I don't really know what I did

But apparently it worked. If anyone with more beta experience than me could review/rate this, it'd be cool.

That was also streamed at http://www.twitch.tv/sebcoh/b/412646655?t=26m37s

Also first replay I posted here yay !

FINALLY SEBBRO IS FUCKING BACK.

Now, I'll check your game and let you know

You need a proper review, many things changed from the Alpha and from COH. Tomorrow I'll explain everything to you ^^

Other player's unit preservation could use some work, and that was a very ill-planned attack they made on the center with their StuG. That early Pak 40 did them no favors either. You did a great job securing the map and although I'm not sure a mortar was very helpful, I guess there's not much else to spend the manpower on. T-34 spam is definitely the way to go so I'd keep doing that - maybe don't build any T-70s, though. Since you didn't end up using your doctrine at all, really, the one that lets you Hit the Dirt would've been more helpful.

He's a top player, give him top tips !!!!!!!!!

First of all Sebbro, despite what your opponent did, the nature of this map makes the German player having better time capping the north of Kholodny because it's more open and easier to defend with MGs, while the south is full of hedges, this means your first Engineer should always start capping the south while your first conscripts squad should try to contest the mid munitions point (that is closer to the left base), while you should use very offensively the rest of the conscripts on the top part of the map.

Remember to issue multiple orders before capping, units will always take the shortest path to reach a point but if there's a fence they won't automatically vault it (so you should issue multiple orders, move->vault->reach the point to cap).

Tactical map, even if not 100% perfect, works now, use num 0 of your keyboard to open it (or click on the button in the right bottom corner of the minimap).

To spend less time possible between each capped point ensure to be at the edge of each capping circle of all the points, on the side where the next point you want to cap is.

In 1vs1 molotovs are ok but not that great, simply because their throwing time is very long so a decent player will always dodge them. Since I'm pretty sure your aggressive playstyle is like mine I suggest you skipping them and going to a 3 conscripts 2 engineers build, getting flamer as soon as possible, building T1 and a scout car with the second engineer a few seconds after the squad gets on the field and using engineers into M3A1 in an aggressive way (but fear multiple grenadiers that can panzerfaust you and stay at max distance vs them, the cal.50 of the M3A1 will do its dmg don't worry and you won't risk to lose it).

Remember that "Ooorah" grants only movement speed bonus +1 and that units attack less frequently while running with "Ooorah" activated, that units do not attack at all when you soft retreat them (when they give their back to an enemy unit they do not attack it at all), that flamethrowers attack only when stationary or when they are inside a vehicle.

A couple more things, houses are a lot more resistent to small arms fire and snipers have a decreased accuracy vs them.

The T-34 transition is ok but the more I play the game the more I find it "meh", since the whole T3 German building counters T34s (StuG, PIV and Ostwind kill a T-34 in a 1vs1 fight, unless you micro your T-34 better than how he microes his Ostwind, which shouldn't be that hard).

PaKs are pretty meh, but Panzerschrecks are very good and in the current build Panzerfausts from Grenadiers always cause engine damaged (so don't be overaggressive when you face grens+pgrens).

In that game flaming halftrack (which is a strong unit even if expensive) could have become a real treat to deal with, since it requires a lot of AT nades to go down and focused fire from infantry, but he wasn't enough aggressive with it. My personal solution for it is taking the doctrine with Guards and PPSh and getting an early Guard squad inside an M3A1, it will have easy time destroying the flaming HT and any other T2 vehicle.

In general if you want to go for a 3 conscripts T2 start I suggest you getting a Maxim MG, it deals a lot of damage and it's perfect to fight PGrens I personally do not go anymore T-34s because I find like the German T3 counters them too hard but they are totally viable when you get at least an AT gun on the field

Whenever you get on Steam contact me and I'll tell you more about the current build orders Hope this helped you ^^

Wow thanks, that's more than I expected to learn.

Btw is doctrine stuff that much better here that it is required ?

On vcoh as US you kinda needed one to win to go with the general strat, but as WM for example is was totally possible to win without any, because basic units and spending muni on mines and upgrades was just as good as any possible doc ability (or actually even better, since mines were so cost efficient), and also there was no real gap that needed to be filled.

I don't care to use a doctrine for the sake of it if it has no benefit (but tbh here I didn't use any because I have absolutely no clue what it available to me).

First of all Sebbro, despite what your opponent did, the nature of this map makes the German player having better time capping the north of Kholodny because it's more open and easier to defend with MGs, while the south is full of hedges, this means your first Engineer should always start capping the south while your first conscripts squad should try to contest the mid munitions point (that is closer to the left base), while you should use very offensively the rest of the conscripts on the top part of the map.

So german play is still supposed to revolve around MG ?

