New arty changes make the game less fun

[The New BK Champion]

Look at this game devs. You wanted to make the game less arty intense - well you failed. Is there any chance you can revert the changes? Or at least increase price of barrage for fucking hotchkiss?

This game is a picture of pure abuse and cancer of current patch. 70% of my units died to hotckiss. Tell me please how is this balanced, or how I can't play well enough.

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[Mr. FeministDonut]

Oh, I see Frost as PE. Not even surprised

[Shanks]

[Warhawks97]

This is just too funy. srsly. I mean the Hotchkiss had always been like that, just they fired from extrem distances. Now range got lowered and people being forced to fire close range and tada: "OMG, how powerfull is this unit?!" *Facepalm*

Anyway. Scatter might get increased so that it has the scatter it used to have when fired from 175 range. Perhaps not that much but bigger than now.
Also Tank support command might be required in future so that the hotchkiss wont be the earliest arty piece available and that Hetzer and Hotchkiss would require both buildings (Tank hunter and support command).
The upgrade cost might increase as well or the barrage cost or both. Also hotchkiss might get slower (its speed got upped from 2.8 to 5.5 and 4.5 with rockets added) so that there is a greater risk deploying it.

One or some of these changes will come.

[Krieger Blitzer]

One or some of these changes will come.

I would say "one" would be enough.. because "some" will be too much, I guess.

And I like how the Hotchkiss became faster now, also... Hetzer should never be delayed.

[The New BK Champion]

This is just too funy. srsly. I mean the Hotchkiss had always been like that, just they fired from extrem distances. Now range got lowered and people being forced to fire close range and tada: "OMG, how powerfull is this unit?!" *Facepalm*

Aoe changes were made. Now infantry dies even outside blast animation radius. Combinig it with smaller range = bigger accuracy you have much more deadly unit. If you can't see it, it's your problem. You don't play pvp anyway so why bother.

[Warhawks97]

I would say "one" would be enough.. because "some" will be too much, I guess.

And I like how the Hotchkiss became faster now, also... Hetzer should never be delayed.

Depending on how strong one of these changes are. EG upgrade cost to 100 ammo or upgrade cost to 75 and barrage cost to 75. Thats what i meant with some of them. It depends how big one of these changes will be.

Also nobody want the hetzer delayed. Just that it might be that Hotchkiss rocket upgrade requires Tank support command instead of simply logistic company upgrade. This arty is very soon available measured on its damage potential. Other arty of that kind requires even a CP unlock and more tec.
And the Hotchkiss is a racing car currently. It doesnt fit in any way to its realistic behaviour. I mean its afterall a tank based on ww1 design. Now its faster than a sherman, even with rocket pack upgraded. That and the quick barrage puts literally 0 risk in using this arty. Keep in mind that this thing can even defend themselvs against light tanks and vehicles that try to kill it and even M10´s quite easily. A Pair of them puts a nice firepower against M10 rush attempts.

So its very very cheap to build, very cheap to fire, very early available, has very high damage (better than a 105 howitzer in all regards, damage and AoE), it is very fast to eacape all risks easily and those who are fast enough can be killed by its 37 mm gun. Its acceleration is also very good, reaching top speed in about a second. Thats enough to escape from most counterattacks.
Wihout rockets its faster than an M10. With rockets still faster than a 76 sherman. E8 has hard times to catch it. M10 can catch it but can be killed by hotchkiss tanks as well.

Aoe changes were made. Now infantry dies even outside blast animation radius.

AoE of this rockets as well as those of normal neblers have been increased from 12-15 range.
The Brackets changed from (short-medium-long-distant):
2/ 5/ 8/ 12 to 1/ 5/ 9/ 15

Damage kept at 350:
Damage modifier at each AoE distant from:
1/ 075/ 5/ 5 to 1.8/ 0.75/ 0.5/ 0.2

Damage modifier vs most allied tanks from 1 to 0.75.

What i figured is that the "Accuracy" in each AoE Bracket changed from:
1/ 0.7/ 0.6 /0.5 to 1/ 1/ 1/ 1 (idk how exactly this affects the game but i think that there is a chance for the blast to miss the target or not to penetrate it. That got changed so that might be one big reason. Total AoE increased, yes, but inf the AoE area lets say of 10-12 should take significantly less damage.

