The German Sniper and the Pio

I'm having trouble ever justifying buying a sniper while playing as German.

Early game getting a sniper is such a huge hit to the German's already weak capping power, as the tier 0 conscripts and combat engineers run around everywhere and push your guys off. The M3 halftrack with a flamer in it also seems to take care of German snipers quite handily.

On a related note the German pioneers are absolutely useless in combat against both the engineers and conscripts... which means they seem to be very unreliable for early capping as well, assuming you don't snatch one of those god-mode granting buildings first. I feel like they should either get a slight combat buff, or maybe for the sake of asymmetry they should cost a bit less. I don't know... I don't tend to build a second pio early game because of their inability to hold anyone off. They also can't plant regular AI mines anymore.. which makes them seem even more useless to me early game.

Getting a sniper mid-late game also seems kind of dumb, since if you've had any decent unit preservation you're hurting on manpower because of the high upkeep costs, and so given you have the fuel, to forgo something like a Stug or a P4 or even a Panzergrenadier squad just seems like a waste.

I don't know, maybe I'm just bad, but does anyone have any thoughts on this?
When playing as the Germans do you build a sniper in the early game? Or at all?
Do you immediately build an extra pio and actually find it effective?

I dont field Ostheet Snipers at all.

I usually have a 2 Pio start build that I use elmost exclusively for constant construction of either wire, caches or mines. If they happen to be nearby, I use them as VERY limited fire support to my Grens. In a pinch, I send them out as backfield cappers. Later game they are dedicated to repair duty. If there is free dropped support weapon nearby, I use these to take it.

Pios, from my perspective, are nigh categorically combat inneffective.
I dont buy them flamers either. I find the munitions far better spent on Gren LMG or g34s.

I tend to maintain 2 Pios throughout the game, particularly as I invariably need to send one home to base to construct the essential medical bunker and all my tier buildings. Meanwhile the other cycles through the above mentioned prioritities onfield.

Im not going to comment or speculate on improvements to Pios in this post, as I feel my explanation of their current uses is adequate as a statement of my perspective of their uses except to say I do feel the MP40s are shit, and I sorely lack ability to build cover with them. I also feel they lack somekind of placed demo pack ability, roughly equivalent to Engie demopack.

PS: The AI minefield quad setting is retarded. Change it to an individual mine patch that can be shift-qued for individual plqcement of individual mine patches.

After one game where I gave it a go (going for the classic GGMS - like VVMS in COH1 instead of a T2 start) I found a little Niche for the sniper.

The idea is to use it exactly like the COH1 sniper in terms of the role it fulfills, except obviously not as aggressively as the COH1 sniper. You'll soon find that, against cons, you'll mostly win those battles quite neatly due to the extra sniper support.

If you keep your sniper screened, you should be able to rack up kills with it.

You have to kill 18 Cons/Support models to return economic equity.

Thats 3 whole squads.

I appreciate your sentiment that it can support onfield infantry action and tip the balance in favor of Grens etc, but frankly, this functio is just as well performed by a well placed Ridle Grenade or Mortar.

Sov units are simply so large, that on its own, Ost Sniper has a huge job cut out for him, whereas a Sov team targetting a 3-4 man unit is a SERIOUS threat to that units onfield presence.

Better off investing in another 1.5 Grens or a support unit, as far as infantry goes, far as costefficiency and onfield effect.

There is a commander that gives you the opportunity to mount a telescope on every tank. No kidding, you will pierce the fog of war with it.

Put a sniper next to a telescope elephant and they will marry and have kids.

Soviet T1 hard counters the axis sniper (clown car and the sniper) which means it's too risky to get it early game. So only get it in the mid game.

The most effective time to get it in 1v1's is if your opponent has gone T2, and has 1 or 2 elite infantry squads out as then you can target higher cost units.

I prefer a one pio start with 4 grens and an mg. This gives you plenty of capping power (remember that mg's are decent capping units now). The pio will be busy enough repairing, constructing buildings and placing down mines so that it's inferior firepower doesn't get shown up.

You have to kill 18 Cons/Support models to return economic equity.

Thats 3 whole squads.

I appreciate your sentiment that it can support onfield infantry action and tip the balance in favor of Grens etc, but frankly, this functio is just as well performed by a well placed Ridle Grenade or Mortar.

Tbh, I used to think that. Then I gave it a try and, what do you know? It's a great support weapon. Plus, at 18 kills, it gets vet 1 so yeah

It's like getting a Wehr sniper in COH1. Okay, you need far less kills, but it still adds up to about 13 rifle kills before Parity. All you just have to do is use it more conservatively.

And also, I've noticed the Wehr sniper doesn't miss retreating units often either in a game I played with them.

I used sometimes SSSSS in games 2v2+ and it was pwning everything