COH: Europe In Ruins

http://forums.europeinruins.com/index.php?topic=12313.msg210047;topicseen#new

Based on the discussion in this thread which sadly got out of hand. What I want to achieve is to make people see that the upgunned puma needs to be buffed against the t17 because its the only unit that a can compete for pop and mobility with the t17.

Thrown in my lap I get the message that much less mobile shrek/pak is a good counter to the t17. The core of the problem is still that wehr can't compete with the mobility of the t17 because the t17 doesnt reliably lose to a puma unelss the puma is standing still, a test which was done in the Balance Advisor Forum and confirmed this. To further the point that the upgun puma needs to perform better I did a test of a t17 versus a 4 man grenadier squad with a shrek and a pak supporting it.

I'd like to contest the claim that the shrek + pak is a reliable hardcounter to a t17 on its own. The t17 is simply too resilient and dodging to be reliably killed by this combo alone. Here's the result of recent test games where we pitted a unvetted t17 with skirts against a single shrek 4 man grenadier squad and a pak of varying vet.

A likely scenario is that the t17 comes in surprisingly while the perfect scenario is that the t17 charges head on, we tested both but abandoned the likely scenario after the first test because it favored the t17 to the extreme, it killed both units taking a single hit from the shrek. The other possible scenario variation is what happens when a gren squad occupies a building, no doubt the t17 will lose to a shrek in a building.. sadly other than having a 2 pop pio building a bunker every time you need to fight a t17 you cant move buildings around. The test was done with me controlling the t17 and Baine controlling the pak/shrek. Pak was cloaked in all of the tests as the t17 attacked.

Test 1: The "likely" scenario - T17 WINS
Vet 1 Pak / 4 man 1 shrek
T17 comes in surprisingly, pak is unable to get a shot off. Some fail micro results in it getting a shot in right before the pak dies, but other than that it is unharmed. Shrek misses or is pushed the entire confrontation.

Test 2: "Perfect" scenario - T17 WINS
Vet 2 Pak / 4 man 1 shrek
T17 just brutally barges in there and takes 2 shots as it approaches. Shrek hits once. T17 wins with a sliver of health.

Test 3: "Perfect" scenario - PAK/GRENS WIN
Vet 1 Pak / 4 man 1 Shrek
T17 user fucks up and lets the pak get 2 shots in while it is circling and it takes 2 pak shots and a shrek on the approach. 2 man pak and 10% hp 2 man shrek survives..

Test 4: "Perfect" scenario - T17 WINS
Vet 2 Pak / 4 man 1 Shrek
Pak misses on approach and is unable to get in the 2nd shot. T17 kills pak and shrek squad with 40% hp remaining.

Test 5: "Perfect" scenario - PAK/GRENS WIN
Vet 1 Pak / 4 man 1 Shrek
T17 takes a pak hit on approach, shrek is hitting. 1 man shrek squad and 2 man pak survives.

Test 6: "Perfect" scenario - PAK/GRENS WIN
Vet 2 Pak / 4 man 1 Shrek
T17 takes pak hits on approach. Gets engine damage from kar98 on 30% health. Unlikely result, but acceptable.

Test 7: "Perfect" scenario
Vet 2 Pak / 4 man 1 Shrek - PAK/GRENS WIN
T17 loses outright with 4 man grenadier and 3 man pak surviving. Pak was allowed to hit the t17 while circling due to fail micro.

Test 8: "Perfect" scenario - PAK/GRENS WIN
Vet 2 Pak / 4 man 1 Shrek
T17 loses outright, all hits on pak and shreks.

Test 9: "Perfect" scenario - T17 WINS
Vet 2 Pak / 4 man 1 Shrek
Pak misses on approach. T17 beats up pak in 2-3 shots. Grenadier squad would have died to pushing so we didnt actually bother to kill it since Baine only had 2 shrek squads in his company, but I am fairly sure everyone agrees that its unlikely a shrek squad would be able to beat a 70% hp t17 on its own while pushed.

Test 10: "Perfect" scenario - T17 WINS
Vet 2 Pak / 4 man 1 Shrek
Pak hits on approach. T17 muscles down them both circling without push. Escapes with 10% hp.

Test 11: "Perfect" scenario - Grens/pak win
Vet 3 Pak / 4 man 1 Shrek
Pak hits on approach. Shrek is able to hit the t17. Pak survives with 5% hp left on the weapon.

So lets see here. A grand total of 5/11 times the t17 charged this 9 pop combo head on overall and beat it more or less by sheer muscle. 1 of the these games were the one where the t17 came in from the side.

