Profile of raw

I just saw this and I think it summarizes soviet early game situation pretty well:

Hmm played majorly germans for a long time, i rarely get more than one MG, and played alot soviet players in 1v1. So heres my perspective as a german player. and the thoughts surrounding fuel points; and here is what gives me trouble:

4 conscript + molotov opening with good micro.

Why? usually the map has two fuel points, and two cases:

1) the fuel point is in a contested area. and another is far away from either of you and require more capping hops usually with easier cutoffs. Think khodony.

they will get the contested fuel point earlier before you do, and usually with scripts, and this is while your first gren or if you choose to start with mg first is building. you can delay them from capping the point but you will ultimately retreat. meanwhile, they will be capping towards the further fuel point.

your mg response is either to bring it to attack the contested point or go straight for their jugular, their cutoff and force a fight, then take back the fuel point. but the soviets have overwhelming manpower here, they can lure a pin, flank the mg, and do all kinds of nasty stuff with this build, all the while capping and maintaining a map majority. the problem starts if only they get 2 mgs, but then again, they can only protect one fuel point, cause when you have that much units to throw around and the beginning fuel advantage, they can already go for higher tier and eventually T70.

the weakness is that you will bleed manpower with this build.

2) the fuel point is your natural fuel point, means it is closest to you and easier to cap. Think minsk pocket.

no brainer here, the german will either pocket his mg down the middle, trying to fight their way straight to your fuel. but with wide open space and superior numbers you will still have map control if you choose to buy time with one squad, pick fights only when in cover. and light up the enemy grens when they try to hide inside cover.

2 combat engineer, 1 conscript, 2 m3 eventually flamers for both. necessary guards for AT (cause they are so good in the m3)

1) soviets will be weak early and most likely cap safe zones towards the further fuel point with priority on the munitions point. at this point if you went double mg you will most like be screwed. you can't cap as fast. you will be deploying agaisn't troops that wont face you head on, as soon as they catch sight of your mg they will try to run away or cap cutoffs. then comes the main event when the two m3 flamers arrive, if a single squad is left alone, they will roast. even on retreat they will die. the m3's will systematically tear you apart.

2) on bigger maps this is where they will shine, they will go for your troops left alone, attack cutoffs and maneuver you so hard that you wish you placed a teller mine on your cutoff earlier. M3's are only afraid of Faust.

2 Con + Sniper + M3

1,2) without sacrificing much early game, this build is harder to use because of the sniper micro and they really have to play it safe. the sniper can lay down the hurt slowly. and because of the size of the german army, retreats are needed. previously the germans have no reliable way of killing these snipers. before the patch if armored car if upgraded, will take ages to kill the snipers if they retreat un-guarded. and if you don't upgrade, you have to spam at least two to maul the m3 to death and take the snipers.

http://www.reddit.com/r/CompanyOfHeroes/comments/1kt0ks/my_thoughts_on_the_metagame_open_to_advice/cbsb4i6

brass ornate all the way baby

I think it would take too long to find games,

Possibly, but I don't think it would be much. I'd take waiting a couple of minutes over wasting 30 minutes of my time anyday. This also goes both ways. Rolling over a RT with my friend isn't exactly entertaining.

Before anyone gets too excited about the 222 buff, it seems the increased damage of AT nades are causing them to go down faster than before.

Seems to me to be about the same as before the patch.

Osteer Sniper is more than viable in 1v1.

I never see them being build and I never build them either. That's all I can say about this unit. 2 games ago I saw the first Ostheer Sniper this month, it had a life span of about 30 seconds.

Had some games with both Germans and Russkies, trying out all the units. Here is how I see it now.

Germans
- Grens: Continue to be swiss army knive of Ostheer
- MG42: Does its job
- Mortar: These are getting build, mostly useless because of mortar halftrack (but OK if you want to preserve some fuel I guess). I don't build them.
- Sniper: Useless
- Officer: Never see these and I certainly don't build them

- Scout Car: Owns russian Scoutcars.
- FLHT: Must
- Pak: Useless
- Pgrens: Can kill other infantry in splitseconds
- Mortar Halftrack: Has napalm. What else you want???


- Stug: Not really useless, but there is no metagame for these things (yet?). Has to competes with other german T3 units.
- Ostwind: Good against infantry but that's about it.
- PzIV: Still the first tank of Ostheer
- Command: I build these things when I get the doctrine.

- T4: Who builds these?

Soviets:
- Conscripts: Conscripts
- Sniper: Must
- Scout Car: Must
- Penals: Useless
- Guards: Must
- Shock: Useless

- Maxim: Useless
- Zis-26: Very good AT/AI weapon that noone ever builds
- Mortar: Useless
- PM-120mm mortar: These are the things I build and that I see getting build.

- HT: Useless except in those 4v4 where germans are spamming strafe
- T-70: Useless
- T-34: Viable first tank, still has to compete with T4->Su-85 techpath. I overall like going T3 first now as it gives much needed flexibility vs. german infantry hordes.

- Katyushka: Noone builds these
- SU-76: Useless
- SU-85: It's the motherfucking SU-85.

There are still some units that are way out of line. Particularly german T4, and soviet T2 continue to be never seen. That's mostly because none of these buildings offer something that can't be done more efficiently with the respective T3. Soviet HT and the SU-76 have zero roles they could fill and are a waste time and money. The HT is mispositioned in T3, it will always come too late to be useful. T1 OR T2 as techpath for soviets doesn't really work, because you really need the units from both buildings. Building both T1 and T2 in early game is certain death due to the high costs of soviet buildings, so skipping one is mandatory. I realize that the idea behind the soviet army is to be less flexible, more standardized equipment, but I'd say at this point soviet is shoe-horned into a singular opening.

Soviet early-mid is still fucked and forces you into scout car micro with flamers and Snipers. While clowncaring germans is fun, once they drive your scout cars of the field you have almost zero force projection. That's compounded by the fact that T3 is still far away at that point in time and T2 doesn't really do anything to solve that problem. Doctrinals also offer you nothing of value at that point. While that may be a concious design decision due to the decision-based teching soviets do, even playing conservatively will make you fall behind. Basically, if you don't fuk a couple of german squads with clown cars in the early game, it's GG.

Please keep in mind that I am writing this from my perspective and have only my own experience to draw from. I am certainly not the best player of this game and it is very possible that the metagame is radically different in the higher echelons of skill (though from what I am reading I doubt it), but these are the issues as I see them.