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Overall thoughts on the game: I thought it was really cool, and is such a big improvement on the old version. A lot of the game felt really good to play, had a greater degree of polish, and a lot more interesting dynamics to units that made them more compelling to use. Really impressed, I had a ton of fun yesterday. A few general changes I think could be good: - Vehicles felt kinda weak across the board, barring a couple units you could purchase everything felt a bit on the fragile end, especially some of the units that feel like they should be bigger and harder to kill like a Titan. I think the only unit that was close to how much health it should have was the MKII, but for combat in vehicles it was almost worth your money and a better balance of game points to purchase cheaper units and bum-rush the enemy, or purchase something that preferred to stay out of the action like artillery. Those sorts of play styles felt more rewarded than they did something like pushing the front line with a tank that's meant to take hits. I think a push on units to be more specialized in roles than others could help this matter, especially when the less straight-forward approach to the vehicles really sets this mod apart from APB. Otherwise, we just end up with APB with a new coat of paint. - Vehicle line-ups felt a little restrictive and almost rock-paper-scissor-y. Things like the MK-II helped bring in more asymmetry to the teams, but it was also disappointing that GDI doesn't have any general use units like a normal Mammoth that's slow, big, takes a punch and gives a punch. Meanwhile Nod doesn't feel like they have anything as impressively big as a Mammoth besides the Cyborg Commando, but even then that feels more like a Ghost Stalker, which GDI also has. I think, like, a couple more pieces to each side to flesh out the variety and give some unique encounters would be really good, but no more than like 2 or 3. I understand a desire to remain as faithful to the original game as possible, but as we see with the infantry line-ups there's a necessity to evoke some creative liberties as an RTS doesn't translate to an FPS totally. For instance, units like the MSA, Mobile Stealth Generator, or Harvester may be incredibly useful tools, but they don't offer compelling game play to use in an FPS. - I think maps could use some neutral objectives, like neutral silos to capture or something like that. I know the urban map has mid-field repair zones, though those can't be destroyed (and also they heal at insane rates that aren't interrupted by damage). Or maybe money/unit crates that are announced to drop at specific zones with visible objectives/timers where you want to control that area to get the bonus? There's a wide variety of options-- just give more reasons to explore more of the map and control more areas. Starting with GDI Units that I used or had an impression of: Wolverine felt very cool to use. The moving sounds, gun sounds, everything about its presentation just felt awesome. I do agree with Guard, however, it felt really inconsistent in its performance and its range really short. It couldn't fire far enough to combat aircraft and had to be REALLY close to infantry to get good damage in. I honestly think the only good anti-infantry vehicle options on both teams were the artillery or just straight trying to crush them. Either a range/accuracy boost to the Wolverine would be good, or if you want to keep it as a closer-range unit then more bullets in its spread would help to make its firing cones real death-zones. Hover MLRS besides anti-aircraft I agree, I didn't really see much use in this unit. As Nod it felt really easy to kill and hardly a threat. Amphibious APC I didn't use this unit but I saw the grenade launcher addition and thought that was really cool and a great idea. I really just wanted to say I thought you guys went above and beyond with this unit that I expected to be a little boring as a basic APC. Titan was also really cool in its art department-- really impressed! But yeah, aiming felt a little weird, and the unit felt a little fragile overall, but all the vehicles kinda do. Disruptor felt so good to use! The damage you dealt felt really good. Only complaint is that the firing projectiles disappear when any part of their model impacts terrain or objects, and when you're trying to shoot stuff either close-up or hiding around complex cover it becomes impossible to hit them because the fired projectiles are so big. Juggernaut felt better to use against aircraft like a flak cannon or base buildings than vehicles. Maybe the intention? Enforcer I tried using a little bit, but the tiny projectiles on that gun felt like a worse flamethrower. I dunno, the idea was really cool but it didn't feel very strong at all. And now Nod: Attack Buggy I was impressed how good this unit felt to use! Good gun, good speed, just a solid implementation. Though the moment anti-tank infantry come into play this unit becomes immediately useless. Tick Tank To be honest I never touched this unit. I never