Profile of Contrivance

Spetsnaz!

So basically the Spetsnaz that people know of now didn't formally exist during WW2. While the Special Forces unit we know of didn't get formed until 1950, the Red Army did form special reconnaissance and sabotage units during WW2 that were also called Spetsnaz (a shortening of the Russian words for Special Purpose).
We definitely want our Spetsnaz to be excellent infiltration and sabotage units, capable of causing all sorts of mayhem behind enemy lines. They'll also have the option of starting off with captured German half-tracks, allowing them to not show up on the minimap while riding in them.


Reason why we're probably going to shy away from Partisans is because we're focusing on battlefield units. Certainly Partisans contributed to the war effort, but almost entirely through sabotage and attacks behind the front lines. Once the Red Army had linked up with Partisans they tended to absorb them as replacements rather than fighting alongside them.

Volkssturm, on the other hand, did fight on the frontlines alongside regular German units, so this is a unit we'll probably add in the future.

If you mean the 'remove from mini map' of Radio Silence, it's just a modifier you can turn on/off, so it can be applied to SBPs individually as you see fit, such as through an aura or some other ability.

If necessary we'll increase the maximum occupancy on ambient buildings and adjust things as needed. Occupying and defending buildings is not a part of the gameplay we want to negatively impact.

US Rifle Squads will be 12 men, eliwOOd mentioned 11 with rifles and 1 with a BAR (or M1919A6, in the case of Parachute Rifles).

As for Conscripts, a small misunderstanding here. They're not gone, just renamed, since there never was a specific military unit called Conscripts in the Red Army, since most of the Red Army was conscripted in the first place. The CoH2 Conscripts unit is supposed to represent Strelki (riflemen), so we just renamed them to such and reorganized them to the correct 9-man structure.

Guards units were identical to regular units, since regular units would get the Guards term as an honorific for proving themselves in battle. So in our mod, a Guards unit has better stats due to their experience, but otherwise has the same structure and options.

Though we will have hardened veterans in the form of Rifle and Guards Rifle units using the 'diminished' structure. Basically the Soviets did not cycle units off the front line nearly as much as other nations did, so manpower would steadily deplete due to a lack of reinforcements. In order to make these depleted divisions still combat effective, they reorganized the personnel, which resulted in trimmed down units that had fewer men but the same amount of machine-guns and supporting weapons. A diminished Guards Rifle Squad or Shock Rifle Squad has only 6 men, but has even better stats, since all of these men are veterans from the beginning of the war and their experience has not been diluted from the introduction of fresh replacements. In the case of Shock Rifle Squads, that also means better combat efficiency at close range and less of an accuracy penalty when moving.

So standard organization Rifle and Guards Rifle units are for recently formed divisions, and the diminished style is for divisions that have been fighting since the early years of the war.

We're hard at work, but had nothing new to show that was flashy or cool.

The good news is that we're working on the last parts of the battlegroup UI and it's finally coming along now. We're getting the basic functionality in of choosing what units you want in it, and with what options.

For example, if your Soviet battlegroup is from a Mechanized Corps or Tank Corps, then the corps either had a Heavy Tank Regiment or a Heavy Self-propelled Artillery Regiment, but not both at once. So you'll have to make a choice between getting a company (up to 5) of heavy tanks or heavy assault guns as a support element. Then you'll have to choose what kind of heavy tank or assault gun you take, though right now we're obviously limited to KV-1e, IS-2, and ISU-152 for these two units (eventually KV-1s, KV-85, IS-1/IS-85, and Churchill III/IV options for the former, and SU-152 and ISU-122 for the latter, will be available if/when models arrive). Then you'll have to choose whether you want the entire company, or just one platoon of it (Cmd vehicle + 2 more), since you might not have enough points left to add it at full strength.

The whole process is a bit like RPG character creation, with trade offs for every decision you make. Do you go for a nicely balanced battlegroup that can do a bit of everything, or do you max out in fewer categories and try to be a specialist? It also makes weaker choices, like taking 45mm anti-tank guns when you could take 76mm anti-tank guns, actually worthwhile since they might be the only thing you can afford after splurging on that artillery you really wanted or the Sturmovik air support you grabbed.