new changes open door to kids, who dont want play on fair conditions, and want have everything immediatly...ChampionBhadra wrote:
I think a new game like this would have been awesome though
8 Nov 2019, 15:44
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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
8 Nov 2019, 15:47
Hello everyone, let me try and answer some of your questions and hopefully provide clarification.
Yes, you are right and we were aware of that problem. This has to do with some internal system changes we made in order to make CoW 1.5 available for all of you, while keeping up creation of the other maps. We are fixing that currently and will have more appropriate starting conditions in the next CoW 1.5 event.Citizenkane wrote:
OK just starting my first test round. Right off the start im confused about the idea's of "Balance" and "Styles of Play" this hope's to achieve. If you start with 5 tank plants and no ordinance plants that hurts players that want to use artillery, anti-tank, anti air forces. I have 4 urban cities that can build tanks, one that can build tanks or planes. If balance and a equal chance to play different strategies is a primary goal each county on a 22 map should have 2 tank plants, 2 ordinance plants and 1 air plant. Again this is just an early observation but if I start a game and their are 5 tank plants then players that want to spam tanks, which requires no real skill, becomes the default primary strategy. That game already exists and has it's own following. I think most players agree to keep COW growing it needs to feature unique options for the gamer to explore.']OK just starting my first test round. Right off the start im confused about the idea's of "Balance" and "Styles of Play" this hope's to achieve. If you start with 5 tank plants and no ordinance plants that hurts players that want to use artillery, anti-tank, anti air forces. I have 4 urban cities that can build tanks, one that can build tanks or planes. If balance and a equal chance to play different strategies is a primary goal each county on a 22 map should have 2 tank plants, 2 ordinance plants and 1 air plant. Again this is just an early observation but if I start a game and their are 5 tank plants then players that want to spam tanks, which requires no real skill, becomes the default primary strategy. That game already exists and has it's own following. I think most players agree to keep COW growing it needs to feature unique options for the gamer to explore.
We still decided to roll out the event now to give first impressions on where we want to go with Call of War in the future. And that future should not be forcing people into the same strategy over and over agai
You kind of state the problem we had with "rare material" over the past years. Nobody really knew what "rare material" really was. It just had this pretty odd state, where you needed lots of it in the first stages of a game but ended with huge loads of it where you didn't really care for it anymore.Zippofish wrote:
My initial reaction is the cost of structures, most especially the rare material. It appears that each structure costs some of every resource. I’m sure I’ll get a better understanding after playing it a bit more. Just seems weird that it makes it not so rare. To me it feels like an obsolete resource now.
We no try to redefine it as a resource that, has its primary use for flying units. You can think of it as aluminium for example, but minerals etc. fall under it too.
Here i can tell you, that you can boost your manpower production by building industry, as it boosts all resource production, as well as money and manpower production.WayneBo wrote:
First observation:All buildings, units and research cost manpower.
Many units require much greater manpower than the original Cow.
But . . . there are NO buildings that increase manpower production!
Let me also stress that are in the first stage of testing our resource balancing in on a great scale. We assumed, that manpower might end up as a bottleneck and highly appreciate all your feedback as it gives us the insight we need to iterate on changes for the future.
8 Nov 2019, 15:55
So guys,
4 hours of playing and it is already the end of Call of War?
As said in another post, this is the first event and we try to listen adopt and evolve the game with you.
In the meantime we already work on new things which not only solve long standing problems but also make the game better. (Last thing is obviously discussable on your point of view)
When i designed Call of War back in 2014 i never envisioned the game to stand still for a long time. Retrospecitvely i must admit that we did not really touch many of the flawed base concepts since then ( Slow early game, fuzzy and hard to understand battles and many mechanics which were designed to be optimized and integrated later (espionage anyone ?!?) to name a few)
We now took the time to really touch some of these systems and i get that not all of you will like it, but i honestly believe that the game needs a facelift to stay alive and keep you interested and attract new players.
So please give us some time and give us honest feedback what you like and what you don´t. This is not a 1 month process after which Call of War will change drastically but a long term project. And of course we won´t make everybody happy or will always make the right calls at first but me and the team believe that the game will be much more interesting longterm.
Till then try to be nice, give honest feedback and help us to shape the game to be future proof!
