This is a well done guide for people who need help fighting okw. This is exactly how I and many other players I have played with have been fighting with our riflemen.
Just a quick tip, it is best to support your rifles with a light vehicle (M15 AAHT is my favorite due to its mix of timing, ai, and at). The light vehicle will give you a bit of protection from enemy infantry, but more importantly will make it harder for enemy vehicles to punish your squads and harass your territory. Usf is a combined arms faction, so don't forget to mix your units!
Great 4v4 with lots of rare high vet units, and very even balance of power till the end from both teams. Shows how even 4x OKW cannot stand up to the might of the US army, and the relentless march of freedom.
I like the idea to make lmg squads set up. 3 seconds is too much, but a shorter setup Tim will make lmgs into a defensive weapon instead of an a move weapon. Park them behind cover, let them set up, and they can defend very effectively. Amoving wI'll just result in the lmg getting flanked and defeated.
These changes should not change lmgs for elite infantry though (paras, guards, obers).
Shermans are musts vs. OKW blobs in the early stages of the lategame, but I find the scott, .50, and the AAHT are must haves to give the Sherman an easier time kiting and bleeding the enemy.
The AAHT gives you a (very micro-heavy), but powerful suppression platform early on that can also help take down units in buildings and wipe squads when on retreat paths. The biggest issue with the AAHT is that it allows a luchs to hit before you can get captain tier up, but that can be mitigated by bazooka upgrades (m20 mines are too easily countered except on large maps IMO). Bazookas + AAHT are more than a match for a luchs. I reccomend recycling the AAHT if possible later in the match (mechanised company), but it is useful to keep it on to take down enemy planes and protect your retreat point.
The .50 I recommend a little less. It is just a little too buggy for me. Once it gets vet 1, it becomes quite decent, but it seems to have issues with firing on time. More annoyingly, it also still has the guner decrew bug like the maxim, so it is hardcountered by riflenades and lmgs.
The scott should be built later into the game when the enemy has lots of AT, and shermans are too fragile to fight on the frontlines. It will bleed consistently over a large period of time if your opponent is a-moving.
Combining a Sherman with 1-2 of these units will make them all much more powerful, due to their synergies.
Make it undecrewable (like Brit emplacment), and have the same weapon as the 251/17 flackht. Cost increased to 30 fuel.
This way, it would be like a bunker +, with better damage, light at, but at the cost of fuel and similar durability. It could then cover flanks, but be destroyed quickly if it is unsupported.
I would like to see all lmgs limited to one per squad, with the exception of DP-28s for obvious reasons. After doing this, all lmgs can be correctly priced for their performance as well, with lmg34 at most expensive, followed by lmg42, m1919, bren/vickers.
The issue is people are trying to use as shock troops, and they are not.
You really should be micro-ing them like you micro sturmpioneers, because they are very to each other in terms of weapon profile.
This is incorrect. Sturmpioneer STG-44s are not assault rifles, they are closer to smgs like the Thompson in terms of weapon profile.
Panzergrenadiers have much better firepower at range. At mid range, they will beat any squad in the game assuming fairly equal vet (ie. vet 2 pgrens vs. vet 3 bar rifles). At long range, they have as a squad similar DPS as an lmg42.
But DShKa... DShKa is 12.7 too! Can we discuss its problems here too, or we will continue to talk about capitalistic machineguns and pretend like DShKa never existed in CoH2?
Dshka is actually really good, you should try it out. Pop it in a building, and it wrecks everything. I think it got ninja buffed a while ago, but can't remember.