Early Game Riflemen Rant

Comparing DPS per entity when there is different number of entities is simply misleading.

Especially when in fight between grenadier and riflemen one grenadier entity is bound to be focused fired by two riflemen.

I think you don't get the point that the moment you lose a model on the approach, you are on the backfoot. How difficult is it to understand that when one model of rifles falls, Grens have better DPS until range 12 which by the way rifles lose their accuracy due to moving until that point ?

I think you don't get the point that the moment you lose a model on the approach, you are on the backfoot. How difficult is it to understand that when one model of rifles falls, Grens have better DPS until range 12 which by the way rifles lose their accuracy due to moving until that point ?

If you expect that riflemen should straight up walk to grenadier and beat them you are simply expecting too much.

What exactly should would the point be of even building grenadiers if enemy mainlines infatry could simply waltz to them take not casualties and straight up beat them?

Ok, but he's acting like you have to play absolutely perfectly to beat ostheer mainlines. It's definitely harder for USF against volks in the early game and during their STG spike, but against Grens? No way do you have to find the 'perfect engagement' to beat them, its exaggeration. Yes, rifleman get bled out at range but they murder them up close.

I agree. As an USF player, I know that if you manage to close in to grens or volks or pfussies, Rifles will dominate them hard, and I mean really hard... but there is a trick to closing in without losing models on most maps. Redball, one MG42 can lock down half a VP and fuel, and with pios dominating rear echelon, on such maps you really do have to be perfect in execution to avoid an MG42 while keeping tabs on grens. In 1v1 that's diffused due to the fact that there are no chokepoints on such maps, but teamgames... yeah. I mostly blame the retarded map design and especially retarded green cover placements on 3v3+ maps

You can always change the officer's build time, that what the modding did, nerfing it at max so USF had the later powerspike possible, not even being a powerspike anymore.

I don't get what you are saying in this one. Could you rephrase that please?

Do you know that Grens have better DPS than rifles until 12 range ? The moment you lose your extra model over grens, you insta lose the engagement. That is also not factoring in the moving accuracy penalty that the rifles will take.

You're comparing a single weapon, not squads.
In this specific fight, the DPS evens out at about 17-18 meters. Even if one model gets sniped but you manage to get to that distance, you have better win chances in a 1on1.

Especially when in fight between grenadier and riflemen one grenadier entity is bound to be focused fired by two riflemen.

The formations have been changed quite some patches ago to address the issue of model snipes. They happen way less frequently now for Grenadiers. Choice of target seems mostly to depend on the distance to the target. On open field, both formations have 2 men in front that will likely get the heat.
Grenadiers will more often stick to cover due to OST's defensive design which allows them to split the damage more equally across all models.

...

The formations have been changed quite some patches ago to address the issue of model snipes.

Yes and that was an improvement but not my point.

They happen way less frequently now for Grenadiers. Choice of target seems mostly to depend on the distance to the target. On open field, both formations have 2 men in front that will likely get the heat.
Grenadiers will more often stick to cover due to OST's defensive design which allows them to split the damage more equally across all models.

.
When 5 entities fire on 4 entities it is certain that at least 2 entities will be firing on a single entity.

If you expect that riflemen should straight up walk to grenadier and beat them you are simply expecting too much.

What exactly should would the point be of even building grenadiers if enemy mainlines infatry could simply waltz to them take not casualties and straight up beat them?

That was the whole point of giving OST strong support weapons? To support grenadiers and keep enemies off of them? We aren't forgrtting that the whole design philosophy of OST was strong support weapons and weaker infantry, right?

If you excel at close range, and lose at long, and most every engagement begins at long range, you're kind of at a disadvantage.

I agree. As an USF player, I know that if you manage to close in to grens or volks or pfussies, Rifles will dominate them hard, and I mean really hard... but there is a trick to closing in without losing models on most maps. Redball, one MG42 can lock down half a VP and fuel, and with pios dominating rear echelon, on such maps you really do have to be perfect in execution to avoid an MG42 while keeping tabs on grens. In 1v1 that's diffused due to the fact that there are no chokepoints on such maps, but teamgames... yeah. I mostly blame the retarded map design and especially retarded green cover placements on 3v3+ maps

You're right, the map pool probaby has a big influence on player perception of this as well.

When 5 entities fire on 4 entities it is certain that at least 2 entities will be firing on a single entity.

