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Call of War 1.5: Mechanics & New Balancing

Attention Generals!

In the last news we communicated the changes to urban provinces and new buildings. Now the first test event for Call of War 1.5 is about to start. To be fully prepared, please read up on more changes in this brand new version!

Mechanics changes

Let’s start with the changes regarding game mechanics. As the title of the game says, this game is about war. Therefore we don’t want to punish players anymore for waging wars and conquering provinces. That is why in CoW 1.5 the morale penalty for being at war will be removed, as well as the province resource upkeep. To balance this out the morale penalty for distance to capital will be slightly increased.

Another aspect are changes to how combat is resolved. A new combat calculation will be at play, resulting in more predictable results, while still retaining a small intended variance. To give more chances to retreat and heal up, units in armies will only start to get destroyed when the condition of the army drops below 50%. When units drop below a condition of 50% they will also face movement speed penalties. Additionally ground combat will be updated every 30 minutes instead of every 60 minutes. Finally, damage limits will no longer be determined by the amount of each individual unit level. Instead, a damage limit exists for the whole army, with damage being reduced at 10 and more units and being capped at 20 and more units.

Furthermore, in Call of War 1.5 units on the field will no longer automatically upgrade when a higher level is researched. Instead, the new unit level has to be produced. Higher unit levels can only be produced in higher building levels, while lower building levels still support producing lower unit levels even if higher levels are already researched.

Last but not least we updated some unit functionalities: Commandos will be stealth units that ignore defence bonuses, while Motorized Infantry, Armored Cars and Interceptors will receive the scout ability. Rockets will not ignore the defense bonus anymore and deal friendly fire upon impact. For more details, please check the forum post linked below.

New Balancing

With Call of War 1.5 we will also introduce a lot of changes to the balancing, which you will experience during the test events. These changes are so countless that we cannot list them all, but we want to highlight a few changes:

There will be a clear progression in power and costs for all buildings, units and researches. All unit values, including damage, speed, health, production time, cost and upkeep will start low but rise from level to level. The same holds true for researches and buildings, which have their cost but , if applicable, also their effects increased per level.

To create a true Rock-Paper-Scissors style balancing which still acknowledges the realities of the war, we will split the armor class ‘armored’ into ‘light armor’ and ‘heavy armor’. This will create more opportunities to counter enemy army compositions. Additionally all unit roles will be reviewed, making sure every single one has its use. As a result of this nuclear powered sea units will be removed from the game. Also, some units will be much stronger in defensive or offensive positions and will be much more effective against certain armor classes, making tactical maneuvering more important.

Resource and gold costs also will be revised and vary depending on type and level. Going forward, all units and buildings will require each resource to be built. Depending on the unit you might not need a lot of them, but they will be required. This way resource demand reflects the need of workforce, materials and energy more realistically. As a contrast, researches will require only money and manpower. These resource philosophies may be still subject to change.

As the CoW 1.5 event is about to start, make sure to join an event game during the sign-up period to provide us with first hand feedback! This will only be the first event in a series of events and there is plenty of room for changes and improvements, so please tell us what you like. We are counting on you to change the future of Call of War together with us!

Your Bytro Team

- Please understand that the list below is only provided in English for all languages -

More details:

Mechanics & formula changes:

  • There is no more war morale penalty on provinces.
  • Removed building upkeep and province upkeep.
  • The distance to capital penalty is increased.
  • Changed combat calculations to reduce outliers in the results and to make results better predictable. A variance of +/-20% is intentionally kept to not make results TOO predictable.
  • Single units of the same unit type within an army begin to die as soon as their unit type is at 50% health or below.
  • Units move slower when at 50% health or below.
  • Units with lower health now deal less damage than in the previous version.
  • There is no damage limiter for each unit level anymore, instead there will be a damage limit for the whole stack limit, with reduced damage beginning at 10 units and damage being capped at 20 units. Visualization for this will be implemented later.
  • Units on the field do not level up automatically when a higher level of the unit type was researched. For the future we consider implementing an option to upgrade units on the field manually.
  • Buildings can continue to build lower research levels when not upgraded.
  • Land and sea combat ticks now happen every 30min.
  • Removed movement speed penalty on allied terrain.
  • Changed some AI defense preferences. They now value border provinces to non-friendly neighbors, capitals and provinces with many buildings (usually urbans) more when deciding where to collect troops.
  • Changed resource outputs of supply crates to have rewards within the same range for all main resources, as their value is now equal. General hint: If you collect supply drops in provinces of stronger nations, you will receive more resources out of them.
  • Increased maximum manpower storage amount (may be removed later). The storage amount increases with conquering provinces.

Unit functionality updates:

  • Commando - stealth, ignores defence bonus.
  • Interceptor - scout (makes stealth units visible).
  • Motorized infantry - scout (at level 3 and above).
  • Armored car - scout (at level 3 and above).
  • Rocket - Friendly fire, does not ignore defense bonus anymore.
  • Moved Commando and Paratrooper to Infantry category, now counting as Infantry type.

