I totally agree with the realism vs immersion thing. Good game design based around fun and player comprehension should always come before realism. I'm worried the new resource management is going to bog down the fun. Now we gotta drive supplies up to the front, and that's only gonna work if the drivers manage to avoid mines, recon players, flanking squads, and not get stuck on the difficult and vehicle-unfriendly terrain that so many maps have. Most areas will only have one direct road leading to the point you need to defend, so the route can easily get camped and mined. It isn't like Squad or Post Scriptum where the maps are huge and you can safely drive off road on most of them. Plus if I remember right your spawn is locked to the enemy so they can't just spawn-camp your supply trucks. That already happens to tanks and artillery in HLL, it's gonna happen to the logi trucks too. And it wasn't really clear in the dev brief, but it sounds like supply players now must reset their crates using nodes, even if they die (I hope that's not the case). So now we've gotta worry about building nodes in strategic places. And what if the nodes get lost behind captured territory? If that happens, we can't resupply anymore since we won't have access to our nodes. Can we dismantle them remotely now? Or are players gonna have to sneak behind enemy lines to dismantle nodes so they can be rebuilt in friendly territory, just so people can resupply and keep building garrisons? That doesn't sound very fun. It's hard enough to get players to build the nodes in the first place, let alone dismantle and rebuild them every time territory shifts. I'm very worried the new meta is going to feel extremely tedious on top of the other problems. As much as I dislike the redeploy-to-get-more-supply meta, I think I might actually prefer it over what's coming.

Fair play Bill, I agree with everything you're saying. I don't know much about the politics behind the scenes with BM and TeamDixx so I can't comment on that. For the rest, I'm getting really bored in public matches. No garrisons and no one building nodes. I don't want to squad lead every match to give my team a chance and no one else seems to be doing it. They need to fix that, not introduce trucks that no one is going to drive. More shooting, less Admin work, and garrison placement needs to be fixed.

Another stellar video. Excited to see what they say in this weeks DB about the meta changes, will be interesting.

Valid points. I agree. The unknown and loosely used term of "Frontline" mechanic, imo is truly what's killing the meta. Or aka, "Player Density" data. Back when the original CoH-like alpha-meta wasn't working, BM was strongly observing data for player density. And they found that players tended to travel around combat, conjuring this cat n' mouse type of hit-or-miss game play. Since then, they came up with the "Frontline" mechanic and thus the map has evolved into what we see today. Today's style of map forces more player density within the points / strongholds. As you said in your vid, it "funnels" people in. Which, in that sense has been not what the backers / vets had asked for. Initially back in alpha, this was done silently. Then along the way with some silent updates in between, they tried to make it work. This has prompted most of us to feel like we just have to "accept it". Like Chuck Dixx, to accept it as is and hope it'll be ironed out in the future. Unfortunately, not much has really changed besides some tweaks to spawn systems and now, support systems coming in U8. I'd be the first to say the meta needs a total re-work, but what can be done without promoting known mechanics that Squad or PR use? What can set apart HLL from the norm in the genera? And that all comes down to the initial idea for HLL, which is a CoH-like meta. Knowing this and BM trying to adhere to a CoH meta, the old alpha meta of all sectors having resources had morphed into Nodes. Because of "player density". We were basically told, "You can't have an authentic battle experience if every other squad / player is chasing resource caps in random single square sectors.", or something along those lines. Thus nodes were introduced to consolidate all square sectors, to three main functioning resource objects for a team to generate resources without having to travel to single cap resource sectors and being out of the fight. (Which has some truth to it.) Now, while they dealt with that, BM never updated the sector "lines" and boundaries of the old style meta for the maps. The sectors we see currently with perfect square grids were actually designed for the CoH separate resource meta. Not this "dynamic shifting Frontline" / stronghold meta we play now. Along with changing the garrison meta, now we see the current issue that is blatantly pointed out in this vid. But what to do? How to fix? Idk, not a game dev. Hear many of feedback on what to do, but all requires complete rework of meta. Not really feaseable for a team like BM who are barely a 20 man team. Excellent team, but a team that is currently focused on producing content and assets atm to meet their scheduling to get "core" material in first. I believe meta change will indeed be revamped, but it'll be revamped for certain game modes to reflect rather than a general meta like we see now. But that's just my assumption.