I did not object to that.
What I said was that, in a real game, you'll most likely get a 2/3 split of Riflemen firing on Grens and 2/2 split of Grens firing on Rifles in an open field battle. On top of that, cover will split the damage more equally, which will more often benefit defensive factions than offensive factions.

That was the whole point of giving OST strong support weapons? To support grenadiers and keep enemies off of them? We aren't forgrtting that the whole design philosophy of OST was strong support weapons and weaker infantry, right?

Exactly.

Only USF now have easier access to support weapons better.

If you excel at close range, and lose at long, and most every engagement begins at long range, you're kind of at a disadvantage.

Tell that to infatry facing shock troops.

But all that does not really have much do to do with Riflemen.

I don't get what you are saying in this one. Could you rephrase that please?

Modding team when they redesigned USF tiers set the lieutenant and Captaine build time to the maximum possible, to delay the HMG because at that time the .05 was effectively good. Then they nerfed the .50 but never really buffed the LT timing, they did it long after, one or two patch ago and nothing really significant.
They also made them be called from outside of the map to delay even more their presence. Note that if you rebuild them they pop in the base.

Today all of this doesn't make sense anymore, Lieutenant and captain timing are way too long for two units you must get to complete your BO, because of this excessive timing USF is outnumbered before them come and when they hit the field they don't bring any powerspike.

Modding team when they redesigned USF tiers set the lieutenant and Captaine build time to the maximum possible, to delay the HMG because at that time the .05 was effectively good. Then they nerfed the .50 but never really buffed the LT timing, they did it long after, one or two patch ago and nothing really significant.
They also made them be called from outside of the map to delay even more their presence. Note that if you rebuild them they pop in the base.

Today all of this doesn't make sense anymore, Lieutenant and captain timing are way too long for two units you must get to complete your BO, because of this excessive timing USF is outnumbered before them come and when they hit the field they don't bring any powerspike.

Build time was increased because the price for requisitioning Cpt/Ltn got 20 fuel cheaper, meaning they come out almost one minute earlier assuming a fuel bottleneck, which translates to 40-60 seconds in the game. USF can float a bit of fuel at this time with a standard 3x Rifle build, still this doesn't delay you for a full minute.
I don't know the exact build times before that patch, but by gut feeling anything that delays the officers for 30-40 seconds is probably sensible.

With the .50cal you mean the sprint removal and slight suppression nerf back in 2018?
The suppression change is a token change, the weapon suppresses super quickly anyway. Sprint removal is indeed a nerf, but a good one. A flanked MG should be properly countered at that point, it should not be able to just run away from the danger.

Decent points, though in poorly written form.

• USF faction on its core is very decent, however suffers from two very serious problems: shitty teching and bad map selection.
  
• It's a retarded design to add a "get me lose the other one" teching mentality primarily because it makes the faction de facto limited and unflexible. UKF suffers the most from it, and OKW suffers the least (primarily because they got T0 ATG). USF is somewhat stuck in an idiotic limbo, and can only produce riflemen or cuckfinders to be competent.
  
• The reason riflemen seem to suck so much is not because of their design but rather from the overally bad map pool competitive games for all modes have. Riflemen are designed to hard-dominate medium-close rifle maneuvering, and most maps either decide the game from very far to very close. Sight blockers, trees, buildings etc give close range units like Sturmpios to dictate the course of every battle. Not to mention especially OKW Kubel can be a mini-sniper and bleed USF hard due to them not having early snaring (or embedded into teching, like OKW has for instance) and need to pay for it. Don't even get me started on OST sniper vs USF.
  
• And after all, it's ok to lose the early game, after all USF is a midgame dominating faction. The thing here is that they do not have all the tools available to cover their early game losses. AAHT is an insane risk for above normie players, simply because it's paper armor that needs some weird positioning to start firing. And good luck finding a non-doc way of having both MG and ATG in the same game without backteching. As such, stupid commanders like Airborne are a must to play.
  

TLDR: Riflemen are a sympton of a generally declining faction.

USF is short on MP in the beginning. In any normal build (3 Rifles into officer, but I think it is the same for 2 Rifles into officer), you will hit the 35 fuel for tech up way before you'd tech up anyway. The only way to make the teching up faster would be to reduce MP cost, but this would also mean that USF had a very cheap backup officer squad for the late game.

What I would have liked to see on USF is to make the officers into actual support units. The Lieutenant is almost a copy of a Riflemen squad, while the Captain has some quite limited utility. The major is good, especially after the sight buff, but with 3 models he can be easily forced to retreat. But the first two need something different. They could even get a single M1919 upgrade in my opinion to add more long range firepower for USF.