General balancing changes:

  • Changed nearly all values, costs, bonuses and build speeds of all units, buildings and researches, which are sadly to countless to list here. And they are also not final and will change in future iterations. For general infos on building changes, visit the previous news “Urban Provinces & New Buildings”.
  • All values of units, except view range, ground attack range and terrain bonuses, follow a progression, from low values at lower levels to higher values at higher levels. On average a unit on maximum level has 4-6x better fighting values than on the first level, and 2-3x the resource cost and upkeep, making it still a bargain to produce higher levels.
  • Changed offensive and defensive focus of many units, with them now being 2-3x as strong in their prefered role. Some units also serve as an allrounder with no off or def preference but also slightly lower values in both roles. General reminder: Defense values are used by a unit when this unit is standing still without any command given, offense values are used when another unit is actively attacked. If units meet on the field while both are in movement, both values are used.
  • Changed preferred terrains of some units. Units also no longer have penalties in certain terrain. Instead, units receive bonuses in certain terrains only. This makes values better comparable.
  • Split armor class “armored” into light armor and heavy armor, whereas Medium Tanks, Heavy Tanks, Tank Destroyers and Railroad Guns are considered heavy armor, the rest of the vehicles light armor. Units therefore now have different or additional target preferences.
  • All costs of researches increase per level.
  • All costs and bonus effects of buildings increase per level.
  • All resources are needed to produce buildings and units, sometimes only small amounts. Units also need all resources as maintenance upkeep. Sidenote: Rare materials represent many different materials, including rubber and aluminium, that’s why they are also needed.
  • Manpower and money is needed for researches.
  • Removed nuclear powered sea units from the game due to role conflicts and deemed unfitting for the time frame of the game.
  • Removed Nuclear Power research from the game to simplify requirements. Nuclear Bomber and Nuclear Rocket now only require the Atomic Bomb research as prerequisite, but got more expensive in return.
  • Removed research levels of several units: Militia -3 levels, Mechanized Infantry -1 level and all ships except transport ships -1 level.
  • Added research levels to the following units: SP Artillery +1 level, Commandos +2 levels.
  • The last level of Commandos now also requires blueprints to unlock.
  • Updated the ingame unit and building descriptions to describe the preferences and uses of them. Open their details panel by clicking on them in the respective menus to read the descriptions and to check out all new values!

Gold cost changes:

  • With the new importance of urban provinces some gold actions became more powerful as less provinces have to be targeted in total to make a lasting effect. Therefore adjustments needed to be made to balance the game. Sabotage building and reduce morale costs are increased from 2,000 to 3,800 gold. Morale boost costs increased from 500 to 950.
  • Most build times got reduced drastically, especially on early levels. To balance this out gold costs for speed ups had to be increased. These prices now also vary on power or level of a unit or building and therefore don’t have a common listing price anymore.
  • All units now receive higher amounts of health when leveled up. As condition boosts heal always 10% of the missing health, condition boosts on later levels became more powerful. The gold costs of condition boosts had to be increased to balance this out. These prices now also vary depending on the health and level of a unit and therefore don’t have a common listing price anymore.

NOTE: Some parts of the new mechanics are not yet complete, especially regarding corresponding interface information. This will be improved in future versions. This is also just the first version of the new balancing and there will be a lot of fine tuning going forward. If you like to give us detailed feedback on this version, it would be highly appreciated, especially if you feel like certain units are too strong or weak!

575 Replies

15 Nov 2019, 09:21

I'm new here but I've played this game for over a year with a few months off at one point. I like the game a lot but I don't care at all for the accuracy of a WWII simulation or for any historical perspective. If any changes effect these things I don't care. I simply want to play a game with strategy and where I feel I have much the same opportunity for success as the other players.

The main things I like about the game are still there with v1.5 but I was getting bored with the game and the refresh with new buildings and economy is somewhat exciting because I have to learn new strategies.

Unfortunately the things I didn't like will still be there. The long delay between knowing you've won and finally getting the necessary points is number 1. So boring. Number 2 is the number of inactives, even in gold games and Frontline games.

So I'm playing 2 event games, one the way I like to, with bombers and a good navy, and one without planes or ships. Day 6 and 7 now. I find I'm using a greater variety of land units, some I didn't bother with before, and this is good. Added fun. Learning to find ways to take advantage of the strengths of those units that have changed is also good.

However I'm often frustrated at the inability to do anything due to lack of manpower. Even though I've captured the territory of the equivalent of 2 countries, and my growth is about 750/hr, manpower is always a problem, slowing the game down for me. The other thing that annoys me is having units of 3 different levels and knowing that some are or soon will be obsolete. Of course it's the same for all players so I may get to the point where I happily accept this game restraint, but I doubt it.

