I think that you need to be extremely careful when comparing SC2 and FAF (in context I am right now Number. 3 on FAF ladder and in Platinum league in SC2 after couple weeks of playing), while it's true that if an UI mod for SC2 exist that does what an UI mod for FAF does then it would absolutely busted and banned for sure (eg. a Disperse move for marines to avoid Banelings to kill them with their AOE) because it removes a vital part of SC2 which is unit micro. The same can be said for an UI mod that would control economy in FAF where it would automatically add pgens, pauses everything that uses power (E-please or whatever it was called mod). That's because a lot of FAF depth lies in economy and macro, much more then in SC2 (in SC2 unless you are Zerg (Queen injects) the economy is basically Select all Nexus/CC/Hatchery make drones while having the hatchery's waypoint on mineral line/Gas).
The point:
Now back to the topic, I believe that UI mods like ATP (Advanced Target Priority), UI party, Spread move, Disperse move actually increase the micro potential because of the importance and trade of's of Micro vs Micro.

Note: While in theory assuming perfect gameplay and APM of >300 on normal and probably >500 on big maps this wouldn't be true but we are mere mortals and taking into account that I am top 5 player It's safe to assume that If I can't do this and it's not optimal for me to invest my APM into it then it's not gonna be possible nor actually beneficial for other players.

Reasoning:
I will try to now explain why I think that is and give a couple of examples. First of all we need to consider what these mods actually do, most of them allow us, the player, to better tell the units what we want them to do via orders or improve the way we give/queue the orders. ATP allows us to specify what we want the unit to target, Disperse move allows us to split the units more efficiently, same for UI party. As Archsimcat already stated you still do the same amount of work in game by giving orders, the part that is improved/simplified is the UI. Instead of needing to somehow (different methods for that as stated by Arch) select 5 groups i can select one, give the orders and tell them via a UI mod to just split. You may say that this is bad and takeaways the micro aspect of the game, but my point is that it doesn't, it allows you to better "translate" your actions to units and because of that micro more.
Why is that you may ask? Because if I am not allow to use that option then I won't do it at all, I just won't micro it (Excluding some edge cases like splitting very important units that you give a lot of APM attention like engies early game when there is nothing going on, your first 3 t3 units, your T4's etc.) and neither should you because it's just not worth it. Why would I spend 3 seconds on splitting my t1 tanks so that your bomber has 100 less mass killed value if this would mean that I am inefficient with my Mass/E/BP balance causing me to make 5 tanks less? Because of the importance and focus on economy most of the time it's just not worth it to invest a lot of attention nor APM into extensive unit micro in this game, It's just how it is.
Let's go over a few examples:
Example N.1 Mod in question - Disperse Move
As stated above a situation is as follows, a t1 bomber attacking my t1 tanks. If I would have disperse move option there is a chance I might quickly select my 4 tanks, give them 3-4 move orders around them and use my keybind for Disperse move. Take probably around 1-1.5 seconds. If I wouldn't have Disperse move I wouldn't bother to move my tanks at all, if I would have tried I could probably manage to move 1 away but realistically speaking, ask yourself, do you really see it out side of edge cases like first 2-3 minutes and special units? No you don't, I don't do it, I don't see it because it's too much hassle for little gain and it's more important to queue 1 more pgen so I don't power stall in 2 minutes.
Example N.2 Mod in question - ATP (Advanced Target Priority)
I have a few units doing a run by and I want to kill enemy mexes. I select my units and using ATP I use my keybind to tell them to focus mexes and move them in between mexes. I then have to options depending on the game state, I can either micro the units by giving move orders to avoid enemy units, dodge shots etc. to get maximum value out of them or leave them be if that's not really important. Now the same situation without ATP, I select my units and either just move them in and pray, move in and then queue Attack orders on mexes or just queue attack orders on mexes from the start. It takes a little bit more (given low amount of targets, don't kid yourself you don't need to queue more then 2-4 usually) time and "micro" to do so then using ATP BUT it doesn't at all allow for any future micro, I won't move micro my units cause they will move but stop shooting the mexes so I just queue and forget.
Another thing is a more strategic aspect like deciding that I want to prioritize targeting of t1 arties given the game state and both mine and enemy unit composition. Without ATP it wouldn't be possible and this takes a potential strategic and micro aspect of the game.

