Wehrmacht Early Game Struggle

Playing ostheer is known to be hard especially during the early games because of the low squad sizes and it would be a different experience against every other allied faction. The faction is good and all when you reach t4 that gives you brumbar, panther, and werfers however before reaching that time you have to maintain good territory control. I find it really frustrating when playing ostheer in the early as your squads alone cannot win engagements thus has to be supported then mg42 positioning becomes very crucial.

For sometime I get tired of using grens as they can really lose early engagements easily especially against Infantry Sections and by the time the grens arrive sections are already in green cover and even they are both in green cover grens would lose. It is really easy to lose against brits in the early game as they have good early game options. They start with Infatry sections that can build their own sandbags and an UC that has really good early game impact and you know that your opponent isn't gonna let you easily faust it.

I find that the ostruppen playstyle is much more easier since ostruppen are good holding the line while your mg42 sets up to support them and a pretty good performance for a 200mp meatshield.

I would rather have conscripts than grens and grens are really hard to keep alive as they can easily die from grenades and indirect fire.

The problem has more do to do with the power level of the other faction infantry then grenadier themselves. Vgs and Penals need to be toned and then one can fix any other problems.

Thing is ostheer lategame is not even good. It's true they have decent lategame tanks but their infantry loses even harder late game. Even a 5 man vet 3 grenadier squad with g43 loses so hard against vet 3 riflemen with weapons upgrades its not even funny. Without machine guns ostheer has no way to hold the line and by lategame your opponent has so much support weapons that can melt 4 man machine guns which will open the floodgates of allied terminator infantry.

Im higher ranked as USF 1v1 than ostheer even though i have played 10x more games as ostheer, don't even know of a single build order as USF. I just overwhelm the poor germans with riflemen and they leave at mid game and if they play ostheer its even sadder.

Thing is ostheer lategame is not even good. It's true they have decent lategame tanks but their infantry loses even harder late game. Even a 5 man vet 3 grenadier squad with g43 loses so hard against vet 3 riflemen with weapons upgrades its not even funny. Without machine guns ostheer has no way to hold the line and by lategame your opponent has so much support weapons that can melt 4 man machine guns which will open the floodgates of allied terminator infantry.

Im higher ranked as USF 1v1 than ostheer even though i have played 10x more games as ostheer, don't even know of a single build order as USF. I just overwhelm the poor germans with riflemen and they leave at mid game and if they play ostheer its even sadder.

finally someone says the truth

Thing is ostheer lategame is not even good. It's true they have decent lategame tanks but their infantry loses even harder late game. Even a 5 man vet 3 grenadier squad with g43 loses so hard against vet 3 riflemen with weapons upgrades its not even funny.

And.... why 240mp squad with 60 muni upgrade should NOT lose badly to 280 mp squad with 120 muni upgrade?
It would be imbalanced if they were even remotely equal.

Without machine guns ostheer has no way to hold the line and by lategame your opponent has so much support weapons that can melt 4 man machine guns which will open the floodgates of allied terminator infantry.

Light machineguns or heavy machineguns?
I'll assume the latter, because ost never was supposed to operate on grens alone.

Im higher ranked as USF 1v1 than ostheer even though i have played 10x more games as ostheer, don't even know of a single build order as USF. I just overwhelm the poor germans with riflemen and they leave at mid game and if they play ostheer its even sadder.

If you'd played UKF you'd be ranked even higher at the same skill level.
Its easier to have higher rank with less populated factions.

And yes, if your opponent is terribly bad and doesn't use anything but grens, he will have a hard time.

i mean they have switched the way how factions are strong in diffirent phases of game, but aren't ostheer by design meant to be bit slow and rely on support weapons and then go aggressive later on?

i mean they have switched the way how factions are strong in diffirent phases of game, but aren't ostheer by design meant to be bit slow and rely on support weapons and then go aggressive later on?

Ostheer is stronger early on when MG42 doesn't die to frontal blobs. Average for the rest of the game.

