Call of War 1.5: Mechanics & New Balancing

_Pontus_ wrote:

Ibeses wrote:

4 hours of playing and it is already the end of Call of War?

Well into day 4 of the event map 1.5...

Yes, indeed; I can positively confirm, this 1.5 is the final end of CoW.

With the start of the BAD CHANGES and now this completely new game in the old jacket (new wine in an old bottle....someone said something about that)

The realism is gone.

The varied game play is gone.

The diplomacy is gone.

On top of all that it:

- the game has become very, very easy. No more knowledge to be discovered, no more skill required;

- the game has become very, very boring. In 4 days I did less military actions than on the 1st day in CoW;

- the research activity is just a plain silly thing now; and I did less than in 1 day in CoW;

- the economic development is a one way street now and offers not a single challenge or choice;

- the development of unit stats is cut loose from anything that resembles anything natural or real.

Enhancing realism?: you failed profoundly!

Enhancing game experience?: you failed even more profoundly!

Now, again I reiterate that I fully understand that innovation is necessary and that companies need to innovate to keep making money. This is even an obligation for a company, as it will not survive if it it doesn't.

However, did anyone ever hear of a company throwing out the door their main product, and replacing it with a completely new product, without any proof that the new product will be at all an acceptable alternative to the client base?

In short: that a company throws out its clients and trusts that they will be back for the completely different product?

Rhetorical question, but let me answer it for the-apparently-not-so-well-informed-Bytro team: NO!!

This is a new game in an old jacket.

This new game is simply far less interesting then the old game.

And you already have Supremacy 1. Really, if I am going to play this type of game, I will play S1.

So... Why destroy CoW??

Citizenkane wrote:

It's called "New Coke" look it up.

"It remains influential as a cautionary tale against tampering with a well-established and successful brand."

I would like to provide a cautionary tale about how one of the biggest brand companies in US history almost ruined their company. And they still had an enormous market share when they undertook this ill conceived endeavor.

New Coke was the unofficial name for the reformulation of Coca-Cola introduced in April 1985 by the Coca-Cola Company. In 1992, it was renamed Coke II.

By 1985, Coca-Cola had been losing market share to diet soft drinks and non-cola beverages for many years. Blind taste tests indicated that consumers seemed to prefer the sweeter taste of rival Pepsi-Cola, and so the Coca-Cola recipe was reformulated. However, the American public's reaction to the change was negative, and "New Coke" was considered a major failure. The company reintroduced Coke's original formula within three months, rebranded "Coca-Cola Classic", resulting in a significant sales boost. This led to speculation New Coke formula had been a marketing ploy to stimulate sales of original Coca-Cola, which the company has denied.

Coke II was discontinued in July 2002. It remains influential as a cautionary tale against tampering with a well-established and successful brand. In May 2019, it was announced that the 1985 formulation (bearing the name "New Coke") would be reintroduced to promote the third season of the Netflix series Stranger Things which takes place in 1985.

please add weather system in COW 1.5.

I have no problem if the air units is OP but if we have weather system (air units cannot be deployed due to bad weather, ineffiecient tanks due to autumn rains, inefficient infantry units due to cold winter), maybe, just maybe, the game will improve much and the weather system will provide more variables for balancing...

MikiRaine wrote:

please add weather system in COW 1.5.

I have no problem if the air units is OP but if we have weather system (air units cannot be deployed due to bad weather, ineffiecient tanks due to autumn rains, inefficient infantry units due to cold winter), maybe, just maybe, the game will improve much and the weather system will provide more variables for balancing...

For example: Thunder storm/rain/ snow causing inaccuracy and decrease in movement, fog causing decrease in visibility, etc...

Rather the X factor, the game admin always told me especially when my units is powerful than the enemy and still get beaten.

Also, I think now the secret sector in tech tree is kind of "dry/dull" without the nuclear ships. I have thought of a few units that it is useful and specialize in WW II.

