Elite Mod COH - Download and Changelog

Try it out and let me know what you think. Mainly looking at:

- Are squads staying in cover?
- Is autocover search range large enough that drag orders reliably let you put your squad in cover?
- Are focus fire orders staying closer together, rather than belly-flopping at the enemy?

I will try them out (especially lmg grens) in an hour or 8, now I have to sleep first.

Hi Tommy. This Mod is a great idea. Thanks you put work into this, it´s much appreciated.

I really like the bug fixes so far but i am not sure about the balance changes. Is it an option to keep the balance as it is and stay at fixing bugs for the moment (Staghound MG for example)?

Only the best CoH Players should try to fix the balance (my twot cents), i am not good enough to be one of them so it´s hard for me to accept and understand the changes you made. I agree, Snipers are a issue but for exmaplae changing the refresh costs, i don´t know.. .

Hi Tommy. This Mod is a great idea. Thanks you put work into this, it´s much appreciated.

I really like the bug fixes so far but i am not sure about the balance changes. Is it an option to keep the balance as it is and stay at fixing bugs for the moment (Staghound MG for example)?

Only the best CoH Players should try to fix the balance (my twot cents), i am not good enough to be one of them so it´s hard for me to accept and understand the changes you made. I agree, Snipers are a issue but for exmaplae changing the refresh costs, i don´t know.. .

I'll just quote myself.

- Yes, the game as it stands (2.602/Steam) is pretty darn good. The balance is great. The core game design is brilliant. However, some strategies remain the 'go-to' while others fall by the wayside and are consistently rendered useless. I'm not talking about niche units, I'm talking about downright unused ones, that really have little purpose. The officer is one of them. The M3 is another. The croc is another. And so on. In a perfect world, EVERY unit would have a purpose. Not every game, and not in every situation, but it would be useful in at least some way. That's what I want to do with this mod.

- Secondly, and crucially, I'm going to be as clinical as possible in my approach to changes. The first, and biggest issue to tackle, is that of snipers. So until snipers are working just the way I/we want (and for that, I need people to report playing experiences ^^), that's going to be the primary focus of change. After that, I will draw a line under snipers and focus on something else. Of course, changes to X unit and mean a change in Y unit, so further small adjustments may need to be made to, for example, snipers, even after we've officially branded them 'fixed'.

Mortars suffer from a few other problems. If you lose one man on the crew then they are one death away from a squad wipe. And if the squad wipe comes during retreat the weapon is lost too.

While this same mechanic exists for ATs there are some differences: First, the AT crew has its own built-in green cover. Second, since there is no retreat, the AT gun will stay on the field meaning you still potentially have that 280mp investment (Edit: And it can be repaired). This mortar crew vulnerability also means that US mortars are pretty vulnerable to the outranging Wehr mortar so many just aren't that keen on getting them, especially for 280mp.

MGs are cheaper at 240mp and much more survivable because they can survive the loss of two men in the crew (despite also being a crew served weapon).

I have no idea if the mortar mechanic can be changed, but certainly its cost can.

The MG and Mortar have the problem of time to retreat.

Often you push retreat, but in that moment the firing crew member dies. Then it takes time till the second crew member moves to the firing spot. By now the Mg/Mortar hasn't retreated for 2 Seconds.
He is finally there and the demount process starts. While that another men dies and with only 1 crew member left the third commits suicide. The Mg magically dissapears now, althought I stopped the retreat seconds ago.

Bad explanation, but I think everybody knows what I'm talking about anyway.

The MG and Mortar have the problem of time to retreat.

Often you push retreat, but in that moment the firing crew member dies. Then it takes time till the second crew member moves to the firing spot. By now the Mg/Mortar hasn't retreated for 2 Seconds.
He is finally there and the demount process starts. While that another men dies and with only 1 crew member left the third commits suicide. The Mg magically dissapears now, althought I stopped the retreat seconds ago.

Bad explanation, but I think everybody knows what I'm talking about anyway.

That happens with mortars but not MGs, they'll stay alive until all squad members are dead. And honestly I consider it a feature that it takes some time for the secondary gunner to replace the dead (main) gunner- a good player will snipe the gunner and use that opportunity to rush the MG.

