Up-to-date unit guides for CoH1?

I've been trying to pick up CoH1.

However, one thing that's vexxing me is that it is extremely difficult to predict how unit X performs against unit Y, until I've tried that combination.

For instance; are Rangers any good at all? If so against which units, and when (if ever) do you upgrade thompsons?

Which units deal damage most reliably vs 251 half-track and the Puma?

If I want to avoid using snipers, which weapons do I use vs Vet2 Grenadiers? Is this the same for Vet2 Volks?

Which units are bazookas good against; are they better than recoilless rifles at anything?

If somebody has a link to something that describes the target-tables in play here, I would appreciate it.

Thanks.

I've been trying to pick up CoH1.

However, one thing that's vexxing me is that it is extremely difficult to predict how unit X performs against unit Y, until I've tried that combination.

For instance; are Rangers any good at all? If so against which units, and when (if ever) do you upgrade thompsons?

Which units deal damage most reliably vs 251 half-track and the Puma?

If I want to avoid using snipers, which weapons do I use vs Vet2 Grenadiers? Is this the same for Vet2 Volks?

Which units are bazookas good against; are they better than recoilless rifles at anything?

If somebody has a link to something that describes the target-tables in play here, I would appreciate it.

Thanks.

I'm not an expert on coh1 but I've also been playing it more recently. I can try to answer some of your questions based on my own experience.

Rangers are good against rifle infantry and team weapons (ofc) but will only trade with mp40 volks. They're also pretty good against pgrens as long as there aren't a ton of stgs. Remember that their bazookas will sometimes rng snipe inf models too.

Probably airborne, greyhounds, and tanks. Greyhound has a long ass reload time though.

IIRC when grenadiers get vet2 they get changed to the "elite" infantry type and take more damage from flamers, so flamer engis behind a rifle squad will usually beat a single grenadier squad. I guess you could make a croc lategame too. I think "elite" infantry also take more suppression, so mgs, bars if you have the muni, or a couple of shermans with .50 cals (bc everything suppresses if there's enough bullets) will do the trick too. Volks get different bonuses and are not changed to "elite" I think.

Bazookas are IMO generally inferior to recoilless rifles (but rangers are better against infantry). This is because zooks have lower accuracy and pen, meaning flanking at close range is going to be your best bet. I think they do more damage tho, and still perform against tanks. I sort of think of them like smgs but for tanks if that makes any sense.

I don't think it has like a spreadsheet with target tables but there's a lot of good information here (I linked the article on volksgrenadiers for no particular reason): http://companyofheroes.wikia.com/wiki/Volksgrenadier_Squad

There's also another site called cohreplays or something that has some guides and stuff.

Rangers are great against mgs. With thompsons and fire up ability used, they can run through the cone of fire without getting supressed and kill mg really quickly. Thanks to bazookas, the same applies to bunkers. When using rangers, you have to be really careful of pumas, since they have insane target table bonus against rangers.

As for general info, the site linked by LoopDoop is amazing and I can definitely recommend it. This site was my first entrance to non-casual coh.

Regarding rangers, I notice that they tend to "dance" a whole lot more compared to other infantry. Is upgrading thompsons and forcing them to move constantly (to avoid dancing) the best way to use them? Would it ever make sense to use them without thompsons?

I've picked apart the wiki site a long time ago when I also started learning CoH1. It's an amazing starting point.

However, the wiki site seems to be too verbose verbose for my tastes. Also the descriptions seem to be too vague, I don't think I get a lot of concrete information out of reading it. I don't need so much an intro manual anymore; I need more like a reference manual I can read up on stuff I could use.

For instance, I've never seen CoH1 smoke (sherman smoke shell, mortar, creeping barrage, tetrarch, rifle nade) do anything to protect tanks or the like; though it is useful when advancing vs MGs.

Or, I understand that sherman upgun upgrade will make shermans worse vs infantry and better vs tanks. However, I need something more concrete than "better" to be able to make a decision.

Hello, long time vCoH veteran here. I'll answer your Qs.

