USF Commander Tweaks Suggestions

From the suggestions proposed for Airborne Company, I decided to look at the unused commanders in the USF roster(I'll look at OKW in a separate thread) and give my suggestions to tweak them so they can be competitive to meta doctrines. Meta doctrines are also being looked at as well here. For the record I assume that all callins are now teched instead of CP based.

Airborne Company

1. Pathfinders should be reduced CP cost to 0. Stats are left unchanged except a reduction in reinforce cost. The reason why I don't want to buff them any further is that they'll just become better Grens with slightly higher RA.
2. AT gun & MG drops changed to Muni based. Too much MP is being used right now just to callin and recrew these weapons.
3. Paratroopers are unchanged. They're basically Rangers that sacrifice durability for DPS.(Their RA is 1 and is only reduced in Vet 3)
4. P47 needed to be on JU-87 level to justify their astronomical cost or give a steep discount for their current performance. Alternatively, a skill based AT rocket strafe can be made where 2 P47s launch 8 rockets each in a straight line for 160 Muni. No more fire and forget ability.

Armor Company

1. Reduce RA on Assault Engineers. Currently they have a RA of 1.0, that explains why they're so squishy. If it was left to me I'll reduce their RA to 0.91(same as Grens). Let me point out that Sturms have RA of 0.87. With this they can be called in as Combat units instead of just engineers with a flamer.
2. Elite Vehicle Crews need a total redesign. There are two ways I propose this, either give Vehicle Crews 5 vet levels to emphasise the "Armor" part of the doctrine with extra abilties like Crit repair while in vehicle OR give an upgrade to vehicle crews like Heavy Royal Engineers with a muni cost that increases their repair speed or something worthwhile. Honestly I prefer the 5 vet levels idea if its not buggy as hell.
3. M10 needs to be tech-tied if possible. I detest the idea of skipping tech as it doesn't reward the opponent for playing well or if the USF player screwed up. Another fix would be removing crushing from this unit. For tech, I allow M10 to be built if any 2 tiers are unlocked(with it being a callin for Lieu+Cap builds)
4. Bulldozer should have Brummbar stats to consider with having an extremely high fuel cost and the fact that Sherman HE exists. The other way would be increasing its health pool and decreasing its fuel cost to act as a meat shield.
5. No change on 240mm.

Calliope Tactical Support Company

1. No change on all abilties except the Calliope call-in.
2. Change the Calliope to be area denial, with more salvos but does less damage per rocket and reduce ROF to allow squads to escape from its barrage.
3. Make Calliope tech-tied to Major with same cost as current one for its performance.

Pershing Heavy Cavalry Company

1. No changes except the Pershing.
2. Make it cost 180 Fuel with same MP cost and unlocked at Major tier.

Mechanised Company

1. Only Recon ability is changed to Recon Run to be the same as the one in Tac Supp.

Recon Support Company

1. Change the Riflemen sight increase while in garrisons to be the same as in Miragefla's mod. Riflemen are given the choice to upgrade 3 men to M1 Scoped Garands, that increase sight range(not firing range) and inverts the Close/Mid/Far DPS of the normal M1 Garand. If being equipped with BARs, the BARs will replace the normal M1 Garands.
2. M8 Greyhound now tech-tied, but is still available as a Call-in only after one tier has been researched. This is so that players going Lieu or Cap still can access it instead tied only to a certain officer.
3. M8 Greyhound changed to have the same main gun stats as the Stuart. The armor upgrade is now bundled with the unit. Decrease the MP cost slightly if needed.
4. Recon Run change to be the same as one in Tac Supp.
5. Redesign of the entire Paradrop ability. Costs MP and Muni now. Now drops only one Support Paratroopers and one AT gun with the option to upgrade to any weapon upgrade, with a special twist. The Support Paras can also be upgraded to have 2 Panzershrecks, reminiscent of COH1.

Infantry Company

1. No changes.

Rifle Company

1. Fire Up ability penalty is completely removed. Either that or fix the bug where Riflemen still has the Exhaustion penality during retreating.

