Conscripts are not fine. They are very bad in dealing damage, specially in late. And no, they have nothing I need. AT nade is bad, Faust is 10 times better, anti-garrison nade is worst grenade in game, flare mines nobody use, really, cheap pirce should not be excuse of uselessness of unit, close combat is poor because of lowest rate of fire in game. So yes, Im still complaining.
Other options? Which are? Penals - unit with no purpouse, just a little better than Cons. And doctrinal infantry can't change mainlines.
It is clear you want something like Volks. Maybe SU isn't the faction for you.
You most likely use Conscripts wrong.
Every time I throw the AT grenade the vehicle gets snared.
Every time I throw a molotov the garrison empties.
Flare mines always reward me kills. A guaranteed model kill for 10mu ... how can this be bad?
They win in close quarters against both Volks and Grens.
If you really don't want to play with conscripts, which is understandable, you can make a mainline with call-in infantry, guards will do just fine, or even mix in some shocktroops, or just play the others two factions available to you, their mainline infantry can blob pretty nice, like Volks do.