Concerns from a french community

[Ze_PilOt]

They can't really speak English, so I translate some of the remarks (I'm not the author of that). I will do a resume and transmit that back :

- Turtling in more present than before : At T2, they see a lot of T2 PD and shields. That make a front line. As air is less effective than before, it's almost impossible to break that line with air forces. Flak spam is common because of the fear or the mercy, and that lock the situation even harder.

- Then come a T3 rush for assault bots, and T3 arty (turtler unit ???). UEF and Cybran are at advantage here because their t3 bots are fast and uncatchable by any unit (from t1 to t3) from aeon or seraphim. You can say goodbye to everything they will cross. If that's not a imbalance !

- As T4 is more expensive (not that bad), offensive T3 is at advantage for UEF and Cybran, I can see the damage done by these units on a map where the mexes are spread. Impossible to counter without air support.

- On these kind of game, the team that make T4 first wins. Except in a case of air domination that can counter easily a T4.
Or One or several ACU with shields + OC, making turtling even more easier...

- Some factions are at great advantage on water (the same : Cybran and UEF). Yes, the t3 battleship is really powerful. Aeon and Sera doesn't have a T3 torp defense to counter it, Cybran do.

- The time passed on sera T3 naval, the cybran player can already have 6 destroyers (same build time). Even at that time, 2 sera subs can't defeat them because they are slowed down in the last patch : The sub cannot kite them. Balanced faction, I don't think so !
No joke, did you see the sera cruiser in combat situation ? And the Aeon destroyer ? It miss half his fire !

- For the upgrades (the sera regen - back), I saw that you don't have a HP increase anymore, and for that cost, I almost had an heart attack !! I think that everyone on FAF stop using it, but UEF and Aeon only do that (shields). Not a imbalance problem here too ?

- On 20 games, 16 were :
- T2 ACU + T2 PD + air t1 spam.
- Turtling in the middle of the map.
- T3 land with t3 arty spam and some bots.
- then a common T4.
Always the same tactics and com bombing strike back !

- Impossible to scout anymore with T3 air scout too expensive. Make turtling even more profitable, because the enemy can't see where he goes.

I've asked several (French) players about all that :
- The balance is not there. Some factions are at great advantage (UEF and Cybran ?)
- When you play a 4v4 on FAF, no need to think, only one tactic works : Eco-turtling and fast T4.
- t1 air spam is so stupid and can defeat fast air T3, but for land, it doesn't work.
- On naval maps (seton, ranaoke), a player that have no fleet lost the game. Air can't be used to get back in the game anymore, the cost of units too imbalanced is the only reason.
- FAF have a totally out of phase with FA logic. In FA, air is dominant, like real war, having air control is normally the way to succeed. With FAF, air is an option, just for scout scouting and dropping.
- I think I will uninstall FAF, I can't have fun with that balance, no strategy, games are all the same. In 95% of the cases, the winning team is the one with the better eco.

[_PG_]

Must be an epic noob who wrote that.... For the turtling and T2 pd... it is easily counterable with MML and alot cheaper then making pd, the opponent will be forced to back off and you then reclaim the T2 turtle spot.....simple

[Gowerly]

I wouldn't show this to ubergeek, he believes cybran are at a massive disadvantage in t3 land.

I'll take the bottom 7 points:
- T1 scouts can be spammed at t3 for scouting
- I don't agree on fast T4 being powerful. If your enemy is ecoing, a simple T2 or T3 acu drop will take care of that. I will happily demonstrate how awesome that is.
- Fast T3 air was ridiculously effective. Now it isn't. This is better. T1 air spam can be taken down by small amounts of flakk. T3 air beats EVERYTHING, no exceptions, so keeping that harder to make moves the balance away from T3 air first = win.
- Navy is strong on naval maps? WHO KNEW?! Again, as has been mentioned, T2 torpedo bombers beat all navy for cost.
- As much as I liked 3599, 3603 is still about some air control, just nowhere near as bad. Yes, real war is about the skies, but the air usually doesn't play such a strong role in the combat as it does in FA. Air being an option is the best thing. You can use it, but you don't have to
- From my experience playing, 3599 was more about eco whoring than FAF is. It sounds like all they have played is Setons, which is hardly a valid show of how FA is.

[uberge3k]

Speaking as a player who started 3 years ago now on GPGNet with ranked, and has made it a point to play as many different types of game modes and styles of play as possible, (and who has also written a tutorial (http://forums.gaspowered.com/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=52617) on the subject), I'll respond to each of these concerns point by point:

- Turtling in more present than before : At T2, they see a lot of T2 PD and shields. That make a front line.

