Eldar players need to forget about DA beating out tac marines. They never should have in the first place.
A tac marine is the quintessential front liner both in lore and by stat. If shoota boys or da step up to the plate in a head on clash expect to be put right the hell down. But Eldar are a race built on countering.
You dont send DA against tacs thats not what they counter. Thats literal suicide. You send reapers with some form of scout to maximize reaper range. Tacs can literally not hurt the reapers before being butchered. DA have short range, incredible burst, disrupting grenadas, and are relatively cheap. You can build almost two to every one ASM. And ASM are what DA counter. They patented the tried and true one guy kites the other guy shoots him in the face.
Pre-patch SM had a ++heresy redacted++ of a time dealing with DA. Thats because ASM spam was the "only" option and it only worked against DA because of assault leap. Now that assault leap has been absolutely gutted that ASM difficulty against DA has only been compacted.
Every Eldar unit counters exactly one other type of unit and will be murdered by anything they dont specifically counter. They are a race of specialists, thats in their ++heresy redacted++ lore.
Yeah, like dark reapers counter only vehicles and only blobbed infantry. Oh wai...
Also, its not dire avengers that counter asm, its banshees. Only they can do that right now only in very early game because they waste their screams when there are multiple squads present due to it being on autocast for some reason.
@Hellhound I agree DA should never have been able to trade cost effectively with tacs....but T1 I'd argue you that Eldar play the least 'Eldar like' of all the races- in all but the fact they can't stand and fight, they instead lose to tacs.
I seem to be spamming threads with this now- but here goes anyway. Eldar are quintessentially a hit and run race but the entire mobility of the Eldar has, by design, been tied to the webway gate. Now that webway gates are (quite rightly) static in T1 and later relocate on a fairly long cooldown (because why would anyone opt for the wraithlord doctrine now) the hit and run nature of the race is limited to the radius of a webway gate in t1.
Meanwhile TAC's have all been made from the Tireless Usain Bolt gene seed, ASM have never had any difficulty getting around and orks too have myriad means of buffing speed, trukk dumping units places etc etc and none of these mechanics are tied to a static structure...meaning orks and SM can legitimately hit and run...meh.....
@Bersercker said:
Yeah, like dark reapers counter only vehicles and only blobbed infantry. Oh wai...
Also, its not dire avengers that counter asm, its banshees. Only they can do that right now only in very early game because they waste their screams when there are multiple squads present due to it being on autocast for some reason.
Banshees get mulched by ASM. Especially if that ASM has any support what so ever. Banshees do however have the ability to immediately close the gap on set up teams regardless of intervening units, stun them out of set up, and can block bullets on their way in.
Just like how DA dont toe it with tacs, banshees dont toe it with other melee units they dont have the health for it. They kill ranged units that cant fight back or run.
@DonDimon said:
This patch fixed most things vocal players whined about. But now the game looks even less balanced. If you put all the pieces together - the Eldar were stripped off their vital advantages, their race mechanics: high mobility and shields, and remain just paper with no credible vehicles. No compensation for the nerfs except for a joke Prism buff. Now what - Eldar will be thinking about any new cheese strategies just to survive. Like spamming those few units that weren't nerfed or increased in cost. Sounds fun.
The true fun starts when every faction is potent and agile. Not when one army is overpowered, the second is under-performing, and the third one is balanced.
And I'm glad that even many SM players abmit that current situation is far from perfect.
For those who saying about crying low-skilled Eldar players - I created this topic before playing the patch. I just do not approve of this new direction. If you nerf the whole faction, at least don't buff their counterpart. When you listen to your community, take a look at the bigger picture.
Later I played and won two 3x3 matches, and guess what, I was the only non-SM player.
So much for diversity now.
Well to be fair. You only have 3 races to pick from.. No wonder there isnt much diversity and SM are the favorite race of alot of people orks and eldar are a little bit down the list of favorites. Eldar will probably get a buff back and i wouldnt say they have no flexibility. Webway gates just need to be placed more carefully to garuntee good FoF coverage. Give it some,time and than complain or whine about it. Im sure eldar will get small buffs next patch to even out the fields but this nurf for the eldar was a bit harsh but neccessary. Im sure eldar players will refamiliarize themselves with the race and adapt and overcome.
@MaxwellsDaemon said: @Hellhound I agree DA should never have been able to trade cost effectively with tacs....but T1 I'd argue you that Eldar play the least 'Eldar like' of all the races- in all but the fact they can't stand and fight, they instead lose to tacs.
I seem to be spamming threads with this now- but here goes anyway. Eldar are quintessentially a hit and run race but the entire mobility of the Eldar has, by design, been tied to the webway gate. Now that webway gates are (quite rightly) static in T1 and later relocate on a fairly long cooldown (because why would anyone opt for the wraithlord doctrine now) the hit and run nature of the race is limited to the radius of a webway gate in t1.
Meanwhile TAC's have all been made from the Tireless Usain Bolt gene seed, ASM have never had any difficulty getting around and orks too have myriad means of buffing speed, trukk dumping units places etc etc and none of these mechanics are tied to a static structure...meaning orks and SM can legitimately hit and run...meh.....
I will admit that they eldar lost some map control. About the only way to get it back is an immediate teleport barracks. But other factions just build forward anyway so.....
In combat though so long as they have fleet of foot they remain the hit and run kings. In combat they still run circles around other factions.
after coh, coh2, dow2, relic learnt nothing. please small patches in small increments.
the best parts of this patch is the nerfing of nuke abilities, thats all. the more i play it, the more i feel that space marines as a whole as been overbuffed.
this is not just relative to eldars, even to orks.
whether tacs need a 40% increase to dps can be arguable. at least they are effective in combat now. but flamers oh god, flamers. combined with the new tacs these things are almost impossible to take out, wipes multiple squads and slows everything down. destroys melee combat and reach almost as far out as normal ranged combat ranges. they have 25 range and most ranged combat are at 30. imo, decreasing these things to 25range and limit their models affected to 4 and 10% reduced damage would be just right for them.
however, i cannot get behind the fact that las devs and pred destructors are getting so much buffs. las devs got buffed big time, the damage increase is kinda unwarranted, just the beam intensity changes would have been perfect. remember these things can be spammed and have an immense range. the last thing to do is to give them huge dps gains and allow them to sustain that beam intensity.
pred destructors are already effective tanks before the buffs. giving them a 60% increase in aoe? havent they learnt anything about aoe in coh2? always have aoe fall off damage, increasing aoe is always a source of balance issue. they were almost too good back when they had 3 radius and you want to load even more aoe and another hp buff? relic what the hell are you thinking?
if i am not mistaken, aoe has little to none fall off damage. i would really like some confirmation on this.
