Pioneers vs Rear Echelon

people try to dogde a bullet, as always.
- in all game mode, RE had to go with Rifleman or cap point mission. There are no way they can act alone like CE, Royal Eng, Pios. And that make thing go wrong:
- First, the force of RE- Rifleman at 1 minutes always underpower against the rest ( Volk-sturm, sturm-kubel, pios MG42, pios gren ). Why USF can't do a stupid stuff like rushing to Axis cut off like Axis can do everymatch ?.
- Second, The unity of RE is not worth 200 mp, poor performance in all state even having a power spike ( weapon rack,smoke nade, LMG, flamer, riflenade, 5 men vet 3). They still bleed like hell, no snare, no defendsive vet.
- And again, RE spam should be viable. Why nerfing them because " USF IS RIFLEMAN SPAM Faction" ?. We are no longer in 2016 era.Every single nerf for RE is invalid.

[Don't know if this is Balance or Gameplay section]

Why are rear echelon so weak in combat, yet cost 200 MP?

I don't think that RE's have been changed since Relic nerfed them into oblivion back when Relic was doing the balancing. They might have needed a bit of a nerf but even that was debatable. There was one high-level player that was doing RE spam. It was a bit overblown since he probably wasn't beating anyone that he wouldn't have beat anyway. I remember the price got nerfed from 160 to 200 which is crazy. I don't remember what else was changed.

Many people keep bringing up the weapon upgrades. I don't usually find it to be worth the munitions, especially the bazooka. Maybe it's because I usually play 3's or 4's where the bleed from trying to use a RE with bazooka(s) is way too much. If I go Infantry, putting a M1919 on them and either putting them in a house or behind tank traps can be useful.

RE can easily push away or even wipe Grens up close.

They are fine.

In late games, they can increase 1 man. I like this kind of async scaling.

Maybe give a slight buff to build fighting pos faster with vet.

Many people keep bringing up the weapon upgrades. I don't usually find it to be worth the munitions, especially the bazooka. Maybe it's because I usually play 3's or 4's where the bleed from trying to use a RE with bazooka(s) is way too much. If I go Infantry, putting a M1919 on them and either putting them in a house or behind tank traps can be useful.

Funnily enough, I'd almost always put zooks on my REs at some point and find them the most valuable weapon upgrade to get. Though as you said, their utility drops off quite hard once heavily armored tanks arrive and they start bleeding MP excessively, but I consider them supplemental AT against anything bigger than a P4 anyway. Still, REs with zooks are great to have as an additional layer of protection if your AT guns get caught out of position or against dives.

I've seen Tightrope using REs with M1919 in his FPV with quite some success, but I haven't tried it myself yet. Though considering Echelons get their offensive Vet a lot earlier than Riflemen, I guess this could be well worth it.

Funnily enough, I'd almost always put zooks on my REs at some point and find them the most valuable weapon upgrade to get. Though as you said, their utility drops off quite hard once heavily armored tanks arrive and they start bleeding MP excessively, but I consider them supplemental AT against anything bigger than a P4 anyway. Still, REs with zooks are great to have as an additional layer of protection if your AT guns get caught out of position or against dives.

I've seen Tightrope using REs with M1919 in his FPV with quite some success, but I haven't tried it myself yet. Though considering Echelons get their offensive Vet a lot earlier than Riflemen, I guess this could be well worth it.

There are different adjectives that can describre RE but great isn't part of the list. Better planting those cheap slowing mines than spending 100 munitions to cover your atgun. RE/zook are only ok vs light vehicle push.

I've seen Tightrope using REs with M1919 in his FPV with quite some success, but I haven't tried it myself yet. Though considering Echelons get their offensive Vet a lot earlier than Riflemen, I guess this could be well worth it.

I've looked at few TR's 1919 games and with confidence can say that RE and .30 cal is not an effective match. Maybe if they get to vet3, but otherwise, you'd rather give it to anyone but REs.

Yeah Rear Echelon carbine DPS is pretty bad. There's a lot of RNG with it though, unlike Pioneers which are quite consistent.

...
- And again, RE spam should be viable. Why nerfing them because " USF IS RIFLEMAN SPAM Faction" ?. We are no longer in 2016 era.Every single nerf for RE is invalid.

Is Pioneer spam viable?

people try to dogde a bullet, as always.
- And again, RE spam should be viable. Why nerfing them because " USF IS RIFLEMAN SPAM Faction" ?. We are no longer in 2016 era.Every single nerf for RE is invalid.

RE Spam should not be viable. Anyone spamming rear echelons needs to lose. If they do win, it's the opponents fault. You can go double spios, double pios, double CEs and 3x royal engies in case of Anvil... but REs should never be spammed. Unless they were turned into little Obers, you don't spam echelons, not now, not never.

Yeah Rear Echelon carbine DPS is pretty bad.

Why?
The DPS is about the same level as CE mosin long range and superior at close range and RE get a 20% unconditional accuracy bonus at vet 1 unlike most other units.

There's a lot of RNG with it though, unlike Pioneers which are quite consistent.

Why?
and pioneers will very little damage far consistently so in that case is not really a advantage.

There are different adjectives that can describre RE but great isn't part of the list. Better planting those cheap slowing mines than spending 100 munitions to cover your atgun. RE/zook are only ok vs light vehicle push.