I've been trying to pick up CoH1.

However, one thing that's vexxing me is that it is extremely difficult to predict how unit X performs against unit Y, until I've tried that combination.

For instance; are Rangers any good at all? If so against which units, and when (if ever) do you upgrade thompsons?

Rangers due to their high initial cost and high reinforcement cost are limited to a support role. At most 2 would ever be purchased in a real game, but this is very unlikely. They are most often called in when the USA player does an infantry heavy upgrade opening (BARS+Nades for example), and does not inflict enough early game damage, and thus has no fielded AT weapons when a puma hits.

Rangers are almost always upgraded with Thompsons, since their anti-infantry capability with it is good (can easily 1v1 any german squad that's not vet3 or has MP40/MP44), and since their anti-infantry capabilities without it is very poor.

Keep in mind though, if you are getting rangers, that they are mostly considered a "panic" unit (panic rangers vs puma suprrise). Bazookas in CoH1 are quite different than in CoH2 in 2 ways: much less penetration (meaning they are completely ineffective against tank front armour for the most part), and less accuracy. Use them only to support infantry vs light vehicles or tanks that you can flank.

Which units deal damage most reliably vs 251 half-track and the Puma?

If your strategy is a fast M8, that should be enough to force any 251 or Puma to play defensively. The best counter for 251/Puma is either: AT gun, M10/Hellcat, or a mine (mines do 200% damage vs these light vehicles, and will destroy the engine) in combination with sticky, AT gun, M8, or tank.

If I want to avoid using snipers, which weapons do I use vs Vet2 Grenadiers? Is this the same for Vet2 Volks?

Snipers are always the best bet vs. VET2 Grenadiers since they have a 300% accuracy modifier against them (AKA, will always hit them on retreat), and VET2 gives Grenadiers "Elite Armour" (-25% received accuracy). However, vetted riflemen perform well against all axis infantry, and flamethrowers do bonus damage vs VET2 Grenadiers. The M8 can also be a reasonable choice, and of course the Sherman. Off map howitzer barrages also have a tendency to 1 shot Grenadier squads that are capturing, and is a good way to eliminate squads from opponents who aren't paying attention.

The Volksgrenadiers do not receive Elite armour at Vet2, and just receive -25% received suppression, and -5% received damage. BAR rifles, flamers, and any vehicles should fare well.

Which units are bazookas good against; are they better than recoilless rifles at anything?

Bazookas are good against tank rear/side armour, and puma/251 vehicles, but have poor accuracy in general. Recoilless rifles have better accuracy and penetration, so are better against all tanks than bazookas, and due to a weird "phasing bug", they tend to travel through pumas/251 quite often, and thus have poor accuracy against these units. In general, bazooka good vs light vehicles, bad vs armour, and recoilless are the opposite.

If somebody has a link to something that describes the target-tables in play here, I would appreciate it.

Thanks.

Use this websites for detailed stats:
http://hq-coh.com/stats/coh-stats.com/Main_Page.html

Extreme detail on target types:

http://companyofheroes.wikia.com/wiki/Infantry_Type
Note: that it might look confusing, but it isn't too bad. For example, all small arms except snipers are .85 acc and .75 dmg vs heroic armour.

Probably airborne, greyhounds, and tanks. Greyhound has a long ass reload time though.

IIRC when grenadiers get vet2 they get changed to the "elite" infantry type and take more damage from flamers, so flamer engis behind a rifle squad will usually beat a single grenadier squad. I guess you could make a croc lategame too. I think "elite" infantry also take more suppression, so mgs, bars if you have the muni, or a couple of shermans with .50 cals (bc everything suppresses if there's enough bullets) will do the trick too. Volks get different bonuses and are not changed to "elite" I think.

As an experienced player, I do not recommend using the Croc or MGs againts infantry, as a Sherman or sniper is almost always better in any serious match. Note also that .30cal does not have extra suppression against Elite armour.

