It’s one more map where it’s not competitive to use a slow glass cannon. Just like in the overwhelmingly vast majority of them.
Then the slow glass cannons, if true, will go down in BR until they ARE competitive again by facing weaker enemies. No big deal.
It’s not so simple. While I generally agree with your assessment of how the BR system self-balances, there are more nuances to it than just that.
For example, to go with your hypothetical, suppose that you lowered the Dicker Max to 2.3 (this is a completely absurd example, it’s just to illustrate a point). For most vehicles, going down by over a full BR would be a buff, but not for a vehicle like this: you only take the tradeoff of a glass cannon, if the “cannon” part of the equation allows you to deal with problem enemies that you would otherwise struggle against.
There is no need to sacrifice mobility, versatility etc for the sake of a big derp gun, if you play at a BR where you meet very little armour. You’re paying the tradeoff for no real benefits.
Also, while I think you’re right that bad players will play whatever while good players focus on meta vehicles, again I think tank destroyers are a bit different. An inexperienced player going for the path of least resistance will go for the “cool” or “popular” stuff, not so much for the stuff that looks impractical to use.
I think it would do better anyway due to the noob players at 2.3, not so much what would happen if everyone was an ace. But yes, I see your point. At the same time, is anyone actually making a lineup around the Dicker Max? I think it’s fine to just have it in a dusty old crew slow and take it out when/if you get Fire arc or Kuban or the Atomic Heart map, or Sversk on the left side, or blah blah, and not take it out otherwise.
It’s one tool in the toolbox. Pointing out that the tool could be more useful if the conditions that suit it were more frequent, doesn’t mean that I want to invalidate and displace all the other tools…
Of course in a game with so many vehicles, it’s not feasible to achieve perfect balance for everything, but generally speaking, I think a few categories of vehicles in game could use a little love.
Test Site has a couple great spots for it, yes, but I would somewhat disagree on the others. Kuban has a decent spot for it close to A from the northern side, but most of the other hills you could choose on the map don’t really overlook anything crucial (save for the odd conquest mode layout) and at that point you’re dragging down the team by sitting still.
Seversk - only from the southern side, overlooking A. That’s an okay position, though doesn’t have many follow up options.
The large version of Fire Arc is 6.7+ only since the update IIRC. The small version is very small and mostly urban. Both have very little elevation changes, too, so not really ideal either.
In my experience, the absolute best maps for the Dicker are: Volokolamsk (short version in the domination layout), 2nd Battle Of El Alamein, and Maginot Line from the northern spawn.
“They took away my one spot for the dicker max! The removal of that one spot ruined all these maps”
“Here’s a bunch of other common maps that have at least one spot for a Dicker Max”
“Doesn’t count, it’s only one spot”
🤔 You were right the first time. The Dicker Max only needs one good spot to work.
I don’t see the reason for the mockery, since I am debating civilly.
I have mentioned three maps out of 57. Before the map changes, I would have mentioned four, since Jungle would have made the list. Moreover, El Alamein is not even native to the Dicker’s BR (I think it’s 5.3+ only but I might be mistaken).
The bottleneck narrows further when you factor in the commonality of conquest layouts (which will more times than not negate that already rare availability of friendly terrain), and the skewed map rotation system. I haven’t played Maginot since before Kings Of Battle. I have played small Volokolamsk once this week. But I got three games of Jungle in a single day. That’s without going into how many times I get Seversk, or Advance To The Rhine (which I love, but still).
How many of those 57 maps would be okay to spawn in a Pz IV, or a Puma? Almost all of them. Can you honestly tell me that wanting a tech tree TD in the same lineup to at least get past single digits is outlandish, and worthy of mockery?
I have no problem with you disagreeing with my arguments, but what you’re doing is trying to delegitimise them by appealing to a supposed lack of internal consistency. Which instead is clearly there.
I’m not trying to “mock” I just legitimately don’t get it, it seems totally contradictory. The jungle example we are talking about had ONE SPOT, but then one spot later on isn’t good enough to count other maps? Of which there are like a dozens if you count single spots.
“I can’t move up if things progress in the match” “I don’t have a fallback plan” etc. etc. yeah… and you didn’t on Jungle either.