now assuming that i am right with aoe, a pred shot does 200 damage.
against normal armor, it means only 40% damage which is 80 damage per model.
against heavy, its 100%, full 200 damage per model.
now assuming that it catches 3 models in its aoe, thats 240 per shot to normal armor and 600 per shot to heavy armor. now with an even larger aoe and given how much units are clumping up in a squad, what is to stop them from catching 4-6 models, doing 800-1200 damage to heavy infantry and 320 to 480 damage
this is what i see in game, chunks of nob's hp getting blasted away. easily 3-4 shotting my full hp squads of nobz, and eating up shootas/boyz/tankbustas in the mater of seconds. heavy infantry are almost always a waste. i understand the high shot damage from AP sources, because vehicles have more hp now and are not affected by AOE as they are only a singular unit. but sharing the same armor type and vulnerabilities as heavy infantry really destroys the viability of heavy infantry, considering how late they are fielded, their cost in req/power as well as elite points.
why not make it so that vehicles have their own armor type that makes them immune to all sources of damage except true and armor piercing? reduce the hp of units with vehicle armor and rework AP damage to do 40% bonus damage to vehicles only, while lowering AP damage across the board (ie. pred to 120dmg) and introduce fall off damage to AOE. this way heavy infantry will still remain useful as a tough infantry unit to hold the line and are less vulnerable to aoe damage due to lowered AP damage and fall off damage.
why relic? why the random buffs, requisition base rate buffs and not fixes to aoe in general. why no fixes to whirlwinds, solaria fire missles too? why no fixes to how hard heavy infantry are countered by high AP damage sources with AOEs, (ie. walkers, tanks, wraithguards)
Relic have delivered plenty of balance patches that make small tweaks, and from personal memory have been accused of not making enough sweeping changes.
The game is young, this is actually the best time for large-scale changes. Why? Because it's the time in a game's lifespan when the design and balance is most likely to be unrefined. Opinion post.
@Bersercker said:
Yeah, like dark reapers counter only vehicles and only blobbed infantry. Oh wai...
Also, its not dire avengers that counter asm, its banshees. Only they can do that right now only in very early game because they waste their screams when there are multiple squads present due to it being on autocast for some reason.
Banshees get mulched by ASM. Especially if that ASM has any support what so ever. Banshees do however have the ability to immediately close the gap on set up teams regardless of intervening units, stun them out of set up, and can block bullets on their way in.
Just like how DA dont toe it with tacs, banshees dont toe it with other melee units they dont have the health for it. They kill ranged units that cant fight back or run.
Um, banshees against devastators? Well, i guess it could make sense in 3v3 compstomps. That quick strike ability is better used against melee blobs or as a sneak attack from cover.
Banshees currently lose a 1 vs 1 fight vs ASM because asm cost more resources, though they are more effective than ASM in melee in strength per cost.
And no, DA can and should go toe to toe with tacs same as banshees with ASM.
@wongtp said:
after coh, coh2, dow2, relic learnt nothing. please small patches in small increments.
the best parts of this patch is the nerfing of nuke abilities, thats all. the more i play it, the more i feel that space marines as a whole as been overbuffed.
this is not just relative to eldars, even to orks.
whether tacs need a 40% increase to dps can be arguable. at least they are effective in combat now. but flamers oh god, flamers. combined with the new tacs these things are almost impossible to take out, wipes multiple squads and slows everything down. destroys melee combat and reach almost as far out as normal ranged combat ranges. they have 25 range and most ranged combat are at 30. imo, decreasing these things to 25range and limit their models affected to 4 and 10% reduced damage would be just right for them.
however, i cannot get behind the fact that las devs and pred destructors are getting so much buffs. las devs got buffed big time, the damage increase is kinda unwarranted, just the beam intensity changes would have been perfect. remember these things can be spammed and have an immense range. the last thing to do is to give them huge dps gains and allow them to sustain that beam intensity.
pred destructors are already effective tanks before the buffs. giving them a 60% increase in aoe? havent they learnt anything about aoe in coh2? always have aoe fall off damage, increasing aoe is always a source of balance issue. they were almost too good back when they had 3 radius and you want to load even more aoe and another hp buff? relic what the hell are you thinking?
if i am not mistaken, aoe has little to none fall off damage. i would really like some confirmation on this.
now assuming that i am right with aoe, a pred shot does 200 damage.
against normal armor, it means only 40% damage which is 80 damage per model.
against heavy, its 100%, full 200 damage per model.
now assuming that it catches 3 models in its aoe, thats 240 per shot to normal armor and 600 per shot to heavy armor. now with an even larger aoe and given how much units are clumping up in a squad, what is to stop them from catching 4-6 models, doing 800-1200 damage to heavy infantry and 320 to 480 damage
this is what i see in game, chunks of nob's hp getting blasted away. easily 3-4 shotting my full hp squads of nobz, and eating up shootas/boyz/tankbustas in the mater of seconds. heavy infantry are almost always a waste. i understand the high shot damage from AP sources, because vehicles have more hp now and are not affected by AOE as they are only a singular unit. but sharing the same armor type and vulnerabilities as heavy infantry really destroys the viability of heavy infantry, considering how late they are fielded, their cost in req/power as well as elite points.
why not make it so that vehicles have their own armor type that makes them immune to all sources of damage except true and armor piercing? reduce the hp of units with vehicle armor and rework AP damage to do 40% bonus damage to vehicles only, while lowering AP damage across the board (ie. pred to 120dmg) and introduce fall off damage to AOE. this way heavy infantry will still remain useful as a tough infantry unit to hold the line and are less vulnerable to aoe damage due to lowered AP damage and fall off damage.
why relic? why the random buffs, requisition base rate buffs and not fixes to aoe in general. why no fixes to whirlwinds, solaria fire missles too? why no fixes to how hard heavy infantry are countered by high AP damage sources with AOEs, (ie. walkers, tanks, wraithguards)
1 step forwards 2 steps back.
Said but truth.
@Kat_RE, pretty please show this quote to the team
There are always going to be new ways to perceive a game as imbalanced, no matter how hard any company tries to balance their game. Could be at the highest level of play, could be at 1v1 vs. 3v3, could be a particular racial match-up, could be anything. People get mired in the details, convince themselves X should work against Y, and if it doesn't, then it's the game that's broken.
And unfortunately, language these days tends to gravitate towards the most extreme/bombastic/exaggerated wording possible to grab attention, because everything is about getting attention at all costs (see: clickbait marketing, YouTube reaction videos, etc.). How is Relic supposed to triage when every single balance concern by each individual is the single most important game-crippling issue that could ever be conceived?