Completely agree with spajn. Ost is supposed to struggle early game. Tier 4 is supposed to be borderline op. Ost was supposed to be a "late game" faction even more so than OKW yet OKW have vet 5 and stock KT, lol. But when the Brum performs well PROVIDED U MICRO EVERYSHOT AND HOLD FIRE ATTACK GROUND, it can be quite good. If u remove the ability to hold fire and attack ground, even the prenerf Brum would not be op. But the allied players who have less than 20 games as axis on this forum couldn't stand the fact that Ost had a tank that was actually good at killing inf so the balance team TRIPLE nerfed the Brum with little consideration of the consequences. Now the KV8 clears support weapons faster than a Brum, is cheaper, tech to it faster, takes 7 shots to kill (Brum only needs 5), doesn't need to micro every shot. Allied fanboys will tell u that the KV8 is doctrinal (hence is allowed to be OP) but the fact is that SU doctrines rarely don't have a piece of mid or late game doctrinal armor. Not a single doctrinal SU tank is meh, they are all very cost efficient to borderline OP. So SU late game can be just as good or even better than Ost midgame.

UKF get either stock comet or churchills and their doctrinal churchills. All churchills are very good in 1v1 with the croc being op in 1v1.

Axis struggle to deal with heavy armor as their TDs have less than 200 pen. Panther doesn't have the RoF of the 60 range allied TDs. Without using the ele or jagd (in teamgames), Ost especially, is vulnerable to IS2/Croc stalling as the only 200+ pen unit is locked behind T4, while SU/UKF can spend all their resources on infantry and support weapons to push very hard due to not needing to tech. Due to large squad sizes, they aren't afraid of the ost p4 which has the worst AI in the game for mediums (tied with crom, only better with the pintle MG.) Hence it's very difficult to punish heavy stalling as Ost. Tiger stalling is nowhere near as effective as I said earlier, Allies have relatively cheap 60 range 200+ (SU85 can have 300+ pen with vet) which are made to counter 375 armor KT pen and these TDs are not locked away in a premium tier. Hence 300 armor Tiger is no problem at all for an allied TD.

UKF and OKW are tied in having the best late game with the best inf and late game tanks. Then SU can be better than Ost and at worst, tied with Ost. Ost is only better than USF when it comes to late game.

Ost as a whole for 1v1 has gotten worse over the last 2 years. It always struggled vs USF and sometimes UKF can be difficult to handle, but at least vs SU, it was an even fight. Now with the popularity of penals, grens are outmatched by all three faction mainlines. Don't tell me that by going T1 u sacrifice support weapons. Support weapons are used to hold the line or clear enemy support weapons. T1 penals hold the line and attack equally well, while sniper + clown car clear support weapons. It requires more skill to use the sniper and clown car over a mortar, but the reward is much higher too. So don't complain about now having certain tools in T1: if u lose ur sniper and/or clown car, it's your own goddamn fault. Even if SU uses cons, he'll supplement with guards or shocks BOTH of which are very good now. Pgrens cannot fight either squad well despite being anti-inf specialists (not saying they should, I'm just saying that it's clear that even SU have inf supremacy now.)

For the Ost late game, it's a mixed bag. If u think the enemy has access to heavies, you're forced to play defensively midgame to ensure u hold a respectable amount of map so u can afford to get T4. Where the Stug was nerfed (I'd say slightly overnerfed), the panther gained. However, before the Brum nerf, the Brum was the better tank to get first. After the nerf, it's definately a lot harder to use the Brum and I suggest the panther should come first. T4 is stronger than T3 now after the Stug nerfs, hence u want to strive for T4. T3 is for players that are either doing very well already and need to keep up the pressure with a p4 or are fuel starved and need to desperately crank out some overnerfed Stugs which are about to be outnumbered due to less fuel income due to the usual poor Ost early game. Only the p4 is kinda worth its price, Ostwind is trash (even allied fanboys agree) and Stug is more like panic puma after the nerfs because it's not ideal at even its intended job: to counter mediums.

Stugs overnerf is real. Sadly

And.... why 240mp squad with 60 muni upgrade should NOT lose badly to 280 mp squad with 120 muni upgrade?
It would be imbalanced if they were even remotely equal.


