Developer's Question #1

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[EscforrealityTLS]

Tying PP to vet is extremely important for this mod. The Devs should not that it is some of the best players of EIR that are advocating its removal. This is because it effects them most, it is their units that are primarily effected by not "Just vetting up" and getting the advantages from it.

Good players must pay for and advantage that newer players simply don't have. Not to mention I find that it adds to "persistency" of the mod it attributes a larger investment into a unit that has vet, that will be permanently lost with its death/destruction.

But like someone else said, vet must be worth the investment your putting into it. That's where increasing the amount of PP gained and item cost by a factor of 10 could help.

 

[Unkn0wn]

I think you will also find that most of the good players advocating its removal, advocate its removal in the knowledge that if such a removal were to take place the vet bonuses would drastically be toned down. Don't forget that the current EIR vet bonuses are in fact some of the strongest bonuses to units we have ever seen in the history of EIR. (Look up the old vet lists and compare)

Anyhow, thanks for the input so far guys, keep it coming. Try to stay on topic, try to stay constructive.
As I stated in the original post, we are taking the time to reflect on the community sentiment expressed in this thread.

[AmPM]

Some Vet is insanely powerful, some is downright useless. Speed increase on the AVRE for example, still leaves it slower than anything that will be chasing it short of a cloaked PAK or KT...maybe.

ATHT getting a damage bonus to its 25 damage hits....woo?

Some of the vet bonuses just do not help in any way.

[EscforrealityTLS]

I agree with that completely, but would that not be an issue with the vet of particular units and not the PP system?

On a different note wouldn't PE type vet be sweet. Allowing the player to go assault or defensive on all vetted units. Just thinking about it sounds like a lot of work...

[AmPM]

Yes Esc, but as I said, simply adding a 0 to prices and gains would help, it allows much finer control.

I was just commenting on the "vet being extremely powerful" statement. Its a unit by unit issue right now, since vet is not universally useful to the same degree.

30pp per game with an extra Heavy Tank costing 20pp and an extra rifle squad costing 5pp makes a lot more sense than 1 and 2...

[bfhogues]

Tying pp to vet helps make losing that vet 2 ranger squad feel more accute. any unit. it makes the retreat or die choice more real. besides it makes pp more useful at towards the end of the tech curve. vet is meant to die, there is a cost for better units.  winning is everything. No one likes a loser.

and i will happily sacrifice all my vet 3(hah, my units only get there by accident. the furher does not like units to show him up so he orders me to send all vet 2 and higher to the front.)

-VET IS FOR CLOWNS

[31stPzGren]

We need to ask ourselves these questions.

1. How does PP costs tied in to Veterancy reduce the amount of veterancy present on the field?

Does it really help or does it simply penalise players who don't play enough (to accumulate the PP) as well as players who don't retreat their troops at the first sign of losing?

While playing EiR previously when veterancy was free, I noticed a trend when I played against some players. Initially, when the war started, everyone was low on vet, it was easy to win these players as their troops retreated frequently.

Thereafter, as the war bogged on, because of my personal disregard for veterancy (don't bring what you can't stand to lose concept), I started having a harder time against very well vetted armies, to the extent of fighting a 50-50 vet2/vet3 armies which was rather insane.

Having played this players prior to their big vetted armies, I'm quite convinced that it is not an increase in skill, simply the amount of vet they have. Rushing a single lone grenadier squad (1xLMG) with 2 or 3 rifles, can easily slaughter it in a non-vetted condition... or simply die like flies against a vet3 gren squad.

So the concept is, its fine to lose some battles at the start. Once you get your huge vetted army, you'll just steam roll everyone else. I honestly see the same thing happening right now even with the PP system. There will always be the veterancy whores, those who play for fun and those who believe sacrificing units are necessarily at times to win games.

2. Is stacking/noob bashing an actual concern? Does PP tie-ins with vet encourage this behaviour?

I personally think tieing in PP w/ Vet encourages this behaviour. Its really simple, if you have vet 2 on perhaps 10 of your units, you're talking about 10PP and a lot of hard work keeping these troops alive for the past several battles, not to mention that you can't keep the vet after each battle. They only go up to the minimum level before requiring a PP purchase to cross over.

As usual I will always cite the risk-reward ratio. Should you risk all your hardwork obtaining all these vet just to play a game which you don't have a good chance of winning? Do you want to lose all that hard work and time invested playing the game?

I believe that by reducing the benefits of veterancy and making veterancy easier to obtain, will encourage average players to face off against good players. The difference in micro is there, but if they have teamwork, they actually stand a chance of winning, unlike fighting against unstoppable waves of veteran units which seemingly charge through fire unscathed, unsuppressed.