Maybe SM were overbuffed, maybe Eldar were overnerfed. Maybe SM just has options now, and maybe Eldar need to adapt.
But maybe looking for any and all reasons to excuse one's self from putting effort into adapting to the new patch isn't the way to go.
@Bersercker said:
Yeah, like dark reapers counter only vehicles and only blobbed infantry. Oh wai...
Also, its not dire avengers that counter asm, its banshees. Only they can do that right now only in very early game because they waste their screams when there are multiple squads present due to it being on autocast for some reason.
Banshees get mulched by ASM. Especially if that ASM has any support what so ever. Banshees do however have the ability to immediately close the gap on set up teams regardless of intervening units, stun them out of set up, and can block bullets on their way in.
Just like how DA dont toe it with tacs, banshees dont toe it with other melee units they dont have the health for it. They kill ranged units that cant fight back or run.
Um, banshees against devastators? Well, i guess it could make sense in 3v3 compstomps. That quick strike ability is better used against melee blobs or as a sneak attack from cover.
Banshees currently lose a 1 vs 1 fight vs ASM because asm cost more resources, though they are more effective than ASM in melee in strength per cost.
And no, DA can and should go toe to toe with tacs same as banshees with ASM.
Again i stress. No DA should not and do not go toe to toe with tacs and banshees should not and do not go toe to toe with asm. That directly defies everything the eldar are. Never has anyone ever been like "yea eldar.....static fighting positions and force on force conflict".
Banshees lose that for a hellava lot more then cost reasons. ASM can disrupt multiple times at a point of their choosing, have way more durability, and pump out a hellava lot more damage. In order for you to bring up the difference in cost to have a numbers advantage you need close to 6 units of banshees vs 5 asm. And with a well timed asm jump my money is still on the assault marines. Compare that to DA who can kite and will begin to outnumber and bleed ASM at a 3 to 2 ratio with that gap getting bigger with every ASM to DA built. Focused ranged fire is a solution to melee. Why do you think melee units outside nobs fall outta favor the longer the game goes. They friggin drown before they can swing.
Quick strike does work as an ambush from stealth to be sure the skill is not one dimensional.
@Quitt I dunno man banshees should go toe to toe with ASM. In fluff on tabletop it's always been pretty close (power swords cutting through power armour etc). In terms of why ASM cost more....well they have a metric tonne of extra utility and that should be reflected in their cost.
I don't believe you are so blind.
It's not shield decrees or range biggest nerf for Eldar.
It's ability to teleport their webway at 1 lvl.
Let's be clear. Eldar can't fight outside webway range (especially now) They have slowest units outside fleet of foot. Their banshees cannot tie ranged units because are slow. Dark Avangers cannot kite/use big burst because are slow and get easily tied up by Boys or even Tact's.
Let's get drop pod and banner on head and you cannot even run, because you are to slow and all army will be wiped out. So you have to fight within webway range.
Now, webway costs 150 req and 30(!!!) energy. You can afford it max 1 or 2 on early game or you will be outteched. They are now easy to destroy since low hp and cant be teleported - so you have to defend them.
For cost of webways, Sm can build flamer and melt bashee, while
Sooo... Eldar can have now only 30-40% map control, since they cannot fight outside FoF = Free points/genes for enemy.
If you lose webway (cuz they are fragile and cant tp) you are behind and will get stomped.
There is now way for Eldar to win now. Even if they can fight 1v1 while under FoF, they cannot keep with map pressure.
They cant just run whole map, destroy genes and be back before enemy will catch you.
Which is funny, because fast attacks are what makes them Eldar.
@MaxwellsDaemon said: @Quitt I dunno man banshees should go toe to toe with ASM. In fluff on tabletop it's always been pretty close (power swords cutting through power armour etc). In terms of why ASM cost more....well they have a metric tonne of extra utility and that should be reflected in their cost.
TT they do match up pretty well. Usual falls to who charged who. Banshees need the extra attacks to get over their abysmal strength. If they do enough damage their equally shitty toughness matters less as well since they get hit back with less. But with strictly average armor and chaos heretic level toughness if they catch those hammer of wrath attacks on top of catching more attacks then they dish out thats one extremely dead squad of banshees.
None of this is taking into account the inumerable ways of cheesing this in 7th ed though.
Anywho this is off subject.
Back on subject why do space marine power swords do true damage but banshee power swords do not.
I feel like Eldar are fine at the moment, you just have to adjust. I'd wager it was never intended you would only need 1 Web Way Gate in a game.
You might have to actually build more than one web way gate and think about their placement now.
From what I have seen and experienced myself this is a very good balance patch. All units have their place and spamming 1 of anything is really not the way to go.
I think it was Hellhound who described it well, you need mixed unit compositions now, with compositions being the really important word that was missing pre-patch.
Setting up your units to either receive or initiate an attack: scouts around, line inf in front, heavy hitting back line spread and something to cover that back line - like banshees ready to jump on those asm's who are gonna jump your DA's.
That's but one example of one composition for one army, the same goes for all 3 races. Adjustments and reactive/proactive play regarding these compositions makes for a really good strategy game.
Add to that doctrine choices, early or late game focus, elites choice and more - you end up with a very rich and varied platform for strategy and gameplay, with many opportunities for innovation in army setup and actual in game strategy.
This is also enhanced by the fact they have reduced the early game snowball effect for all races, so the games really do go longer and you need to keep adapting to the game state throughout, never give up too early, especially if you take upkeep into consideration(but that's another story which would require its own post!).
It's too early to say how the meta's will settle but I'm hopeful that there will be many strategies and counter tactics now, giving a much richer competitive environment.
I for one am greatly enjoying playing and discovering this new patch, not only that but I'm also having much more of a blast watching it played now.
Go and play the game, try out new things, have fun!
I'm having zero issues with TM blobs. Macha, Dark Reapers and Kyre eat them for breakfast. Fire Prisms are stronger, Warp spiders and Falcons are still great. loving the game balance right now.
I'd be absolutely fine with the balance of the patch were it not for the surprising lack of mobility in Eldar early game ....it just doesn't suit their flavour and it means you have to sit passively waiting for the enemy to push into you so you can capitalise on battle focus.
The first engagement scenario is out of whack as well - there is no favourable way for Eldar to construct it. Orks can often build Waagh towers before a DA squad can force gretchins off the build and space marines have drop pods and battle standard to essential guarantee the first engagement.
Orks are less of an issue but the Waagh tower which can often be finished before any chance to counter is also a cause for concern.
The best approach as I see it is to bait these out and disengage or if the opponent screws up you can -occasionally- take it if you want for a quick warrior portal and banshees. This adds to a surprisingly passive opener- ceding map control and also doesn't seem to offer a strong sense of trade...what does the Eldar get in return for almost certainly losing this first engagement?
