Profile of Mr.Smith

Don't forget about your infantry. Brit infantry might not have snares, but they do have PIATs, and PIATs absolutely wreck slow-moving late-game armour:
- You need 4-6 PIATs (more, and Obersoldaten will melt your face; fewer and the enemy tanks will escape).
- Get a Comet to vet1 if possible
- Send your infantry in (if you can really afford it MP/MU-wise get PIATs on commandos)
- Make sure you mix a mine-sweeper with your infantry (attack ground any mines you spot to "defuse" them)
- Comet stays back spams and smoke/WP to support your troops (focus fire on MGs and AT guns)
- Once your infantry maims/scares the heavy TD's your Comets move in and kick everyone's ass.

However, if you feel allergic to PIATs/think they aren't worth it, here's what you can use:

Against Panther spam:
- 2 Fireflies work wonders, if you can vet them up and keep Panthers away (Tulips help, but no need for them)
- Don't even think about spamming Comets; you will lose hard
- (I'm assuming you don't want to build AT guns, as they are easily countered by rocket artillery)

Against T3 spam (Stugs, PIV):
- Mainly what Rollo said about Comets
- 1 Tulip Firefly for 1-shotting

When JT/Elefant/JP4 hit the field:
- If you are really good with micro, consider Cromwell spam. Too risky though (Cromwells get 2-shot by the heavy TDs)
- Firefly Tulips can also traverse buildings, if you want to deal some safe damage
- PIATs are your best bet here.

When a KT hits the field:
- Fireflies are great at this. Beware of Raketens/JP4/heavy-TDs though
- PIATs can still work, but only if you manage to flank the rear side of the KT (otherwise the cannon will start vaporising your squads)

If you encounter a Pak43:
- Commandos all the way
- Otherwise, aim your Tulips at max range against it and you can one-shot the Pak43.

However, most of all:
- When you notice that the enemy adapts, you also need to make sure that you adapt your composition.
- Be flexible; don't fill up your Popcap just because you have the resources for a 4th Comet.

PS: Does anybody else think that the vanilla Churchill simply has no synergy with the other elements of the faction?

1. piats are cheap enough to be spammable.
6. Remember at vet 1 REs get -30% cooldown WHEN IN COVER,+50% Reload WHEN IN COVER.

Three sidenotes:
1. Sapper Cover bonus ONLY affects their stens; it doesn't affect PIATs/Vickers/LMGs etc. Thus, feel free to keep them out of cover so that they won't get wiped by mortars/tankshells etc
2. Advanced Cover (the new commander ability) affects reload time. This means that Tommies with PIATs/Schrecks/whatever become anti-tank doomgods when the ability is active and Tommies are in-cover (I don't have the commander to try it :3)
3. Word on the street (Cruzz) says that Relic did not use the right modifiers for Advanced Cover combat. As such, Tommies also benefit from a small buff also when they are out of cover (I haven't verified it yet, so I haven't reported it yet).

Otherwise, +100 what FG127820 waid.

Totally disagree on never giving them to Tommies, you need the sight range of pyrotechnic tommies to use them effectively as their biggest strength is their range.

Nothing prevents you from making a Pyrotechnics Tommy squad and keeping it ahead of the pack to give you vision. Oh yeah, Pyrotechnics is also currently bugged (à la vet-bug); thus you will end up losing the bonus sight as the game drags on.

PIAT range is insanely awesome. I'd say that their biggest advantage is, though, their insane rate of fire, and the ability to fire them over obstacles.

Relic might not be the best company in the world when it comes to quality assurance and other things like that. They might lack the funds or the personnel to handle this challenge.

This is fine, however; CoH2 is a game and nobody's life or livelihood depends on it.

However, I do find that there is ample of room low-effort steps to improve the situation. The best proposal having already been outlined here:

the question is: why do they patch thursdays when they dont work on weekends?
its a common thing to patch things on mondays if you dont have workers work on weekend. its just plain stupid and not well thought of LELic

+100

Every time there is a new patch out, inadvertently new bugs surface; this is human. However, relic are basically shooting themselves in the foot by releasing new content on Thursdays; that gives them only a single day to solve bugs, if and only if those bugs are identified in time.

