Some additional points since this video is blowing up: Arguments can be made that soft counters allow countered units / builds to still maintain a tactical viability even when countered (so that the outcome depends on which side makes less mistakes, micros better, and the specific scenario), whereas hard shut-downs could suck the fun out of a match-up. However, on a macro, strategic level, not being able to hard counter something that’s immediately game-ending is certainly problematic. A quirk with many Allied builds is that when improperly countered, such builds don’t simply subject the opposing side to a setback - Rather, they can kill their opponent straight up (It’s why Cryocopters are especially frustrating to go against and makes you feel utterly powerless when a counter isn’t fully prepared; Also think Turret pushes and Javelin laser lock). Then comes the “fun” aspect of the game: Cheese builds are called “cheese” for good reasons - The general playerbase doesn’t enjoy going against such builds. When it comes to “commit to the exact soft counter or die”, a cheese build takes away the defender’s agency / freedom of choice almost entirely. While on a high skill level (where people are capable of carrying out soft counters perfectly), the win rates may be “balanced”, such a “balance” certainly comes at the expense of a perceived fairness. (Hence, Nash Equilibrium is generally deemed undesirable for a competitive game.)

Amazing video! Well thought through and put together! This feels like the first properly nuanced explanation of the "allies op" outcry that is often seen. Most other explanations I've read are surface level and not accurately describing RA3's balance. Also, super interested to see your balance mod played out in some matches.

So. I watched entire video and left two comments. What can I say? You deserve your grade, that's for sure. You helped me in understanding of balancing from actual developer perspective, something I truly need to hard punish infantry spam in my map. Also, this is one of the most helpful video I have ever seen in KZfaq apparently (no jokes). And you also popularly explained why games die, and why RA3 is "fair and balanced". Also now I get why I don't really want to play against pros, but if I want to learn - I must. Thanks for such great content throughout these years.

This reminds me a lot of the "What is Balance" video by the Team Fortress 2 youtuber HiGPS. He illustrated the same problem using a variant of Rock Paper Scissors with only two elements as an example. If you can only choose between Rock and Paper, picking Rock never makes sense as you can at best draw and at worst lose, where with Paper you can at best win and at worst draw. Playing against Allies often feels like being a Rock player in this situation - assuming you and them are of equal skill, staying alive is the best outcome you can hope for, and winning is more a matter of the Allied player making a mistake than you outplaying them at their best. AFAIK HiGPS isn't a trained game designer (and it shows, no hard feelings), so it's pretty interesting to see this phenomenon examined through the more holistic lens of game theory.

As a disclaimed, I haven't played RA3 beyond the campaigns, so I can't directly comment on the balance of the game. What I did play is Starcraft 2, and I must say, while you focused on the problem of specific counters to specific builds, its not that of a big issue per-se, but the second part that after countering you only equalize the game. Zerg is the most reactive of the 3, but Zerg needs to be kept in check in all times or they will over-run you either with crushing economy + numbers or by fielding many devastating high-tech units and a forest of static defenses so that becomes more of a dynamic of the Zerg trying to get and keep it's golden economy and Protoss /Terran trying to disrupt as much as possible via harassment and/or timing attacks. To compare it to RA3, instead of giving more counters to each army, I think it may be better to strengthen the mid-late game options of the other armies.

Very well done as always.

One point I'd like to make is the problem of special abilities. In RA3, some units have special abilities that actually 'do things' and have huge impact on the battlefield, as opposed to units that have second abilites that just give flat stats or do nothing at all. And most of the good, game-changing special abilities (blackhole armor, shrink ray, emp etc) are on Allied units. Allied units are so versatile precisely because of these specials, while Soviet and Empire units have very boring abilities that do very little. This is especially true if you compare the tier 3 units of each class. Soviets are supposed to rule the land and Empire the water, but in reality Allies beat them on both land and water because Allies' tier 3 units all have super impactful special abilites while Empire and Soviet don't have any. Black hole armor and EMP missile can single handedly decide the flow of a battle; naginata's torpedo ability and shogun's charge are extremely clunky abilities that might as well not exist due to how difficult it is to use them effectively. Similarly, on land the utility of Athena's aegis shield and mirage tank's cloaking field are miles ahead of soviet v3's aoe missile toggle and apocalypse's useless tractor beam. Sure an army of apocs will beat an army of mirages head on, but who will actually engage like that in actual play? Athena and mirage are much better as a late game army in combination with infantry than soviet units ever could be.