Bazookas are IMO generally inferior to recoilless rifles (but rangers are better against infantry). This is because zooks have lower accuracy and pen, meaning flanking at close range is going to be your best bet. I think they do more damage tho, and still perform against tanks. I sort of think of them like smgs but for tanks if that makes any sense.

This is very last ditch effort tactic. AT guns or tanks are almost always better. Ranger flanking is desperation mode, and you will almost for sure take heavy casualties from Grenadiers, the tank itself, or snipers. With a 45mp reinforcement cost, this is not advisable. Rangers are best used in houses or green cover vs light vehicles.

There's also another site called cohreplays or something that has some guides and stuff

Lol, close enough. It's gamereplays.org/coh

Regarding rangers, I notice that they tend to "dance" a whole lot more compared to other infantry. Is upgrading thompsons and forcing them to move constantly (to avoid dancing) the best way to use them? Would it ever make sense to use them without thompsons?

I've picked apart the wiki site a long time ago when I also started learning CoH1. It's an amazing starting point.

However, the wiki site seems to be too verbose verbose for my tastes. Also the descriptions seem to be too vague, I don't think I get a lot of concrete information out of reading it. I don't need so much an intro manual anymore; I need more like a reference manual I can read up on stuff I could use.

For instance, I've never seen CoH1 smoke (sherman smoke shell, mortar, creeping barrage, tetrarch, rifle nade) do anything to protect tanks or the like; though it is useful when advancing vs MGs.

Or, I understand that sherman upgun upgrade will make shermans worse vs infantry and better vs tanks. However, I need something more concrete than "better" to be able to make a decision.

I think that smoke just decreases accuracy significantly on both ends, so if rngesus wills it it might save your sherman. Useful for when your sherman is say distracting a panther while m10s flank or (the mortar kind) for assaulting mgs (I think).

Pretty sure it's better to just stop in good cover and try your best to avoid dancing but that does seem to be a major issue. However, when stopped at close range Thompsons will often drop models with each burst from the individual weapons. They lose a lot of dps with the first two model drops vs. infantry though (as the bazookas will get transferred to the other guys with Thompsons. Sidenote: I'm pretty sure the rangers garands are really awful, not like their carbines in coh2.

It is not worth it upgrading your shermans since the reduction in anti infantry capabilities is felt very harshly. On top of this, the upgraded shermans still struggle vs Wehrmacht vet 3 Panthers. You are better off with a couple of m10s and doing a blockade or a couple of m18s for that cloaked shot that whoops a Panther's ass.

Keep your shermans unupgraded infantry killers at all time. When the vet 3 grens and vet 3 knightscross holders show up, believe me, you wish you didn't upgrade.

Unupgraded shermans also destroy pe blobs.

As for the Pumas, they have an insane small target size. I believe the 222s have this to some extent too. The Puma however is almost impossible to hit with any at gun or handheld at weaponry. The shells will miss or either pass straight through them. Your best bet is to snare the Puma orlure it into a mine. This works best against 222s too.

Infantry fights are somewhat weird in CoH. Damage wise it is less of an rng fest than CoH2. Riflemen beat out unupgraded volks and grens at close range, at medium range it becomes a little more rng since both sides have a somewhat equal chance (slightly in favor of k98s), and on the long range the latter two win easily. When you bar up your riflemen, they win vs unupgraded grens and volks at basically all ranges. When grens get their lmg, they are superior in long range and lose out close to mid. Volks with their mp40s lose out at every range most of the time.

Riflemen beat out pgrens (pe) at close range unupgraded (both) and lose to them at medium to long range (both unupgraded). Pgrens with g43s will win at all ranges vs unupgraded riflemen. Upgraded riflemen will win vs unupgraded pgrens at all ranges and lose to upgraded (g43) pgrens at long ranges. Unupgraded and upgraded riflemen will lose to stg upgraded pgrens at close to mid ranges.

If pgrens are upgraded to 4 men, the g43 upgrade wins at every range but close range vs bars and the stg 44 wins at close and mid vs bars.