@Hellhound said:
A tac marine is the quintessential front liner both in lore and by stat. If shoota boys or da step up to the plate in a head on clash expect to be put right the hell down. But Eldar are a race built on countering.
Every Eldar unit counters exactly one other type of unit and will be murdered by anything they dont specifically counter. They are a race of specialists, thats in their ++heresy redacted++ lore.
This generalization is incorrect. If you look at Eldar unit design with respect to this game, they are an army of generalists. The dark reaper, for example, is a jack of all trades unit that deals true damage and splash damage but must set up. Compared to units dedicated to dealing specific types of damage against specific threats (see heavy bolter vs lascannon devastators) the dark reaper will always be inferior because it is a unit that is, by design versatile and unspecialised.
The same is true for the dire avenger. The dire avenger has average damage output from it's reload mechanics, average survivability granted by having shields and delaying bleed, and average utility from grenades and ability based doctrines. Compare that to units like the tactical marine which, based on its upgrades, becomes a specialised late game unit and you see the difference. Banshees are possibly more specialised, given that their damage is primarily targeted toward infantry and elites, but they lack any elements of design that make them counter a particular unit or strategy, unlike jump infantry they still have to walk up to their target even if that means using their dumb charge thing.
Space marine is the new specialist army. Every unit in space marine excels at one particular aspect of combat, whether its shredding elites or listening posts with plasma guns, disintegrating infantry blobs with flamers or heavy bolters, or focusing heavy walkers and vehicles with lascannons carried by devastators or predators. Each individual unit within the space marine army does very high damage against a specific type of enemy and requires a specific response from an opponent. For this reason, the combined arms space marine force is now the strongest in the game.
It isn't that each eldar unit is a dedicated counter unit, so much that each space marine unit now requires a dedicated counter.
Edit: To clarify, this isn't a commentary on balance, but a commentary on design. If the end result is that every race creates combined arms armies for various reasons, then the game is healthier for it.
I've not had that problem myself, I can often get there before a tower is up and at least pressure. If it seems you aren't going to be able to stop it, then look for a different way.
It takes time for nodes to garner a return and just having a point gives you nothing without a gen on it(which in itself takes time to construct and also gain a return), and if you later bash that gen without it at least paying for itself, you have gained an advantage.
Don't panic early if you have to give up some points, instead look to ones you can take and work towards to your own power spikes, if you feel you have a weaker straight up army just poke and probe for weak points for a while, and if they push play defensive(there is defenders advantage in this game).
Pick your fights .
You still have mobility early game, its not like WWG's have been deleted, you just have to place them strategically now and work around that, there is nothing to stop you trading the same as you used to in that zone - its even fine to fight outside of FoF as long as its nearby to retreat back into.
Try to fit in a second WWG into your build, this gives you more mobility than you used to have with the old 1 WGG builds to be honest. You just have to plan it a bit better and be mindful of positioning and defence. On most maps(talking 1vs1 here) two WWG's will give you overlapping coverage of one flank and the middle - that's hell of a lot of mobility to have if you think about it.
I tend to think of WWG's as a pseudo army unit rather than a structure - its part of your army, a huge stationary buffing unit - not a construct once and forget unit. And when t2 hits, being able to bunny-hop around 2+ WWG's also makes for an even more mobile race in my opinion.
I think a bit misconception is the thought that you should be able to have an even fight, anywhere, at any point in the game.
The give and take of the game seems in a really good place at the moment, sometimes you have to push sometimes you have to withdraw, this is normal in a strategy game and is healthy in my opinion.
I think the patch was deliberately a bit extreme to shift the meta. They really wanted to shake up ganeplay and get people to change the units they were building.
We should see a gradual "regression to the mean" on any units that were over-buffed in the next patch.
@MaxwellsDaemon , do you have a webway gate up before that fight?
Yea Eldar dont really get the ball rolling until they can counter match units. For me this occurs right after i get 1 DA, reaper, and ranger, and then start on a second da.
It feels extremely wierd not being able to contest the mid point. I mean after reaper ranger combo ill fight anything but DA....yea they arent rushing down anything. Im really ok with this though gives da their own little niche as short range massed burst. Super cheap unit for the hurt they dish out to anything they ambush or that drops too close.
Look i get why Eldar map presence took a hit. Even Eldar only players can agree that having a teleporting webway spawn next to teleporting bonesinger outta jump street was dumb. Webway networks not just the one gate is a much prefered method. But good god give them something other then "we run fast sometimes". Honestly would it be so bad to be able to port units between webway gates and only gates right off the bat. That would both encourage expanding the webway gate system as well as reward players for destroying them. Keep the teleporting structures behind a tech wall by all means. Make webway gates valuable and hidden all over the map. But for the Emperors light give them some kind of map mobility.
As an SM main, I'd probably agree that the tac's feel a bit too strong after the patch. Over all, it's a good feeling to see them actually viable, but perhaps a minor nerf (and I mean minor) would be warranted in the name of a more balanced feel versus the other races. That said, considering their cost, you have to consider their non-doctrine competitiveness. Without frag grenades to disrupt, without slow burn and upgrades (making them effectively a tier 1-1.5 unit), etc- they are still less mobile than the other races tier 0, and since you can purchase nearly two squads of another faction to one TAC, you can have one group tie them up in melee while the other shoots them. Or grenades them. Or simply pressure more points simultaneously. The drop pods and banners are meant to win an engagement. If you choose to give the point for 1 minute, or force them to move to another point, those abilities are then wasted, and suddenly the fight isn't so one sided. In short, don't fight the battle the Space Marine wants to fight, but the one he doesn't want to fight. If that means running away and losing a couple models, that's a fairly minor requisition loss in exchange for multi-minute faction abilities. Cheaper units allow for this sort of play style.
That said, obviously there are still more tweaks to be made, as many have pointed out. Though one might consider also that races like Eldar- which are not a straight forward tank and spank faction, require more micro intensive strategies to win out over their competition. The fact that this balance patch has forced players to stop expecting their cheaper units to necessarily win out over other more expensive units is a step in the right direction. As many have pointed out, this game favors balance base on hard counters, and is the basis of having a diverse army. If you're worried about Tac's and flamers, invest hard into power and rush tier two and counter attack with a truck or falcon. If you wan't to go toe to toe with those flamers early on, engage in melee and drop grenades, stuns, or taunts, to neutralize their ability. The other factions have them without doctrines and on most their early-mid game elites for a reason.