I read here that bombers were finished as a viable unit, hence the game without them, but by day 6 I can't live without them for a little scouting and putting out spotfires. And in the game where I've had them since day 1, now level 3, they have been good, except for level 1 v troop transports. However it seems to me that all level 1 units are pretty ordinary, and if I play another game, I will not make any level 1 units except light tanks.

I'm pretty sure I'll try the next v1.5 event, if it's not too far away, but I doubt I'll be playing any more 1.0 games for quite a while.

15 Nov 2019, 13:50 (edited)

_Pontus_ wrote:

Guys... did this just really happen?

Don't laugh at this ....or better... you actually should laugh at this:

Took a province in Poland. Had to stop for a moment, so pulled my units together in a mixed troops def-position and went away.

Came back and see a tank army with MTs approaching from the west and LTs army from the north.

So, remembering their terrible performance during the Polish invasion ... I hurriedly pulled my LT's out of my def-position and drove them behind the lines, when these tanks (with limited Inf and other cohorts) came to attack....

Hadn't I done that, my LTs would surely have perished, as they like attracting a lot of damage and doing nothing worthwhile in def.

Now my only ACs and Inf defended with arty cover, while my tanks ran away.

(Can you imagine the shouting of the comrades from the AC and Inf detachments staying behind?: "COWARDS! USELESS MOFO'S! I WILL SHOOT YOU MYSELF WHEN YOU COME BACK AFTER THE BATTLE!".

Result though:

I don't have single casualty while enemy is dying of his last HP from the MT group.

Now pulling in the LTs again to faster finish of that last bit of the attackers.

Realism rules...somewhere....BUT NOT HERE!

RIDICULOUS...

This is the twighlight zone. Things turning weird... Could it turn even weirder?

I agree that is RIDICULOUS and was thinking before version (1.5) was released that we would see something truly amazing seeing how we had a truly good foundation from which could have been the starting point (1.O) and introduce

things such as nation military skins as even under the lend lease program nations that took military equiptment and

introduced their own nations insigna ect. Hell just look at one nation in particular the united Kingdom ( England ) and

this being one of quite a few in the game. England had great tanks (Churchill) great interceptors,(Spitfire)

great ships (Duke of York) great bombers (Lancaster) so you see where im going how 1.0 could have been improved

just right their across the board with many other nations / Also a very good tutorial for the cannon fodder would

have been a great improvement rather than here's how you spend real money kids. There are so many things that

could have been done over and better in the name of monetization. But i will leave some more truly great suggestions for later on guys. What we truly have is trash in 1.5 and a very lazy effort in regards to game (development improving.) Im here to play your product not tell you how to fix it or spend countless hours playing trash. when i did see written that it was said you's tested this 1.5 before releasing the event. so i will play 1.0 until the trashy 1.5 takes over. Then play a very in depth game not the trash i archived. ect hence the very lazy effort game development

and if i do stay it will be because the finished product is better than 1.0 for me / for us the players that agree with

myself & Pontus and you would be supprised in the end just how many like minded there are?

15 Nov 2019, 16:20

7thCircle wrote:

For example, seems like it you could inflict lots of damage on a stack of tanks and the stack before the stack loses even a single tank
this "feature" was announced, copied over from Sone.

another downside to this "feature" is that units with low health continue to consume resources as if they were at full strength and manning levels.

15 Nov 2019, 16:43

Just a few observations:

1. After a week, the initial enthusiasm seems to have worn off,

and the drop out rate increased to the normal CoW levels.

2. Only one player has been clever enough to exploit the heavily

armed sea transports, and is successfully dispatching ground units

on beach defense, since those units have very little power

against naval units. {This exploit was also available on CoN, not

sure if it still is?}

3. One Player (yes, I admit, it's me) has used the 20cm guns now

available on Destroyers to totally devastate enemy units that

wander too close to shore, or buildings that were foolishly placed

in coastal cities.

4. Only one player (not me) has exploited the massively overpowered

motorcycle infantry. Faster than armored cars, and greater attack values

than level 2 light tanks.

5. The maneuver/ counter maneuver aspect of CoW seems to be

preserved, IF you have a worthy opponent.

15 Nov 2019, 16:50

_Pontus_ wrote:

Further, S1 sports a number of innovations and though in its core it resembles The Real CoW a bit, it definitely is a different game, which has to be played differently.

And - because it is a different game - that is not a problem, but an asset.

True about Sone.

Unfortunately, most games on Sone start with only a few players, and rapidly lose many of them.

Of 19 games on Sone, I was the sole remaining player on 12.

Another VERY unfortunate feature is that the unit icons and banners are so large that

the battlespace is cluttered to the point you cannot select units or determine who is attacking what.

15 Nov 2019, 17:03 (edited)

I can now build Heavy Tanks... One of the 'cool' units. But can anyone suggest why I would ever want to build one of those instead of two L2 MTs (available 2 days earlier)? Even if I somehow got the research unlocked for free? The low attack strength just guts their value. Too expensive, too slow, and too weak on the attack to ever be worth building, especially when you already have MTs researched and they do the HT's one job (defensive anti-armour pillbox) better.

