Anything being done to buff France?

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zinc
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Anything being done to buff France?

Post by zinc »

Here is my own idea which I'm pretty sure no one else will agree with-- gap generators to France only. That would make them truly distinct and powerful.

I also think England needs a buff as the cloaked transport is now too easily detected really. I used to think it was OP with the cloaking, then (I hope I'm correct in saying -- how I remember it) there were changes to make detection easier, and it's pretty rubbish now.

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avalach21
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Re: Anything being done to buff France?

Post by avalach21 »

zinc wrote: Here is my own idea which I'm pretty sure no one else will agree with-- gap generators to France only. That would make them truly distinct and powerful.

I also think England needs a buff as the cloaked transport is now too easily detected really. I used to think it was OP with the cloaking, then (I hope I'm correct in saying -- how I remember it) there were changes to make detection easier, and it's pretty rubbish now.
lol yea i disagree.. gap generators should be for everyone.. Why do people think France is so weak? Fake structures are extremely useful.. mobile gap generator is very useful.

Germany is great - obviously great with advanced chronoshift, chrono tanks are super cool too but honestly a bit gimmicky imo. I'm half decent with them but i'm sure theres some super pros that are godly with them.

What does the british spy even do.. is it just cheaper?? that's lame as hell..

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netnazgul
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Post by netnazgul »

Phase transport is quite powerful if only your opponent hasn't locked the whole map with teslas. Driving Tanya behind the lines totally undetected is much better than a 13-tank chrono by germans because its damage could be done quicker.

France was actually buffed recently (I think in first playtest) - fake structures have 30% of original building HP instead of 10%. Which actually makes them as good as walls.

And spies are useless you say? You're Jon Snow here then :P

zinc
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Post by zinc »

Not sure he was saying they were useless; it might be more that he thinks creating a special unit which is the same as the regular unit, only cheaper, is a bad game idea.

Personally I don't mind, but 300 or 350 price would be better imo for what is sometimes a game changing unit. Or maybe actually come up with an increased ability or two.

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avalach21
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Post by avalach21 »

zinc wrote: Not sure he was saying they were useless; it might be more that he thinks creating a special unit which is the same as the regular unit, only cheaper, is a bad game idea.

Personally I don't mind, but 300 or 350 price would be better imo for what is sometimes a game changing unit. Or maybe actually come up with an increased ability or two.
lol yea, i never said spies are useless, just lame that it's a normal unit but cheaper..

what if the british spy cost the same, if not a little more, but it was able to cloak? that would be cooler imo

zinc
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Post by zinc »

Interesting idea, although they can already be one of the most annoying parts of the game without cloaking thrown in!

zinc
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Post by zinc »

With France, you could also have cheaper gap gens, or more effective gap gens, like a little bit larger radius. I think that was actually the plan at one time.

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avalach21
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Post by avalach21 »

zinc wrote: Interesting idea, although they can already be one of the most annoying parts of the game without cloaking thrown in!
haha yea i agree.. what is the best way to deal with spies currently as an allied player? In team games, spies are ridiculous to handle without having a soviet teammate send dogs everywhere... is there any counter for an allied player other than meticulously watching every entrance to every base and manually killing them? there's usually quite a bit of other things to focus on other than patrolling every inch of your base for spies..

as for the cloaked spy.. maybe it can't disguise itself... only cloak.

another idea.. maybe buildings that reveal cloaked units should also disable a spies disguise?? (as well as my hypothetical cloaked british spy)

Also, what buildings exactly detect a cloaked unit? Someone here mentioned tesla coils.. to be honest im not exactly sure which allied buildings reveal cloaked units.

another thing, i think the player getting spied on should receiving a notification.. if they get cash stolen they get notified "credits stolen," but if other buildings get spied, you might not even have a clue... I think it should notify the player "building infiltrated" and also have the option to hit space bar and go to the building that was spied...

sorry if i'm taking things a bit off topic, but yea i agree spies are good.. almost a bit too good and maybe could use a bit of tweaking IMO

zinc wrote: With France, you could also have cheaper gap gens, or more effective gap gens, like a little bit larger radius. I think that was actually the plan at one time.

this isn't a horrible idea.. better than the "british spy" at least IMO, but i still personally don't like the idea of a slightly modified unit/structure/superweapon as a "racial bonus". Even advanced chronoshift is a little lame since its just a bigger radius but I can live with it.
Last edited by avalach21 on Tue Feb 13, 2018 2:24 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Mo
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Post by Mo »

avalach21 wrote:
zinc wrote: Interesting idea, although they can already be one of the most annoying parts of the game without cloaking thrown in!
haha yea i agree.. what is the best way to deal with spies currently as an allied player? In team games, spies are ridiculous to handle without having a soviet teammate send dogs everywhere... is there any counter for an allied player other than meticulously watching every entrance to every base and manually killing them? there's usually quite a bit of other things to focus on other than patrolling every inch of your base for spies..

as for the cloaked spy.. maybe it can't disguise itself... only cloak.

another idea.. maybe buildings that reveal cloaked units should also disable a spies disguise?? (as well as my hypothetical cloaked british spy)

Also, what buildings exactly detect a cloaked unit? Someone here mentioned tesla coils.. to be honest im not exactly sure which allied buildings reveal cloaked units.

another thing, i think the player getting spied on should receiving a notification.. if they get cash stolen they get notified "credits stolen," but if other buildings get spied, you might not even have a clue... I think it should notify the player "building infiltrated" and also have the option to hit space bar and go to the building that was spied...

sorry if i'm taking things a bit off topic, but yea i agree spies are good.. almost a bit too good and maybe could use a bit of tweaking IMO

zinc wrote: With France, you could also have cheaper gap gens, or more effective gap gens, like a little bit larger radius. I think that was actually the plan at one time.

this isn't a horrible idea.. better than the "british spy" at least IMO, but i still personally don't like the idea of a slightly modified unit/structure/superweapon as a "racial bonus". Even advanced chronoshift is a little lame since its just a bigger radius but I can live with it.
Counter to spies as allies is using defensive spies. A bit more expensive but that’s the asymmetry that is RA.

zinc
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Post by zinc »

I have suggested before that putting a spy in a pill box could give you auto-detection.

