...

[Genmotty]

I can understand your point - I took down an entire AI base with infantry alone (+helicopter transports)
But infantry is underused in vZH because it's too weak and useless...

However in ROTR, infantry in general have been given more opinions. Russia's conscripts are scout units as well as cannon fodder to protect their tanks from missile troops. Redguard have a nifty grenade attack that isn't effective against moving infantry, but could be improved damage wise to make them more effective against buildings and stationary vehicles. US ranger are pretty much as they have always been, awesome units in their own right. I don't know what up the devs sleeves for the ECA and GLA, but I would assume that these units would have their own uniqueness.

I'm mostly making a suggestion that certain units (aka Redguard (but also the US troops against certain units)) are far too effective against buildings and certain vehicles. You can test it out yourself using the worldbuilder 7-9 Redguard should kill off a Tunguska before it has even killed more than 1 Redguard. A Sentinel can be taken out with about 10-12 Redguard in 1 or 2 waves. 1 Hokum can die to 3 Flaktroopers before it's taken a single one out.

These are specific units I am talking about, not general cross board adjustments (except in the case of buildings and MG weapons to which buildings appear to be very vulnerable).

Mixing units can curb this overpoweredness, yet it still doesn't remove the underlying imbalance, because it is always easier to spam infantry in the early game than vehicles, which would lead to many meta games being about rushing your opponent with as many men as possible as soon as possible (particularly with the tiered base defense system).

Gen

[Anubis]

I do agree with Genmotty on this one. Realism is not something i desire in any game i play, but seeing 5-6 redguards take out a structure in a few seconds or a light vehicle/truck is just to much imo. This was a big problem in ZH and it persists in RotR/Shockwave as well. I have played mods that changed the gattling and small_arms damage vs buildings and tanks to a much lower level and in the end they were just as much if not better balanced than shockwave or rotr. Again realism is not the problem of this discussion but ridiculosly powerfull bullet infantry/tanks is a bit to much imo.

[ΓΛPΤΘΓ]

A full rifle calibre can't take down a truck? Think again.

As the Chinese in ROTR uses a semi-auto rifle, I can safely assume it use at least a full rifle calibre weapon which can easily WTF own your trucks.

[Frostyarmy]

What are you talking about , Gattling tanks ,, and Russian Light vechicle AA Shread infantry to bits , not only do they Outrange them , they can move and shoot at the same time, Take a look at your units for 2 seconds move them back a bit. its not that hard.
I think it would simply look retarded to have 25 red guards Just die epically to 1 (unmanaged) Anti infantry vehicle.

[Mcbob]

The Hokum
Essentially this is an AT autocannon. Slow ROF (rate of fire), but high damage, as it stands, it’s just a very poor AP weapon, it should be more effective against infantry. Perhaps an increasing of whatever damage type it is against infantry is in order of about 10%-15%. At the end of the day, the Russians have got the Hind for AP helicopter gunships.

Note on the Hokum:

It's an anti-armor platform which uses guided missiles as opposed to rockets of the Mi-24. Liken the Hind to more of a hovering, self-replenishing Frogfoot.

It is much more effective against stationary structures than mobile tanks.

For balance and practicable reasons, the Hokum's 30mm cannon isn't very effective against armor. Realistically, against modern tanks, no 30mm cartridge is except for the 30mm DU round of the GAU-8.

IRL, the Hokum's 30mm has a high ROF for an autocannon. It's not as slow as a Bofors gun or the M2 Bradley's 25mm.

This post has been edited by Mcbob: 10 Nov 2009, 5:49

[Frostyarmy]

*Facepalm* Hokums are anti Armor helicoptors , ofc there not gonna own infantry.

[Mcbob]

*Facepalm* Hokums are anti Armor helicoptors , ofc there not gonna own infantry.

I was commenting on his statement about the Hokum ._.

Or am I confused now?

This post has been edited by Mcbob: 10 Nov 2009, 5:52

[Sharpnessism]

make gattling tanks or something

if you had a situation where it was red guard versus any tank just run them over.

I do agree with Genmotty on this one. Realism is not something i desire in any game i play, but seeing 5-6 redguards take out a structure in a few seconds or a light vehicle/truck is just to much imo. This was a big problem in ZH and it persists in RotR/Shockwave as well. I have played mods that changed the gattling and small_arms damage vs buildings and tanks to a much lower level and in the end they were just as much if not better balanced than shockwave or rotr. Again realism is not the problem of this discussion but ridiculosly powerfull bullet infantry/tanks is a bit to much imo.

do these mods keep the same spirit as ZH? or are they total conversions?

Mixing units can curb this overpoweredness, yet it still doesn't remove the underlying imbalance, because it is always easier to spam infantry in the early game than vehicles, which would lead to many meta games being about rushing your opponent with as many men as possible as soon as possible (particularly with the tiered base defense system).

if you knew anything about the metgame then you'd realize that redguard or any bullet infantry spam is useless since their counters are on the same tier as they are. spamming bullet just makes you less mobile, and MUCH more vulnerable to helis.

i disagree with most of the original points suggested, mostly because i doubt anyone knows much about the "state of balance" and it would be reckless to change things for no reason. buying bullet infantry is pretty useless already, just leave it the way it is.