Now you can calculate everything for yourself.

Combinig it with smaller range = bigger accuracy you have much more deadly unit. If you can't see it, it's your problem.

Yes, but it has always been like that. It got used against my team already but i also used it myself prior to the patch quite often. It does kill inf a bit better now but its harder to kill tanks now. This Hotckiss is Not new, ive seen it already long before, but most of the players simply played with two blind eyes and used it wrong by shooting it from max range. Nobody was brave enough to get closer on the target bc 99% of the players here are 0% risk players. But taking a risk is what brings perhaps the wished results (take the B29 Bombings on Japan in 45. Usually dropping them from 8 and more km altitude and thus far less in danger of AA guns and japanese fighters which had poor performance at that altitude, they then got order to drop from like 4 km altitude in order to increase accuracy but taking more losses. Same goes for decisions whether to fly bombing missions at day or night.

So dont blame a unit when in fact the way of usage has changed by force.
I agree that steps must be taken now, just saying that its funny how its "Suddenly" deadly.

You don't play pvp anyway so why bother.

Wrong. What has actually changed that i dont bother arround with these self proclaimed pro-gamer community with all these guys that are always complaining about random players, bad team balance or whatever and their meta gameplays. I had a discussion two days ago with others. I didnt know them but you could see the huge split within the community. There are plenty of players now and 4 vs 4 get filled within a minute sometimes. But its these "BK nobles" that makes it very hard for many players to get pvp experience or to get into the BK community bc they get kicked all day long. And dare one of them ruins the 200 Win Streak of my favorit faction x. OMG hell lot loose.

[The New BK Champion]

Yes, giving it acceleration buff was stupid. Not explainable neither by realism nor balance.

I am against further nerfs of hetzer, but hotchkiss is definitely op now.

[Warhawks97]

Yes, giving it acceleration buff was stupid. Not explainable neither by realism nor balance.

The acceleration was always high but top speed increased from 2.8 to 5.5 and 4.5 with rockets.

In comparission an easy eight has 4.6 top speed. Why i mention that one? Bc its the only US unit that might be fast enough without being threatend by the hotchkiss 37 mm gun.

I am against further nerfs of hetzer, but hotchkiss is definitely op now.

I think thats the common sense now.

[MarKr]

Aoe changes were made. Now infantry dies even outside blast animation radius. Combinig it with smaller range = bigger accuracy you have much more deadly unit. If you can't see it, it's your problem. You don't play pvp anyway so why bother.

The Hotchkiss has still same AoE per rocket, does deals more damage to infantry only on direct hit (but that would have killed infantry even before 5.1.5 so it does not make any difference). The only difference is the range:

pre-5.1.5 Hotckiss had the range of 175 which meant more spread and so the rockets did not cover the entire hit zone with their AoE. Now the maximum range is 135 and the rockets have still the same size of AoE but at this range they more easily cover the entire hit zone, but nothing prevented anybody from shooting such barrages in pre-5.1.5 games, but people mostly fired at max range so the arty wasn't so effective.

Anyway...you speak about Hotchkiss being the problem but in your first post you write

Is there any chance you can revert the changes? Or at least increase price of barrage for fucking hotchkiss?

So you ask for putting every arty unit back to where it was...what is the problem with other arty? I haven't heard anyone complain about anything else appart from Hotchkiss and perhaps Priest.

EDIT:
The Rocket upgrade will get some requirement so that it is not available so early, the scatter will be a bit bigger and possibly the price per barrage a bit higher. Speed increase was requested from players (don't remember who came with it but I remember this was idea from players). It was put on same level as Light tanks of Allies with speed decrease after upgrading the rockets. It can be lowered. What speed would you find appropriate? Obviously the speed with rockets is too high but is the 5.5 speed without rockets OK or do you consider it also too high?