 If we discount the unlikely event of the t17 getting engine damage from a kar98 the t17 won 5/10 times. 50% is a reliable counter? And 9/10 of these games were the perfect scenario where the pak "knew" which direction the t17 was coming from.

If we count the kar98, but discount the player of the t17 letting it be hit while circling (not optimal micro) the t17 won 4/8 fights .

If we discount the unlikely event of kar98 giving engine damage and fail micro allowing the t17 to take shots while circling the pak where the t17 actually loses, we have the tests left where the pak may or may not have hit the t17 on approach but the t17 was not taking damage from it after it had closed the distance with the pak. 5/8 of these tests the t17 won.

I wonder if a sherman or a m8 would have been able to win as much as the t17. I also wonder what the effective health of a skirted t17 is against shreks and paks.

As it stands now, for POP, both the mobile counter of wehr and the slow moving counter for same pop is unreliable against the t17.

test replays: (1 battlefile, several replays since baine only had 2 shreks in his company, ironicly.)
http://www.filefront.com/14581727/t17%20vs%20pak%20and%20shrek.rar


Conclusion
What other population equivalent counters to the t17 does wehr have than a shrek + pak or a upgunned puma, that is mobile and able to be employed aggressively? Mines cannot be moved up. The puma can only beat it standing still. The pak+shrek is unreliable at best.

Is wehr expected to camp buildings or bring a pio + bunker along every time they want their basic AT combo to reliably beat a t17? (And once you include a pio and a bunker, you basically could have sent a p4.)

Remember its for POP and mobility here.

T17 is basically an ostwind with M8 dodge, speed, and accuracy.

So how would you gather you buff the upgun puma? If you buff it too much, then it's a light tank killer that would take out tanks better than a T17 would because of it's higher penetration especially vs m10s and m18's.

Also fausts are really good vs t17's and stags, and do enough damage to get into the engine crit stage.

It's also sorta the same thing with axis heavy tanks, what pop equiv can take out a KT? I can pretty much gurantee you that if you take 4 AT guns vs 1 KT head on, the KT wins by pure brute force.

please, ostwinds do a lot better vs infantry than t17's do and the t17 is basically useless vs tanks without any type of back up.

Fausts are horrible vs t17s and stags tym, its broken.  It takes like 6-8 fausts to kill them right now, and thats just t17s.

Ostwinds rape t17s...

I'm curious how far apart you had the pak and the shrek squad, because there should be no way to push the shrek squad AND circle the pak at the same time...

nice once smokaz,

also renember the staghounds, theyre much more common. (and probably win 100 out of 100 times)

also, i tought this would be handy to have a pricing compare:

T17                                                                               Staghound  
Doctrines: Armour                                                            Doctrines ALL
Pop 8                                                                             Pop 8
Manpower 330                                                                 Manpower 350
Ammunition 60(sandbags)                                                  Ammunition 75 (50 Cal)
Fuel 75                                                                           Fuel 80


pak 38                                                   Grenadiers
Pop 4                                                    Pop 4
Manpower 380                                        Manpower 240                                         together 620 mp
Ammunition 120                                      Ammunition 140(schreck)                           together 260 mu

The upgunned puma doesn't need a buff, the T17 needs a nerf or a massive price increase.  The staghound MG just needs to be fixed to be the same as the M8 version.


Fausts do half damage to T17/M8s, thats 50-62.5 damage a hit, "really good" indeed. ::)


KT will not beat 4 ATGs.  I've killed a KT(poorly supported) with just one ATG and three carbine rifles with zooks and stickies.

KT has never been a problem, its too slow and vulnerable to a multitude of threats.


Ostwinds do a lot worse than the T17 against infantry that can actually fire back.    And since when is the ostwind useful against tanks?  The difference is the T17 can actually run away from an enemy tank.


No, me and smokaz tested this a while ago.  Ostwind beats a T17 with like 25% hp left, which is silly if you compare cost.

Fact is:
I saw t17 dodge like 7 pak shots from me.
Worse for shrecks.
And if u hit it still takes like 5 hits to actually die.
Conclusion:
Raise pop, or price, or work on the unit stats or make pumas survive at least 4 atg hits.
Or:
Get rid of TOV units.

1
there are buffs that make a cetrain unit stronger vs only one other unit

2
fausts..... ARE NOT GOOD AND GET DODGED DONT DO DMG AND DONT DMG ENGINE

3
kt is a t3



edit:
also, ive just played a game. where a stag was flanking us, he drove back to their side meeting a stug and a schreck squad. he got away with no dmg at all

and that happened a second time.