Another great, informative video Bill, thanks for sharing!!....

When the game isn't fun, verisimilitude(realism) is no defense. I normally watch you for comedy, but your last couple videos have been spot on.

I'd give you another upvote for that Yes Minister/Yes Prime Minister snip if I could. Excellent stuff!

bro... keep it up! your videos are way higher quality than most other youtubers. i will keep liking and sharing your vids to help you get the subs you deserve!

Finally, my two completely unrelated interests (Yes Minister and HLL) have overlapped. Bring back ninja garrisons. It was obvious day1 of U7 that their removal was terrible. It remains obvious. It would have been obvious before U7 if they had told us they were gunna remove them. I'll go back to the reddit wars now. ty for vid xxx

I agree that people were whiney about the new meta 2 days in to U7, i told people to wait and let it settle and then judge. Now is a good time to start judging and asking for some sort of addition or expansion of this current meta! I fully have my faith in these devs and i think compared to alot of games companies today, BM are a godsend but there are moments where they should listen more to the core community and not try to make the game super normie friendly, even tho the core community can come of as whiny and not always being very nice, we are the ones who truely care and want the game to prosper! I belive these Devs will do it though, they are very transparent with us and do their best to listen to everyone, its not always easy. Good vid though Billy boy!

C'mon Blackmatter, fix the stuff and let Bill go funny again...! (joking, it's spot on as usual)

I'm getting tired of picking up the pieces for teams everytime, so recently iv not been playing. It's not enjoyable. I love the game. But people need to communicate.

If the developers don't get it after this great summary they will never get it. Maybe it is like the king of Rohan (devs) getting corrupted by Wormtongue (dixx) ;). We need a Gandalf, maybe you are him in this case mate. Keep the great vids coming, I enjoy watching them better than playing the game at the moment, with the exception of clan trainings on Friday which are still enjoyable with you lot ;). Matches are less enjoyable, are over too quickly because of what you are explaining in this video and the previous one.

I do love me a good Jackfrags

This iteration conveys the problem better than the last one. I agree with the positioning imbalance. There's a lot of factors that go in the broken meta. Like you've shown, too many SLs walking around are pulled straight out of Idiocracy because there's no mechanism in-game for them to learn or a barrier to entry. It's a tricky situation: how do you fix the so called "ninja garrison" issue? How do you get better SLs to keep playing that role? Do you introduce rating and consider it to be a zero-sum game? Hopefully the new updates resolve more problems than they will introduce. I'll keep playing and witness.

Wait, are you telling me reddit bois can't think so they need a 2nd video explaining what has been said? Can't be

Keep making vids bill!

I think the main issue is that it's taken too long to roll out U8. I'm sure they're going to fix everything; they're not blind to what's going on. It's just taking very long.

Yes there’s a lot of problems with the meta and capture points. But what I find is the best way to approach it in the present moment is to adapt and overcome it to the best of your abilities. A couple days ago I was German commander in St Marie Du Mont and two capture points were the Barn and La Mount (two of the capture points you talked about). We got pushed back to La Mount and got virtually surrounded entirely by infantry and tanks. But we had fortified the compound of structures and defended long enough for 2 squads to retake Barn by flanking due to the enemy using all their men to push La Mount. We ended up winning that game.

Where can I hear Starlord's piece about what is wrong with tanking?

Which is why I'm playing Rocket League instead right now

Awesome Wild Bill, agreed 100%.

Hey, please keep up with your videos. Its so good to hear/see finally someone talking about the real issues and not the discord supportermesshall nonsense

I'm giving the dev team a small break, yes U8 has taken longer... And maybe for good reason on their end? Who knows? But we have to remember the devs clearly do care about how the game is doing and are doing their best to maintain it's stability. Like any update, there will be good, there will be bad, and definitely ugly but the developers will obviously anticipate this going in, and make the needed changes.

The devs acknowledged your comments in their update today. Edit: sorry I only read it today (25 November) but it was actually Developer Briefing #103 from the 20th of November.