1:06 I actually catched this issue in my own "game" (custom map for Warcraft 3). If I will grossly oversimplify, one player turned one unit into complete disaster, that I can't patch for literal days (and yes, development of custom map in WC3 needs much less time, so in fact I don't really know what to do now since there is 100% WR strategy that you can always use. Even cryo rush isn't so oppressing). So yes, this statement is completely true and I can say it from my own experience. P.S. Sorry for littering comments

This vid popped up in my vid, and man, the first time back to this channel in a long time and wow. This was super intriguing to see and even a bit vindicating because of how I once asked under one of your vids about why cryocopters and the like weren't banned from tournaments. The balance patch you're making sounds like it may give a huge shakeup, the kind the game will need.

Reminds me of Starcraft 2, when I started multiplaying with a friend years ago, I quickly realised how completely outclassed I was having not memorized the 'perfect' openers.

I freaking love this video as it's so amazingly well put together.... but it also means a lot of statistical adjustments for the game I am currently building.... thank you so much!

I like when someone meddles with game theory and applies it to real world situations. Good job, mate

This is an incredible video, I loved your in-depth analysis of the game's units strengths but also focusing on motives of player's in-game choices it really opens up my eyes for how balance in other rtses could be viewed as (like per say, in starcraft 2)

Prisoners Dilemma is best interaction with only one on one encounters. If you really want to study the interactions with groups of players look up Wizzards Duel sometimes called 3-way duel or truel. But often when it comes to faction balancing, it sort of boils down to Faction Calculus which sort of reduces to no more than 5 balanced Factions with other Factions taking on either a heavier or lighter role of one of the 5, or by splitting up the branches of the faction such as making one side have heavier air units while another faction that would be a mirror if it weren't for a swarm style air units.

Well done on the analysis!

Mental Omega Balancing is kinda about opening up options as well. But because everyone has so many options Allies are actually weak in that mod because Allies doesn't have the numbers to back up their situational effectivness.

