With the 80th anniversary of the Battle of Stalingrad from last July up to the final victory in February of 2023, I think the devs need to reassess the Stalingrad campaign we have right now. For starters, the serious problems we have with Stalingrad right now include,
Lack of map variety - It has been a couple of major updates already and Stalingrad has been left in the dark in the map selection. Even Pacific felt like it have more maps than what we have in Stalingrad. As a Red Orchestra 2 veteran, this is a halfassed representation of the campaign with the lack of the known landmarks(Pavlov’s House, Grain Elevator, Mamayev Kurgan, etc) and areas(Gumrak Station, Red October Factory and settlements near Stalingrad) even worse with the lack of winter maps where the most important parts of the fighting happened from Operation Uranus to Operation Winter Storm to Operation Koltso.
Levels and Weapons: As a full access user, I honestly think they need to remove the paywall as this idea failed and scrapped by the time Pacific came. The mid levels need to be reworked like why the PPD-34 and Thompson instead of the more common PPD-40 at the time although already started to be replaced by the PPSh. PPSh box mag should’ve been in the mid levels too knowing its historical use there. The paywall is problematic as this causes massive balance issues with players have no full access don’t get the decent stuff that could’ve helped them but those were paywalled. What makes it worse is only one faction gets most players that did pay which at the time, I see more full access players playing German than Soviet.
Playerbase - back when the Stalingrad campaign came out, most people went for Axis as they get most of the new small arms like Kiraly, captured PPSh and Mkb 42(H) while most of the new stuff the Soviets get are vehicles thus lots of one sided battles at the time favoring the Germans. Now the population have moved on to their usual campaigns or a future new campaign like the Pacific so the campaign felt the most dead of all. I still play from time to time with BP tasks but not as much as Berlin or Moscow because of the issue with map selection.
What needs to be done in my personal opinion
New maps - The most important thing instead of playing the same 3 areas(Train station, Gorky Theater and the area around Univermag) over and over again to the point that Moscow has more map variety. This campaign need more winter maps like Moscow along with iconic locations like in Berlin.
Remove the paywall and atleast compensate full access players with something - I would mind some free decals, cosmetics or even gold, just open up the progression for everyone already so atleast the non full access players have the chance to help each other with better equipment.
Remove some other bad features - Get rid of the machine gun aiming consume stamina and other stupid gimmicks and make it something like the Pacific with weapons work like other campaigns.
@Veekay45@Scav_Sergei I would like to ask what other ideas you guys have for the campaign.
I really hope the devs give some attention to Stalingrad considering what they have been doing to Pacific.
I’d rather they fix the stupid hat/helmet glitch/bug that got introduced with the Pacific update. I and other people have payed real money for those hats and helmets and expect them to work properly! It’s been over 3 weeks now and nothing has changed!
Yes, Stalingrad needs love ! I really hope next update brings new maps. Also, you guys have any ideas for unique unlocks to Stalingrad? Was thinking KV tank models are unique to this campaign for the soviets so another interesting variant of that. As for rifles?
Despite the hate Stalingrad gets I think it has immense potential as a campaign. The two killing factors are the paywall and the lack of maps. I sincerely hope that the next update is focused primarily on Stalingrad and brings it especially content and makes it the highlight of the update. It would also coincide with the anniversary perfectly. I hope with the paywall being removed so goes the 4x xp. My friends and I never play the campaign solely because we unlocked everything in the first two weeks and whenever one new level is added we get in 2 or so matches.
Seconding the paywall thing because while I like the look of the flamethrower tanks, I’m on principle not buying into a campaign that’s been limited access for a year and was succeeded by a campaign that’s not limited access.
I know some players always want something to grind unlike myself where I would just play with my maxed squads at max level regularly but I mostly agree. Its just those who have full access need compensation to remove the 4x xp because they paid for it.
The maps are most important for Stalingrad to be different from Moscow and Berlin.
When it released it was like a big deal: new visual effects, PA propaganda, flamethrower tanks, bombers, customization, etc. And after Berlin it was the second campaign where the devs actually recreated certain areas of the city building by building:
Maybe that became a curse?
Like in Moscow, Normandy or Tunisia you can just put together a village, some trees, some roads and a river and call it a new map.
But with Stalingrad you actually have to model the buildings?
Idk personally I’d love to think some outskirts, nearby villages would be nice to see at least.
But it’s been what? 8 months and 0 new maps, just the same 5 buildings and 3 crossroads.
And yeah the paywall should have never been there.
As a full access player too, I would’ve been happier if more F2P real players joined the matches. The x4 booster and additional slots was more than enough.
Or at least have a 90% off sale and let it go for like $1 so that no FA buyers get too discourached that it’s now free.