Over all the argument is that these mods don't take away micro from the game because Yes, they simplify some part of micro but if it's not simplified it's not used (except some edge cases where the mod isn't actually taking away the skill needed cause given low amount of orders value gained from the mod is so small it can be ignored) so nothing is lost, we actually gain the possibilities for micro and increase the potential of it. I would hate to see banning or blocking via changes such UI mods since it would make the game dumber, more boring and actually decrease both the focus on micro and it's potential.
Another thing I would like the bring up is balance, if the mod follows the basic rules (as stated by Mach) and it's not a cheat mod then it really doesn't make units OP (Few exceptions like Shift G + ATP on ACU priority). Did t2 arty/unit drops became OP after ATP? Yes they can be stronger bcs of ATP but it requires extra attention and micro (in order to get more value you need to set targeting to eg. power and then MICRO your arties so that they don't die to defences and stay at the edge of their range). T1 bombers doing Spread attack? Yes they will utilize their AOE more efficiently but it takes more clicks then just move + A-move or just A-Move.
All these mods do is take an aspect of micro that is in theory possible but not worth it because of the time required to achieve it being long due to UI being bad or UI limitations and making such move a viable one.

Back to Keyser.
"the pr you are showing is here to preventing cheating : UI mods abusing the feature to give order to units (ie auto dodging, auto hover bombing etc etc)" Agree with that, these are and should be considered cheat mods and therefore be banned."
"It is also here to remove the split move to trap ACU with T1 units (balance decision in accordance with the balance councillor)." I think this is a very weak argument for removing such an excellent feature like split move, I also don't see why unit blocking of ACU is so bad while for example while blocking an ACU with spamming of t1 aa is not (absolutely busted since it fucks with pathfinding insanely). I really fail to see how units getting on top of the ACU and blocking it is such a bad thing, yes it may be frustrating but I think it's healthy. ACU's are absolutely busted compared to units and you want to keep your ACU in range of enemy units while keeping your units outside of enemy's ACU range. If you move in your units on top of enemy ACU you should be able to block him at the cost of clumping up your units and making them more prone to OC. After all it's only effective if you have a lot more of units bcs of how attacking vs defending unit formation works. If blocking wouldn't be possible it would make ACU even stronger (bad idea in my opinion) and even if you have 50% more t1 tanks you still wouldn't be able to kill enemy with an all in because of defenders advantage in engagements and Vet on ACU etc.
" Spread move / disperse move not working after that, would be an unfortunate side effect." I think that there should be a focus on finding alternative solution if that's the case, it would be a huge loss for micro and gameplay to lose those mods.

Please make sure that your posts contains some actual information, don't make ridiculous claims like "oh this will make bombers OP" without giving it a second thought nor actually argumenting your position. You can have your own opinion but sharing it as facts is just foolish. This thread as all others derail and become a spam fiesta of people arguing and quoting each other back and forward for no real result. This stubborn guy won't change his mind about XYZ so just don't bother. This is not the place for that. Without deeper game knowledge or game balance you shouldn't really claim anything, you can hint that you think or in your opinion something is ... but it's really not that useful for the discussion. It may seem "elitist" but in 99% of the cases it's just the truth, if you don't understand the game well enough you can't say what's OP or UP cause most of the time you can't properly use it or counter it.

Footnote: I've spent a lot of time on this post and thought it through so I won't respond to some low effort quotation and BS claim by some random guy, so just don't bother. I am looking forward to get some answers from other top rated players, but mostly Balance and Game Dev Team as well as to use it in the near future in any related discussions so I won't need to spend 1h again explaining and argumenting my points.