But with regards to predators, please consider the fact that one- they are a TIER 3 ANTI-PERSONNEL unit. A falcon is a Tier 2, and butchers infantry squads with it's small aoe but high rate of fire. The predator destructor is behind a 425 power research wall on top of it's 275 power cost. By this point in the game, if you are relying on blobs of anti armor infantry, and don't space them properly or scout for their increased range, you sort of deserve to have your squads obliterated. By this point in the game, you have nearly reached Elite point 9 units (at least if 3v3), and have access to long range true damage fire prisms, multiple wraithguard, or artillery trucks. Never mind the armored unit counters like Killer Kans and Wraithguard with scouts. Before a squad of wraithguard would almost be guaranteed to one up the Predator, and they weren't a Tier 3 unit.
@Victor_Magnus said:
As an SM main, I'd probably agree that the tac's feel a bit too strong after the patch. Over all, it's a good feeling to see them actually viable, but perhaps a minor nerf (and I mean minor) would be warranted in the name of a more balanced feel versus the other races. That said, considering their cost, you have to consider their non-doctrine competitiveness. Without frag grenades to disrupt, without slow burn and upgrades (making them effectively a tier 1-1.5 unit), etc- they are still less mobile than the other races tier 0, and since you can purchase nearly two squads of another faction to one TAC, you can have one group tie them up in melee while the other shoots them. Or grenades them. Or simply pressure more points simultaneously. The drop pods and banners are meant to win an engagement. If you choose to give the point for 1 minute, or force them to move to another point, those abilities are then wasted, and suddenly the fight isn't so one sided. In short, don't fight the battle the Space Marine wants to fight, but the one he doesn't want to fight. If that means running away and losing a couple models, that's a fairly minor requisition loss in exchange for multi-minute faction abilities. Cheaper units allow for this sort of play style.
That said, obviously there are still more tweaks to be made, as many have pointed out. Though one might consider also that races like Eldar- which are not a straight forward tank and spank faction, require more micro intensive strategies to win out over their competition. The fact that this balance patch has forced players to stop expecting their cheaper units to necessarily win out over other more expensive units is a step in the right direction. As many have pointed out, this game favors balance base on hard counters, and is the basis of having a diverse army. If you're worried about Tac's and flamers, invest hard into power and rush tier two and counter attack with a truck or falcon. If you wan't to go toe to toe with those flamers early on, engage in melee and drop grenades, stuns, or taunts, to neutralize their ability. The other factions have them without doctrines and on most their early-mid game elites for a reason.
But with regards to predators, please consider the fact that one- they are a TIER 3 ANTI-PERSONNEL unit. A falcon is a Tier 2, and butchers infantry squads with it's small aoe but high rate of fire. The predator destructor is behind a 425 power research wall on top of it's 275 power cost. By this point in the game, if you are relying on blobs of anti armor infantry, and don't space them properly or scout for their increased range, you sort of deserve to have your squads obliterated. By this point in the game, you have nearly reached Elite point 9 units (at least if 3v3), and have access to long range true damage fire prisms, multiple wraithguard, or artillery trucks. Never mind the armored unit counters like Killer Kans and Wraithguard with scouts. Before a squad of wraithguard would almost be guaranteed to one up the Predator, and they weren't a Tier 3 unit.
This! All of this! Except the tac nerf. To justify their extreme reliace on doctrines as well as their numerous counters and cost, they best be the slug it out in a straight fight infantry unit. As you mentioned yourself dont just stand there and fight them head on expecting to win, youre playing their song.
I never thought the idea behind Webway gates was to have them on leash to follow around your units from time 0:00. If that was the case, then just get rid of them and give permanent FoF to Eldar. The idea was that you would have to venture outside of the Webway bubble to attack, and then on the retreat you would boost away once you re-entered the Webway gate bubble. Hopefully, your shield management was good, so you never lost a model. Meanwhile a complete wipe, forced retreat, or a couple enemy models were lost on the other side from winning the attrition war. Rinse repeat. Of course aggressive Webway placement could be an option, but it would also be a risk that could be punished.
Then in Tier 2, larger army pushes with a teleporting Webway gate could start to happen.
I think Eldar just got addicted to almost always having FoF active with Tier 1 teleporting Webway gates, and now the withdrawal symptoms are kicking in.
I don't have the game - after the way these people designed and balanced COH2 I'll never trust them again. But I took one look at the patch notes and saw nearly everything Eldar nerfed, nearly everything Space Marine buffed, and laughed out loud. Unless balance was just a total and complete joke, even a moron knows you don't hard nerf A, give buffs to B straight down the line, and not expect there to be serious issues afterwards.
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Hellhound
Eldar players need to forget about DA beating out tac marines. They never should have in the first place.
A tac marine is the quintessential front liner both in lore and by stat. If shoota boys or da step up to the plate in a head on clash expect to be put right the hell down. But Eldar are a race built on countering.
You dont send DA against tacs thats not what they counter. Thats literal suicide. You send reapers with some form of scout to maximize reaper range. Tacs can literally not hurt the reapers before being butchered. DA have short range, incredible burst, disrupting grenadas, and are relatively cheap. You can build almost two to every one ASM. And ASM are what DA counter. They patented the tried and true one guy kites the other guy shoots him in the face.
Pre-patch SM had a ++heresy redacted++ of a time dealing with DA. Thats because ASM spam was the "only" option and it only worked against DA because of assault leap. Now that assault leap has been absolutely gutted that ASM difficulty against DA has only been compacted.
Every Eldar unit counters exactly one other type of unit and will be murdered by anything they dont specifically counter. They are a race of specialists, thats in their ++heresy redacted++ lore.
Bersercker
Yeah, like dark reapers counter only vehicles and only blobbed infantry. Oh wai...
Also, its not dire avengers that counter asm, its banshees. Only they can do that right now only in very early game because they waste their screams when there are multiple squads present due to it being on autocast for some reason.
MaxwellsDaemon
@Hellhound I agree DA should never have been able to trade cost effectively with tacs....but T1 I'd argue you that Eldar play the least 'Eldar like' of all the races- in all but the fact they can't stand and fight, they instead lose to tacs.
I seem to be spamming threads with this now- but here goes anyway. Eldar are quintessentially a hit and run race but the entire mobility of the Eldar has, by design, been tied to the webway gate. Now that webway gates are (quite rightly) static in T1 and later relocate on a fairly long cooldown (because why would anyone opt for the wraithlord doctrine now) the hit and run nature of the race is limited to the radius of a webway gate in t1.
Meanwhile TAC's have all been made from the Tireless Usain Bolt gene seed, ASM have never had any difficulty getting around and orks too have myriad means of buffing speed, trukk dumping units places etc etc and none of these mechanics are tied to a static structure...meaning orks and SM can legitimately hit and run...meh.....
