Profile of CieZ

Mortars are completely RNG dependent and require a "lucky" hit, does seem like the best counter. However the scout car offers protection from mortars. Is it true the second model never dies!?!? WHAT?? So it is an exploit!!! Ugh ...

Flanking and hiding are good strats, however very good players stay away from those blinds spots and use cons/guards to scout. That's what I do, I am 4-0 with this cheapAss strat.

One thing you forgot to mention is the at gun. Though not the most reliable it can kill that pesky scout car and open up more opportunities to get a mortar hit. HOWEVER, by this time he is well on his way to katuysha or sU-76 and has been contesting your fuel while keeping his.. Plus hAs been draining your mp for first 4-7 minutes of the game.

222??? No sir, completely unreliable. It's a tin can. If your opponent messes up royally then I guess...

So basically it takes skill and a lot of luck to beat it. Once you can kill the scout car, especially early, there is a better chance.

As far as I've tested (and this has been reported) the second Soviet sniper model is immune to countersniping while inside the M3. It can still die to anything else (mortars/mines/nades) etc etc. I wouldn't really call it an exploit because I don't think anyone knew about it (myself included) until a friend and I extensively tested it, so I don't think anyone was purposely abusing it. Additionally I've ever seen anyone but myself and a couple close friends countersnipe into the M3.

Anyways, a lot of this game is dependent on RNG and it is easy to chalk up mortars to just being "rng" counters to things but you could claim that about a mortar shooting at any squad. Sure there's a small chance that you can go an entire game without your mortar landing a single hit on anything, but it isn't likely. Even a perfect PGren flank could fail to kill both models because... well... "rng." Part of this game is creating situations where rng favors you, and taking advantage of that. The mortar HT (or even a regular mortar) over the course of a game will have a pretty damn good chance of instantly killing the sniper, but even if it doesn't it still puts heavy bleed on guards and the incendiary round is an extremely useful area denial tool.

The 222 is great just to keep the M3 at bay and to force guards to be constantly present. Sure you're probably never going to actually kill the M3 against a good player, but you also shouldn't lose your 222. Guard/Sniper early game is generally something like 1 Sniper, 1-2 Cons, 2-3 Guards - the important thing is that they usually only have 5 infantry squads, even less if they go double or triple sniper. If you force one guard squad to constantly babysit the M3 because of your 222s presence on the field they only have 3 squads (4 if you really want to count CEs as a combat squad mid game) to contest the rest of the map, in which case you should have a larger portion of the map held than the sniper player.

To beat a strat you either have to undermine its strengths, or exploit its weaknesses. The strength of sniper/guard is extreme manpower efficiency since you're almost never directly engaging in infantry combat, and your sniper can put heavy bleed on the German player. I've played sniper/guard/su85 since beta and trust me when I say, if you start losing lots of guards you're going to be *extremely* manpower bled, ultimately making it very difficult to tech or get T34/85s. Consequently the best ways to bleed guards, while avoiding snipers are the German sniper, and mortars/mortar HT.

Alternatively you could exploit the weakness of this strat - map control. You don't want your sniper to be capping, and you always need a squad spotting for the sniper, and you probably won't have PPSh or molotovs which means your Cons will lose to grens, badly, as soon as LMGs/G43s enter the equation. All of this culminates in the fact that if the German player spreads himself out and caps multiple points on the map simultaneously it becomes difficult to hold onto everything, since you'll probably only be winning fights where your sniper is present. Guards with DPs can stand up to vanilla grens, and can beat LMG grens if you land a good grenade but in terms of MP efficiency you'll still probably be on the losing end of the trade.