I have never thought about red alert 3 so deeply in my life

I hope you will make more of these game design vids they're amazing

this is a very well-thought-out video, and for the most part, i agree with everything except how you break blanace down into the proactive player is always going to be the strongest and more overpowered. while, yes, one faction in any RTS being the best at being proactive can cause problems, it does not inherently always do so. making a faction more proactive than another is an explicit design choice one can make as a means to differentiate the factions and make a wider variety of how the game is played. in the case of RA3, it does do the opposite. but it does not always do the opposite. StarCraft: Brood War is an excellent example of this, with Zerg Mutalisk timings against Terran. Terran has several different options to *react* to this *proactive* move of the Zerg, and each of them has different strengths and weaknesses. however, if the Zerg *does not* do this, the Terran actually has a much easier time deciding on what they should do, because, generally, the Marine/Science Vessel combo is objectively the strongest against Zerg. due to Mutalisks, you can decide to make Missile Turrets, Valkyries, or Goliaths, instead of Marines, and by doing so you provide a basis for your infrastructure to switch between different tactics more quickly and easily, you do not *have* to go for Marines to counter the Mutalisks, and if you did, then you'd likely have a harder time switching your tactics on the fly, and, indeed, we do actually see that in BW, Terrans that put a lot of investment into bio have a harder time switching to mech, but Terrans that build up to and invest in different air counters can still reflect the mutalisks and then have infrastructure to provide that option to switch. to be clear: the Zerg for the early stages of the game are still *100% in control* of the game, they have the vision, they have the map control, they are forcing the Terran to react with anti-air, they have almost every control-based factor in their favor. and yet despite having this proactive grip, Terrans are often the ones that leave the early stages of the game with the upperhand. now, why do i say that about the infrastructure? well, Valkyries and Goliaths require an Armoy, and Armories are where you get your Mech-related upgrades. Goliaths take Factories and Valkyries take Starports. by going Goliaths, you build Factories and an Armory or potentially two, and now you have provided your mech with a light production basis. if you go Valkyries, you are still providing some infrastructure basis for mech. going Valkyries does also mean you are providing a technological basis for Marine/Vessel as well, so, even by doing Valkyries, if you DO want to stick to the best plan then you have actually also set up some infrastructure for that. why is that important? because we do indeed sometimes see Terrans do a major tech switch from the Marine/Vessel style into the mech style, even though the Marine/Vessel style is stronger and they may even have the basis of infrastructure to fully-commit to it. this switch ends up allowing Terrans to take a major proactive advantage against a Zerg, because Tanks and Vultures with Spider Mines takes a very different approach that a Zerg may not have their own infrastructure available to respond to than Marine/Vessel does. Zerg has already invested into a Spire, but a Spire is not very useful against Mech. so now they have this infrastructure that isnt contributing anything for them. so as you can see, despite this more proactive nature that the Zerg has for the early-game, it ends up being that later on Zerg actually ends up more on the backfoot and having to end up playing more defensive. even if the Terran does go for the Marine/Vessel style, it can be very difficult to keep the pressure on the Terran instead of on you. even though Vessels definitely do have a lot of very strong counters, that the Zerg already has the infrastructure for, it can be a very tricky composition to deal with. and, ultimately, if a Zerg simply leaves a Terran completely alone, they will almost always go for that Marine/Vessel composition. this ends up making a much staler game and will always give the Terran the proactive advantage from that point forward. and, really, we get down to what an RTS game is closer to at its core. always vying for the proactive lead. in ANY RTS game, taking a proactive lead and making your opponent have to react to you always give you a distinct advantage, no matter what. but in an idealized RTS game, when the game is relatively equal, or even decently in the favor of the proactive player, there are options for the reactive player to turn the game around and become more proactive. it DOES come down to, yes, needing proper counters in your game. *however,* breaking it down into it being counters vs a proactive faction being the reason that faction is stronger or not is not really the full picture, here. a faction can be more proactive, still have counters, and still be stronger, or be proactive, not have counters, and still be weaker. realistically, i think it just cant be broken down into this simple basis. proactiveness, in an ideal situation, only really determines who is controlling the pace of the game, and not necessarily who the stronger or more overpowered faction is. like i said, everything else about the video is definitely very good, especially the proposed balance changes, there is frankly no reason why these tech paths should be so restricted for Soviets and Rising Sun tbh, and i dont have any real concern about them design-wise. Archer Maidens in particular were a much-needed addition with Uprising for very similar reasons that you propose, as they give very much-needed early anti-air that Rising Sun pretty much entirely lacked otherwise. if im understanding right, they STILL dont really give Uprising good early AA though? which is a pretty big shame, but the idea on paper i really liked about Uprising.

Thank you for producing this video. Just recently started playing CNC titles in general, but the balance education is useful for games I'm more experienced in.

Great content, intellectual and entertaining commentary about my favorite game.

This was actually a really helpful video thank you

I'm so glad an actual game designer has a look at this game. I love it and want it to prosper and completely agree, that it needs some changes, in order to survive another decade. The video itself is also top, with all those examples from actual games. Big like!

Takes me back to 2012 when I applied something akin to Intransitive Balancing analysis to Nethack, when I was still in University and taking Economics as an elective. My purpose was explaining the non-numerical advantages that each role possessed for their preferred strategy of Ascension, and why certain paradoxical "hard" classes had some of the best performances in Ascension races between players. Nethack is a game of risk management that is roughly broken up into four stages. (Early-Level Gambit, Mid-Level Descent, Pre-Gehenna high-Level, post-Gehenna high-Level) Normally, you have all the time in the world to effectively beat each stage of the game in order to move onto the next part, with an overarching meta-goal experienced players call "Building your Ascension Kit". This "kit" is a set of items to prepare you for the biggest challenges the game has to throw at you from the moment you go to grab the Amulet of Yendor in Gehenna. So crude efficiency in class features (which are one of the few things completely in the player's control and not RNG-oriented whatsoever) normally dictates which classes are easiest to Ascend with. However, when the game is subject to time-constraints via acing conditions, the typical "meta" classes tend to fall behind "harder/risky" classes because of specific early game gambits available to them. This is because for highly experienced players who regularly Ascend, they recognize that the early game is actually the most difficult and influential part of the game. Successfully pulling off one of these gambits enables them to play much more freely and aggressively int he mid game, which in turn, leads to better times in late game, where all classes basically play the same with little variance.

Red Alert 3 Turns 14 years old. Oh god... I am so old.... AHEM Thank for the video man really good to see someone explain this in such a deep level. I am really REALLY rooting for your balance patch to be a success!

