Profile of squippy

If anything, the real life equivalents probably help 'balance', because at least you have a solid idea of what the function of the unit is; not because you have real life data to draw on.

But frankly I think all this whingeing about Relic's ability to 'balance - god I hate that word - is so much entitled guff. I think it fails to appreciate how difficult a job that really is, in something that has so many parts and relationships. And if you think that fixing bugs is would be easy enough to do if only Relic could be bothered, you obviously don't appreciate how mammoth an undertaken even that is.

@squippy, sorry for putting words in your mouth. What I meant was, defensive bonuses are better than nothing, but they were completely nonsensical on stuff like mortars and AT guns, essentially the coh1 implementation of global veterancy was flawed from the beginning and even if offensive bonuses were given. It ensured the bonuses would have to be poorer than the "earned" veterancy because of potential for late game spam of elite troops. Some might consider lategame fielding of elites only a cool defining faction perk, just like OKW forward bases and fuel penalty, but I simply think it is not possible to balance it alongside other factions that gain veterancy the "normal" way.

Fair enough. And in the interests of raising the tone of debate, let me say that I did read your more detailed argument, and while I think I ultimately still disagree with you, it's always much better to end up disagreeing over detailed well argued positions.

Although I will say, everyone has a moment where you're praying for that last PAK shot that will kill that tank marauding in your base, and which if you don't get will mean the tank kills your gunners and then everything else you have. Defensive resilience has its virtues.

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Also, IIRC, one of Coh1's Wehr vet levels gave passive healing, so again they were a lot more survivable. And as ZombiFrancis mentions, you could always use the 5-man Volks squad to absorb fire before it arrived on your 4-man grens.

On top of this, the basic infantry units had different health values:
Rifleman: 55 health
Engineer: 55
Volksgren: 60
Pioneer: 70
Grenadier: 80
Tommies: 60
PE grens: 55

So a gren squad had a total heal of 320 and a rifleman squad had a total health of 330. But the difference in per model health meant that individual grens were more likely to survive a grenade that would kill most of the models in a rifleman squad. In both cases, the squad itself could well avoid being wiped.

EDIT:
According to the chart in the OP, CoH2 Grens, Conscripts, and Rifles all have 80. So in the respect the relationship that existed in CoH1 where Wehr models were tougher is gone, but the proportional squad sizes remain.

Iraq shows off Chinese drones:

I wasn't initially unsympathetic to the idea that was a problem here, as Wehr have had small squad sizes all the way back to CoH1. CoH2 was just keeping with the established standard that had already worked, so there shouldn't be a problem.

But now it occurs to me that there may well be a problem because of the changes to the veterancy system. Where in CoH1 it wasn't such a big deal to have a squad wiped, because their veterancy was attached to base upgrades, now it's a much more significant issue. In CoH1, your newly built squad would have the vet you have upgraded for its type, but now it's all lost.

In this light, maybe continuing the the 6:4 balance in squad sizes that CoH1 established isn't such a good idea. But I'm not sure exactly what else to suggest doing. It was obviously intended to create the thematic effect of the Germans being outnumbered, and this would be lost if grens and pgrens went up to 5 men. Changing all the squads so the relationship is 8:6 would likely work, but it would be a major overhaul. IIRC, the Eastern Front mod for CoH1 had some 8 man squads, and it didn't seem to change things hugely, but it would still be a big deal.

Machii Isao versus a baseball.