felt the need to, I felt like front-line tank units were a bit useless after trying to use the Titan a bit and that it was better to just save the couple hundred extra dollars and get a Stank, Artillery, or Devil's Tongue. Speaking of... Devil's Tongue When I discovered the digging tool dealt damage to units when you collided with them I fucking pogged. Amazing idea, made it feel really cool to use especially with the ambushing aspect. Finally a flame tank unit in a Renegade mod that's used for something other than base-rushing! Stealth Tank felt great. Missile locking had to be pretty close to work, but then I discovered the non-lock right click and thought that was a good edition. Felt like a more fun and tighter-made version of IA's Ezekiel's Wheel. Mobile Artillery Between this and the Devil's Tongue these were the two units I had the most fun with. Getting aircraft mid-air felt so fucking good, the unit felt really strong and effective but not overbearingly so. Great unit, loved to use it. Kerubim made me realize how much more effective infantry can be in this mod than vehicles. Not saying this guy's overpowered, I just feel like vehicle armor is kinda underpowered and the anti-infantry vehicles kinda weak in comparison. The only good counter against these guys was... artillery, because they couldn't just melt you in a second. A couple misc. bug-related things: - Disruptor clips into the ground when not driven, but maybe that was just a big-player-count instability thing. - When a vehicle is deployed over a gate and exited, the gate will close and lift that deployed vehicle into the air. Because it's deployed, it will stay floating in the air even when the gate opens again and now you can't get into it. - Sometimes I couldn't get into a Wolverine at all. I just wasn't able to enter it, or re-enter it, like I just locked the keys inside of it or something. Anyways, big post of feedback but really, honestly, I loved what I saw overall and I absolutely cannot wait to see what's next. Great work!

No, I do not feel that's a fair assessment. I've probably done a poor job communicating what it is I'm requesting be done. I'm saying that the guidelines need to be concrete, and not so extreme. If the problem is users posting explicit written content, such as ejaculation jokes that forego any sort of cleverness and go straight for the shock value, or anything of the sort that we are considering to be the actual problem, then that would warrant an extension on the "Do not post porn/gore" such as "Do not post explicit/NSFW content". In the PM that Voe mentioned, regarding "keeping things PG-13", if we were to go by that standard then a poop joke like what NFHavoc had posted in his video's title would still be perfectly acceptable. Or, something along the lines of "Within reason, respect each other's boundaries" or some such. ("Within Reason", of course, meaning if anyone is complaining about Meta saying "Poopoo peepee" verbatum, honestly the mod would understand that's not an issue). An example of a rule regarding even written content, from another server, might look like this: http://puu.sh/J8kRo/3fd9029f27.jpg None of these, of course, are hard and fast suggestions, just examples. Yes, I would say a full-frontal vomit emoji is bad as someone just typing "I pooped on the refinery". Is it to say that emoji was bad? No! It's meant to illustrate how unreasonable the demand for tone-policing is becoming. I understood the purpose of the post, in showing how disregarding a direct request can be disrespectful. However, the example given was still direct racism and slurs, and that's being put in comparison to poop jokes. It's not a fair comparison by any stretch, because I honestly do not think it's reasonable for a mod to request tone policing on the more innocent poop jokes (like what NFHavoc had posted). It was actually just today/yesterday that such a line was crossed, when Voe started tone policing on video titles that really didn't deserve such action, as well as taking moderator action against Sith from a conversation last night that seriously did not warrant the action. Honestly it wasn't until the past 1-2 weeks or so that this tone policing really started to be something that's come up. I did not post anything in response to it when it first happened because, of course, when the "problems" were at their most rampant it involved people posting gifs of near-explicit content that toed the line for what could be considered pornographic, but was still clearly NSFW. Yeah, a fair number of it needed to be cracked down on. But, extending it to literally any joke involving the words "piss" or "poop" is honestly ridiculous. It's taking things way too far, demanding that the community police their tone to such an extreme, and is really only going to cause more problems. If you want, I can run this new practice and how it's implemented by other moderators or people of much larger servers on their opinions of such a take. I'm pretty confident that I am far from the only one that thinks this current stance is far too extreme and power-abusing.