The problem used to be worse, as you could only force fire on them and they weren't targeted when you moved the mouse over them. Not too much of a problem for your own troops, but it was a nightmare trying to detect them if they were imitating your team mate's troops.

zinc
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Post by zinc »

A cloak-only spy might be a good experiment, but I would hope that getting too close to a pill box would expose them etc

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Smitty
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Post by Smitty »

The weakness of France and the spamability of the $250 spy is something I still want to change. Problem is we need an accepted strategy going into the next playtesting phase.

I still favor the two birds, one stone approach of replacing the British spy with the sniper drop, and swapping the phase transport and mobile gap generator between England and France.
So far the playtesting has shown promise, and I’m getting more positive responses than negative. The problem is, there’s still a bunch of apathy around this. I’d say the responses towards the sniper drop are 40% positive, 10% negative, and 50% ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.

If we go a different route, we’ll need some more viable counter-proposals than the ones out there. As always, I’m open to hearing new ideas. Most ideas aren’t rejected because they are bad, but because they aren’t feasible.
"Do not trust the balance tzars (Smitty, Orb). They are making the changes either for the wrong reasons, for no reason at all, or just because they can and it makes them feel good." - Alex Jones

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avalach21
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Post by avalach21 »

Mo wrote: Counter to spies as allies is using defensive spies. A bit more expensive but that’s the asymmetry that is RA.
Interesting... I didn't know that. Does it matter if your own spy is disguised or not?
zinc wrote: I have suggested before that putting a spy in a pill box could give you auto-detection.

The problem used to be worse, as you could only force fire on them and they weren't targeted when you moved the mouse over them. Not too much of a problem for your own troops, but it was a nightmare trying to detect them if they were imitating your team mate's troops.
i like this idea.. does putting a spy in a pillbox do anything now?
zinc wrote: A cloak-only spy might be a good experiment, but I would hope that getting too close to a pill box would expose them etc
yea i definitely agree.. can anyone point me to a list of what units/structures are able to expose cloaked units at this point? Is the phase transport the only cloaked unit in RA? Are Subs treated as "cloaked"?
Smitty wrote: The weakness of France and the spamability of the $250 spy is something I still want to change. Problem is we need an accepted strategy going into the next playtesting phase.

I still favor the two birds, one stone approach of replacing the British spy with the sniper drop, and swapping the phase transport and mobile gap generator between England and France.
So far the playtesting has shown promise, and I’m getting more positive responses than negative. The problem is, there’s still a bunch of apathy around this. I’d say the responses towards the sniper drop are 40% positive, 10% negative, and 50% ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.

If we go a different route, we’ll need some more viable counter-proposals than the ones out there. As always, I’m open to hearing new ideas. Most ideas aren’t rejected because they are bad, but because they aren’t feasible.
Overall I really like the idea of a british sniper.. i think it's pretty cool and a nice idea to borrow from RA2. From what I've read, the sniper actually used to be in OpenRA? before I started playing in ~2014 or so. There must have been a reason it was removed (probably OP if spammmed) but the air drop should keep a limit to them. Ideally I would like the sniper probably more than my hypothetical cloaked british spy, but really, one way or another, I think the british spy concept is super lame and hope it is improved upon.

Can you explain the logic of swapping the mobile gap generator and phase transport if the sniper drop is introduced? I don't disagree exactly but I'm also not entirely sure why it's necessary. I assume it's to balance out the bonuses.. is the mobile gap generator not seen as a useful unit by most people?

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Smitty
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Post by Smitty »

avalach21 wrote: Can you explain the logic of swapping the mobile gap generator and phase transport if the sniper drop is introduced? I don't disagree exactly but I'm also not entirely sure why it's necessary. I assume it's to balance out the bonuses.. is the mobile gap generator not seen as a useful unit by most people?
That's correct, the Phase transport is a more effective tool and comes with some utility as well. The main use is crushing enemy infantry in the open field. Sneaking a Tanya behind the lines or blocking a refinery are other common uses for the vehicle.

The MGG shouldn't be completely worthless on paper, but I often view it as a giant "blindly fire artillery here" sign. It doesn't cover enough space to hide your numbers in it, so a quick helicopter/yak scout should tell you if it's a feint or not.
"Do not trust the balance tzars (Smitty, Orb). They are making the changes either for the wrong reasons, for no reason at all, or just because they can and it makes them feel good." - Alex Jones

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WhoCares
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Post by WhoCares »

mgg should have the following behaviour to be worth it :

2 diffirent effects :

-Shroud generating with ability to toggle on/off
-LOS reduction for enemy unit as a permanenet effect independant of the shroud generation.

With that, it would become a good tools as you can use them as decoy while you sneaking your army by another side with an mgg set on "OFF".

When you would start a fight with your opponent's army, if your mgg has been unspotted and his shroud is off you can start the fight with a LOS advantage that can make a huge difference.

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