Enjoy the weekend everybody!
8 Nov 2019, 16:57
Ibeses wrote:
When i designed Call of War back in 2014 i never envisioned the game to stand still for a long time.
Are you planning something to actually retain/increase player base or the whole Call of War 1.5 is only gameplay changes?Ibeses wrote:
We now took the time to really touch some of these systems and i get that not all of you will like it, but i honestly believe that the game needs a facelift to stay alive and keep you interested and attract new players.
8 Nov 2019, 17:16
The game right now is strange.. like research levels are very important now but you have to focus on something and try to build it because you cant do everything.. like i choose to go for planes then i need to fast start lvl 2 and 3 air base and research tactics bombers lvl 3 and interceptors but you end up withot resources and you have to wait days to fill back the resources.
If you wanna improve the resources then you have to build factory which improve your production in the long term but u will need days to make them at least lvl 2 on your urban provinces meanwhile you have no resources to make any troops.
So you either go all inn with troops lvl 1 and start war in the first 2 / 4 days or stay still and slowly improve the economy which makes the game so slow that most ppl would feel like to quit.
8 Nov 2019, 17:24
Your game your rules. 4 hours or 4 days, im stating the fact that: Players like me who have played a long time, don't seem to like it, this is an overhaul more or less. This game built 99% of my social life on the internet, on Discord. I care and want to continue playing this, but im not gonna be an yes man and try and be "nice" about the fact that your are changeing the game in most ways that would validate an new game as much as Supremacy 1 did. It's not that people don't want this updated, and that we don't respect your work. You do amazing work makeing games that no one else has. But when you have such an monopoly on this kind of amazing game, people get defencive.Ibeses wrote:
Till then try to be nice, give honest feedback and help us to shape the game to be future proof!Enjoy the weekend everybody!
I personally, don't play CoN, nor Supremacy (1914 OR 1), Call of War is the game we all love. Hence why we might be a bit aggressive to see thease types of radical changes. Im not gonna sit here and claim "i speak for all people on Call of War". There is clearly people who like it, im not gonna say theres not. And I know a lot is subject to change.
You want to do an facelift but plastic surgery tends to make things more ugly. I am really trying to be nice here, as said, your game your rules. I would not join the 1.5 event if I did not want to give this an shot, and im not gonna out right quit before I see the final changes, but Im saying this now so we can start an discussion and so that we are both able to make this game great, but like I did with Supremacy, if I don't like how the game works, im not gonna play... so we will have to wait and see how this goes.
I wanna make this an nice conversation, so I hope we can continue speaking as we see how develoups.
8 Nov 2019, 21:09
ok how do you build more tank factors and air factors, cause I start out with five tank factories and I want to build more but I do not see an option for it. Also I can not build more air factors
8 Nov 2019, 21:13
Tank Factories and Air Factories are only allowed to be built in urban provinces, so your starting cities. You can build air strips in provinces aside from urban provinces but those are just so you can move your planes around like normal.wedgeantilles wrote:
ok how do you build more tank factors and air factors, cause I start out with five tank factories and I want to build more but I do not see an option for it. Also I can not build more air factors
Dante Bugler1
Game Operator
EN Support Team | Bytro Labs Gmbh
Game Operator
EN Support Team | Bytro Labs Gmbh
8 Nov 2019, 22:20
so basically, you can not spam build ships tanks and infantry
8 Nov 2019, 22:22
Basicaly you cant spam anything.. because there are not enough resources and building structures is too much resource demanding. Even a normal air land is way too costy and the balance around air units is too stupid because they do low damage and gets insane dmg from anyone even infranty lol xD this has no sense at allwedgeantilles wrote:
so basically, you can not spam build ships tanks and infantry
8 Nov 2019, 23:00
Good job bytro ruining what was a decent war strategy game that i would happily spend real money on occasionally.
What we have now falls well short of balance between is it worth playing and occasinally making a gold purchase ? NO. Money can be spent on much better products ect war strategy games that can be inserted into our pc's and the end result is much better in every facet and a more worthwhile investment for war strategy players like myself.
8 Nov 2019, 23:09
Kids rule on game market. True strategy for longtimers has too low RoI (return of investments) for developers.
9 Nov 2019, 00:01
Been playing the game for 4 years now and I can see some real potential behind these changes/ideas.
