RA Current Balance Discussion

[klaas]

I don't think the grenadier is underpowered, the explosion it makes upon death makes it just unusable in squads. Maybe the explosion of a grenadier could be decreased to the force of a single grenade exploding? Currently grenadiers are only used in the first 5 mins of the game, which is a pity because they are fun to see, lobbing their little grenades and stuff.

[noobmapmaker]

If you add them in the mix late game they'll blow up your own masses

Allready said it, may have been changed but I think not: the minelayer should not be audible for opponents imo. It takes away the surprise.

[anjew]

im not saying its underpowered, im just saying it shouldnt take 33 seconds of constant attacking on a pillbox, it has the same problem with all defence structures though
10 rifleman take 30 seconds and cost less
flame throwers take 2 seconds

[Murto the Ray]

Flamethrowers dont rip through pillboxes like they do other buildings

[anjew]

Have you tested with any of this?
The 5 flamethrowers destroy a pillbox 10 times faster than 10 grenadiers.
Im not saying flamethrowers are the problem, im saying there is a problem with grenadiers and ALL defense structures. It's because all defence structures use heavy armour and the grenadier only does 5 damage per throw. This is understandable against a tank however pillboxs have 400 HP meaning it takes 80 grenades to take out the pillbox. It also takes 80 grenades to take out a SAM site. Try it out yourself

ps. grenadiers kill walls with their full damage
This is most likely a bug so I made a github ticket

[klaas]

Yeah, it does not make sense that grenades do that little damage to heavy targets. So I agree with Anjew here, upping their damage to heavy targets 10x would be OK. This would mean they are only half as good as flamethrowers vs. heavy armor, not even taking into account their explosion problem.

[jaZz_KCS]

Yeah, it does not make sense that grenades do that little damage to heavy targets. So I agree with Anjew here, upping their damage to heavy targets 10x would be OK. This would mean they are only half as good as flamethrowers vs. heavy armor, not even taking into account their explosion problem.

This reminds me of how baffled I was when first witnessing the difference of dmg of grenadiers vs buildings in OpenRA compared to vanilla TD.

Remember GDI mission 2 where you would have to knowck out the SAM sites before Airstrike would unlock and you would defeat the little Nod base.

In the original it was enough to have 5-7 grnadiers in your inf. blob to easily dispatch of those SAM sites (albeit it takes a while to take them out due to their armor).

In ORA, even if you have 20+grenadiers in your blob, the enemy is almost able to compensate for the damage just by repairing the building since the dmg by the grenadiers against buildings was very very low and the damage of the riflemen close to nonexistant.. With 20+ grenadiers it took me almost 3 minutes to destroy one SAM site since the repairing of the CPU almost balanced out the dmg. It was hilarious. That was a while back though... Still funny memory.

[guest]

I agree that the mammoths are a little underpowered, they should have a 10% increase in speed like so scared was saying and also the missiles should kill multiple infantry, but concerning them running over concrete walls, I don't think that should be implemented, those walls are a little tougher than you might think.. the mammoth even with the increased speed wouldn't have enough velocity to smash right through the wall. Migs having air to air capabilities would be really good but obviously you should do it with all the other air units as well like so scared said, you'd have to have more variables and coding in general but it wouldn't be that hard and you guys don't have a deadline like the major companies so don't throw something out just cause it would seem like too much work... Anyways the main reason I posted here is to give you feedback bout the AI, you have them put down the most available defense structure down right away but this is flawed.. as long as they have the proper units for any situation at the very start, they don't need this. I'll give you the example I ran into since it was one of the extremes lol so I have my custom AI fight against rush AI's, now the most important unit in my AI's strategy is the V2RL, so they build the dome which is fine cause it' one of the more important structures but then they build the sam site lol which we all know rush AI uses no air units, but then to balance it out they build the spen which is great and all unless you run out of money for proper defenses against the enemy lol they just walk right into his base and destroy him lol

[IronScion]

I managed to get the spy into a sub pen in a 1v1 and aquired the sonar pulse but I'm a bit confused about it: you can see the subs but you can't actually attack them. The curser becomes a 'no' sign when you put it over the subs, and units in range don't react at all.

Do people think the subs should be attackable when the sonar pulse is activated?

[AoAGeneral1]

@Noobmapmaker:

As far as blowing up their own masses with grenades go you can actually avoid this by microing the infantry. If used correctly you can also lead target by force firing on the ground making the infantry run right into it. Easily said then done of course but it was a trick I always did in C&C95.

@JaZz_KCS:

The grenadiers have had some major buffs in the past as far as ORA goes. I do remember sometime ago when they could barely kill structures. (Due to their grenade speed being slown down). But these guys are still very effective.

About six releases I lost my MCV to a rush a player had done and was only able to build infantry. Imagine his surprise when I stormed his base with an army of grenadiers able to blow up his GTs with ease along with his army of minigunners. The ol' lob and kite trick can do a lot of things.

[IronScion]

I agree with upping the grenadiers damage against base defenses. I would like to see them more useful overall, without losing their explosion-on-death, which is a cool feature.

[newwe]

I agree that the mammoths are a little underpowered, they should have a 10% increase in speed like so scared was saying and also the missiles should kill multiple infantry, but concerning them running over concrete walls, I don't think that should be implemented, those walls are a little tougher than you might think.. the mammoth even with the increased speed wouldn't have enough velocity to smash right through the wall. Migs having air to air capabilities would be really good but obviously you should do it with all the other air units as well like so scared said, you'd have to have more variables and coding in general but it wouldn't be that hard and you guys don't have a deadline like the major companies so don't throw something out just cause it would seem like too much work... Anyways the main reason I posted here is to give you feedback bout the AI, you have them put down the most available defense structure down right away but this is flawed.. as long as they have the proper units for any situation at the very start, they don't need this. I'll give you the example I ran into since it was one of the extremes lol so I have my custom AI fight against rush AI's, now the most important unit in my AI's strategy is the V2RL, so they build the dome which is fine cause it' one of the more important structures but then they build the sam site lol which we all know rush AI uses no air units, but then to balance it out they build the spen which is great and all unless you run out of money for proper defenses against the enemy lol they just walk right into his base and destroy him lol

Thanks for the feedback, I'd recommend paragraphs and periods though if possible. The devs know that the AI is extremely flawed, unfortunately no one wants to/can work on it.

I managed to get the spy into a sub pen in a 1v1 and aquired the sonar pulse but I'm a bit confused about it: you can see the subs but you can't actually attack them. The curser becomes a 'no' sign when you put it over the subs, and units in range don't react at all.

Do people think the subs should be attackable when the sonar pulse is activated?

Probably. Does force firing also do nothing?

[guest]

well I hope you all don't think like this fool -_- little things like that take the freedom right out from the user and as far as I knew, this was supposed to be an OpenSource.. Is this gonna become another failure like all the others? If you just cut corners what was the sense of trying to bring back what Westwood was trying to accomplish?.. They weren't only trying to make a game, it was supposed to be an actual simulation of real war that takes actual intelligence to play, I just hope you wont be another EA...

[anjew]

If you want to code the AI go ahead but until that day things need to be prioritized

[IronScion]

Does force firing also do nothing?

I'm pretty sure the 'no' sign cursor doesn't allow you to force fire.