Red Alert 3

Over the course of the Red Alert 3 Beta and now the full release of the game, the play style of each of the three factions has evolved. Brought on mostly by balance patch changes, strategies have come and gone. For example, early in the Red Alert 3 Beta, the Soviet rush of choice was the Stingray rush, but a series of nerfs forced players to take a more land based approach. Early Dojo Cores used to mean an automatic Oil Derrick, but with patch changes and player adaptations Dojo Core rushing became less viable. The Allies never went early air, until the Vindicator Rush was invented later on in the beta.

What notable metagame changes have you all noticed? Have they made the game better or worse, and are these new player trends good for the game?

Feel free to discuss any metagame trends or issues here. We are looking forward to reading your comments!

I remember back in the beta when someone came up with the idea of using an unpacked dojo core as the counter to early bear/dogs at oil derics.

Though, the whole reason that came about was because oil derics were super valuable. They gave 10 creds a second, had 1000 capture bonus, and had insane health.

Now a days, oil isn't a must have and the whole core use isn't seen as much since their turn time and speed has been nerfed.

Well as with all RTS, the metagame comes in layers, for example, we saw after a few games that the Soviet expansion mechanism is much safer and cost effective than the Allied expansion method, allowing Soviets to dominate on land simply due to better econ.

After this, Allied players soon realised that early air was exceptionally viable, and so started using this to the detriment of Soviets across the globe

Then comes a half step, where flak troopers and bullfrogs can balance with vindicators when used correctly and cause a fair fight, and then even after that has come the time of the peacekeeper, which has allowed Allies to become so popular at the moment (especially when combined with moving the mcv for instant turrets right outside the Soviet's base)

Oh and as for Japan, as soon as an air build was made, they were pretty much screwed.

But I think the strategies have layered quite nicely, and it is still an extremely new game, so I personally have high hopes for its future intricacies

Allied players including myself seem to have evolved from just the basic air rush to combo's with inf. Also Allied players are moving mcv more, mcv use in general has increased.

I've seen little development in EvS and AvS. Why is that?

i disagree with you gigabeef,
i dont think that the empire is screwed when the allies or sovjets build air units.
at least not the sovjets, because i played them the most, and just what i found, was that it is easy for the empire to build a balanced mix army with anti-air artilery and anti ship/anti vehicle.

All three factions have had their shot at the top step of the imba podium now, Empire had its turn early in the beta, then Soviets and now Allies. Leads me to believe that Empire will be the next imba :-)

Once this big balance patch comes out I can see EA hitting air hard, so I dunno.. it could all go horribly wrong.

I remember playing allied in the beta. People used to say vindicators sucked because you couldn't kill a miner with a full airport, but I noticed that vindicators were very cost-effective weapons because they had a very easy time returning home, could kill precious tanks and would have forced my opponent to spend a lot more in AA. I used them pretty much like black eagles in RA2, a mean of denying easy expansion and movement.
Then afterwards, when I switched to empire, they happened to get recognition from everyone and started being used as a mean of rushing. Allies seemed to have much potential in the beta, with a very powerful navy that required a full load of micro if compared with soviets and japs, fragile but powerful ground units and high flexibility with paratroopers and centuries. But a little flaw in balance caused such a well designed faction to rely on two t1 units for 99% of games, and that's too bad, I hope to see more guardians/ifv/destroyers used in the future.

The soviet mirrors really evolve all the time.

In the start of the game you always saw people building grinders all the time and leaving walls behind.
after a week or so people moved to the fast warfactory -> sickle harassment
now people mix. People learned how to counter the fast sickle strategy, making the grinder viable again.

Very interesting things for sure!

well that's all nice and dandy for soviet mirrors netput. allied mirrors have degenerated into who can mass the most PK's lol!

if your opponent starts spamming PK's, you must spam PK's back to match his PK numbers, or you will lose -> WOW UBER GAMEPLAY!

allies match soviet econ with moving MCV and not using a fast warfact build order, as you can't keep ur tier2 unless you keep your MCV stationary, so yah, you see tanks in mid-late game in allies vs soviets rather than the reverse.

empire was pretty fucked from the start, although they seem to do OK vs soviets.

soviets do pretty good all around the table.

I didnt play in the beta, but as a soviet players the most noticable change in the metagame is the soviet players mindset to counter vindicators. Alot of people had difficulty but with a few highly regarded soviet players sharing some key tips the storm died down. I think next for soviets we will see alot more useage from early terror drones with backed up with twinblades in soviet mirrors(Im biased though, because im trying to make this strat work)

Generally metagame develops as we learn what the MOST potent way of doing things is. as soon as a particular strat becomes easily countered the metagame must move on. It always interests me to see how metagame develops for RTS games and thats pretty much why in my experience its much easier, and its much more fun, to be involved with an RTS game from launch.

so true, many people don't but if your defending you can place turrets down that help immensely vs pk. It's more of an imbla/powerfull tactic if combined with javs.

i do believe that allies mirrors are evolving since the game has started. first it was all out air, then it was air to a rax, then rax to air.

sometimes you get double rax now on small maps like infi isle.

also at first people just builded vindi´s, then they went from 4 vindi to 2 vind+2 apollo. and now you often see 4 apollo.

so whats happening right now is that you get an infantry spam by both players, then you both build airfield and get 4 apollo out. then you fast tech to tier 3 to counter the defenses of theo ther player.

i geuss you can compare allies mirror to the soviets/USA in real life during the cold war. you both just build army´s but can´treally attack cause the other players defenses are to strong till your T3.

the best steamroller wins allies mirrors right now.

You can thank me for the mass apollo metagame developments ^^ myahaha, took a while for players to realize if they get vinds and their opponent gets apollos they are fucked lol.

This is complete shit. On any map, OTHER THAN Infinity Isle, 2 flank Engie/IFV's at the very start followed by PK Turret camp absolutely dominates inf spam. Even fast tech to tanks which you will have to micro properly (in groups) will smash PK spam. But this one's risky cuz if the Allies player goes airfield first you're screwed.

uh, not exactly vedz...it always depends, as you are right the PK turret dominates inf, but if your opponent takes down your 1-2 turrets with vinds then he has a really easy timing window to overrun your base if he was massing up PKs and you were not.

and uh, all allies players go airfield first -> so as you said, you are screwed...how is what I said complete bullshiot when you just verified it lol?

go back to ooe forums and pretend soviets are underpowered with trojan lol

Meh i knew this for a long time but was too stupid to go ref+ref b4 airfield

In your post above you say that Allies players go airfield first, making engie IFV and fast tech to tanks useless.

Well here's a quote from you saying that it's stupid to go airfield first, and that you should go 2 refs first.....

So Avilo....you keep going 2 refs first in Allies mirrors, as soon as someone Engie IFV's you, you'll see how stupid your arguements in this thread are. 2 Engie IFVs can be in your base before you even have 1 vindie in the air, by going 2 refs first.

Contradict yourself much?

i think it is pretty feasible to get a few pk to counter that if you go 2refs before airfield...

Only on infinity isle can you counter it with PK spam. All other maps have more than 1 land entrance. I mentioned this before, please read all posts before posting.