Enough is enough, fix the Brace

Story: I'm Allies player for years, and decided to try some Axis, because i'm bored of Allies factions at this moment. After about 30-40 games as OKW and Ostheer both i discovered next thing: Brace is cancerous, most annoying game mechanic in this game. I'm pretty serious.

There is no problem with fighting with one emplacement, but Bofors+Mortar emplacement is most cancerous thing i've ever seen in both COH games, especially in team games - UKF player build AA and mortar emplacements near fuel and VP (Rzhev, Rails and Metal, for example) -> this area is locked almost forever.

And if UKF uses that "repair all structures" ability then Sim City is basically invulnerable.

At first i tried to force UKF player to use Brace with artillery and AT guns then run to AA emplacement with infantry (first 10 minutes of game) to throw incendiary grenades and shot it with small arms and cannons, but here that actually happens:
1. Enemy MG's, AT guns and infantry do enough damage on your "assault team", some squads retreat due to 1-2 soldiers left in them;
2. Those troops that are lucky enough to reach braced AA emplacement throw 1-2 grenades and shoots it with their small arms ->structure recieve almost no damage -> AA unbrace -> AA gun simply wipes those squads or forces them to retreat;
3. UKF repair his sim city, then wait for tanks and steamrolls you afterwards.

Secondly, i tried to constantly damage it with Puma/Pak/Mortar/Lelg. And again:
1. Mortar emplacement do significant damage do stationary Puma and weapon crews.
2. Damage output of your units so low that engineers repair building faster than it damages.

At last, i tried at least to cut occupied fuel-VP sectors, but there is problem again - most 1vs1 and 2vs2 maps are small enough, so enemy have no difficulties to recapture critical sectors, and my units cant stay forever near enemy base to hold them.


Solutions:
1. Brace should cost ammo. About 30. This ability is too powerful to be free. Axis tank smoke costs 30 ammo (another annoying pudding in this game), and this is same "get out of jail free card" for Axis, why Brits one should cost nothing?
2. (optional) Brace should work only on connected sectors, allow more way to counter play sim city?
3. Braced structures should be vulnerable to some damage types.

Smoke n flank

playercard ....

Retreating squad doesn't cost anything, neither should brace.

If you struggle vs emplacements its either:

L2P issue.

Or

You play allies all the time and have no clue how to fight allied stuff, which is again, usual L2P issue of all one army heroes.

Solutions:
1. Brace should cost ammo. About 30. This ability is too powerful to be free. Axis tank smoke costs 30 ammo (another annoying pudding in this game), and this is same "get out of jail free card" for Axis, why Brits one should cost nothing?

Important difference: The tank won't be there when smoke disperses. Emplacement will be in exactly the same spot, taking bonus damage from exactly the same sources.

2. (optional) Brace should work only on connected sectors, allow more way to counter play sim city?

Emplacements are immobile units, they cost pop, they are displayed on the unit UI, this makes as much sense as disabling infantry nades because they are on wrong territory.

3. Braced structures should be vulnerable to some damage types.

The very point of brace is to NOT be vulnerable.
Wait 30 seconds, destroy the emplacement. This is the very essence of L2P.

Show Spoiler

flanking an emplacement which can shoot 360° LUL

solution 1 and 2 are reasonable, i would welcome it.

No.

-Brace costs ammo
Then the british would literally have no munitions.

-Connected sectors only
send a decoy kubel or a decoy group to hold the connecting point until it is at least de-captured, then send tanks in. ez.

-Vulnerable to some damage types
You failed to specify 'some'. Also then it would be useless since i'd just spam units that generate said damage type.

L2P, L2B

No.

-Brace costs ammo
Then the british would literally have no munitions.

L2P, L2B

+1
Nicely said.

IIRC, stukazufuss is dealing extra dammages against Brit structures.

Kozo.

Brace/emplacements are indeed cancerous, but its not op or anything and you have the tools deal with the emplacements. Just another example of bad design.

Brace/emplacements are indeed cancerous, but its not op or anything and you have the tools deal with the emplacements. Just another example of bad design.

Wait, you say it is bad design when something is not OP or anything and when it got a clear set of tools to counter it? That does not make sense.

Emplacements were bad in Coh1. Now they are pure cancer. It does not fit the game and it is incredibly annoying to defeat. The axis players have to mass forces only to see how that is countered by pressing a single button.

I don´t know why Relic didn´t learn from their mistakes in Coh1. A lot of people complained back then about camping Brits. Now they reintroduced emplacements in an even stronger version.

You know what people also complained about in Coh1? Vet that Wehrmacht could buy. Maybe we should introduce an entire faction for the Germans that does not gain vet but buys it. Makes as much sense as this emplacement-bullshit.

Wait, you say it is bad design when something is not OP or anything and when it got a clear set of tools to counter it? That does not make sense.

The fact that it is a pain in the ass to deal with, forces to start arty/camp wars, no fun included and is also very annoying for the brit to be constantly repairing them, being careful that his engineers dont blow up doing so.

If that is not bad design then i have no idea what is.

Wait, you say it is bad design when something is not OP or anything and when it got a clear set of tools to counter it? That does not make sense.

Technically, a concept that involves one-shotting any single thing in the game could be balanced. But players are still going to find their IS-2es and KT being literally one-shotted to just suck.

=> That's adding more parameters like the "one-shotting" to the state though.

Brace in a nutshell

brace has a cooldown. Once brace is off, every emplacement gets rekt very fast imo.(flames, mortar HT, leig, schreck blob) byeybe 400 MP mortar pit
Furthermore the stuka zu fuß deals with +50% bonus damage to emplacements.

Smoke and flank. Emplacements won't survive 3 minutes on the battlefield without it.

I think people are confusing 'flanking' with 'approaching out of LOS/LOF.'

The way to deal with Brace in team games (which is what was being described as particularly cancerous) is to have an OKW player dedicate themselves to liegs.

If a Brit is dedicating themselves to emplacements, an OKW has to spam liegs in response. Bofors and mortar pits alike have the indirect fire and range to counter mortar teams. Ostheer mortar halftrack, while useful is not cost efficient in the slightest, and cripples the Ostheer player through doctrine choice. It's biggest utility is actually being able to reposition once the counter barrages from the bofors and mortar pit begin.

You can't split your forces against british emplacements either. You have to concentrate your entire army on dealing with the emplacements. Yes, on most multiplayer maps this is impossible, or playing right into the allied teams hands, but that's unfortunately the reality of it.

Emplacements in general don't work for everyone the way CoH2 maps are designed, especially 2v2+. They dictate and constrain gameplay for every player which can have strong strategic implications.

force a brace, and then when the brace wears off, attack it with your preferred method wether it be flamers, leigs, offmap artillery, etc.

Brace is fine but stand fast ability is broken. The ability costs 60mun to repair all structures and works while braced. The repair rate is faster than the damage rate while braced. The ability should have to be applied to each structure individually and shouldn't work while brace is active.