Profile of Sander93

Buffing up commanders is out of question, ok, and I understand that you dont want to touch too many things in this patch.

This patch fill focus primarily on getting the core armies back in shape to create a solid base from which to move forward. We'll hopefully get to do a commander focussed patch after this, so keep working on those ideas for underused commanders, we may need them later.

The more mobile the players are the less effective mortars become. Top level players move around so much that by the time a mortar has aimed and fired the squad it was targetting has already moved somewhere else.

They seem to just forget about them. Whenever they are built (by certain players who do use them more often) in the mid to late game to counter HMGs or other defences they seem to work well. Luvnest had a vet 5 ISG in that game on Crossroads. Also in this case nobody built T1 as Ostheer because of Osttruppen, so no one on the Axis side had direct access anyway. Getting T1 for just one mortar isn't cost effective at any stage of the game. And the USF T0 mortar isn't very good beyond the early game. Pak Howitzers weren't built because the primary choice (to counter Osttruppen) was Lieutenant and every bit of spare manpower mid to late was needed for Captain backtech + ATGs and armor. I'm sure a Pack Howie would've done wonders against Osttruppen and HMGs but no one could really afford to get them.

Personally I don't like using mortars not because they don't do well, but because they're pretty RNG dependant. Sometimes they hit a lot and then you'll win a lot of engagement because of that, sometimes they won't hit anything and you're constantly down one squad. I usually prefer the safety/control of an extra squad or HMG instead.

Then choose your faction simultaneously. 30 second time limit for allies to ban a commander and 30 second time limit for Axis ban a commander so that a total of 3 commanders are banned for allies and axis. Then launch the game.
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There is a reason why league of legends has been the most popular game in the world for 10 years now, why not copy them?

A problem with commander bans compared to other games is that there are several commanders with overlapping abilities. For example if someone wants to ban Osttruppen they'd have to waste 2 of their bans because there are 2 Osttruppen commanders. Or even worse; say the Tiger was still dominating, then if you'd want to ban the Ostheer Tiger you'd need 4 bans just to achieve that. Another small problem is the fact that WFA only have 9 commanders each while EFA have about 20 each. But yeah commander bans could easily be explored in some fun/ML tourneys to set up a proper and fair system.

The Burratino would like to have a word with you.

Touché. Most of Wargame's howitzer/rocket artillery design worked very well.

What if the damage/scatter of all rocket arty was nerfed but all got longer suppression time (and maybe vehicle stuns on direct hits)?

So rocket arty has more of an active suppression/degrading role during engagements, not a tool for continuous bombardment. (I've just been reminded IRL the biggest effect of rocket arty was psychological)

This is how rocket arty and howitzers should have been designed - with all factions having (stock) access to both. Rocket arty should have dealt major suppression in a large area but little damage so that it could be used to stop an enemy advance or to reduce the effectiveness of enemy defences while launching your own assault. Howitzers should have brought precision killing power with a zeroing mechanic (every consecutive shot becomes more accurate). This way there would have been two distinctive types of artillery each with their own goals/uses and strengths. This is how howitzers and rocket arty were done in the Wargame series and it worked very well. Sadly, it's too late to implement this in CoH2.