Tips for play against soviet early

So could anyone give me some helpful tips on dealing with early soviets, I was unfortunate enough today to get matched against the same guy 3 times (thanks match making) he was a fair bit better than me, my main issue was his heavy usage of conscripts, I find them ridiculous to deal with as soon as I lose a fight to them I have serious issues retaking ground because of the free, fast building heavy cover they get which is really bloody frustrating.... Grenadiers also simply don't have the damage, until upgraded, to properly deal with with conscripts in cover, while conscripts are able to rush the grenadiers for some nasty damage. Of course an early mortar would help, but that means a very early mortar (after second gren squad) which puts me at a serious disadvantage if the enemy switched to more mobile tactics.

Any tips even unrelated to this problem would be greatly appreciated, Ostheer is easily my favorite faction, it's really frustrating having issues due to it being quite lackluster early, especially when they rely so much on munitions, I find soviets can walk circles around me and rig the map with mines while I'm torn between an essential med bunker or the essential MG42 upgrades.

I think you hit the nail on the head there- either you go for an early mortar/MG, or you give up even more map-control than you normally already have to give up, and hope you can bring it back. Personally, I often struggle getting the most out of an early mortar, so I usually go with a MG, but I like going 3 grens first (or double pio)* and getting early vet (from Elite Troops Doctrine) or LMG on one squad after the MG, then tech. It's late teching in comparison, but normally allows me at least a guaranteed foothold on one VP if not two, depending on the map.

Take this with a grain of salt, I don't have much experience against different players, it's just what has worked for me so far.


*I found that having 3 grens is the sweet-spot against conscript spam, because while it doesn't allow you to do much against them head on (especially if blobbed), it allows you to kite them around so that at least one squad is always firing on them, and you still have a third squad to step in, in case you need the back-up (which you really shouldn't, with your HMG) or have to retreat one of the original two squads (without losing what little ground you had). In comparison, having that fourth gren squad early seemed to not do much at all IME, it's just one more squad you have to retreat all the time ;p

May we have a replay?

What defines "heavy usuage" in this situation? Generally, you can expect to encounter 4 squads. 3 Grenadiers and a weapons team should be enough for you to stay on the field and at least be relevant until you can tech.

... I find them ridiculous to deal with as soon as I lose a fight to them I have serious issues retaking ground...

I suspect you might be asking to do too much with your grens. You really have to be tactically sure, pick your fights with a good %age chance of routing your opponent, which usually means isolating a squad on the opposite side of the map; otherwise, forcing him to engage at his cutoff with a well placed MG team can also be a great early game tactic, but that comes down to map veto's. Also bear in mind, if he's concentrating his forces, capping around him shouldn't be too too much of an issue, especially if you manage to route his engineer team

Regards.

3-4 Grens + one mg (adjust to map), keep them close together in the beginning, dont't spread out too much. Use Grens to scout, mg is backing up.
Main object in the beginning is to protect your cut-off and fuel, maybe one ammo.
Then t1 + halftrack to maintain map domination, cause you don't need to retreat.

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