the cure for cancer (aka emplacement)

You mean the Sexton...

If you can find me someone who has a good word to say about it I'd be impressed by your leet search skills!

The Sexton is the most deserving unit in game for a Buff.

The thing with emplacements is that everyone expects one single unit to effortlessly hardcounter them.

Pretty much this.


UKF has a serious gap in its roster and that is useful artillery. To compensate, UKF have emplacements which allow for a unique playstyle. This playstyle has weaknesses that can be exploited if you know how to play.

The playstyle only becomes problematic on some narrow team game maps. But these maps were never balanced to begin with.

you don't see the problem in forcing the ostheer to get two mortars? Artillery are suppose to be a hard counter to stationary defensive. bofor shouldn't be able to fight back. Both the flak truck and mg bunker completely lack the ability to fight back against artillery.
as well.

Can you see how ridiculous it would seem if a single ost mortar hard counters the Bofors which costs fuel (and specialisation tech) plus pop cap? Keep in mind the Bofors' suppressive barrage requires garrison bonus, and can only target one unit at a time with a long cooldown, and yes, it's unique indirect fire ability that no other unit has. If it's suppressing your mortars, why not move an AT gun or two and take it out quickly? Remember the Bofors direct fire range is shorter than the raketens for a reason; I've even seen Pumas take it out.

My point is the Bofors suppressive barrage is not the real problem; it's the other things such as standfast, or counterbarrage from advanced cancer regiment that rewards emplacement spam. An unsupported Bofors can be easily dealt with, but with support the pain-to-cost ratio really goes up.

By the way, unless a mortar pit is in range the UKF has not non-doctrinal indirect fire to take out flak bases and bunkers. So usually AT guns and armour are the way to go; similarly for Ostheer in this case it seems.

Make it so that the cooldown on brace starts after the emplacement is repaired to full health (the emplacement would start with brace). That way brace can't be spammed as easily and opens up more time for emplacements to be attacked without making the ability as well as the emplacements useless. Make the counter-barrage ability in the Advanced Emplacement Doctrine an activated munition costing ability (A long duration ability costing similar to a recon run with a moderate cooldown length) so that emplacements intended counters can actually have a window to do what they are supposed to do, yet provide the Brit player a BALANCED option if being hit by indirect spam. If Bofors performance and abilities are to stay the same, they'll need a substantial price increase (suggest 300MP and 50 FU). If Cromwell performance is to stay the same, it needs a slight increase in fuel cost. Brits problem solved.

Can you see how ridiculous it would seem if a single ost mortar hard counters the Bofors which costs fuel (and specialisation tech) plus pop cap? Keep in mind the Bofors' suppressive barrage requires garrison bonus, and can only target one unit at a time with a long cooldown, and yes, it's unique indirect fire ability that no other unit has. If it's suppressing your mortars, why not move an AT gun or two and take it out quickly? Remember the Bofors direct fire range is shorter than the raketens for a reason; I've even seen Pumas take it out.

My point is the Bofors suppressive barrage is not the real problem; it's the other things such as standfast, or counterbarrage from advanced cancer regiment that rewards emplacement spam. An unsupported Bofors can be easily dealt with, but with support the pain-to-cost ratio really goes up.

By the way, unless a mortar pit is in range the UKF has not non-doctrinal indirect fire to take out flak bases and bunkers. So usually AT guns and armour are the way to go; similarly for Ostheer in this case it seems.

soviet mortar will kill an okw flak truck given time, bofor and ostheer shouldn't be any different.

three isgs can actually defense themselves against infantry pretty well. the long range of the ISG's auto fire is pretty potent.

even without the suppression ability, isg + flak is a pretty formidable defense. The combo would be a lot weaker if isg's auto fire range get cut down to 80 meters, but that would probably require a cost decrease as well.

He didn't include flak truck in his calculation but he included Bofors. That's why I brought this up.

soviet mortar will kill an okw flak truck given time, bofor and ostheer shouldn't be any different.

