WG4 decks + gameplay discussion

[QUAD]

2) If unit balance between peers is done correctly so every card option is attractive, mixed decks will have infinitely more variety than coalition decks. Think of the synergy between UK tanks and M2A2 Bradleys for instance, or TY-90s and MI-28. If a unit is directly crappier than its peer, then its availability or price should be changed until its an attractive unit.

Think you hit the nail on the head with this one.
Key word in this one is Balance.

Agree it would be awesome if you did have freedom to pick which one you think is best for your play style.

I think the 120pt T-72's are a good example of doing little variations of similar units.
(E-Ger) Most Armoured + fast, but least accurate
(Pol) slightly more accurate & bit better RoF bit slower bit less armour
(Fin) one's hard hitting & accurate but has bad armour.

Exactly, that's a really good example.

I think the Scandinavian unit roster is another example of the kind of balance I'm going for. If you're making a BLUFOR mixed deck pretty much every non-antique Scandi unit has a good niche that makes it worth taking.

[thelizardofdoom]

Personally I think this is a terrible idea. If yu want to toss coalitions then you want everything to be competitive alone then you need to remove nations.

You can't advocate for removing nations and coalitions and then claim you want to do that because it would give more options. It doesn't, in fact it does precisely the opposite. Which is particularly true when you advocate so hard for mixed decks.

Mixed decks got nerfed hard for a reason. They don't provide the utility you claim, all they do is allow for a person to take the best units in each class in the game and combine them into one deck.

And the only way to prevent that is to make everything cooker cutter standardized.

If you want more diversity of choice in wargame, deleting choices is not the best way to achieve that goal.

[James-Bond]

I'm not too fussed on the whole Coalitions etc need to be removed or not argument.
National/Coalition, Thematic Specialization and Era, all have their Pro's and Con's for deck selection.

But at end of the day it still comes down to balance.
A mixed deck shouldn't be about cherry picking the best units
but It should be about picking units that suits your play-style /strategy.

A good example of something which I think is currently balanced.
Say you are picking picking an 80pt Tank for Blufor, (all come at 10/7 availability)
- Merkava IIB
- M1IP Abrams
- Leopard 2
- Chieftain Mk.11
- STRV 103C
- AMX-40
- Leopard C2 Mexas
Which one do you choose?

Spoiler : :

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[thelizardofdoom]

It shouldn't be......but it is. I'm not going to debate about this because we already saw the reality of the situation before the mixed deck nerf. And that was a bunch of mostly cookie cutter decks.

Worse yet, mixed forces the nerfing of good units so that they don't overperform in their category. For your tank example, a while back I would have chosen the K1 but that got nerfed because it was in every single mixed deck. So BD then lost a very good unit because or mixed.

[SmallWhaler]

I want the game to be unbalanced with USA and USSR being slightly better than the rest, especially for the "most common" way to play, but Eurocorps / Commonwealth / NSWP / Red and Blue Dragons to be dominating USA/USSR in some situation or by some specific metrics, so 50% of the matches involve the 2 big, but you can still fight interesting match against the other ones if the user of the colation knows what he is doing.

Typically, USA has the very goodtanks and very good infantry, but Eurocorps has a much better opener and much faster troops overall. It is overall slightly weaker so if you know how to leverage that speed... great for you.

Basically

[Stoffen]

My personal wishes for a future wargame release:

Continue with cold war era as it is now.

Lock things more into specializations. Ie. super heavies locked to armor decks.
Certain powerfull attack choppers locked to moto decks or whatever.

As it stands, specializations are usually used for cheese such as israeli mech or entente mech.
It would open for more variations in the meta, due to every deck having significant disadvantages.

Remove General decks. Its too difficult to balance.

Lock CERTAIN prototypes to national only.

Now the question is, but how to make sure that not only the big factions are played? Well thats where the coalitions come in. Although unable to use certain prototypes, have far more flexibility.

Certain nations would close to never be used standalone, such as Denmark, but that is on the other hand very realistic.


User interface:
All players into the same pot, as a starting point.
Matchmaker quicksearch function as the primary means of finding games, that can search multiple parametres at once: 1v1 2v2 3v3 etc.
All matches gives elo, automatically - you cannot matchmake without getting or losing elo. Map veto function.
ALSO: you should be able to search matchmaking in timeframes. So that if you tick off the pre 85 or pre 80 box, only decks with those limitations are eligeble. This would split the playerbase a little bit, but it is such a shame that historical gamers cant use this aspect of the game in an automated way.