By reducing the benefits of vet, letting it become more of an boasting privilege with marginal bonuses, the benefits to stack/noob bash is removed significantly. The behaviour itself will never be totally eliminated but it does give the opposing party a better chance of winning on merits of skill than who-has-been-here-longer-and-have-more-vet.

However, if noob bashing or stacking, is an accepted behaviour and perfectly fine. Then there is a hardly a problem with letting it continue then.

Side Comments on some stuff I read in this thread

- Good players advocate for removal of the PP + Vet system not because they stand to lose the most but because they hardly get any games with all these negative downsides. Troops & Vet lost can be regained but its something that most people do not understand. By allowing vet to be easily obtained w/o overly penalizing the player for losing them will at least encourage more games to be played. Good players win by tactics, strategy and coordination, NOT BY VETERANCY BONUSES.

In Conclusion
Go and re-read all the discussion in the EiRR Secrets revealed thread. All the points regarding the potential imbalance has been brought up previously and has become true valid points which the community is concerned about.

Read http://forums.europeinruins.com/index.php?topic=7778.0 about page 2 or 3 onwards where these issues we are discussing now are brought up. A lot of good points were made, contributions by people like schultz, suckisucki, mannfred, mysthalin, AMPM & wafffen 17th ss.

Read this page and its whole thread http://forums.europeinruins.com/index.php?topic=7521.60 and you'll find that MistenTH and Mannfred has explained their positions and potential problems already.

The biggest problem between EiRR's development as compared to OMG's development, is the mindset that your development team takes. When you all get very absorbed in your concept, you do not acknowledge other valid points. We have "told you so" about all these potential problems, provided suggestions and were called "theory crafting" in return.

At the end of the day, its about whether the development team and certain influential players want to change the Status Quo of the current meta game

Some decisions are good, some are bad. For those that are bad, let go of it, move on, and rebuild it.

[EIRRMod]

AH!  I think I misunderstood your statement Esc (AMPMs comment cleared it up)

Scaling PP by 10 (overall) may help with tweaking costs.

31stPzGren, you post some very good arguments, yet taint them with comments like:

However, if noob bashing or stacking, is an accepted behaviour and perfectly fine. Then there is a hardly a problem with letting it continue then.

and

The biggest problem between EiRR's development as compared to OMG's development, is the mindset that your development team takes. When you all get very absorbed in your concept, you do not acknowledge other valid points.

I have continued on the path of a closed development, and for good reason - changes before implementation may look good on paper to start, yet only through testing them are not. (To para-phrase a comment you have made)
However, a closed development does NOT equate to:

do not acknowledge other valid points

Thank you (and others) on your comments, and the (mostly) structured posts / arguments everyone is giving

[AmPM]

Well here is the problem, in a persistent environment where you want to reward people for playing, but use those rewards to buy upgrades and more units, the people that consistently win without high loss will continue to ramp up faster and higher than the less skilled (in game and meta game) players.

Right now you try not to lose PP as you build up, but once you are there you can easily throw it all into high vet again.

All this does is punish people that don't play a lot who still get a lot of XP on their units by playing the game well.

By making people lose less when vet dies it might be easier to get a game....

Myself for example, I used to whore vet because I knew that after a few games of being careful I would have a nice advantage over people throwing units away. I count myself as being pretty good at playing, but why pass up a long term gain for a short term loss.

Same goes now, don't use units that cost PP until you have all your advantages and doctrines and reinforcements. That means for maximum efficiency of spending, since you gain the same for losing as winning you want to minimize PP expenditure to finish the company as fast as you can, so you can just dump it in vet.

"Teamstacking" will never go away. Mainly because some of us actually like to play together, as opposed to with random people that may not even use vent, and generally people enjoy winning more than losing. I will play with good players, bad players and anything in between on my team, as long as I like them. Just don't expect me to jump into a no win situation.

Basically, people don't like losing games or units or resources, and will do whatever they can to minimize the chances of it happening no matter what you do.

[EIRRMod]

I had an interesting convo about this in vent yesterday, and this was another posibility.

Remove PP from Vet entirely BUT replace it with another type of Currency - which is gained by the performance of your company. (Gained via a win or loss in game, say, 3 for a win, 1 for a loss)
This keeps in place the 'blocks' for vet 2 and vet 3, but removes the ties to PP, and thus the 'Doctrines then Vet' mentality.

Benefits:
Removes the link to PP
Keeps the Slow gain rate of Veterancy within a company BUT penalises the very good OR vet hoarders (not the same people btw..)

Issues:
*Another* resource type (Minor)
Still keeps the hoard mentality (somewhat)

(As this conversation progresses, I'll post other ideas that have been discussed but not mentioned here)

[Tymathee]

very interresting

[AmPM]

You don't want to penalize good play, also it would lead to more noob bashing than there is already since you now gain for winning more than losing by far.

