Crawling Penal Satchel Charge Party Patrol

Agreed, all infantry should see a reduction in grenade range when suppressed. Maybe make it a flat 7 (or other number, plz suggest) so that a squad getting suppressed from close range (I.e just came around a shotblocker and got suppressed etc) can counter the mg but preventing those guys from long range crawling in and ruining your day? Reason I suggest a flat change is cause otherwise riflenades (esp from vet grens) would still be able to do it cause of their incredibly long range.

It's not appropriate for any unit to throw things while suppressed. Do you really think it's fair that infantry can negate infantry counters just by crawling up to something and throwing an explosive?

The OP out right states that it's bullshit for any unit to do it, except the issue is exacerbated with penals due to the power of the satchel charge.

It absolutely is appropriate for units to be able to throw while suppressed. Otherwise there are literally no ways to counter good MG42 play. Grenades are the counter to isolated MG's, and the reason they shouldn't operate alone.

MG-42 are not freaking 'infantry counters' at the same sodding price tag as a a basic infantry squad. They are Infantry. Support. Weapons. They support your army by slowing down and rendering units combat ineffective, with the ability to target several squads or a single high priority one.

If a unit crawls up through cover and you don't move your MG you are to blame because you played badly. Grenades dislodge MG's so other units can continue their push. That is how it is supposed to work and how it does work. The special case is the rifle grenade, because its range is so huge at vet 2 that the units in question very rarely have to take any fire (if get suppressed at all) to be able to punish an MG crew. But nothing's perfect.

As for 'the issue is exacerbated with penals'.... my god. Seriously? You let penals get to point sodding blank (their throw range is tiny), and then stood still so long they could throw the satchel, wait for the fuse to go down, and detonate, and still hand't moved? That is 100% a failing on the MG owner and nothing to do with a problem with suppression mechanics.


I've said it before and I've said it again. The state you are thinking of is called pinned. It exists. It stops nades being activated. It is 100% not appropriate for pinned to be the effect that MG's inflict on infantry in the first burst or two unless they're in red cover.

Have you ever tried not walking into the line of fire of a machine gun that fires 1200 rounds a second? Or maybe tried going around? or how about this: tried using something that can fire outside the range of an MG? Like those things with the long range scoped rifles? Or the tubes that fire explosives over terrain?

It is 100% bullshit for a gren squad to walk into the LOF of a maxim, and then just crawl up and 1 shot it with a rifle nade. It is 100% bullshit for a Rifle squad to crawl up and throw a grenade and 1 shot a MG42 squad.

You are acting like this bullshit is unique to 1 faction when it isn't.

As Commash suggested earlier a easy fix for this would be to take squads get pinned way faster, which means they will take less damage BUT they won't be able to just hang out in the LOF of an MG forever.

It absolutely is appropriate for units to be able to throw while suppressed. Otherwise there are literally no ways to counter good MG42 play. Grenades are the counter to isolated MG's, and the reason they shouldn't operate alone.

MG-42 are not freaking 'infantry counters' at the same sodding price tag as a a basic infantry squad. They are Infantry. Support. Weapons. They support your army by slowing down and rendering units combat ineffective, with the ability to target several squads or a single high priority one.

Underlined and bolded a point in your argument that completely contradicts your disagreement.

The point is that MGs of any kind are pretty incapable to keeping a single unit away from being able to deliver some kind of grenade. No MG can really hold off a frontal assault without a grenade that forces them to move. Most infantry can get into grenade throwing range before even being suppressed, let alone getting pinned.

In many ways this completely undercuts any merit to flanking maneuvers because it's usually more work and risk than reward than simply telling a squad to march forward and decrew an MG for some munitions.

You are acting like this bullshit is unique to 1 faction when it isn't.

As Commash suggested earlier a easy fix for this would be to take squads get pinned way faster, which means they will take less damage BUT they won't be able to just hang out in the LOF of an MG forever.

Not at all. It's just about three times as easy for Ost to do it compared to any other army. Because, as mentioned, the grenade range is enormous. Doubly so at vet 2. Grens don't even need to crawl. They can pop the ability before an MG really has any chance to suppress.

Pinning units faster isn't a requiement, it's a dream for players to have easy, lazy days with never having to actually micro their MG42 and just be able to sit back and watch them single handedly contain entire fronts full of infantry.

Other counters do exist, but they're slow, inaccurate, and generally not so much a counter as a way to force a unit to re-position. Mortars do not counter MG's, they harass them. Snipers do not counter MG's, they harass them (unless they come in bunches of two or three, at which point the game should be a joke.)

We have seen what happens when infantry squads are rendered incapable of forcing MG repositions. We saw what it was like in the beta, when oorah was free. It was god awful. Seriously awful, stagnant, boring play. It was what gave birth to maxim spam, because a 1v1 fight with a maxim vs. MG42 was, at the time, the only reliable way to push the sodding things off.

Underlined and bolded a point in your argument that completely contradicts your disagreement.

The point is that MGs of any kind are pretty incapable to keeping a single unit away from being able to deliver some kind of grenade. No MG can really hold off a frontal assault without a grenade that forces them to move. Most infantry can get into grenade throwing range before even being suppressed, let alone getting pinned.

In many ways this completely undercuts any merit to flanking maneuvers because it's usually more work and risk than reward than simply telling a squad to march forward and decrew an MG for some munitions.