Was that before or after Relic nerfed t17 penetration?

A long time after.  Its part of the T17 vs upgunned puma tests we did for the advisor forum.

The biggest difference between the ostwind and T17 is the fact that the ostwind usually won't hit shit on the move, while the T17 hits more on the move.

The biggest difference is that Ostwinds die to 2 atg/zook or a few more rr hits, whereas the t17 keeps rollin on, guns blazing just to return fully repaired to wreak more havok.
Well and the price too as far as i remember.

Health:
Puma 310
T17  350
Stag  450

If that isn't a problem to start with... since the Puma is the slowest of them, and fires slowly as well.

T17 is the topic of this thread, not the staghound

Ostwind has 400 health. Just thought I'd throw that in as well.

Exactly. The T17 has almost as much health as the ostwind, fires twice as fast (no reload) and moves faster than any of them. It also has stun, so heavy tanks avoid it, not to mention the ostwind pretty much screams "please hurt me" while the T17 just says "ha you missed me"

I'd have to agree, the T17 is quite a powerful little light armored vehicle. If the M8 was a sherman, the T17 would be a pershing. Lets not forget that T17's are also effected by some doctrine buffs, making them slightly more powerful then vanilla T17s. Either way, it doesn't matter since any armor player will likely get the abilities that buff it.

I'd recommend a price increase, probably a bit more MP/Fuel. I don't think buffing the upgun puma is the solution to the problem, nor do I think comparing an upgun puma to a T17 is necissary. The upgun puma just doesn't work well because it only counters a few vehicles under relatively strict circumstances. You might consider arguing that the upgun puma needs more damage or a greater rate of fire in exchange for a slight cost increase.

Just my thoughts,

PQ

I agree a price increase for the T17/Staghound is in order.

vetted t-17 gets 15% health then a 25% health bonus on top of it....

The 25% hp at vet 1 was removed when skirts were added.

Keep in mind that the Staghound has the Stuart armor type instead of a light vehicle armor type so it doesn't have dodge bonuses.

Mabey the T17 skirts should be moved back to a vet requirement.

T17s now, in my mind, are how they should be when they reach a high veterancy level. But with a fully developed armor player, T17s are just too amazing right out of the gate.

At its base, i think the T17 is fine. Its just the buffs it gets that make it OP. Make them more fragile earlier on and id say that would be a step in the right direction.

What I wanna know is where is poor Mr. M8 in all this? :(

moving skirts to vet for one unit could bring the same argument for skirts on p4's, panthers etc.

if anything, tone down it's vet2 or 3.. or make the vet levels much higher like 15, 40, 75?

P4s and Panthers cost a hell of a lot more than  Staghound.  Cant even compare the unit.

Having said that,  I dont think adding a vet requirement to the skirt is needed.  A moderate price increase would be good IMO.

Just put Staghound in a Doctorine Spesific (Commandos or RCA since Royal Engineers has already heavy tanks)

Give T17 faust damage so that it'll have a hard counter

how much health does a hotchkiss have? just out of curiosity?

300hp and stuart armor (like brit stag) and not the epic dodge of the T17 with m8 armor

how its balanced:

puma  gets bonus vs t17(and stag) so it will pretty much always hit.

hochkiss gets received penetration reduction vs t17(and stag)

fausts do more dmg vs t17(and stag)

and this: http://forums.europeinruins.com/index.php?topic=12339.0

Pretty much all of what you just said is wrong.

Puma will lose to a T17 most of the time,  its only chance is when its sitting completly still.


Fausts are currently useless against Stag/T17


The only viable thing you said was maybe the Hochkiss, and I only say that because I have never seen them in action against a T17/Stag.

when do you understand stag!=T17

the issue of the T17 lays in high health (sandbag upgrade) combined with its dodge armor type (m8 armor) and its possibility to cap territory (armor T1) and its decent infantry sniping capabilities and its maingun that can noticeable damage vehicles (other than non upgunned puma) and tanks (rear armor hits)

You know, I have to wonder what relic was thinking making the same unit for both CW and US, but making them behave totally differently.

One gets a .50 upgrade and starts with more health and has a slow firing main gun, while the other needs to vet to get more health, has a quick firing gun, and has a WP round. Why didn't they just make a different model and make a whole different unit??

I meant, How it would be balanced..


