Profile of T.R. Stormjäger

76mm Sherman is garbage don't waste your time building this.

This

Poor 76mm got murdered by nerfs. All for the sake of overnerfing Mechanized.

Allow me to disagree. Snaring is so imperative it kills not have it on mainline OR start with Royal Engie Section instead of IS. This is my reasoning.

As UKF, in order to have early game antivehicle capacity you must get Royal Engies (270mpish) and optionally give them 2 PIATS (100mp+15fuel for rack, plus 100 muni for the guns themselves) so we are talking about a 370mp 15fuel 100 muni sink to have the same capacities and effectiveness of 2 infantry squads snaring at more or less 80muni combined.

It's a huge huge problem. I am not saying it's groundbreaking, but it 150% puts the UKF player at disadvantage, especially against 222s where they are paper thin armor and just snaring plus firing at them kills them completely (so it's a huge waste to give the aforementioned resources just to be able to kill 222s).

I don’t disagree, I was just stating that it’s a small issue instead of a big one like veterancy and pop cap, so I’m fine with sections not having snares in isolation. In the faction context, this is a problem on top of many more.

My intent making this post is to vent about the faction and see what the 1v1 community thinks. I do not care whatsoever about teamgames, this is only for 1v1. This post has been a long time coming and I am surprised to see that it is made by someone who only recently played a lot of 1v1s with this faction as opposed to UKF veterans like Aimstrong, Kobald, Seeking (RIP) and Tootsy. For context I grinded out UKF the past month for 60+ games and faced a bunch of good players (not top because UKF ELO is a meme) and managed to reach an abysmal rank 3 which would be rank 30 if everyone played tbh but still gave me good perspective on the faction and its issues in 1v1.


Balance decisions

I want to begin by acknowledging that the current state of UKF is a symptom of massive nerfs/buffs from patch to patch and the balance team running out of time. UKF was definitely a super cheesy faction in the past, very strong if you knew exactly what you were doing or if your opponent was clueless, but with very exploitable weaknesses and some awful matchups vs JLI/VSL Grens. Current patch UKF feels like a response to their strong state last patch without intent to keep it in a solid state for the rest of coh2's life cycle but as a desperate attempt to see if the multitude of nerfs it received balanced it out and made it less cheesy, a tactic which was employed in the past numerous times when super meta strats were overnerfed (or buffed??? osttruppen...). The result of these changes is the current UKF faction which feels weak, with its crutches massively nerfed and the result is that trying to play the core faction is an uphill battle against superior factions.


Economy

The first aspect I want to touch on is the economy. The idea of bolster and weapon racks being optional was supposed to facilitate a choice between mainline infantry stronger than the axis and a faster medium tank timing. This choice is almost nonexistent because going with the first option is basically mandatory. LMG Grenadiers are so powerful that it is suicidal to face their LMG hordes with stock 4man sections, leading to an awful manpower economy, constant sniper bleed and awful map control which means you can't get the fast cromwell in the first place. Choosing to invest in bolster and weapons racks is the wise decision, but this basically puts your cromwell timing around the same as the panzer IV of Ostheer assuming you went for the 75 fuel AEC to cope with the 30 fuel 222 or a flame HT. Against OKW you are even more pressured because STG Volks destroy unupgraded 4man sections and JLI will always bleed even upgraded sections, while the Puma can counter everything lighter than your last tier of units, from sniper with aimed shot to AEC in a straight up fight. The result of this is that vs Ostheer you are always basically a unit behind and vs OKW you are always at a disadvantage vs JLI and Puma. Honourable mention goes to the awful AEC, which costs 75 fuel and has no role aside from poking out of cover units if your opponent either loses his light vehicle or skips it. Most UKF mains I have talked to are very lukewarm about it. Personally I love its tread shot but I absolutely loathe its lack of veterancy buff to its MG, which would be the perfect way for it to scale better. The result of this is that you are basically forced to spend 45 fuel more than Ostheer to keep its 222 in check, while AEC contributes less to infantry fights for the benefit of you not HAVING to get a 6pdr but then if you combine it with bolster + racks + the weak UKF economy you are basically left to pick if you want to get a Cromwell while the Ost P4 has a minute or two on the field to push you off the map.