No it isn't. There's absolutely no reason for it to be taken so far and so absolutely-- it's an extreme kneejerk reaction under the belief that it will "fix matters". There are far better ways for the moderator team to handle reigning matters in without going to such extremes, but doing so like this makes it look like the moderator team is just fixing for a reason to just ban certain people, rather than go to lengths to amend behavior. Measures like this will and currently do hit perfectly innocent posts. This does not address "problem behavior", it just makes the environment needlessly restrictive for everyone who isn't posing any problems. It's perfectly possible and effective for moderator teams to put sound guidelines in place that make it clear what does and does not fly, and it's ALSO very possible to do so while making it difficult to toe a line! If a member is managing to toe the line and cause significant problems for the community without officially breaking the rules, then that's a failing on the moderator team for not putting effective and proper rules in place. And even if still some people are toeing the line, that's just the way it's going to be on ANY server, and acting like making the rules more and more restrictive and extreme will somehow curb this behavior is ignorance. In every community there will be people that try to toe that line, regardless of what the rules are. The point of moderation isn't to prevent that, it's to put comprehensive and rational guidelines in place and watch for those that DO cross the line.

"Somewhat flexible" is being generous at best here. The standard for what is okay and what is not to say is not only WILDLY incoherent (a video titled "I take a poo on building" is bad but I can still say normal cuss words? What's the standard here?) but entirely misguided. If your intention is to reign in the chat, you're going about it completely wrong by invoking grade-school standards of "don't say peepeepoopoo jokes or you'll have to go sit in the corner". It shows no time was spent trying to come up with a plan and seeing what gets moderated and what is not, it's so very obvious that situations are purely being cherrypicked and the new "rules" are being used as excused to punish members that are disliked versus those that are. There's no clear standard or guideline being upheld, and any excuses for trying to frame it in existing rules have been farfetched at best. Humor, especially if we're talking "potty humor" (christ, the fact I have to frame it like this), is an incredibly broad subject in its rhetoric and execution. It can range from the incredibly tame to the explicit and discomforting, as can be said about jokes involving any subject ranging from violence, murder, sex, or what have you. At the moment right now, the environment you're cultivating is like if I were to get banned from a TF2 server because I equipped Jarate. A blanket prohibition is absurd, and the execution is poor, and I'd hope that the moderation team would have the rationality to be able to distinguish what is crossing the line and what is not. But clearly not, based on what sorts of actions are being taken. And, if we continue with such a system, it becomes obvious how clearly easy it is to abuse. Anyone can make an appropriate stink about something someone else is saying and bring about moderator action, and since there's no clear ruleset, it seems like all I have to do is complain about X person's behavior and suddenly they're just in the crosshairs, regardless of whether there truly was any problem with their conduction. And onto Sith. All you're demonstrating for me is a bias. You did not punish for past crimes nor illustrate any present rules that were broken. During the conversation that was present, there was no problem with any other member in the conversation that you recently punished him for. You admitted he broke no rule, could not bring one present, and admitted that it was a witch-hunt. I'm not talking about past examples here, because if you failed to act on those that's on you, and that's in the past. I'm talking about the present, and if you're bringing past interactions that have no relevance into current moderation, then that's acting irresponsibly. Character alone also isn't the point here. Whether someone is a complete angel making a disconcerting post or a total asshat toeing the line, I expect them to be moderated fairly, over clear guidelines. and I know WHY Havoc's post was deleted. It was incredibly tame, and the action you took was an incredible overreaction. If you're intent on "cleaning up the frontier" as you will, you need to do a much better job than this.

