In the event of an Expansion......

[Schiannath]

So far all i have read for ideas for an expansion are;

Pacific (Japanese vs US Marine/ Commonwealth/ Other Resisting forces or even Soviet Russians...that one time!) and Russian Front, with a possible 3rd German army involved.


Axis sympathizers (possibly an incorrect use of the term, sorry)
Hungary, Italy, Vichy France, Romania, Finland ...to name only
a few.
"Free Forces" such as French Legion (South East Asia and Africa), French Partisan, Polish, Dutch, Greek, China, the free
people of Asia... so'on. However none of the for-mentioned create any solid basis individually.


Personally I'd love to see Commonwealth Forces anywhere (Africa mostly) Australians and 8th army British. (incredibly biased POV on my part) or even an entire separate Canadian Army for the hard fight up the French coast, they earned it.

But the point i am trying to boil down to is that these options may be better left to mod developers for now and that relic could expand on current platforms. New units for existing forces
and above all MAP PACKS!


I would much rather a few more units and some quality relic maps than to spend money on an expansion that i only share half of the interest in.
I have a few ideas and for expanding current forces and i would like to see others:

American: Medical jeep, upgrade for med station.
Browning .30 cal teams for airborne are the newer
slimmer versions that are aircooled as opposed to
water. Faster pack/ unpack. M1919 i believe.
Deuce and a half transport trucks with some effort
put in like the half track( maybe carry 2x 6 man
squads or appears from off map carrying 2 reinf
squads
Tank commander...... i got nothing.
Edit: Maybe a US Mk. Stuart Tank
Also use the Captain model from the editor the one
who is dressed like Patton (Colt 1911 and leather
jacket.)

British: Valentine tank. I know it was being replaced by
Sherman's and "Churchies" but not altogether gone.
Commando Sniper from the campaign ('Dammit' that
bugged me.)
British paratroopers with helmets, maybe a little less
awesome than the Commandos but more rounded(AT?).
Scotsmen. They have the model with the kilt why not
use it as an Infantry squad when Royal Engineers are
selected, say a squad that helps protect tanks from
Infantry attack, or can set up defenses around a dug in
tank.
Also the Hurricane/ Spitfire/ Hawker Tempest attack
runs could be worked in.
Edit: The M3 Grant would make an excellent addition to the tank
depot in perhaps.

Wermacht: ( A little scarce on ideas, thats where you come in)
Perhaps light Mg Emplacements MG 38s. Not a Concrete
bunker but a light, camouflaged position.
Terror could have werewolves (as in Otto Skorzeny)
disguise instead of camo, that place demo charges
everywhere and send false communications to enemy
commanders. however these would be out of place most
of the time.
Blitz may get STUKA dive Bombs that are deadly
accurate and are harder to hit with AAA than
conventional planes.

Panzer Elite: FallshirmJager gun teams (sorry for the lack of
accurate reference), as seen in 'Band of Brother:
Carentan'; firing rockets or 'Saving Private Ryan';
as it annihilates an American infantry squad that
has boarded a Tiger Tank.
Make the AT barricades good.
Give the AT army a Kubelwagon for Recon and
luring purposes.
Scorched earth could perhaps find some way of
making all enemy Infantry move like patrolling
British soldiers in front line sectors no matter what
buffs are being used.


As for now these ideas are all i have to share, but i would like to stress that my main objective is to have more maps available above all other expansion details. Please pick apart my concepts and correct me where due. Previous to writing this i was reviewing several expansion posts and noticed the level of racial sensitivity in some posts and how much time these posts dragged away from the main discussion. I have tried to be sensitive writing this and if anything written here is offensive let me know i will edit such text. Thank you.

[B4_life]

*points to the Suggestion box (http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=155730)*

[Engima]

Wasn't the Waffen SS separate from the Wehrmacht?You could have that as a new army.

[Schiannath]

thanks for the link B4_life

and the idea for Waffen SS as much as i'd love to see them (not for politcal reasons, but because they were worthy opponents.) it goes against the principles Company of Heroes has set for not using pro Nazi figures. and the SS are undeniable.

[Riddles]

I like your idea of adding more content to the existing armies as opposed to a lot of new content. Its also a safe bet with the developers, we've gotten used to, and like these armies now, (with some exceptions for some people of course) so adding new content is a win win yah?

I wouldnt mind seeing some more content for say americans, perhaps a new doctrine to each of the older armies? :) Theres plenty of inspiration around surely, and some fresh ideas could really mix it up a little.

Some thoughts for additional potential docs that i think might add to factions.

Americans:

- A mobile infantry doc,
Using the humble rifleman, in conjunction with open topped call in halftracks to ramraid enemies much like the PE do, but with a unique U.S. flavour. They could also have some cool upgrades to vehicles only available once the doc is chosen, oh say, recoiless on the jeep? :P Also, by making a doc to support mobile infantry play, we avoid yet another arty doc, focusing instead more on unique call ins, which everyone loves.