Isu152s are good ... I love them ... But in big games I still think the tiger is the best tank to have (in small games too )

Molotov's are also good but Idk if Id rate them as miles better than rifle nades (especially figuring in the fuel cost of molotoves)

Kv8 I didnt include because it has no counterpart (its an awesome tank just crazy one dimensional)

Sov snipers are better when going agaisnt the german sniper, but due to cloaking speed,and rate of fire i persinally rate the german sniper as slightly superior (althougg less survivable)

Lets not get into offmap artillery/airsupport i think both sides have very good options there

I disagree with the guard dominance that you describe. Their AI is decent at best and the AT peters off quickly after german t3/4 hits the field. Button is awesone but it does get broken quite easily (smoke,nos, etc)

Well my main point in including the offmaps/doctrinal stuff is that you can't really just compared two "counterpart" units in a vacuum and declare one faction to be better than the other. You have to consider what they're fighting against and you have to consider what else is in the game to support them. Guards tend to fall into this category as well. Sure they lose horribly to Pgrens unless you land an awesome grenade but their impact on the game with how flexible they are is pretty much unsurpassed.

I don't think Shocks are a problem at 1 CP, I find them much easier to deal with than early guards. But a lot of that has to do with the fact that early guards are almost always accompanied by Snipers.

For me Tiger vs ISU152 is map dependent, but then again they fulfill different roles so it is hard to compare them. Tigers are great units for spearheading attacks and they can be very annoying to finish off - especially once they unlock turbodrive (Blitz). ISU152 just get to sit back and 1 shot things all day, which is why I love them (I actually think their ability to instantly gib squads is over the top).

I'd love to play in a tournament that you run but if necessary I could help you run it, and then perhaps you help me run a 2vs2 tournament. We could even see about a bunch of people from the clan helping you run another game keys tournament.

Also, I've considered shoutcasting before and I know Con has wanted to as well, maybe the two of us could cast the games for your tournament.

there is a way to kill the stuka bomb, before he drops the bomb?! I thought there is no way, to kill the stuka bomber...

The stuka bomb from that call in does not actually come from a plane that spawns in the game, so even with all the AA in the world, you can't stop it.

As far as I know the only thing you can "shoot down" with Ostwinds/Quad m5s are the strafing runs.

I find this thread and topic beyond hilarious! Shocks are the one (count it one) soviet unit that isn't outperformed directly by its German counterpart and there is outrage by the German players.

Greens > cons
Pgrens > guards/penals
P4 >>> t34
Panther >> su85
Tiger >>> pick a unit
Panzerwerfer > katushka
German bunker > sov b... Oh wait sovs dont get one
German mortar > sov mortar (vet 1 they even out)
Do I need to keep going?
Wait. Just for lols .... Tiger ace >> actually that's not even worth filling out

Are you guys really that mad that you have to micro and actually play well against the one unit that the german equivilant isnt suoerior?? How do you think soviets feel when pgrens clown cons/guards/penals like they aren't even there? Do you think sovs like having to use 2-3x the manpower (if they don't have the doctrinal shocks) to counter pgrens?

I think you forgot to mention that the Soviet sniper squad is > German sniper.
CE > Pios (not that this has much of an impact on the game, but still the Soviet counterpart is stronger)

Guards and Pgrens fulfill different roles, can't really compare them. Aside from that fact Guards are almost indisputably the best infantry in the game. I'd certainly take them over Pgrens any day. They dominate light vehicles, they're still strong against German T3, their grenades give them the potential to win any infantry engagement, DPs are actually crazy good, button vehicle is possibly the most broken ability in the entire game, they have the best squad AI plus the best Vet bonuses (and they vet so quickly from shooting vehicles).

Vet 1 Soviet mortar is better than a German mortar ever will be, by far.

If you lose Su85s to Panthers, you're really doing it wrong.

Katyushas are probably stronger than Panzerwerfers, especially considering that they're in Soviet T4, which is significantly more viable than German T4 (at least in 1v1).

ISU-152 is by a mile the best tank in any mode bigger than 1v1 - and even in 1v1 I've had great success with it.

Of course all of this isn't taking into account how strong molotovs are, IL-2 strafe being batshit crazy, incendiary barrage being probably the second best off-map (only behind IL-2), Soviet mines being freaking amazing, demo charges 1 shotting squads all day, mark target being bonkers, Kv8s well... being Kv8s.

Anyways, in 1v1 Germans probably have a slight advantage this patch - although Sniper/Guard is still really hard to beat 1v1. In team game Soviets are just absurd with 1 CP Shocks/Guards/Snipers on the field simultaneously.