Faction crutches

The first unit that was supposed to be a faction crutch is the Infantry Section. This is a unit that does become more powerful than LMG Grenadiers for Ostheer, but has to suffer on its way there. Early snipers, camouflaged units with ambush bonus, early LMGs for Ostheer and G43 squads all bleed UKF hard before upgrades. Bolster is usually popped after the AEC otherwise the 222 runs wild, so you cannot afford early 5man Sections to push back stock Grens. This means you will bolster around 8mins in and get racks about 9mins in. This leads to the second issue, the fact you need 90 munitions compared to Ostheer needing 60. I think the strength of the upgrade being higher than the LMG42s is actually mitigated by the out of cover penalty for sections and the drop rate. This also fits in with the economy aspect for two reasons. One is cost meaning you have to get racks later and two is you cannot afford to spend your munitions early because you need to save up to get double BRENs on all your sections as soon as possible for maximum value from the upgrade. Against OKW you actually do great against STG Volksgrenadiers and even trade decently vs Obers since you both stay max range. However, JLI are too good against UKF, winning the manpower trades on almost all fight with equal numbers and cover. This is made worse by your inferior indirect fire (pit vs leig) and HMG options (MG34 vs Vickers).
The picture that has been painted so far is of a balanced unit that has some awful early weaknesses and does a lot better lategame when fully upgraded. The lategame issue however is the inferior veterancy it receives compared to Grenadiers and elite OKW infantry. This is the biggest drawback of UKF in general in my view, strong units when invested into that do not provide sufficient return due to their veterancy being bad.



The AEC is a complicated unit for its timing and role and has been discussed a lot over time without too many changes. My honest opinion on the unit is that it needs some kind of veterancy buff to its hull MG and it either needs its build time to be reduced or for its side tech to be removed altogether. 75 fuel for a weaker Puma that can't countersnipe is too much in the context of UKF. Getting an AEC is a big enough investment already, the time and cost investment on top of that for the sidetech is excessive.


Problem units

In this section I wish to talk about the units that hold the faction back from being competitive, starting with the worst HMG in the game, the Vickers. This unit is absolutely awful, does not suppress, is useless without using its ability, is only 4men, does absolutely nothing when suppressed and at vet 0 takes forever to reload (7s I think?). It does get good veterancy but when you consider its appalling vet 0 state it is also lacking. Even compared to the Maxim it is awful, as the stock Maxim is 6men instead of 4 and actually is useful when suppressed so you can win MG duels with it. This is a huge faction issue, not having a reliable HMG to contain zones of approach and deliver long range suppression/lock down areas.
Another unit that fits into this is the Cromwell, not because the unit itself is bad, but because it fails at its role as a stock medium tank you get before the heavy tanks. As a unit itself, it's quite good. Offensive smoke, very nice veterancy, very good vet 1 ability, decent cost. Its two weaknesses that absolutely cripple the faction are lack of reliable anti infantry and as a result it cannot punish double ATG walls by flanking them, something you HAVE to do because you do not have a reliable stock rocket artillery platform. USF overcomes that with Scotts and HE Shermans which have devastating anti-infantry capability, but UKF does not have that. Its stock medium tank only gets the AT edge on the Ost P4 at vet 1 at a cost and it only deals a fraction of its anti infantry performance. Add to that the lack of a pintle MG mount, which makes it near impossible to punish flanked AT guns like the panzer IV can.

In general the lack of vehicle anti-infantry is evident. You do not get vehicles with good anti infantry performance, you do not have proper rocket artillery, you do not have good indirect fire like leig or heavy mortar and you do not have a specialist anti-infantry platform like the Brummbar or Scott. Land Mattress is completely irrelevant and a meme, it's not worth discussing.

The sniper is another problematic unit because of its god-awful veterancy.

