Thoughts from a player playing Red Alert for a couple of months

[Clockwork]

[17:20:56] <pchote> back to the earlier topic, i'm tempted to implement the proper chrono conyard return just to spite the attitude in that reply

Lol

[lawANDorder]

[17:20:56] <pchote> back to the earlier topic, i'm tempted to implement the proper chrono conyard return just to spite the attitude in that reply

Lol

Next time when you post insulting replies, leave me some time to answer before you delete it, Mr. OpenRA expert.

[Sleipnir]

I can quote lines from IRC too:

[19:37:57] <pchote> and I guess the bit that Happy missed was that "implementing the PR out of spite" is not "forcing this feature through out of maliciousness"
[19:38:09] <pchote> it simply gives something solid that more reasonable people can discuss

And also to stay on topic:

[19:07:56] <Smitty_> I'm fine with it.
[19:07:58] <SoScared> there are still ways of circumventing it but it'd deal with the perma-base issue for the most part
[19:10:54] <SoScared> it makes chrono MCV's more deliberate and requires planning or coordination

Most of the playerbase are reasonable people, who I'm sure are willing to adapt for changes that make OpenRA more enjoyable for others so long as they do not unduely hurt other aspects of the game. The chrono-mcv issue has been grumbled about for years, and i'm sure that many people will welcome a fix one way or another.

Two of my well known annoyances in this community are folk who assert that any opinions that they disagree with are invalid because the poster hasn't been blessed by a toxic subset of the community, and people who's idea of contributing is to insult, badmouth, or deliberately misrepresent the effort that we put into trying to make OpenRA good for everybody.

There are times like this where I will happily bump something that I don't consider important up to the top of my priority list for the satisfaction of knowing that, if nothing else (filing a PR does not guarantee that a feature will be merged), the last word on a topic wasn't someone's good-faith ideas being shut down by toxic behavior that doesn't reflect what I want this community to be.

[KOYK_GR]

From IRC

[14:06:17] <MicroBit> "respectable well known community member"
[14:06:25] <MicroBit> dfuck

Hey watch out, they might get mad at you! oh wait its ok if you do that since you agree with them.

[15:35:14]<FRenzy> Smitty_: no problem with criticism, but with the attitude and the verbal disrespect ^^

<pchote> back to the earlier topic, i'm tempted to implement the proper chrono conyard return just to spite the attitude in that reply

"if somebody makes a ridiculous suggestion, its impolite to ridicule it, even though it is so ridiculous that it should be called out"
"Let's exterminate a group of people. -> "Oh yeah, lets also chop our own heads off" -> THATS RIDICULOUS, WHAT HORRIBLE TONE, WE ARE JUST PUTTING IDEAS OUT THERE, HOW CAN YOU BE SO UNCIVIL

pchote it is funny how you can tolerate some other people. But put me on the death sentence, especially when you know that I am on your side protecting the welfare of the community. And just an example : https://github.com/OpenRA/OpenRA/issues/15104
But hey Ουδείς πιο αχάριστος του ευεργετηθέντος.

And you actually did implement that! haha nice! I have gone against your god like maintainer figure and I paid the price.
Ill love to see the comments in the next release. γελαει καλυτερα οποιος γελαει τελευταιος.

nobody represents the playerbase as a whole and your thoughts are as valuable as suggestions of those who consider themselves as the elite or more important because they play the game for a longer time

Nice way to twist my words and and make the boss happy! But hey let me explain what I meant

Lets forget the rest of the player base that is loyal and plays openra daily for ages

I play this game a long time and I support it by inviting people to play it when the opportunity comes. And because I play that long I am a loyal player, And I expect that the "maintainers" will not ruin the fun out of this game by changing it to something else, Its like a "mutual agreement" in most of those cases. this is a situation is like cnc4 if you are familiar with that game you will know that EA decided to remove the fundamental mechanics of the series to please the new gen of player. And of course lost all the "old" players. That was what I meant by that. But I know you are doing your job to aid your pack of hyenas.

I knew from the start what I did it will probably have an impact on my mod. Because pchote most certainly won't answer any of my mod related questions in the feature or help out, And I am pretty sure he would probably ban me from openra all together if he could. But unlike you hypocrites I don't fear to speak up.
And certainly I don't take sides just to gain the "good boy points"

Masks away In the end you all know what happen here. And this will be a reminder and a testament of that. Have fun playing cloak and dagger with each other.

[Clockwork]

[17:20:56] <pchote> back to the earlier topic, i'm tempted to implement the proper chrono conyard return just to spite the attitude in that reply

Lol

Next time when you post insulting replies, leave me some time to answer before you delete it, Mr. OpenRA expert.