I would like to see a more diverse map pool, such as middle east, eastern europe, asian/pacific.
Also more interaction with the terrain, hills, weather, rivers, bridges etc. As it stands, terrain rarely plays a part. It would be awesome to see marine type decks at an advantedge on certain maps due to amphibious vehicles.

For factions, I think it is obvious to include the middle eastern nations. Iran, Iraq, Egypt, Jordan and Syria. Although limited changes to the equipment (if any), it would really round out the games reflection of the hot/cold war nations. It would also allow for a more diverse map pool. Golan heights fx.

Although I like the idea of pioneers doing things such bridging / bride reconstruction and/or mine laying/clearing, it may prove too diffcult to carry out in a meaningfull way in the game.

In terms of unit / world interaction, I think Steel Division did a lot of good things in terms of how units move around. It doesnt have to be much more advanced than that imho - with one exception. Embarking and disembarking transports would be amazing to have more organic. Although I understand that this would be insane amounts of work due to the sheer amount of different transports. so its a luxury item rather than a nescecity!

Generally, wargame is the best PC game I know and I guess not too much should change from that. The learning curve just needs to be adjusted so its easier to understand for new players. Marketing needs to step up their "game"

[integ3r]

Some stuff I want:

Veterancy overhaul
- F&F weapons gain almost no bonus from veterancy (I.e. Hellfire), but are generally quite accurate.
- GUID weapons gain a large bonus from veterancy (i.e. malyutka)
- MCLOS weapons and certain GUID weapons are unaffected by ECM values.
- Veterancy generally gives a flat or inverted increase to accuracy, so a unit with low accuracy gains lots from veterancy but a unit with high accuracy does not gain much from veterancy. Which means elite crews can bump a Crappy tank much higher 35% -> 55%. But new tanks don't gain much from veterancy as they rely on technology, but have generally high accuracies anyway.

Reworking ECM
- Helicopters and some tanks can essentially have ECM. (T80UK, shtora, flares)
- Two separate ECM categories: IR / RADAR. If the weapon firing at them is not of these two, then it uses normal accuracy (SPAAG)
- Flares: When fired upon, helicopters/planes gain a temporary buff to avoid being hit by IR based weapons. Higher Flare rating means it lasts longer (with more flare spamming).
- Radar weapons and SPAAG are unaffected by flares but there is a similar effect vs Chaff.
- Aerial jammers grant stealth to nearby aircraft. Now a raven can escort crappier bombers. Or they simply reduce accuracy of Radar based weapons

EW operators
- EW crew can detect presence of enemies without knowing their exact positions ("Detected 2x Tank 1x Infantry") by picking up enemy radio traffic
- [RADIO SILENT] units are undetected by this (See special forces)
- Friendly units within a friendly EW squads radius will know if they have been visually spotted. Otherwise, they will appear as if they're hidden.

Tanks
- Smoke canisters are triggered when a unit panics. This only provides an evasion buff, not a LOS block. Uses SDs retreat mechanics. The canisters can only be used once unless resupplied.
- Tanks with ERA resist 1 hit. If they are hit by a unit that would NOT have killed them then the ERA is still expended. This is bypassed by [TANDEM] warheads which expend the ERA and can kill as normal. ERA can be resupplied.
- Shot corrections. If a shot is missed, then the next hit on the same target will gain accuracy.

Explosives
- Special forces can plant explosives to be detonated at will. (for example, trapping a reinforcement road)

Economy
- Income scaled up to avoid the 5 point balancing problem.

More confusing? More elements, more decisions, more depth, more variety, more fun.

[47andrej]

Some stuff I want:

Veterancy overhaul
- F&F weapons gain almost no bonus from veterancy (I.e. Hellfire), but are generally quite accurate.
- GUID weapons gain a large bonus from veterancy (i.e. malyutka)
- MCLOS weapons and certain GUID weapons are unaffected by ECM values.
- Veterancy generally gives a flat or inverted increase to accuracy, so a unit with low accuracy gains lots from veterancy but a unit with high accuracy does not gain much from veterancy. Which means elite crews can bump a Crappy tank much higher 35% -> 55%. But new tanks don't gain much from veterancy as they rely on technology, but have generally high accuracies anyway.

