Because your damage is now halved on retreat. So where micro could be implemented “grenades on retreat” it’s not worth it now. Even the mind games of tossing a grenade to the side or a little behind cover in hopes your opponent dodges onto it. Are now void. Because it’s just better to retreat.
Well its true to some extend, except for maybe PGs\Guards because from my experience they can be used to wipe squads on retreat.
But again, retreating in CoH3 with all its phasing is punished way more, because maps are significantly bigger. In CoH2 most of the 2v2\4v4 maps are about the size of a 1v1\2v2 map of COH3, or at least in feels like it. In CoH2 whole idea of retreat being a bad thing, was basically replaced with wipes, because 1v1\2v2 had incredibly small maps, so you was able to be back in action in a fraction of a time it takes in 3. 3v3\4v4 had big maps (which were the least popular), but even they were sabotaged by forward retreat points.
I personally have 50\50 opinion here. On one hand, ability to predict impact is good, as well as not being screwed by RNG, on the other hand, game sometimes do feel forgiving for some idiotic or greedy moves, especially if player who is doing them have time to spare, since he is only really punished via time he wasted.
So I would say units during retreats should be easier to wipe, but not as easy as it was in CoH2, because its balanced out by different factors, which weren't present in 2.
I don’t see the justification of them reworking retreating buffs besides making it harder to wipe units on retreat.
My guess would be because of VP drain and how fast teching is. In CoH1\2 you was in a disadvantage if you sustained multiple wipes, but you realistically had time to recover, in CoH3 you basically have chance of recovering only if your army is already established and if you aren't triple caped. Not a fan of this one myself, but this is a consequences of stupid VP drain change.
Or it could be simple Relics overtune. Because during Alpha tests it was incredibly easy to wipe retreating squads, which resulted in one player snowballing like crazy.
Green cover as well is now useless against grenades. It’s almost always better retreat, then try to dodge.
This one is kinda strange. I've personally always hated it in CoH2, when a guy got lucky and was able to tank a nade, especially considering that he should be punished for not dodging it. Still, I do believe, nades in 2 across the board were much faster to throw. This includes audio notification, nade throwing speed and so on. In CoH3 its much easier to dodge them, yet if you failed to, you are punished more.
So situations where its better to just retreat, are situations where you would gamble in 2, trying to tank them with your face and continue fighting.