Light machineguns or heavy machineguns?
I'll assume the latter, because ost never was supposed to operate on grens alone.


If you'd played UKF you'd be ranked even higher at the same skill level.
Its easier to have higher rank with less populated factions.

And yes, if your opponent is terribly bad and doesn't use anything but grens, he will have a hard time.

As i said i don't take seriously what someone who doesn't play the game has to say.

Secondly 5 man grenadier squad is 270 manpower also where do i sign up for 280 mp grenadier squad that actually can stand up to a rifleman because i gladly pay that.

Spajn and IncendiaryRounds gave good summaries of Wehrmacht's problems. You only need to look at Momo's California Classic to see the weakness of the faction atm. Its almost never picked in 1vs1 and you could also see this trend in KoH.

I can live with the early game problems of the faction as long as you can expect late game superiority but thats not the case anymore. In last years UTT tournament Stugs were build in a lot of games, now compare this to the 2vs2 anniversary tourney: You have to look very hard to find games in which the wehrmacht player used Stugs. I dont think that the unit was even build in the series of the 8 best teams.
Do you need to know more?

Conclusion:
I really think the mod team need to add some general balance changes to the new commander patch and finally make Support Armor Corps more attractive:
1. Reworke Ostwind
2. Stugs need to be brought back to the old power level but should be more expensive (100 fuel)
3.Ideally Pzgrens should get reworked too.

I know designing the new commanders need a ton of work but i really hope that the team find the time to do some general balance changes. (E8 included)

Spajn and IncendiaryRounds gave good summaries of Wehrmacht's problems. You only need to look at Momo's California Classic to see the weakness of the faction atm. Its almost never picked in 1vs1 and you could also see this trend in KoH.

I can live with the early game problems of the faction as long as you can expect late game superiority but thats not the case anymore. In last years UTT tournament Stugs were build in a lot of games, now compare this to the 2vs2 anniversary tourney: You have to look very hard to find games in which the wehrmacht player used Stugs. I dont think that the unit was even build in the series of the 8 best teams.
Do you need to know more?

Conclusion:
I really think the mod team need to add some general balance changes to the new commander patch and finally make Support Armor Corps more attractive:
1. Reworke Ostwind
2. Stugs need to be brought back to the old power level but should be more expensive (100 fuel)
3.Ideally Pzgrens should get reworked too.

I know designing the new commanders need a ton of work but i really hope that the team find the time to do some general balance changes. (E8 included)

Ya, Ostheer is badly outgunned right now. I hope after the 6th thread in a year about hte ostwind, it's buffed FOR REAL this time. If you're talking about giving the old RoF back to Stugs, 1)I think the backlash will be immense 2) SU76 will have its RoF restored as well. The problem with the old stugs were the alpha strike from a pair of stugs, and then the stugs rush in for a second volley for the kill. The way to fix the Stug is to give it better defensive stats because it has survivability problems. Better speed and/or turning speed or a noticeably smaller target size, I'd say just a bit bigger than a Stuart, so the Stug is still vulnerable up close but harder to hit at distance. It's historically accurate too as the Stug was made to have a low profile. I'd say better vet such as better range at vet 3 would be ok since it's hard to get a vet 3 stug.

I feel like OST does best early game also. Atleast early grens can kinda hold against allied infantry and the mg42 cant be mobbed. They are also better in team games where they can support a OKW player since volks are 100000000000x better at covering a mg42.

Late Game grens get absolutely dumpstered by Penals/IS/Rifles. The OST p4 is the definition of an average medium tank and OST t4 is pretty good in teamgames but as others said pretty bad in 1v1. Also Grens seem to spontaneously combust in teamgames due to artillery.

Honestly I feel like OST is only good in teamgames because they fill the holes of OKW. IE: early snares, early suppression, and MG counters. Which allows OKW to perform even better than it already does. Which is a shame because I love playing OST but it feel like pulling teeth half the games I play with them.

I feel like OST does best early game also. Atleast early grens can kinda hold against allied infantry and the mg42 cant be mobbed. They are also better in team games where they can support a OKW player since volks are 100000000000x better at covering a mg42.