Well said analysis. Guess that's why videos like Bryan Vahey's video with RA2 content is still appealing....

One thing that could use an actual change is the multigunner turret. Instead of it being just super powerful, it could have a base damage the same as a javelin, which would be half, and then the current power after you put a javelin inside. Would make plenty of sense and force Allies to diversify their army and not spam turrets.

Today i learned this game still is relevant..... to 5 people.

So it sounds like Allies don't actually have to commit to any particular build. So you can bluff one thing, and then build its counter's counter.

Really highlights just how deceiving stats, and points can be if you do not fully understand the problem.

Baked in subtitles! Nice!

This game was so good. One of my crowning achievements was finishing this whole series, together with the commander challenges, all under par time for 100%. Did it like a year ago.

if you want see a balance version of the the cryo copter, I would suggest looking at the one in mental Omega.

I LOOOVE THIS CHANGESSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Amazing suggestions. Like you said, allies arent op just because of 1 cheesy build, they r OP because they dictate the game and decide whatthe enemy will do ,and they r op because they r the only faction with answer to ANYTHING(even cryogeddon) . Other factions just dont have good answer. Athena outclass other artilery due to her versatility , making her useful not for one ,but for 2 things. Same with almost every freakin other allied unit. Their ,,bad ones'' are still decent. Like in other games- why would u pick a character that does one thing good, when you can pick one ,that does many things good , making it versatile and reactive to any situation. Its like the devs wanted allies to be the best faction

Thank you for such deep lecture about game design! Hope cryos are only a dream and I will wake up once.

this was a good video well done.

This was really cool.

Finally someone with a higher than room temperature IQ in the C&C Community. Maybe the subreddit has poisoned my mental image, but it is refreshing to see someone capable of performing robust analysis and adopting a nuanced position on things. Someone who clearly has a half-way decent handle on game design.

l love how you play and discuss red alert3 bro it helps me alot keep it up bro😊

That is an interesting concept. I wonder if the prisoners dilemma applies to other video games, like the fighting games (smash bros, street fighter) where you get even less time to answer with the right response to whatever an opponent throws at you

I was a Soviet player and spent 8 years hanging around pvp section of this dead game. I'm glad that someone debunk the key point of RA3 balance issue. I always say that 95% of the game Allies player could win if they made a right decision at a right time. Others only wining chance is to wait for Allies player to make mistakes. Well, 5% of the totally matches I played, or view were excellently performed where Allies player did nothing wrong but still lost. Like you know, to me it's 5%.

wow really profound, very interesting!

7:08 XYHC saying sus isn't something I thought I really needed to hear

Great video. I've been working on the balance for OpenRA: Combined Arms for a couple of years now, it's so much fun. It has five main factions (Allies, Soviets, GDI, Nod, Scrin) and twenty subfactions so it's a big challenge to balance and I've certainly wrestled with some of the stuff you raised here, though this definitely casts a new light on it. If you want something different to look into I'd be really interested to hear your thoughts on CA, but regardless thanks for the interesting content.

Very good video, and I anticipate the king sputnik mod or balance patches, I don't even play RA3 multiplayer but I religiously watch sybert and it would be new and interesting content. My own thoughts for balancing allies which I don't think is brought up much is in their later game units, I think their tier 2 and 3 units are too well rounded. Their artillery can counter support powers, their destroyer can counter any high damage micro play, and their T3 ship can shutdown any base or ground forces. From my perspective it locks down any tactics or advantages from the other teams. They either need to be altered or moved around. IMO the dreadnought could take the emp, or the apocalypse take the blackhole armour.

Even against the AI, Vindicators are the most annoying things ever. Every building needs AA defense or else it's just gunna get bombed to bits. Even worse is when you have complete AA coverage and you just see the Vindicators swirling around their airfield because the AI's decision to attack is based solely on "Does it have AA around it?"

When you are talking about only one soft counter option, it reminds me of Uprising challenge mode, where in late game the tactic is Empire VX spam

Thanks to your vid. Now I realize that S.H.R.I.N.K. beam have its alternative title. Meme aside, this is really mind-opening and edutaining vid. Thanks man!