I never thought I'd have to be the one here to talk about something like this, but here we go. As of late, it seems like Voe has been on an absolute power trip enforcing rules that do not exist to a degree that has lead to the muting and threatened banning of established community members over trivial items. Prior to these events, frequent jokes in the discord (and, by extension, in-game as well) revolved around "Bodily Fluids and Excretion". While jokes are jokes, often times these jokes would extend to the use of gifs that would range from tame as hell to borderline explicit. In response to this, action was taken, and in regards to especially the use of the gifs where it it very closely toed the line of the "Do not post pornography/gore" rule, I can understand why the action was taken and why the moderators stepped up to put a stop to matters. Except, action did not stop there. The enforcement of this "rule" has extended to even the removal of a video from the chat simply because it was titled this: http://puu.sh/J8hfK/a6fb8edfa9.jpg. It has also extended to the 1-week timeout of Sith and Greyson simply because Voe had felt they had overstepped a rule that is not at all stated in the community guidelines and in which nobody else at that moment had any problem with. To make matters worse, Voe essentially admits to the fact that there was no actual rule being broken, and that Sith was muted with threat of ban simply because some people "wanted it" and that there's a witch-hunt involved, as seen in his DM's http://puu.sh/J8hp3/940c9a9314.png Enforcement is also highly inconsistent when you're basically allowed to post the vomit emoji, which is honestly pretty frontal and graphic. But, it's clear the rule was entirely only made to target one member and one member only, rather than actually and responsibly take care of a community. The enforcement of these sudden, vague "rules" that are not at all enlisted in the guidelines over perfectly harmless jokes that would be A-okay to see in a completely normal PG-rated film is unacceptable, furthermore that the mods then go to bend the definitions of existing guidelines in an attempt to justify this behavior. Hell, they're even equating making a poop joke to be on the same level as actual hate speech simply because they don't like it http://puu.sh/J8hqQ/ee0bf2ba1b.png. At this point, the mods are going on a full power-trip and being absolutely over-the-top and nailing down even just plain fine and innocent jokes, but also so far as to threaten with banning long-time established, even donating members as Sith when they haven't even broken a rule. If you can't justify moderator action on something with proper and clear-cut community guidelines such as posting porn/gore, actual hatespeech or flaming, and essentially listen to a couple people who have a vendetta to enforce a witch-hunt because they want to? That's not proper, responsible moderation, that's abuse plain and simple. Moderators need to either enforce clear-cut and rational rules, or if those rules are not adequate in covering behavior that would otherwise warrant a reasonable response, then craft community guidelines that are properly airtight and easily understood by the community, as well as give the community a proper chance to read and understand those changes. Otherwise, the moderators should back off, and if this community wants to be taken seriously as a community, then they need to be held accountable for their actions.

...how long have you actually paid attention to the way Threve plays? He'll abuse anything that can be abused. Now on for the actual balance discussion! You've seen my big list of suggested changes to the maps, and for now all of that still stands for me. I will say this for Blazing Sands, though, is that the base economy on the map if you don't control anything extra is utterly dogshit. It's bad to the point that the first team that's capable of controlling the Tib Machines will then be able to control the game from then-on, and GDI has a good leg-up on this because of their access to the top machine. In all honesty, the tib machines in their tunnels should be removed and replaced with more obvious tib silos in their respective areas. Having the only way to reliably win the match be something that's hidden away isn't a friendly design for anyone who isn't a seasoned veteran. On top of that, the tib silos in the bases need to be upgraded. Right now, if you don't control much extra, your team will not make nearly enough money to be able to fight back. As for the units listed above, I think these are some good additions to consider: Rocket Soldier Officers - This is the unit that essentially invalidates all defensive structures on a map besides the Obelisk/AGT, and for one reason: because calling this unit a rocket soldier is a lie. This is a sniper unit in disguise. Either the range needs to be adjusted, or add some projectile drop to make this unit harder to use at longer ranges. Nod Fanatic - I honestly think this unit could be a bit better. A buff to its damage and blast radius or a big reduction to its cost would be a good adjustment to make to have this unit see use on the field more often. GDI Tanks - Right now I feel like GDI has far too many generic medium/light-style tanks that offer nothing to the table to make themselves drastically different in their roles from each other. If players were being honest about what really matters for GDI, the only tanks that really bring anything to the table are: The Challenger 2, as their best/most economical "medium" tank; the AMX or the Sheridan as a light tank, though you're kidding yourself if you think this is a better way to spend your money on a fast damage-dealer than the TOW Humvee; the Mammoth 120 for its range and the Mammoth Railgun for its raw damage; and the Mirage Tank for being a very dangerous glass cannon. Besides these, there is no reason to really use any other tank for GDI because nothing is distinguished enough in their roles from these few. They don't offer anything to the table to set themselves apart, and it makes for a rather bland way to play the team. On top of that, they're supposed