Both USF and OKW were Over-performing upon release and regarding all these nerfs for USF, OKW received the same treatment.
When both factions released I played them both extensively. The best way to learn how to counter a faction is to play it first.
OKW did not receive the same treatment, let me explain. First the initial design of OKW was that of a fuel starved faction. The faction had a significant fuel penalty. To make up for the penalty it required extensive knowledge of the map to salvage wreckages on the field (which weren't clearly explained to the player unless you made a custom game and tried each map to determine optimal salvage points without the AI interfering with you) and to use your Mechanized Truck in which you can convert Ammo to Fuel or Fuel to Ammo. This meant that you had to choose what resource to prioritize and that your units were significantly stronger to compensate. You also did not have access to a stock machine gun.
Naturally once something new comes out people will struggle not because of something is OP but because of the lack of knowledge on how to deal with it. Once players figured out how OKW worked you saw endless Allied Blobs. Penal Spam, Rifle Spam etc which forced OKW to adapt and they had to pick either the Luftwaffe Commander for the CP 1 MG-34 or the Defense Commander for the MG-34 as well.
This led to massive tears in the OKW community because they were forced to pick the same commanders each game just to get the MG-34. Second the fuel penalty while a good idea was way too map dependent. Some maps the design worked fine...on other maps it was a huge fail so they rallied to get the fuel penalty removed.
In smaller game modes OKW was balanced with the fuel penalty. What made them overpowered was when you combined larger maps with a Whermacht player who focused on making Caches which were only 200 MP at the time instead of 250. Now that the resource penalty didn't apply to them (due to caches) they can pump out a King Tiger in like 8 minutes (or less). On their own they were fine but horrendous map design and Whermacht caches threw the balance way out of whack.
Most of the nerfs that OKW received were because adjustments had to be made due to the removal of the Fuel Penalty (which was a significant buff) that the faction was designed around.
Overall they made out like a bandit and were made stronger despite the nerfs. They got to keep their fancy toys like the Stuka that were specifically designed with the factions lack of fuel capacity in mind which is why you can still get it earlier than any other rocket artillery today. Sure it got nerfed but considering the easier access made by the fuel penalty removal overall it was a huge net buff for the faction overall
USF on the other hand have been crippled and made significantly worse over time, they never had a resource penalty setting them back or gimmicks in their design such as needing to salvage resources. These nerfs shrunk the USF player base considerably that most USF players are die hard fans of the faction creating a smaller concentrated group of experienced players that tend to be significantly more skilled than players of other factions. You have much more people playing Axis for either faction than USF including the baddies which makes the numbers look more even than they actually do.
Any nerf USF has received were straight nerfs outright gutting entire units. When was the last time anyone made a Stuart or M20? Compared to T-70 or AEC which show up at least 50% of the time. Meanwhile every single Axis Unit is good at its intended role most USF things in general have no role and if they do they are the worst at that role compared to every faction. Even the meme OKW IR Spotlight Track that was a joke for so long became a good unit. Meanwhile USF are stuck with array of sub-par units like Rear Echelon which are almost universally agreed upon to be useless with the only saving grace being that they can carry weapons like the Bazooka.
Now if you look at UKF they have a similar weapon rack system but you never hear UKF players complain that Royal Engineers are useless because unlike Rear Echelon, Royal Engineers serve a purpose and have an actual/important role in the army while Rear Echelon do not besides being Cache Builder and their to repair the Pershing if you happen to be brave enough to pick that Commander.
USF lacks design focus and rely on crutch units like the Jackson or Calliope to remain remotely competitive. It is a house of cards waiting to fall.
As far as Infantry Goes, why go USF when I can play Soviets with Penals which are not only better but have access to superior support weapons such as 2CP DSHK. I also don't need to worry about Calliope as I have Katyusha which is cheaper and better (since Calliope had its cooldown nerfed multiple times). I can also get Shock Troops which are rangers that don't cost ammo to upgrade.
UKF also have Raid Sections now which are better than Rifleman while having easier access to MG (though the Vickers is rather shit at least it is easier to access) and easier access to AT Guns which are not only significantly better but don't cost ammo to actually use. Even without Raid Sections you are not handicapped by having the trash Rear Echelon squad at the start so you can build momentum up faster by having more viable squads out on the field (similar to OKW) while getting much better tanks later on.
Besides ambulance there is literally no reason to have a USF player on your team as they bring nothing but mediocrity as anything unique or special that they once had has been gutted. Hell UKF even has better Air Strikes than USF now that the P47 has been gutted into the ground. Which is misleading because every USF trailer came out showcased USF air strikes making you think USF actually has a good array of air power to choose from but they don't even win on that front.
It is also unfair for you to bash the balance team regarding there unfair treatment of USF, i distinctly remember OKW having volks timing and MP nerfs early game SOLEY for USF who where struggling with mass volk swarm while UKF and soviets were fine with it. OKW early game was nerfed solely for USF.
This is a perfect example and an excellent case as to why the balance team is an epic failure. Broad changes have broad consequences. OKW struggled with Maxims. They give OKW buffs to address Maxims, now USF struggles vs OKW. So Balance Team decides to buff rifleman, now rifleman dominate grenadiers. Rifleman then get nerfed. The balance team creates an endless cycle creating further imbalance instead of doing targeted surgical buffs like COH 1 did.
So in the instance where USF were struggling vs OKW I would have given Rifleman or Rear Echelon either an accuracy buff or recieved accuracy buff only vs the specific units that are causing the imbalance. This way we solve the actual issue without creating further issues with other factions causing an endless cycle of nonsense.
Take another situation as an example. Lets take a current hot topic like the M8 Scott as an example. USF struggle with team weapon spam which forces them to pick Calliope every single game. Since we know Calliope wont be made non doctrinal the same way the HMG-34 was made non doctrinal for OKW for being forced to pick a commander for a specific unit every game and we cannot expect to have equal access to basic tools rather than address the problem the balance team will do a song and dance and adjust numbers. New numbers are just an illusion that don't actually fix the damn problem.
How about Giving the M8 Scott a (random number as an example)50% damage penalty vs normal infantry squads but a 50% damage bonus vs Team Weapons. Granted Katyusha/Panzerwerfer/Stuka don't have such a limitation and can delete entire units but this is USF which can't have equal access to useful things.
Anyway this approach would not only make sense but solve the issue of Team Weapon Spam while not deleting the entire Axis Army for all the cry babies who like to cry about their units being deleted while having the ability to do so themselves.
This approach would require fairly advanced knowledge of the Modding Tools instead of employing simple number changing that they typically do (We don't even have accurate tooltips so my expectation of the balance team is rather low considering fixing tooltips is a low effort task) but we don't get actual solutions to issues from the balance team, only smoke and mirrors while lacking the foresight to prevent future problems such as the changes they made to SturmTiger.
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