Maxim is also fairly mobile, also unsuppressable (you can suppress but it'll still shoot) and had such low reinforce costs, the bleed was negligible. Now the Kubel has appeared, people who defended the Maxim are complaining. Yet I have not seen even 1 replay with 6-8 Kubels and I've seen dozens with that many Maxims.
Because the Soviets have great counters to the Kubel.
Don't get me wrong, I'm against having suppression units that can be spammed. It slows the game to a crawl and makes it boring as hell. Which is what Maxims were doing for so long. The point of my post is why people who defended the Maxim tooth and nail are now complaining about a unit that causes exactly the same problem but which can be countered in T1/T2 by soviets.
"If the kubel was just recon, utility and light damage, it would be fine."
Strange I've never seen you or any soviet-biased player (I'm axis biased, sure) say this about the M3HT. That unit has cost this game more players than any other. minimum fun maximum frustration.
A supressed maxim will deal less damage (and supression?) and won't be able to move or turn if pinned. If we add that it gets wiped on retreat...
Dealing with maxim spam is annoying but not OP (1v1). But effective for the amount of effort needed. This is a problem with maxim and conscript design. If maxim where designed to be MG and not LMG with supression, we would have maybe a "proper" use of it. Theres a reason spamming maxims is effective but using it as "support" for your conscripts doesn't work as well.
M3: you can see what is he teching. Its either Penals (lol), snipers (damn) or M3 what is going to be coming from it. It cost fuel, it requires your CE to build T1. On the other hand we have a T0 unit (this was also my concern with the Dodge, but that was doctrinal and had a lacking late game potential).
After that being adressed: what is your opinion with Kubel vs USF. Who cares, right?