tl;dr: Fewer tiers are not feasible, because tanks.
So, I’ve seen several people propose, that there should be fewer tiers in the tech tree. And I’m almost inclined to agree. Almost.
Yes it’s true. Most bolties perform roughly the same. There are differences in ROF and mag capacity and there are different preferences, when it comes to sight pictures. But they are all very good at killing things at a distance. They could easily fit in 2-3 tiers. The same is true to a lesser extent with other guns. Some are blatantly better than others, but they are all ultimately deadly weapons against soft targets. A dude armed with a Federov is as susceptible to death fromm 9mm bullets as a dude armed with a PPS-42. A lowly Sten can clear a room. Not as quickly as a Thompson can, but it’s still a potent weapon.
Similar deal with aircraft. A an early Messerschmitt can take out a Mustang. The different flight characteristics really only matter in the hands of experienced pilots.
But the same cannot be said about tanks. An M5A1 and a Panther don’t even operate in the same realm. And those two aren’t even situated at the extreme ends of the tech tree. Nobody would want to take on a T-34 in a Pz.III J, even though these two tanks are relatively close to each other in performance. Small differences can have a huge impact in tank vs. tank combat.
If we were to put for example Pz.III J1, Pz.III N, Pz.IV E, Pz. IV F1 and Pz.IV F2 in the same tier, that would simply be a waste of four tanks, because everybody would want to play only the F2 (except for a few excentrics and those, that haven’t unlocked it yet).
I could maybe imagine reducing tiers to 9, 8 at most.
(Bonus hot take: Introducing high-end tanks like King Tiger and IS-2 was a mistake from the very beginning. Now they continue to be a bother in different ways.)
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I don’t want to argue for the sake of it but, like, we’ve had Stuart vs Tiger and Pz.II vs T-34 for quite some time…
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And I hate that. It’s never such a big problem, when they start a new campaign. But things always get out of hand sooner or later. I can tolerate Stuart vs. Panzer 4 or T-34-85 D5T vs. Tiger, but not the shit we have right now.
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War Thunder my ass, br system barely even works as intented there, I totally agree that vehicle balance sucks right now in Enlisted, but it would be like WT 2.0, sad
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pretty sure I have seen Panther II and IS 3 pictures. Those are in the game files right?
Im currently experimenting with it and imo it not really because of tanks.
I was able to work with six though I wanted five levels at first. You don’t need 10 levels and the system of DF also doesn’t really do it as there are a lot of gaps or levels filled with like one tank.
And if you played it well, you stuart made a tiger. And you can.
I want to see a Russian tank flamethrower versus a Tiger II or jaghtpanther.
After all, no one will stop you from taking this vehicle to Berlin. Or M3 flamethrower on Normandy.
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I posted as much in the main thread. I think the 10 levels is good because vehicles need it.
“Mostly” i think the “vehicles” list is pretty good (soviets and germans anyway). Its the small arms that need work.
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I have slight disagreements with the vehicles, but they are surprisingly well arranged, compared to the small arms. I really do suspect, that the devs tried to get the tanks in order first and now they are trying to fit everything else into that picture.
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Even though I agree tanks are a bottleneck, it is still very possible to shrink the number of tiers. A lot of the early stuff is very spread out and with a bit of intelligent placement, you could shrink the first 7-8 tiers into 4 tiers. Also, they don’t really need to spread out the infantry weapons as much as they have even with the full 10 tier setup.
Even beyond vehicles, it just gives more wiggle room for both scaling and balance.
Its a lot less drastic to move something from tier 4 to 3 in a 10 tier system than doing the same in a 5 tier system for example.
Equally, you also have a lot more room to add future content without feeling cramped between other equipment
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Agreed. Am okay with the 10 levels and the vehicles.
With a bit of work, we got room to more appropriately place small arms and add extras.
I am still optimistic. I expected this layout, only real suprise to me was bolt actions in t6
Possible intermediate compromise:
Leaving tiers as they are, BUT making lowest ones (1-4, 1-6?) very quick to progress through, AND able to meet each other in battle.
(I’m considering tiers as a whole. I’m not going to discuss specific, “problematic” guns or vehicles that can easily be moved forward if needed)
This way we still have a confined low tier zone, where the guns powercreep is very limited or nonexistent, and the possible performance gap between vehicles can be quickly be overcome by stepping just above basic level.
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I agree, there definitely needs to be a certain tier zone where new players can learn the game without getting bent over constantly.
You cant protect new players with a tier, because you can’t prevent veterans from playing in that tier in any way. No matter how low you pull that tier. You can only protect new players with the MM rule. For example, if you put a new account in a protected match up to X battles, either partly or mostly filled by AI. Where the novice player gains a minimal amount of experience and may have initial success against the AI. The latter is the most important, since whoever is not raped into the first 10 battles is more likely to stay later.
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Your MM rule would be something i would agree with. I think it would be a good idea to have a fresh account be pushed into a more bot filled game to learn the ropes and add actual players as they go through their first 10 games.
However I dont think down tiering will be that much of an issue. Here is a snippet from another post of mine explaining in more detail. Overall, the insulation newer players will get with the new tiers will be better than what we have now, which is nothing protecting them.
Additionally, i dont think that down tiering to seal club will be a common issue because realistically there isnt much benefit. You would have to make a complete barebones setup to match with true newbie players, but it would only reduce any meaningful XP you would gain compared to if you played within your tier with more competent teammates and more versatile equipment.
Even if people still try to do it, it would be better than what we have now where high tier players can encounter a brand new player in a match at any time.