New US Armour Doctrine: Suggestions

Greetings all!

This isn’t meant to be a rant / rage thread or anything quite so dramatic, just some feedback / suggestions I have based on my time playing the doctrine.

First things first, lets make this clear.

I am not asking for radical changes to the doctrine and I think the rework is amazing in most respects.

So with that out of the way, let me get to the elephant in the room concerning the doctrine and no, It isn’t moaning about losing buildable Jacksons.

Its about the Cavalry riflemen.

Putting it simply, with the way infantry for the doctrine are designed, Cavalry riflemen are simply undesirable to use. This seems a peculiar thing to say, especially since I actually like the changes made to cavalry riflemen and their veteran counterpart in terms of abilities and upgrade options.

So what’s the problem?

For me, I think its primarily the fact they are in tier 1, and their fuel cost. Paying 20 fuel for a mid level infantry unit in a doctrine that has an extreme focus on fuel type units is not feasible. This is especially obvious bearing in mind the fact that the new engineers are actually really good with their grease guns, therefore why pay extra fuel when you can simply get 4-5 units of engineers that are cheaper, trade better and can repair your light vehicles? 20 fuel per rifle is fuel that is far more valuable in being spent in light vehicles or tech.

Furthermore, by the time you have cavalry rifles come onto the field, your typically up against vet 1-2 axis infantry, and they will tend to trade poorly in terms of manpower cost, which again raises the question of why bother going for them when you have engineers that trade better manpower wise, have veterancy by this point and probably M3 Grease guns to boot! Them arriving in a 50 cal jeep is obviously the reason for the fuel cost, and its by no means a useless vehicle, but by this point any reasonable axis player will have some form of soft AT that will relegate if not completely neutralise the jeep. (Panzer grenadier fusiliers with the at grenade option are especially problematic in this regard)

So what’s the solution?

Thankfully, I feel that this is quite easily fixed, while at the same time giving the doctrine extra options aside from the current meta choice of engineer spam / blob which is simply not particularly fun to play with or against:

Dismounted Cav rifles available at tier 0. Hear me out.

These would be copies of the riflemen you get at tier 1, without the 50cal jeep of course. This grants you a riflemen level unit (Without the rifle nades that make regular riflemen so potent) which can perform at the mid range that gives an armoured player something other than engineer blobbing to do. In return, the Bar / Thompson upgrades should be locked behind tier 1 to still make tier 1 a compelling option and prevent CQC rushing. Potentially increasing the cost of the dismounted Cav Rifle squad by 20 could also be considered as an act of balance. (Reduce early game map control if going rifle heavy, keeps the engineers appealing)

Addendum edit:

This change would still have the mounted rifles at  tier 1, I would consider it not a buff or nerf but  simply a change to encourage a more diverse early game build. I have already outlined why they would not be blobbed (Cost increase over engineers, lack of rifle nade)

Furthermore, playing a few more games, for a doctrine that’s supposed to not have especially strong infantry, having 4-5 engineers makes for a pretty oppressive infantry force that rushes up with carbines, especially with grease guns being mixed in. So I find this initial response of US armoured riflemen at tier 0 being ‘too strong’ with infantry puzzling. It also makes the mid to late game especially oppressive, as you have 4-5 units as well as vehicle crews to  repair. Shermans get fixed in seconds. (Another reason to having a core infantry unit that cannot repair)

That’s more or less it really. Thanks for reading!

• This topic was modified 4 years ago by ArmouredTopHat.
• This topic was modified 4 years ago by ArmouredTopHat.
• This topic was modified 4 years ago by ArmouredTopHat.
• This topic was modified 4 years ago by ArmouredTopHat.
• This topic was modified 4 years ago by ArmouredTopHat.
• This topic was modified 4 years ago by ArmouredTopHat.
• This topic was modified 4 years ago by ArmouredTopHat.
• This topic was modified 4 years ago by ArmouredTopHat.
• This topic was modified 4 years ago by ArmouredTopHat.