I listened to Frenzy and removed the flame comment with a comment pointing out an indefensible comment. You can pm me of you want

[Sleipnir]

Because pchote most certainly won't answer any of my mod related questions in the feature or help out, And I am pretty sure he would probably ban me from openra all together if he could. But unlike you hypocrites I don't fear to speak up.

If you knew me at all then you would know this is untrue. I think the rest of the post speaks for itself, so leave it without comment.

[lawANDorder]

I listened to Frenzy and removed the flame comment with a comment pointing out an indefensible comment. You can pm me of you want

You'll have to enable PM. Go to User Control panel -> Board preferences -> Allow users to send you private messages

For my part, we're done.

[KOYK_GR]

What should this tell me about your character?

<pchote> back to the earlier topic, i'm tempted to implement the proper chrono conyard return just to spite the attitude in that reply

And by the way In order for some one to get to know you, you first need to invite his attention in to doing that, other wise there's no point in complaining about it. But if you are actually a good person as you claim to be and I misjudged you. Know that I welcome any one to be my friend as long as they are honest. And I say this not because you will ever be interested in being friend with me I say this because you said that you are not the person I think you are, I too am not the person you think I am ; )

I think the rest of the post speaks for itself, so leave it without comment.

it sure does. But I am the one who is going to sleep with his morality unscathed tonight.

[camundahl]

I think they are all good points.

[Sleipnir]

What should this tell me about your character?

It should tell you to stop cherry picking single lines out of larger discussions and presenting them without context in order to misrepresent somebody elses views. I have already clarified the context around that comment above, which is more than I feel it deserves. The IRC logs are provided in a spirit of transparency, but don't expect us to copy edit casual conversations in case somebody hostile tries to present it out of context in order to make us look or feel bad for developing OpenRA.

[Sleipnir]

I have deleted a series of comments from this thread that clearly violate the forum rules against flaming/abusing others, and derailing topics.

The original post triggering the discussion in these comments was based around the idea that OpenRA's gameplay should not be changed on a whim. This first point was on topic, but was presented in a way that triggered further comments insulting the character of other forum members and other off-topic discussion.

In the spirit of transparency, I admit a conflict of interest with deleting these comments (I was involved in the discussion), but the forum rules are clear and apply to me as well as others.

[avalach21]

Hello! I'm known as Que Boi de Rasa, aka "The Strategic Genius" and I'm a well respected member of this community.

This thread got really dramatic lol.. I will say that calling oneself “well respected” is opening yourself a bit to ridicule (let your respect speak for itself IMO) but yea, this is a discussion board so there is nothing wrong with someone bringing up things to discuss, no matter who they are.

Also right off the bat you say that you mainly play 3 v 3 and 4 v 4. I also enjoy team games but pretty much every RTS I have ever played has been primarily balanced around 1 v 1 matchups and usually 2 v 2 at most for team games. I think for example, even Blizzard’s official stance for WC3 and SC2 balance was definitely based primarily on 1 v 1, but tops out at teams 2 v 2 matchups at most. I am curious if pchote has a comment on OpenRA’s stance on this.



Allied AA-turrets

AA guns are powerful and may be better than SAM sites. Mammoth tanks are also very powerful and better than Medium tanks. We should expect each team to have strengths and weaknesses so saying that one side has something better than the other seems kind of pointless and expected. Then you also have to take into account power consumption and cost differences, as well as the fact that Soviets get early easy access to mobile AA to fill in any range gaps..

I will say that having an AA gun spawn underneath your airforce and gun them all down before you even have a remote chance to escape is one of the most annoying things in the game.. There’s no other structure I want so badly to behave like a War/Starcraft/Generals style building where you get some “construction” time to either take it out or escape its range… but that instantaneous building spawn mechanic is part of classic C&C. It’s part of the game and sometimes annoying shit happens..


Chronosphere

Advanced Chronoshift

I’m not sure I understand the problem here… and again you are referring to 3 v 3 and 4 v 4 team games. I think at some point you just have to accept that crazy shit is going to inevitably happen in team games as they get larger and larger.. Just think of something crazier and do it better/faster than them... that’s the joy of playing an RTS.

Chrono MCV

This is a huge discussion in itself and probably warrants its own thread IMO if changes to this are actually being considered. IMO, I think that the behavior of chronoshifting an MCV in RA1 and 2 should be a primary reference point and that an effort should be made to balance around that behavior. I am pretty sure you could chrono your MCV in each game and it would behave the same as it currently does in OpenRA but I’d love if someone with better memory than me can confirm or correct that.