Honestly, a healthy metagame is always going to involve players bitching and moaning for a few weeks after a patch. You never really know how things will shift when a large community gets a hold of them. It's better to have a little instability than a stagnant game

I have to say, it is nice to see that someone has the same view as me when it comes to how to balance an RTS. (Also applicable to some other games). I generally think that each action should at least have two viable counter responses. And those have two viable counter responses. This creates a dynamic game where you have to always adapt. Where the one taking action first will not always dictate the flow of the game. Naturally this is just a rule of thumb and one needs to look at how to apply this philosophy. Having also options for suboptimal counters that are less viable, but still viable, may mix things up even more. I do feel that I should study more of how designs of fighting games works, since they play around with a lot of similar concepts. It is not the sort of game I play. But they're clear similarities. Like micro is analogous to being able to pull of technical moves and doing them quickly. But the macro being how you can set up opponents in to traps and dictating the overall flow of the game. Due to how fighting games have had more experimentation and quicker iteration cycles overall, I do think the strategy field can actually learn a thing or two from it.

Good job.

This is the conversation RA3 needed ❤❤

omg, great video. can't wait for RA3 to receive a real rebalance after 10+ years.

This is how I felt about dota 2 meta changes but honestly it keeps the game alive and I'd much prefer that than a dead game.

As a Skirmish only scrub who just fights Brutal AI 1 v 2/3 for fun. I always found the Allies to be the weakest due to how slow they take to expand their base (only 1 construction tab unless you build another MCV) and tech up (battle lab and research), i.e. they have slow 'macro'. I intuitively thought that it was similar for the competitive scene with for example. Empire being the "Zerg/Rush" faction. Quite funny to be proved wrong after watching the competitive scene and this video illustrates it succinctly.

That whole thing about Allies being slightly underpowered but oppressive when used right kind of reminds me of carriers in Steel Ocean. Good carrier players were incredibly oppressive but also incredibly rare. In fact my attempts to get into carrier gameplay caused me to respect a carrier player that single-handedly wiped my team instead of get frustrated at it despite the fact that getting an enemy carrier player at high tier was an almost certain loss.

Could you do a video on the balance changes of King Sputnik and what they are for?

Very good video. Watched the whole thing and i don't even play command and conquer! (Beat the campaings twice thats about it). I love when people analyze things in games, you had teached me how to evaluate game balancing more. The prisoner dilemma was use adequately for the exposition of your point. Cheers!

RA3 is definitely the best spectator game from CnC franchise but it still boggles my mind why Uprising doesn't have multiplayer.

I like the idea of introducing new units when simply balancing doesn't work, despite introducing new things to keep in mind for each faction. When you mentioned the simple solutions of giving the Soviets and Empire players faster access to dock and airfield, and then adding the archer and mortar, I was like... yeah... that seems reasonable. Game balance is difficult, so if you are making your own mod to address these issues, I wish you luck. I have subscribed so if you make more videos on this or similar topics, I will probably watch them.

4:40 literally any T4 except for Monkey King in Supreme Commander.

It's sad that Uprising ended up being such a balancing nightmare with OP units because there were some genuinely good ideas there. The archer maiden and mortar cycle deserve to be included in the base game. The gigafortress should have been a REPLACEMENT for the Psionic Decimator, as the Empire's ultimate weapon. It's a perfect fit for the Empire's unorthodox and versatile military doctrine - a superweapon that can transform and move to adapt to the situation, at the cost of being unable to hit targets from afar like the Proton Collider or Vacuum Imploder.

So what you are saying is: Soviet and Empire are playing rock paper scissor, while the Allies are playing Tic-Tac-Toe and they always do the first move. (If you play Tic-Tac-Toe correctly, the first to move will always draw or win, if the other player makes a mistake)

Man, I would say if the mod could include the Yuri faction, that would be so funny considering how broken Yuri's economy was. (I mean turn the Initiate into Brutes and send them to the meat grinder was one of the greatest trade off I have ever seen)

Would it be correct to say that intransitive mechanics are more evident when a game doesn't receive many, if any, balances after a while? Or maybe that meta shifts just take months if not years? I might be entirely wrong but it seems to me as a casual RTS observer that metas tend to form, stagnate and then after something like 6 months to a year without a game receiving any updates a new meta might emerge from players making more use of units that were previously thought of as not that good, or that can now work better under the current meta.

