Let's talk about Irregulars

From the little testing I did, plain Irregulars aren't worth it. However, I have just the free commander that can only call in Irregulars and not Partisans, and only the LMG variants. Therefore, I won't be able to comment on those.

They seem to come with either a LMG42 + 3 Kar98 or with 2 DP-LMGs + 2 Mosin Nagants. In theory they could offer some very interesting variety but the LMG-squads need a little buffing. Currently, they are a bit like Grenadier-squads light, as in that they are simply worse in every aspect.

Inadequacies:
Squad count: 4 men (or women). I think they are designed to be the counter-part to Osttruppen (6-men squad in a faction of 4-men squads <-> 4-men squad in a faction of 6-men squads) and this is actually a good idea but this also makes them squishier than Conscripts.
Armor: 1 armor is the same as Conscripts have but Conscripts have a higher squad count. Now, I don't think buffing them to 1.5 would be sensible, after all they are just irregular troops.
30 MP reinforcement cost. While higher reinforcement costs promote the use of Merge, the other factors above combined with this make them uninteresting.
Their weapons: From what I can tell by looking at the stats, their versions of weapons (except the AT weapons) seem to be generally weaker than the original versions. This makes sense (scavenged weapons, limited ammo, worse maintained) but further decreases their usefulness. Of course their weapons don't cost munitions so they shouldn't be as good as the original LMG42/DP-LMG.

So to sum this up, their survivability, cost and squad DPS is too low.


How to fix this? I really don't know. To be honest, I think Soviets already have enough call-in infantry and call-in support weapons. Upgraded Guards Rifles for example come with 1.5 armor, 2 DP-LMGs and 2 Mosin Nagant (+2 AT rifles), have the same reinforcement cost and a higher squad count. For pure anti infantry duties there are Shock Troopers.
For LMG-Irregulars to be special instead of just weaker options to other units, they'd need a niche that they currently don't have and that I don't really see open anywhere.


As for the Partisans (remember I can't play them):
Spawning behind enemy lines is very interesting and gives them their own little niche, for sure.
However, handing them that amount of AT prowess (even if I haven't seen it ingame yet) sounds like a horrible idea. For Partisans, a form of (slow building) mine, detonation charge or IED would have been a more interesting option instead.
Burrying a primed AT grenade sounds a lot more like Partisan tactics to me than toting around several heavy AT rifles or Panzerschrecks. Partisans would probably have been lucky to have even one of those (and enough ammo for them) between several squads.

they are pw2 partisans as much as the inteligenge skill is a legal maphack. you totally missed the point.

back to the topic.

the russian lmg partisans come with the german upgraded rifles i think they hit very hard. they can shoot the lmgs standing, and the m3 idea seems nice. i wish i would know the propper stats from them.

p2w cause of maphack? what about g43 interrogation?

back at topic:

i think they still have their place in the soviet army (standing behind the conscripts for fire support or defending support weapons) yet imo they do need to be affected by rapid conscription. i also think they lvl up quite fast so they get decent vet boni early on

Spy-maphack is only 10 seconds or so, and even if the cooldown isnt very long it will still drain your muni to spam it, even at its low cost.

The partisans are very squishy. The things I have found them usefull for are:

ATpartisans:
* Kill unsupported light vehicles such as mortar halftracks, scoutars and supplytrucks.
* Get the finishing blow on a tank that tries to get away (if you are lucky enough to get schrecks. Also the squad is quite unresponsive the first seconds so you have to time it really well.
* Destroy fuel/muni caches

AI partisans
* Decap cutoffs and fuels
* Kill teamweapons

They do however, die like flies. Its even hard to retreat them since they usually get deployed behind the lines and a low health squad retreating will get shot at by a random squad at the front, killing it entirely. This means spamming them is a huge MP drain, not to mention all the heavy weapons they litter the maps with, and thats rarely something you want to give the oshteer player for free...

With no elite infantry, no lategame units, and no doctrinal artillery its hardly p2w.

I think the partisan commander is mostly fine except for:

1. It devalues already weak weapon teams even further.
2. You can spawn them in any building on map without line of sight so the only way to "control" them is to go through the long process of destroying every single building as germans (which really takes ages) or keeping all remote buildings occupied (also a really bad option). Either option effectively loses you the game already so maps with lots of buildings tend to be autoloss as you will be permacut.
3. On very building heavy maps like semois they're just way too mp efficient, because their supposed weakness (the lack of hp, armor and models) is covered by the large amount of buildings to camp in which lets them abuse their very high damage to manpower ratio.
4. They can build mines.

As for irregulars, they either really should work with rapid conscription or rapid conscription should be taken out and the commander given something more useful. They probably could use some other buff on top of that, but not really sure what kind of role Relic is imagining for them.

As for irregulars, they either really should work with rapid conscription or rapid conscription should be taken out and the commander given something more useful. They probably could use some other buff on top of that, but not really sure what kind of role Relic is imagining for them.

You can't really have a doctrine called 'soviet reserve army' without having rapid conscription in it.

You can't really have a doctrine called 'soviet reserve army' without having rapid conscription in it.

Cant work as long as Rapid Conscription brings in Cons, cos you could basically recycle and sacrifice low value units into higher value Cons. The resulting Con spam would be enormous, and extremely cheap.

As with Partisans, they are imo meant to be supportive of a significant Con force.

Cant work as long as Rapid Conscription brings in Cons, cos you could basically recycle and sacrifice low cost infiltrating units into higher value Cons.

The resulting Con spam would be enormous, and extremely cheap.

Except the doctrine does not have low cost infiltrating units...

In fact, no soviet doctrine at all has units that are of lower value than conscripts.

