Is it just me or are many German Vet1 abilities bad?

Hello,

I am just a casual player in CoH2 and I am not pretending to be any good, so maybe you will tell me that my observations are inaccurate and that some people actually think very differently. If that will be the case I am happy about advice.

What I observed is that several of the German abilities (I am not talking about Soviets because I don't play them much) which unlock on your units when you reach veterancy level 1 seem to be not really useful. There are also some good ones like the Blitzkrieg on Panzer IV etc. or the Stun shot on StuG III. But the following abilities don't seem on par:

Medkit: Grenadiers and Panzergrenadiers get a Medkit which costs like 20 or 30 munition. They cannot restore fallen comrades, so when your guys are wounded you probably have to retreat to reinforce anyway where your Medic Bunker is. I don't feel it is worth wasting so much munition for this.

Counter-Barrage: On first look this seems useful. It lets your artillery units shoot automatically on enemy artillery, so it lets me spend my attention somewhere else. However it is cumbersome to use because for some reason you cannot move units when they activate that. It also seems to have a huge cooldown when it uses the barrage with this ability, at least my Panzerwerfer needed a lot longer to recharge after a counter barrage than with a normal barrage, so it seemed counterproductive actually. I don't know if there is any bonus over a manual barrage, it didn't seem so... so overall it seems better to just target manually.

Incendiary Rounds: Sniper has this, it kills one squadmember of the enemy and stuns the rest. This is really expensive, the stun is really short so not very useful and the ability seems bugged. Often my sniper will just stand around aiming on the moving target forever but never shooting. This reminds me a lot of the High-Powered Shot ability of the Techmarine in Dawn of War 2 which is very similar in its function and has also the same bugged behaviour.

Infantry spotting ability (don't remember name): Scout Cars and Halftracks have this. The range doesn't seem to be very good and the problem is obviously that those cars don't really last a lot of time in general. The Soviet counterpart Overdrive seems a lot more useful in comparison and lets it actually survive easier, which seems ideal on such a vehicle.

Both soviets and germans have some strong and some weak vet1 abilities. Over all I don't agree with the title as you only posted the meh ones.

Medkits are situational, but can be useful from time to time. Sometimes squads get injured badly but don't lose members. For 25 ammo, you can keep them on the field without having to run back to base. They also work nicely in combination with a half-track. Personally, I would like to see the price of this ability dropped to 10 or 15 ammo as 25 ammo is only really worth it on gravely injured squads.

Infantry tracking on the light vehicles is great. It greatly increases sight range which allows your scout car to really do it's job: Scout.

Counter barrage is 'meh'. It's advantige is that your units will auto-fire on enemy barrage weapons even without knowing where they are. It's meh to decent on howitzers and panzerwerfers, but it's practically useless on mortars.

Target weakpoint is pure gold. It always penetrates and stuns the target long enough for another shot (except on the elephant due to long reload). I heard it's bugged at the moment though I have not experienced any issues myself.

Incendiary rounds brutal. You just need to make sure you activate it before the actual fight because it requires a reload.

The sniper fire can, as far as I know, kill more than one entity. It's expensive though and not a super good ability over all.

Blitzkrieg is excellent. There is little else to say about it.

Pretty much agree with Aero here; First Aid is definitely very useful, but can be expensive if used too often. I definitely wouldn't get rid of it, though, and I've used it a hell of a lot more than I've ever planted Trip Wire Flares.

I'm not sure about Counter Barrage as I am not 100% how it works. Does it still only apply within the unit's original ability radius? I remember a lot of people saying the ability should be improved, and to do that it should fire within a +50% radius. If that's not already the case now, then I think it should be. That would make it much more useful.

Target Weak Point is indeed bugged: 1) it doesn't work the way it used to (it targets where the unit was when you selected it, and not where it will be when you fire, i.e. it doesn't track); 2) StuGs, Elefants and Sturmpanzer IVs can still use it when their gun is damaged/destroyed.