Remember to issue multiple orders before capping, units will always take the shortest path to reach a point but if there's a fence they won't automatically vault it (so you should issue multiple orders, move->vault->reach the point to cap).

Worse, I forgot we could do that! And spend hours walking around the map and wondering why it was so long. I even wired the left next to a fence which is probably useless then. :/

Tactical map, even if not 100% perfect, works now, use num 0 of your keyboard to open it (or click on the button in the right bottom corner of the minimap).

I never really used it on coh.

To spend less time possible between each capped point ensure to be at the edge of each capping circle of all the points, on the side where the next point you want to cap is.

I do that early game already. Even starting to walk before the point is fully capped.

In 1vs1 molotovs are ok but not that great, simply because their throwing time is very long so a decent player will always dodge them. Since I'm pretty sure your aggressive playstyle is like mine I suggest you skipping them and going to a 3 conscripts 2 engineers build, getting flamer as soon as possible, building T1 and a scout car with the second engineer a few seconds after the squad gets on the field and using engineers into M3A1 in an aggressive way (but fear multiple grenadiers that can panzerfaust you and stay at max distance vs them, the cal.50 of the M3A1 will do its dmg don't worry and you won't risk to lose it).

Any kind of grenades in vcoh was dodgeable, it was still useful and could win early games. It depends on how smart you are with them and how the opponent reacts.

What might really change my mind is how bad they seemed to be against buildings in another game I played. (?)

Also can you burn from your own grenade or not? Sometimes I walked into it I wasn't really sure.

Remember I've discovered the flamer vehicle rush in early beta with you, I might try it again. It was so broken I thought it was fixed.

Remember that "Ooorah" grants only movement speed bonus +1 and that units attack less frequently while running with "Ooorah" activated, that units do not attack at all when you soft retreat them (when they give their back to an enemy unit they do not attack it at all), that flamethrowers attack only when stationary or when they are inside a vehicle.

I was trying to figure out that ooorah thing, I guess that works like fire up rangers then. Good to know about flamers. Mind blown about soft retreat. That makes picking good fights so much more important. Or maybe just need to play ad carry style hit and run between attack speed (I need to check how long that is and how long they take to turn around fight and turn again).

A couple more things, houses are a lot more resistent to small arms fire and snipers have a decreased accuracy vs them.

Grenades suck vs them too? What is answer then, flamer ? mortar ?

Does smoke works like it used too (decreased accuracy, no suppress, but flame and stuff the same ) ?

The T-34 transition is ok but the more I play the game the more I find it "meh", since the whole T3 German building counters T34s (StuG, PIV and Ostwind kill a T-34 in a 1vs1 fight, unless you micro your T-34 better than how he microes his Ostwind, which shouldn't be that hard).

I don't even know what is T-34 and if I build one there or not LOL. I guess I'll figure out that kind of stuff, even if a tier counters it, I'd assume you can always hit and run and play around like it was possible with m8 or sherman. Or even just used it to cover AT guns and other stuff I don't know.

PaKs are pretty meh, but Panzerschrecks are very good and in the current build Panzerfausts from Grenadiers always cause engine damaged (so don't be overaggressive when you face grens+pgrens).

Ok I'll try to pay attention.

In that game flaming halftrack (which is a strong unit even if expensive) could have become a real treat to deal with, since it requires a lot of AT nades to go down and focused fire from infantry, but he wasn't enough aggressive with it. My personal solution for it is taking the doctrine with Guards and PPSh and getting an early Guard squad inside an M3A1, it will have easy time destroying the flaming HT and any other T2 vehicle.

That seems strong for how fast it came, or maybe I just teched slow on my side.

About small arms (focused fire ?), what vehicles do they kill or don't ? What is the limit ? Each compared to riflemen effectiveness vs bike, pe ht, wm ht, tank ?

In general if you want to go for a 3 conscripts T2 start I suggest you getting a Maxim MG, it deals a lot of damage and it's perfect to fight PGrens I personally do not go anymore T-34s because I find like the German T3 counters them too hard but they are totally viable when you get at least an AT gun on the field

My only plan here was to spam the shit out of infatry (3 rifle nade 2 rifle heal style) and cap all the map and then buil random units.

What kind of AT do you use if you go T1 and vehicle flamer rush ? Still build T2 ? Or you rush the vehicle from T2 ?

Whenever you get on Steam contact me and I'll tell you more about the current build orders Hope this helped you ^^

Ok thanks for the help, it definitely did. I'll hopefully stream some more tonight. I don't really want to discuss extensively just yet though, I need to experience it more.

Also how useful are mines here ? Rate from sherman smoke to vcoh mine opness.

The idea behind mines has been changed a bit now, as germans can build a minefield.. imo they should change it to the same as soviets. Maybe make it cost 25 muni with a single mine, because soviet mine does alot of damage right now and is worth the 35 muni. But i never use german mines anymore, because the minefield has posts warning u "HEY ITS A MINEFIELD" which makes it pointless.