After playing quite a few games over the last days and participating in the rush for the highest rating I must say that this is truly amazing, never before was I able to just come online and play games during non prime times without the need to wait in a lobby sim for 30+ minutes. After the ratings are settled I believe that sadly TMM will die out in the 2k+ bracket (although I really hope it won't be the case) but for the rest of the players it's a huge game changer. I believe that TMM will help a lot of players get better at the game and allow them to experience the huge variety of maps and strategies FA has to offer. There are few bugs but they are minor and everything is working really really well especially considering this is just a beta. It's already awesome and it's gonna be even better when there will be full release as well as the addition of leagues/divisions.
Overall huge thanks and hats off to everyone involve with the project.

Can any member of the balance explain why these changes are being made?
Bomber and Scout balance changes
While I like the bomber changes to enable more 1st air openings and buff the air aggression I really really disagree with the scout changes which makes them more expensive and increases the BT massively.
In my opinion people don't scout enough in this game anyways and don't respond to what their enemy is doing so I see no reason why the primary way of getting intel should be nerfed, I don't think that we need to buff cheese like surprise t2 bomber all in snipes or anything like that.
I believe that another side effect of this change will be that first of all 1st air openings with a fast scout on transport rush maps will no longer be viable (which in my opinion is the healthiest meta for transport rush maps since if both players do it they can see if enemy is going for transport or inti rush and adapt their BO and respond accordingly (takes some skill) and avoid the Rock/Paper/Scissors of Transport Rush vs Inti Rush vs 1/2 Inti into Transport).
Another side effect will be the randomness on big air maps (mostly trans rush maps) where you will no longer be able to cover all possible routes of enemy transport (usually 2 or 3 scouts needed) and thus making catching enemy transport even more random as well as decreasing the chances of players actively thinking about where to drop their engies and how many based on the intel of enemy transport position and it's cargo.

While I understand that you want to make the scout more expensive and harder to get in order to force 1st air openings to only build bomber instead of bomber + scout I don't think it's the correct approach since it has massive negative effects on other areas of gameplay.
If you wanted to just nerf scout then I think what should be changed instead is nerfing it's Speed, Turn Rate, and Acceleration to a point where an inti can catch and kill the scout.

Note: Please do not post in this thread unless you are a member of the balance team or a well respected and high ranked player. I don't want this thread to become a shit posting cancer.

PR is up and merged.
https://github.com/FAForever/fa/pull/3265

A lot of the games are singleplayer so if we would delete all replays that have 1 player and are older then 1 year we would hopefully reduce the memory usage enough while not removing the abillity to watch older multiplayer games. I do sometimes watch older games, even from 2015-17 because that's what you need to do to actually watch some really high rated 1vs1 games that were not part of some tourney.

