[RA] Experimental v2.2

[Doomsday]

I'm liking pretty much all changes.

Seems like these changes are mostly about fixing the following balance issues.
1) Soviets being generally weaker than allied
2) Base pushing is too strong
3) High tech units are not utilized

I don't really know what to think of flame tower projectile speed change. Flamethrower is quite slow projectile speed in real life. I don't think it's necessary change but as a soviet fanboy, I'll take it.

Sam site price reduction seems reasonable. Allied AA turret is much stronger and 7% price reduction should not break anything.

Wall change is definately a good change. It is really frustrating to play against someone who builds tons of walls to slow down a push. Walls can be gamebreaking and it's still weird how rarely they are utilized.

Allied tech center HP change seems reasonable. Paradrop being able to single handedlly destroy a tech center is too easy.

Barracks HP nerf seems like a good idea in order to nerf base pushing. HP / cost ratio was insanely high.

I don't have anything to comment on Helipad and Airfield price increase. What is the reasoning behind it?

Light tank change seems cool. Today someone actually complained about their fast rate of fire being annoying to listen to. Allied lack viable early game eco harass options and it's cool to give them an option for doing so.

MCV production change and speed feel like good nerfs to basepushing and it doesn't make sense how people almost use their MCV for scouting. These changes should incentivise players to scout where they are expanding and that should be good.

I'm in favour for high tech unit cost reduction. All those units tend to be support type of units most the time. None of them feel gamebreaking on their own. I assume it is no accident that tesla trooper build time was not changed.

Yak and Mig vision change seem good. It's common to lose a Yak even if you are paying attention because of planes' move pattern. Allied helicopters are much easier for vision because of their easier maneuverability.

Paradrop, parabomb and spy plane timer reductions feel alright. Allied GPS is still much stronger ability than all soviet support powers combined. I think this type of game features are cool because they make the two factions assymetrical. In terms of their support powers, soviets have advantage in midgame because their powers become online earlier and allied have advantage in ultra lategame with GPS.

All in all all these changes are quite small and I don't see anything being gamebreaking. I generally prefer small changes instead of major fundamental changes. For this reason I'm more in favour of Experimental V2.1 balance or Omnom's MCVedit instead of more game-changing TABedit.

[Blackened]

Slower MCV was interesting and I quite liked it but I think the speed used was a bit too slow. I think if it was the Heavy tank speed it would be about perfect.

[SoScared]

Vod of the streamed event: https://www.twitch.tv/soscared/v/115198460

@Blackened: Yeah it's funny I felt exactly the same way about the MCV. Probably has something to do with fast being fun and slow is not. Despite good results its useless if you don't enjoy it.

@Doomsday/Smitty: Helipad/Airfield price increase was added to slow down the immediate spam of 3-4-5 air structures, if only just a little. Just like Barracks you can yank up the production super fast and it's always been in the corner of my mind the past few years. As of the previous release and experimental high tier aircraft are stronger, quicker to build and all aircraft reloads much faster with the auto-queue rearmament (plus MiG/Yak vision increase). The +100$ price increase was added simply to ease the transition although there's no definite problem given that the aircraft strength and structure cost hasn't been exposed separately. Might be a mistake but we'll see.

Likely we'll run the next (and last) experimental with a MCV speed of 71 (Heavy Tank speed) and strip the helipad/airfield price increase.

[Smitty]

The main reason I was against the price increase is because when you go for a sizable air force build, you need several airfields/helipads to keep the things armed and useful.
While powerful, a pack of air units is also a huge investment, and any miss-micro will make the Combat Losses counter rise in a hurry.

I was hoping for more of a point by point breakdown from other competitive players on where they stand on the changes, like I did earlier in the thread. Personally I tend to be very conservative on changes, and I don’t want to see a bunch of changes without thorough vetting.
Changes should be made because they are right for the state of play, not because they make sense in theory and not that many people opposed them.