[Warhawks97]

The Hotchkiss has still same AoE per rocket, does deals more damage to infantry only on direct hit (but that would have killed infantry even before 5.1.5 so it does not make any difference). The only difference is the range:
Hotchkiss.jpg
pre-5.1.5 Hotckiss had the range of 175 which meant more spread and so the rockets did not cover the entire hit zone with their AoE. Now the maximum range is 135 and the rockets have still the same size of AoE but at this range they more easily cover the entire hit zone, but nothing prevented anybody from shooting such barrages in pre-5.1.5 games, but people mostly fired at max range so the arty wasn't so effective.

viewtopic.php?f=27&t=2786

So i am right but apparently people didnt want to believe me.

In topic i meant 12 AoE in versions prior to the entire 5. series and betas. (attrib file)

EDIT:
The Rocket upgrade will get some requirement so that it is not available so early, the scatter will be a bit bigger and possibly the price per barrage a bit higher. Speed increase was requested from players (don't remember who came with it but I remember this was idea from players). It was put on same level as Light tanks of Allies with speed decrease after upgrading the rockets. It can be lowered. What speed would you find appropriate? Obviously the speed with rockets is too high but is the 5.5 speed without rockets OK or do you consider it also too high?

It might be a "light tank" but was still heavier than the axis tanks (Tank I and II) at that time and had superior armor and gun. It was very slow and germans kept it in service as support vehicle or reverted it into TD´s, gun carriage and command tanks. Germans took everything they got their hands on, there was always a purpose like for crushing partisans and stuff.
The point is that it can serve as a light tank for TH doc for veery low cost that can deal with early vehicles or at least protecting friendly infantry from vehicle attacks. Later being used as a rocket carrier supporting the bigger tanks.
The speed 2.8 was based on realistic speed of 28 kph. The stuart has 5.8 bc it had a speed of 58 kph.
And as far as i know thats the reason why most tanks and vehicles have got their speed values. Like Panthers and shermans recently. I dont see a reason why a outdated french tank shall be a 1 to 1 counterpart to stuart tanks which came into service when the Hotckiss was long outdated.

I would simply drop the build cost even further so that it is really a cheap support for PE infantry early on and keep its old speed... well perhaps a bit faster. But generally i found them usefull enough and i managed to get as close as 120 range, fire the barrage and escape. This speed makes it simply uncatchable and thus a 0 risk unit.
Has that speed change been even announced or mentioned in the changelogs?

[MarKr]

The speeds - I am not sure which Hotchkiss variant is used in the game. VCoH had the H35 which had max speed of 28km/h but later version (H39) had speed of up to 36.5 km/h - this verison had the SA38 cannon (or at least some were upgraded with this gun) which was better than the original short-barrel on H35 and in the game the Hotchkiss comes with this upgraded gun.

So the basic speed could be set to 3.6 and with rocket upgrade it could drop to the original 2.8.

And yes, the change is mentioned in the 5.1.5 changelog - in the "PE section".

[Krieger Blitzer]

The Rocket upgrade will get some requirement so that it is not available so early, the scatter will be a bit bigger and possibly the price per barrage a bit higher. Speed increase was requested from players (don't remember who came with it but I remember this was idea from players). It was put on same level as Light tanks of Allies with speed decrease after upgrading the rockets. It can be lowered. What speed would you find appropriate? Obviously the speed with rockets is too high but is the 5.5 speed without rockets OK or do you consider it also too high?

Don't nerf it too much.
I agree with this:

So the basic speed could be set to 3.6 and with rocket upgrade it could drop to the original 2.8.

However, if you combine this with "later available rockets upgrade" in addition to "a bit bigger scatter" as well as "higher barrage price" then I believe it will be too much... No one wants to see the Hotchkiss too OP as it is now, but at the same time.. no one would be happy to see it useless either!

So, I would say.. just lower the speed as you said, and delay the rockets upgrade until the 3rd OR the 4th building(s) is constructed.. and that's it.

[Warhawks97]

The speeds - I am not sure which Hotchkiss variant is used in the game. VCoH had the H35 which had max speed of 28km/h but later version (H39) had speed of up to 36.5 km/h - this verison had the SA38 cannon (or at least some were upgraded with this gun) which was better than the original short-barrel on H35 and in the game the Hotchkiss comes with this upgraded gun.

So the basic speed could be set to 3.6 and with rocket upgrade it could drop to the original 2.8.

sounds fair.

[The New BK Champion]

Yea, I agree with this.