Good video , no one knows me on this account but i approve

U8 on paper looks great, trucks, APCs, fortifications I love it. But why they want to complicate matter even more when it comes to placing garrisons. Recently I Played as SL in open match and I have built 68 garisson through entrie game. Nobody else was building it. Now I will not only have to find a support guy but also engineer and I will be wanting for new supplies instead killing poor chap. And guess what. Even if anybody will bother building nods they will be decimated by arty/planes. And even if that is not going to happen now Support guy will have to do twice as much running as before. Where is a point? People will get bored by driving trucks after couple days. And we will fight in the land of no garrisons and people getting killed in their APCs while trying to set up new op. And I hate that idea because i really love that game it is awesome as hell.

The thing is what you do and say is 100% right but the way you do it will make the devs feel uncomfortable. You mentioned jackfrags. He would never let that happen. He is 100% supportive

I agree with your point of view: we (players who love that game) don't need more gadgets. We need a better balance to ensure all the games will be enjoyable, not only the ones we play as US. However, it makes me realise we could have a "survivor bias" from the dev point of view. Maybe we are like the 20% who tried the game and enjoyed it and we are all good with it (except this balance issue). It could be the devs are trying to retain the other 80% with more gadgets, which is a bit sad actually but fully understandable from a business model point of view.

They will get more then enough data about the competitive players getting annoyed if they don't fix the meta. By seeing that more and more experienced players stop playing and there will be nobody left to teach the causal players. Then everybody will just rage quit and the game will die. It's sad because I like the game, but nowadays I just want to rage quit after one match of pure frustration.

I love the audicity someone has when he calls out players who provide their viewpoint on the upcoming changes as whiners. Sure, experienced players who have hundreds of hours but more importantly understand the game are just whining when they point out rather obvious problems the changes will create. That's what a healthy community looks like after all.

Saint Marie du Mont is a horrible map in U7. Open fields make the side points harder to cap. I can't remember the last time I won a game as Axis on that map. Great points again. You can tell the experienced players know this, as we won on Hill 400 last night as Axis after we lost the middle cap "Flak Pits" and there was genuine surprise that we pulled it off. Purely because we had a few decent officers and probably a whole lot of luck. People don't normally say "Bloody hell we won as Axis after that point dropped" when they win.

I have to disagree I believe that transport trucks, if used right could be used to make a mobile front line by moving troops around quickly. Now the issue with that will be if the team will take advantage of those trucks. With the whole defenders advantage that HLL has the new defense buildings that we will be able to build may not be a good idea. Anyway that’s my two cents

I started playing the game weeks ago, and even now, after watching your videos, it is hard to figure out half of the stuff I am supposed to do, and when I am doing it, no one comes in to do what they are supposed to do: no one builds nodes, garrisons or drops supplies. And even when supplies are dropped, it takes up to half a minute to figure out where they are at, and where you can build stuff (radius), and by the time you are done figuring things, someone shot you in the bum. Because everyone just wants to shoot stuff in public games. And every single game has been 1. our team rolls over and dies. 2. Their team rolls over and dies (public matches). I mean holy moly, I feel war thunder has more -balanced- strategy involved than this, and that game is broken anyway. To be clear: this applies to public games. And let me tell you, after a few games of this nonsense, and after the novelty is gone, you do not feel like playing anymore. And lo and behold, most people I see in game are very low rank. This tells me that: the game may appear to grow really fast, but the attrition rate of those new players is very high. Very few hit rank 30 or higher. Therefore, no one reaches that point to understand some of the fundamentals of the game, because it does not matter: it never feels that you influence in any game the outcome of a game. It always feels it is predetermined.

Im right. I did hear it. I see another comment that confirms what I thought I heard the devs say. They only used your first name but did say they were addressing the issues that "Bill" brought up. I could only think they meant you & I guess they did,

Interesting point of view...again, but I must say again that I find the meta now reasonably good. In my experience, if a game is lost, it has been because of the team not being succesful in building enough garrisons, not about that they couldn't be placed in enemy territory. Who says that a couple of squads can not flank and place their OP's behind. Every time I see a squad or preferably two do that, the team is succesful. And, one of the most important part of attacking is to find and dismantle those enemy garrisons, something that the recon should focus on always. Maybe one reason that I am happy with this meta is that I have a quite aggressive play style. I usually play squad lead, and I love doing those flanks and fight in enemy territory. Anyhow, lets see what the devs come up with in the new update so that you can quit this journalism and focus more on comedy ;) Cheers!