Change the minefield for germans and it would give more of a mind game.

I saw those signs and lol'd pretty hard.

Wow thanks, that's more than I expected to learn.

Btw is doctrine stuff that much better here that it is required ?

On vcoh as US you kinda needed one to win to go with the general strat, but as WM for example is was totally possible to win without any, because basic units and spending muni on mines and upgrades was just as good as any possible doc ability (or actually even better, since mines were so cost efficient), and also there was no real gap that needed to be filled.

I don't care to use a doctrine for the sake of it if it has no benefit (but tbh here I didn't use any because I have absolutely no clue what it available to me).

Both factions can win without doctrines, but the Soviet ones are 5 times more useful than the German ones. Lots of elite infantry call-ins and abilities like hit the dirt and PPSH upgrades on the conscripts or vehicle self repair and 120mm mortar while Germans have nothing really comparable.

So german play is still supposed to revolve around MG ?

Yes the mg is very good and I find it automatically switches targets between suppressed infantry to non-suppressed infantry easily able to pinning an entire army approaching from the front. Though conscripts are a little better than riflemen in vcoh at flanking mgs due to abilities like oorah and molotovs which are a burning over time damage rather than a once off damage forcing the mg to move. I usually only get one in 1v1 since maps are pretty big and you need to be more mobile


Any kind of grenades in vcoh was dodgeable, it was still useful and could win early games. It depends on how smart you are with them and how the opponent reacts.

Yea I've been rocking the 3 conscripts to molotov myself, Imo molotovs hit at exactly the right time to flank mgs and tip engagements vs grenadiers. Also houses are almost impervious to small arms fire but molotovs are super effective against them. It burns troops quickly out of houses and prevents them from getting in again. So keep doing this build until the metagame settles down

Also can you burn from your own grenade or not? Sometimes I walked into it I wasn't really sure.

Yes you can.

I was trying to figure out that ooorah thing, I guess that works like fire up rangers then. Good to know about flamers. Mind blown about soft retreat. That makes picking good fights so much more important. Or maybe just need to play ad carry style hit and run between attack speed (I need to check how long that is and how long they take to turn around fight and turn again).

Use oorah so you can get quicker to where you want e.g. flanking the mg from behind. Remember oorah is not like fireup since you will get suppressed so don't use oorah on the squad that is going to be suppressed.

Grenades suck vs them too? What is answer then, flamer ? mortar ?

For soviets the answer is clown car with flamer inside and/or molotovs. For Germans there is almost no counter (rifle grenades are very unreliable against buildings) until flamer halftrack. Don't bother getting an early pio flamer as Germans as it dies easily and costs alot of munitions.

Does smoke works like it used too (decreased accuracy, no suppress, but flame and stuff the same ) ?

I'm not entirely sure how smoke works in the game but the main difference between coh2 smoke and coh1 smoke is that coh2 smoke blocks line of sight. So an mg or AT gun won't fire on the infantry or tanks which are behind the smoke. Smoke is useful at flanking mgs and protecting your tanks. I'm currently playing the German doctrine where you can put smooke canisters on your tanks which is useful for saving the tanks from the last critical shot. Just fire the smoke and back away.

I don't even know what is T-34 and if I build one there or not LOL. I guess I'll figure out that kind of stuff, even if a tier counters it, I'd assume you can always hit and run and play around like it was possible with m8 or sherman. Or even just used it to cover AT guns and other stuff I don't know.

T34s are an excellend transition if you're winning since they are so cheap and spammable. But you have to use them wisely as they do very little real damage to tanks and have weak armour. But they are good at countering tanks once you get more T34s than the enemy has tanks. The reason is ram. Ram is currently broken and we're waiting for it to be fixed. It disables the tank's and enemy tank's main gun and engine. So long as you have more T34s than the enemy has tanks, you just ram it with one tank and let the other shoot the helpless german tank to death. Remembers stugs, ostwinds and p4s are much more expensive than T34s so trading blow for blow is quite good for you.

That seems strong for how fast it came, or maybe I just teched slow on my side.

About small arms (focused fire ?), what vehicles do they kill or don't ? What is the limit ? Each compared to riflemen effectiveness vs bike, pe ht, wm ht, tank ?

The only real shock unit the germans have is the flamer halftrack so be ready to prepare for that. There are many counters if you can get the unit up in time to meet it. The poor man's counter is what Marcus said, guards in an m3, almost like an oh shit button as the m3 can easily go down so remember to kite. Some other counters if you have the fuel is a quick T70 or SU-76 or any kind of armour. I find T70s most effective as it is fast and can easily kite infantry and paks. It also snipes very effectively too. Just be careful with it as it has weak armour.