Again, I don’t think that mentioning how something can be used effectively in some scenario is grounds for saying it needs to be nerfed. You would have to illustrate how it is being overused (~never a better alternative in all situations), too easy to accomplish, and/or too impossible to counter before suggesting the game needs to be altered. Superweapons are powerful but they take a considerable amount of tech, money and power investment as a trade off. When you have a high tech high player team game, it should be expected that multiple superweapons can & will be coordinated for maximum effectiveness. Don’t be surprised if you get hit by 2 nukes within seconds of each other, have someone chronoshift a 12 piece army + MCV on top of your base and then have that all Iron Curtained.. it’s part of the game.


Naval Gameplay

I’m a huge fan of naval gameplay (some people here suggest to just cut navy entirely  ) and people have discussed the coast camping issue before. I would like to say that many naval maps, you can move your base away from the shore to negate this issue entirely (especially if it’s a soviet player with subs) but this topic has been well discussed and you can seek out the previous discussions if you are curious.



Artillery

I don’t really see an issue in anything you said. You just find the role they take in 3 v 3 and 4 v 4 “boring.” I find them fun for the most part.. if only their targeting logic worked properly (I assume it’s broken because they do retarded shit all the time).

GPS

This conversation has also happened before. I don’t really have a strong opinion on this other than it used to expose the entire map & fog of war in the original game and there is nothing wrong with it being a useful tool for the Allies after the extensive tech/power/time investment.

Soviet Hind

I am a strong supporter of trying to figure out a way to move the Hind to the Soviets and introducing a replacement that functions identically as the hind (or close to it) under a different more appropriate unit. I really think having an apache with chaingun (TD style) and a longbow with missles with some kind of visual distinction between the two would be the best/easiest thing to do. I really found pchotes ideas on making the hind and yak fill more nuanced roles interesting as well. Also this gives soviets the opportunity to have the “transport helicopter” back, or at least the discussion of it (which seems to be brought up quite a bit)


Closing thoughts

I love RTS games and the original C&Cs are some of my favorites. OpenRA does a fantastic job of keeping the C&C spirit alive today and hopefully for many many more years to come. It is awesome how this is such an open platform and community, and it’s great we can discuss changes to the game directly with both the developer(s) as well as the community at large who have supported this project passionately for many years. My only suggestion would be that many if not most of these topics have already been discussed before and many still have active threads discussing them. I would think it’s more appropriate to join in those discussions to share your thoughts, or start new specific discussions if necessary, rather than making a gigantic megapost of suggested changes from the “well respected ‘strategic genius.’” :-p anyways I think I saw some of your videos on the OpenRA reddit page and they were pretty funny lol

[SirCake]

From a combined gameplay, “realism” and close to the original point of view I think
allow to chrono mcv + deploy but the teleport back as undeployed seems best of QbdR’s proposals.
chrono mcv tilts big maps into allies favour to the point of frustration atm.

[Graion Dilach]

In RA2, the Chrono—MCV tactic was counterbalanced by the terrain — most maps don't have enough place to transport and able to deploy an MCV properly or if yes, the defending player might have spread the defenses good enough to prevent the attacker keeping it alive.

It is still a sneaky tactic, but it's a lot harder to pull it out there.

[eskimo]

I've found myself some time to reply to this thread now. I saw yourself in a lobby twice, so it's nice to recognise names and even better to hear you're enjoying the game. I wish more people would come forward and give their opinions as i think the only ones coming forward are the ones with concerns about balance, yet balance to me and many other does seem relatively fine (without a major overhaul).

Here are some of the things I think are balance related issues. I am mainly a 3v3 and 4v4 player, which probably might give a different perspective on some things.

Try some 1vs1s if you want to see the other side, they will change your perspective on some units. I think the team games currently are mostly won by which team can co-ordinate a little, because mostly there is so little team play in these games (i play them a lot atm), and i can often hold up 2 players solo because they simply just cannot co-ordinate well. Also the chosen maps are very much based upon chokes, and therefore a-bomb efficiency. This is why some things will feel stronger than compared to 1vs1 or 2vs2 games on maps such as doublestep.

Allied AA-turrets
Of course you can still stay out of the range. But this leads to very stale games, where a cautious player would never attack near the allied enemies bases with aircraft, it is simply too risky. This also makes base pushes more problematic in team games. Because you cannot use aircraft to snipe of enemy artillery when an AA-turret is near.

That's not entirely true but i get your point. Stagnant team games tend to come from chokey maps and players who prefer to tech play and/or high eco maps with large distances in between. The AA gun just allows allies to nullify air attacks with little effort. It's been argued before that the main cause of stale games is generally all of the allies ingredients combined. Long range artillery, static jammers, weak tanks, high map awareness, etc. Whereas soviets are brute force and require a little more micro. This all kind of changes from map to map, and 1vs1 to 4vs4 etc.