Let's be honest, CoW as it is now is fun, but the game experience can be much improved in terms of balance, tactics, resource and province management. Therefore, the initiative is welcome and to be respected.
Some feedback already after the first few hours exploring the changes, especially in the technology branch :
- Medium Tank has been rendered useless following the huge attacking boost on the Tank Destroyer. Even if the med tank defensive values are better than the destroyer, neither should be used for defensive purposes (the heavy tank or other units are there for that). Moreover they now share the same speed, which really gives no reason to use medium tanks for breakthroughs vs. tank destroyers. I am not sure though how to balance this properly, as I quite like the new attributes of the tank destroyers... maybe lower some of the values ?
- Motorised Infantry finally a lot more useful through the new attacking bonus implemented for some units. Yet, I would increase its current AA defense value (now only half of the Infantry AA defense value). Also thought the damage should have slightly higher than the Infantry until I realised the added +25% overall damage in plains, which actually fits nicely (but would still increase the AA value...).
- Mechanized Infantry is still not there yet. The speed may be an important factor in tactics, but the damage values are still a bit too low when comparing with the new motorised infantry attributes (and the light armor class does not compensate enough as it is now in my view)
- SP Anti-Air damage values are very scary (but heading in the right direction) and I find the +50% damage bonus in mountains (and nothing in plains) fairly unusual for this type of units. Overall, maybe a slight mistake for its attributes ?
To be continued
Cheers
9 Nov 2019, 00:16
In Cow 1.5 air units are nerfed on the ground.. there are no points in invest in making an air force. Air force has got always nerf after nerfs but now its not flying anymore its feels like chickens that try to fly
9 Nov 2019, 00:30
Willing to give a chance to the new balancing, but if I can say one thing it is that the new rule "all units costs a bit of everything, but in various proportion" is reaallly not user friend nor newbie friendly, and is really something for economic optimizers rather than strategists.Ibeses wrote:
So guys,4 hours of playing and it is already the end of Call of War?
As said in another post, this is the first event and we try to listen adopt and evolve the game with you.
In the meantime we already work on new things which not only solve long standing problems but also make the game better. (Last thing is obviously discussable on your point of view)
When i designed Call of War back in 2014 i never envisioned the game to stand still for a long time. Retrospecitvely i must admit that we did not really touch many of the flawed base concepts since then ( Slow early game, fuzzy and hard to understand battles and many mechanics which were designed to be optimized and integrated later (espionage anyone ?!?) to name a few)
We now took the time to really touch some of these systems and i get that not all of you will like it, but i honestly believe that the game needs a facelift to stay alive and keep you interested and attract new players.
So please give us some time and give us honest feedback what you like and what you don´t. This is not a 1 month process after which Call of War will change drastically but a long term project. And of course we won´t make everybody happy or will always make the right calls at first but me and the team believe that the game will be much more interesting longterm.
Till then try to be nice, give honest feedback and help us to shape the game to be future proof!
Enjoy the weekend everybody!
In CoW 1.0, when I launch a game I check my ressource situation and then map out a bit whether I should invest more in mobile force or infantry etc. If I want more of a specific unit, I quickly realize which resource I lack and I orient my strategy to get it.
In 1.5, it is way more complicated.
It also makes the game auto-balance harder (if you don't have a resource, or very little of a resource, you are DOOMED, whereas in CoW provided you had supplies you could probably find some units to produce), will harm any small AI nations without all resources (since they won't be able to build anything, which means taking their capital will be payday) and is in general not easy on the eye.
The rest I am willing to test more, but the "everything cost all resoures" needs to go IMO.
A minor irritant is that there has been a split between heavy armor and medium armor (which seems a bit too detailled, but fine) but SP AT has been put heavy medium armor, when historically most AT were actually medium armor.
Since you can produce units of different tech level, I would put the early SP ATmedium armor, and the later ones use heavy armors, but actually go slower (you can even end the "Medium SP AT" in research and create "Heavy SP AT" as a new branch that needs Medium SP AT fully researched so it is easier for the player). Minor and personal taste, but missed opportunity if you ask me.
By the way, I am a (former) producer and designer of mobile (freemium) strategy games, so I know my way around balancing & monetisation.