Bofors has suppressing barrage ability if it's close to FHQ or a unit hoped inside for a second. It counters mortars. Also has brace which flak truck lacks. Flak truck also costs 120 fuel and you need it to buy units. Bofors is cheap, not a prerequisite for other units, and easily replaced.

Thats assuming you don't want to attack the enemy mortar with other units (mortar pit infantry tanks etc.)

soviet mortar will kill an okw flak truck given time, bofor and ostheer shouldn't be any different.

I don't think you understand what asymmetric faction design means. As I just mentioned UKF doesn't have a reliable non-doctrinal way of dealing with flak trucks with indirect fire either. Ost also has other ways of dealing with Bofors as I mentioned besides 1. mortar barrage it with HE 2. basically get mortar HT. Just because Soviet-OKW match up is thus, doesn't mean a single Ost mortar should sh1t on the Bofors; besides OKW can counter fire with stuka and leIG fire. If there is no mortar pit, or it's not in range, then the Bofors is royally screwed and people will give up on these emplacements completely. I think you're missing the bigger picture here by focusing on a single ability which isn't super OP, and there are, as mentioned, other ways of countering Bofors.

I've tried 2xleIGs on Bofors under constant stand fast with constant barrage. It doesn't kill it, and wastes my micro when they could be firing at infantry. Counter battery skill-shots all indirect fire with a click of a toggle button. There are other more salient 1-click no-micro abilities that you fail to consider and all I'm hearing from you is "boohoo my single mortar doesn't sh1t on the Bofors; bitch is shooting back at me."

As a britfanboy emplacements are dumb

In most situations they are nothing but useless MP sinks and in certain maps with emplacement repair they are OP (station, semoisky etc).

Remove the mortar pit and give brits an actual mortar team, make heavy mortar rounds from alpha unlockable with Hammer/Anvil that basically upgrades it to a 120mm esc unit and gives you some options to deal with pak/command tank turtling late game.

Keep the 17pdr and Bofors but remove brace, allow the 17pdr to shoot through buildings.

As a britfanboy emplacements are dumb

In most situations they are nothing but useless MP sinks and in certain maps with emplacement repair they are OP (station, semoisky etc).

Remove the mortar pit and give brits an actual mortar team, make heavy mortar rounds from alpha unlockable with Hammer/Anvil that basically upgrades it to a 120mm esc unit and gives you some options to deal with pak/command tank turtling late game.

Keep the 17pdr and Bofors but remove brace, allow the 17pdr to shoot through buildings.

+1

Emplacements from a purely design standpoint is AIDS gameplay. It is powerfully non-interactive and requires a boring linear counter. Whereas most matchups are full of back and forth, Brit design is campy stupidity.

Relic just doesn't get it. They have no lead game designer that cares about making the game fun or has a high level understanding of the game.

The problem with doing that; is it seriously cuts into the Defensive-theme of the faction. Unless it has something odd like double-rate of fire in Cover.

What would be better, is a mobile howitzer that ties into the Royal Artillery abilities since Royal Artillery is the worst doctrine in game. No replacing units or Emplacements.

allow trenches to accommodate them (if they don't already) allow trench to provide rof bonus and slightly higher than normal range (10%?)
trenches are much squishier than current form

As a britfanboy emplacements are dumb

In most situations they are nothing but useless MP sinks and in certain maps with emplacement repair they are OP (station, semoisky etc).

Remove the mortar pit and give brits an actual mortar team, make heavy mortar rounds from alpha unlockable with Hammer/Anvil that basically upgrades it to a 120mm esc unit and gives you some options to deal with pak/command tank turtling late game.

Keep the 17pdr and Bofors but remove brace, allow the 17pdr to shoot through buildings.

That'd just make them into a copy of Ost and remove asymmetrical design.

allow trenches to accommodate them (if they don't already) allow trench to provide rof bonus and slightly higher than normal range (10%?)
trenches are much squishier than current form

This'd be something. It wouldnt be as good as current design, but if Trenches are still only allowing UK units inside then it would be ok.

has that bofors suppression fire thingy actually existed?

