AtWar Autumn 2019 Competitive Tierlist Survey

Good Afternoon everyone, for some time now I've been working on devising a few objective ways to gauge the true standing of strategies in this game on a quantifiable basis to better evaluate the necessity of rebalancing them, as well as rotating them properly to ensure a fresh, entertaining, and competitive scene for all players. Without question, this has proved to be a monumental task considering the scope of different picks, maps, scenes, etc. It makes for a worrisome metagame for non-competitive players, and a more boring one for competitive players. After talking to many members of the RP, Scenario, and World game communities, it has come to my knowledge that the vast majority of these players simply use Blitzkrieg or, more often, Imperialist at all times, making this issue rather moot for everyone but competitive players. The concept of having custom strategies or new ways for mapmakers to craft more original playscapes for their players is still on Dave's backburner as far as I'm aware, but for now I personally can only focus on testing and rebalancing strategies pertaining to the competitive metagame: EU+ 3v3 10k and EU+ 1v1 10k, with the 2v2 and 5k variants being relatively similar anyhow.

Balancing around Europe+ has been a mainstay for almost a decade now, and it's not without reason: Europe+ is the most diverse, yet enclosed map presets in the game, and features all different types of geographic terrain, cashpot countries, sparse areas, etc. It's a very good proving ground for testing these strategies in a vacuum, almost, hence why I personally base my findings and balancing with the Implementors and various mods/supporters/community leaders on the Test Server.

But with that out of the way, I want to hear your voices too in this manner so we can better gauge the community's standing on every strategy- Is Desert Storm really overpowered? Is Relentless attack really the worst strategy of all time? Now is the time to let the staff know what you think, and based upon your answers we will be balancing, retooling, and overlooking the competitive scene from here on out.

The way in which you rate these strategies is using a multiple-choice method; S-Tier is reserved for single strategies that are beyond dominant and completely change how the game is played, for better or worse (See: 2018 Lucky Bastard, or 2011 Iron Fist). A-Tier is for the cream of the crop strategies that are currently the most chosen, most effective, and most viable in many picks. B-Tier is for the nice middleground between being overpowered and being underpowered- this is the Goldilocks zone for the most part. C-Tier is for strategies that have quite a bit of potential, but perform below average or just need a small kick to be more viable. D-tier is for strategies that barely function outside of obscure picks or in certain situations. F-Tier is for completely broken and/or useless strategies that currently serve absolutely no purpose whatsoever.

Please check out the two surveys below and answer honestly and with integrity- Only answers with a real username at the end will be counted in our data collection, so don't answer multiple times with alts to get your way. Cheers!

Survey Part 1

Survey Part 2

Filled it with Froyer the best dick sucker as name and Froyer for the second

Wr1tt3n by Froyer, 13.09.2019 at 13:03

Filled it with Froyer the best dick sucker as name and Froyer for the second

Thank you for your honesty!

Garde you're fucking american. Use the word fall instead of autumn.

My votes

Blitzkrieg: B-Tier
Counter-Insurgency: B-Tier
Desert Storm:A-Tier
Great Combinator: B-Tier
Guerilla Warfare: S-Tier
Hybrid Warfare: C-Tier
Imperialist: A-tier
Industrial Powerhouse: F-Tier
Insurrection: S+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Tier, I would vote higher but I can't
Iron Fist: C-Tier
Lucky Bastard: B-Tier
Master of Stealth: C-Tier
Naval Commander: B-Tier
Perfect Defense: A-Tier
Relentless Attack: D-Tier
Sky Menance: C-Tier

This is based on my experience using all of them. Typically when I want to troll I'll pick something C-tier or below.

Voted, btw this survey can get trolled since people will just steal others name to vote, i can see at least 4-5 guys who gonna name themself 4nic or wd or lao or anyone else and troll the votes.

Answered as Jugers.

Wr1tt3n by Witch-Doctor, 13.09.2019 at 13:10

Garde you're fucking american. Use the word fall instead of autumn.

Not all Americans say Fall! Next you'll tell me it's Soda, and not Pop.

Wr1tt3n by Garde, 13.09.2019 at 15:37

Wr1tt3n by Witch-Doctor, 13.09.2019 at 13:10

Garde you're fucking american. Use the word fall instead of autumn.

Not all Americans say Fall! Next you'll tell me it's Soda, and not Pop.

Only brits use autumn.

