RA Current Balance Discussion

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Discussion about the game and its default mods.
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How balanced do you think RA isat the moment?

Everything is very balanced!
14
45%
Soviets are underpowered!
10
32%
Allies are underpowered!
7
23%
 
Total votes: 31

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Murto the Ray
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RA Current Balance Discussion

Post by Murto the Ray »

Hello everyone, Murto the Ray here.

The current release has been out for a while now so its about time some feedback was given back from the community. From collecting suggestions from those watching SoScared's stream, people in-game and from github suggestions i have compiled a list of possible balance changes:
  • Spies should be given to solely Britain
  • Mammoths are underpowered
  • Allied late game is underwhelming, something to make allied tech have a bigger difference should be introduced
  • longbows are underpowered (Fire too slowly, dont do enough damage vs armor)
  • Migs should have anti-air capabilities
  • Missile subs should have an anti-air capability
  • gunboats should have an anti-navy role
  • More untis/buildings should detect spies
  • MAD tanks, nuff said
Take all of these with a grain of salt because all they are are some (not always well thought through) ideas that have been thrown around.

Leave your feedback and thoughts below!
Last edited by Murto the Ray on Thu Mar 17, 2016 7:56 pm, edited 3 times in total.

hotze
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Post by hotze »

I'm firmly against spies being exclusive to England.
  1. Removes strategies from the gameplay of Germany and France
  2. Makes Soviets OP against Germany and France due to
    • no risk of low power due to spies
    • no risk of playing against vetted units
    • no risk of money being stolen
    • no incentive to build dogs other than 1 or 2 for early scouting
There are currently only two problems with spies.
  1. Spies do not detect other spies, therefore allies have no way to combat spies.
  2. The British spy can be used to generate an infinite amount of money.
I don't think mammoths are underpowered, but it doesn't make much sense to build them considering their cost and build time given that the cheaper and faster options Soviets have are more than strong enough.

Longbows definitely need a fix. More ammo, faster shooting, for example.

If missile subs get an anti-air capability then I don't see a reason for MIGs to have AA capabilities as well since Soviets already have mobile AA.

GoldenHippo
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Post by GoldenHippo »

Well, the British spy thing is fixed in the next release.

Mammoths are a bit pointless at the moment because of the cost of them and the fact that rocket soldiers can shred them fairly easily. Maybe make the tusk rockets a bit more potent to combat this? If they could crush vehicles then that would make them something!

Not sure I agree about the Allied late game. GPS is really powerful against Soviet, especially when combined with arty.

Not sure what you mean regarding gunboats? They can already detect subs? Do you mean make them more powerful against subs? If so, I would agree but at an increased cost.

And yes, MAD tanks are utterly pointless unless in a team game with mixed teams and you can manage to iron curtain chrono 5 of them in to the enemy base...

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Murto the Ray
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Post by Murto the Ray »

GoldenHippo wrote: Not sure I agree about the Allied late game. GPS is really powerful against Soviet, especially when combined with arty.
Allied lategame is pretty lackluster. The allied tech center is flimsy and the chronosphere isn't integrated into allied lategame in the same way the IC is integrated into soviet late game. GPS is only good if you can get it up but that's hard enough because the tech center is so flimsy. Longbows are pretty awful at the moment too. And arty gets shredded vs a good soviet player.
GoldenHippo wrote: Not sure what you mean regarding gunboats? They can already detect subs? Do you mean make them more powerful against subs? If so, I would agree but at an increased cost.
There has been discussion on github about this and i believe the end verdict was to make it solely anti-ship by giving it a better anti-ship weapon and removing it's cannon. it is possible that the anti-ship capability would also be removed from the destroyer. This would give it a more important place in gameplay as the primary counter to navy without affecting land battles.

As for mammoths, if they worked like they do in TD and tusks fired at vehicles then it would make them a hell of a lot more powerful but that would be a bit too imbalanced vs allies atm.

GoldenHippo
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Post by GoldenHippo »

Yeah, that's true about the Allied Tech centre being flimsy. How about shortening the time it takes for GPS to be launched? and maybe making the Tech centre more like the Soviet one in that parabombs don't always destroy it in one hit? (That's at least how it feels)
I'd totally forgotten about Longbows! That kinda shows how useless they are. Arty should only really get shredded if you don't protect them though, or the IC of doom comes along.

That would be very interesting for the Gunboat, especially with removing the Destroyers capability to spot subs.

Could it be a case of improving the Light tank (a la TD but not quite as powerful) so the Medium tank becomes more late game?

