DECEMBER BALANCE PREVIEW V1.0

We are happy to announce the December Balance Preview! Please note the changes below are NOT FINAL and will be undergoing weeks of iteration based on the community's feedback and extensive playtesting in the DBP Mod (which will be publicly available on the Steam Workshop later this week). For more info on what will be included in the December Update and the formerly suspended Fall Balance Preview, please check out our Blog.

For any feedback you have regarding the proposed changes below, make sure to post in out DBP Balance Feedback and DBP Bug thread located in the Balance Feedback section of the forums.

DBP Goals

Tune select underused / undervalued commanders to increase and diversify the number of viable strategies available in automatch (More info to come - to be included in V2 of the DBP Mod)

Tone down the effectiveness of some the Axis’ elite, heavy tanks to make them less spammable and dominant in team games

Tone down the squad wiping effectiveness of some over performing, off-map abilities

Adjust some of meta dominating units (primarily Soviet) to improve strategic / competitive diversity

Improve strategic diversity and quality of life by making minor adjustments to redundant, underused and generalist units

Primary Focus

Revitalizing 2 – 3 underused commanders for each faction (more info to come - to be included in V2 of the DBP Mod)

Continuing the work from the Fall Balance Preview’s highest rated changes

Secondary Focus

Adjustments to units dominating the current Soviet meta in competitive play

* Lend Lease Commander

* Maxims & Penals adjustments

* Conscripts

Adjustments to select heavy tanks that are currently over performing in team games

* OKW Panther V

* Elefant

* Jagdtiger

Adjustments to vet 4 and 5 of select OKW units that trade too cost effectively at higher veterancy (More info to come)

Adjustments to OKW and UKF Forward Retreat Points to come with a trade-off and become an interesting choice for the player rather than a guaranteed decision (primarily affects team games)

Adjustments to select Off-map abilities to reduce the effectiveness of frustrating, one-click squad wipes

General improvements to help with quality of life and strategic diversity

GENERAL

Blitzkrieg/Overdrive/War Speed/Step On It

These movement boost abilities will now cease when the vehicle receives an engine critical.

Forward Retreat Points

UKF FRP requires Company Command Post.

OKW FRP requires either a Mechanized or Schwerer Panzer Headquarters established.

OKW Battlegroup unable to reinforce if cut-off from friendly territory.

Reinforcement cost (global) increased by 20% while FRP ability is active

2 minute cooldown when FRP ability is deactivated

30 sec cooldown when FRP ability is activated (i.e., can't be deactivated for 30s after being turned on)

Sandbags and Ghosting

All sandbags standardized to 240 health and 35 armor.

Ostheer sandbags build-time from 60 to 45

Units that have been in combat in the past 3 seconds will cause all unfinished enemy ghostbags within 4 radius to immediately deconstruct

Repair Speeds

USF Rear Echelon & British Royal Engineers:

Vet 0 repair speed reduced from 2 to 1.6

Vet 2 repair bonus decreased from 1 to 0.5

Heavy Sapper upgrade (sappers only) decreased repair speed from 2 to 0.525

Sturmpioneers

Vet 0 repair decreased from 3 to 2

Squad Behaviour

Added a squad AI behaviour where individual models in squads assume varying postures while fighting the enemy (without changing their position) - i.e. Elite squads will prefer a crouching animation for some of their members, whereas non-elite squads will also drop prone to the ground.

Fixed a disparity where low-member squads also suffered from the most densely-packed formations (making them even more vulnerable to AoE weapons)

Assist each squad in their role (e.g., the new reinforced wedge formation will make paratrooper squads always have their thompsons at the front line) - Make each squad feel more unique

Squad formations are now, once again, more fluid while the squad is moving. In addition to improving immersion, this will also help the individual squads spread out better to make a better use of their formations.