Hellhound
Banshees get mulched by ASM. Especially if that ASM has any support what so ever. Banshees do however have the ability to immediately close the gap on set up teams regardless of intervening units, stun them out of set up, and can block bullets on their way in.
Just like how DA dont toe it with tacs, banshees dont toe it with other melee units they dont have the health for it. They kill ranged units that cant fight back or run.
CANNED_F3TUS
Well to be fair. You only have 3 races to pick from.. No wonder there isnt much diversity and SM are the favorite race of alot of people orks and eldar are a little bit down the list of favorites. Eldar will probably get a buff back and i wouldnt say they have no flexibility. Webway gates just need to be placed more carefully to garuntee good FoF coverage. Give it some,time and than complain or whine about it. Im sure eldar will get small buffs next patch to even out the fields but this nurf for the eldar was a bit harsh but neccessary. Im sure eldar players will refamiliarize themselves with the race and adapt and overcome.
Hellhound
I will admit that they eldar lost some map control. About the only way to get it back is an immediate teleport barracks. But other factions just build forward anyway so.....
In combat though so long as they have fleet of foot they remain the hit and run kings. In combat they still run circles around other factions.
wongtp
after coh, coh2, dow2, relic learnt nothing. please small patches in small increments.
the best parts of this patch is the nerfing of nuke abilities, thats all. the more i play it, the more i feel that space marines as a whole as been overbuffed.
this is not just relative to eldars, even to orks.
whether tacs need a 40% increase to dps can be arguable. at least they are effective in combat now. but flamers oh god, flamers. combined with the new tacs these things are almost impossible to take out, wipes multiple squads and slows everything down. destroys melee combat and reach almost as far out as normal ranged combat ranges. they have 25 range and most ranged combat are at 30. imo, decreasing these things to 25range and limit their models affected to 4 and 10% reduced damage would be just right for them.
however, i cannot get behind the fact that las devs and pred destructors are getting so much buffs. las devs got buffed big time, the damage increase is kinda unwarranted, just the beam intensity changes would have been perfect. remember these things can be spammed and have an immense range. the last thing to do is to give them huge dps gains and allow them to sustain that beam intensity.
pred destructors are already effective tanks before the buffs. giving them a 60% increase in aoe? havent they learnt anything about aoe in coh2? always have aoe fall off damage, increasing aoe is always a source of balance issue. they were almost too good back when they had 3 radius and you want to load even more aoe and another hp buff? relic what the hell are you thinking?
if i am not mistaken, aoe has little to none fall off damage. i would really like some confirmation on this.
now assuming that i am right with aoe, a pred shot does 200 damage.
against normal armor, it means only 40% damage which is 80 damage per model.
against heavy, its 100%, full 200 damage per model.
now assuming that it catches 3 models in its aoe, thats 240 per shot to normal armor and 600 per shot to heavy armor. now with an even larger aoe and given how much units are clumping up in a squad, what is to stop them from catching 4-6 models, doing 800-1200 damage to heavy infantry and 320 to 480 damage
this is what i see in game, chunks of nob's hp getting blasted away. easily 3-4 shotting my full hp squads of nobz, and eating up shootas/boyz/tankbustas in the mater of seconds. heavy infantry are almost always a waste. i understand the high shot damage from AP sources, because vehicles have more hp now and are not affected by AOE as they are only a singular unit. but sharing the same armor type and vulnerabilities as heavy infantry really destroys the viability of heavy infantry, considering how late they are fielded, their cost in req/power as well as elite points.
why not make it so that vehicles have their own armor type that makes them immune to all sources of damage except true and armor piercing? reduce the hp of units with vehicle armor and rework AP damage to do 40% bonus damage to vehicles only, while lowering AP damage across the board (ie. pred to 120dmg) and introduce fall off damage to AOE. this way heavy infantry will still remain useful as a tough infantry unit to hold the line and are less vulnerable to aoe damage due to lowered AP damage and fall off damage.
why relic? why the random buffs, requisition base rate buffs and not fixes to aoe in general. why no fixes to whirlwinds, solaria fire missles too? why no fixes to how hard heavy infantry are countered by high AP damage sources with AOEs, (ie. walkers, tanks, wraithguards)
1 step forwards 2 steps back.
Gorb
Relic have delivered plenty of balance patches that make small tweaks, and from personal memory have been accused of not making enough sweeping changes.
The game is young, this is actually the best time for large-scale changes. Why? Because it's the time in a game's lifespan when the design and balance is most likely to be unrefined. Opinion post.
Bersercker
Um, banshees against devastators? Well, i guess it could make sense in 3v3 compstomps. That quick strike ability is better used against melee blobs or as a sneak attack from cover.
Banshees currently lose a 1 vs 1 fight vs ASM because asm cost more resources, though they are more effective than ASM in melee in strength per cost.
And no, DA can and should go toe to toe with tacs same as banshees with ASM.
RedDevilCG
Duplicate post.
DonDimon
Said but truth.
@Kat_RE, pretty please show this quote to the team
PrimaGoosa
There are always going to be new ways to perceive a game as imbalanced, no matter how hard any company tries to balance their game. Could be at the highest level of play, could be at 1v1 vs. 3v3, could be a particular racial match-up, could be anything. People get mired in the details, convince themselves X should work against Y, and if it doesn't, then it's the game that's broken.
And unfortunately, language these days tends to gravitate towards the most extreme/bombastic/exaggerated wording possible to grab attention, because everything is about getting attention at all costs (see: clickbait marketing, YouTube reaction videos, etc.). How is Relic supposed to triage when every single balance concern by each individual is the single most important game-crippling issue that could ever be conceived?
Maybe SM were overbuffed, maybe Eldar were overnerfed. Maybe SM just has options now, and maybe Eldar need to adapt.
But maybe looking for any and all reasons to excuse one's self from putting effort into adapting to the new patch isn't the way to go.
Hellhound
ai> @Bersercker said:
Again i stress. No DA should not and do not go toe to toe with tacs and banshees should not and do not go toe to toe with asm. That directly defies everything the eldar are. Never has anyone ever been like "yea eldar.....static fighting positions and force on force conflict".
Banshees lose that for a hellava lot more then cost reasons. ASM can disrupt multiple times at a point of their choosing, have way more durability, and pump out a hellava lot more damage. In order for you to bring up the difference in cost to have a numbers advantage you need close to 6 units of banshees vs 5 asm. And with a well timed asm jump my money is still on the assault marines. Compare that to DA who can kite and will begin to outnumber and bleed ASM at a 3 to 2 ratio with that gap getting bigger with every ASM to DA built. Focused ranged fire is a solution to melee. Why do you think melee units outside nobs fall outta favor the longer the game goes. They friggin drown before they can swing.