Ugh, no, it doesn't.

MG's render one unit combat ineffective. They will not stop them using abilities. MG's are not meant to one man rambo style hold off frontal assaults at all.

You know who should be doing that? The rest of your infantry. The grenades, if they do get off, should be pretty sodding obvious. I don't get why so many axis players have this crippling obsession with only repositoning their MG once the suppressed squad has started the throw animation. It's probably too late by then. Once they hit the dirt and start crawling, if you can't levy enough firepower to force a retreat on them and they get close to nade range, just sodding pack up, move back a bit and set up again. Problem solved.

Smoke grenades would like a word with you. The issue is that it's way to easy to negate smart play with HMG's using basic infantry whose counter is supposed to be HMG's. And if you seriously think it takes THAT LONG to kill an MG42 with the Soviet mortar or Sniper you haven't been using either.

But this is getting away from the topic at hand which is:

It is already silly enough that HMG's are stupid easy to snipe because of the received accuracy, meaning often times you don't even need to use grenades to kill an MG. Just walk up to it and kill it.

Smoke grenades would like a word with you. The issue is that it's way to easy to negate smart play with HMG's using basic infantry whose counter is supposed to be HMG's. And if you seriously think it takes THAT LONG to kill an MG42 with the Soviet mortar or Sniper you haven't been using either.

The Mg42 can take on 3 squads on avg, its easy to hold a front and easy to move. The smoke range for the rifle men has a short range and by the time they fire it off they get suppressed. After this the USF player will try and move the rifle men close for a nade but by that time the mg has already moved and re-positioned itself making it impossible for USF to have the "Early game advantage" as everyone complains about.

Back to the topic at hand, I think its alright that they can throw it while suppressed, it has a long count down and makes them able to counter bunker spam early game.

Smoke grenades would like a word with you. The issue is that it's way to easy to negate smart play with HMG's using basic infantry whose counter is supposed to be HMG's. And if you seriously think it takes THAT LONG to kill an MG42 with the Soviet mortar or Sniper you haven't been using either.

But this is getting away from the topic at hand which is:

It is already silly enough that HMG's are stupid easy to snipe because of the received accuracy, meaning often times you don't even need to use grenades to kill an MG. Just walk up to it and kill it.

Oh my god 1000MP plus and some amount of MU can kill a fragile infantry support weapon that has no infantry to be supporting TRAVESTY.

Stop saying this like it's a problem.

MG's are not four/six man armies. (Especially not he maxim.)

An MG should and will be overwhelmed if it's all that's there. If suppressed infantry is focus firing it than all the time it spends taking shots and retreating all your infantry can beat up theirs. Suppression does not wear off for squads in combat either. It supported your infantry. It did its job. Its job is not to make all the dirty commies/yanks/krauts run home crying to mommy because it made loud noises at them when they tried to advance.

Smoke grenades are a way to be able to advance safely in any situation, they're not dedicated Mg counters. Again, smoke is obvious as feck, if you see smoke land in front of your MG and don't reposition you're a scrub.

Regardless, to correct your assertion: It's easy to force HMG's to have to be actually microed by the player controlling them. This is not a problem. Using an Mu ability to force an MG to have to move and set up again, buying yourself some down time with the MG fire to advance and find cover and generally fight the fight, is what MU abilities are supposed to be for. It's what they do.


Stop leaving your MG stationary come hell or high water, and you'll soon learn that grenades aren't all that bad. If you do lose an MG to one, it's your fault, and yours alone.

Unless it's a rifle nade, because the range on those. Pfff.

Good thing the thread isn't call for a nerf then.

Asking for a unit feature to be removed constitutes a nerf.


When Soviets lost the ability to stick snipers in scout cars, it was a nerf. Asking that penal battalions lose the ability to throw satchels when suppressed- never mind that that the low range should already be enough- you're asking for a nerf.

Don't touch my Penal!

Don't touch my Penal!

keep it in your pants then

keep it in your pants then

A master of the mixed message he is

Smoke grenades would like a word with you. The issue is that it's way to easy to negate smart play with HMG's using basic infantry

play against lemons double mg double gren opening and say its easy to counter, its really not.

The Mg42 can take on 3 squads on avg, its easy to hold a front and easy to move. The smoke range for the rifle men has a short range and by the time they fire it off they get suppressed. After this the USF player will try and move the rifle men close for a nade but by that time the mg has already moved and re-positioned itself making it impossible for USF to have the "Early game advantage" as everyone complains about.

Back to the topic at hand, I think its alright that they can throw it while suppressed, it has a long count down and makes them able to counter bunker spam early game.

I'm pretty sure they still throw when suppressed but not when pinned, and think that is okay. I've played Soviet in around 400 games, and destroyed maybe a dozen Schwerers. It's pretty much only when someone thinks that the Schwerer should be able to lock down a huge area by itself so they place it really aggressively and don't support it that I get one with satchels. Had they picked even a semi-decent location for their Schwerer, then it wouldn't get satchel charged.

As far as "smart" mg play goes, when I run into someone who actually is good with them, I have the same thing happen to me as you describe. It's really tedious and if you're having to use smoke from either a Shock or mortar, you'll probably find the smoke on cooldown and end up retreating, with only wasted munitions for your efforts.