This is the role of PDs and shields; to make a defensive line over a valuable resource that you need to hold - in this case, land.

It's important to note that PDs and shields cannot move. If the other team is investing heavily in PDs and shields (and the power to run said shields), I'm putting my economy into making MMLs and tanks to overrun them with. They now need to invest exponentially more than I do to hold that line against my MML spam. If they're too dug in, then I'll circle around and hit them where they are unprotected - again, firebases cannot move, and they are necessarily neglecting other vulnerable areas.

Finally, making a defensive line over a contested area necessarily requires them to have already won the early skirmish over it. I have yet to see a "T2 PD rush" be successful as early T1 spam can easily overrun and kill the PD rusher before he has his first PD finished. Alternatively, if are have already lost that early skirmish and thus allowed them to dig in with PDs and shields, then you are already losing, and that team deserves to be able to have a better chance at holding that territory with their economic advantage.

As air is less effective than before, it's almost impossible to break that line with air forces.

And this is far better than the alternative. In 3599, ASFs and strat bombers were so overpowering that you needed very little expansion - the single best tactic on nearly any map was to tech fast to T3 and have ASFs out by the ~8 minute mark, with a quick T3 bomber to harass your enemy's base. After that, it was a race to see who could spam more ASFs, as they are the only viable counter to strat bombers. Thus, ground forces, aside from the occasional super-cheap and spammable experimental, were largely ignored in favor of eeking out a few more ASF.

Please view this replay (go to GPGNet and paste it in chat to download it): replay:TAG_uberge3k/7-26-2011-11-47-19.SupremeCommanderReplay

Myself and an acquaintance + some randoms vs a team of Fredou and fellow SUT clan members. I did nothing but eco and rush a T3 bomber by 12 minutes, which singlehandedly won the game, even after losing a teammate early on - to the point where Fredou and his friends repeatedly abused the shield give exploit to stay alive! While the exploit usage is quite secondary to this post, it speaks to how overpowering early T3 air is in 3599 games.

Flak spam is common because of the fear or the mercy, and that lock the situation even harder.

Flak is not a counter to mecies. They are far too easily distracted and flak is far too slow for it to be of much use at all - stationary T1 AA is their only real counter. Tangentially, I fully agree that mercies need nerfing - however, flak spam, even if it is a corollary to mercy spam (which it shouldn't be, as it is ineffective), is the correct counter to T2 air and slowing down T3 air.

A mobile T2 flak costs almost as much as an ASF, mass wise - shouldn't it be powerful enough to at least graze them on their way past?

- Then come a T3 rush for assault bots, and T3 arty (turtler unit ???).

Upgrading to T3 is a common and correct counter if a T2 battle has stagnated and one side has enough time to upgrade to T3. It is completely impossible to "rush" to T3 successfully - it takes a minimum of 10-12 minutes before the first T3 bot is ready, assuming there is reclaim on your map, a decent amount of mex's available and easy to defend, and you are allowed to do nothing but eco.

I have yet to see evidence that T3 arty is OP. Assuming I've already done this mythical T3 rush, why would I build T3 arty? T3 bots are far more effective at killing T1 and T2 swarms.
T3 arty is mostly useful for shelling (fire)bases from a distance, and possibly outranging T3 armies during standoffs. And it is indeed necessary to use it against an especially turtle-y player who is layering shields and possibly has T3 PDs - in fact, T3 arty is perhaps one of the best anti-turtle units in the game. You mentioned just earlier that 360X leads to more turtley games with lines of PDs and shields, so I would have thought you would like this kind of unit?

UEF and Cybran are at advantage here because their t3 bots are fast and uncatchable by any unit (from t1 to t3) from aeon or seraphim. You can say goodbye to everything they will cross. If that's not a imbalance !

I wholeheartedly disagree with this assessment. Consult the unit database and compare and contrast each faction's T3 units: http://88.191.143.136/faforever/unitsDB ... bp=UAL0303

Yes, titans and loyalists are slightly faster, 3 to 4. The difficulty is, they also have horrible DPS compared to, say, a harbinger: http://88.191.143.136/faforever/unitsDB ... bp=UAL0303

Let's do some quick math, using the Loyalist as an example (since Cybran are horribly OP at T3, as per your claims):

Even if you have 2 loyalists to 1 harb (960 mass to 840), you still have less DPS and only 200 more HP. You can run away, sure, but that only benefits the harbs, thanks to their quickly regenerating shield. Titans are slightly more effective, since their shields can regen as well, but they also have less DPS so you'll take even longer raiding back and forth, during which time the harb's shields are still regenrating.