My only plan here was to spam the shit out of infatry (3 rifle nade 2 rifle heal style) and cap all the map and then buil random units.

What kind of AT do you use if you go T1 and vehicle flamer rush ? Still build T2 ? Or you rush the vehicle from T2 ?

Imo you have too many conscripts, it's almost the equivalent of spamming volksgrenadiers, they're not the best infantry you can have. The current soviet build I'm doing is: 3 conscripts->molotov->heal(if needed)->retreat engy (or if I'm winning just build another engy)->T1-> clown car->penals/Guard/Shocktroops->AT nades->T3/T4.

The only real vehicle the german player can rush is flamer halftrack. AT nades are enough to slow it down. But remember don't bother to rely simply on AT nades to kill the flamer halftrack. And don't even bother throwing it if you cannot kill it. Just instantly retreat if it catches one your units harassing as flamer halftrack can kill troops on retreat really easily if you stop and throw. If needed you can slow it down by throwing an AT nade just so it gets a damaged engine critical. Get some real counters to it from T1 or T3/T4 and your AT problems will be solved for early game.

Mines are very good though slightly less effective than vcoh mines so long as you have the munitions. Soviet mines are kinda random against infantry, doesn't suppress them and sometimes one guy dies, sometimes 3 guys dies. German mines are ok but expensive so i'm usually strapping for munis. So I only get them when I'm winning and you can win without them anyways.

Hope this helps.

Seb, you're no newbie! Lots of bad play on my part. Need some tips. More later, have to run!

Booked!

About doctrines, as I wrote in the 1vs1 balance thread in the eSports forum, yes you need a doctrine when you play Russians vs a competent opponent, and this is also part of the reason because they are stronger than the German ones. Germans simply do not rely on them that much and they have a minor impact on your gameplay (compared to the Russian ones at least).

In my experience you can play 1vs1 both relying on an MG or by simply spamming Grenadiers. MGs are better than their COH equivalent, they switch targets instantly and they do overall more damage (pinned units start received increased damage after a few seconds now). On the other side, TrueSight and ColdTech, as well as smoke being useful now, made MGs less viable. I never get more than one and I usually rely on a strong T1-T2 strategy (3grens,mg,mortar,sniper->T2) to ensure I have a good number of early game units on the field to stop Russian power in the first minutes.

As I said molotovs are ok, but the animation of the guy throwing the molotov takes a lot more time than vCOH (you will notice the difference if you call a special infantry unit like Shock Troops and Guards and try using their grenades), so yeah a decent opponent will most likely dodge them. More than that I feel like those 25 fuel are spent better to get the first M3A1. The M3A1 is not that strong as it was before, but it's cheap and it offers a lot of mobility around the map, you can use snipers/engineers/guards inside to counter infantry/MGs and garrisoned units/light vehicles. For me it has the same impact an M8 could have in COH. But again, having played on the other side too I can assure you it's nothing that hard too counter.

Vs buildings flames, molotovs, grenades, ATs, tanks but more than that grenadiers grenade launcher and mortars are the best way to clean them. You have to aim the exact window where you want to throw the grenade, it affects the damage dealt by a lot, especially molotovs. (pretty much like in coh, but if you don't aim correctly in COH2 you may cause less to no damage at all). Units still attack faster the closer you get to your target as in COH.

A T34 is the medium tank you've built, it's a worse Sherman more or less, which I found more consistant vs infantry. The small tank you built was the T-70 and it's like the old American T17, capable of shooting very fast, good vs light vehicles and infantry.

The effectiveness of small arms fire on the scout car and the halftrack right now is: scout car feels more or less like PE scout car, halftrack feels to be something between a scout car when you use the ability to secure a point and a Puma. You won't kill it with normal fire usually, but if it's left with few HP small arms fire will do the job.
On a side note: the frontal MG of the M3A1 does penetrate the armor of the Halftrack like butter

For the rest, yes play more and experience these things yourself

Anti tank mines from both sides are great against tanks, about as effective as Teller mines. Russian AT mines counter infantry too, with mixed results though never a bad idea if you are floating muni. German S (anti personnel) minefield takes way too long to construct, but its effects are comparable to PE sector artillery if there isn't a minesweeper nearby. However tanks can plow through the S minefield and take almost no damage.

Anti tank mines from both sides are great against tanks, about as effective as Teller mines. Russian AT mines counter infantry too, with mixed results though never a bad idea if you are floating muni. German S (anti personnel) minefield takes way too long to construct, but its effects are comparable to PE sector artillery if there isn't a minesweeper nearby. However tanks can plow through the S minefield and take almost no damage.

Thanks Marcus for your input. The problem that I had was that I was not maintaining map control because I was bleeding manpower. Also, it's probably true that I could have used my FHT to better effect, but was worried that he had an AT/mine laying around. GG Seb!

I know what you did - you picked russians