This mode will be separate from the main game mode with battle ratings. The most pressing question then is: what kind of balance is this, pitting Mosins against sturmgewehrs, or Ha-Go against Shermans, and so on?
I would like to propose the following measures to alleviate this situation.
No amount of online would be enough to simultaneously utilize both historical bindings and weapon battle ratings. Therefore, the balance needs to be adjusted for the new mode.
In general, in the context of battles using historical weapons, balance comes when the player reaches the pinnacle of leveling. Just like in the campaigns (It could have been. Devs screwed up even in this simplest shit.) Therefore, it’s necessary to make the obviously weakest representatives competitive.
The first is to significantly increase the recoil of all automatic weapons. This is realistic and reduces the balance gap between automatic weapons and rifles.
Second, restore the stamina drain when aiming a machine gun, as it was at the start of the Stalingrad campaign. And make heavy machine guns only aimable from a rest or prone position. (To clarify, you can fire while standing, but only from the hip.)
Third, if everyone has semi-automatic rifles, there’s no point in using bolt-action rifles. And having everyone armed with semi-automatic rifles isn’t very historical. Therefore, bolt-action rifles need some additional advantage. The damage soldiers take when hit by a bullet is purely an in-game balance value that has little to do with real-world logic. A semi-realistic shooter, in this regard, only needs a relatively low TTK. Why bother with this explanation? I propose a damage distribution like this:
Bolt-action:
Red - one shot zone
Blue - knock zone
Self-load:
Red - one shot zone
Green - knock zone
Blue - two shot zone
Thus, bolt-action rifles will remain competitive against self-loading rifles.
Third – Let’s continue playing with damage distribution.
M1 Carbine, Volkssturmgewehr, De-Lizzie and all pistols (except the machine pistols):
Red – one-shot zone.
Blue – three-shot zone (no knock).
For all automatic weapons (except heavy machine guns and more powerful automatic weapons):
Red – one-shot zone.
Green – knockout zone with one hit and death with n hits.
Blue – death with n hits (no knockout)
Regarding what n equals:
For simple submachine guns and machine pistols, n = 3.
For rapid-fire submachine guns (such as the PPSh and Suomi), n = 5.
Fifth, all submachine guns with n = 3 should be brought to approximately the same accuracy ratings relative to each other. The same applies to submachine guns with n = 5. The “simple” will be more accurate and economical, while the “fast” will be an uncompromising means of clearing rooms due to their insane rate of fire.
Therefore, the PPS, grease gun, etc. will remain competitive with the PPSh, the Thompson, etc.
Sixth, not every soldier was armed with assault rifles, and it’s not very authentic when all assaulters use it in combat. Therefore, I propose making it available only to machine gunners. After all, this weapon was originally conceived not as an assault rifle in the modern sense, but rather as something in the light machine gun niche. The player will have a choice between the SMG, which has a larger number of it in setup, and the AR, which has a lower number in setu. The AR will be something like a light machine gun without the machine gun’s debuffs.
Seventh, limit the number of automatic rifles. The reasons are probably clear to everyone. Make regular automatic rifles the machine gunner’s weapon of choice, and keep sniper ones for snipers (so logical).
Eighth, limit rifle grenade launchers to the anti-tanker class. The reasons are the same.
Ninth – vehicle balance. It’s simple. This is already used in almost every online game (including War Thunder). Vehicles are purchased with points earned in battle, like in the robot event.
From the start, players should have the necessary points to purchase the cheapest armored vehicles and aircraft. Or even make the weakest armored vehicles and aircraft free.
Point accumulation should be limited to the cost of the most expensive vehicles.
Prohibit the farming of points for purchasing vehicles when playing with vehicles.
This way, we prevent the endless, self-sustaining cycle of spamming the most expensive vehicles and give more options to the weakest vehicles available on the map. (And it’s not very historical when nothing but the KTH and IS-2 are used on one map because there’s simply no point in taking anything else.) Additionally, this will increase the diversity of the vehicle-based gameplay experience by encouraging players to choose different vehicles based on personal preferences, the battlefield situation, and their point total.
Tenth, increase the damage of some machine guns mounted on tanks. Give the Browning m2 a one-shot (because it’s a Browning M2) (and it’s also realistic), and give this machine gun, which is mounted on Japanese tanks, the same damage as the bolt-action rifles described above (or also a one-shot. It deserves it), because a 20-rounds machine gun on a tank is absolutely pathetic. (And also, give the Brauning on tanks a dismembered appearance, like a mounted machine gun.)
Eleventh, give one-shot to all tank-mounted autocannons and anti-aircraft guns. This will at least slightly improve competitiveness against tanks with normal HE shells. (And the dismemberment feature should be brought back, too. This is simply ridiculous.)