I don't see the problem for infantry and tanks to just walk straight through calliope's barrage then.

They'll just laugh it off as if it was rain.

Airborne Company

1. Pathfinders should be reduced CP cost to 0. Stats are left unchanged except a reduction in reinforce cost. The reason why I don't want to buff them any further is that they'll just become better Grens with slightly higher RA.

At 0 cps that maybe too strong in their current state due. I really do not like to a straight up better unit at the start of the game because it limits counter play. Grens vs cons is largely considered balance, or at least in the early game, because grens will win at range while Cons win at close range. I am experimenting around with a mod that does this with them.
-260 manpower
-.91 RA
-scoped garands slot weapons are added when vetted up. One at vet 2, and one at vet 3.
Grens would be stronger at long range, at mid range, it would be a toss up, and at close range the pathfinders would win. Making a bit more of a balanced start and they can play defensively seeing they still have cloaking.

Airborne Company

4. P47 needed to be on JU-87 level to justify their astronomical cost or give a steep discount for their current performance. Alternatively, a skill based AT rocket strafe can be made where 2 P47s launch 8 rockets each in a straight line for 160 Muni. No more fire and forget ability.

Peronally, I would like to see all Loiters changed in strafes. The JU-87 does need a nerf.

Armor Company

1. Reduce RA on Assault Engineers. Currently they have a RA of 1.0, that explains why they're so squishy. If it was left to me I'll reduce their RA to 0.91(same as Grens). Let me point out that Sturms have RA of 0.87. With this they can be called in as Combat units instead of just engineers with a flamer.

On this note, this is another reason why the starting unit should be volks instead of Sturmpios. A bit off topic.

Armor Company

2. Elite Vehicle Crews need a total redesign. There are two ways I propose this, either give Vehicle Crews 5 vet levels to emphasise the "Armor" part of the doctrine with extra abilties like Crit repair while in vehicle OR give an upgrade to vehicle crews like Heavy Royal Engineers with a muni cost that increases their repair speed or something worthwhile. Honestly I prefer the 5 vet levels idea if its not buggy as hell.

Maybe not Vehicle Crews but perhaps Major's Vehicle you can go up to vet 5. I do not know if it is possible if you can change the max level veterancy in game but you can make it new, alternate vehicles are built instead with five levels a veternacy. I might play around with this.

Armor Company
4. Bulldozer should have Brummbar stats to consider with having an extremely high fuel cost and the fact that Sherman HE exists. The other way would be increasing its health pool and decreasing its fuel cost to act as a meat shield.

Unlike the Easy 8 and M4C (yes there is a difference between the two) both the Bulldozer and 105mm are animators on the Sherman. Meaning you can have one or both be applied as an non doctrinal upgrade. In the mod I am making and improving, I made the bulldozer upgrade increases health and armor to act more of damage soak for a near by Jackson. Then I turned the Bulldozer Call in to an Easy Eight build-able.

Calliope Tactical Support Company

1. No change on all abilties except the Calliope call-in.
2. Change the Calliope to be area denial, with more salvos but does less damage per rocket and reduce ROF to allow squads to escape from its barrage.
3. Make Calliope tech-tied to Major with same cost as current one for its performance.

This could work if you add Suppression to the rockets.

Rifle Company

1. Fire Up ability penalty is completely removed. Either that or fix the bug where Riflemen still has the Exhaustion penality during retreating.

This similarly affect Tactical Assault with Paratroopers and Stormtroopers.



These are just my few suggestions for your suggestions.

My suggestion for the dozer would be to become an indirect fire support vehicle.

The are many way to achieve this:
One could turn it into a small KV-2
One could add barrage ability
One could turn it small Priest with a range of something like 80

Assault engineer could use a DPS nerf and MP cost nerf and be more like pioneers. They would probably need a bigger cooldown in Spawn and maybe start with ability on cooldown.

Alternatively they could become a promotion for R.E. after reaching certain vet level.

I don't see the problem for infantry and tanks to just walk straight through calliope's barrage then.

They'll just laugh it off as if it was rain.