Counter Barrage is literally the most useless ability in the game. With precision strike taking out your mortar in one hit, you pretty much won't ever get to activate it.

First aid is OK, if a little too expensive. It's very useful for AT guns and storming pgrens though.

The German sniper is just bugged too much ATM to really analyze the effectiveness of its vet ability. Plus, I also heard that certain Soviet infantry are immune to the stun effect, making it pretty useless if true.

Can someone explain to me how exactly the German infantry tracking works? AFAIK, the Soviet one is just a straight up LOS increase but does the German one work like armor detection except for infantry?

Agree with Aerohank on the "good" German abilities. And yes, stun is bugged.

But I did mention that Blitzkrieg and Target weak point are really good

I guess I will concede my point on the Medkit. At least you agree with me on Counterbarrage and the Sniper ability, so it is not just me

I agree that the medi-kit and scout car vet1 abilities are garbage. In about 500 games I used both abilities about 2 or 3 times each. The medi-kit usually isn´t that great - the ammunition is better spent on an early medi-bunker. A cost decrease for bandages would be appropriate.

Target weakpoint on the other hand is THE BEST vet ability in the game imo. It will turn the tides in almost any tank engagement. It´s the ability that makes vet1 StuGs effective.

I agree that the medi-kit and scout car vet1 abilities are garbage. In about 500 games I used both abilities about 2 or 3 times each. The medi-kit usually isn´t that great - the ammunition is better spent on an early medi-bunker. A cost decrease for bandages would be appropriate.

Target weakpoint on the other hand is THE BEST vet ability in the game imo. It will turn the tides in almost any tank engagement. It´s the ability that makes vet1 StuGs effective.

Except target weak point bugged this patch and doesn't track targets. It shoots the ground.

I was just in a 4v4 and I used counter Barrage on the artillery, and boy was it effective. Took down 4 mortars, 2 SU-76s, and a katuysha in like 5 mins, all hands free.

It can really be effective on the heavier artillery pieces. Problem is it's near useless on the mortar since all it can counter is the 82mm mortar and even that you can probably do better manually since the german mortar is better. Even the heavy mortar is hard to counter with it because they are usually a bit out of range. Maybe a range increase while the ability is in use would help it out.

Does counter barrage extend range? What about cooldown. Does it always fire or does it fire and cool down. The mortar version felt weak so I never actually used the Howitzer version.

Target weak point on the pak seems worthless.. Takes forever to load.

Does counter barrage extend range? What about cooldown. Does it always fire or does it fire and cool down. The mortar version felt weak so I never actually used the Howitzer version.

AFAIK Counter barrage doesnt extend range, If u turn counter barrage it stays in that state and waits, waits until enemy mortar will hit your units or mortar itself (thats usually to late tho ) It doesnt kill enemy mortar, does a couple volleys and stops and waits until enemy shoots again. To sum it up ... It's useless, doesnt finish enemy mortar, doesnt feel more accurate than normal barrage, mortar it self is more effective when not using counter barrage.

We did try this against soviet mortar:

Soviet mortar started to do barrage on my grens, ost mortar counter barrage it, does almost no damage, precision strike finish of ost mortar

Counter barrage on LeaF/Werfer is useful only against static targets, it can wipe your enemy katyusha if they dont resetup after each shot. But again its better to do this manually.

In my opinion to make it more usefull I would only increase range on counter barrage ability or maybe make it more accurate.

On other abilities:
Sniper vet1 - is great but its bugged against shocks, doesnt stop them;
Medpak - is also useful but imho to expensive;
Inc rounds on mg42 - it's a beast, wait for first burst to suppress then change the ammo, u dont need to turn it on before the fight. Watch how lazors cut flesh
Weak spot - overall its great, currently bugged - useless.
Infantry tracking - shows your enemy infantry on minimap, dirt cheap.