While I did not include this in my calculations (remember, the attacking loyalists/titans cost 120 mass more than the defending harbs), since in this scenario the harbs necessarily be standing still while the titans and loyalists raid them, they would have an even larger advantage as they pick the terrain - and are most likely closer to reinforcements.

- As T4 is more expensive (not that bad), offensive T3 is at advantage for UEF and Cybran, I can see the damage done by these units on a map where the mexes are spread. Impossible to counter without air support.

This is completely, 100% false, and quite easily disprovable. Let's start with the cheapest experimental, the Monkey Lord: http://88.191.143.136/faforever/unitsDB ... bp=URL0402

It costs 21k mass, has a 4k DPS main weapon (which, in practice, is much less as it must move from target to target), and has a maximum movement speed of 2.5.

Let's compare this with the tank of one of the horribly underpowered factions, such as the Oothum: http://88.191.143.136/faforever/unitsDB ... bp=XSL0303

You can get nearly 25 Oothums for the price of a monkeylord. Who will win this engagement?

The Oothums will win, hands down, as they move at the same speed as a monkeylord and their range is almost identical (30 for the ML vs 25 for the Oothums). When you add shields into the mix, something Cybran does not have, the balance tips even further.

If you do the same math with Harbingers, it turns out even better, seeing as harbs are faster than a Monkeylord (movement speed of 3 vs the ML's 2.5). A very, VERY far cry from "uncatchable without air support!"

- On these kind of game, the team that make T4 first wins. Except in a case of air domination that can counter easily a T4.
Or One or several ACU with shields + OC, making turtling even more easier...

I think my above paragraph already disproves this line of reasoning. There simply is no way for an experimental to be more cost effective than it's T3 counters. And if you aren't at T3 and your enemy has an experimental... well than I think we can all agree you were going to lose anyway.

- Some factions are at great advantage on water (the same : Cybran and UEF). Yes, the t3 battleship is really powerful. Aeon and Sera doesn't have a T3 torp defense to counter it, Cybran do.

Seraphim are still the dominant force on the seas by the time battleships come into play. Their T3 subs are still *incredibly* powerful against their counters, even with reduced speed. They also have their own battleship.

Aeon have their own battleships to counter, as well as easily spammable hover shields and flak, not to mention destroyers which are very powerful against slow moving targets such as a Cybran destroyer.

Cybran T3 torp launchers are *rarely* seen, and when they are, it's almost always when they'd already lost the sea and are desperately trying to stay in it. Subhunters from any faction can kill it quite mass effectively as well.

- The time passed on sera T3 naval, the cybran player can already have 6 destroyers (same build time). Even at that time, 2 sera subs can't defeat them because they are slowed down in the last patch : The sub cannot kite them. Balanced faction, I don't think so !

Build time is largely irrelevant in such discussions, as economy is vastly more important.

Compare and contrast the subhunter http://88.191.143.136/faforever/unitsDB ... bp=XSS0304 and a cybran destroyer: http://88.191.143.136/faforever/unitsDB ... bp=URS0201

The destroyer has 6050 hp, and can only do 100 DPS to subhunters via their torps, for 2250 mass.
The subhunter has 4500 hp, does 335 DPS, and costs only 3000 mass.

Using your example, the seraphim player has put in 6k mass into their subs, while the cybran has put in 13,500. That's less than half.

I would say that T3 subhunters are still slightly OP.

No joke, did you see the sera cruiser in combat situation ? And the Aeon destroyer ? It miss half his fire !

Cruisers aren't meant for combat scenarios. They're meant to provide anti-air support and to TML bases into submission from afar.

Aeon destroyers have a bug with their beam weapon's targeting. This is being worked on - I agree that in it's current state, they are less effective against other faction's destroyers.

- For the upgrades (the sera regen - back), I saw that you don't have a HP increase anymore, and for that cost, I almost had an heart attack !! I think that everyone on FAF stop using it, but UEF and Aeon only do that (shields). Not a imbalance problem here too ?

Assuming you are referring to the Nano upgrade, it still gives a very large HP increase, which also multiplies on top of veterancy increases: http://88.191.143.136/faforever/unitsDB ... bp=XSL0001

It remains perhaps one of the most deadly ACU upgrades of any faction, even moreso than shields, due to it's ridiculously fast HP regeneration that makes it nearly invincible to everything but masses of snipers or experimentals.

