Profile of CombatWombat

Could you take a look at the AOE suppression of the Vickers. Its inability to stop blobs advancing is bit of a problem in the mid to late game, especially with vet and decreasing RA.

Please also consider looking at the wasp upgrade which has very poor performance next to the HT flamer. The UC has a harder time staying alive with its previous patch nerf which makes wasp a very risky and unattractive upgrade.

Damage from 16 to 14 and compensating with higher accuracy is a slight adjustment, not a "nerfbat". Besides the fact that I think you are overreacting, we're already ahead of you and also plan to buff the sniper's aimtime and increase the suppression on the Vickers a tiny bit to compensate the slightly decreased IS performance. Amoungst other things.

I hope that by Vicker's suppression, you mean you guys are considering the AOE suppression. The Vicker's inability to stop angry mobs charging directly at it the way that the MG42 can, is a cause for concern.

Also for the for the love of all that is holy, please do something about the Comet so that we can start seeing more diverse strats from Brit players. At the very least you could buff the vet.

I mean Vickers just in comparison does slightly less surpression but it is if anything just as good in doing the job. I find is that it has more or less similar surpression but the main highlight is the fact that fact Vickers excels better in dealing damage better at range in comparison to the MG42.

Vet for Vicker is real good too. The one that increases its arc and range when in structures is quite a huge defensive advantage.

I did not say that MG42 is bad. It is great also. I just think in my experiences Vickers is better since it picks off models way better. MG42 does have "incendary rounds" but there is a delay which is kind of the downside about. Vickers has kind of as it vets increased penetration rounds by default which helps excels against light vehicles and against units in structures. That is upside about it. I think it is also more accurate too.

The only time MG42 ever really kills models is close range. Vickers can do all from long to short but of course the shorter the better. It is my personal experiences that I regard the Vickers as the best HMG. Maybe you think MG42 is. There is nothing wrong in that. It is just personal opinion!

MG42 has slightly better surpression
Vickers does better damage (better DPS) and better at killing models in distances.

So you have a perception of the comparative performance but what do the numbers say?

Lets address the notion that the Vickers is a better damage dealer. Like I mentioned before, the HMG42 and Vickers have next to identical dps profiles with the Vickers doing 8.6 dps and the MG42 doing 8.3dps at long range of 40. The Vickers does not have a noticable dps difference (4% difference) apart from short range where the Vickers is actually much better - not the MG42. Long range accuracy is better on the MG42=0.35 vs Vickers=0.24 but Vickers has better burst length with HGM42=1.63 vs Vickers=2.75.

The reason the Vickers is thought to be a damage dealer is due to the slower suppression rate, meaning the suppression damage reduction mechanic does not kick in until typically one model has been dropped. MG42 will however push the target to pinned status much quicker where the damage reduction is goes away and models start dropping like flies again. While the under the Vickers the squads stay in suppressed state for longer and benefit from the damage reduction longer while having the benefit of still being able to move and use abilities.

Speaking on suppression the suppression value on the MG42 is considerably higher and can suppress almost instantly. Base and AOE suppression values are MG42=0.012/0.096 vs Vickers 0.0078/0.0062 though total suppression is dependent on other values like rate of fire, burst length, accuracy(?), etc but I'm not clued up on the specifics (perhaps some one with working knowledge of mechanics can chime in). I can confidently say that the HMG 42 is the best suppression platform, but without actual numbers that's just opinion give so I'll run some tests and get some official suppression time values.
While I'm at it, I'll also test kill times as there seems to be a lot of misconception concerning effective damage of the two HMGs.

Penetration values for the two different HMGs: HMG42=2.2/1.8/1.4 vs Vickers=1.9/1.6/1.3 at short/med/long at vet 1. So the HMG42 has higher base penetration out the gate. At vet3(or 2?) the pen profile for the Vickers is 2.4/2.1/1.7 while the HMG42 is unchanged, so an increase for Vickers but not drastically more than the MG42.

The Magic bullets ability (and yes they very much are magic bullets considering what they do) is one of the most batshit insane abilities in the game: +100% damage and +8 penetration. That is a massive boost to firepower and why the MG42 can kill a UC in a single burst - for just 20 muni and a faster reload animation... Hows it okay that a unit has an ability that can one shot kill something with little to no counter play? The reason it got this over powered was to help counter the sniper clown car and sov windustry T70 rushes from many many moons ago. This is no longer a thing yet this insane ability state still exists.

The only thing the Vickers gets is an increased attack range when garrisoned (15%) as its vet ability - not sure what you mean by increased arc however? I'd take magic bullets any day which completely mulches everything in the MG's firearc that isn't a tank.

The most important role of the HMG is crowd control which its does through suppression so suppressing as many squads as possible, in as short a time frame as possible is what qualifies as a good HMG - not the ability to drop a few models before getting flame naded or lasered down by elite blobs.

Killing a few models might be important to your play style and more power to you but I would argue that numbers don't support the claim that the Vickers is categorically the best HMG. I'll run some test to shed more light on the matter however

It's pretty strong vs. OKW in early game since they don't have Fausts - you generally have to rely on preemptive Raketen + luck with actually hitting it. Even with OST on maps like Crossing in the Woods it's almost impossible to Faust and you just bleed MP like crazy until counter comes out. Combined with the already effective Section Spam meta it can be pretty rough. You definitely need to be able to scare it off with small arms a bit better than currently but they'll need to fine tune the nerfs so that it doesn't become useless (IMO Wasp is already pretty UP so you do need that early game utility)

Thanks for clarification

I've rarely had to face off against the UC whenever I play axis and always found it to be a unit that can force units into cover rather than straightup killing machine.

The wasp is a rather underwhelming upgrade but maybe the new assault sections will be able to make for a massive lack of UKF anti-garrison.

Well, nerfing the UC will almost certainly lead to more IS spam.

Another possibility, but by no means a sure fire solution, is to use a UKF sniper to counter the LeiGs.

Sneak him forward, use him to spot for possible arty abilities, use snipers flare marker or just try to pick off models. Of course its very much map dependent but its an alternative at least.

LeiG spam, covered by a flack truck with IR halftrack and spec ops flare spam is an absolute nightmare for Brits as they don't have the indirect options to deal with it. More often than not, it means giving up the ground completly and holding out until you get something powerful out like LM's or crocs.

If I'm not mistaken there is also a bug with the LeiG's crew cover where its gives green cover for the sides as well which makes flanking an trying to gun down the crew harder than expected. Often times you get the jump on the LeiG but it can just walk away without losing models.