----

Rail Guns are ridiculously hard to assault, due to heavy armour (say what?) and 200hp. I'm a bit bitter because I lost a significant army stumbling in to one overnight. Their only weakness is that they don't do much damage on defensive ticks, but assuming the owner of the rail gun counter-attacks, my Medium Tank is doomed even if he didn't start shooting until I melee-attacked the gun for some reason. Come on now... Rail guns aren't armoured like a warship. They would be impossible to move. Is this supposed to be a (Wehrmacht drawing-board-only) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landkreuzer_P._1500_Monster ?

----

Does anyone else get the general sense that units, while having faster speed values than status quo CoW, are actually moving around the map much more slowly than usual?

15 Nov 2019, 17:33 (edited)

CityOfAngels wrote:

Does anyone else get the general sense that units, while having faster speed values than status quo CoW, are actually moving around the map much more slowly than usual?
Yes!

except for those Harley's with machine guns in their side cars,

they are blazing fast!

As I remember, there was a movement malus on Sone for units at less than 100% HP.

Might that have carried over?

15 Nov 2019, 19:01

CityOfAngels wrote:

I can now build Heavy Tanks... One of the 'cool' units. But can anyone suggest why I would ever want to build one of those instead of two L2 MTs (available 2 days earlier)? Even if I somehow got the research unlocked for free? The low attack strength just guts their value. Too expensive, too slow, and too weak on the attack to ever be worth building, especially when you already have MTs researched and they do the HT's one job (defensive anti-armour pillbox) better.

----

Rail Guns are ridiculously hard to assault, due to heavy armour (say what?) and 200hp. I'm a bit bitter because I lost a significant army stumbling in to one overnight. Their only weakness is that they don't do much damage on defensive ticks, but assuming the owner of the rail gun counter-attacks, my Medium Tank is doomed even if he didn't start shooting until I melee-attacked the gun for some reason. Come on now... Rail guns aren't armoured like a warship. They would be impossible to move. Is this supposed to be a (Wehrmacht drawing-board-only) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landkreuzer_P._1500_Monster ?

----

Does anyone else get the general sense that units, while having faster speed values than status quo CoW, are actually moving around the map much more slowly than usual?

Yes.

Even though we have faster production and combat times, the overall game feels slower than regular Call of War. Trying to be "Faster" ends up getting your units killed more easily.

15 Nov 2019, 20:40

CzarHelllios wrote:

Trying to be "Faster" ends up getting your units killed more easily.
I forecasted that already in 2017, as some players wanted shortened production time and more frequently combat tiks.
15 Nov 2019, 21:26

f118 wrote:

CzarHelllios wrote:

Trying to be "Faster" ends up getting your units killed more easily.
I forecasted that already in 2017, as some players wanted shortened production time and more frequently combat tiks.
Yeah. Combat ticks were plenty fast enough for me in the original game - Considering we had Tacs and Arty and Lts, things would go through pretty fast. The new changes just make the overall metagame slower.
15 Nov 2019, 21:47

_Pontus_ wrote:

Romania owns Yugo, Poland, Bulgaria, exactly half of Turkey and half of Greece.

Now on the way to take the German possessions of Poland, tomorrow you can add Germany to the list.

Might take Albania and remainders of Greece too.

Day 8 as Über-Great Romania in Pokemon-CoW

Blast....didn't log in all day, because I couldn't be bothered?

So will finish adding Germany, Albania and Greece tomorrow.

From now on its anyways Farmville and mopping up.

Very enticing this new game...very.... I thought it was to make it easier for the 'blessed players', but it actually makes them lose even faster.... Strange.

15 Nov 2019, 22:16

Tin Military wrote:

and if i do stay it will be because the finished product is better than 1.0 for me / for us the players that agree with

myself & Pontus and you would be supprised in the end just how many like minded there are?

That is the point I don't get.

Even a train that left the station can turn back, by first using the breaks to come to a stand-still and then reversing.

The key questions remain:

- why this profound change to the game or factual new game?

- for whom?

It is not for your old client base... So much is clear.

15 Nov 2019, 22:16

CityOfAngels wrote:

Does anyone else get the general sense that units, while having faster speed values than status quo CoW, are actually moving around the map much more slowly than usual?
Absolutely!
Killings my business, and business is good!
15 Nov 2019, 22:58

CityOfAngels wrote:

Does anyone else get the general sense that units, while having faster speed values than status quo CoW, are actually moving around the map much more slowly than usual?
INDEED!!!

I was wondering already, but I am glad you mention it.

Every trip from A to B takes ages. Even my ACs go at turtle speed.

The higher speeds are only figures, but in reality, movement has slowed.

15 Nov 2019, 23:28

_Pontus_ wrote:

Tin Military wrote:

and if i do stay it will be because the finished product is better than 1.0 for me / for us the players that agree with

myself & Pontus and you would be supprised in the end just how many like minded there are?

