I have talked about that issue some time ago when we had the ranged unit dominated meta.
As I recently saw the video about the pathing “fix” devs implemented which makes the “patrol stacking” broken I think it’s time to talk about what in my opinion is the real issue.
For some reason units sometimes prefer to attack units that are otuside of their range, trying to pathfind towards them. This is less of an issue for (mobile) ranged units that aren’t engaged in melee combat. But much more so for melee units that then start to bump in each other.
IDK how implementable it is, but in my opinion there should be a comparably easy “fix” to that. And this is giving units that can be hit without moving a huge boost in the target selection or vice versa units that can’t be a very low multiplier (like .2 or something like this). Then the melee units would heavily prefer to hit targets they can range even if it’s not “optimal” from the target selection. But in many cases “not optimal” is way better than bumping around for minutes.
Edit: There might also be the issue that there are too often no targets in melee range, so if THAT is the main issue then it would be an idea to increase the melee range just slightly. Just listing an alternative reason as I can’t really tell what technically is the issue that leads to the problem.
I speak about that now because I think it’s due to change the patrol system because if let in it will completely mess up ladder and even tournaments. And this would almost necessarily lead to a new upcoming ranged unit meta IF e don’t do anything for melee units at the same time. The current balance is fine, maybe still generally slightly better for ranged units, but it’s the best we had for years. Because before the ranged unit dominance we had complete Knightmares if you remember, that wasn’t good either. And currently most stuff is viable to some degree, which is really nice. And I hope a patch that fixes the patrol stacking AND target selection at the same time could do work in fixing whilst all units stay viable.