Is Naval Balanced Between Soviet and Allies?

Discussion about the game and its default mods.

Is Naval Balanced?

It's balanced no problem
4
17%
It's unfair to Soviets, but can be fixed just by tinkering with original units
6
26%
It's unfair to Soviets, and probably the only way to fix is with an extra unit
10
43%
It's unfair to Allies
3
13%
 
Total votes: 23

zinc
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Post by zinc »

If you wanted to stick with just the original units, there is the option of giving either the regular submarine, or the missile submarine, the additional ability of being able to surface with a flak gun. (How the flak submarine works in the special rules maps.) Or as far as I know they could be given that extra ability anyway.

If anyone objects that it "isn't how they worked in the original", it's already the case with the missile sub that it isn't working how it originally did with the AA ability. It's either have an extra unit or change somewhat the nature of the original units.

The thing about changing original units, is it would give the AA either at tier 1 or tier 3, rather than tier 2 which is ideal imo. Unless you did something like, change the nature of regular subs, but only when a radar exists; which I doubt is even possible with the game engine at the moment. You could probably have a semi-reasonable in-game explanation for that-- you need a radar to track the helis/planes for targeting your AA. But it would be arguably unfair as you would have the extra time to produce units at tier 1, which all instantly turn into tier 2 units the second you get a radar.

Printer
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Post by Printer »

Kiraye wrote: Well I don't think it would make them universally effective, if it could be a decent AA platform as it is advertised in its description. Its would be still useless against naval units, imagine this Missile Sub spam, that could be ruined by 500$ Gunboats.
Even now, without minimum range on Missile Subs, (which they should have as a side-note, for paritiy with the Cruiser) Naval units, such as Gunboats, Destroyers and Submarine could make short work of them.
For example: you have this so called Missile Sub spam, lets say you have 4 of them, thats 8k assets. Lets be minimalist here, use 4 Gunboats(2k assets) against them with minimal to moderate micro you can kill all the Missile Subs, pretty much with no-to-minimal losses.

Making the Missile Subs armor Heavy would only increase effectiveness of the Depth Charge against them (from doing 60 damage vs Light to 80 damage vs Heavy armor, which means instead of 7 shots, one Missile Sub would be killed in 5 shots.) And I am not supportive of the armor change anyway, but there is some trade offs to that change in some situation.

Also adding the Flak sub won't really change the situation where the soviets dominated naval once they destroyed the shipyards. Flak Subs would kill Air units anyway, unless you want the Flak Subs to be useless against Air also, in which case we are back where we started. And I am not against some new units, don't get me wrong here, but unlike the Sniper which could add some depth gameplay-wise if fine-tuned correctly, the Flak Subs offer nothing of value, that some tweaking with the Missile Sub can't fix.
I hope there's a way to solve this without a new unit. The present meta is elegant and I think unit tweaks would be good enough.

MiG AA is a delight to micro (tested several times with Omnom's build months ago) and would round out the AA issue with Soviets though. No new unit! It would also establish the theme that Soviet T3 units are multipurpose (M. Subs, Mammoths & Migs).

TBH though, the focus on MSubs vs Air distracts from other things-
a. like the non-viability of depth charges, (Needs a buff)
b. Fragility of all subs vs helicopters (the fact planes pass over means only helicopters are too effective)
c. difficulty of Soviet navy in rivers or around rocks, (Might not be fixable)
d. uncalled for AOE of torpedoes, (makes up for c?)
e. oddity of torpedo's being affected by radar jammers,
f. THE LACK OF TRANSPORT TRANSPORT SPACE

Seems to me Heavy Armor fixes "A" & "B", "C" could be removed to keep ballance, "D" is unfixable, "E" is low priority- and "F" is long overdue.

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AoAGeneral1
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Post by AoAGeneral1 »

SirCake wrote: Just so funny what Kiraye wrote ^^ How expectations and facts don't meet at all sometimes :D

@AoAGeneral: How is a unit with a very defined profile something bad for RTS?
I allways hated Starcraft for the marine, which is basically a rifleman who can attack air and ground, armored targets and buildings while beeing good at every role. Most boring unit ever! Can only be countered by more stuff.
Because that is what CNC has been about. CNC95, RA95, RA2, etc etc.

Many units have multi role uses which makes the unit have a greater value. The example you took is not CNC. Starcraft 2 actually, is a bad example of game balance in which you just pointed out the major issue. Try playing Starcraft Brood War and using marines in the same method. It won't work. You will find a mixed unit compilation destroying them. (IE: Siege tank combos)

zinc
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Post by zinc »

MiG AA may be a fun thing to use, but...

A group of Yaks can destroy a Missile Sub in a split second. They could maybe even kill 2 or 3 in a very short time depending on the timing and positions, that they are all lined up and surfaced around the same time. Like 3 or 4 seconds and they are gone.

If you are trying to micro MiGs as anti-air you might get 1 or 2 Yaks down if you are paying attention when the attack happens.

Compare that to Destroyers protecting a Cruiser. You don't need to micro. You don't need to pay attention. It's automatic assuming the Destroyers aren't busy with something else. You might be able to inflict a good bit of damage on a Cruiser with a Yak attack, but your Yaks will get shredded in the process no question about it.

Also as mentioned I think it's going to be problematic to try to balance tier 2 Allies stuff with tier 3 Soviet stuff. Maybe not impossible, but it likely makes it hard to be done.

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JuiceBox
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Post by JuiceBox »

JuiceBox wrote: Everyone who has posted in other topics since this thread has been made should be ashamed.