It's supposed to be area denial, not a nuke like it is now. Plus with more salvos the damage would be the same but more over time instead. Infantry that insist on staying within the barrage area deserve to get wiped.

I am experimenting around with a mod that does this with them.
-260 manpower
-.91 RA
-scoped garands slot weapons are added when vetted up. One at vet 2, and one at vet 3.
Grens would be stronger at long range, at mid range, it would be a toss up, and at close range the pathfinders would win. Making a bit more of a balanced start and they can play defensively seeing they still have cloaking.

Unlike the Easy 8 and M4C (yes there is a difference between the two) both the Bulldozer and 105mm are animators on the Sherman. Meaning you can have one or both be applied as an non doctrinal upgrade. In the mod I am making and improving, I made the bulldozer upgrade increases health and armor to act more of damage soak for a near by Jackson. Then I turned the Bulldozer Call in to an Easy Eight build-able.

These are just my few suggestions for your suggestions.

Yeah those extra stuff you said also works as well, I agree with most of the stuff you said but I think maybe the Pathfinders could have their Scoped Springfields at Vet 1 & 2 respectively, as Vet 3 is a bit too late for them.

Plus the non-doctrinal Bulldozer upgrade could be MP & Fuel based instead of Muni, but the Easy 8 is maybe being a little too much because it makes Armor Company superior to Rifle Company. Maybe if possible to include the 76mm Sherman instead(with stat tweaks of course)? Doesn't mess with Easy 8 and there's a unused unit to use.

Yeah those extra stuff you said also works as well, I agree with most of the stuff you said but I think maybe the Pathfinders could have their Scoped Springfields at Vet 1 & 2 respectively, as Vet 3 is a bit too late for them.

Actually the amount of veterancy required, currently in the live game, for them is pretty much cut in half.
Pathfinder 340\680\1360
Riflemen 560\1120\2576

More like unit tweaks than commander.

I don't mind 0CP Pathfinders but they'd have to have slightly higher cost and/or recharge time. I'm fine with that, though I also recognize that they're not exactly best squads USF has to offer.

While I see the logic behind ATG/ HMG being munitions cost, I think that might swap one resource float for another. I also sort of think these two abilities aren't used often compared with things like off-map artillery or unit call-ins. it also means you can "double up" on unit production by going captain and training AT Gun, while also spending munitions for HMG; harder to pull that off if other options use the same resource.

I think Elite Crew Training should just give a XP gain modifier. Anything else seems like a cheat, and giving new XP levels after selecting Armour Company might not be technically feasible.
The line of thought I have here is that the ability should augment the Vehicle Crews capabilities, in this case gaining more XP means you are able to level up vehicles faster (and encourage using them instead of other infantry manning vehicles), and obtain Critical Repair ability earlier. This boosts the ability of using Vehicle Crews and vehicles in general without making you use them in a different manner, which Thompsons do as it requires you to use them like Rangers or Shock Troops.
The other problem with a 5 vet level, in the case of things like passive repair, is that it would make them very powerful if you manned something like a Panzer4 or a Tiger with a vet5 crew; you wouldn't need to worry too much about it's destroyed engine because the unit can do it for free on its own. At least critical repair required risking the unit to repair and costing munitions to remove something that would otherwise cripple a tank;s ability to run away or fight. A vet5 ability that skips all of this would be overpowered.

i'm a bit rusty on EFA details, but it think only Soviets and USF have doctrinal units tech-tied, and none are heavy tanks. Given the weaker characteristics of Calliope and Pershing, I'm not a huge fan of applying the same idea.

I'd rather have I&R Pathfinders utilize the ideas you suggested for Riflemen, it would make them stand out from just being 155mm arty pathfinders and make them more relevant to the game, it also doesn't turn Riflemen blobs into blobs with scouting capabilities.

If you are going to change the airborne team weapon call ins, reduce their mp cost instead of making them cost munitions. USF in general tends to be extremely short on munis. Reducing the cost by 100mp instead makes them competitive mp-wise with "real" built mgs/at guns while not using munitions that are needed elsewhere.