Pd's are not the issue at hand here. The problem is that you can spam RAS bois that give you economy but if your enemy decides to push you already have BP in place (Ras coms) that are hard to kill and can easily build tons of PD's.
The problem with the later stages of the game is that the amount of mass you have in units compared to your income is growing. Basically usually the longer the game goes on the longer it would take for your economy to re built the army you have. This indirectly makes reclaim insanely important and thus promotes very static gameplay.
I think that in order to achieve healthier gameplay in later stages of the game we would need to encourage players to trade more during the game. The easiest way to do that would be to reduce the amount of reclaim you get from higher tech units.
We should look over some games and see how the value of Total mass in units/mass income changes through the game when we reach different stages and then adjust the reclaim in order to bring values of different stages closer together.
I would need to go and see some replays but from the top of my head the difference rn is huge. (This is for 10x10 land maps, different maps have different values and it also depends if you make land, air, navy).Early t1 stage is ~2k/~25, Late t1 stage ~4k/~35, t2 stage ~8k/45, late t2/t3 rush ~14k/~60 , t3 stage ~20k/80, late t3 stage ~30k/100. As you can see from this very inaccurate approximation from the top of my head the value of the units on the field grows much quicker.
To address one of the arguments against changing our beloved 81% reclaim value. I really disagree that changing that number for different tiers will confuse ppl so that they won't know how much reclaim they will leave. First of all most people have no idea how much units cost so they don't know how much reclaim a Rhino will leave anyways. Changing the % of reclaim left by t2, t3 units won't really confuse ppl since it's quite intuitable, higher tech units leave more mass, it doesn't matter (in sense of understanding) if a brick leaves 800 or 1k mass, it leaves more then your t2 tank, that's all you really need to know. If we are talking about judging how much mass will a failed attack donate you do it with experience and on the fly judging so people will just adapt with time to those changes.
Another counterargument is that with such changes all the wreck props (reclaimable units) on the maps will be changed with such balance change. I am really not to sure what's the best way to address this issue but I don't think it should stop us from balancing the game. Possible solutions are: Just let it happen, most maps will be absolutely fine with slight reclaim decrease. If author wants to adjust his maps, he will do it, as for GPG maps and Classic ones whose authors are inactive we could look over them and see if any would require changes and adjust the wrecks there as needed.
The other idea is to separate the values for civilian owned units or w/e but I am not sure if this is even possible and it's extremely hacky and then unintuitional for future mappers, so I don't think this is the way to go.
Over all I think there is a need for some changes to the values of reclaim in order to make the gameplay especially during later stages of the game healthier, more action packed and rewarding. If we look at other RTS games, especially SC2 we can see similar pattern. Pro matches there used to be either cheeses or games where something happens in the early game, then both players macro'ed, maxed out and clashed once. Right now games can be a 30 minutes of nearly constant fighting, often in different parts of the map at once.
As for the exact number I don't have a proposition yet, I am not even sure if we should balance it for t1, t2, t3 ,t4 or for each tech stage for Land, Air, Navy separately. It needs to follow a logical progression -> higher tech units yield more reclaim (in total since they cost more) but they yield lower % of their cost. With such changes I really hope that we could also buff micro compared to macro since players would be more rewarded for constantly trying to use their units and to find weakness in opponents defense (as it is currently during t1 stage on most 5x5 and 10x10 maps).

I can offer 1vs1 lessons as part of the prize for the winners of both brackets (1 for each winner, they usually last between 45 mins - 2 hours)

I am reading through this thread and I see both sides just throwing stones at each other. This discussion will never work if both sides don't agree on some frame of reference. Anyways, here is my take on this:

T3 mex nerf (be it income decrease or price increase) won't have direct effect on early t3 Land because you are supposed to get t3 land BEFORE you get t3 mexes, that's what we are trying to achieve here after all, so there is no need to worry about balance of t1, t2.
What such change WILL impact:
For 1vs1.
Increase the importance and length of early - mid t3 stage (harder to transition towards more eco) which would be problematic if you don't adjust reclaim since it will deepen the issue of importance of reclaim during t3 stage.
Slow the game down after early t3 stage
For team games:
Force people to actually make some units during t2 stage or rush t3 to defend vs t2 armies (Before making t3 mexes)
Make reclaim more important past t3 stage and slow the game down (people will need to make some units leading to a stand offs with slow eco'ing (bcs of bad map design))

It's nearly impossible to change the game so that Team games become dynamic, the map design promotes more passive and turtly gameplay, and people play those games meaning they want such gameplay. I think that making a slight adjustment to slow the t3 eco switch a little bit would be good and healthy if properly implemented but you can't change the fact that still most team games will be passive and turtly.

As a prize for the lower bracket winner I can offer 1vs1 lesson if such person will be interested.

Yes, swifties loose mass for mass vs inties but that's intended, otherwise they would be waaay too OP. They are faster which is insanely useful, they have more concentrated dps and hp, are much better vs AoE, they have a lot more fuel so they don't end up useless after 2 interceptions on larger maps. They also can win vs inties if micro'ed well because once they get in behind it's really easy to shred huge clouds in inties.
Imagine if swifties would actually win mass for mass vs inties, with all of their other advantages it would be impossible to win air vs aeon untill mid t3 stage. Oh yeah, they also do quite well vs early ASAF and can easily catch and murder a Strat bomber.