Mortars suffer from a few other problems. If you lose one man on the crew then they are one death away from a squad wipe. And if the squad wipe comes during retreat the weapon is lost too.

While this same mechanic exists for ATs there are some differences: First, the AT crew has its own built-in green cover. Second, since there is no retreat, the AT gun will stay on the field meaning you still potentially have that 280mp investment (Edit: And it can be repaired). This mortar crew vulnerability also means that US mortars are pretty vulnerable to the outranging Wehr mortar so many just aren't that keen on getting them, especially for 280mp.

MGs are cheaper at 240mp and much more survivable because they can survive the loss of two men in the crew (despite also being a crew served weapon).

I have no idea if the mortar mechanic can be changed, but certainly its cost can.

Euhm how is it in COH2, does the weapon drop?

I know the Squad sizes are bigger there, which could be an option to make them 4 man teams. Another option is to give them a more resilient armor type.
Because it's true that it's somewhat an issue that mortars are so vulnerable. Oth you can protect them by putting behind buildings or other shot blocking objects.

Autocover Tweaks v2 for EliteMod

i added the squad AI to elite mod, so it's fine right?

First impressions:
* They seem to clutch more together behind cover, really searching the cover (if there is only a small part available, like a car or tractor). It really looks great. The drawback is: more vulnerable to aoe weapons, but i'll take that trade.

* Their 'dancing around' has reduced significantly.
They still jump in front of the cover sometimes: I guess that happens (i guess it was with ATTACK MOVE) when there target moves away or around a corner or something when certain squad members can't fire anymore at the targets.

So far so good, just keep it this way I think.

edit:
Err my gerd, the LMG guy doesn't jump around any more once in cover. Yaay, feels really kewl.

Because it's true that it's somewhat an issue that mortars are so vulnerable. Oth you can protect them by putting behind buildings or other shot blocking objects.

But don't we all know which parts of each map are out of range?

Mortars are useful. Really useful. So why aren't more produced? Because of the vulnerability of being a 2 man squad where the weapon can be wiped, something from which no other crewed weapon suffers; and you pay 40mp more for the privilege. (MGs are 3 man crews and Howies, 88s, and ATs can be recrewed and/or repaired).

They become a unit that needs micro managing. Repositioning after shots, making sure the enemy doesn't get near, careful location. I am not opposed to that, in fact I do it quite a bit. But they are arguably less survivable than a sniper and for not much less cost.

On the other hand I will capture them and /or use Supply Drop mortars in a second because of the low cost.

I thought the reason mortar's weren't used that much is because snipers fulfilled basically the same role, only they did it better.

Well they don't provide smoke.

But also they don't stay revealed, they have a much more immediate effect and so can't be dodged. They retreat the moment you click the button. So both units need care and some babying, but the sniper at least rewards your commands with instant results where the mortar doesn't shoot, hit, move or retreat at the press of a button.

Nah he took a gamble shooting at a moving sniper. Sometimes it works; sometimes it doesn't. RNG will always be part of this game, and it's kinda a beauty of the game.

Who doesn't move their Sniper? It's not like you can wait for your opponent not to move it after a shot. You have to just take your chances.

I agree about RNG but Sniper vs Sniper has always been a different animal. It's all or nothing. It doesn't have a large sample size to average out. It's ~500+ Manpower on one 50% dice roll.

I feel like people are too focused on countering the sniper(s) with a sniper. Ignoring all the other ways of defeating snipers. If you make the snipers more reliable at countersniping snipers then you'd create more dominance and focus on snipers tbh. And you channel your options into getting a sniper.

Well this I can agree with, but what other option is there that can deal with a well defended Sniper? Artillery, that's it. Which is even less dynamic and interesting than Sniper vs Sniper. I'm not sure how you can approach buffing Jeeps/Bikes that would let them be a reliable Sniper counter 30 minutes into a game.

I think what we really need to focus on is reducing what makes them strong in the first place: their cost effectiveness.

Going back to the point that everyone always moves their Sniper - what if they had a reason not to? You made it sound like the Countersniper had a choice whether to shoot at a moving Sniper or not. What if we made that an actual choice? Like moving your Sniper after a shot gives you that 50% miss chance, but it also had penalties attached. Maybe longer cooldown between shots, lower accuracy, or longer cloak time (so units other than Snipers have a shot at killing it).