I didn't look for a long time, but at least wikipedia says nothing about this particular Bofors being used as artillery. It probably was AA only. But we all know that CoH is not the most realistic war game out there.

Speaking strictly from 2v2, and playing about 10-15 games as ost in past 2 days, I will say there is absolutely no way you can ignore emplacement spam with commander. If you are screaming L2P or saying it opens up weaknesses you obviously havent played much against these commanders..

The counters to these commanders dont help, MHT is very vunerable and can die to just about anything besides small arms fire, its range to fire barrage always puts it in danger. Ost mortars are a joke against emplacements and just get killed immediately. You can build a HQ behind the mortars and they are constantly being heale, it takes very little micro to use these things. And while the Ost is sitting there trying to think of a way to dislodge, the Brit is suffering very little MP bleed and can get a tank out fairly quickly.

I am not saying lose emplacements all together, they are actually very balanced without the OP commander. The commander just needs to tone it down a bit, many times my teammates and I have tried all out offenses when trying to dislodge brit players, only to find another 2 mortar pits behind the bofors, and another bofor behind that bofors. If they are spaced out correctly, your in for a lot of hurt.

Really guys, don't be such blind fanboys and recognize a flaw in your faction, it will make the game much better for all sides.

I didn't look for a long time, but at least wikipedia says nothing about this particular Bofors being used as artillery. It probably was AA only. But we all know that CoH is not the most realistic war game out there.

They were defenitely used in an direct fire role against ground targets, not only AA. I haven't read anything about an indirect use, possibly except for the participation in the bombardment across the rhine.

They were defenitely used in an direct fire role against ground targets, not only AA. I haven't read anything about an indirect use, possibly except for the participation in the bombardment across the rhine.

Sure, direct fire itself is correct. But I think he was referring to the Bofors' artillery barrage that comes with its garrisson bonus.

Sure, direct fire itself is correct. But I think he was referring to the Bofors' artillery barrage that comes with its garrisson bonus.

Yeah he was, I was answering mostly to "it probably was AA only".

The indirect barrage is likely a fancy construct by Relic. Possibly used in that role in the assault at rhine, but from what I've read that could've been direct fire just as well.

I don't think you understand what asymmetric faction design means. As I just mentioned UKF doesn't have a reliable non-doctrinal way of dealing with flak trucks with indirect fire either. Ost also has other ways of dealing with Bofors as I mentioned besides 1. mortar barrage it with HE 2. basically get mortar HT. Just because Soviet-OKW match up is thus, doesn't mean a single Ost mortar should sh1t on the Bofors; besides OKW can counter fire with stuka and leIG fire. If there is no mortar pit, or it's not in range, then the Bofors is royally screwed and people will give up on these emplacements completely. I think you're missing the bigger picture here by focusing on a single ability which isn't super OP, and there are, as mentioned, other ways of countering Bofors.

That'd just make them into a copy of Ost and remove asymmetrical design.

stationary defensive is weak to artillery, that's how it is. If an enemy bunker down in an area, you either go around him or shell him into oblivion. Unfortunately, going around the enemy is not always an option, even in 2v2. Charging an fortified enemy defensive is suicidal, just ask any USF player in the pre-terminator days.

Even if OKW can counter advanced emplacement with LeIG and stuka, it still means the ost player is screwed without the right doctrine. The mortar ht is in a grand total of approximately two doctrines, festung support and spearhead.

The british does have a common artillery technically, the coordinated fire from the tommys and snipers. If british is going to be kept from possessing an mortar for the sake of asymmetrical balance, then at least buff the coordinated artillery. A faction with no form of artillery is going to be either a punching bag or a stonewall, and neither are that fun to play with or against. At least OKW knows to separate their emplacement and artillery.

and really, the british isn't the first faction to get emplacement in coh2. The axis had already got their flak truck and pak43 and make them sort of work.