---Killer344: Calm down, one sentence is enough to say that.

'

becouse theyre lazy, and they are so different becouse t17 is replaced by M8 and stag is replaced by CCT

you get the stag much later, so its much stronger. makes sense in vcoh, not here. so it isnt balanced here becouse they made it too strong for its price.


---Killer344: sigh, take a break if you can't stop raging.

they are basically different units because of their armor type

e.g. shrek vs T17/stag

T17:  damage modifier 70%
         accuracy modifier 71%
         moving accuracy  80%

Stag  damage modifier 100%
         accuracy modifier 100%
         moving accuracy 100%

exactly thats why a 350HP T17 needs much longer to kill with shrek than a 450HP Stag

its like an 880HP stag because shrek misses much more often and does less damage

Leophone, you really are talking garbage.
When will you fucking learn that the stag =/= T17?
Do you understand they use DIFFERENT ARMOR TYPES!? From how you're posting, it doesn't seem like it.
I believe that the T17 should be granted stuart armor to become balanced. It truelly does have good enough health to not need any dodge modifiers.

I'm talking to you LeoPhone, I won't edit all your posts individually again in this thread, I'll delete them from now on.

damm, sry for that.

i was kinda pissed off(not eir related btw) and needed to get rid of my anger...


but i still dont like mysth

In more than one occasion of the testing, my vet 2 / vet 3 paks didn't hit the T17 when he approached from the front, what automatically resulted in a loss. So yes, dodgemodifiers or the armour/health are the points that should be changed, not all at once of course.

But many people clump the two of them together wrongfully, and the staghound ihas a greater potentional of being much more deadly....

Ugh, I haven't encountered any staghounds luckely, but I do agree with the point that the armor type of the T17 should be changed, today I had two T17's against me, had a P4 and a Pak38

One of them died a while ago (with much efford and 2 grenadier squads lost) and the other had a damaged engine, destroyed barrel and a sliver of health...

The enemy wants it dead, so he "rushes" it into my P4 and pak, it's distance is like, 10 meters... the P4 misses the first 2 shots and the pak the first 3...

If it would have been able to fight it could have probably killed my AT and damaged my P4 by circling around it

The real problem with both of these vehicles is they don't seem to fit into any of vCoH or OF's categories. We had heavies, mediums, and lights, and then all of a sudden two new toys were introduced with advantages of lights and mediums combined. I.E. T17 has dodge bonus, speed, and infantry slaying power of light vehicles, combined with nearly the same HP as a medium tank (with .7 schreck damage, the effective health of a T17 is 500HP) and the ability to kill tanks (stun, rear penetration + 25dps which is higher damage per second than a panther BTW) while the brit stag has the same speed and infantry slaying power combined with 100 more actual HP, and much better AT table. This is specifically why Armor companies can rape most light vehicle heavy PE companies; they just have too many advantages and can take on too many of their own "counters" by themselves.

Bottom line? Relic wanted to sell an expansion with a very short campaign with little replayability and no new factions, so the best way to sell it was to make the new units badass. That's also why the hellcat model is so ridiculously huge compared to every other unit in CoH.

500hp for the t17? vanilla t17's were like 175hp i thought.

Lets not become a mob with torches here, even if the t17 puts out more "damage" than the panther over time it hasnt the same ability to penetrate armor thus it cant compete as a AT weapon.

And yes, the skirts and the modifiers put the t17 at an absurd amount of health for its price and unit class.

I absolutely don't mean to claim a T17 is overall better than a panther, I just stumbled on that while running numbers. I was surprised one time to lose a panther that I was trying to pull off the map to a T17 who just zipped up behind it and kept eating away at its rear armor. I hadn't really considered T17s as dangerous to panthers until that happened.

The math: T17 health = 175*2 = 350 for paltry mun cost, divided by .7 schreck modifier = 500 effective vs. schrecks (not to mention the near impossibility of getting a high rate of hits)

Panther dmg 137/7 second reload = 19.5dps, T17 dmg 50*.5 = 25dps (20dps with skirts)

I know that it rarely penetrates panthers in particular, but armor buffs change even that.

They removed the vet modifiers in the last patch I believe for t17s(or are going to, they are removed in the new vet tables, whenever they are implemented...)

I was unaware of vet specifics. All of my calculations figure on vanilla (and skirted) panthers and T17s with only the sandbag purchase.