In fact, no soviet doctrine at all has units that are of lower value than conscripts.

Uhhh...

Regular partisans?

I edited o remove the infiltration part, since irregulars dont. Getting Cons in return is still too equitable, due to how versatile they are. Sort of like Ost getting Grens from Ostruppen deaths.

Uhhh...

Regular partisans?

160mp to call in. 20mp to reinforce. Identical cost/model as conscripts.

40 munitions to get the same health/model as conscripts (compensates for weapon upgrade).

I edited o remove the infiltration part, since irregulars dont. Getting Cons in return is still too equitable, due to how versatile they are. Sort of like Ost getting Grens from Ostruppen deaths.

Except irregulars are more expensive/model and have regular and AT nades, making them just as versatile as conscripts.

Cant work as long as Rapid Conscription brings in Cons, cos you could basically recycle and sacrifice low value units into higher value Cons. The resulting Con spam would be enormous, and extremely cheap.

As with Partisans, they are imo meant to be supportive of a significant Con force.

Conscripts 240 mp
Irregulars 250 mp

160mp to call in. 20mp to reinforce. Identical cost/model as conscripts.

40 munitions to get the same health/model as conscripts (compensates for weapon upgrade).

Yes, none of that except the 160mp part would matter for rapid conscription as it'll give conscript squads on squad deaths. Except apparently not all squad deaths count.

Yes, none of that except the 160mp part would matter for rapid conscription as it'll give conscript squads on squad deaths. Except apparently not all squad deaths count.

Plus of course, there is no doctrine that combines rapid conscription with partisans.

Let's wake this conversation a bit.

Today I tried out first time this commander that had these Irregulars. I think they are really fun unit. I like the idea that you can have powerful guns with them. I agree that they are actually only support unit to conscripts (maybe to have small flanks also). From green cover supporting e.g. conscript squad that is taking a point they work great.

However I also think they are a bit underpowered. I don't think there has been any changes to this unit since this thread was created? Still same HP's etc. are valid?

I would think a small buff would be nice, either a bit smaller cost or a bit more HP. Nothing too major though.

What do you guys think? I haven't tried these yet in online games, I think I will find out and then made my final opinion whether they are good or not.

imo irregulars are an advertisement for partisans

their usefulness in their doctrine and that of the doctrine itself is insignificant

Ive also just bought the commander to give it a try.

The units sounds mega mega squishy, but used sparingly they add such a cool tactical use, that they could turn several important engagements in your favour. Just dont over use them or you will bleed too much.

After calling them in to: destory a cache/complete a flank/destory a crippled vehicle etc, just retreat to base and use them behind main conscript force.

Probably work best with T4 so you have heavy AT, and the tank hunters can help protect against circle strafe, once you have a shrek squad.

And yeah, only use on good green cover maps with good buildings, similar to Ostruppen, so Semois etc.

The way Im thinking is have it selected with other good conscript doctrines, and only select it if a really good opportunity to deploy them arrises, so something like taking out an early FHT, or P4.. otherwise probably stick to a normal doctrine.

I think thats quite a mega ability to have available at the drop of a hat.

Ive also just bought the commander to give it a try.

The units sounds mega mega squishy, but used sparingly they add such a cool tactical use, that they could turn several important engagements in your favour. Just dont over use them or you will bleed too much.

After calling them in to: destory a cache/complete a flank/destory a crippled vehicle etc, just retreat to base and use them behind main conscript force.

Probably work best with T4 so you have heavy AT, and the tank hunters can help protect against circle strafe, once you have a shrek squad.

And yeah, only use on good green cover maps with good buildings, similar to Ostruppen, so Semois etc.

The way Im thinking is have it selected with other good conscript doctrines, and only select it if a really good opportunity to deploy them arrises, so something like taking out an early FHT, or P4.. otherwise probably stick to a normal doctrine.

I think thats quite a mega ability to have available at the drop of a hat.

Those are Partisans and yes, the doctrine is very nice. This thread however, is about Irregulars. Irregulars are available in the free Soviet Reserve Army commander.

I just played a game using the Irregulars. Sadly, my conclusion is that they are just a waste of a doctrine slot. The only benefit they have over conscripts are their grenades. This comes at the price of being: more expensive to call in (250mp vs 240mp), more expensive to reinforce (30mp vs 20mp), less survivable (4 man vs 6 man squads), no Oorah, no molotovs, no Merge, less DPS on the move (LMGs need to be stationary to fire), can drop weapons for the enemy, and finaly, they don't count for Rapid Conscription.

The Conscript support tactics commander is way better if you want to use rapid conscription, ppsh, and conscript repair. If you want howitzers and ppsh, go for guard rifle combined arms instead.

Oh sorry, yeah I agree, the Irregulars kinda feel like they have no real use and are probably to encourage sales of the Partisans commander.

As someone said, sticking them in an M3 could potentially be cool and useful as a long range M3 instead of a flamer one. If you get opportunity against squads with no faust, can race in for high DPS. No repair for the M3 though.

They are...adequate, but when the late game crunch hits and you need suicide infantry right this instant, I just build Cons. Most of the time I can arm them with PPSh's, which are actually pretty good at this point, and for 10 MU a pop I can upgrade a blob of cons for the same price as a Gren LMG. While Irregulars are actually fairly good at KILLING enemy infantry when used en masse, they drain so much MP it's rarely worth it (and using merge all the time is a massive micro hassle, let's be honest). Cons w. PPShs can also grab shrecks and dropped LMGs, with more models to parcel them out to, reducing the chance of a drop. I think of Irregulars (I haven't gotten an MG42 out of them in two weeks now) as Guards without the PTRS rifles, armor, or ability to tank damage from explosives (model count).