ISU honestly already does slaughter any and all armor beneath elephant/KT/JT. However inorder to effectively beat the elephant in a heads up fight you require mark. The issue I have is its penetration at max is <50% against the JT, which just seems dumb. I had my ISU recently bounce against an OKW p4 and was surprised by that. Not that the ability needs to give it 400 penetration but its pen most of the time isn't what holds it back versus non-superheavies, it's the rate of fire and shell swap times. I don't think a +20% timed pen ability would really break the ISU any further than the current JT or elephant.
At the very least the CPR should be considered for a change, as many people have agreed with it being mediocre.
I vaguely remember that we once estimated the ISU's AT capability to be roughly equal to an SU85. So overall, it should lose to a Panther.
Your post got me the impression that you want the ISU to win or at least roughly be equal to the Elefant in terms of AT when the ability is activated. But pen buffs are as you said not as valuable for the ISU due to the deflection damage, which would mean damage and or ROF buffs. And those would hit lighter targets alike.
Not really. With "low" armour and low ROF, a single Panther will always be able to take on the ISU152. Soviets on the other hand will have trouble with the Jgd/Ele. First their RAM combo has been gutted and you need to invest a lot of micro/munitions/MP/fuel to take it down. Worse if the enemy is competent.
Jagd and ele should have massive damage and armour and HP, but their mobility and rotation should be extremely low as well, and abilities should focus on AT, not AI.
ISU152 has good good armour (340) and good HP. Suffers from mobility as well. It's AT is decent enough and it's AI is great. Overall a well balanced unit after the HE range nerf.
Jagd wouldn't even be that OP if it was not in the same commander as the fussies
As you can read from the post, my whole point was under the assumption that the ISU gets some type of timed AT ability that enables it to win against e.g. the Elefant, I was not talking about the current ISU.
CoH2 does not allow a unit to be good vs heavy units but bad vs lights, not with the current range of accuracies and target sizes. A buff vs heavies often works against lighter units too. The only way to somehow dofferentiate is by picking damage thresholds. And an ISU that wins against the Elefant MUST get higher ROF, meaning it will kill all other units more quickly. |
I completely agree with OP.
Converting AoEII fans to AoEIV was a huge achievement and showed that Relic can still give to RTS.
I trully trully wish that this treatment is reserved for COH3. WW2 is a huge genre, and few RTS ever got it right.
COH for me got it the best.
They didn't really convert the AoE2 base though. The DE version has only slightly decreasing player numbers. It does not explain where those ~20k AoE4 players come from. These must, for the most part, be players that are either new to AoE or older gamers that decided to pick the game up.
I think CoH2 will remain after CoH3 is released. I think the Mediterranean theatre is interesting, but probably not as widely known as the western and especially eastern front.
CoH3 however has quite an advantage over AoE4 though. AoE4 had to somehow outperform a VERY highly acclaimed and polished AoE2. CoH3 on the other hand has to outperform "only" CoH2, which still lacks a lot of features and fixes.
That's were CoH3 can really shine. I hope Relic realizes that. |
and they decided to add an anti-team weapon ability to a tank with 450 armor, guaranteed pen and extreme damage on each and every tank that it fires at in the game
do they care about that point anyway?
Bullshit on one unit does not excuse bullshit on others.
But even if we accept that the JT can fight team weapons:
There is a huge difference between the JT pushing back a single team weapon (probably an ATG which is supposed to counter it) that is a third of its price and population and the ISU forcing back the Ele/JT at a similar price level. Especially since this could have the side effect that an ISU that is capable of defeating the Ele/JT would slaughter the Panther and anything below. |
You'll answer yourself this question, when you sit for a moment and contemplate on how allies counter ele and JT.
That's quite nonsense.
If the ISU had great AT, even via a timed ability, you remove one of he few weak points it has. |
I slayed the monster you abooser  apparently the AP shell's penetration is 200/230/260. I'd prefer a pen buff ability to manhandle the ele/JT from the front. That, I would gladly pay 60 muni for.