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Murto the Ray
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Post by Murto the Ray »

GoldenHippo wrote: Yeah, that's true about the Allied Tech centre being flimsy. How about shortening the time it takes for GPS to be launched? and maybe making the Tech centre more like the Soviet one in that parabombs don't always destroy it in one hit? (That's at least how it feels)
This is the type of thing that really needs some debate, a slight change in something like this could drastically change things (possibly for the worst).
GoldenHippo wrote: Could it be a case of improving the Light tank (a la TD but not quite as powerful) so the Medium tank becomes more late game?
Considering that light tanks have recently found more use and tank battles are already quite even at the moment i dont personally think they should be buffed.

newwe
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Re: RA Current Balance Discussion

Post by newwe »

Murto the Ray wrote:
  • Mammoths are underpowered
  • longbows are underpowered (too slow, dont do enough damage vs armor)
  • MAD tanks, nuff said
Those three are points I strongly agree with. Buff the mammoth speed imo, they are basically defense structures at this point.

Migs are underpowered as well, but anti-air might be too much of a buff, as it could make allied helis obsolete and soviets already have flak trucks.

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Murto the Ray
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Re: RA Current Balance Discussion

Post by Murto the Ray »

newwe wrote: Migs are underpowered as well, but anti-air might be too much of a buff, as it could make allied helis obsolete and soviets already have flak trucks.
Im not too sure about this either; allies dont have great mobile anti air and the longbox (if it were better), imo, should be allies' late game equivalent to the flak truck.
Last edited by Murto the Ray on Wed Mar 16, 2016 9:52 pm, edited 1 time in total.

noobmapmaker
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Post by noobmapmaker »

In general I think the balance is pretty good at the moment, just a couple units are still not so usefull. Some considerations:

- Mammoths crushing tanks sounds fun, and give them +3% speed or some other small %
- Make missile subs anti air, but with rockets that dont go to far and are easy to lose, so mostly they are good to kill off static choppers
- Allies need something in return: buff the Longbows. Perhaps adapt the TD version: no reload needed after their first burst. Very slow firing though unless it reloads on the helipad.
- Migs not anti-air, make them $50-$100 cheaper
- Let the Mad tank be able to destroy trees! (a bug that has been fixed, but I think its fun!)
- Take the loadingsound off minelayers... theyre allready not so good but it takes away any suprise for the enemy left if they can hear them loading mines.

With all these things I think Allies is getting worse compared to Soviet so they really need a buff somewhere. Perhaps make the techcenter a little tougher (+50HP or something) and perhaps reduce the sattelitetimer with a little bit (15 secs?). It could also detect spies.

But the allies need something at the ground to make a fist and be able to do SOME micro. The medium tank is about the only option. Id say increase their speed +1 (1 faster than heavy tank) or let them shoot a tad more powerfull against certain armors.

Btw this spreadsheet with all unitstats is helpfull: http://pastebin.com/raw/WDbQkkz6
It was compiled by Saber: https://www.reddit.com/r/openra/comment ... readsheet/
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af
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Post by af »

For the Mammoth, what about giving it the ability to crush walls, and maybe pillboxes? Could make it a useful counter for Allied players who turtle with arties, behind layers of defensive structures.

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kyrylo
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Post by kyrylo »

I don't think Allies are underpowered. I think Soviets are. Soviets depend heavily on Iron Curtain and Tech Centre. Without the IC they have no chances against Allies and a lot of successful attacks/breakthroughs depend on IC'ed units. In terms of different strategies Allies can do everything Soviets can, and they additionally can control the sea and drop units.

The most powerful unit in the game, Tanya, belongs to Allies. Base pushes of Allies are much stronger due to the fact that you can build turrets faster than tesla coils. Spies can absolutely win you games, and keeping an eye on them is a constant pressure, so you will miss at least one or two (even best players don't always notice them). Allies have medics and mechanics, so if you're lucky enough you can micro properly and retain a lot of your army. Soviets are doomed to lose more because arty + Tanya leaves 0 chances to infantry (even to shock troopers) and tanks on their own can't do anything (except maybe tesla tanks).

I don't get why everyone is disappointed with Chronosphere. It's pretty damn powerful already. You can: destroy enemy harvesters, teleport arties, teleport tanks, steal enemy units, crush infantry, teleport MCV's. So many uses!

Spies should be given to solely Britain

I think it was my idea and I still like it. Transfer spies to Britain and make them worth $500. It's an extremely powerful unit and the price of $250 is just a joke. Hijackers cost $500 (IIRC) and they're buggy. Spies, on the other hand, always work reliably.

Mammoths are underpowered

Indeed they are. They cannot use their ability to regenerate health at all because they can *never* escape due to their slowness. I would increase their speed leaving the turn rate the same and boost splash damage of tusk rockets. I'd love them to be similar to TD mammoths, but less powerful. So, it should be something in between the current mammoth and the TD mammoth.