Allied squads once again, assign support weapons (e.g., bazookas) to flanks rather than the core of the formation

Smoke Barrages

Activating smoke barrages will now only order one unit at a time. Previously if multiple mortars were selected, all units would fire smoke at the target position

Fuel and Munition Caches

MP cost increased from 200 to 250

Garrisoning

Load time for buildings increased to 1 (per model)

Max load time increased to 3.25 (entire squad)

Unload time for buildings increased to 0.5 (per model)





OKW

Kubelwagon

To decrease the manpower bleed the Kubelwagon can inflict in the early game (primarily vs USF), we have made the following changes:

Decrease rear armor from 4.5 to 1.6

Decrease front armor from 4.5 to 3.5

Increase health form 190 to 240

Jagdtiger

To decrease the on field dominance of the Jagdtiger against Allied tanks, the unit has received the following changes. To help keep the unit useful vs infantry, the Supporting Fire ability has received some performance enhancements.

Damage reduced from 320 to 300

Accuracy reduced from 0.06/0.05/0.04 to 0.055/0.045/0.03

Range reduced from 85 to 80

Supporting Fire range reduced from 125 to 95

Engine upgrade rotation bonus removed

Pop-cap increased from 21 to 23

Supporting Fire ability now available at Vet 0

Vet 1 replaced with Supporting Fire Barrage shells increased from 3 to 5

Supporting fire changes:

No longer collides with terrain

Mid distance from 2.25 to 1.5

Angle scatter from 6 to 8

Distance scatter max from 8.4 to 10

Distance scatter offset from 0.1 to 0

Panther V

As arguably the best non-doctrinal heavy tank in COH2, we felt that the unit offered too much benefit to spam and was increasingly dominate when produced in numbers. To encourage players to diversify their late game tech, we have made the following changes:

Pop-cap increased from 16 to 18

Decreased moving accuracy from 0.65 to 0.5

Increased moving scatter from 1.7 to 2

Vet 2 +10 % armor bonus removed (also affects command Panther)

Combat Blitz

+100% accuracy bonus reduced to +20% (affects all OKW vehicles)

Sturmtiger

Abandon critical now only occurs from ballistic weapons

The Sturmtiger Abandon Critical while reloading chance reduced from 50% to 25%

Damage reduced from 640 to 580

Manpower cost increased from 560 to 620

Fuel cost increased from 160 to 180

Population cost increased from 18 to 20

All random critical types removed except for vehicle stun

Le.ig

Now has access to a smoke barrage ability





WEHRMACHT

Elefant

Damage has been reduced to prevent the Elefant from two-shotting most Allied tanks.

Damage from 320 to 300

Pop-cap increased from 20 to 22

Panther V

Unlike the OKW Panther, we feel the OST Panther is more or less in a good spot. However, to make it somewhat more reliable in combat, the variable reload time of the main gun has been reduced.

Pop-cap increased from 16 to 18

Vet 2 +10 % armor bonus removed

Reload time decreased from 5.8 - 6.7 to 5.2 - 5.6 (reload time does not include wind-up)

Stuka Dive Bomb

Increase AoE damage multiplier from 1/0.35/0.05 to 1/0.35/0.08

Increased Munitions cost from 160 to 200

Removed critical hit modifier

Stuka close air support

CAS loiter no longer deals deflection/penetration criticals on attacked vehicles





SOVIET

M4C Sherman

The M4C Sherman has been tied to Soviet Tier 4 tech to prevent it from being spammed and to encourage players to diversify their tech.

Now required the Mechanized Armor Kompenya to be constructed.

CP cost decreased to 0

Penal

The Penal Squad has received some minor adjustments to bring it more in line with its cost and to reduce its effectiveness as a powerful generalist unit by offering a more distinct choice between anti-infantry and anti-vehicle.

Moving cooldown from 0.5 to 0.75.

Reinforce cost increased from 25 to 27

Veterancy requirements increased from 540/1080/2160 to 640/1280/2560.

Regular Satchels no longer collide with vehicles.

Targeted Anti-Vehicle Satchels now require the PTRS upgrade.

Targeted Anti-Vehicle Satchels will continue to track targets, even after they have moved out of range.

Fixed an issue where Targeted Anti-Vehicle Satchels would deal high damage to passengers onboard vehicles.

Fixed an issue where satchels were dealing more damage to friendly infantry than enemy infantry.

PTRS Ready Aim Time reduced from 2 to 1.25 (affects all PTRS variants)

Dshka

The Dshka HMG has proved to be exceedingly cost effective and thus the adjustments made to the unit below will bring it more in line with its performance and make it less of a spammable unit.