It would reduce the advantage for "microing" your Sniper, but I'm not even a top-tier player and I feel that moving your Sniper after every shot is second nature. I don't know if this is my preferred angle at addressing Snipers but the idea occurred to me while reading your post.

Going back to the point that everyone always moves their Sniper - what if they had a reason not to? You made it sound like the Countersniper had a choice whether to shoot at a moving Sniper or not. What if we made that an actual choice? Like moving your Sniper after a shot gives you that 50% miss chance, but it also had penalties attached. Maybe longer cooldown between shots, lower accuracy, or longer cloak time (so units other than Snipers have a shot at killing it).

I think you might be on to something here.

Additional options are almost always a good thing, as long as the positives and negatives are balanced. I could definitely imagine a longer cloak time being a feasible trade off for moving after firing- a good player will use that longer cloak time to guarantee at least a chance at getting the countersnipe, while alternatively a good player will also be rewarded for being quick when taking the first shot at a stationary sniper.

As for coding feasibility I'm sure it's possible, but not quite sure how I'd go about it off the top of my head.

I think you might be on to something here.

Additional options are almost always a good thing, as long as the positives and negatives are balanced. I could definitely imagine a longer cloak time being a feasible trade off for moving after firing- a good player will use that longer cloak time to guarantee at least a chance at getting the countersnipe, while alternatively a good player will also be rewarded for being quick when taking the first shot at a stationary sniper.

As for coding feasibility I'm sure it's possible, but not quite sure how I'd go about it off the top of my head.

Well the alternative, cooldown on the move modifier, is probably the easiest to implement as their is no extra coding required. I like the idea because the skill be game flow awareness related. Do I want to keep my sniper still for more kills or do I want to move him, because i'm fearing my enemy has a countersniper? It does add an extra layer of gameplay and knowledge.

And it's almost a direct nerf in most sniper situations. But it would also be a nerf to the situation where you are kiting that massive grenblob.

And seeing you are not a fan of increasing the reload after 10 shots, I have a feeling you don't want to increase it after every shot. xD


About mortars, hmm the more I think about it, i would add a man to the squad. Like an extra carbine (and maybe a volks kar98k for Germans?) wouldn't give the mortar really noticably more combat effectiveness. But it would give the much needed survivability.

And it's almost a direct nerf in most sniper situations. But it would also be a nerf to the situation where you are kiting that massive grenblob.

And seeing you are not a fan of increasing the reload after 10 shots, I have a feeling you don't want to increase it after every shot. xD


About mortars, hmm the more I think about it, i would add a man to the squad. Like an extra carbine (and maybe a volks kar98k for Germans?) wouldn't give the mortar really noticably more combat effectiveness. But it would give the much needed survivability.

+ 1 for both


Btw, you might want to give a reload time for the switching buttom of the cloak ability (c).

I like to spamm this feature when my sniper is chased by rifles and I just need to run 4 meters to be covered by my mg.
If I run with cloak, rifles just run on me and kill me,
If I run without cloak, rifles just focus me and kill me,
So I just spamm cloak/decloak to stay alive.

It's micro but a bit of abuse, and fixing this would nerf ultra aggressiv sniper use. If we give a switching time on the (c) of 1 sec, it should be better as we would need to really time the (c) and optimize cloak phases and decloak phases.

@Tommy : Could you please put the kolaris file which kills the units AI in the first post ?

edit : Autocover Tweaks v2 for EliteMod

+ 1 for both


Btw, you might want to give a reload time for the switching buttom of the cloak ability (c).

I like to spamm this feature when my sniper is chased by rifles and I just need to run 4 meters to be covered by my mg.
If I run with cloak, rifles just run on me and kill me,
If I run without cloak, rifles just focus me and kill me,
So I just spamm cloak/decloak to stay alive.

It's micro but a bit of abuse, and fixing this would nerf ultra aggressiv sniper use. If we give a switching time on the (c) of 1 sec, it should be better as we would need to really time the (c) and optimize cloak phases and decloak phases.

