Conscripts and Grenadiers

Grens should get the Rifle upgrade made available no matter what commander you are for 20 munitions and buff the damage on rifle grenade a lot, then reduce its min range. That should even things up a bit.

How does a smaller squad lower AOE damage? yes, total damage done is less but the impact is greater because it's a small squad. a bigger squad can soak up more damage.

I know, right? People seem to fail to understand that. Formation is what effects AOE damage, not squad size. And all infantry squads maintain the same formation so a 4 model small squad will suffer the full brunt of an AOE attack the same way a 6 man squad will. Except a larger squad can take more damage so ultimately AOE is less effective.

For those who are complaining about "oh this unit isn't in that doctrine, that unit isn't in that doctrine"

Learn to actually pick doctrines when you need it rather than when you get 1CP.

It's an elementary skill from VCOH

TY

I feel that a fast introduction is required for so extended post, this post was written after a quite long period of PvP matchmaking and in a course of a few days from various ranked match game experiences with both German and Soviet sides. As well as some research of basic unit statistics of the game. Post is so long because, for me, it is difficult to explain an issue witount having a couple of good examples or explicit data.

Ignoring all other issues about whitch I will write in other posts I will talk about these units only, as I feel a lot of game imbalance comes from these two units. Because they are the main units used of early to mid-game.

Balance issues starts with conscripts, without an adequate Command tree and researched upgrades conscripts are worthless and even with them they are quite ineffective for the resources invested in them. They need way too much investment compared to German counterparts.

So… from what I have seen, Relic has created the model of pseudo equality in most units, for example the core units of both factions, conscripts and Grenadiers:

• Cost the same, 240 MP per squad:

• Do almost same damage, squad vise:

• Have the same abilities, being one an infantry oriented (Molotov cocktail and rifle grenade) and an antitank oriented (RPG-43 and PanzerFaust):

• Same ability to fortify positions, Dirt bags and Bunkers:

There are a lot of differences between these units but in the essence they are the same thing. This differences create very interesting breakup between factions that makes the game very fun to play. The problem is the way that these differences are executed.

Both squads cost the same but squad size difference makes units appear to have different costs, doing the simple math, it costs 40 MP per man for conscripts and 60 MP for grenadiers. Knowing as well that it takes 50% less MP to reinforce a lost squad member than it costs to buy a new one, making it 20 MP for conscript and 30 MP for a grenadier to reinforce. But MP vise they cost exactly the same but conscripts do less damage squad vise. Meaning that to be balanced they either:

• Must be statistically equal in terms of overall health and damage, because they cost the same to field and reinforce the casualties but conscripts do less damage while Grenadiers have more armor. Here are some ingame unit statistics :

- Grenadiers: Near-DPS 3.4 (x4 = 13,6), Far-DPS 1.4 (x4 = 5,6), Armor 1.5
- Conscripts: Near DPS 2.0 (x6 = 12) Far-DPS 0.9 (x6 = 5,4) Armor 1

Even accepting the armor advantage of grenadiers, because they are “elite units”, DPS values should be equal because grenadiers already have an advantage, better armor value, for example statistics shuould be:

- Grenadiers: Near-DPS 3.4 (x4 = 13,6) Far-DPS 1.4 (x4 = 5,6),
- Conscripts: Near DPS 2.265 (x6 = 13,59) Far-DPS 0.933 (x6 = 5,6)

• Or conscripts must have their reinforcements cost decreased to compensate for the lack of effectiveness, and to support the fluff of conscripts being “cheep” units, lost in great numbers. Because now they are equal to grenadiers in their cost but still lost in greater numbers, because of great Statistic disparity.

-Taking in the account that conscripts do around 88% of the damage that grenadiers do, their cost should be decreased by 12% resulting in something like:

-Conscripts 210 MP to field (35 MP per unit), 17 MP to reinforce a lost squad member.

To this point we have basically established that core units of both armies are surprisingly equivalent. Having in mind this equality, even with the minor imbalance of cost/efficiency, bothering thing to notice is the absences of upgrades for conscripts, other than by command trees. What I am saying is that grenadiers can be upgraded with MG-43 LMG to bolster their damage and if the player chooses to do so even upgradable with camouflage and additional semiautomatic G-43 rifles.

Similarly, soviet players have the ability to give their conscripts “Hit the dirt” ability which is somewhat different to camouflage but can be considered direct equivalent as it makes the unit better in a certain way. Also just like grenadiers can be upgraded with G-43 to risen their efficiency by the use of the command tree, Conscripts can be upgraded with PPsh SMG’s. But what feels strange is after all this seemingly equal upgrade and abilities, conscripts lack a default weapon upgrade. It would be more than wise to continue this equality and make available for Conscripts an upgrade of x2 DP-28, just like LMG for Grenadiers, as for example, here are some statistics of ingame LMG’s:

• LMG-42 does Near DPS 10.9 Far DPS 6.7
• DP-28 does Near DPS 4.8 (x2 9.6) Far DPS 2.83 (x2 5.66)

As you can see two DP-28’s are almost equal to one LMG-42, funny fact that,combined they do 88% of the damage that LMG-42 does, exactly the same number that conscripts do when compared to Grenadiers. So hence the solutions would be the same, either:

• Increasing the damage of the DP-28 to:
- Near DPS 5.45 (x2 10.9)
- Far DPS 3.35 (x2 5.66)

• Or decreasing the cost by approximately 12% (Difference in damage LMG-42>DP-28)
to 50 Ammunition (from 60) for the upgrade.