[Destiny]

And of course...artillery. They can kill those infantry even them ever coming into sight of it. Things like the Nuke Cannon blow them away. The Msta, fully upgraded has a horrendous ROF. The Tomahawk...at least they're guided near the infantry.

[Casojin]

I've heard the team said RotR is not about realism before. Genmotty, if you want to play ZH mod with realism and Russian/Soviet theme, I suggest you try Cold War Crisis. I do like that mod but no one around me (at home) seems interest in realism mod like that (most of my friends only played for fun not for realistic feeling).

[Frostyarmy]

CWC sucked.

[Casojin]

CWC maybe suck to you but great for me. However, not many people can play it effectively though.

[Genmotty]

Since when did one say that Gatling tanks or the Russian APC were not balanced, or that I was after realism!!?

I thought I said that I would like to see ‘corresponding balance of key units’, that is keeping an 'even feel' between similar types of unit. Not saying I want them exactly the same. I didn't like vZH for making China and the US almost the same in style myself, and this is not what I am advocating.

I am talking about imbalances in the fact that some units do not appear to have good armor settings vs certain weapon types. More specifically Weak Russian Secondary tank MGs in comparison to the US drones vs infantry. Redguard, US Rangers and Tunguska vs buildings being a bit overpowered. The Sentinal being rather too vulnerable to Reguard. The Tunguska taking too long to kill a single infantryman (ref: it takes 35s for one redguard to kill a Tunguska, therefore a spam of 5-6 should be capable of taking it down in a couple shots, against that squad the Tunguska should be at least capable of taking 1 or 2 Redguard before it itself is destroyed. One on one, of course infantry are no match, infantry spams work on the principle of a lot of dakka from a lot of barrels to kill stuff before you take too many losses. Credit for credit, an infantry spam appears to win most of the time against Tunguska's in their current form.)

Recall as well my opinion is not for any drastic changes for these units, just small changes in the armor values of those units that are a bit weak against certain damage types, or a change to damage where of course changing the armor would be a bad idea. For instance I would expect that in the code Tunguska's use the 'SMALL_ARMS' as a damage type, which a load of other weapons already balanced against infantry would be using. Therefore changing 'HumanArmor' here would not be a good idea, just up the damage effect of the Tunguska, but drop it's ROF to still keep the same DPS (damage per second). Then it will do more damage per shot, and for low HP units like infantry it will kill off a couple before the vehicle itself dies, yet it will still do the same damage overall to other units (on average).



Zhao I am talking from a perspective of unit on unit, tested in the Worldbuilder, not against AI in Skirmish, in response to your PM.

Gen

[Destiny]

Oh wow, do you not read posts? Why on Earth would you be sending a single unit to attack the enemy? You will not find a situation where a single Tunguska will go up against 5 or 8 soldiers and sit there and get shot at. That Tunguska deserves to be destroyed in this case, ze.



Edit: Added more content to make it more...productive.

This post has been edited by Destiny: 10 Nov 2009, 21:52

[WhiteMetalSesa]

WOW great!

[walkingGhost]

I feel this is -currently- a non-issue. If the team was going to spend time on balancing now, they would have to address the more serious problems first, like the TOW-Humvees. But balance-fine-tuning is mostly pointless as long as there are factions left which havent all of their key units implemented (I dont know about that, I'm just guessing from the state of the public beta). Thus, an infantry- debuff is just NOT GONNA HAPPEN (soon).

And that is a good thing. Because it's not like a tank in ROTR can't take on basic infantry- he can crush them, no problem. The tank just dies to basic infantry if the player controlling it is lazy, incompetent or distracted- and thats just how it's supposed to be. If you put effort into managing your forces, you get rewarded. If you dont, your tanks loose. It's as simple as that. And it's just fair that a player who spends money on infantry (which is slow, short-ranged and vulnerable) gets some serious firepower for his money, because thats ALL he gets.

And for the last argument -realism: Well, there are hardly ANY strategy games which even earn the "strategy" in their name; usually, what you do in a such a game is to directly control minor amounts of totally not independed units/squads/whatever in tactical situations, and the scenarios you find yourself in are, if not fair, then at least winnable for either side. What a joke. Reality isnt like that; reality promotes cheating, reality makes you fight wars with fixed outcome, reality lets you abuse rules and "imbalance". You get even rewarded for doing so- and thats just nothing you want to have in a game, not in any form. Hence, adapting game mechanisms to reality is generally a bad idea, and doing it just for the sake of it is utterly stupid.
Feel free to disagree, but keep in mind that the very best (as in: "preferred by most people") games already reflect this (Counterstrike vs. OPF, Warcraft vs. Total War, ...); realism does not improve a game by itself.

[Frostyarmy]

TPAM =