Reworking ECM
- Helicopters and some tanks can essentially have ECM. (T80UK, shtora, flares)
- Two separate ECM categories: IR / RADAR. If the weapon firing at them is not of these two, then it uses normal accuracy (SPAAG)
- Flares: When fired upon, helicopters/planes gain a temporary buff to avoid being hit by IR based weapons. Higher Flare rating means it lasts longer (with more flare spamming).
- Radar weapons and SPAAG are unaffected by flares but there is a similar effect vs Chaff.
- Aerial jammers grant stealth to nearby aircraft. Now a raven can escort crappier bombers. Or they simply reduce accuracy of Radar based weapons

EW operators
- EW crew can detect presence of enemies without knowing their exact positions ("Detected 2x Tank 1x Infantry") by picking up enemy radio traffic
- [RADIO SILENT] units are undetected by this (See special forces)
- Friendly units within a friendly EW squads radius will know if they have been visually spotted. Otherwise, they will appear as if they're hidden.

Tanks
- Smoke canisters are triggered when a unit panics. This only provides an evasion buff, not a LOS block. Uses SDs retreat mechanics. The canisters can only be used once unless resupplied.
- Tanks with ERA resist 1 hit. If they are hit by a unit that would NOT have killed them then the ERA is still expended. This is bypassed by [TANDEM] warheads which expend the ERA and can kill as normal. ERA can be resupplied.
- Shot corrections. If a shot is missed, then the next hit on the same target will gain accuracy.

Explosives
- Special forces can plant explosives to be detonated at will. (for example, trapping a reinforcement road)

Economy
- Income scaled up to avoid the 5 point balancing problem.

More confusing? More elements, more decisions, more depth, more variety, more fun.

Some great proposals. Also pretty much any point is logical. Scaling up the prices a bit is ok, but still with 5 point system: Wargame is already very math-heavy. 373 points expensive T-80U, 57 points expensive Marder 1A3 and 11 points expensive militia, it would be disgusting and annoying to handle.

Would add artillery radar recon and bridgelayers. Latter ones about giving additional tactical flexibility to the player, not being absolutely necessary.

[James-Bond]

Some stuff I want:

Veterancy overhaul
- F&F weapons gain almost no bonus from veterancy (I.e. Hellfire), but are generally quite accurate.
- GUID weapons gain a large bonus from veterancy (i.e. malyutka)
- MCLOS weapons and certain GUID weapons are unaffected by ECM values.
- Veterancy generally gives a flat or inverted increase to accuracy, so a unit with low accuracy gains lots from veterancy but a unit with high accuracy does not gain much from veterancy. Which means elite crews can bump a Crappy tank much higher 35% -> 55%. But new tanks don't gain much from veterancy as they rely on technology, but have generally high accuracies anyway.

Reworking ECM
- Helicopters and some tanks can essentially have ECM. (T80UK, shtora, flares)
- Two separate ECM categories: IR / RADAR. If the weapon firing at them is not of these two, then it uses normal accuracy (SPAAG)
- Flares: When fired upon, helicopters/planes gain a temporary buff to avoid being hit by IR based weapons. Higher Flare rating means it lasts longer (with more flare spamming).
- Radar weapons and SPAAG are unaffected by flares but there is a similar effect vs Chaff.
- Aerial jammers grant stealth to nearby aircraft. Now a raven can escort crappier bombers. Or they simply reduce accuracy of Radar based weapons

EW operators
- EW crew can detect presence of enemies without knowing their exact positions ("Detected 2x Tank 1x Infantry") by picking up enemy radio traffic
- [RADIO SILENT] units are undetected by this (See special forces)
- Friendly units within a friendly EW squads radius will know if they have been visually spotted. Otherwise, they will appear as if they're hidden.

Tanks
- Smoke canisters are triggered when a unit panics. This only provides an evasion buff, not a LOS block. Uses SDs retreat mechanics. The canisters can only be used once unless resupplied.
- Tanks with ERA resist 1 hit. If they are hit by a unit that would NOT have killed them then the ERA is still expended. This is bypassed by [TANDEM] warheads which expend the ERA and can kill as normal. ERA can be resupplied.
- Shot corrections. If a shot is missed, then the next hit on the same target will gain accuracy.

Explosives
- Special forces can plant explosives to be detonated at will. (for example, trapping a reinforcement road)

Economy
- Income scaled up to avoid the 5 point balancing problem.

More confusing? More elements, more decisions, more depth, more variety, more fun.

The proposals are interesting, and well thought out, but just think a lot of it unnecessarily complex for the actually game play.
Hope it doesn't sound like i'm hating on your post, but would find it interesting to find out more about it.

Examples
for veterancy one.
Balance issue? as it would be better to select cheaper Guided missile & up vett it as it will has a significant accuracy bonus also not affected by ECM, since cheaper stuff has better availability than more expensive things you don't really lose out.