Well I wouldn't have noticed if o4b didn't point it out to me.  Apparently before this last patch(7.0d) or new vet tables anyways, t17's got a health bonus at both vet1 and vet2, in addition to the sandbag purchase.  That has been or will be removed, so after a 3rd(4th?) nerf, can we please stop whining about them?

The extra hp at vet was removed when sandbag upgrades were put in. The vet that shows in the launcher is from a very old list.

Light armor never needed a nerf in the first place, For the first time in EIR history it was a viable, and surviveable alternative to Medium and heavy tanks for more then just a select few. 

Now, All the nerfs just make ppl use mainline tanks more.  Befpore the last patches, How many people did t-17 spam or Staghound spam?  I never saw many, Also with Ostwinds effected by heat rounds they become an Anti light armor and infantyry vehicle which helps alot more, making them multi purpose so if you have 1 pak and an ostwind you can hold out, or 1 postwind and a shrek there is some good fun in there. 

My shrecks never missed them much anyhow, Now it seems nothing misses.  GEts hit everytime, making light armor just shit yet again. 

Light armor is "Spammed" because for the price of a p4 you can afford 4-5 pumas in terms of fuel cost but its at the heavy expense of manpower... 

There is a downside to lgiht armor in that your manpower is severly screwed.  It shoudl be a good supporting unit.

And the reason that PPumas, T-17s. and stags own anykind of at gun....  Speed.  Runs past.  Thats the padvantage to being heavily under armored.  A double shreck, or 2nd at gun makes them shiity. 

Do a simple test, 1 pack backed up by another.  BEcause you have to find the pak, usually by having it shoot at you or hit you, then guess where it came from, by then there is support headed that way.

1 wehr doctrine and 1 T4 enabling ostwinds to fight off t17s hardly make up for the t17 performance against the other doctrines and the other choices within blitz.

I dont think anyone doubts that a single light vehicle cant be dispatched by two paks overseeing each other.. but as other threads have discussed, this is not a very mobile counter.

Its also far more costly than the unit it counters.

its the same in terms of Pop...come on smokaz, this like saying its costly to have to use more than 1 pak to beat a Sherman...you have to use multiple forms of AT to kill every single type of vehicle/tank except MAYBE an unskirted M8 if you get lucky and alphastrike it with a pak.

Do you think a sherman will beat a shrek + pak?

Does sherm have 50 cal?  Double shrecks?  Is there onboard mechanics involved?  Do the people have a recone run to see if its storm shreks or grens?  Do they have a recon to see best possible angle of atk?

IN a game, Honestly, IF you want to base units soly on Shreck and Pak guns, then against a pershing, you would need 5 paks or 2 packs and 2 double shreck storms....  Oh wait... Thats more pop cap.,... Hwo do i do this EIR math again? 

How can you say that a terror guy with 1 shrek won;t be around?  OR a getsutz wagon, OR even a P4 tthat shoots off the supporting rangers first then the t-17 next?

You made it such a narrow focus it was a bullshit test but bogus and tipped rusiults catered to the desired answer, That t-17s are "OP" 

The onlyt reason t-17s were op was not because they were used 1 at a time, But in pairs....  And withonboard mainly.  Every armor company had them with onboard....  So you saw them over and over and over...


Its so funny how these "Tests" Only proved one side, yet in most anyone real game type game, if there is a single tank between 2 players and the normal amount of at which is at least 1 pak and at least 1 shrek, 3 t-17s would not make it out if they atked, Maybe 2 would live, all have dmg, and you can recrew the pak with base infantry, not wasting the 110 MU u put into it....

Certainly the test wasn't perfect, but have you seen it yourself? Dont you think a single shrek and a pak should be able to take out a t17 more than half of the time? And why would three t17s attack a pak and a tank? This theory crafting to defend the t17 is getting laughable. The test was a shrek and a pak because its the most common combination of AT to fend off allied tanks and vehicles, and also the normal non-doctrinal option as well as being very similar in pop. The recrewing pak argument is funny as well,  seeing as a vehicle surviving a engagement can repair.

I run a armor company as well, and I find the t17 over the top, thats my take on it. I have no desired outcome, other than all units being equally viable for cost and the game being balanced.. but you are welcome to make a clown of yourself be trying to play some bias card against me.

holy crap this disscusion has been goin on for a while

No i don;t think it should,m a well microed light armor peice should negate any at gun down a road and flank it.  A heavy tank is ment to take on an at gun head fiurst and soak up dmg while the other support it. 

So no, A pak and Gren shreck should never meat light armor, if done properl because the pak shpould be a non factor.

It's going to be likely *looked* at for the next patch.