Precisely. This "Indirect fire" thing is being parroted around by the standing members of the Axis Anti Nerf Committee, when they really mean to say is howitzers. The 120mm mortar also does wonders.
But this only applies to Soviets and 1/6th of US commanders. By the time I have significant indirect fire (howitzers or powerful offmaps), I will also have tanks, call-ins, AT guns. I don't need help at this phase. I want to know what to do about the Schwerer in minute 8 of the game.
And even so, let's say people use howitzers, AT guns, offmaps etc - so now we have used ammo, manpower, teching, fuel, all to remove a structure from the battlefield. What about opportunity costs? While you are investing resources and time, I assume the OKW enemy is kind enough to have units of comparable manpower cost simply idle around and do nothing? When I build a T4 as Soviet, it does not present an inconvenience on the map and OKW doesn't have to allocate resources just to remove it or lose access to a portion of the map.
I will remind you that Sov tier buildings are more expensive, offer about the same in terms of unlocked units, but none of the advantages. Trying to pass a forward HQ, a fortification and a repair center as a weakness instead of an immense strength of the faction is asinine. Nothing prevents you from putting all your buildings at the base just as every other faction has to, and still have a more useful, cheaper base, with inbuilt repair and medic functions. Literally anything you do beyond that is a bonus, an OPTION, a glorious possibility that you have that no other faction has. If you choose to use this option, you enter the realm of risk/reward mechanic. Except the risk is relatively small, and the rewards immense. Worst case scenario - the building goes down. So? you lost roughly a Puma's worth of resources to occupy a significant portion of opponent's firepower for a prolonged period of time.
Now, I personally like the different flavours of each faction, and it's nice to have OKW differ in this aspect. But you can't really complain about forward positions being exposed to artillery. Yes, we know they are. It's because you choose to put them there even though you could have put them in the base and still be no worse than all other factions.
This entire argument is negated by the fact Relic buffed all 3 of the trucks to discourge players from placing them outside the HQ sector.
They aren't meant to be placed in the HQ sector, they shouldn't even have the option of being able to. The entire point of OKW is the truck/HQ system being unique, why the fuck do people want to turn OKW into Ostheer with a fuel penalty?
And USF has the best artillery call ins in the game, use them. Don't deliberately ignore the tools you are given then bitch when you feel like you have nothing. The 75 howitzer is bleh, but usable, the Priest works quite well and can be pop cap abused and negates the stuka bombing strike.
Christ on a cracker there is no "Anti nerf" committee, there is no axis conspiracy, there are counters in the game for OKW and the fact you don't use them is on you, not us.