Thanks for all of your replies!

Is there any situation where the following units are good for:
- 30 cal
- Sherman crocodile
- Upgunning shermans
- Hellcats (compared to M10 deep-dives); if I want to make Hellcats work, how do I work around them?

Thanks for all of your replies!

Is there any situation where the following units are good for:
- 30 cal
- Sherman crocodile
- Upgunning shermans
- Hellcats (compared to M10 deep-dives); if I want to make Hellcats work, how do I work around them?

I don't really have the experience of the others mentioned here, but I'll do my best to help.

Sherman crocodile can be summed up through this video. It's old, but it might help.

9:23 for reference.

I have yet to have found a replay seeing the Sherman crocodiles in use. Even in the campaign, they're just ineffective in my opinion. Hell, even the FlameHetzer can do better than this thing.

As for Hellcats and how I have seen them, they're used in a similar manner as if the Jagdpanzer IV had a turret in CoH2. Although it has a machine gun, I wouldn't recommend using the Hellcat to fight infantry.

Hope my bystander advice helps.

Thanks for all of your replies!

Is there any situation where the following units are good for:
- 30 cal
- Sherman crocodile
- Upgunning shermans
- Hellcats (compared to M10 deep-dives); if I want to make Hellcats work, how do I work around them?

.30cals generally are never worth buying. However, I can think of two instances where they're worth using (not buying though, as you'll see)

• Extreme late game as Airborne doctrine. When you air drop supplies, you'll get a recrewable mortar and .30cal. Grab the .30cal with your riflemen and throw it in houses or positions around the map to prevent harassment of key resources or VPs from roaming grenadiers.
  
• Also extreme late game, where you know you have to camp the VPs to win, it can be very beneficial to build a .30cal nest on a VP. The nests are harder to kill than in CoH2, and if you protect them properly, they can buy you a lot of time.
  

Sherman crocodile

• Since this tank is so expensive and comes from the last tier in the game, it's generally ineffective in a real game. I've only see it purchased in games where the skill difference is so great that rushing a crocodile is a cheeky way to quickly win. Otherwise, a Sherman is better since it has good AI capabilities, and some AT. Flame tanks in general in CoH1 are much worse than in CoH2, perhaps because of the differences between the game engines.
  

Upgunning shermans:

People are saying this upgrade is worse than it is, in my opinion. Sure, the AoE damage is reduced slightly, but it's just as accurate versus squads. It will act more like an infantry "sniper" which kills 1-2 guys per shot, rather than relying on killing 1 guy and killing others (maybe) with splash damage. The extra penetration is good versus vetted stugs, but against bigger tanks it doesn't really matter.

Hellcat:

• generally used exactly the same role as an M10. The hellcat is a bit slower, but doesn't suffer from the "misfire" bug (where shot animation triggers, but no shell is shot). So you can really use either, but if you're inclined to use the tanks more defensively, hellcat is of course better since it can cloak and wait for prey.
  
  

Sherman upgun is worth if you go tank doc and get pershing. This ugrade increases penetration. So any german tank can be killed by pershing except KT.
As for me, I get this upgrade is situations where I have enough fuel for that. Always worth. Still good vs infantry and also becoming good vs tanks, although not like m10 or m18, but still.

Is there a way to micro around the M10 bug? Like, anything I should do to avoid it happening?

I've also encountered another issue where M10 given explicit orders to hit a walking stuka would abandon that order while it is moving to shoot at Panthers. Is this an M10 thing or do all tanks suffer from such streaks of pacifism?

Is there a way to micro around the M10 bug? Like, anything I should do to avoid it happening?

I've also encountered another issue where M10 given explicit orders to hit a walking stuka would abandon that order while it is moving to shoot at Panthers. Is this an M10 thing or do all tanks suffer from such streaks of pacifism?

I believe that if you press "hold" right before it shoots, it should help mitigate the misfire.

Targetting units works differently in CoH1. Unfortunately, if you give an attack order, and then a move command, it will target the highest priority unit in range, not the one you gave the order to. If you want to kill the stuka you'd have to right click, shoot, move, right click, shoot. etc.