9 Nov 2019, 00:31
Well 95% if the battle was flight in land, not in the sky at sea.
BMfox
Moderator
EN Community Support | Bytro Gmbh
Check out my YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/BMfoxCallofWar
Found a bug or need help? Send a ticket here!
Moderator
EN Community Support | Bytro Gmbh
Check out my YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/BMfoxCallofWar
Found a bug or need help? Send a ticket here!
9 Nov 2019, 00:31
I disagree - Starting Hit Points of tac bombers are now 40 and keep increasing by 40 per level.C88 wrote:
In Cow 1.5 air units are nerfed on the ground.. there are no points in invest in making an air force. Air force has got always nerf after nerfs but now its not flying anymore its feels like chickens that try to fly
Air force used to be the only thing to produce to ensure victory in a lot of situations and vs. most players. It is not the only thing to produce anymore, which is for the best.
Yet, I find the AA value of Anti-Tanks a bit too high.
9 Nov 2019, 02:26
There are many way to counter air units in cow..but most playerbase doesnt have a clue how to use them like i still see ppl who do directs hits under my patrol. hits points means nothing if any units have AA buffed and attack of tactics is so low..Also the patrol tic is still 15 mins meanwhile it should be 7.5 mins because now every attack of the ground is 30 mins and the patrol tic was related to ground tics too.. so another nerf for the planes but you may not even realize what im saying do you?Entrocit wrote:
I disagree - Starting Hit Points of tac bombers are now 40 and keep increasing by 40 per level.Air force used to be the only thing to produce to ensure victory in a lot of situations and vs. most players. It is not the only thing to produce anymore, which is for the best.C88 wrote:
In Cow 1.5 air units are nerfed on the ground.. there are no points in invest in making an air force. Air force has got always nerf after nerfs but now its not flying anymore its feels like chickens that try to flyYet, I find the AA value of Anti-Tanks a bit too high.
9 Nov 2019, 04:34 (edited)
starting HP's of most landunits is eqaul or higher then starting HP's of air units and keep by +-30 per level....Entrocit wrote:
I disagree - Starting Hit Points of tac bombers are now 40 and keep increasing by 40 per level.
But take a look only on two main land unit now: infantryand armored car.
Infantry start with 35 HP 3 aa-damage, first upgrade +25HP +3 aa-dmg, next + 30HP +3aa-dmg; (dont forget +50% damage buff in city)
armored car stadt with 45 HP, 6 aa-dgm, lvl2 +35 HP, +6 aa-dmg; lvl3 +50 HP (!), +6 aa-dmg; lvl 4 +55 HP (!!!) +6 aa-dmg. ( dont forget +50% damage buff on plains)
Also: airforces are nerfed, airforces in CoW 1.5 are 3 till 5 times (each lvl up is more weaker) less usefull then they were in CoW 1.0;
9 Nov 2019, 08:18
C88 wrote:
so another nerf for the planes but you may not even realize what im saying do you?
Someone disagrees with you, so you switch on to a condescending speech to make a better point ? Do you now want to continue in that direction and start comparing K/D ratios vs. players between the 2 of us ?
Last Warrior wrote:
Also: airforces are nerfed, airforces in CoW 1.5 are 3 till 5 times (each lvl up is more weaker) less usefull then they were in CoW 1.0
Tac bombers are still very strong against all artillery and all tank units, starting at first levels.
Now against armored cars and infantry, they are indeed less effective and are matched in damages, but only where armored cars and infantry receive their respective terrain bonus as you described. Still, bombers have more HPs than both of them at the last upgrade.
I agree on the fact that infantry and armored cars may have about 10-20% too much AA defense values though (but still give more AA defense to motorised infantry). Armored cars also seem to have too high damage values vs. light armor and heavy armor.
In summary, the air force (or more precisely the tac bombers) loss of effectiveness in general (which needs to be balanced) is aiming at encouraging players to build all different kinds of units of rather equal amounts, in order to find solutions in most situations.
Bombers have been the fastest and close to the most powerful unit in CoW for a very long time, only to be balanced a bit more recently, which gives more breathing space for other units to exist on the battlefield - And again, letting that happen is a good thing, because having players win most battles by just sending a patroling pack of 40+ bombers on almost anything is a bit sad and unrealistic.
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