How many of those 57 maps would be okay to spawn in a Pz IV, or a Puma? Almost all of them.
And how many of those maps would be okay to spawn a Dicker Max if you stay consistent with “one good spot is enough” logic? Almost all of them.
It was actually pretty easy to get out of there and relocate: you could head left from the ridge and drive down towards C. Of course you had to be careful not to get stuck, but if you knew your way around, you could with a bit of driving get down and move more or less in cover to - for example - go north and help A if it’s falling. Maybe more importantly, C was likely to stay trafficked and contested until the very end, since it’s the “mid map” point that can “tilt the balance”.
On El Alamein, likewise, you can keep relocating while staying in cover, making it harder for CAS to find you.
The issue with Seversk and A is twofold: the first is that most of the time, very few people go A. That is a perfectly good opportunity to make a difference if you’re in a medium or light, because you can cap and push quickly if you win the encounter. If you’re in a Dicker, you could end up with nothing to do, or maybe one kill, two if you’re lucky, and at that point your marginal utility to the team rapidly drops to near zero: you might as well J out and respawn in something that can go B and C.
Trust me, I have no problem using Dicker Max in insane situations, I’ve taken it to top tier as well just for the lulz, so if I tell you that I don’t see the point of using it on Seversk, it’s because that vantage point over A is genuinely very, very underwhelming.
At Seversk I usually either flank A from the west, or C from the east. A stationary TD at A will, most of the time, simply not be competitive enough, imho.
I mean yeah obviously you could leave the one spot if you wanted, but then you’re now operating in any of various not-good-for-dicker-maxes other parts of the map, and all of those other not-great areas are still in the map today, as we speak. Yet you don’t think those other areas are good enough currently to bring out a Dicker Max.
So your entire reason for thinking jungle was ruined for dicker maxes was still just that one spot…
If you’re in a Dicker, you could end up with nothing to do, or maybe one kill, two if you’re lucky
That’s what snipers SHOULD be doing, lol. “I couldn’t kill 2/3 of their entire team as one guy sitting around” is just another way of saying “It’s pretty balanced now”
(As for zero kills, you can actually delay spawning for a few seconds to see where your teammates spawn if you are worried about it, and only choose this if you are under-supported over there, in this example)
Once you’ve had an impact, you’ve had an impact.
Hypothetical example: you set up in a good spot, score whatever amount of kills - let’s say five. That’s spawn points you have, spawn points the enemy team no longer has, and tickets subtracted.
Then you assess. If I notice one area of the map is ok and the other is doing badly, I’ll go there, even if it means venturing into non-Dicker-friendly territory.
You’re saying that the absence of the initial spot would make no difference, but that’s not true: you would not have those kills, those spawn points. Those players would have been active, with all sorts of cascading effects.
Not with you in a Dicker Max, anyway. So you spawn in something else instead, because it gives you a much better chance to open strongly on the new version of Jungle compares to an open topped SPG.
This is, again, about tradeoffs. A light vehicle that caps a point will have a much bigger impact on tickets than a TD with 2 kills. A heavy vehicle can draw fire, which has its own uses, a vehicle with no armour and no mobility has only one way to contribute to the match: kill.
No no I’m saying there’s like 20+ other maps that have one good spot for a Dicker Max, but not multiple good spots or a whole range of fallback options, etc. Just like Jungle. Like Atomic Heart. Yeah you only have one good spot, but “Once you’ve had an impact you’ve had an impact” That’s pretty much just you agreeing that one spot is enough for a Dicker Max to be helpful.
I disagree that a light tank is just going to magically always do better. Maybe for you, that just means you’re great at light tanks, lol. Tons of people go forward with a light tank, instantly get completely vaporized, and accomplish jack squat.
Being at the same BR implies that these two classes are already getting similar battle efficiencies across all average players.
I really don’t feel like it’s a competitive spawn choice on so many maps as that. Almost always, I have a better spawn option that I don’t take up because I’m stubborn and dumb.
That’s not what I was implying. I was talking about ways to contribute to the match, so it’s not a question of overall performance, but versatility. Light vehicles can cap, decap, scout, get into cas at a discount. Dicker is rarely gonna do anything other than kill.