Another thing that is quite strange to me is completely unbalanced way of getting the abilities of Conscripts and Grenadiers compared to each other. The problem is that soviets need to invest fuel and MP in researches to make it possible for their conscripts to use same abilities that Grenadiers can have for free. It is quite silly but Grenadiers start with the ability to use Panzerfaust, that cost 25 ammo to use (10 less than soviets), and it can be used right away with no prior upgrades necessary. In the other hand Soviets need to research the ability for 125 MP and 25 Fuel to allow this ability to be used and when done, it does approximately the same damage and costs 35 ammo, 10 more than panzerfaust.

Strange thing are the Molotov’s. Molotov’s can be researched for the same amount of resources (125MP and 25 fueld) than RPG-43. In this case I can understand why the additional cost was added, this is because Soviet army can have grenades right from the star of the game, while German side will have them for free but much later. This creates a good risk/reward situations for Soviet players as they are investing resources, effectively delaying their Tech advance, delaying their armor or artillery.

So Basically Molotov research makes sense, because it is cheaper to use (15 ammo)then rifle grenades (20), it can come much faster in the game and the fact that soviets start with 30 more fuel than Germans, it is obvious that the cost for resarch is quite balanced, taking these facts in the account.

But RPG-34 costing resources to research is totally stupid, makes no sense what so ever. They cost 10 more ammo than German counterpart (panzerfaust), do same damage or even less, and bring no advantage to conscripts if researched early in the game. In my opinion it would be vise to fix this problem either by:

• Making RPG-43 do much more damage to vehicles because of it high research cost and the actual high ability cost. At least make 2 grenades destroy the SdKfz 251 Halftrack. What is the point of having wasted practically the same amount of resources to only research (125 MP and 25 fuel) the RPG-43 grenade that it takes to build the Halftruck (120 MP 30 Fuel). As for if it takes additional 4-5 grenades that cost 35 (140-175 !) each to put the halftruck below 90% and that needing to put additional small arms fire to kill it. It makes no sense, none!.

• Make it cost less and have it cool down reduced at least by half, because of investment that soviets must put in the research and also because of the lack of infantry held Antitank weapons. This would fix big antitank problems that soviets have as well as being historically accurate.


• Or make them make the vehicle with damaged engine move much slower, as now it makes almost no difference in their movement speed, must be less than 20%. Damaged engine should slow the vehicle for 60% at least.

• Or make them throw 2 grenades at the same time.

The problem is not with Grenadiers having panzerfaust, because they need it for the possible M3 scout car rush, problem is that it is not remotely useful for the soviet army have these grenades researched because it is much vise to use that fuel for the molotovs or faster tanks or artillery than to have those overpriced useless grenades.

Your DPS values are incorrect.

Mosin Nagant rifle does 2.54 DPS at near and 0.86 DPS at far.
KAR 98K does 3.8 DPS at near and 1.36 DPS at far.

At near range, 0 - 10 units, a Conscript takes on average 31.53s to kill a Grenadier squad. Similarly, a Grenadier squad takes 31.58s. However, if you take the absolute values the time is nearly identical, rounding resulted in the minor discrepancy.

Hope this helps. Otherwise, great analysis from everyone.

That was a good analysis...

We can also analyze the units in a different way, other than just straight up comparisons. The synergy they perform in the battlefield with other units has to be taken into account, not when fighting in the very early game, but as the game progresses, the costs of these units can sort of be justified.

You missed two things that Conscripts have, that Grens don't. One is Oorah, and the other is merge. They aren't big enough to justify any cost changes by themselves, but they do help compliment their combined arms as the game progresses.

Oorah gives them tactical options, in the very early game, whoever gets the better positioning is probably going to win. Oorah can help you reach that building or cover first. They also give some added value to the AT Nades, as they can rush against enemy vehicles, something the germans can't do unless they use a specific doctrine, and spend about 8 times the munitions to achieve. Merge can be underused, I guess, but it does give you options if you don't have a halftrack and you need a weapons team to stay in battle, for instance.

This doesn't mean conscripts are better right off the bat, but it gives them an added benefit for what you are paying.

Germans, on the other hand, get very versatile options in their tiers.

The OP seems to be suggesting that Grens and Conscripts be made more similar by giving Conscripts LMG like upgrades etc. I for one truly enjoyed the diversity between Volks and Rifles in COH1 and would much prefer the two sides in COH2 be as asymmetrical as possible. It makes me sad to see that both core infantry deal the same damage at varying ranges, both have damage engine inducing sticky bombs and yes both gain veterancy in the exact same way. Both infantry also having almost identical DPS upgrades might be just a little too on the nose. Balance does not have to equate sameness. Sameness = bad. Diversity = good.