The tulip should remain as is, unless addressing the extreme low RoF of the Firefly, and the potency of German super heavy TD's, which require a Firefly alpha strike in order to even allow the Firefly a chance to kill them.

This is one option, which I completely agree with.

The moment that heavy TDs hit the field (Elefant/Jagtiger -- even the JP4), USF & Soviet TDs immediately become a liability:
- The Jackson is way too fragile and will go down in almost one shot
- The SU-85 has no turret, and can't play the chicken-game with the other TDs

If the Firefly cannot dish out burst damage vs these TDs, then it becomes yet another tank destroyer that has to sit in the back and do nothing.

This is because it's only the first shot that matters, and you are firing against a 400-500 armour target. The risk you are taking with each shot is that you run into a cloaked Raketen/JP4 and/or some stray schrecks.


Thus, the Firefly will have to sit uncomfortably next to the Churchill, the Jackson, the SU85, the m8, the SU76 and all other tanks that are hardcountered by the super-heavy TDs. That is, until some other units manage to do the job (which?).


However, I also like Miragefla's idea:

I'd prefer if Tulips become massive AT snares than their current all or nothing 240 rockets of death or misstruction while the gun got better.

My ideas implemented in my mod:

-Reload from 10 seconds to 8.
-Tulip Rockets now deal 120 damage from 240.
-Tulips now cause a blind critical on penetration and stuns the tank for 2.5 seconds. (Vehicle LOS reduced to 0 for 8 seconds)
-Tulip Rocket ability cost from 100 to 80.
-Tulip Recharge time from 120 to 80.

This would give the Firefly a lease of life to help countering the super-heavy TDs / aura-stacking command tanks, without immediately making all T3 armour irrelevant (the Brits have the Comet for that).

It will also make bumrush tactics against Fireflies a bit less rewarding.

However, if I want to be a nitpick, the Firefly also happens to be the only non-doctrinal solution that Brits have vs campy Pak43 placement (remember: no indirect fire, lacklustre assault infantry). Would it be possible to make the Tulips continue the pose a threat to the Pak43 -- or are you thinking of another option to deal with this blindsight?

(NOTE: Every single Anvil ability is currently bugged/won't work properly. Except for the following two:
- Airburst shells received an OK-ish buff vs infantry
- Repair speed on Heavy Engineers (I haven't verified that it works); armour and construction rate will vanish as you replenish the squad)

Depends on which gamemode you're playing. Note that I am better seasoned at teamgames than in 1vs1's.

In all cases, your choice of tanks should complement your infantry composition (e.g., if you have AT covered with PIATs, you could invest in an AI tank, and vice versa)

Centaur

+ AA capabilities (JU87 loiter is insane, shutting down recon is good)
+ Excellent AI capabilities with the Vet1 ability; just throw a smoke shell on the Centaur and let it rip
- Very bad mobility; only gets bearable at Vet2 & Hammer warspeed

Verdict:
- 4vs4: MUST HAVE (AA is crucial -- Centaur will vet by itself with enemy recon planes)
- 1vs1: liability (dedicated AI, too slow to help/escape)

Comet

+ White phosphorus/Smoke allows your tank to support infantry advances from afar
+ Can survive 2 hits from Elephant/Pak43/Jagtiger and have enough HP to escape
+ Best denial to Ostheer T3 units (due to armour/healthpool)
+ Amazing at kiting (best range for AI cannon in the game + speed)
- Extremely cost-inefficient vs Panthers

Verdict:
- 4vs4: It is a good option to have for the extreme-lategame (Cromwells have a snowball's chance in hell to stay alive)
- 1vs1: Whatever the Comet can do, the Cromwell can do cheaper

Churchill

+ The canon is surprisingly accurate vs infantry
- Pity that it has a short range, and lacks the mobility to kite infantry
- There is absolutely no redeeming quality about this unit anymore (or Anvil specialization)
- Very poor at supporting your other units (no smoke shells; Churchill's smoke ability slows the tank down)
- In this patch, its OP grenades were fixed; now they're normal
- Trivially countered by: Elephant, Jagtiger, Command Panther, Stug spam, JP4

Verdict:
- 4vs4: Never build. Anvil might be worth it when they fix the bugs, though (but again, never build Churchills).
- 1vs1: Why are you going for Anvil, again?