to be getting yet ANOTHER generic light/medium tank, which is really just going to saturate their selection of bland. When considering vehicles, at least look at how the Sheridan, which is great for its amphibious capabilities and how decently strong its weapon is against structures and defences, compares to the AMX, which with its better speed and faster fire-rate/more accurate weapon better cements itself versus vehicles. Or how the Mammoth 120mm still ends up being around just as viable as the Mammoth Railgun for its difference in cost but, more importantly, the range of its weapon and how it can be used better in certain situations. Having distinct roles for different vehicles is what makes the game interesting to play. GDI Prism Tank - If we were ever concerned about removing RA2-styled units, we could redesign this thing as some sort of experimental railgun platform, and it would functionally still be the same. But, in terms of proper balance, I feel like this unit is generally kind of underwhelming. Its range is meant to be its strong point, and I feel like a small boost to its damage would be good and help cement its use among other long-ranged damage dealers that GDI has, such as the HMLRS or the ADATS. GDI Orca Truck - This unit is useless. I get the idea, being a mid-field refill pad for aircraft, but the fact of the matter is that, like the Wolverine Bridge, it becomes something you have to completely babysit or else it just gets easily blown up or stolen. Not only that, but the benefits that this unit offers are next to nothing for a real simple reason: there isn't a single map in this game that's large enough to justify this unit. It takes literally seconds for any aircraft to make it back to base for its refill. Saving time on this is such a small, negligible difference that there's no point to waste your time and money on this unit. Buying and using this unit, even as seriously as possible, is just wasting your money, your time by setting it up and babysitting it, and in the end you're just giving Nod points. Remove this unit so people can stop team hampering pretending they can make it do something meaningful. GDI Wolverine Bridge - Again, this unit, for all purposes, is completely useless. The only way to "use" it is to access hyper specific points for your team, only to watch this get stolen or destroyed very easily. It's a waste of money, and otherwise is only used by GDI players who waste the entire game trying to play minecraft with this fucking piece of shit and make build a bridge across the map, only to have it never succeed. There's no reason for this unit to be in the game. Remove it from the roster so teammates can stop hampering the game, and place repairable destroyed bridges on the all of three maps where this unit is even intended to be used. Will comment again when Nod stuff is posted.

Disagree. No infantry should be able to destroy a building so quickly and effectively without having to get near it. Proxie mines are of no use in preventing this because the PICs don't need to get in the buildings, and the mine limits prevent your team from covering both buildings and all vantage points to your base, and pretty much every map is full of places that a Sydney or Shock Trooper can go where they're out of sight of defenses and are in range to destroy a building. Most other teamwork options are something you can effectively defend against with teamwork, especially on the vehicle end. Vehicles are large, easy to spot, have to take the main lanes. Even the stealth tanks, chances are your teammates out on the field are going to spot a rush coming or the sensor arrays are going to reveal them. There are ways that a team, or smart teammates, can play smart to prevent larger tactics and at the least give their team a fighting chance. But a PIC/shock rush is different. Infantry are much harder to notice, and while you can mine a base to stop people from rushing into buildings with explosives, there's only so much you can do to prevent people from taking one of many vantage points to take out a building. Beacons announce their placement and show up on the radar, giving ample time for the team to close in on them and stop them. Upgraded PICs? They melt a building in ten seconds and there's nothing you can do about it. It's just not a fair upgrade. Infantry shouldn't be able to just utterly demolish buildings from the outside like that, and I seriously don't think it should be possible. "A part of the game" is something you say when someone is complaining about another person using a cheap strategy, and people are absolutely allowed to use them like that, but it's not something you say when the discussion is about balancing their effectiveness. Yes, it's a part of the game, which is why I'm arguing we change it.

Long time powder user first time writer Just some general feedbacks: - The Wolverine is hilariously bad. Like, okay, its weapon has a big mag, great range, strong against weak armored stuffs. That said, the vehicle itself is SLOW AF and easy to kill just by ramming it with literally anything, but I'm sure you're looking into that internally. - I know both teams have the heavy weapon boost upgrade, but for what it is, and definitely on the PIC side, is that it's just straight bonkers. Three PICs or Shocks with that upgrade can steamroll a building in seconds, and if an techy or two isn't in there IMMEDIATELY it's dead and there's nothing you can do. Honestly, I think this needs to be rethought because it doesn't take much coordination once the upgrade is bought. It definitely feels a bit stronger in GDI hands, though, as the PIC and battle suit are both stronger than the Shock Trooper overall. - Nod definitely needs a boost in the non-stealth department. Once you've got a bit of money and don't have to farm cash with the Ol' Faithful (Wiesel), your options are more or less going with artillery units, or grabbing a Stealth/Ezek/Infrared. Good options, but things like the Super Tank, Flame Tanks, etc. all feel pretty useless in comparison. - EMP grenades are annoying af. I dunno, might not need to be changed but they're definitely a big pain in the ass.