Welcome to OpenRa mate.
"I love the smell of JuiceBoxes in the morning"
LT. COL. Bill Kilgore
Apocalypse Now

SirCake
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Post by SirCake »

@AoA: I can't think of many multi-role units in the ra original. Mammoth maybe, destroyers, longbows, and rocket soldiers. Some units like tesla coil or flame thrower had secondary roles like anti-infantry, which they were not too good at.

Anyway, I think defined roles for units are very good because making a good army vs everything is then more difficult and gives the opportunity to "cut corners" which in turn makes you vulnerable to a counter-composition, which requires scouting.
This is also the reason why tanks dont have anti-infantry weapons like IRL, because this way they are more defined in their role.
---
Obviously I like my own design, the flak trap, because it fits into the sub pen, is a direct ww2 reference, has a super defined role, therefore introduces a lot of counter play and allowed to extend the other naval units roles without major balance concerns ("One unit counters everything! What should i do? :( ").

Check out Dune2k-Advanced on my moddb page!

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avalach21
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Post by avalach21 »

SirCake wrote: @AoA: I can't think of many multi-role units in the ra original. Mammoth maybe, destroyers, longbows, and rocket soldiers. Some units like tesla coil or flame thrower had secondary roles like anti-infantry, which they were not too good at.

Anyway, I think defined roles for units are very good because making a good army vs everything is then more difficult and gives the opportunity to "cut corners" which in turn makes you vulnerable to a counter-composition, which requires scouting.
This is also the reason why tanks dont have anti-infantry weapons like IRL, because this way they are more defined in their role.
---
Obviously I like my own design, the flak trap, because it fits into the sub pen, is a direct ww2 reference, has a super defined role, therefore introduces a lot of counter play and allowed to extend the other naval units roles without major balance concerns ("One unit counters everything! What should i do? :( ").
Can you link me to info about your Flak trap or repost it here? :-)

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netnazgul
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Post by netnazgul »


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AoAGeneral1
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Post by AoAGeneral1 »

SirCake wrote: @AoA: I can't think of many multi-role units in the ra original. Mammoth maybe, destroyers, longbows, and rocket soldiers. Some units like tesla coil or flame thrower had secondary roles like anti-infantry, which they were not too good at.

Anyway, I think defined roles for units are very good because making a good army vs everything is then more difficult and gives the opportunity to "cut corners" which in turn makes you vulnerable to a counter-composition, which requires scouting.
This is also the reason why tanks dont have anti-infantry weapons like IRL, because this way they are more defined in their role.
---
Obviously I like my own design, the flak trap, because it fits into the sub pen, is a direct ww2 reference, has a super defined role, therefore introduces a lot of counter play and allowed to extend the other naval units roles without major balance concerns ("One unit counters everything! What should i do? :( ").
Shockies, APCs, yaks, Migs, Hinds, chrono tanks, are some additional lists for multi role units. The roster is actually pretty good.

Tanks never really had an anti-infantry role because thats how its always been with the exception of crushing. Otherwise you mixed units together to make a counter.

Single role units is a bad idea because you then have major OP problems.

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avalach21
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Post by avalach21 »

Nice! the amphibious light tanks might be a little too adventurous for my taste but all the other ideas are interesting. The Flak sub is a little bulkier than I was envisioning. How does its speed compare to the other subs? Is it also able to hit nearby land targets on the shore?

SirCake
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Post by SirCake »

Why don't you host a game of MIX or UOE and find out?

Check out Dune2k-Advanced on my moddb page!

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avalach21
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Post by avalach21 »

SirCake wrote: Why don't you host a game of MIX or UOE and find out?
don't know how

SirCake
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Post by SirCake »

Um, download a map with the uoe or mix playtests applied to it (see links below "changes picture"), put into your documents>openra>maps>ra>release20171014 folder, go online, select empty server, change map to "mapname - UOE/MIX".

Check out Dune2k-Advanced on my moddb page!

zinc
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Post by zinc »

avalach21 wrote:
Nice! the amphibious light tanks might be a little too adventurous for my taste but all the other ideas are interesting. The Flak sub is a little bulkier than I was envisioning. How does its speed compare to the other subs? Is it also able to hit nearby land targets on the shore?
The description suggested it could hit land targets, but it didn't seem to work for that?

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FiveAces
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Post by FiveAces »

That's an interesting can of worms we're opening up here; I voted for "navy is balanced", but take it with a grain of salt.

First off, the destroyer vs. subs matchup is balanced, fun and rewarding due to the micro involved. There's outplay potential on both sides and I really like it no matter what faction I'm playing. Obviously, Destroyers are the Swiss army knife of the seas, but keep in mind they are not great vs. wood armor - this means that even if the Sovs lose the battle at sea, they can still rebuild sub pens and get at least one sub out to contest again. Granted, this gets a lot trickier with Hinds on the field. I was one of the first advocates for AA missile subs back then, and they _sort of_ do their job versus flocks of Hinds, but it's obviously not the be-all end-all solution to tack an AA role on to a high-tech unit that takes ages to produce.
Sea Scorpions are a pretty solid idea, I just don't know if the devs want to implement another unit that was not in the original RA since that kind of goes against their design philosophy (personally, I'd like to see them in).

One of the problems I have with navy right now is how underwhelming both the T3 siege vessels are. Neither are really worth their hefty pricetag; maybe a slight accuracy buff would be in order.


I've seen the AA Mig idea resurface earlier in this thread, and I'd like to reiterate how bad of an idea I think it is. Migs are the single most mobile unit in the game, and they have a deceptively high range - 6 cells is more than most non-artillery units! Any competent player will abuse this to no end and get free picks on air units left, right and center. Allies are already struggling with mobile AA, that's why the AA gun has to be so strong.

To sum it up, I think that naval battles are fairly balanced, but there's still lots of room for improvement.
#VoteForSeaScorpion2017

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