Allied late game is underwhelming, something to make allied tech have a bigger difference should be introduced

It's already much more versatile than what Soviets have (given so many different special units) and GPS satellite provides ultimate vision, so sneak attacks are no longer possible. It's hard to keep it alive for 9 minutes? Hah, build two! Chronosphere is amazing, too. But it should not whiff that often and teleport nothing.

longbows are underpowered (too slow, dont do enough damage vs armor)

I would *only* increase their damage, just a bit, so they could recharge less often.

Migs should have anti-air capabilities

I think this will break the game. Migs should definitely be faster to build (the price is probably reasonable) and have slightly more health (flying tanks). As of this release you need at least 4 migs to destroy 1 AA-gun in 1 go , and you lose 1 mig in 100% of cases. This is ridiculous given the price of the unit vs AA-gun. Ideally, in this scenario, you should lose no migs and increased health can provide this.

Missile subs should have an anti-air capability

I think everyone likes this so far.

gunboats should have an anti-navy role

I like this idea, and it also requires a change to destroyers, so they could not attack subs. Destroyers - land/air damage. Gunboats - sea.

More untis/buildings should detect spies

Make silo reset the disguise :) Just kidding, I don't know what to say here.
Last edited by kyrylo on Wed Mar 16, 2016 12:35 pm, edited 1 time in total.

zinc
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Re: RA Current Balance Discussion

Post by zinc »

Mammoths should be faster at least. Worth trying anyway.

Longbows need a buff probably, but are already useful because I believe they have greater vision than any other heli now, and obviously the AA ability is useful.

Soviet SAM seems to be a little short on range.

Missile subs should be cheaper imo.

Gunboats should maybe be cheaper at 400.

Worth trying Mig anti-air

epice
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Post by epice »

Fix the iron curtain so you can pre-select your units.
It's bullshit you gotta waste time setting them up out of your enemies reach. Then half of its gone by the time your shit is in range to attack.

Double longbow ammo.

One spy shouldn't completely disable you're entire power grid. Maybe like 30% of your power plants(at random) should go offline and not all of them?

Nerf arty spam

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SoScared
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Post by SoScared »

  • Mammoths are underpowered
Pretty much. 10% speed increase + wall crush ability FTW! Afaik the ability to crush walls is already on its' way.
  • Allied late game is underwhelming, something to make allied tech have a bigger difference should be introduced.
Hmm... at least the Phase Tank looks to be under-utilized for Britain. The Chrono Tank (Germany) needs to be reviewed. I'd like to see the tech center increase it's HP so it doesn't fall to a single para-drop.
  • Longbows are underpowered (too slow, dont do enough damage vs armor).
Not really slow, and it does good damage vs armor. It's been suggested in the past to increase its' missile speed and/or increase it's health for durability. I'd love to see an adjustment for a playtest.
  • Migs should have anti-air capabilities.
I've been against this for a while due to it affecting a long series of variables, and the arguments both for and against it has been inconsistent to say the least. However the prospect of having functional air-to-air battles in the mid- and late game is absolutely worth a playtest or two. The Longbow would increase it's value by default as well. IMO it's definitely worth a playtest.
  • Missile subs should have an anti-air capability.
Saw it tried out on hamb's stream some time ago. Same slow long range missiles taking down lazy unattended aircraft with cluster damage. Wasn't OP. It was beautiful. It's a good bet we'll see this soon in a playtest.

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Murto the Ray
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Post by Murto the Ray »

kyrylo wrote: Mammoths are underpowered
SoScared wrote: Mammoths are underpowered
I agree 100% with you both and i like the sound of your proposed changes.
kyrylo wrote: I like this idea, and it also requires a change to destroyers, so they could not attack subs. Destroyers - land/air damage. Gunboats - sea.
I agree although do you think there should be any price changes as a result of this?
kyrylo wrote: Migs should not have anti-air capabilities
SoScared wrote: Migs should not have anti-air capabilities
Agreed although i personally think Migs and Longbows should have a damage increase(and a fire rate increase for longbows) vs armored targets. This would make harvester harassment more viable with these units and make them viable to use as anti-armor as part of an army composition in the same way hinds can be used to act as anti-infantry. As for AA guns, i think the problem lies in the gun rather than the aircraft.


SoScared wrote: Not really slow
Whoops, that was a mistake; should have been "Fire too slow". Editted for clarity.
epicelite wrote: One spy shouldn't completely disable you're entire power grid. Maybe like 30% of your power plants(at random) should go offline and not all of them?
Maybe some system where your power goes completely down and then with every 2 seconds 5% of it recovers until it is back at 100% would be better?

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