Thanks for all of your replies!

Is there any situation where the following units are good for:
- 30 cal
- Sherman crocodile
- Upgunning shermans
- Hellcats (compared to M10 deep-dives); if I want to make Hellcats work, how do I work around them?

I *sometimes* make .30s if I have a ton of field presence and the enemy is blobbing pgrens or volks (or has an early med bunker), but as nosliw said, your mp is often better spent and they're good when you get em free with airborne drops.

I personally almost never use crocs or the hellcat, the former because normal shermans can fight tanks and inf and the latter because I hate giving up the penetration power. People do actually use the hellcat though, as it has more armor/health and cloak, and is still very useful for flanking heavier tanks.

Upgunning shermans I'll do very rarely against pioneer cheese opponents where bar rifles can easily handle whatever small inf presence they have and I really need to worry about lategame vetted axis tanks, especially if I get a Pershing because it gets increased pen from the same upgrade (but severe ai) reductions. I think I read that the rounds fired by upgunned have very negligible difference in ai firepower, but they take like a second longer to reload, which is the kicker.

I've been trying to pick up CoH1.

/questions/

Thanks.

Cool! Welcome Aboard!
Give the Eastern Front mod a go when you have a good feel for the game; It's a fantastic mod!

To answer your questions:
Rangers are OP as f*ck. They are the Terminators of CoH1 that come with bazookas; so good against everything except an MG.
Thomson upgrade when you have loads of CQC (think of em like the Shock troops of SU)

AT guns are your best bet against halftrack/Pumas.
You may want to try a 1,2 punch combo with rifle's sticky bomb.
Aside from AT gun, M10 or Sherman.

Grens are better at close range, whereas volks are better at range.
Volks with MP 40's get better close range firepower.
Both melt in front of a 30cal.

Bazookas are best against tanks/light vehicles.
Recoiless is an emergency use bazooka for paratroopers/rifles; wouldnt do much damage to a stuh/stug from the front tho.

Sorry, I dont have target tables.

http://hq-coh.com/stats/coh-stats.com/Main_Page.html
Some outdated information, but most of it up-to date. Lurk that

I've been playing and enjoying CoH1 way too much. However, there are some party-pooper strats I haven't managed to figure out how to counter.

How do you counter ketten-push cancer, pushing squads off capture points and resetting cap progress? Are you supposed to outblob them, or you pre-emptively move your squad before the push and try to click the flag before the other guy clicks the flag?

Also, is it just my idea, or do Bar-ed up riflemen perform worse than unupgraded riflemen in 1v1 vs Volks? How do you beat Volks squads 1v1 if the enemy pops a medkit at the beginning of the fight? Any tips?

I've been playing and enjoying CoH1 way too much. However, there are some party-pooper strats I haven't managed to figure out how to counter.

How do you counter ketten-push cancer, pushing squads off capture points and resetting cap progress? Are you supposed to outblob them, or you pre-emptively move your squad before the push and try to click the flag before the other guy clicks the flag?

Also, is it just my idea, or do Bar-ed up riflemen perform worse than unupgraded riflemen in 1v1 vs Volks? How do you beat Volks squads 1v1 if the enemy pops a medkit at the beginning of the fight? Any tips?

With Ketten-push the only thing you can do is spam click the point with the squad so as soon as the ketten pushes the squad away they instantly start capping again, usually PE players only go 1 ketten but if you are playing US and they do more a jeep isn't that bad to deny them. Also if you think about it although he's denying your capping he is also not capping himself so it isnt as bad as it seems.

BAR'ed riflemen perform much better against volks than unupgraded riflemen you just have to get in close range and the volks will melt, as for the medkit there's not much you can do other than knowing that it makes the squad slow as its healing which makes it an easy target for grenades if you have them upgraded (in my experience the medkits usually don't help in a fight that is already won by riflemen so most likely you are walking into engagements that aren't that good).