And my opinion about the current winter patch: Stuart, T-70, Stug E fixed (nerfed and now they are fixed)
Ostheer - mostly nerfed, 222 is now rubbish, it was like one of main units and now it sucks, Stug E nerfed, huge nerf to snipers(and cost is the same, makes sense), some Puma nerf, small pio buff, conclusion: ostheer sucks even more
Soviets - Penals nerfed and removed flamer upgrade, guards nerfed and cost increased (I lol'd at this), T-70 nerfed, Su76 barrage nerf, conclusion: soviets could be playable, but mostly they suck
USA - not much changed, some mortar nerf, Stuart nerf, some minor changes to vehicles, nothing about rifles smoke nade, rifles performance, conclusion: still OP
OKW - possibly the best buff for sturmpios, no vet required for meds and costs halved, med truck is not necessary, some minor changed to early vehicles, luchs kinda nerfed, conclusion: i believe the early game got buffed a lot
Brits - some Piats nerf, Bren carrier possibly buffed a little, Aec survivability increased and vs infantry got nerfed, not much, conclusion: possibly same as before, slightly changed
Your right about the base building stuff, you are pretty much right about most of that stuff, although i wouldn't solve these issues in the same way as you. However what you would like is a major overhaul of many entrenched mechanics which is something we cannot do now. Maybe if this patch goes well they will let us move onto change more things in the future.
About the other stuff, the 222 was too cheap, now it is more inline with what it should cost. Also it did in a way get buffed because now the mg works its damage is consistent meaning you don't have to rely totally on the cannon getting a one off hit to wipe a squad.
The soviets have been nerfed quite a lot this patch however some of the nerfs might be toned down a bit, we are still testing (which is why we want more information and REPLAYS to help us figure out where that sweet spot is).
USF is actually getting nerfed quite a bit including rifles. They cant double equip M1919's and the Vet 3 received accuracy bonus is going from 20% to 15%. Could you give me a little more information on how you think smoke nades are op?
unfortunately there isn't much we can do about brits this time round.
What we need from good players like yourself is to test these things out in game and give us real detailed feed back (with a replay if you can) so that we can adjust things, its not all set in stone. As good as you may be at judging a patch from the change notes alone, your feedback wont be worth much when you haven't actually played it.
I wont be able to play for the next few days however I'm more than happy to play you once I can, or you can find someone else. gl hf