1) Land mine infantry.- For setting/ disarm land mine. They may carrier one at a time and reload when it is back to the station. Once a unit gets hit, they will stop for a certain amount of time before they can move again.

2) Katysha Rocket Launcher- it can be against tanks, ship and air.

3) Radio Tower- it can scan all units especially hidden one within a 2-4 provinces in radius. With add air defense within that city.

Citizenkane wrote:

I would like to provide a cautionary tale about how one of the biggest brand companies in US history almost ruined their company. And they still had an enormous market share when they undertook this ill conceived endeavor.

New Coke was the unofficial name for the reformulation of Coca-Cola introduced in April 1985 by the Coca-Cola Company. In 1992, it was renamed Coke II.

By 1985, Coca-Cola had been losing market share to diet soft drinks and non-cola beverages for many years. Blind taste tests indicated that consumers seemed to prefer the sweeter taste of rival Pepsi-Cola, and so the Coca-Cola recipe was reformulated. However, the American public's reaction to the change was negative, and "New Coke" was considered a major failure. The company reintroduced Coke's original formula within three months, rebranded "Coca-Cola Classic", resulting in a significant sales boost. This led to speculation New Coke formula had been a marketing ploy to stimulate sales of original Coca-Cola, which the company has denied.

Coke II was discontinued in July 2002. It remains influential as a cautionary tale against tampering with a well-established and successful brand. In May 2019, it was announced that the 1985 formulation (bearing the name "New Coke") would be reintroduced to promote the third season of the Netflix series Stranger Things which takes place in 1985.

I am pretty new in CoW, i have only play the current version and the 1.5. So i don't know how good the old version is.

Say it out here what is good and how should they implement it, and let the Dev and players justify it. The Dev will decide on his own.

@ Coolgame 2019, OK Mr new player. First i think learning from others mistakes is always important in life. "Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it". Also here is a top 10 list that will be completely ignored.

1) Remove tank factory, Naval factory, air factory and secret factory.

2) Allow any province with proper industry to build any unit a player desires.

3) Remove man power from research.

4) Have all units upgrade when research for that unit complete.

5) Do not have all units require all the same resources to build said unit.

6) Do not have all buildings require the same building resources.

7) Return nuclear plant to buildings.

return nuclear research to research tree.

9) Have player's allowed to trade units.

10) Allow diplomatic relation settings for players outside your coalition.

Citizenkane wrote:

@ Coolgame 2019, OK Mr new player. First i think learning from others mistakes is always important in life. "Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it". Also here is a top 10 list that will be completely ignored.

1) Remove tank factory, Naval factory, air factory and secret factory.

2) Allow any province with proper industry to build any unit a player desires.

3) Remove man power from research.

4) Have all units upgrade when research for that unit complete.

5) Do not have all units require all the same resources to build said unit.

6) Do not have all buildings require the same building resources.

7) Return nuclear plant to buildings.

return nuclear research to research tree.

9) Have player's allowed to trade units.

10) Allow diplomatic relation settings for players outside your coalition.

Torpedo28000 wrote:

To continue my thread about early gameplay:

So it is day 5 for my game now as Romania, I have the most provincesin the game (56) and had the strongest army day 4. I launched an attack into aplayer about 30 mins before the end of day 3 and so far have taken him out andalmost another player too. Casualties are the following:

Ukraine - 34,650

Greater Romania - 589

And

(thisplayer had previously taken a beating by another)

Greater Romania - 134

Communist Russia - 2,812

This tome signifies that I probably could have attacked early on day 3 as my armyclearly was strong enough. Ukraine built many lvl 1 units whereas I only builtlvl 2 ones. This game me a HUGE advantage (as you can clearly see). I waiteduntil lvl 2 troops so began to build my army after about 11-12 hours after day2 so it took about 1.5 days to build up my army to quite a decent point (I had10 arty, 6-7 LTs and 2 ATs). After crushing a player who utilised lvl 1 troopsit is clear to me my decision to skip building any troops day 1 was a good one.However, I do not believe this was intended given the super fast productiontime of lvl 1 troops. For this reason I believe it strengthens my previousargument of having lvl 2 troops unlock on day 3,4 or 6. Given it took me about1.5 days to build up a relatively strong army I would say lvl 2 on day 3 couldwork. I do believe the progression from lvl 1-2-3 etc is too much and perhaps a50% increase instead of 100% would be better and more realistic/better forbalance.