As with all games, if they reach T3 tech, abombs, IC, or chrono is simply the easiest way to push through the turtle/camped base. Yaks do still snipe off artillery with ease, even if you're trading at 1 yak to 2 artillery you're doing well as it buys you time in order to get the IC, whereas the Allies have to wait a long time to get their GPS up. In 1vs1 games sniping a few artillery is generally all you need to do to get a little attack profitable.

Regarding your Mig suicide, was their abomb up first? If it wasn't and they were allies, it doesn't matter. And as Sovs you can just IC yours anyway, giving you a free nuke advantage essentially. One could argue that the IC is therefore OP because allies cannot do that. Which relates to the ADV Chrono also, you can defend with your IC still, wall up your abomb and a few tesla take care of 13 arties anyway, if they can even squeeze that many in your base. France do have the advantage of building fakes. Anyway back to Migs, no 1vs1 player will ever ever send in Migs to an allies base for the reason you state. 8 Migs sounds like overkill also, personally i'd just go with a paradrop + 5 yaks. Or as a team you can co-ordinate these kind of things.

Taking the above, this leads me on to the point of without team play you're gonna lose. And because of that, taking team games as examples currently for balance purposes has holes in its arguments because as soon as people start really working together (not spamming beacon i mean), we'll start really seeing strong play.

However i agree the AA gun is a bit meh, but imho, without a serious overhaul it feels quite meaningless to change it up, because on the other side of that AA gun you've got the strength of the IC.

Advanced Chrono shift on naval maps

I think Advanced Chronoshift is a bit too strong on some naval maps (like Bombardment islands).

Agreed, but it's a fun feature. In 1vs1s i can't recall a game that was decided upon a ADV chrono swinging the game. Typically it's the GPS or IC that wins it. A buff to other factions is my opinion of fixing this. And that helps France stop becoming a meme. We've also seen a massive reduction in people playing as England due to the Phase Transport indirect nerf.

Chrono MCV
I know this is a widely debated problem. First of all I don't think it makes any sense. You cannot chrono demo trucks, they will explode immediately (probably killing your own or your team mates units when you attempt it for the first time).

Personally i've not heard it discussed before, but i've only been around about 1.5yrs.

Agreed a bit annoying, but i do it too. Realistically if people are going to play chokey maps with high eco, how else would they prefer to break enemy lines? I believe altering the MCV chrono is going to cause even longer drawn out games. If it isn't supported correctly it always fails anyway. Just like the regular basepush in 1vs1s. And also overly committing to it can be waste of resources and time anyway.

You can chrono M.A.D tanks btw, paired with an IC which is hilarious. Not good bang for the buck, but who cares in a non competitive game. And the M.A.D tank requires attention anyway, the range is shorter than the original. And could easily be buffed by making it 1 tank per player (like Tanya), give it a bigger range and same current damage so it's used a support weapon.

Naval gameplay

I think that there is a problem with naval warfare. Usually the player who gets naval units first will easily be able to camp the enemies water, and kill any naval structures as they are built. I don't know how to solve this. But I think that it makes naval gameplay a lot less dynamic and more boring.

Naval needs attention and everyone knows it. But it seems Allies keep on getting attention to change them from what i can tell.

Artillery

Indeed, but your suggestion as with others makes allies a soviet mirror. Nerfing/buffing them to any level either makes them OP or allies weak.

GPS

I suggest that the GPS work differently. In its current state it is very strong, as it will allow you to pick of enemy artillery without having vision of them. It also allows you to see where enemies are planning to attack. All in all GPS is very strong, usually to the point that a team without Allied players in 3v3 or 4v4 will be at a big disadvantage late-game, because the enemy will always have a "greater picture" about what is happening on the battle field when GPS is online.

I propose changing the GPS so it works like a spy plane, but on the whole map at regular intervals. So when activated, the GPS will reveal the entire map for like 30 seconds. Then the player needs to wait a couple of minutes until they can use it again.

Hate to say it, but if you can't see an IC coming you're doomed. Sure you can hear it, but RA doesn't have surround sound :p
If the GPS works like a spy plane it gives Soviets the increasing advantage. Spy Plane is T2, GPS requires 200 power + radar + defence.

The Soviet Hind thing
One thing that would be nice though would be to implement cargo planes, which are the Soviet equivalent to Chinooks, which can transport units by air. They need to get loaded on the airports, and will drop off units with parachutes mid air. This would solve the balance problems where on some maps, there are areas which are not accessible by Soviet players.

See some maps called "UOE". Sircake made this available to Soviets and are the best mod maps i've played for RA. Balance is iffy but it's mega fun.




I would like to ask if you feel there's anything wrong with Soviets? As the devs stated they want the game to be fun for all so it's good to see a team player's input on this. But imo removing key features of the fun isn't doing it any favours. And doing huge overhauls is a gamble. Hopefully we'll continue to meet on the battlefield.