Quick strike does work as an ambush from stealth to be sure the skill is not one dimensional.
MaxwellsDaemon
@Quitt I dunno man banshees should go toe to toe with ASM. In fluff on tabletop it's always been pretty close (power swords cutting through power armour etc). In terms of why ASM cost more....well they have a metric tonne of extra utility and that should be reflected in their cost.
Molek123
I don't believe you are so blind.
It's not shield decrees or range biggest nerf for Eldar.
It's ability to teleport their webway at 1 lvl.
Let's be clear. Eldar can't fight outside webway range (especially now) They have slowest units outside fleet of foot. Their banshees cannot tie ranged units because are slow. Dark Avangers cannot kite/use big burst because are slow and get easily tied up by Boys or even Tact's.
Let's get drop pod and banner on head and you cannot even run, because you are to slow and all army will be wiped out. So you have to fight within webway range.
Now, webway costs 150 req and 30(!!!) energy. You can afford it max 1 or 2 on early game or you will be outteched. They are now easy to destroy since low hp and cant be teleported - so you have to defend them.
For cost of webways, Sm can build flamer and melt bashee, while
Sooo... Eldar can have now only 30-40% map control, since they cannot fight outside FoF = Free points/genes for enemy.
If you lose webway (cuz they are fragile and cant tp) you are behind and will get stomped.
There is now way for Eldar to win now. Even if they can fight 1v1 while under FoF, they cannot keep with map pressure.
They cant just run whole map, destroy genes and be back before enemy will catch you.
Which is funny, because fast attacks are what makes them Eldar.
Hellhound
TT they do match up pretty well. Usual falls to who charged who. Banshees need the extra attacks to get over their abysmal strength. If they do enough damage their equally shitty toughness matters less as well since they get hit back with less. But with strictly average armor and chaos heretic level toughness if they catch those hammer of wrath attacks on top of catching more attacks then they dish out thats one extremely dead squad of banshees.
None of this is taking into account the inumerable ways of cheesing this in 7th ed though.
Anywho this is off subject.
Back on subject why do space marine power swords do true damage but banshee power swords do not.
Castiel
I feel like Eldar are fine at the moment, you just have to adjust. I'd wager it was never intended you would only need 1 Web Way Gate in a game.
You might have to actually build more than one web way gate and think about their placement now.
From what I have seen and experienced myself this is a very good balance patch. All units have their place and spamming 1 of anything is really not the way to go.
I think it was Hellhound who described it well, you need mixed unit compositions now, with compositions being the really important word that was missing pre-patch.
Setting up your units to either receive or initiate an attack: scouts around, line inf in front, heavy hitting back line spread and something to cover that back line - like banshees ready to jump on those asm's who are gonna jump your DA's.
That's but one example of one composition for one army, the same goes for all 3 races. Adjustments and reactive/proactive play regarding these compositions makes for a really good strategy game.
Add to that doctrine choices, early or late game focus, elites choice and more - you end up with a very rich and varied platform for strategy and gameplay, with many opportunities for innovation in army setup and actual in game strategy.
This is also enhanced by the fact they have reduced the early game snowball effect for all races, so the games really do go longer and you need to keep adapting to the game state throughout, never give up too early, especially if you take upkeep into consideration(but that's another story which would require its own post!).
It's too early to say how the meta's will settle but I'm hopeful that there will be many strategies and counter tactics now, giving a much richer competitive environment.
I for one am greatly enjoying playing and discovering this new patch, not only that but I'm also having much more of a blast watching it played now.
Go and play the game, try out new things, have fun!
Quitt
@Castiel
Amen, sir. SM now are indeed tough, but we'll get them one day
nerva2940
I'm having zero issues with TM blobs. Macha, Dark Reapers and Kyre eat them for breakfast. Fire Prisms are stronger, Warp spiders and Falcons are still great. loving the game balance right now.
Castiel
Warp spiders now, so much fun!
Castiel
Oh and on a side note, I think it's viable to take titans into 1vs1 now. Taldeer
MaxwellsDaemon
I'd be absolutely fine with the balance of the patch were it not for the surprising lack of mobility in Eldar early game ....it just doesn't suit their flavour and it means you have to sit passively waiting for the enemy to push into you so you can capitalise on battle focus.
The first engagement scenario is out of whack as well - there is no favourable way for Eldar to construct it. Orks can often build Waagh towers before a DA squad can force gretchins off the build and space marines have drop pods and battle standard to essential guarantee the first engagement.
Orks are less of an issue but the Waagh tower which can often be finished before any chance to counter is also a cause for concern.
The best approach as I see it is to bait these out and disengage or if the opponent screws up you can -occasionally- take it if you want for a quick warrior portal and banshees. This adds to a surprisingly passive opener- ceding map control and also doesn't seem to offer a strong sense of trade...what does the Eldar get in return for almost certainly losing this first engagement?
Am I missing something, some trick or nuance?
Xerrol_Nanoha
This generalization is incorrect. If you look at Eldar unit design with respect to this game, they are an army of generalists. The dark reaper, for example, is a jack of all trades unit that deals true damage and splash damage but must set up. Compared to units dedicated to dealing specific types of damage against specific threats (see heavy bolter vs lascannon devastators) the dark reaper will always be inferior because it is a unit that is, by design versatile and unspecialised.
The same is true for the dire avenger. The dire avenger has average damage output from it's reload mechanics, average survivability granted by having shields and delaying bleed, and average utility from grenades and ability based doctrines. Compare that to units like the tactical marine which, based on its upgrades, becomes a specialised late game unit and you see the difference. Banshees are possibly more specialised, given that their damage is primarily targeted toward infantry and elites, but they lack any elements of design that make them counter a particular unit or strategy, unlike jump infantry they still have to walk up to their target even if that means using their dumb charge thing.
Space marine is the new specialist army. Every unit in space marine excels at one particular aspect of combat, whether its shredding elites or listening posts with plasma guns, disintegrating infantry blobs with flamers or heavy bolters, or focusing heavy walkers and vehicles with lascannons carried by devastators or predators. Each individual unit within the space marine army does very high damage against a specific type of enemy and requires a specific response from an opponent. For this reason, the combined arms space marine force is now the strongest in the game.
It isn't that each eldar unit is a dedicated counter unit, so much that each space marine unit now requires a dedicated counter.
Edit: To clarify, this isn't a commentary on balance, but a commentary on design. If the end result is that every race creates combined arms armies for various reasons, then the game is healthier for it.
Castiel
I've not had that problem myself, I can often get there before a tower is up and at least pressure. If it seems you aren't going to be able to stop it, then look for a different way.