Armies really should vet win or lose, its part of war and part of a good meta game that leaves you choices. Do you retreat early and lose a battle to save your men and resources? Or do you throw everything away to win the day?

That was a choice that had to be made before, and armies rarely fight to the last because its a waste. Right now though with vet costing PP its just stupid to spend PP on it till you max out everything else.

Adding another resource doesn't help, and just makes it harder for the newer players to catch up. Nothing will help poor players.

Letting new players that are good and understand the game gain not only vet from fighting and getting their men off the field but also gain some resources/doctrines/etc in the form of PPs is a good thing. They can compete with older players faster and more successfully instead of being held down.

Basically, free vet upgrades punish poor players that cannot see the big picture and helps anyone that thinks strategically about how their company should progress. Its also more realisitic and immersive. You have a company that really does get better as you play on a unit by unit level, instead of just paying out for it and limiting how fast units can get better.

If I have a Rifle squad kill 53 Germans in one game, I see no reason they shouldn't become badasses.

Same goes for a plucky Sherman or a dreaded Tiger.

Putting a limit on how much good play can affect your company isn't really good.

PP system works for everything but vet, which should be based on your performance only.

You will still have noob bashing, and teamstacking, because this is a competetive game and thats how the world works. But at least those noobs can bleed their enemy and then fall back and retreat to fight another day, and gain Vet on their units that will help them catch up faster.

Remember, there are only 3 levels of vet, its not hard to get up to vet 3 with careful management even while losing games due to the enemy having filled out doctrines and more resources.

But at least it makes you more even faster as long as you are a decent player.

And yes, i am at work and bored.

[EIRRMod]

Good argument AmPM.

The PP system for Vet is both well recieved by some, and loathed by others.

With all this information, we hope to present you with something that does NOT penalise good players, retains persistancy in a non-jerky manner and still retains the theme of the system as a whole.

[Scyn]

Yet new players and poor players will also never advance if they can't learn that playing people better than you is the only way you'll see the big picture. Sitting in the launcher and waiting an extra 45 minutes to play people on par or lesser than you is not only a poor attitude, but it's also one of the biggest errors a player can make and they will continue to suffer for it.

[sgMisten]

How about re-implementing passive EXP gain again, or increasing the amount of XP gained per kill, with reference to your opposition?

For example:

Side A companies have average of 3000 xp per company.
Side B companies have average of 2000 xp per company.

Normal XP gain is 1% per battle.
Against highly vetted opponent, XP gain = (3000-2000)/2000x1% = 1.5% XP gain

Limits and such will have to put into place of course, in order to avoid ridiculous scenarios like newbie with 0 xp fighting against 5000 XP opponent gaining 5000% XP, instant vet 3 etc, but that's the general idea.

-This would not cost PP
-May only apply up to vet 2, perhaps vet 3 units will have to earn at normal rate

---
+ Units earn everything they earn
+ More intuitive system
+ Less "jerky"
+ Quick catch-up between lower XP players and higher XP players
+ Higher XP players don't gain XP faster
- (?) Eventually many companies will hit high vet more quickly

[gamesguy2]

Good argument AmPM.

The PP system for Vet is both well recieved by some, and loathed by others.

With all this information, we hope to present you with something that does NOT penalise good players, retains persistancy in a non-jerky manner and still retains the theme of the system as a whole.

I like the idea of putting vet on a seperate point system based on w/l.

Would it be possible at all to make that scale with relative company values?  For example a rank 5 company(team average) stomping a rank 0 company would get an experience penalty of say 50%.  Afterall how much does a battle hardened veteran learn from killing barely trained recruits?

Say you are rank 6 and your ally is rank 4, and your opponents are rank 2 and rank 0.  Your average team rank would be 5 and your opponent's average rank would be 1.  Which means as a rank 6 army, you would gain only 50% of normal xp in that battle, where as your ally would gain 70%.

Your opponents would gain 130%(rank 2) and 150%(rank 0) respectively.  Numbers can be adjusted of course.

[Malevolence]

I would go with that, but not penalize the higher level team. If they want to fight noobs, that's fine, but let the noobs get a benefit from having to fight a harder game. Buff the losing team, don't nerf the winning team, et c.

[Two]

I would go with that, but not penalize the higher level team. If they want to fight noobs, that's fine, but let the noobs get a benefit from having to fight a harder game. Buff the losing team, don't nerf the winning team, et c.

"Allied/Axis command have decided to use some of your armies resources to help other areas in the war effort as they believe you are good enough to make due"

Or something, aka they steal some of your call ins against nubs