British:

- A deception doctrine
In the battles of northern africa, between the brits and the germans, the brits made a gigantic fake force, consisting of wooden tanks and trucks that gave the germans the wrong impression of where the enemy was about to attack.

Many brit emplacements are fairly potent. Why not a doc that would be able to create gigantic wooden replica's of all your favourite guns, :P or perhaps of dug in tanks. Or even some markers which register as blips on the opponents minimap when discovered. This idea of deception is touched on in the commando tree, but the british base is such a huge investment, i think a doc using deception and "illusion" would really supplement the brits gameplay wise.

Wehrmact:

How about an eastern front doctrine :P ?
Maybe you could include some elements based on the predominant features of the eastern front. Say perhaps an artillery strike from big bertha, that lands in a random part of the sector it is targeted into with a huge explosion, causing fear in the enemy, much like the real one did. Or perhaps some 6th army grenadiers, complete with torn overcoats, and some seriously stressed voice acting :P, to give the wehrmact a form of early ground superiority infantry, arriving say, to combat commandoes.

Panzer elite:

A kamphgruppe doctrine?
The field groups of the late war were a mish mash of units, from all the armed forces, thrown into battle side by side. You could make a doctrine for panzer elite that say, supplements combined arms between infantry and vehicles, by giving mounted infantry much better accuracy for example. Or even giving panzer grenadiers a "Target spotted ability" which makes the enemy target more susceptable to say, tank fire. Forcing an even battle group. You could add a cool officer based off the Majorgeneral Voss model, who increases unit accuracy in an area, if the area contains only 1 of each unique unit.
This doctrine hopefully would increase the thought required when composing a PE battlegroup, and reward players when they use the tools they are given correctly and tactically.

[Schiannath]

"Big Bertha" That's a railway mounted gun right? I like it. :)

[Q77]

Rail and road versions were made. The official BB was a howitzer-type, later on they named different types of big guns BB, like the Williams Gun that could throw shells over 100 km away.

[Pyro Paul]

the next two factions that could logically be added would be the Russian/red Army and the Axis Minor powers (you could name it the Tripartite Pact as all the other nations where signintaries of it)

a Russian faction could be told to you by almost any one in this forum as every one has ideas of the russian army and we have a very large record of their forces and exploits through out the war, so their construction would be rather easy to make. it is the axis minor powers/puppet states which would become more confusing because you have Germany as the primary Axis power in Europe and Japan as the primary axis power in the Pacific.

the Axis minor powers would involve Italian Social Republic (reminents of Facist Italian army), Romania, and Hungary which would be using primarly german lower quality equipment or out of date equipment (chance to introduce older versions of the Panzer and some older tanks that where circulated out of German service) and each doctrine would promote a single nation of the three providing nation unique units.

the Base units of these nations including a majority of the infintry and armor would be of german control as each of these nations received Heavy german support through out the war.

Italian force ideas (http://www.comandosupremo.com/Weapons.html)

Romanian force ideas (http://www.worldwar2.ro/arme/)

A hungarian tank (some more at bottem) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/40_M_Turan_I)

[B4_life]

A variant on Pyro's idea is to make a to make an all-italian/romanian/hungarian army, but have the doctrines be the "heavy german support". I see easily three different german call-ins for them (somewhat like the blitz tree, with one side being "standard" wehr or PE units and the other being a set of doctrine powers).

Although I have to say some people would think it's just a hastily put-together faction with random units thrown in doctrines.

[themisfit]

I have an idea, expand the relic servers ability to not crash on weekends, now thats an expansion :)

[Thadius]

Maps are all well and good for the peeps who play MP, but what about those who play solely Skirmish? Don't get me wrong new maps for skirmish are nice so long as they aren't all 1v1 maps, and new units for existing armies would still be interesting. But for me and maybe others here, I would prefer at least 1 new nation for a new expansion, mostly to justify paying the retail price for a bunch of units that modders could do with hard work, the same as new armies can be added by modders.

Campaigns are great for the existing armies already and a new one or two would be even better. I would like to see a middle ground though maybe with new units for the exisitng groups with a new faction to top it off. The only thing I would be worried about would be the AI :)

[lordkosc]

http://www.missionmodels.com/files/images/t_17721.jpg

:eek:

do want , I could see the cries of IMBA already, as 1 shot takes out an entire allied base. :slow:

[Mannerheim]

Adding new stuff to existing armies with expansion would break the compatibility with everyone not owning the new addon... and that sounds bad ad doubt relic will ever do it in that way

At the moment the mod support for coh is poor, its impossible to create totally new vehicles and stuff so modders cant do the stuff you people mention there

[Pyro Paul]

Adding new stuff to existing armies with expansion would break the compatibility with everyone not owning the new addon... and that sounds bad ad doubt relic will ever do it in that way

At the moment the mod support for coh is poor, its impossible to create totally new vehicles and stuff so modders cant do the stuff you people mention there

Relic does it all the time... it has been done once already with OF and has been done with each of the Dawn of War expansions.

the Expansion Adds a new unit to the orginal armies. it then also adds the additional armies recieved in the expansion so that players with out the expansion can play against players with the expansion. all the expansion does is allow the player to play the single player campaigns as well as play the unique new factions that come with the expansion.


for instance.
CoH:OF added the King Tiger to the Whermacht which is accessable to vCoH players...