- On 20 games, 16 were :
- T2 ACU + T2 PD + air t1 spam.
- Turtling in the middle of the map.
- T3 land with t3 arty spam and some bots.
- then a common T4.
Always the same tactics and com bombing strike back !

Please provide replays of this.

However, even if you can, I can counter it right now as I can tell you that 20 out of 20 3599 games will involve swarms of ASF. So, we're already at an improvement as we have more tactical diversity!

As for com bombing... What? ACU death blast damage has been lowered to 2500, and it can barely scratch bases now. Combined with the fact that Share Until Death games are becomming more and more the norm, com bombing is incredibly ineffective.

- Impossible to scout anymore with T3 air scout too expensive. Make turtling even more profitable, because the enemy can't see where he goes.

Since when are T3 scouts more expensive? I'm looking at http://88.191.143.136/faforever/fafwiki/index.php/3605 and am unable to see the part where T3 air scouts were affected, aside from the normal (and quite negligible) 50% increase in energy consumption. T3 scouts are just as quick, cheap and disposable as they've ever been.

- The balance is not there. Some factions are at great advantage (UEF and Cybran ?)

I disagree completely, and have elaborated and supplied supporting facts to prove this. If you believe this so much, please point out the logical flaws in my above arguments, and where my math is incorrect. Please, double check it for yourself using the unit database. If you are so certain of this, it should be quite easy to prove it!

- When you play a 4v4 on FAF, no need to think, only one tactic works : Eco-turtling and fast T4.

I would be happy to show you a wealth of games in which this is not the case. In fact, I daresay that you could pick most any replay, at random, containing 8 top players and see that there is little to no use of your "eco turtling and fast T4" situation.

- t1 air spam is so stupid and can defeat fast air T3, but for land, it doesn't work.

I'm not sure I understand this.

T1 landspam can most *definitely* defeat "fast" T3 land. I have already proved this with my earlier argument.

Now you dislike the very same balance in air? You claimed that you disliked T3 land because it could not be countered by T1 (which is inaccurate, as I proved earlier), which would imply that you are *for* T1 spam being able to overwhelm quick T3 rushes. But... now you've done a 180 on this argument, and *want* T3 air rush to be able to beat T1 air spam?

Color me confused.

- On naval maps (seton, ranaoke), a player that have no fleet lost the game. Air can't be used to get back in the game anymore, the cost of units too imbalanced is the only reason.

Please watch this replay: replay:TAG_ROCK_/5-30-2011-13-38-38.SupremeCommanderReplay

It is a 4v4 on Seton's Clutch, using the 3603 mod.

We lost navy on both sides, and yet somehow managed to win, mainly due to air.

- FAF have a totally out of phase with FA logic. In FA, air is dominant, like real war, having air control is normally the way to succeed. With FAF, air is an option, just for scout scouting and dropping.

First off, FAF is simply a lobby and update system for FA, so speaking of them as two separate entities in that context is misleading.

Second, this is a game about giant robots blowing each other up in the 31st century. We've already made and accepted many, many logical leaps to get this far. Comparisons with real life are irrelevent when you can instantly and effortlessly beam matter and energy from opposite ends of an 81x81km map, transport matter to distant planets through a quantum network, and efficiently harvest raw natural resourses to materialze war machines.

Lastly, more options is always a good thing. In 360X balance, spamming ASF is no longer mandatory. You are now free to try a much wider variety of tactics than you otherwise could have with 3599.

I define a strategy game as "having many options available to choose from, but only being able to practically implement a small subsection of them". In other words, each game is something like a grand adventure - I can choose to spam T1 land and ACU rush, I can choose to try and tech quickly for a T2 rush, I can choose to go all air, I can choose to drop you or bomb you, and many, many more options - yet I can only successfuly do one or two effectively.

In that sense, having one single strategy no longer be the dominant, beats-everything-else-by-a-mile strategy, there are many more viable options now, and the game is even more strategic and interesting! This is a good thing!

In 95% of the cases, the winning team is the one with the better eco.

As it should be. There are very, very few games where the winner, at the end of the game, has less mass used than his enemy, if you filter the endgame statistics that way. In fact, I can't think of a single reason why it would happen, aside from an exceptionally lucky snipe.

- I think I will uninstall FAF, I can't have fun with that balance, no strategy, games are all the same.

I would be sorry if you did so, as I genuinely believe that you would be missing out. I think that if you approached it with an open mind and let go of past preconceptions regarding air balance, you might come to appreciate the new balance - and if not, you would most likely be in a much better case to support your arguments as you could accumulate new facts and defenses for your opinions. Who knows, you might come up with something we missed!