That is the point I don't get.Even a train that left the station can turn back, by first using the breaks to come to a stand-still and then reversing.

The key questions remain:

- why this profound change to the game or factual new game?

- for whom?

It is not for your old client base... So much is clear.

Personally i think it all has to do with the prolific inactivity and the fact this was never addressed properly and

lets face it how many username1234567 and so on start a map and just go inactive without even building anything

or even recruiting some extra military and you rarely even get a response to message ect mail.

Now im not a conspiracy theorist about the prolific inactivity but hell are half these username1234567 and so on

even real people? The mind wanders when yet again your sitting on a map staring out for signs of life.

Will the new version cow 1.5 address the inactivity. Not from what i have been reading and with regards to the key

question / For Bytro Labs & company of course not for the player base that actually seem to love and believe

in cow 1.0 and should be the starting point from which to address all things cow 1.0 not send it to the trash bin

but rather continue to develop ect evolve an already very good product rather than replace it with cow 1.5 that

will go to the monetization failure bin anyway.

16 Nov 2019, 00:24

7thCircle wrote:

I am fairly new to this game and its possible others have already commented on this. So apologies if this is just reiterating what someone might have already stated.

Observations about 1.5 CoW so far:

1) Feels like air strategy (which is what I tend to prefer) is someone inhibited with the new changes. If you invest early on planes you will also have to invest early on lots of airstrips since your existing planes wont upgrade as you research level up nor will their ranges. The cost of all these closer airstrips places you at a serious disadvantage on land since so much of your resources are going towards extra airstrips. In WW2, air strategy was center stage from the onset of the war, in this game you almost have to wait til you have research leveled up planes to max before making the investment.

2) Really dislike the need for all these extra building to build units. Sort of the same problem as with planes. once you invest in building higher level tank plants for example and then advance you have to invest again in building them closer to the front lines. Just the number of building required is greater than I would prefer.

3) Something about the battle computation seems odd to me. Not sure yet if I prefer it or not, maybe just need to get use to it. For example, seems like it you could inflict lots of damage on a stack of tanks and the stack before the stack loses even a single tank. I guess this can go both ways so not sure yet if I like it or not, just not use to it.

4) Just feels like not having research levels improve existing troops slows down the pace of the game and makes your early investments on units wasteful. Sometime your earliest troops will endure for the full span of the game thanks to researching levels up. Now you'll be replenishing troops more or even hoping they are killed off so you can replace them with higher level troops so you dont have to suffer the plenty of upkeeping lower level units.

Overall, I would say I am sort of OK with the changes. Like someone above stated, its just new parameters of the game one needs to get use to but maybe I dont have the history with the game that others have. The one 1.5 feature I really dont like is the researching levels not affecting existing units.

However, my biggest complaint of this game has little to do with 1.5 changes (though it seems like it exasperates it) and that is the issue of game speed. I much prefer the faster speed worlds. I get impatient with 1 day marches of troops hahaha.. I much rather play hard and fast for a week and then take weeks off than play slow for months but I digress.

Thanks for the feedback!

1) we are planning to include an option to upgrade units on the map manually once you researched a higher level. There is also a feature in discussion that gives your planes the ability to exceed their attack range when traveling to another friendly airport.

2) Understandable. Probably a thing we will keep though.

3) This is indeed a new feature. Units start to die when the army drops below 50%.

4) As said in 1), we will work on solutions for this.

Regarding game speed: Probably you feel it is slower due to the lack of resources. We will rebalance this and probably increase the availability of resources in the next round.

Dunzell wrote:

I'm new here but I've played this game for over a year with a few months off at one point. I like the game a lot but I don't care at all for the accuracy of a WWII simulation or for any historical perspective. If any changes effect these things I don't care. I simply want to play a game with strategy and where I feel I have much the same opportunity for success as the other players.

The main things I like about the game are still there with v1.5 but I was getting bored with the game and the refresh with new buildings and economy is somewhat exciting because I have to learn new strategies.

Unfortunately the things I didn't like will still be there. The long delay between knowing you've won and finally getting the necessary points is number 1. So boring. Number 2 is the number of inactives, even in gold games and Frontline games.

So I'm playing 2 event games, one the way I like to, with bombers and a good navy, and one without planes or ships. Day 6 and 7 now. I find I'm using a greater variety of land units, some I didn't bother with before, and this is good. Added fun. Learning to find ways to take advantage of the strengths of those units that have changed is also good.

However I'm often frustrated at the inability to do anything due to lack of manpower. Even though I've captured the territory of the equivalent of 2 countries, and my growth is about 750/hr, manpower is always a problem, slowing the game down for me. The other thing that annoys me is having units of 3 different levels and knowing that some are or soon will be obsolete. Of course it's the same for all players so I may get to the point where I happily accept this game restraint, but I doubt it.

I read here that bombers were finished as a viable unit, hence the game without them, but by day 6 I can't live without them for a little scouting and putting out spotfires. And in the game where I've had them since day 1, now level 3, they have been good, except for level 1 v troop transports. However it seems to me that all level 1 units are pretty ordinary, and if I play another game, I will not make any level 1 units except light tanks.