It takes time for nodes to garner a return and just having a point gives you nothing without a gen on it(which in itself takes time to construct and also gain a return), and if you later bash that gen without it at least paying for itself, you have gained an advantage.
Don't panic early if you have to give up some points, instead look to ones you can take and work towards to your own power spikes, if you feel you have a weaker straight up army just poke and probe for weak points for a while, and if they push play defensive(there is defenders advantage in this game).
Pick your fights
.
You still have mobility early game, its not like WWG's have been deleted, you just have to place them strategically now and work around that, there is nothing to stop you trading the same as you used to in that zone - its even fine to fight outside of FoF as long as its nearby to retreat back into.
Try to fit in a second WWG into your build, this gives you more mobility than you used to have with the old 1 WGG builds to be honest. You just have to plan it a bit better and be mindful of positioning and defence. On most maps(talking 1vs1 here) two WWG's will give you overlapping coverage of one flank and the middle - that's hell of a lot of mobility to have if you think about it.
I tend to think of WWG's as a pseudo army unit rather than a structure - its part of your army, a huge stationary buffing unit - not a construct once and forget unit. And when t2 hits, being able to bunny-hop around 2+ WWG's also makes for an even more mobile race in my opinion.
I think a bit misconception is the thought that you should be able to have an even fight, anywhere, at any point in the game.
The give and take of the game seems in a really good place at the moment, sometimes you have to push sometimes you have to withdraw, this is normal in a strategy game and is healthy in my opinion.
KanKrusha
I think the patch was deliberately a bit extreme to shift the meta. They really wanted to shake up ganeplay and get people to change the units they were building.
We should see a gradual "regression to the mean" on any units that were over-buffed in the next patch.
@MaxwellsDaemon , do you have a webway gate up before that fight?
Hellhound
Yea Eldar dont really get the ball rolling until they can counter match units. For me this occurs right after i get 1 DA, reaper, and ranger, and then start on a second da.
It feels extremely wierd not being able to contest the mid point. I mean after reaper ranger combo ill fight anything but DA....yea they arent rushing down anything. Im really ok with this though gives da their own little niche as short range massed burst. Super cheap unit for the hurt they dish out to anything they ambush or that drops too close.
Look i get why Eldar map presence took a hit. Even Eldar only players can agree that having a teleporting webway spawn next to teleporting bonesinger outta jump street was dumb. Webway networks not just the one gate is a much prefered method. But good god give them something other then "we run fast sometimes". Honestly would it be so bad to be able to port units between webway gates and only gates right off the bat. That would both encourage expanding the webway gate system as well as reward players for destroying them. Keep the teleporting structures behind a tech wall by all means. Make webway gates valuable and hidden all over the map. But for the Emperors light give them some kind of map mobility.
Victor_Magnus
As an SM main, I'd probably agree that the tac's feel a bit too strong after the patch. Over all, it's a good feeling to see them actually viable, but perhaps a minor nerf (and I mean minor) would be warranted in the name of a more balanced feel versus the other races. That said, considering their cost, you have to consider their non-doctrine competitiveness. Without frag grenades to disrupt, without slow burn and upgrades (making them effectively a tier 1-1.5 unit), etc- they are still less mobile than the other races tier 0, and since you can purchase nearly two squads of another faction to one TAC, you can have one group tie them up in melee while the other shoots them. Or grenades them. Or simply pressure more points simultaneously. The drop pods and banners are meant to win an engagement. If you choose to give the point for 1 minute, or force them to move to another point, those abilities are then wasted, and suddenly the fight isn't so one sided. In short, don't fight the battle the Space Marine wants to fight, but the one he doesn't want to fight. If that means running away and losing a couple models, that's a fairly minor requisition loss in exchange for multi-minute faction abilities. Cheaper units allow for this sort of play style.
That said, obviously there are still more tweaks to be made, as many have pointed out. Though one might consider also that races like Eldar- which are not a straight forward tank and spank faction, require more micro intensive strategies to win out over their competition. The fact that this balance patch has forced players to stop expecting their cheaper units to necessarily win out over other more expensive units is a step in the right direction. As many have pointed out, this game favors balance base on hard counters, and is the basis of having a diverse army. If you're worried about Tac's and flamers, invest hard into power and rush tier two and counter attack with a truck or falcon. If you wan't to go toe to toe with those flamers early on, engage in melee and drop grenades, stuns, or taunts, to neutralize their ability. The other factions have them without doctrines and on most their early-mid game elites for a reason.
But with regards to predators, please consider the fact that one- they are a TIER 3 ANTI-PERSONNEL unit. A falcon is a Tier 2, and butchers infantry squads with it's small aoe but high rate of fire. The predator destructor is behind a 425 power research wall on top of it's 275 power cost. By this point in the game, if you are relying on blobs of anti armor infantry, and don't space them properly or scout for their increased range, you sort of deserve to have your squads obliterated. By this point in the game, you have nearly reached Elite point 9 units (at least if 3v3), and have access to long range true damage fire prisms, multiple wraithguard, or artillery trucks. Never mind the armored unit counters like Killer Kans and Wraithguard with scouts. Before a squad of wraithguard would almost be guaranteed to one up the Predator, and they weren't a Tier 3 unit.
Hellhound
This! All of this! Except the tac nerf. To justify their extreme reliace on doctrines as well as their numerous counters and cost, they best be the slug it out in a straight fight infantry unit. As you mentioned yourself dont just stand there and fight them head on expecting to win, youre playing their song.
RedDevilCG
I never thought the idea behind Webway gates was to have them on leash to follow around your units from time 0:00. If that was the case, then just get rid of them and give permanent FoF to Eldar. The idea was that you would have to venture outside of the Webway bubble to attack, and then on the retreat you would boost away once you re-entered the Webway gate bubble. Hopefully, your shield management was good, so you never lost a model. Meanwhile a complete wipe, forced retreat, or a couple enemy models were lost on the other side from winning the attrition war. Rinse repeat. Of course aggressive Webway placement could be an option, but it would also be a risk that could be punished.
Then in Tier 2, larger army pushes with a teleporting Webway gate could start to happen.
I think Eldar just got addicted to almost always having FoF active with Tier 1 teleporting Webway gates, and now the withdrawal symptoms are kicking in.
guymandude
I don't have the game - after the way these people designed and balanced COH2 I'll never trust them again. But I took one look at the patch notes and saw nearly everything Eldar nerfed, nearly everything Space Marine buffed, and laughed out loud. Unless balance was just a total and complete joke, even a moron knows you don't hard nerf A, give buffs to B straight down the line, and not expect there to be serious issues afterwards.