This happens in Injustice 2, a fighting game where characters based on long range attacks (Dr. Fate, Starfire, Green Arrow) can keep moving back and doing these safe attacks that will charge their special meter while the opponent is forced to duck/jump over while trying to close the distance. Then, if they are too careless about geting close, Starfire/Dr. Fate... will have close range moves that are good frame-wise and will punish those attackers, linking it into a combo that can send them back once again. Games like Street Fighter counteract this problem by making zoning characters (like Guile) require holding a button for a certain amount of time before being able to do these types of moves, which makes it more unreliable as opposed to being able to dictate the direction of the match every single time.

I feel like I've seen this kind of game balancing phenomenon get described in a number of different ways. First time I've seen the Prisoner's Dilemma get used to illustrate it, though. I always think the term for this sort of issue is over-centralization, but I have very limited knowledge of the actual terms and mechanics.

though i play starcraft, i totally understand your arguments. some units have way too much value when properly mirco'ed. combined that with your faction having a wide array of early game cheeses (that may or may not be difficult to read) and sometimes you get tired of it when you're on the receiving end. especially when tech trees are different across factions. moreso if the game allows you to hide your tech structures elsewhere on the map.

The Allies (especially in RA3 & Uprising) are basically the equivalent of Gilgamesh from the Fate franchise - both have arsenals that define their OP status which let them stand out against their enemies but, because of their exploitable weaknesses, they are also far from invincible with the right opportunities given.

10:55 That Cryocopter pilot is an Ace Combat protagonist

I remember seeing Generals also had a fairly popular community balance patch and the most drastic effect was to nerf USA rockvee spam IIRC I think i get what you are getting at with the prisioners dillemia but I want to make sure i’m understanding you correctly because I think some of that conversation dilluted your point a little, I think its valuable but I wanted to be sure I understood you correctly TL:DR High level strategy in RA 3 is effectivley a rock paper scissors game, the allies are effectively playing with all three tools at almost any given point but Empire/Soviets are only using rock and paper, especially at the early game, which is where the prisoner’s dillema strategizing comes into play (allies running Paper every time) and it limits AvE and AvS matchups in the midgame because of the nature of allies to dictate how the strategic tempo will go, had we effectively given E and S Scissors (I.E your proposal) that would at make allies not nearly as oppressive. Would that be a fair summary of what you were trying to get across or did I misunderstand you somewhere?

I know almost nothing about game design but I wondered something: at 2:26 why you multiplied the Build Time with 15 and DPS with 10?

Something must be missing from the equation if at top skill levels Allies cannot convert their overwhelming meta advantage in the early game into a significantly higher win rate. It seems to me that a successful soft counter doesn't make the game state even, but rather non-Allied favoured at least to some extent. I cannot think of another explanation. This isn't a refutation of the claims in the video. I know very little about RA3 theory and couldn't comment on its game specific strategies anyways, but it seems to me that on a game theory level, this analysis has to be incomplete.

I dont know if this was pointed out but I like that it sort of plays into the in-universe explanation as well - The Allies were being pushed back hard in the setting and by the time of the Allied Campaign we get all these neat little goodies that must've helped even the playing field by the time the Soviets were pushing into Brighton Beach. So they went for a "defect" build to give them a chance against their overwhelming opponents just so they have a fighting chance, which is why they end up winning the war. Just a minor thing I noticed.

Can you increase the bitrate of gameplay footage? Feels like I'm getting dizzy watching it because of the textures + blocking.

more theorys plz :(

Ah, the Pokémon gen 4 Garchomp dilemma. The best counter to a Garchomp was another Garchomp. And you can only hope to break even if you do not use one.

Where can i read King Sputnik balance patches?

great video but i my opinion calmer background music with a lower volume might make listening more enjoyable. other than love your clear and concise explanation and as a non native speaker the subtitles help me greatly.

I still remember when the flak troops were nerfed this hard - everyone on the ladder did flakdrops via twinblades, especially on Temple Prime back when noone ever destroyed the houses near the ref spots - people were butthurt and so the flak dude was gimped. I still find the whole situation pretty hilarious tbh

APC + Zone Trooper in Tib 3/KW is like IFV + Tankbusters but better in performance (worse in price point because of tier 3 requirements)

Would the ra2 factions beat the sc2 factions?