Oh well, I wouldn't call vanilla REs great by any means, either. I'd still take a pair of bazookas over a bunch of light-AT mines though. I personally find those mines pretty underwhelming, to say the least, and haven't seen anyone make good use of them outside of memeing in ages. Plus, what unit would you give zooks to otherwise? Out of the stock line-up, only the Major would kind of make sense as anything else looses way too much combat value and will bleed you even harder than REs. Rangers and Paras are of course an obvious alternative due to getting access to the beefed up zook variant, but those will bleed MP even more when used offensively. Things may be different in team games where you can quite easily build up a critical mass that one-shots almost everything on tracks, but for 1v1 I'd rather not gimp the AI capabilities of my elite infantry with hand-held AT.

Why are rear echelon so weak in combat, yet cost 200 MP?

to make a long story short:

- rear echelons get better combat veterancy bonuses than their OST/SOV counterparts. They are 5 men with 0.77 target size at vet 3. This is especially strong when they pick up weapons from the racks.

- they have a suppressive fire ability from the get go which allows them to win a 1v1 against any squad in the game IF said squad is charging towards them.

Tested this option 3 times.





Rifles won like that 2 times, once won with only 2 models remaining and pixel health.


Now I'm quite well aware that this is against all recommendations, charging pios in cover. But in this situation, with green cover being extremely unreliable (well, a lot of 3v3 maps have such unreliable cover for 5 model squads), in a sense that it's impossible to position squad in green cover to trade with pios wihtout being suppressed by an MG42 behind pios, how is this well balanced. This is probably now a gameplay category thread seeing as how can USF win on such maps with echelon + 2 rifles in first couple of minutes against pio + gren + MG42, where one MG42 can lock down 2 whole sectors, meaning that if you have an inferior spawn, you are forced to shift or rely on your ally to win their lane to flank onto yours. Of course, pios DPS drops to 0 the further the enemy is, but rifles are also quite weaker than grens and volks, the further away they are, meaning the MG42 can just hammer away and bleed hp until one squads comes up and forces them away.


On this map, and a couple of other 3v3s, green cover is non existent in it's full extent (one model outside of cover or in yellow cover or not covered at all from most angles)... meaning that one MG42 behind those pios makes all assaults impossible. Flanking is non existent and once grens show up, all you can do is just abandon this side for the time being. Of course, that's not a balance problem, but an idiotic map design. Anyway, I digress.

I have confirmed as well that if you spend 20 munitions, which in that stage, the first minute... is A LOT... you will win against PIOS hard. They suppressed 4/5 times and won without a single model dropping. That one time was probably a RNG favour.
However, my point with these pictures is to show that, unlike other game modes, starting squads and starting firepower is extremely important in 3v3. On most such maps, USF strengths are nullified by the design.

Some maps allow you to put the whole squad behind green cover and just trade, while the 2nd squad is flanking or just capping other points, but for some reason, we never got a 3v3 map rework/pool and got stuck with maps that are just horribly designed.


Of course, aerafield is right, veterancy bonuses and 5 man with good target size at vet3 is all well and good... but on paper mostly. I've had plenty of REs that got to vet3 with double zooks, but it's still mostly a bleed-fest against explosives (still, 5 man proved to be a saving grace many times, where the squad survived with 1 model after a P4 or tiger hit).



To sum up, I do not think that Rear echelons are UP or OP, nor do I think that pioneers are UP or OP. I think that rear echelon could use a small rework, at the cost of the suppressive fire (which could be added to rangers perhaps to justify such a high 350/10 price with 0 utility). Whether it's a slight price/reinforce buff or maybe giving pioneers extra offensive power at veterancy, and reducing their SMG offensive power at vet0, so that they can't just charge and win (spios can do that against anyone but they are 300 MP).

I also do not think that any faction is OP or UP (Brits are a shi*stain of a faction, I do not consider them to be a valid faction, they do not exist). What I do think that people should be aware of such small details concerning map design so that future problems are mitigated (COH3). Where having a larger squad can be a weakness in certain maps because they simply don't fit (conscripts have massive sandbags).

Balance wise, I highly doubt there will be further patches, but concerning the map design, if any of the designers from COH2 will participate in designing community COH3 maps, they should be aware of the squad sizes/cover lengths. As grenediers are basically conscripts in COH3, they might have a problem of fitting behind cover, so one should pay attention to that so that grens don't end up useless on some maps.

...
To sum up, I do not think that Rear echelons are UP or OP, nor do I think that pioneers are UP or OP...

If that is the case I suggest you stop posting things like:

"Why are rear echelon so weak in combat, yet cost 200 MP?"
"why are rear echelon so amazingly bad at combat?"
"They have poor repair speed"
"They lose to each and every combat unit there it, from early to late."
"So why are rear echelon so damn sh***y and relatively expensive."
"seen one rear echelon flank a lone MG42, and the MG42 crew, the other 3 models actually, went toe to toe with vet0 echelons and actually bled them, almost winning the fight"
"realizing that rifle nade on echelons is as useful as is an SMG on a sniper against decent opponents."

because it pretty clear you are describing a unit that is UP and thus it seem you are contradicting yourself.

because it pretty clear you are describing a unit that is UP and thus it seem you are contradicting yourself.

it is clear


thank you for realizing that REs suck

it is clear


thank you for realizing that REs suck

Well RE do not suck according to top players.

Even op changed his mind:
"I do not think that Rear echelons are UP or OP,"

RE can easily push away or even wipe Grens up close.

They are fine.