Basically, look at it this way. You can get two kills in a light vehicle and still have done very well, with one cap, maybe two, and multiple assists. But a Dicker Max that only got two kills has underperformed, because it hasn’t drained the enemy of tickets in other ways, or assisted the team in other ways.
Oh, no. I suck at light tanks. TDs are my specialty. But that’s precisely why I know their limitations.
I have nothing but respect for people who can use light vehicles to their maximum potential, like this very good friend of mine who’ll drop nukes in the Fiat 6614 on maps like Stalingrad, knowing that even just .50s mean literal death. I want to learn to do that as well, in time, even though I have a soft spot in my heart for TDs.
There is a reason why one of these playstyles is meta, and the other is not.
On maps with trees, as a Sniper, i usually drive a light tank with quick reload to a spot where i can overlook my own half of the map, and i get quickly rid of the trees in the way with inexpensive rounds… then go capture a point… or die trying.
then the fun starts when i spawn the dicker max, waffentraeger… either i have a good team and nothing to do, or the enemy is coming up into my view and dies. usually most games where i score more than 4-5 kills are games where over-enthusiastic enemies drive carelessly near the spawn area to get easy kills and then unexpectedly die.
And, i think, these are the ones whining about “hidden” spots.
On maps without trees ( like desert ) of course i will spawn the max directly and go to my position, waiting for the first overenthusiastic enemies that come rolling to the spawn point.
I am way over fifty and quite slow, this is the chill play style that i can handle :D just keeping the starting area clean for our guys to go out again unmolested.
You will have nothing but CQC knife fights and you are gonna enjoy it.
Honestly, it’s pretty moronic to see 10.0+ vehicles being literally trapped in a map that’s not even 800m wide and 1000m long (rows containing spawn areas not included).
This is absolutely aggravating, how something as dumb as this could even pass the testing phase ?
I had no idea they ruined normandy too. Doing that is a great way to kill any proper strategy/map knowledge.
I want to know why gaijin seems to be against flanking.
What, and allow people to side-shot BVMs?
Yeah, some maps now have modes like this where like half of the map is blocked off, @ARK_BOI also posted several similar pictures above.
Thinking isn’t allowed, just spawn, drive straight for like 75m and engage the enemy.
Your vehicle isn’t suited for that kind of playstyle ? Too bad, but be sure to buy our premiums.
I just got my first 3 instances of those narrowed maps yesterday. They were tons of fun, and required way MORE THINKING than normal, precisely because they forced people out of what would normally be the meta, objectively best spots. People were wheeling around dynamically search for each other, coming up with tactics and maneuvers on the fly creatively, etc. It’s great. Much more engaging, much more tactical.
This benefit wouldn’t last forever, as eventually people would work out a meta for them too, but Gaijin should just change them up again if so and do some other variant.
Thinking isn’t allowed, just spawn, drive straight for like 75m and engage the enemy.
This is an excellent description of the OLD maps, yes, where the existence of objectively best sniping spots meant that people didn’t think, just spawned, drove straight for like 750m, to their memorized spot that they got from a tips and guides website and probably didn’t even find themselves, and engaged the enemy.
I agree it was terrible. Good thing they are fixing it.
It was a blast, Gaijin, keep up the good work.
Those maps can work in lower tiers, where you often hang out, so I was expecting this answer.
Taking a map, cutting off it’s edges while changing nothing else simply can’t introduce more complexity, especially on a map that is already small in it’s full size.
There’re like 4-5 streets in total, so if you are in a 16v16 game it’s almost guaranteed someone will be there, so it’s only a matter who will get to the advantageous angle first.
Head-on engagements will be massively prevalent here, thus limiting possible plays from fast, unarmored vehicles and IFVs.
Any map that doesn’t allow vehicles to use their advantages is literal trash.
There’s nothing tactical about being forced into a small area, and being unable to use your tanks advantages. It’s just “whoever has the better gun” wins.
That’s just not true. There is more to playing ground battles than just sitting in a sniping spot the whole match. The new small maps prevent tanks from using their strengths, and they kill any tank that needs flanking to be effective, like M18s, France 6.7-7.7, and lightly armoured vehicles.
I’d love larger maps if gaijin could make a balanced and fun one.