Thiswould have enabled me to begin my attack probably day 3 (I will assume 2 daysto build up as I would not have had as many rss stockpiled from day 1) I dohowever believe additional starting rss, esp cash (needs WAY more, perhaps goto 200k) and an additional 10k goods, 5k food and 5k oil and metal would benice to try in the next patch as I think building up the economy day 1 is alsoimportant. I have spoken to another in my game and we both agree the start istoo slow and quite boring (given I had to wait about 4 days to do anything) Myproposed research times along with rss amounts would aim for the possibility ofa day 2-3 attack being possible (if you want to build up more that is yourchoice, but atm it is not really a possibility)

I reallylike the faster lvl 2 troop times but having to wait 1.5 days for it was notvery exciting, given you wanted to make the early game more exciting, thecurrent times have kind of done the opposite as lvl 1 troops are just not worthgetting when lvl 2 come only 1 day later and are about 2x as strong.

So fararty has been VERY strong and successful, my LTs have done very well but enemydid not build any AT. I will begin building planes on day 6 to begin testingthem. I have so far however noticed that during my attack I did not have enoughrss to build any ab to send my int to scout. As such I think the rss for ab isa little too high. Also the 30 minute refuelling time I believe is too high.(Yes lvl 2 makes it less, (right? It actually doesn’t say so) but having to payfor lvl 2 abs all the time along with the increased plane cost really makesthem harder to use) That is all I will say regarding planes for now as I havenot tested them enough.

Manpower has been a HUGE issue. I now have the most provinces and it is still my largestbottleneck and really think either manpower costs should be lowered, or our manpower production should be higher. I understand the reasons for making everything cost it, but right now it is too much of a bottle neck. I am alsostruggling for goods (I have a lvl 3 IC in my double and lvl 1 IC in single good province) But as I am building arty this does make sense. (Although I dothink goods production should be boosted a bit) as I am not a coder I don’tknow how difficult it would be, but would an overall 5-10% production increase of goods in all provinces be possible? I would think starting with a relativelysmall number to see if it has an effect helps with that. Rares are going to bea HUGE issue for planes as despite not really using them for troops I only have3k of them atm. I think either a decrease in rare cost for planes or increasein production will be required but I will investigate this further when I getfurther into plane use.

Overall,I like the concept of the faster production times, but with the current systemit actually slowed down the early game instead of sped it up. I hope if youimplement my changes or something similar, I believe it will at least speed itup and make it more enjoyable, whether it is enough/too much is yet to bedetermined. In its current form it is a slower and IMO worse system thancurrent, but with the changes to speed I believe it would become a superior oneto the one we have. So currently good signs but definitely needs tweaking.

Normally at this point I would have taken out 2-3 nations and my economy would be awhole lot larger. My ally (a fellow staff member) has taken over almost 1nation (due to it being further away than my target) and their economy is smaller than mine. In comparable games they normally would have taken out 1-3nations by this point and they also believe the start is too slow.

To quickly sum up my main recommendations:

- Changethe starting day of lvl 2 troops to day 3,4 or 6.

- Start with 200k cash, 10k more goods, 5k more metal and oil to enable building sand troops for day 1

- Increase manpower production/decrease manpower costs

My minor recommendations/ones that need more testing:

- Decrease AB cost (goods and rares) and planes cost (rares for planes)

- Increase goods and rare / decrease good/rare costs overall

- Decrease the lvl progression of troops to a 50% increase rather than a 100% one. (Or somewhere in between).

Hopefully this all makes sense.

Also thanks for your second post about airforce. As said we will look into it and rebalance it together with all other units in the next version.