Asking out of genuine curiosity: when will I be able to get my grubby little hands on the King Sputnik mod? Watching some RA3 content recently (including this vid and others from you) got me to reinstall the game out of a want to play it. I wanna crack some AI skulls with Apocs.

0:32 XYHC: "all three factions can win with relative consistency" Soviet: goes red for everything, even the ladder win rate

ratio + allies balanced (khay made that meme cus of what I said xd)

OPness

10:55 Explaination: the Cryocopter fell on a non-critical area, allowing him to stick the landing

What have you taught us, you ask? You have basically cemented that the Allies are OP. I legit wish I owned the game so I can mess around with it against bots :3

I've had this video in my watch later list for so long, finally watched it and found it to be really eye-opening :) I didn't like RA3 either when it launched, but I don't think I ever thought of it as a SC competitor. Most people I knew were disregarding C&C because SC is the RTS that Koreans play and because it's so balanced and all that... I bet none of those people ever considered RA3 as a serious RTS either. Kinda sad for the devs, really. All that work poured into it and people don't even notice

Yo, I want to join RA3 community and play your mod so much, where can I get in contact with players?

0:18 The Allies absolutely TRIVIALIZE Commanders Challenge they're so OP. I can use only Aircraft Carriers and kill almost everything on the map, even the maps with tiny PONDS can have Aircraft Carriers and Assault Destroyers pumped out in large numbers.

Can you make unit guide: Mortar Cycle?

If more flexibility for sov is needed what if sov players could have their hammer tanks start with an extra weapon as soon as they leave the war factory? Just pay 1/4 the unit who's weapon you want as an extra cost (since you can already do this with a crusher crane this really just a quality of life improvement) but you need the appropriate tech first. Here's an example. Maybe the allies are doing a strange multigunner with peacekeeper/cryocopter push and you want anti armor and anti air You could build a Hammer tank with a bonus bullfrog flak turret for only $225 more Or let's say you imperial is going imo warrior and tsunami tank. You could pay an extra $250 to have your Hammer tanks to come with a stingray Tesla coil. That roughly doubles their anti armor damage while letting them one shot infantry. You would need a naval yard first though to unlock the this because you need to be at least able to build stingrays.

So Allies have the initiative. It would make for an interesting asymmetric game

You left out one broken piece of lategame allied tech: cryogeddon. Activating it in the middle of an army, even when the opponent is fully prepared, spells certain death. Cryogeddon needs a flare to signal its arrival, just like so many other support power who are all on a hefty delay.

Thx, XYHC, for the video and analysis of the game's balance (or rather i say unbalance or OPbAllince =) ) My first game experience was murky, i was playing "turtle and eco, endgame in rush". Yeah, strategy is sucks but first exp'. Some years have passed, I found some guide video of yours (rush tactics, unit guide) and was like "wait, i was playing suck". Yeah, as the result, the second experience was a way better. I had never seen problems with balance before Allies' superiority in all. Vindics, Appolos and, ahhh, cryos are turning skies in some non-flying zone. Seas magically becomes the area of carriers (with air, thx that not cryos) and amphibious destroyers. I will keep silence about the land with a lot of trees. I was like "what? I'm circled (ellipsoided) in 3 dimensions!". Uprising just proved my thoughts. Thought that Allies are so OP (da, cryo? You little...cheezy scientist) Even your video approves that "ants" on seven level of minds make an opinion that cryo rush or even any other rush of Allies (that can be supposed as support of cryo rush, 'course how without it?) create a nightmare for even "game giants" (i'll keep silence 'bout "ants"). As the result: no enjoy, abondon the game. I have seen some videos of Sputnik mod (thx for video i found more other differences with vanilla as migs on tier1, for example) it is fair that every player that play non-Allies faction can come up with some new countermeasures, not to waste expensive resources for defending turrets (prepared to meet the cryo rush, fail the defences to jav-reptide rush and give up from nowhere appeared cryo) and fully attend the attention for expansions and military growing. The way better when all factions are more-like balanced in time and resource management, no early (vindic) spam but reconnaissance and small skirmishes. Thx, XYHC, for the video of vanilla's OPbAllience and commentaries below video. I'm not alone in my thoughts anymore. And remember, long live His Majesty and Excellency The Mightiest Sputnik!

nice grades :)

Dimonnn The Yellow Soviet : OP? Hold my vodka.. 🔥🔥

Good

allies is very op agreed