I'm pretty sure I'll try the next v1.5 event, if it's not too far away, but I doubt I'll be playing any more 1.0 games for quite a while.

Thanks for the feedback!

Great to hear that you are able to deploy different strategies.

We got alot of feedback that resources aree too scarce, so we will likely increase availability of resources in the second round of Events.

We are also planning to provide options to level up units manually after they were built, should help with the remaining lvl1 units.

CityOfAngels wrote:

I can now build Heavy Tanks... One of the 'cool' units. But can anyone suggest why I would ever want to build one of those instead of two L2 MTs (available 2 days earlier)? Even if I somehow got the research unlocked for free? The low attack strength just guts their value. Too expensive, too slow, and too weak on the attack to ever be worth building, especially when you already have MTs researched and they do the HT's one job (defensive anti-armour pillbox) better.

----

Rail Guns are ridiculously hard to assault, due to heavy armour (say what?) and 200hp. I'm a bit bitter because I lost a significant army stumbling in to one overnight. Their only weakness is that they don't do much damage on defensive ticks, but assuming the owner of the rail gun counter-attacks, my Medium Tank is doomed even if he didn't start shooting until I melee-attacked the gun for some reason. Come on now... Rail guns aren't armoured like a warship. They would be impossible to move. Is this supposed to be a (Wehrmacht drawing-board-only) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landkreuzer_P._1500_Monster ?

----

Does anyone else get the general sense that units, while having faster speed values than status quo CoW, are actually moving around the map much more slowly than usual?

We will probably swap some Tank stats to make them more realistic and give them better usability. Also we will invest time in balancing units against eachother to make sure that stats on the same level are comparable, one thing we didn't do enough for Event 1.

Railroad Guns are a unit that require building level 3. If you compare it to other armored units of that type, its stats are still comparable. It is a bit tankier, but also slower. But for sure this isnt the final balance, and stuff like this we will review and finetune.

It would really surprise me if actual movement speed is slower in this version, technically that really cannot be. Is it maybe just an impression because the whole game feels slower due to resource scarcity? We will work on that point, so maybe then things will feel faster overall. Also, it depends on which maps you compare, because size of nations are different on some maps. For example on the 22p speed tutorial map, the map size is 25% smaller than on regular 22p maps. Also the 100p map has smaller provinces due to its total size. The 1.5 map is a copy of the regular 22p map, so should have the same distances. Nevertheless we will check if there is a bug with the unit speed values.

16 Nov 2019, 00:36

Immortal unit bug wasn't fixed in 1.5 version. Game #2890637 - Air unit based in Budapest went to convoy when ground units took the city. Instead of dying, it's accumulating negative hit points (currently at -1345), but still returning fire. Ground units are stuck so will all die unless resolved.

16 Nov 2019, 01:44 (edited)

Very recently I have been 'stomped' for not giving a detailed technical and dry analysis of what is wrong with Pokemon-CoW, but giving it to the public in a more creative way, demonstrating the ridiculous nature of some changes.

Though everyone else got the meaning exactly, it went beyond that reader.

Thus here goes for a new analysis of the game so far, in which I will give a few tries:

Try A. Whats not wrong with Pokemon-CoW?

Oh? That was not dry? More detail wanted? Here goes:

Try B. In 1 phrase: Everything FEELS wrong, while the FEELING of a game determines its success, like the FEELING of a glove, which, if it fits well, YOU WILL LIKE to wear and when it doesn't, you will NOT CHOOSE to wear.

Not enough? OK then, here goes another try:

Try C. Herewith a list of failures in Pokemon-CoW; that is, if it pretends to be a worthy replacement of The Real CoW.

These do not deal with exact numbers, because exact numbers are COMPLETELY IRRELEVANT to the core principle of most misconceptions. The numbers accompanying these misconceptions can easily be changed; the misconceptions are at the core of the new game though, and cannot be changed without again changing the game:

1. Buildings:

a. Every building is now practically single-use, single-purpose, which kills all variety and freedom in choices to shape your economy and industry and thus army and thus your military campaign and thus your own play-style.

b. Indeed, there are little side effects to buildings, like a 1% moral influence for a Weapon Factory, which besides being completely illogical, is such a minor influence that it is ridiculous.

It goes so far that I am now building weapons factories and barracks in far away industrial centres - which will never-ever produce a single unit - to solely improve moral, because for some weird logic applied by who knows who, Infrastructure (which provides a 5% moral influence bonus) can't be constructed in cities...

c. Buildings require manpower to be constructed. NOT temporarily, no, they consume it.... Excuse me? Yes, they consume it. It is like in the Soviet Union during Stalin or Brezniev: "Send the prisoners to build that road! Work 'm till they are dead!" Or, much earlier with the Pyramids, where all workers who knew too much of the construction were killed off, so no-one could tell where the entrance points were. (Sorry, I cannot go dryer in my descriptions; descriptions must live IMO)

So, in Pokemon-CoW, you send 3400 workers to build a level 4 IC (say 5-6 hrs wait-time to gather them and 14-15 hrs to get even from increased manpower production = a set back of roughly 20 hrs... ) and then, when the building is finished, you kill them all. Where is the realism in that???