Citizenkane wrote:

@ Coolgame 2019, OK Mr new player. First i think learning from others mistakes is always important in life. "Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it". Also here is a top 10 list that will be completely ignored.

1) Remove tank factory, Naval factory, air factory and secret factory.

2) Allow any province with proper industry to build any unit a player desires.

3) Remove man power from research.

4) Have all units upgrade when research for that unit complete.

5) Do not have all units require all the same resources to build said unit.

6) Do not have all buildings require the same building resources.

7) Return nuclear plant to buildings.

return nuclear research to research tree.

9) Have player's allowed to trade units.

10) Allow diplomatic relation settings for players outside your coalition.

11) Moral management being crucial when you are not 'blessed', we should have more realistic options to influence moral, like i.e. introducing a moral boost from constructions that benefit the general populace. Maybe have Infrastructure give such a boost to moral development? And/or fortresses, for providing safety? Some realism required ofc.

12) In general, make the buildings more interesting by having influence on more factors, whether economic or logistic or militarily. I.e. have Harbors as well as Infrastructure stimulate economic output?

Yunno...just thinking out loud

Another balancing note:

L2 Destroyer

Vs ground 4.1, Naval 10, Sub 24, range 30, 130hp, 67kph speed

...is (much) stronger than an L1 Cruiser?

Vs ground 3-4, Naval 6, Sub 5, range 60, 90hp, 52kph

This is nonsense for a much-smaller ship built maybe a year later with a few technology improvements. The guns shoot twice as far but do ~half as much damage?

As you have already noted, the linear power progression of units in general needs to go back to the drawing board. Again, the change seems to have dramatically messed with units that were already well balanced in the status-quo game.

----

I'm not sure how the "Units in a stack don't start dying until they are below 50% health" is supposed to work, but it's weird. I started bombarding a stack of 15 infantry when they were at maybe 60% health. Now they are at 16%, and there's still 9 of them alive-though-grievously-wounded (with an SBDE of 41%)? That seems off. It will need some playtesting to see how it works in practice for sure. (I do appreciate that you are trying to deal with one of my infamous exploits of the many tiny stacks, so I'll keep an open mind!)

----

So far I definitely don't like losing the longer-range upgrades for higher level units. (Cruisers always have 60 range, and so on.)

CityOfAngels wrote:

I'm not sure how the "Units in a stack don't start dying until they are below 50% health" is supposed to work

Had a team mate move in and finish off a stack of 20 I had been bombarding for hours.

He got credit for 20 kills, Ha Ha.

Misc: Two level 1 infantry attacking vs two level 2 infantry defending.

Just hit and I'm checking back on it: My two stack infantry are at 94% health. The opponents two are at 28% health and are about to die. I afked and let my opponent kill most of my early start army, while just now popping out lvl two infantry and light tanks versus numerical superior lower level units. Just very light afk testing. Plains terrain.

Infantry so far seem to be pretty alright defensive units. For choke point areas in Italy, Afrika, or the like - It encourages people to just stack them into more defensive oriented lines. Punishes any early game aggressive play hard if you micro between Attack/Defense with a LT here or there, especially if you conserve for the mid game. So definitely seeing early game favoring turtling to "Exploding" in mid game. You eventually have to explode - You can't keep up consistent unit production nor throw up new production centers, and you need to rapidly get more resources so you can keep upgrading your units. The starter stuff is essentially just a meatshield that dies fast.

Two Light Tanks level 1 vs 6 lvl 1 infantry, 1 AC at 86% health in a Hills province. I attacked the opponent who was on the move to attack me. First round of combat, my two light tanks are at 54% health. My opponent is now at 80% health.

Second round, enemy units at 75%, on my end down to 1 LT, at 25%. Which lasted a while, with neither doing damage to either other before eventually dying.

Once the units are on lower health, it seems they sometimes start to last a bit longer - Or that the health bar is a bit incorrect visually. It's not exactly completely "Random", as in a X-Factor.