Hmm i'm open for the idea, but I agree with your second point aswell; you are essentially taking away micro. But the cloak spam is a bit abusive yes. Hard to say which choice is best.

I haven't installed this yet, but I think the idea and work is fantastic. I'm primarily a US/Airborne player, and so wanted to make some comments along those lines. The Recon Run comments are directly applicable to sniper balancing, while the rest of the comments can be considered for changes later on.

General Comments: Airborne's late-game problem is that it lacks manpower efficiency and has no persistent support. OMCG always provides more than 800 manpower worth of stuff, Allied War Machine and Field Repairs keep your vehicle armadas going strong, Calliopes and Howitzers dump out an unbelievable amount of damage and are often critical in dislodging the Wehr player.

I've taken to calling Infantry a "manpower positive" doctrine because of OMCG, Armor is a "manpower neutral" doctrine because you have to pay full cost of stuff to get it on-field but then you can get it back for free with AWM. Airborne is "manpower negative"; the amount of manpower you spend on something is generally more than the effect it'll provide. Paras are good, but probably overpriced, and AT guns on command are good for those "oh shit" moments but it's always better to just get the motor pool and build AT guns because there's only one Wehr doctrine where you're not guaranteed to see any tanks. You'll also need to be able to use your off-maps more to keep parity with other U.S doctrines having on-map artillery, which in turn requires supply drops, which in turn is manpower.

Air Power:
Recon Run: I think the decloak on recon run is not long enough to make it particularly useful in a sniper war. Would suggest reducing the cost to 40 munitions, or increasing the decloak time by 1 second. I don't know if it's possible, but if Recon Run can get a "decloak multiplier" for a bunch of cloaked things being in proximity (i.e. 3 snipers blobbed up get decloaked for 3 times as long as a single sniper) that might really help for a doctrine with no artillery to deal with sniper blobs.


Strafe: Strafe is situational, but amazing in those situations. If other artillery abilities (firestorm, defensive arty, 105mm howitzer shoot) are not seeing a munitions increase (because of their general "good vs. everything" capacity), then Strafe should see a munitions cost decrease to probably 125 munitions.

Bombing Run: Bombing run is a pretty amazing ability, but overcosted. It does enough damage where if you get lucky you may potentially be able to kill(!) a vet 1 Panzer 4 from full health I believe, and it frontloads all its damage and appears to have a faster call-on time than the Howitzer Shoot. Would suggest reducing cost of Bombing Run to 200 munitions, to bring it in line with 280mm Rocket Barrage, which I consider to be a similar ability. Yes, 280mm Rocket Barrage is better because of larger area and more guaranteed killy-ness (not counting the greater call-on delay), but Airborne gets Supply Drops, which will mean more frequent bombing runs.

Air Drops:
Paratroopers: I think paratroopers could use a decrease in reinforce costs to somewhere between 37 and 40. As is, they cost more than Grens to deploy, and can take on vet 2 grens 1v1 at close range, but the manpower drain from using them is maybe a little excessive given their abilities. This is particularly true when in-field reinforcement actually increases their drain on your manpower, since they'll be in the field taking fire longer and are not as durable as Rangers (either in hitpoints - 80 hp compared to 85 - or in armor).

AT Drop: Could *maybe* be decreased in manpower cost to 330 or 340, but it's not really necessary since "AT Gun on Demand" is such a powerful ability.

Supply Drop: This is pretty baller, but to keep up with Infantry Doctrine getting howitzers and Armor getting Calliopes it may need an increase in the resource value to 125 (or maybe even 150) munitions (and maybe 60 fuel, but the munitions are more important). Perhaps a small decrease in manpower cost to 80 to make Airborne a little less manpower intensive.

Cheers!

Would you believe that for part of the squad movement for attack orders the squad leader gets 50% received damage for 5 seconds?

I can't help but feel this is compensation for him jumping out of cover...

Still tweaking, going for a V3.

Would you believe that for part of the squad movement for attack orders the squad leader gets 50% received damage for 5 seconds?

I can't help but feel this is compensation for him jumping out of cover...

Still tweaking, going for a V3.

What happens if the squad leader is already dead? Does the "leadership" or bonus transfer to anothe runit? Sorry about the basic question but I am only beginning to read the RGA's and LUA's....