I have played almost every single RTS game starting with the original Command and Conquer. One of the things that Company of Heroes 1/2 does well compared to other RTS games is that you become emotionally invested in your Units due to the Veterancy system. In Starcraft if I lost a Protoss Zealot, Zergling or whatever unit it didn't really matter as it was just resources that I could easily replace.

I bring this up because the officers being "free" as part of your tech basically make these units the same as that Starcraft Zealot or Zergling. I don't really care if they die since they were free and they gain Vet much faster than Riflemen so losing them doesn't have that same emotional impact as it does when losing a Vet Rifle Squad does.


This is one of the things about USF that I dislike the most and would like to see changed. I agree with you that LT/Captain should be made into support units. They should be vital to USF and not just a Rifleman clone without a soul that you do not care about.


Losing "free" Officer Squads and having to pay for them would be a fair trade if it meant USF had easier access to HMG/AT Gun and making the LT/Captain have some useful abilities built in since you would be paying for them instead of getting them free.

While probably not broken, what would you replace the two commander slots with?

Assuming No New Abilities (Even though it would be easy to make new abilities)

Infantry Company
The M191A6 LMG Replaced with Advanced Infantry Equipment
(which gives Riflemen Flares and Rear Echelon Flamethrowers) Thematically it would work



Tactical Support Company
The M191A6 LMG Replaced with Rifleman Field Defenses
Same as above from a Thematic point it would make sense if you could drop mines/make sandbags as part of the "Support" or "Tactical" theme going on with the commander.

Both of these would fit these commanders well without changing too much.

I have played almost every single RTS game starting with the original Command and Conquer. One of the things that Company of Heroes 1/2 does well compared to other RTS games is that you become emotionally invested in your Units due to the Veterancy system. In Starcraft if I lost a Protoss Zealot, Zergling or whatever unit it didn't really matter as it was just resources that I could easily replace.

I bring this up because the officers being "free" as part of your tech basically make these units the same as that Starcraft Zealot or Zergling. I don't really care if they die since they were free and they gain Vet much faster than Riflemen so losing them doesn't have that same emotional impact as it does when losing a Vet Rifle Squad does.


This is one of the things about USF that I dislike the most and would like to see changed. I agree with you that LT/Captain should be made into support units. They should be vital to USF and not just a Rifleman clone without a soul that you do not care about.


Losing "free" Officer Squads and having to pay for them would be a fair trade if it meant USF had easier access to HMG/AT Gun and making the LT/Captain have some useful abilities built in since you would be paying for them instead of getting them free.





Assuming No New Abilities (Even though it would be easy to make new abilities)

Infantry Company
The M191A6 LMG Replaced with Advanced Infantry Equipment
(which gives Riflemen Flares and Rear Echelon Flamethrowers) Thematically it would work



Tactical Support Company
The M191A6 LMG Replaced with Rifleman Field Defenses
Same as above from a Thematic point it would make sense if you could drop mines/make sandbags as part of the "Support" or "Tactical" theme going on with the commander.

Both of these would fit these commanders well without changing too much.

Incredibly based. RET flamethrowers are a blessing upon the faction.

EDIT: I would also like to add that LMGs unlocking with major is a great idea not only because it gives USF some nice late game power, but also because also it's a risk/reward, being that in order to outfit vetted riflemen with LMGs, you'll have to hold off on giving them double BARs.

However, one unforeseen consequence of this might be RETs synergy with M1919s and Volley Fire. Oft unused, in my opinion it's only overlooked because it's restricted to two less than meta commanders. With good micro and positioning RETs can 1v1 any unit. Being introduced into stock might make it a combo that should be "looked", to borrow another's words.

Incredibly based. RET flamethrowers are a blessing upon the faction.

EDIT: I would also like to add that LMGs unlocking with major is a great idea not only because it gives USF some nice late game power, it also is a risk/reward, being that in order to outfit vetted riflemen with LMGs, you'll have to hold off on giving them double BARs.

However, one unforeseen consequence of this might be RETs synergy with M1919s and Volley Fire. Oft unused, in my opinion it's only overlooked because it's restricted to two less than meta commanders. With good micro and positioning RETs can 1v1 any unit. Being introduced into stock might make it a combo that should be "looked", to borrow another's words.