Another thing worth mentioning is the DT-29. It has a larger magazine than the DP-27 and, in reality, a higher rate of fire. Why use the DP-27, other than it’s authentic? What to do? Implement the hip-aiming feature for heavy machine guns? But the DT-29 is lighter than the DP-27, and that doesn’t make sense. In that case, I propose making the DT-29 available only to machine gunners in assault squads. The same applies to German MGs with an extended magazine.
Also MKb and StG with optics should be made available only to snipers in assaulter and machinegunner squads, or machine gunners in sniper squads.
I’d also make the Kiraly an assault rifle. From a historical perspective, it makes little sense. But within the system described above, it would make . . . sense. Besides, some games label it as an assault rifle. (How people praise the 9x25 Mauser Export. I can’t blame them. It’s fantastic.)
Now let’s move on to the most interesting part – leveling up and binding weapons to maps:
First, a wipe. As I mentioned above, leveling up for the main and historical modes is separate. Existing players will have nothing at all at the start of Historical Mode. The only thing that can be shared is probably gold. You can also transfer some premium and event squads, as well as Battle Pass and event weapons and squads, from the main mode to Historical Mode. Some squads can be transferred by replacing their weapons with more historical equivalents. More on that later. And yes, Historical Mode players should of course be able to farm Battle Pass and Events so that the rewards can be used in the main mode. Now, let’s talk about how leveling up and binding weapons to maps works.
The simplest solution is to use letter-based matching instead of a battle rating. This was implemented on one of the old test servers. Each weapon was labeled with the first letter of the campaign in which it was available. The player would then be assigned to that campaign.
Problems with this approach:
Players who choose weapons from an unpopular campaign will be doomed to kick bots.
Some campaigns will be very rare due to their unpopular weapon set.
Possible solutions:
Enable the ability to customize alternative setups for different campaigns. Similar to how it works with appearance customization. (By the way, this feature would also be very useful for the main game mode.)
Battles aren’t 10 vs 10, but up to 5 vs 5. If you want full lobbies, you can head to the main game mode. Also, from my experience playing custom matches, I can say that the reduced battle density adds variety.
The ability to switch to the enemy team even if it has fewer fighters than yours. This will help smooth out online imbalances (This feature would also be useful in the main game mode).
The ability to leave a battle without penalty if the enemy team has fewer fighters than yours. This will also help smooth the online imbalance. It will be useful if you are on a shitty map and don’t want to play it. (And this could also be useful in the main game mode.)
Now about weapon transformations.
There’s simply no point in transforming weapons from events or the Battle Pass that weren’t used at all in WWII.
Weapons included with event squads are a different matter. Still, such weapons are worth transforming to enable interesting squads.
I’ll give a couple of obvious examples:
Premium AS-44 - captured MKb-42.
Charlton - BAR or Bren.
Airborne Type-Hei Auto - any Japanese machine gun with a shield (although this doesn’t make sense, considering they’re paratroopers. It would be more logical to simply replace it with a regular machine gun).
Welgun - sten.
OG-43 - MAB-38.
PPSh-42 - Thompson (It’s simply the most similar-looking weapon. Although, at least in the new mode, Soviet nurses should be given the opportunity to use any SMG.)
PPK-42 - Thompson to.
PPK-41 - Thompson again. (It’s also simply the most similar-looking weapon. Yes, this gun was used in World War II, but it’s safe to say it was used literally to protect the factory where its designer worked. And there’s no location in this game where this weapon could have been used.)
PPT-27 - Reising (Similar-looking gun, no such location in this game, where this gun is used)
PPSh(S) - PPD - with BraMit device or regular PPSh.
Assault Engineers - give them some damn SMGs already.
And so on.
Other changes:
Remove winter clothing from the autumn Stalingrad maps.
Remove camouflage from the future.
Restrict the Japanese AT rifle to bipod use only (If you want to do a 360 noscope while jumping from this thing, you’ll still have access to the main mode.).
What will this give the developers? Why shouldn’t they instead order another thousand of crappy skins for one buck from an Indian outsourcers and shove it into another BP, which will be bought by people who haven’t yet fled in horror from this game (for some reason)?
Bringing back an existing audience who left because the game no longer offered an authentic and realistic gaming experience.
Bringing in a new audience who enjoys an authentic and realistic gaming experience.
This new gaming experience will encourage the current audience to stay with the project even longer.
Devs will finally fulfill their promise they made many years ago and stop looking like little liars. (Okay, I’m exaggerating a bit. They promised to make this a feature for custom matches. But they still haven’t done it, damn it!)
So?
- Yes
- No