2. Units:

a. Unit roles are being changed away from realism, simply because a certain role must be filled or must be eliminated in the eyes of the devs.

But isn''t this supposed to be a RTGS WW2 simulation game? Or is it just an imitation of a Chinese-Money-Sink-Game?

Like: "Don't complain. Just learn the new roles and you will be fine. Who cares whether they are realistic? "

Well, I do. It was one of the great features of CoW as it was.

As someone proposed earlier: why have PZ III's (or was it IV's?) on the map, if they might just as well be Monster Insects shooting laser beams from their butts?

b. Unit stats are so terribly misconceived and unrealistic!

-i- Light Tanks have to run away from defensive positions, when other Light Tanks attack that position, and thus leave the defense to ACs and Infantry... Astonishingly, the ACs and Inf easily will shred the tank attacks, which still leaves me flabbergasted. And not just me...even on 'The Other Side' things are stirring up....(of which my witness account was given to the public).

-ii- Motorcycle infantry...the new early game super weapon... The what..? Yes; those...

-iii- ACs have become super defenders...rrrright...so realistic in WW2. In WW1, ACs shielded the crew relatively well and their mobile machine guns were effective weapons...in WW1. Their role in WW2 can be looked up on Wikipedia, but I can tell you already: it was not defending positions against tank attacks...

In short: this new set up for unit roles is just bollocks!

And no, I don't have to give the numbers that go with misconceived stats. They are known by the devs and visible to the players and tweaking the numbers will not change their misconceived role.

c. Units have become - like the buildings - single purpose. Can it defend, than it must not be capable of attack and vice-versa. That seems to be the new ruling logic..... What a load of crock!

3. Economy

a. Moral management posed a challenge in The Real CoW, but you had a wealth of options, depending your resource situation. What changed? Well, the only way to support moral in industrial centres is to construct weapon factories and barracks...

Do I need to elaborate on this really? I surely hope not! That's just a load of cobblers!

b. Resource management posed a challenge, but you had a wealth of options in The Real CoW.

And now? IC's are what is needed for resource production increases, functioning much like mines or farms... And since they increase resource production, well, they also increase manpower and income, because essentially these are also resources. Short on something? Build an IC.

Yes, that may be correct, but it is not sexy at all. And again this 1-dimensional approach thus wipes other dimensions from the game and limits choices, thus decreases complexity and challenges. Maybe that is thought to be good for 'blessed players' but I severely doubt it.

For one, because if you could not manage your resources and income in The Real CoW, the limited options you have now, will only make it worse. The cost of ICs is so high, that leveling up ICs in your cores kills all other progress. Even now, at >1000 manpower production, leveling up a level 4 IC stops me short of doing anything else for hours, because of the workers being executed after completing the building.

Basically resource management now means: kill your neighbor ASAP or starve.

4. Research

The most important input is again manpower. already in short supply and than cash, also in short supply. How boring; what a lack of imagination has struck the people who developed The Real CoW, S1914 and S1. So now I have to build ICs everywhere to be able to do research?

What does this result in? Right: endless waiting. Farmville, watching the crop grow and harvest when it is time....

But I thought we were playing a cool RTGS WW2 simulation?

5. Battle

Über-simplified. I have nothing to say about it; that simple it is.

6. Other weird mechanics

- Unit speeds have increased in the stats, but factually everything moves slower over the map.

- Battle-tick now 30mins. But everything else is slowed down.

It all boils down to reducing FREE choices with which you could develop your own play-style.

You are molding all choices into the same format.

Because of the lack of choices and options, the game has now been über-simplified one side and on the other it is now over-complicated.

The result? It does not feel good. It is less fun. It is less realistic.

Was it needed? The old game was improving in smaller steps and going the right way until the bad changes to market, diplo and fire settings...

Until the bad changes it was by far the best MMO RTGS game around. That is a status Pokemon-CoW can never achieve.

And why put effort and time into changing The Real CoW into a S1 look-alike?

S1 has not even been truly launched yet and already you create something that will cannibalize on it.

For sure this Pokemon-CoW looks too much like S1 and thus there will be no incentive to play both.

The Real CoW, being quite different from S1 and S1 offering completely different concepts as well as being a faster game, can very well be played next to S1.

The logic at Bytro eludes me.

Hint: Please read up on 'New Coke' ánd also on how Philips build its strategy to introduce first the 1-headed electric shaver, then the 2-headed and then the 3-headed one and how they capitalized on this.