Uh oh hhh boys, you can not place garrisons in enemy territory. Hopefully you will be able to live with it :D

The Jack Frags part 🤣 He's painful to watch playing milsims. Love the guy, been watching him since Bad Company but too used to the arcade nature and doesn't play the meta. Just runs and guns

The more the subject is brought up the more I'm convinced a rework of map territory needs to happen, the map advantages given to one side or the other is a large determinant of whether a point is even contestable or not, like your example on SMDM. I only found HLL after update 5 and so never knew about the CoH style of the old game and the real origins of the sectors and allied/axis territory. The more they tinker the more the game feels like a patchwork of mechanics rather than solid gameplay, the benefits of resource generation is so abstract and alien to the average grunt or even SL that nodes are almost never built, and when they are built its usually by some veteran who'll make a locked squad with a mate and then run off to hide them, which is completely unengaging and feels like a chore to both build and destroy. Games at best usually have one or two SLs who actually try and build garrisons with a decent comm, and at worst nobody even bothers or understands the importance of garrisons, I just want to level some of the other roles instead of playing just SL or support damnit. Adding another layer of logi trucks might alleviate some of the pain for building back garrisons, but with the way the maps are now I can't see a logi not getting stuck / blown up after 1 run, it feels like they're just putting out the small fire of start of round boredom whilst pouring kerosene on the rest of the round by inhibiting support players & SLs from building their own garrisons. Imagine if they contoured the territory to points of interest instead, based on the midpoint between the two capturable strongpoints rather than some now arbitrary 400x400 sector. Like having the G6 compound in SMDM be the border between axis and allies so that either team can actually build a garrison there etc. What if nodes could influence territory, like if you build a node on some preset capturable/contestable location near the new contoured territory border it balloons your territory more as well as gives resource ticks, e.g theres a pin in the centre of the open field SW of Rue that you can build nodes at, and if you're German it allows you to build a garrison in Rue. It would actually give non commanders a reason to build nodes, as well as provide a new source of conflict stretching the funneling that currently happens. I feel like these ideas could be explored more, but I want to provide something to go towards rather than just be another dude shitting on the meta. I definitely do not want the old ninja garrisons back after all but other solutions seem to dance around the almost pointless nature of sector capture power as it is and the arbitrary stagnant borders that you have repeatedly identified as problems with battle flow and map control.

Devs killing HLL with the particular realism.

Curious if garrisons were allowed in enemy territory how that would change the game

It's all true

I do appreciate that you're making these videos and being the "voice" of the "comp" community. However, I have an issue with this one because it comes off as you trying to frame the devs as incompetent or ignorant. They're NOT. Max has come out and said that they aren't affiliated with Dixx in any way except for some media production and whatnot. They've said countless times that they're listening and recognize the issues that have arisen since U7. They've talked about team balance, map balance, and the disparity between attack and defense. But you haven't given them credit for this, which is a little irritating because it's so obvious that they care, yet you don't talk about their efforts. Instead, you say they don't understand their own game when they absolutely DO, or at the VERY least are making their best effort to understand. I dunno, when you don't talk about these things, it makes the video kinda one sided and you come off as impatient and kinda mean.

mmmmm i dunno about this one hey. like i agree with the balance issues for sure and its great to point them out. but i dont like the whole subtext of this video which is that the devs aren't aware of this stuff/haven't realized the issues or thought about it/are incompetent. I guarantee you that the devs have thought about this longer than you guys and the game just isnt finished yet. 'competitive players' seem to think they are game designers? being good at the game =/= being a good game designer. people just need to have some self awareness imo. i also feel that a lot of the criticisms of update 8 were quite straw-man-y. lets just wait and see update 8 first before criticising it. playing on pte barely gives you the opportunity to test things, its so short. feedback is really important, just needs to be delivered in a respectful way.