Because mercies can be countered in a way where they deal 0 damage and corsairs will always (unless you have complete air control) get through and deal damage. It doesn't matter if you can kill the corsairs after their 1 volley if you are already dead.

Adjacency matters when you are dealing with low amounts of resources and you need to be most efficient resource wise and not time/ BP/ scaling wise. I submit my every single BO on low mass maps where I put my t1 pgens around my t1 air factory/s.

Even though the OP raised some nice points the conversation quickly derailed and achieved nothing. Stop with all of this quoting and arguing back and forward, especially about something that's not the topic of the thread. From now on I will be deleting a lot more posts that derail the discussion or serve as a platform to attack/argue with another person. Since we now enforce some standard for the thread to be made we will also ensure that the discussion has some merit and it's not pure shit posting and arguing.

I would love to have more stealth play but not with the current engine and how vision works, it would be just total cancer. It's already insanely annoying to play vs a cybran army with deceiver + aa because vision is laggy and refreshes slowly and having high enough frequence air scout stream is very costly. Would not like to deal with such things in every match up.

@arran said in Monkey Lord - roleless T4 that needs a Buff:

If, and I stress IF, the Monkeylord is underpowered, perhaps a solution would be allowing it to climb steeper terrain (like a spider can) to allow for more tactical deployment?

Was referring to this.

I am still not sure if buffing cybran ACU is the right way to fix current balance issues, after all it's supposed to be their weak spot, both ACU and t2 land all ins. Yes, after the mantis nerf cybran is not as dominant on land maps during t1 stage but they still have arguably the best t1 tank in most situations (eg. most land based maps) and good t2 units that work great together with medusas and their stun. The whole idea for cybran gameplay is that you get an advantage during t1 stage, keep it during t2 stage where you try to take away map control from your enemy using previously acquired advantages and quick strikes, preferably with stealth field while avoiding an all out com battle in the middle. You also have corsairs so your t2 air transition is very powerful and is something that enemy ACU needs to very much consider if they are planning on being very agressive and pushing down the middle with ACU + units. The truth is that if you don't feed enemy ACU a lot of vet cybran can stand their ground during t2 stage as long as it : Attacks on the sides, got an advantage during t1 as they should, in the middle get a pd + shield to asssit their ACU. Then you switch to t3 and you have the best t3 mobile arty which absolutely annihilates any t2 army.

Blocking shots with buildings is a nice feature eg. with t1 engies when you are being raided.

@askaholic said in Complaint about TMM and Ladder Pool Rating Brackets:

1. Update your client to the latest version.
2. Go to the matchmaking tab and click the desire map pool.

The map list displayed comprises of the maps for your pool. You don’t need to know what your mu is.

@Auricocorico Just do this? XD

@FtXCommando you could mention in the posts displaying the maps and rating brackets that the brackets refer to Mu and not shown rating.

@Askaholic Is there a way in the client to even see your Sigma? It used to be shown when you hover over your nick in aeolus but now it's no longer the case I think? I can't get it to work.

@auricocorico said in Complaint about TMM and Ladder Pool Rating Brackets:

Alright I did it for you all :

Easy enough, i'm such a genuis

I am sure that the sigma is the same for every player.

You cannot combine Wagner's role as annoying amphibious raiding unit on large map and a decent ish normal tank. Right now it does the first well while being a weak normal tank. If you buff it then it will become OP on large navy raiding maps, if you change it in a way that nerfs it's raiding role you remove the only thing that's special about it. There is a case to be made for nerfing it's under water speed even more while buffing it's raw stats but again, you take away Wagner's advantages in its specialty because you want to bring it more line with standard bland tanks.