That's just a fallacy. The whole reason people play CoH2 and not other RTS is because they are fine with certain aspects of RNG.
It's the huge swinging effects which have no proper player input or form of counter that most "top" players and most of the playerbase are annoyed off.
New players may initially like the randomness and chaos of certain elements of RNG ("every plane crash tells a story, Quinn Duffy trademark) but those are the kind of players who are not gonna keep playing the game in the long run after the novelty wears off.
You are confusing the kind of gamer that plays an RTS with one who likes "party like games" or a casual FPS.
There's different degrees of agreement in which elements are fine or borderline stupid, hence the competitive mod for tournaments. But those elements are still in the base game.
IMO, i think the effects are fine but they just need tweaking. Ex: main gun destroy threshold been lowered to 10/20% instead of 25%.
I completely disagree. The games follows the same principles and design behind COH1 and share the same problems they had for teamgames as well. I'm someone who plays 2v2 and i'll say that you balance around 1v1, cause if you can't barely comprehend and do your job trying to balance on that small case, how the hell you expect to do balance in modes which way more variables. You walk before you try to run and jump. I'm not saying you ignore the issues that arise in team games at all (ISU/ELE/Artillery) it's just that most things are solved if you can properly balance the game well for 1v1. You just need to fix the exceptions and not try to force every single doctrinal unit to work for every game mode (Super heavy TDs on 1v1 and heavies on teamgames).
(I would like to make a small clarification that IMO 2v2 still follows many of the same principles behind 1v1 and that things go wild on 3v3+).
From your comment i deduce you didn't play the game back in 2013, the beta or are ignorant behind the decisions and comments the developers made nor how fragile Relic and THQ (extint) situation was and how it was later acquired by SEGA.
Most people who haven't been from the beginning assume too many things about Relic plans for the future. The game was barely able to release at all for starters. Sure, there had might there been some ideas floating around bringing new factions or commanders to the game but nothing was definite. Hell, the whole supply system and monetization arrive much later. Reminder that we have the heavy amount of EFA commanders due to them not knowing really what direction they wanted to go and were testing waters of how much BS they could pass off.
For those who were in the beta group post launch, they would know that some features that were been tested as commanders for EFA went to be push for WFA and beyond.
Ask anyone who started playing since release back in 2013 if the game was thought and design around team games. IF they had any proper "support" for those modes or if they ever end up releasing features which are key for any game which goes into team games territory.
Hell lets look at maps released and design. There is a reason Relic tested custom points which rewarded other things than resources because the whole concept of dynamic economy changes doesn't apply in those modes cause the concept of cut off is practically null.
How about integrating people who were mostly team game based players to the "secret"/private balance testing group or applying changes based on team games only. You can see at the change log that the word "team games" only started to appear like 2/3 years ago.
Just like "Smash" at it's core is a party game that can be played as a competitive fighting game, COH2 is a 1v1/2v2 base game that can be played as 3v3/4v4.
A team based game wouldn't leave factions with 80/90% WR screwing the modes for months without hotfixing it.
You are right that I didn't play at launch. I started playing 2015? 2016? Something like that. I also agree that you balance around 1v1 but that doesn't mean that it's a 1v1 game. As I've said. 2v2+ modes are much more fun and as such are played more. That's all you need to state that it's a team based game. While I agree with 90% of what you have said you are having a different perspective. While I cannot claim what was at launch and how things behaved (I do know about monetization and such) regarding factions, I can claim that the game now feels much more balanced for teamgames than it was 3 years ago.
I am not quite sure what you mean by that "wouldn't leave factions with 80,90 screwing modes...". What period? I don't quite follow, sorry.
About 2v2. It's quite similar to 1v1 but still much more fun and dynamic than 1v1. You don't have to play a specific meta build because your partner can patch holes in it but still you only have one partner so it's "kinda" necessary to follow the trend. 3v3+ is where the fun really begins, and even though an elefant/JT/ISU can kill any sort of tank plays on lane-y maps like redball (ISU more vs infantry since at long range it has "only" 200 penetration), it's still engaging and challenging to play vs them. Sure, lost plenty of games vs vetted sturm shooting over hedges and/or out of sight range when you try to push (spotting scopes from ally provides vision for it), and jagdtiger shooting down Jacksons that tried to scare away the sturm... they were still fun challenging games even though a lot of people would screech "JT OP, nerf Sturm, spotting scopes OP" and whatnot.
Point is. As much as the game is being balanced around 1v1, as you have said is the simplest one, it's still not a team based game. I can not accept that a WW2 themed with 5 factions and plenty of units to combine it's all about cutoff and holding behind sandbags. Heck, I've always advocated that people stop complaining about balance because considering how hard it is to balance something that has more parameters than there are unofficial sex workers in Prague. Considering all that, the game is in an excellent state of balance. Few units require minuscule tweaks (nerf one thing, buff another) but nothing that would stand out. One thing I would argue is that one should balance for 2v2 since it combines the best of both worlds. It's not as chaotic as 4v4 and not as dull as 1v1.
EDIT: What I mean is. I think that COH2 by itself has had more problems in the company/development that they just said "fu** it" and went for 1v1 since 3v3 modes are performance-wise... absolutely dreadful. Still, at it's core, no matter how much 1v1 mode is more optimized or whatnot, Company Of Heroes franchise is a team based franchise.