16 Nov 2019, 04:10

This will be looking into some more economical/rss issues in 1.5

I haven't felt that troops are moving slower but yes the pace of the game feels WAY slower which maybe gives that feeling. Normally by day 8 I will be producing more than 4 units at a time. While sure it depends on the unit (arty I can spam the crap out of while planes are slower to produce) only 4 is really slow and now they also take 8+ hours to produce the game has slowed further, while day 3ish it began to speed up and felt quite nice, now it is feeling really slow and tbh I dont think solely an increase to starting rss would solve it.

I think that this is partially due to not enough rss at the beginning of the game yes, but even at day 8 things are still slow, an increase of early rss would have enabled faster expansion so this day 8 lull may be less, but in general either building prices and troop prices seem too high (esp planes of which I will have a total of 6 before I am out of rares for more) or production of rss is too low. It seems harder to get up ICs and without infra there is only 1 method to increase rss production (outside of war). The economy side of CoW seems to be lacking in 1.5

Also the 1.5k rare cost of air strips is really high, combined with the high rare cost of planes I am unable to move my air around. Given in 100 maps I am often building 5-10 ABs a day to ensure no rockets, spies can knock my planes out of action, this cost is REALLY high as will lead to either build ABs or planes, but not both which kind of means neither because without ABs, planes are useless, and without planes, ABs are useless.

I have 2x lvl 3 ICs and soon my double rare to lvl 4 but I lack mostly manpower but also other rss to get them up to increase my rss to get out of this lull period. I am building 1xlvl 1 and 1xlvl 3 IC, 2 lvl 2 tacs, 1 lvl 3 LT and 1xlvl 1 SPA and have no more manpower for more anything and only 900 rares left (which I stockpiled pretty much from day 1) and am at +560/hr atm.

Manpower ofc I dont think I have had more than 2.5k of it and even at day 8 with 90 provinces I have 2k atm and am waiting on more for more buildings. This has been said to be improved next patch which is good but I want to acknowledge it is an ongoing not just early game issue.

I think to fix the initial rss issues starting with more would solve it. But this will need to be determined next patch whether there is also a general lack of rss in general or whether starting with more would enable constant growth, But I believe it is the first of these option and thus believe troop and building prices will need to be lowered or a flat total increase in rss production across the board, or both.

I also believe there should be another option to increase rss, in version 1 we had infra and ICs and even forts for further away provinces to aid in moral. In this we just have ICs which while they do the same total job (+100% production at lvl 5) It feels like less, and is harder to obtain. In a very basic nutshell in V1 if you had excess oil you could build infra and not enough oil ICs. They where relatively cheaper to increase which ultimately made it easier as if you get 2 cheaper methods to increase by 10% and do it twice it will lead to more rss produced than one more expensive 20% increase.

I would recommend to solve this to add another building to increase rss production, whether that is the old method of IC and infra or an alternate one. Only having one method to increase rss feels like a dumbed down version and also makes it more difficult to increase rss, thus making the game slower and more boring due to a lack of diversity. Given what I believe is a general increase in costs to build and decrease in ability to increase rss production. I would actually recommend keeping IC at lvl 5+100% rss and infra at +50% at lvl 3 to attempt to solve stuff being too expensive. Or both at 50% and a general decrease in costs of troops and buildings. This can be adjusted, perhaps +60% for both and a decrease to troop/building costs.

Troops and my evaluation of their costs: (not their combat effectiveness but costs)

I havnt build every troops but of the ones I have;

I will split into 3 categories; (manpower is an issue for everything tho)

1 of they are very/ maybe too cheap, 2 they are okay, manpower is lacking but everything else is tough but increase in early game rss may solve this (may but we shall have to wait) and 3) they are too expensive.

AT - 1

AA - 1 (only built 2 of them)

Artillery - 2

Light Tanks - 2

Self-propelled artillery - 2

Interceptors - 3

Tactical bombers - 3

For both planes rare cost is very high and not something I am able to produce many of despite saving my rares pretty much from day 1.

I would have liked to try and build more troops but I lack the manpower to even research them.

Research is very tough due to manpower and early game cash constraints.

Also a single method to increase manpower would be nice, as I said, ICs are just flat too expensive.

Also plane movement speed while they move faster in the air the 30 minute - 60 minute refuel time is very slow and is too high IMO. We shouldnt have to build lvl 2-3 ABs in all provinces just to move planes around without having to wait for 30+ mins, esp given the general lack of available rss it is not feasible.

Hopefully this provides enough detail of my day 8 experience of the economy, I think an increase in starting rss will help but some troops and all buildings (esp IC) are a struggle to upgrade/train. Also an additional building to increase rss and manpower would be great as atm only 1/none is quite boring and feels like a step down from version 1.

16 Nov 2019, 07:15

One of the things I'm most unhappy about is the 1 hour refueling time for planes, but most times it is 30 minutes. Most but not all times I go to a base for the first time it is 1 hour. When on auto-attack it was 30 minutes. And it doesn't seem to matter what level the base is, but I'm not sure. Does anyone have a clear understanding of this aspect of the game so we can comment properly.

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