If we are talking about "Micro-management", if anything specializing units so much to be offensive/Defensive requires a bit more Micro than normal. Just on keeping them consistently moving and maximizing the def/off differences.

I'd say their is a bit more activity right now, but that is more or less likely due to it being a event and something different. Let's see how things even out over a three month, six month, nine month, and twelve month points.

After roughly saving my resources for practically four days(I was completely AFK until the middle of yesterday) and am now just pushing my opponent back keeping irregular production queues going, I'm already nearly out of resources to keep up consistent production. If I'd be doing anything other than infantry and a occasional LT, (diversifying), I'd be completely broke earlier - Especially trying to keep up with research. I'm personally somewhat disliking the Stock Market tax as before I could micro sell my resources around a bit to squeeze a few more units out before I was broke, it's not feasible at all with the market rules. Seeing as this will be tweaked soon, that will be good.

With other things, it's far more punishing for the defender to send a few units forward to delay a slightly superior force as a stalling tactic for time / isn't as solid as it was in the older version. This can be offset by faster unit production times which is what I have been doing pretty successfully so far, but with the definitive resource shortages are, it's not viable for very long at all. Can't exactly send units piecemeal to the front to stall and group up to slowly overwhelm the opponent as much either, considering how fast they die. Can't do vice versa either. Favors stacking units even more than the old version.

Provided the enemy focuses more on early game units versus research and build up, even if you lose a good chunk of your country and army and create a smaller but superior force, it's relatively easy to punish early game aggressive play. Though being unable to produce anything outside of Urbans does limit choices for throwing up quick production centers here or there, which I suppose creates a artificial "Supplies system" mode (As in supplies going to the front), instead of being able to throw up new factories and producing closer. I suppose I'd say the early game favours turtling more - But turtling as a long term strategy is not as viable long term as in the older version. This can be a combination of reasons due to being unable to throw up extra production centers, resource shortages, and the like.

For countries like Spain, France, or the like some things are less of a issue. With others such as Germany with such a broad front and Urbans so close to the front, I'm seeing other players having a bit of trouble.

Neither of the above is negative nor positive feedback - Just things I'm noticing as I play for a little bit.

Just some thoughts from a few hours of play with a good glass of tequila.

CityOfAngels wrote:

Another balancing note:

There are so many...

The whole thing reminds me of the reading of achieved notes from a test to 120 students, where the 2 lecturers had a list they read out loud (mind you, this was in the last century, so no apps available).

The points here go from 1 (extremely bad; you just spelled your name right and everything else you got wrong) to 10 (excellent; no mistakes).

So the one lecturer starts reading the list by name and giving the note: 2, 4,3, 1, 6, 5, 3, 2, 1, 1, ....you get it (well, not the blessed probably), but pretty awful.

One girl interrupts the lecturer after some 30 notes were read, and asked: "Sir, how many students actually got at least a sufficient note?" (that being a 6 at least).

The 2nd lecturer, evidently pissed-off (because she implied their failure in teaching capacity), rips the list from the hands of nr1 and starts counting those out loud: "... hmmm...1....uh...2....3....hmmmm...4....6... ... 7 ehhhh.... there were a lot of insufficient notes".

In short, apparently almost everybody - except 7 of the 120 - failed at correctly preparing for that exam.

Now, is that only the fault of the students, or might it have had something to do with a failure of the lecturers?

In this case of Pokemon-CoW, I would be the 2nd lecturer: soon realizing that there are very few positive notes...

Not going to read out all the negative ones either. except one: day 6 and I know I have already won the map, given I look at it once in a while.

Back to the drawing board.

For sending this game back to the drawing board, it suffices to conclude that:

- It feels unrealistic; all of it

Someone said something along the lines that the Pz III's might as well be purple monsters. Does this require more detailed input? Nope. For a RTS game in WW2 setting, realism is essential.

This is not an issue of tweaking.

- It feels as something in-between of something and out of (its) place

Actually it feels as a compromise between 2 games which have their own merits (The Real CoW and S1), without offering any merit of its own.