Currently the only changes I am 100% sold on are:
$2500 and 40 sec MCV - One of Omnom’s changes that has a noticeable impact on the power of base-crawling.
$1600 War Factory - Another of Omnom’s changes. This one mainly effects the early game as it allows for earlier scouting and pressure builds.
Paradrop with vetted infantry - One of SoScared’s changes. Doesn’t do that much on paper but makes the drop more powerful vs players who don’t respond in time.

[SoScared]

I think it's important to note, new changes presented in the experimental builds are layered on to the playtest balance changes started from around March/April of 2016, mostly grounded in Frame Limiter's and my own playtest maps. With a healthy number of downloads/played games and being reviewed by experienced players throughout April-September I was barely able to jam in a few in before release 1019.

see: https://github.com/OpenRA/OpenRA/issues/11995 and https://github.com/OpenRA/OpenRA/pull/12040

As mentioned above I'll be making a ton of playtest maps after exp v2.2 for easy access and proper reviewing (as with Playtest Maps v1 through v4) and is practically my endgame of almost a year old process of balance playtesting involving quite a few players of the highest caliber. If this last phase delivers with at least the same success as the previous batches of playtest maps before release 1019, I suspect it will carry some serious weight in the coming months.

[Smitty]

I do feel there’s a divide concerning play-testing between European and American players just based on the available time we can play together.

Omnom, myself, Barf, Medium Tank and German night owls Lorrydriver and km compose the core group of players I get to have competitive games with. We’ve spent a good deal of time on Omnom’s playtests as of late, not because those are the changes we agree with but because that’s where the games are.

I hope to see sort of a melding of the minds on these playtests soon, taking the results of both and seeing how well they work together.

[SoScared]

Eh I don't think there's much of a divide really. Afaik OMnom is the only one who's provided some serious test maps the past month. Try getting some Euro players more intrigued and willing to host the playtest maps but in that case you might need to settle on some set of values for a longer period of time. Up until now OMnom's playtest progress has gone forward extremely fast, like seriously lightning-speed fast! In all likelihood this have prevented others from gaining valuable insight into the changes as once they've gotten to know them properly they're already several versions behind the focus of the balance thread. The map versions has literally been uploaded on almost a daily basis!

http://resource.openra.net/maps/uploader/1201/

Compare that to FL's or mine back in 2016 where a batch of maps were available for about a month at a time, sometimes more, where balance changes where tried out with thousands of games and information between the playtest maps, reviews and balance discussions were in constant flux, influencing the next batch of playtest maps.

My best suggestion is to agree on a set of values you think are best and would have a reasonable chance getting through to the community and then stick with it. The players will come.

[SoScared]

Alrighty then, the latest and final build is up. Updated OP.

The harvester thing is something I intended to put in way earlier but simply forgot. Mainly it's to prevent harvesters wandering across sources of ore on certain maps where the sources are relatively close to each other, giving the player more control over harvester behavior. Otherwise little impact (doesn't conflict with A.I. - A.I. hereof using an exclusive set of codes). Also added was refinery ore scan, lowered to 20 from 30 (harvester looking for ore from the refinery position). This was added by mistake but I won't correct it for exp v2.2 since it's pretty much inconsequential for showcasing.

[jaZz_KCS]

Tomorrow (Mo, 23rd January) will yet be another day when the Experimental Branch by SoScared will have a chance to make a stand, it's vast changes already hitting the competitive scene like a bedrock thrown at your child's bedroom window!

Don't forget to bring a towel

And don't forget to tune in on Mumble if you want to participate mano-a-mano.

Mumble server address: 64h.mine.nu
Mumble server port: standard (64738) (can be omitted)

--OR (if you already have it installed, try out one of these "mumble-links" below)--

[url]mumble://mumble.openra.net[/url]
[url]mumble://64h.mine.nu[/url]
[url]mumble://openra.endoftheinternet.org[/url]

Note: You should join the channel "lobby" at first connect. Feel free to change to channel "OpenRA". The stream VoIP session is held in a locked channel (to prevent possible flooding/interruptions.) After joining you will be relocated to the channel where the party is happening (or at least you can ask to be relocated, if your arrival has not been noted)

Stream starts Monday at 19:00/7:00pm UTC!

[SoScared]

:8|

Jazz you need to start narrating movie trailers.