Increased reinforcement cost for vanilla crew from 15 to 20.

Traverse speed decreased from 90 to 38

Suppression decreased from 0.00044 to 0.00030.

Rate of fire multiplier decreased from 2.1/1.5/0.9 to 1.3/1.15/0.9.

Setup time increased from 2 to 2.25.

Fire aim time from 0.125/1 to 0.125 - 0.5.

Ready aim time from 0.375-0.5 to 0.25

Population from 6 to 7

Maxim

To make some slight performance improvements to the Maxim HMG, the following changes have been made:

Suppression from 0.00006 to 0.000065.

Nearby suppression from 1.25 to 1.

Ready-Aim Time to 0.125.

Fire-Aim Time to 0.125.

Fire-Aim Time multipliers standardized to 0.5.

Maxim Suppression Intel Bulletin

Suppression bonus reduced from +5% to +1%

Conscript

To make Conscript squads scale better into the mid to late game, as well as, be able to trade better vs comparable Axis squads such as Volksgrenadiers, the following changes have been made:

Damage from 16 to 12

Accuracy from 0.541/0.495/0.334 to 0.7182821/0.6598548/0.55654425

Near range increased from 0 to 10

PPSH accuracy from reduced from 0.621/0.43/0.2 to 0.5645455/0.3909091/0.181818

Molotov upgrade has been merged with the Anti-tank upgrade at the HQ

Veterancy changes:

Vet1: Added a Received Accuracy modifier of 0.92

Vet2: Molotov range replaced with increased Molotov throw speed

Vet3: Added accuracy modifier of 1.1 & Reduced Received accuracy modifier from 0.6 to 0.707

ISU-152

To make the ISU more accessible, in-line with its cost and less dominated vs other super heavy tanks such as the Jagdtiger, the following changes have been made.

Armor increased from 310 to 340

MP cost decreased from 720 to 680

HE Far damage increased from 0.05 to 0.15.

HE AOE Distances decreased from 1.25/2.75/4.5 to 0.25/1.5/6.

Concrete-Piercing and HE rounds can now bypass landscape/terrain.

Scatter Distance max increased from 8.7 to 10.

Angle scatter increased from 5 to 6.5.

AP Shells deal 50% deflection





USF

Calliope

To bring the Calliope more in line with other mobile artillery and less dominant at mid to short range, the following changes have been made:

Pop-cap increased 16

Delay between rockets fired of 0.125 added

Near AOE increased from 0.5 to 0.75

Removal of Reload Frequency

HP decreased from 640 to 480

Priest

The Priest has received the following changes to make it less abusive and spammable in team games.

Mid AOE from 0.15 to 0.28

Creeping Barrage weapon now shares the same stats as the standard barrage weapon.

Population decreased from 16 to 15.

Can no longer be de-crewed.

Jackson

The Jackson has received a slight buff to its health to allow players to be a bit more aggressive and utilize its speed to perform more hit and run tactics. Cost increased to match performance.

Health increased from 480 to 640

Fuel increased from 125 to 140

Manpower increased from 350 to 400

Rear- Echelons / Riflemen

To improve Rear Echelons as a support unit and improve their usefulness at different stages of a match, the following changes have been made:

Smoke moved from Riflemen to Rear Echelon (Lieutenant retains smoke)

Rear Echelon now have access to the Light M7 mine at a cost of 15 Munitions per mine





BRITISH

British Trench

British Trench now capturable by enemy troops

Cost reduced from 50 MP to 0 (free)

Can only be built in captured territory (also affects OST trench)

Firefly

Due to the Firefly's range and accuracy, when combined with the Comet or when multiple Firefly's are fielded, this combination of tank power can prove to be overly dominate (primarily in team games). To compensate, the following changes have been made:

Accuracy from 0.08/0.07/0.05 to 0.06/0.05/0.4

Moving accuracy from 0.75 to 0.55

Tulips no longer cancels move commands upon stun when hit

Tulips now deal 33% damage versus infantry.

Mortar Pit

Now has access to smoke barrage at Vet 0

Vet 1 reduces smoke barrage cooldown





BUG FIXES & Quality of Life Changes