This is not an issue of tweaking.

- It feels as a - slightly cheap - attempt to create more opportunities for making more money off of a 'franchise'.

Basically like the 5th movie in a franchise, still trying to capitalize on the success of the 1st one, which was the best, after which the 2nd was still good, and then it got worse and worse.

Tight res&cash? Hey, gold can fix that, yunno?

Fast production and construction and you missed out on too many slots? Hey, psssst.... HC can fix that!

Forcing to buy never works well and not for long, bc at some point there are always alternatives elsewhere.

Making people wanting to buy - i.e. like I wanted HC to support The Real CoW ..as well as enjoy the good old fire settings, which allowed for more off-line time (but no longer do since the BAD CHANGES) - works a lot better and will deliver more consistent income.

Now..I do know feelings about something are not easily quantitatively measurable, but during a 'Client Journey' feelings are the most important factor.

A client often feels 'satisfied' or 'dissatisfied' without exactly knowing 'why', but it does have an effect on the recurring sales to that client.

In that respect:

- The Real CoW feels good (well balanced, realistic, good mechanics, a wealth of discoveries to be made, a wealth of choices etc)

- The new Supremacy 1 feels new and truly has its own merits that are asking to be discovered (innovations, looks, units, mechanics that fit the game). It is just my sadness over the soon-to-be-demise-of-The-Real-CoW, which inhibits me to play ... would feel like dancing on a coffin.

But

- Pokemon-CoW ... simply feels not right.

Ofc, the few 'blessed players' on the forum with their rather bland support-for-the-purpose-of-support-only of just-any-changes would say it is an OK game, because they don't have clue anyway. (are they desperately hoping it will be easier for them now to achieve something? keep dreaming boys; it is your 'blessed' state of mind that is the problem; not the game)

Or players who just play for the look of things and like to play with tanks and air planes. Totally valid reason to play a war game, but not valid for commenting on the mechanics or realism. And please keep playing; everyone needs cannon fodder.

And what does it mean that only 'blessed' players like it?

Methinks, it means that if Pokemon-CoW had been fitted with Purple Monsters (shooting StarCruisers out of Orbit with laser beams from their arse ... someone very poetically said), the 'blessed players' would also have liked it. Or... I am pretty sure they would also have said the same things, if suddenly Tank Trees had to be planted on farms, to harvest tanks... Bigger trees providing heavier tanks ofc... It must remain logical after all.

Just get rid of the morale penalty all together. I don't see why it has taken Bytro literally five years to not see the stupidity of it first on the mega S1914 maps and again with COW. In the world historic maps Vietnam always rebels from France after two weeks.

I could care less about 95% of all the 1.5 changes proposed. What the community wants is to keep the game the way it is and for Bytro to stop making upgrades that turn it into fundamentally a new game. Every 2-3 years S1914 & COW have become unrecgonizable from their previous generations, and not in a good way. It's one thing to change graphics. But most of the time what you change is core strategic elements of the game that take away the stuff that brought people into the game in the first place. New units and new maps have always been your most successful and sustainable way to improve the game. Why not focus on that?

I think Bytro is missing out by not playing into the "what if WWII kept going" angle. Imagine an alternate history where WWII went a few more years to 1949? Imagine adding V2 rockets being launched from ships? Or even longer range bombers? Basically WWII but with 1950s technology.

Air craft refueling is bugged. Some times they are taking as log as 2hrs to refuel. This recent most example a group of fightersare taking 45 min to refuel.

https://gyazo.com/fa1482b0f88dcd520c7f8e7a140572cahttps://gyazo.com/fa1482b0f88dcd520c7f8e7a140572ca

. irrelevant to the 1.5 discussion/removed it

jackass01992 wrote:

I think Bytro is missing out by not playing into the "what if WWII kept going" angle. Imagine an alternate history where WWII went a few more years to 1949? Imagine adding V2 rockets being launched from ships? Or even longer range bombers? Basically WWII but with 1950s technology.