Wr1tt3n by Witch-Doctor, 13.09.2019 at 15:44

Wr1tt3n by Garde, 13.09.2019 at 15:37

Wr1tt3n by Witch-Doctor, 13.09.2019 at 13:10

Garde you're fucking american. Use the word fall instead of autumn.

Not all Americans say Fall! Next you'll tell me it's Soda, and not Pop.

Only brits use autumn.

The Chili's gotten to yo head, boi

Quick update for everyone: S tier means that a strategy is overly dominant and cannot be stopped, meaning there cannot be more than 1 S rank in a single list; think monometa.

Edit the survey to add a "don't know" option, otherwise you're going to get a lot of guesses.

Wr1tt3n by Sid, 13.09.2019 at 18:08

Edit the survey to add a "don't know" option, otherwise you're going to get a lot of guesses.

Having a guess is more valuable than nothing in this situation, as it gives us insight into how players view a strategy without necessarily being accustomed to it or knowing its modus operandi.

Blitz is good

Wr1tt3n by 4nic, 13.09.2019 at 13:26

Voted, btw this survey can get trolled since people will just steal others name to vote, i can see at least 4-5 guys who gonna name themself 4nic or wd or lao or anyone else and troll the votes.

I'll know who is who based upon the answers, and I'll contact the players as well to confirm if it comes to it.

Blitz ukr is way too powerful but I am just a noob so i cant use it. Instead I stick to a second rated ukr called ds. Sad

Wr1tt3n by Garde, 13.09.2019 at 18:19

Wr1tt3n by Sid, 13.09.2019 at 18:08

Edit the survey to add a "don't know" option, otherwise you're going to get a lot of guesses.

Having a guess is more valuable than nothing in this situation, as it gives us insight into how players view a strategy without necessarily being accustomed to it or knowing its modus operandi.

No offense bro, but if you truely want to rebalance the strategies and want to know their true standings within this community, guesses will only do more damage than actually being helpful. If history has tought us something, its that most people that comment or say something about strategies changes, only know so little about any of them.

Oh and not to mention that rebalancing strategies on this game is like a fairytale lol

Wr1tt3n by Waffel, 14.09.2019 at 04:21

Wr1tt3n by Garde, 13.09.2019 at 18:19

Wr1tt3n by Sid, 13.09.2019 at 18:08

Edit the survey to add a "don't know" option, otherwise you're going to get a lot of guesses.

Having a guess is more valuable than nothing in this situation, as it gives us insight into how players view a strategy without necessarily being accustomed to it or knowing its modus operandi.

No offense bro, but if you truely want to rebalance the strategies and want to know their true standings within this community, guesses will only do more damage than actually being helpful. If history has tought us something, its that most people that comment or say something about strategies changes, only know so little about any of them.

Oh and not to mention that rebalancing strategies on this game is like a fairytale lol

I don't claim to be a high capacity comp player or anything, but I don't plan on using only this feedback poll solely on determining balance changes, rather like I said this is a gauge of where things stand and what people want, ultimately.

Wr1tt3n by Waffel, 14.09.2019 at 04:21

Wr1tt3n by Garde, 13.09.2019 at 18:19

Wr1tt3n by Sid, 13.09.2019 at 18:08

Edit the survey to add a "don't know" option, otherwise you're going to get a lot of guesses.

Having a guess is more valuable than nothing in this situation, as it gives us insight into how players view a strategy without necessarily being accustomed to it or knowing its modus operandi.

No offense bro, but if you truely want to rebalance the strategies and want to know their true standings within this community, guesses will only do more damage than actually being helpful. If history has tought us something, its that most people that comment or say something about strategies changes, only know so little about any of them.

Oh and not to mention that rebalancing strategies on this game is like a fairytale lol

Guessing its still better than the elitist clan with its soys to balance strats of how they think its more fair because they got beaten up from it.
This should have been always the way to rebalance strats or to have the one mastermind to know it all. We used to have tophats but after tophats era there is noone to take his place.

Voting as AlexTheCrusader, just saying so you dont forget..

What the hell is an autumn, it says Fall on the badge for competitive victories. Things aren't adding up, you aren't being intellectually honest, Garde. We need change and we need change fast.

I don't like the tier ranking, there are strategies that are generally bad but are very good in specific settings. They can't be properly rated in that ranking.