Reworking ECM
the flares for helicopter, would that not make heli-rushes much more annoying? also would flares have cool down or would they need re-armed

EW operators
How is EC Crew related to recon units? (some units has EC ability?) how do you reflect the X units nearby in the UI
could this be abused like if you have 2 EC crew nearby & they both detect 2x tank, then 2x tank will likely be in the overlapping area. like a venn diagram or playing mine sweeper.

Tanks
ERA Armour, this not make armour etc ingame more difficult to balance? Also would it means it's more difficult for ATGM vehicles as tanks can shrug off the 1st hit.

Explosives
When the SF units die, what happens to the explosives, & how do you remove booby traps?

Economy
II don't mind how things are scaled, never understood why things are in 5pt steps, what's wrong with integer values?

[integ3r]

Examples
for veterancy one.
Balance issue? as it would be better to select cheaper Guided missile & up vett it as it will has a significant accuracy bonus also not affected by ECM, since cheaper stuff has better availability than more expensive things you don't really lose out.

Older units typically have other significant drawbacks like lower AP, lack tandem warheads, are slower, have lower range, longer aimtimes, they have no ERA, ECM and have low armor values. Imagine a BMP with a malyutka. Veterancy will just bridge the gap on the accuracy between the malyutka and the superior konkurs (but not completely). You still have to contend with the slow missile speed and the low AP value. The point of this is to make normally "useless" units not completely useless so you actually have an interesting decision to make. More numerous and higher vet, but slightly weaker older units? Do you just take old units at low vet because they will vet up during the match? Do you simply take a modern unit because it has the best of everything?

Reworking ECM
the flares for helicopter, would that not make heli-rushes much more annoying? also would flares have cool down or would they need re-armed

Well I imagine a world where we can maybe get something like SD's map control system. So the value of heli-rushing would be diminished significantly. Older cheaper helicopters do not have flare-pods and flare pods have to be a balancing point. Even so, SPAAG which is the ideal anti-mass heli unit are unaffected. Flares work on a cooldown. Once fired upon, a helicopter or plane will pop a flares which gives an evasion bonus (lower chance but not impossible to hit). Lets say for a basic flare pod it grants you 1.5 seconds of protection then after that it takes 3 seconds for the cooldown during which you have no protection. A more advanced one for like a Raven could grant maybe 3 seconds of protection with only a 2 second cooldown.

EW operators
How is EC Crew related to recon units? (some units has EC ability?) how do you reflect the X units nearby in the UI
could this be abused like if you have 2 EC crew nearby & they both detect 2x tank, then 2x tank will likely be in the overlapping area. like a venn diagram or playing mine sweeper.

I imagine a recon type unit in the recon tab. It only has basic weaponry (weak AT if any at all, a nothing special MG and assault rifles) and is a 5 man squad but relatively expensive. It has a big circle around him when selected. When enemy units are inside this circle, lets say 2x infantry squads and 1x tank, then above him a tiny icon looking like an infantryman and a tiny icon looking like a tank will appear with the number of detected units next to him.

And yes, I imagine that if you have 2 of them, you CAN "abuse" them by overlapping areas and "triangulate" enemy positions. I think it would be interesting and a fun gameplay mechanic.

However if that was a problem then we could make it so that if friendly units within your circle are protected. Instead, when the circle from an enemy EW operator and a circle from a friendly operator touch, then a "???" will be displayed over the operators head and he cannot detect anything within each others circle. So he knows he is being jammed, but he doesn't know anything more than that.

Tanks
ERA Armour, this not make armour etc ingame more difficult to balance? Also would it means it's more difficult for ATGM vehicles as tanks can shrug off the 1st hit.

Maybe, but I think it will be interesting. Basically ANY hit will destroy an ERA. Even a crappy old T-34 will destroy it. Some advanced warheads are also Tandem, which will destroy the ERA and still have a chance to kill.

Explosives
When the SF units die, what happens to the explosives, & how do you remove booby traps?

I imagine they are in place permanently until removed. I also imagine any recon unit will detect it and just shoot it to blow it up.

Economy
II don't mind how things are scaled, never understood why things are in 5pt steps, what's wrong with integer values?

I don't mind it if things were in integer values, but people, justifiably, think it looks ugly and it is more difficult to perform quick head calculations. But it is a problem where cheap infantry units are not worth 15 points but can't be made 10 points. etc.
But to fix this you can just scale up the economy. So, for example, a basic line-infantry unit can cost maybe 30 because you get more income now.