Elefant is probably the strongest and most specialized AT unit in the game. JT is supposed to be similar, for some odd reason it gets the AI barrage. The ISU however is fairly AI specialized, it shouldn't be able to really contest the Elefant.
But overall I agree. 60 mun for the current ability is not really worth it. |
7 per squad 
This stolen ISU really seems to haunt you... |
I actually had no idea how HE's and CPS aoe stacked against each other. Imo If you look it that way, then yes, ability becomes extremely situational compared to what it used to be. Also doesn't ISU have some kind of hard limit of how much models it can kill with one shot?
Afaik, there is no hard limit to damaged or killed models.
The previous CPS profile was very different from the HE shell. I understand that they changed it because a range 70 shot with large OHK radius is just frustrating and unfair to play against, but at least the ability was providing a different shell.
It is obviously not the same as the HE or the AT shell, it is just very boring. Like both shells in one, a bit better and piercing, but you only get one shot. It does not really add that much anymore.
I am not sure how large the delay was before the changes, now it is about 4 seconds. Which opens op the possibility to cheese a normal HE shell followed up by a CPS slightly behind the retreating team weapon.
As an easy fix, I think it should just get cheaper, and increase the CD if necessary to prevent spamming. A more complicated fix would be to craft a completely new ability. I could imagine something like an AT focused stun shot, owing to the large caliber or so. |
I've decided to edit graph a bit to better represent current AI performance of the Concrete Piercing shot. Keep in mind that that the regular shot has 60 max range vs 70 and concrete piercing round has no scatter.
That's also what I mean.
Against tanks, the ability is not really that helpful, because either there is no slow heavy on the field or you keep your ISU out of the way (JT/Ele). Situational at best, but the main use is probably infantry.
Against infantry, you pay 60 mun for 10 more range, no scatter and an okay buff to OHK compared to the normal shell. All this is okay, but is it really worth that much? The normal shell really isn't all that different.
A little bit less damage than the normal HE shell due to scatter, but against MGs, mortars and even PaKs, they perform similarly overall.
The ability isn't outright bad, it is just really mediocre and boring due to it using a very similar AoE profile compared to the normal shell. It is basically 60 mun for shooting an improved HE shell through a wall. |
You did not disagree with OP's claim the ability become useless after the patch but was more than happy to call my point that it is not "completely useless", a "stupid statement".
No one said anything like this, please stop to make up posts. This thread won't derail into an off topic discussion. |
And there is context, I was replaying to a claim that the ability "practically useless" which you agree it is not.
So in sort you confirm that you posted just to disagree with me.
Please don't make it a personal thing, it helps no one and nothing and just drifts the discussion off topic.
I simply returned a facepalm because if one reads this without knowing anything else:
one would think the ability can no longer wipe squad and team weapon and can only be used vs Super heavy vehicles which is simply false.
His further context is 3 posts above the one you quoted. We're also still on page 1 and people are going to read OP's post. There is enough context.
The ability is very difficult to hit medium speed moving target unless they are driving directly into the barrel of the gun.
In AT role it is designed to be used vs those slow big heavily armored targets like KT/JT/Ele.
In addition since the ability can fired and score hits in the FOW and even behind certain shot blocker one can use it with impunity. Retailed from JT/Ele is not even guaranteed unless their gun is facing in the right direction
One can even combine it with mark target for extra damage.
So no I would not say that the penetration buff negligible
nor
that ability is useless.
Mark target etc are not part of this. They're a different ability for which you pay extra and not available with all ISU commanders.
I agree that the ability is meant for slower units. As I said before the whole setup of this ability is VERY situational, especially since the ISU is quite immobile, so driving it behind shot blockers and then facing the actual target takes a while and requires a long setup.
The overall damage buff regarding the penetration is negligable. The ability has become slightly more reliable. In terms of DPS, not much though. Serealia says the deflection damage previously was ~80, normal damage is 240. We can debate how much sense "DPS" makes in single shot abilities, but e.g. against an Elefant your chance difference to deal those 160 damage between old and new ability is 25%, or 40 damage. |
Relic Entertainment
cblanco ★ 
보드카 중대 
VonManteuffel 
Heartless Jäger 