You'd open with rear echelons, give them BARs, and wait for the major to give them M1919s? I mean, in theory, sure. But I doubt any USF player would survive playing with REs for 15 minutes to have the later game M1919 volley fire.

M1919 unlocking after the Major is not a bad idea overall. I highly doubt there would be balance issues. But alas, unless a miracle happens, there won't be further updates.

You'd open with rear echelons, give them BARs, and wait for the major to give them M1919s? I mean, in theory, sure. But I doubt any USF player would survive playing with REs for 15 minutes to have the later game M1919 volley fire.

M1919 unlocking after the Major is not a bad idea overall. I highly doubt there would be balance issues. But alas, unless a miracle happens, there won't be further updates.

No, no. Just play with Riflemen as normal. Maybe give RE just one zook until major, then give them the lmg. Use them to support/defend on flanks perhaps, once they aren't needed to fend off LVs any more. With an M1919 they can stop any unit from closing the distance with Volley Fire.

Not some kind of mainline infantry replacement, but a true support/ defense unit.

I bring this up because the officers being "free" as part of your tech basically make these units the same as that Starcraft Zealot or Zergling. I don't really care if they die since they were free and they gain Vet much faster than Riflemen so losing them doesn't have that same emotional impact as it does when losing a Vet Rifle Squad does.

This is one of the things about USF that I dislike the most and would like to see changed. I agree with you that LT/Captain should be made into support units. They should be vital to USF and not just a Rifleman clone without a soul that you do not care about.

Losing "free" Officer Squads and having to pay for them would be a fair trade if it meant USF had easier access to HMG/AT Gun and making the LT/Captain have some useful abilities built in since you would be paying for them instead of getting them free.

I personally don't have the feeling that officers being "free" contributes to having no connection to them, because I do not see them as free. I pay for them as part of the tech up. They are basically the next mainline infantry that I would buy, they just happen to come with an odd mechanic due to USF teching.
If they were not free and teching costs the same, USF would need some serious remodelling of their MP spending. The problem is that they are not "officers", they don't lead your troops into battle or command something. The Captain's "On Me" is the only thing that goes into that direction.

But back to topic:
Riflemen by themselves are okay, they are just stuck in a faction that has no strong options to inflict MP bleed, especially in the late game. No sniper early/mid, no long range infantry, only the scott as arty.
In 1v1, they can still sometimes single out enemy squads and go 1on1 on them where they perform very well. But the larger the mode, the more enemy squads will shoot on you when you close in. That's what most close range infantry suffers from in these modes.

But back to topic:
Riflemen by themselves are okay, they are just stuck in a faction that has no strong options to inflict MP bleed,

The modding team made sure of it through all the nerf and changes they brought to the faction in order to make it as they like it, like we would have had another patch they would have nerfed the scott and reach their objective of making USF a dead faction.

Rifles SUCK!!!
Rifles are only good at vet 3 but then you have to fight Vet LMG Obers!
Why is this talking though because it will always be this way.

I have played almost every single RTS game starting with the original Command and Conquer. One of the things that Company of Heroes 1/2 does well compared to other RTS games is that you become emotionally invested in your Units due to the Veterancy system. In Starcraft if I lost a Protoss Zealot, Zergling or whatever unit it didn't really matter as it was just resources that I could easily replace.

I bring this up because the officers being "free" as part of your tech basically make these units the same as that Starcraft Zealot or Zergling. I don't really care if they die since they were free and they gain Vet much faster than Riflemen so losing them doesn't have that same emotional impact as it does when losing a Vet Rifle Squad does.


This is one of the things about USF that I dislike the most and would like to see changed. I agree with you that LT/Captain should be made into support units. They should be vital to USF and not just a Rifleman clone without a soul that you do not care about.


Losing "free" Officer Squads and having to pay for them would be a fair trade if it meant USF had easier access to HMG/AT Gun and making the LT/Captain have some useful abilities built in since you would be paying for them instead of getting them free.





Assuming No New Abilities (Even though it would be easy to make new abilities)

Infantry Company
The M191A6 LMG Replaced with Advanced Infantry Equipment
(which gives Riflemen Flares and Rear Echelon Flamethrowers) Thematically it would work



Tactical Support Company
The M191A6 LMG Replaced with Rifleman Field Defenses
Same as above from a Thematic point it would make sense if you could drop mines/make sandbags as part of the "Support" or "Tactical" theme going on with the commander.

Both of these would fit these commanders well without changing too much.

give this man COH2 nobel