Profile of The_Courier

T34/76 easily penetrates a Tiger/Panther?

I want some of what the OP's smoking.

grens are meant to scale. cons are not. the majority of soviet doctrines have elite infantry for a reason.

Thing is, all other factions don't need a particular doctrine to get quality scaling infantry. They get their rifles and volks/Obers and grens/PGrens no matter what. It could be a case of asymmetric balance for sure, except it also pretty much pigeon holds most Soviet players into taking a doctrine with Shock Troops, since Guards are a bit lackluster against infantry and PPShs are only situationaly useful.

And other factions, save for Ostheer, can also get doctrinal elite infantry on top of their non-doctrinal goodness, so that's not unique to the Soviets anymore either. Airborne, Falls, Panzerfusiliers and Jaegers all fit. Assault engineers if you really stretch it too.

Conscripts aren't meant to scale, but IMO they should. Being pretty much forced to get Shocks in order to have my infantry go toe to toe with my enemy's gets old. Against Ostheer it's not that bad, but against the OKW elite infantry swarm conscripts simply cannot cut it, and Penals are barely better. There's a reason Maxims are much favored.

I'm not certain DPs are the answer, but conscripts do need help. Out of all the core infantry units (scripts, rifles, grens, volks), they are the only ones that have no way to properly scale. Molotovs and At nades don't count since everyone else gets an equivalent too. They become pure cannon fodder mid-late game, especially against OKW and its bevy of long-range elite infantry. Even PPShs are hit and miss, because they have a hard time surviving to make use of them in many cases.

And no, I don't think that because their name is ''conscript'', they should scale badly. Volksgrenadiers are a fancy name for ''we're scraping the bottom of the barrel'', yet they are proper combat units that have excellent veterancy and a solid AT option, as well as a grenade that doesn't need to be researched, while costing the same.

I'm not sure a weapon upgrade is what's needed. Maybe a squad size increase with vet 2 or 3, like for Rear Echelons? Something that increases their general durability so they can more reliably use abilities without being decimated in 3 seconds by incoming fire? Whatever it is, they need some sort of scaling mechanism. In the WFA meta of everyone having elite infantry at the 6-7 minute mark, the role of conscripts is severely limited.

I would be fine with putting OKW Panther stats on the Ost one. Ostheer T4 needs love anyway. OKW already has the KT and ridiculous veterancy to reflect their elite status, they don't need a magically superior Panther.

Anymore than that, however, I'm not sure. The Panther is still a pretty great tank hunter. Sure, it can,t solo two heavier mediums, but I'm pretty sure it's not supposed to given the cost disparity. It sill wins 1v1 against anything save an IS-2, and even then luck and micro can make it the victor. Well supported and using its range/speed advantage (Blitzkrieg yo) it can deal serious damage. Stat normalization and a slight price decrease are the most it needs.

A larger problem could very well be the call ins by themselves, which allow you to have instant medium/heavies (rather than wait, for example, a full 60 seconds for Jacksons) with no need to tech. Perhaps call-in costs across the board need an increase, to reflect the fact they arrive quicker without the player having to commit additional fuel for teching.

If Katyusha had 2 minutes cd, costed 130 fuel to produce, smaller range and had tighter AoE I wouldn't mind it to stay the way it is provided damage to the base building was adjusted. Ambient building damage can be the same.

''It's fine if you apply 5 nerfs to it''. Yeah great reasoning. it's OP but it's not an insta-win unit either.

And it IS also very vulnerable. That doesn't make it balanced, but the thing dies to 1 tank shot and is very cumbersome. On some map, it's very possible to track down and destroy, depending on opponent's skill.

It needs nerfs. That is beyond question. What it doesn't need is to be hit so hard with the nerfbat it sinks into irrelevance once again.

Arty in general needs to be looked at, honestly. Rocket artillery currently dominates the meta by being mobile and tremendously powerful, while most howitzers save the B4, and even then, are barely ever built because they are too cumbersome, easy to avoid and easily destroyed. Even after the buff, the 480 MP US pack howie still barely tickles the enemy, for example. Howitzers should be the more powerful but immobile ones, rocket artillery needs a nerf across the board for being way too easy to use and way too potent in general. In particular it needs a range and damage decrease IMO.