Powerful allround strategies: Perfect Defence, Imperialist, GW
Decent allround strategies: GC, LB and SM
Powerful niche strategies: DS
Decent niche strategies: MoS, IF, HW

Everything else is pretty much garbage.

I would define a niche strategy as a strategy that is generally bad but has some scenarios where it is very strong. For example a high starting fund DS country can win quite easily against a low starting fund infantry spamming country.
We need more niche strategies to enable diverse gameplay and change strategies that get used 90% of the time or invent a counter against them.

Also, coming up with a new strategy that would punish spamming infantry for attacking which has been the meta for so long would be nice.

Wr1tt3n by Chess, 15.09.2019 at 13:21

I don't like the tier ranking, there are strategies that are generally bad but are very good in specific settings. They can't be properly rated in that ranking.

Powerful allround strategies: Perfect Defence, Imperialist, GW
Decent allround strategies: GC, LB and SM
Powerful niche strategies: DS
Decent niche strategies: MoS, IF, HW

Everything else is pretty much garbage.

I would define a niche strategy as a strategy that is generally bad but has some scenarios where it is very strong. For example a high starting fund DS country can win quite easily against a low starting fund infantry spamming country.
We need more niche strategies to enable diverse gameplay and change strategies that get used 90% of the time or invent a counter against them.

Also, coming up with a new strategy that would punish spamming infantry for attacking which has been the meta for so long would be nice.

Thanks for the response, Chess!

Just as a refresher before I address your point: As I stated in the OP, this is based around specifically Europe+ 10k/5k 3v3, 2v2, and 1v1 settings, these variations all mix in a very similar fashion; We're also talking about overall effectiveness and general usage, in which case there is a certain definitive aspect to which strategies objectively trump others. When you say scenarios, I'm assuming you're referring to picks or areas/events on the map that favor a certain style of play or a particular strategical ethos and approach that befits a proper solution, this aspect is entirely being factored into the objective model I'm currently working on alongside this community feedback model.

For example, a strategy like Lucky Bastard currently holds a 2.58 rating in the feedback poll (2.58 being an average based upon a numeric-assigned system to each tier numbering 1 (S-Tier) to 6 (F-tier) using the classic arithmetic A = N/S equation to determine aggregate standing), which means as an average, the community views Lucky Bastard as a solid A-Tier strategy. As we know however, Lucky Bastard cannot be played in every pick nowadays due to cost constraints with 10k starting income, therefore a more objective approach considering only four out of nine established competitive picks in Europe+ can play Lucky Bastard at a gain for your average competitive player would be to consider this fact; I'm still working on a thorough and approximate approach to this, but as an estimate I would imagine Lucky Bastard would hold a rating closer to 3.25 or so, making it a solid B-Tier; Great where it can be played, but a financial boon where it cannot.

To model the metagame further, more research such as this needs to happen, and surely I will be making more polls in the future to further gauge the community's opinions surrounding the metagame (I would like to do a similar poll based around units and picks atm) so we can map and coordinate what further development needs to occur in the future, and how we will be doing it.

As for your "niche strategy" approach, you're precisely right. The niche category in my model corresponds to B-Tier strategies; Ones that function as intended, follow their established ethos, and work great overall, but still maintain natural counters and hold no invincibility to speak of. These strategies typically function best when their economic and geographic factors are considered; You wouldn't play Naval Commander Germany generally (unless you're insane like myself and others who experiment with these sorts of things, or you just want to rush Belarus) because of the lack of bluewater ports and a lower-than-needed starting cash for transports, as well as the conglomeration of nearby cities and peripheral countries that could contribute to a much better suited strategy like Perfect Defense, Iron Fist, or Guerilla Warfare. But in a pick where Naval Commander would feel right at home, like the United Kingdom, it functions so well that it shifts the gameplay of many games to an odd angle and degree; A well-done Austria rush or Sweden rush is comparable to Blitz Turkey walling off all of Ukraine's expansions T1 as well as succeeding in Moscow and elsewhere nearby; it can be clutch. But, it only works where the pick is in a prime spot to utilize it; This is where we want strategies to be, where they have a home somewhere on the map and perform well under those conditions. We also want as many areas of the map to work like this as possible, but some strategies cannot function everywhere of course, unless you're Perfect Defense.

I will be posting my analysis and the results of this poll sometime this week, as well as my personal thoughts moving forward with strategies retooling, balancing, etc.