Late Game grens get absolutely dumpstered by Penals/IS/Rifles. The OST p4 is the definition of an average medium tank and OST t4 is pretty good in teamgames but as others said pretty bad in 1v1. Also Grens seem to spontaneously combust in teamgames due to artillery.

Honestly I feel like OST is only good in teamgames because they fill the holes of OKW. IE: early snares, early suppression, and MG counters. Which allows OKW to perform even better than it already does. Which is a shame because I love playing OST but it feel like pulling teeth half the games I play with them.

Yeah Ost is ok in teamgames and they complement OKW well but 1v1 axis is at least 80% OKW since its the only playable axis faction in 1v1 without needing to outskill our opponent considerably.

Yep i agree wermaht is pretty goood in teamgames especially with okw teammate. U want be pro 4vs4 wermaht player ? Just make 2mg and 2mortars. But i cant say how 1vs1 wermaht looks like because iam 4vs4 player only. I think the easiest way to fix wermant is to buff grens and slightly mg nerf. Thia will solve 4vs4 mg abuse and buff 1vs1 mode. Dont listen vipper dont nerf all other infantry units be smart and buff just one.
Maybe 5man upgrade for panzergranadiers after last tier ?
But i cant agree that wermaht late game is weak. Panther panzerwerfer and brumbar they all great so wtf?

Stugs overnerf is real. Sadly

They had to overnerf the StuG to make people go for the mediocre Panther.

The real thing that crippled Ostheer were the lategame nerfs. I could live with them having weaker infantry since it was compensated by good lategame qualities. But those were nerfed. Brummbär was good but nowadays can't deflect shots. Panther is mediocre, the Tiger lacks purpose.

Currenty Ostheer is just an inferiorversion to the Brits.
Bren Infantry section > Ostheer infantry
Cromwell > Panzer IV
Centaur > Ostwind
Churchill > Tiger or Panther (Apples and Oranges here, but the former is simply the better choice in most scenarios)

Since Ostheer lacks a 60 range td, their armor should be better imo. Some of Osts vehciles simply need more frontal armor, namely the Tiger and the StuG. Lastly Ostwind needs to perform.

Bren Infantry section > Ostheer infantry
Cromwell > Panzer IV
Centaur > Ostwind
Churchill > Tiger or Panther

Elefant> firefly
Panzerwerfer>landmatres
Schrek>piat
Mg42>vickers
Pak43>17pounder
Wermaht mortar>mortar pit
U see u are wrong brits are worse lol

Grens themselves are fine, its just certain allied squads should not be able to dual equip then that alone will level the playing field. If you utilise support weps effectively with ur grens u should be able to handle the opponent better in the early game.

And regarding changes to the stug, maybe it should now be tested with 60 range. its already had its health, armour, pen and ability nerfed to sh*t

Elefant> firefly
Panzerwerfer>landmatres
Schrek>piat
Mg42>vickers
Pak43>17pounder
Wermaht mortar>mortar pit
U see u are wrong brits are worse lol

I'm not sure whether you are trolling since this statement is obviously wrong. But I'll take the bait.

- The Elefant was nerfed quite hard and is doctrinal. I would say both units are mediocre at best.
- Panzerwerfer sucks, comes in the latest tier anc costs 80 fuel. All to wipe some models off weapon crews.
- Schreck is better than Piat but restricted to a 340 mp squad.
- MG and Vickers are pretty similar. The difference in performance is marginal.
- Pak43 is doctrinal and can be deleted with abilities. Brace makes the 17 Pounder stronger imo. Both weapons are static and have little usage in this game. But locking down a corridor for tanks for a longer time is done better by the 17p imo.
- Wehrmacht mortar is different to the mortar pit. The pit can outrange the mortar crew. I wouldn't say the Ost mortar is better.

Now compare the poitns you made with the ones I made earlier. Your points proove marginal, small differences at best. Meanwhile the points I made will decide between mutliple squad wipes (Centaur > Ostwind) general field presence (Brit infantry > Ost infantry) or lategame tank domination (Churchill).