I cannot understand why the sniper gets defensive and anti-tank veterancy bonuses. Who thought this was a good idea? Why do vet 0 and vet 3 UKF snipers fire just as fast? While I agree that snipers in general are stupid, giving Ostheer's sniper the best sniper veterancy and ability in the game while UKF's sniper gets the worst creates a gap in actual performance in favour of Ostheer. Not to mention timing.
While on the topic of veterancy, the Comet's veterancy is also abhorrent.

This unit's anti infantry performance got rightfully nerfed, but now it's just got worse Panther veterancy (less reload and no armour bonus for just more speed) with inconsistent anti infantry and no pintle mount on a faction starving for vehicle based anti-infantry. The only thing going for it is the great vet 1 WP shell. Other than that, it's a worse Panther with no pintle, worse vet and better main gun anti infantry.


Lend Lease

The unquestioned UKF meta at the moment is lend lease because it plugs two huge holes in the roster and gives you lategame repairs and skill planes. The first hole is early section performance, which is compensated for by early assault section strength and thompson timing. The second hole is midgame vehicle anti infantry, with the quad coming in to provide speed, damage and suppression, able to duel and win against the 222 without needing 75 fuel invested into it. The result of this is players having to crutch on this doctrine to close the distance a bit with the axis factions but make no mistake, this is not a doctrine being OP issue, this is a faction being trash issue. This doctrine is not a problem, although it would absolutely have to be nerfed if stock UKF was buffed.


Conclusion and ideal changes

UKF is an awful faction that becomes a bad one if you play lend lease. That's the bottom line. Section rifle damage, Valentine timing and Comet scatter nerfs have really killed the faction by taking away its cheese but not sufficiently propping up the faction in return. Sappers getting snares was an excellent change but it's honestly not enough in the slightest. In its current state the faction makes you suffer when playing it, losing games you absolutely should have won by playing much better than your opponent simply because you are playing a worse faction. Equal skill, you will very likely lose and most likely lose without lend lease. This is why the 1v1 leaderboards for UKF are in a sorry state, with most players having abandoned the faction altogether and UKF mains just ditching the game altogether. I am appalled that UKF got to this state this patch and that there is no accountability about it. This is a paid DLC faction that's basically unplayable and I am not happy about it, as I'm sure neither are people who paid for it on release only for it to forever be in its current state for the foreseeable future unless there is a major change and we get another balance patch.

If I had to fix the faction, the two main things I would fix on the spot are veterancy and pop cap, both of which UKF has worse than every other faction. I do not want to get into pop cap specifics, I defer to Jibber on the topic. Veterancy changes would be tedious to list but all I will say is units like Infantry Sections, AEC and Comet would need better veterancy. The early manpower economy of UKF would also have to be better, the reinforce speed of its units and base medics healing speed (I think it's slower, might be wrong.) would also need to be improved and the Cromwell and possibly the Comet would have to ditch the pointless tank commander upgrade for a pintle MG mount. I would also reduce BREN gun drop rate and fix the awful anvil point sight bonus which is pointless, replacing it with something useful like slightly improved movement speed in captured territories. Bolster would also have to be made cheaper by 5 or 10 fuel and the AEC would have to lose its side tech.

I welcome people's opinions on the topic, unless you wanna argue semantics or teamgames, in which case please respect the 1hr I spent typing this out and gtfo. Thanks.

I don't agree with the changes but I do agree that UKF needs some hard buffs.

I'd move Sections down to 250mp, reduce bolster to 30 fuel from 35, nerf assault sections by having a single shared cooldown for all 3 grenades of theirs and making their thompson upgrade 70munis, make changes to UKF veterancy and pop cap which are both absolutely atrocious, remove the sidetech for AEC or reduce AEC build time, buff the absolutely useless Vickers to respectable levels, give the Cromwell a fuckin’ pintle so it can actually kill infantry and flanked AT guns and I'd replace the useless anvil territory sight bonus with something useful.

UKF is in dire need of a buff atm. It is beyond miserable to play in 1v1, in large part due to having the worst MG in the game, awful manpower economy/veterancy/pop cap and a stock medium that cannot kill infantry unless you crush or get great RNG rolls.

Rushing2