I would like to apologise in advance because most of the following focusses on thing that either puzzle, irritate or simple frustrate me, while there's been many many good changes as well. There's also most likely elements in my criticism that might balance the gameplay between different factions better and just appear odd or unreasonable to me ("pedantic realism"? hehe). In addition, I haven't been playing for quite a while between now and an wayyy old version, so many changes that probably went gradually appear abrupt to me. I'd like to express my fondness and appreciation in general for the whole EF Mod. You rock! - oh, and excuse me for pouring this into Yauz' thread - for some reason, I cannot create a new topic (nor reply-reply normally) because all my browsers believe the forum server is misconfigured, when I try to do so.
Now for the rant, thoughts, criticism:::
The Nashorn is a nifty addition/Flak replacement and the time needed to move/set-up seems fair. Great concept for a new kind of unit as mobile Flak8, but the rate at which a heavy MG squad destroys a Nashorn is ridiculous - a single HMG unit afflicts more damage/time to it than a lucky Sherman, whihc came close enough to the Nashorn to driving around it a few times. It is supposed to have a the chassis of a Panzer IV and not a motorcycles, right?
The riflemens anti-vehicle bombs do way too much damage on heavy armored cars. In addition, the car gets hit with the sticky bomb even when moving past the soldiers at full +accelerated speed, is often immobilized instantly and half way destroyed, which is way too much of an effect - the damage is basically the same to a scout car, which seems about fair on this one - even though it is quite frustrating to see an engine-damaged scout car (which has a mounted MG42) try to move away from a single squad of rookie riflemen+BAR while they take it apart, barely risking to lose one man out of six while the MG42 fires into their general direction without much of an effect. Something went wrong here with balancing, especially with the heavy armoured car vs riflemen. Scout cars MG42 has too little effect on infantry, the way I see it.
It also seems a little absurd that the vehicle needs to get repaired back to 100% in order for it's engine to work again/immobilization to be lifted. One would think that gaining back mobility has priority in an repair effort made in the field. But here, I can imagine it makes sense for balancing.
An American/Infantry Howitzer barrage aimed at a single civilian building with enemy troops in it is accurate enough as to noticeably damage the building (which looks awesome) but leaves the troops inside unharmed. That's a bit odd to look at.
At random, WM (Terror) Stormtroopers engage enemy troops when camouflaged, even though told to hold fire.
Why was the squad size of soviet shock guards decreased to 4? The way it feels to me from subjective gaming, it is way too likely now that a whole squad gets lost in one lucky hit from mortar/artillery/tiger.
I suspect they were simply too strong - especially with their slowdown (which i really miss... alot) - this made them particularly awesome to fetch enemy weaponry like panzerfaust/lmg42- which they now can no longer pick up at all after being upgraded with mid/short range weapons. I think this is sad.
Before they changed, i liked that they differed from banner strelky by walking combat-ready out of the garrison - without the need to upgrade them any further with a specialisation. On that note, Soviets have plenty of close range specialists already; the mid-range rifles seem the most sensible path.
Producing them requires three upgrades and ALL soviet base structures - isn't that enough? Why even more upgrades to make them work? The small squad size makes them quite disappointing - especially with them being unable to pick up even a single MG42/Panzerfaust. They are supposed to be the best russian infantry squad, afterall.
Why is it that soviet mortar teams can engage cloaked (and holding fire) snipers, even while there's no other sojviet unit around to spot/decloak the sniper for them?
It is very frustrating to witness soldiers getting "overrun" and killed by touching a barely moving enemy tank, running next to it, going faster than the tank with destroyed engine. I'm aware one could technically get crushed from a tank that is only moving very slowly - but at a certain pace and angle of soldier-to-tank, this looks like the soldiers deliberately commit suicide, not the tank killing them.
When i come to think of it - maybe a vehicle like the heavy armoured car should be able to kill infantry while running through them at full force - instead of "bouncing off" of the enemy infantry, what it is occasionally doing at the moment. This might even balance out that two squads of rifle men with sticky bombs have such an easy time disposing off the anti-infantry armoured car.
(AI controlled) tanks occasionally retreat by driving backwards, straight through another tank.
PIAT troops tend to damage/destroy the structure/emplacement they were just repairing because while firing at an approaching enemy vehicle, they miraculously hit what's right in front of them instead of what they are shooting at - even though the arch of the flying PIAT projectile suggests they can fire over an obstacle.
British Vickers MG emplacement efficiency against PE infantry is (suddenly?) ridiculously low - squads of Fallschirmjäger or with Panzerschreck or assault rifles can stroll towards it directly and they take it apart within seconds - the MG does little damage and rarely manages to suppress the enemy infantry even with them being bloody rookies.
The attack movement of british troops, both rifle squads and PIAT-sappers is sometimes rather weird - they walk very very closely to both enemy infantry and vehicles and hence do not fire PIAT or Bren. Especially in open field where there's no cover to direct them to instead of just aiming at the enemy forces, this behaviour is quite disturbing. - What I mark as a positive change is Rifle squads with the Bren upgrade receiving two Brens now, giving them decent to good effectiveness against both infantry and light vehicles. PIAT troops often take awfully long to aim/shoot - as if they'd be waiting for the enemy vehicle to begin moving again, just so they'll miss it.