Winter Assault and Dark Crusade for DoW added the Greyknights and Chaplins to the Space Marines faction... these units are buildable by the player even if said player doesn't have either of the expansions.



Second off-
Relicnews.com supports a mod community and has a mod dedicated forum page located here (http://forums.relicnews.com/forumdisplay.php?f=189).

on that page users can obtain the tools required to mod the game as well as simple tutorials on doing exactly that. the only problem is that Adding new complex models require new animations and skeletons which can not be added easily to the system, however, it is still possible...

[Znuff]

Pyro Paul, you can play against OF with vCOH, it just requires patching. If a new expansion only adds units to the older factions then that type of patch wouldnt work as you then wouldnt need the new expansion to use the new units.

I think its difficult to motivate adding minor countries to the game before the major ones. The bar was also set at two factions with OF so I would think it hard to take a step back and add only one faction in the next expansion. So I think its a fairly realistic asumption that we will end up with an Russian/Japan expansion with an Eastern Front and Pacific single player.

[Mannerheim]

Pyro Paul: no the king tiger wasnt a new unit, there was never supposed to be a tiger ace but king tiger but they ran out time/limits something... you can find the post about it somewhere. King tiger just replaced the ace model and stats.

The idea about each faction getting new units would mean everyone would have to buy the expansion to get them or else everyone would have them free, else it would mess the balance just more if someone would have extra units that the other side has no equal/counter since they didnt buy it.. it would only if the new units would have no real effect on balance meaning they would be just fill-in units that relic guys said they dont want to make.

Mod support is poor, your referring the subforum where im more active than here :)
there is no way to get new animated units in the game because the most critical mod tool, the object editor has NOT been released, you can check the forum stickys, its not about being complex to do but the fact relic has only released one part that is useless untill we get the rest of them.. community has been waiting it since coh has been released so like 2 years soon :)

[IndigoSpyder]

Anyone here wants to have a US atomic bomb and and German V-2 for a real superweapon? :science:

[Pyro Paul]

The idea about each faction getting new units would mean everyone would have to buy the expansion to get them or else everyone would have them free, else it would mess the balance just more if someone would have extra units that the other side has no equal/counter since they didnt buy it.. it would only if the new units would have no real effect on balance meaning they would be just fill-in units that relic guys said they dont want to make.

Again, No.

look at Dawn of War, the Other Relic game made by the same people whom made Company of Heroes... Relic.

each expansion has added a new unit for every faction in the game. if i buy JUST the Dawn of war game and none of the expansion and download the patch so i can play on-line i can build each of the new units provided by Each expansion dispite the fact that i did not purchase either of those expansions.

i could have vDoW and Only that game, but as a space marine player i would still get access to the Chaplin hero, provided by the Winter Assault expansion, and the Grey Knights, provided by the dark crusade expansion.

[Vretsu]

The thread title makes the arrival of a new expansion sound like a frightening and malevolent catastrophy.

"Powerful new FREE FRENCH faction retreat button sends your armies running doggedly towards the enemy HQ."

[Riddles]

Well my idea with new units being added to old factions was through a fourth DOCTRINE, if relic wanted, they could make this selectable by only expansion players, to extend thier american armies maybe. otherwise they only have new factions in thier expansion. This way it doesnt affect the core american army, and we get new american things.

[Schiannath]

I agree a step backward in terms of adding campaigns and army's in blocks of two would give relic a chance to get organized and not kill the game by adding some terrible army that noone likes. Also we have to look at this in terms of Relic making a profit for their hard work. They are not going to release another expansion only to see half their fanbase buy it and the other half reject the game altogether.

To be honest the safest bet would be to stay along the same old track, armies wise, and work on upgrading features and multiplayer maps that are not simply 1v1 but immersive missions beyond the campaign sought of thing, where an entire town could be set upon by 4v4 (5v5, preferably, just one)
and make them AI compatible for those who love skirmish like i do.

Nextly the term "Company of Heroes" is from an officers memoirs from the European theatre of war (I'm sure you all know who i mean) So CoH should probably stay Europe.


and yes the title i chose was to give the impression that i fear it as much as i am eager to see it.

[Lethal Dosage]

In the event of an Expansion......

Press the Wallet button, then mash the Retreat button repeatedly unit you reach your HQ. :lol: