Tried making some historically accurate american loadouts. I don’t know that well what weapons America used so i would like to get some feedback
Early war marines:
Invasion of normandy:
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Always nice seeing other people make attempts at historical recreations of combat units!
I do have a couple of notes if you wish to refine your setup even further, but I will say that you’ve done a great job so far!
Early war marines:
You’re using a lot of of Garands, which I would advice against when representing early war Marines. As a rule (not formal, just observed reality) in the US military the Marines get the latest stuff last, and nowhere is this more prevelent than in the USMC when it comes to the M1 Garand. The Rifle was only formally adopted in Febuary 1941, and it would take until after Guadalcanal in 1942 where they got to fight alongside Army units equiped with the M1 until they actually started pushing for the mass adoption of the weapon, otherwise the few M1s that they already had were almost always issued to garrison units and not combat formations. I would advice you to skim down the use of the M1 (almost all of them, if not all of them, depending on what year you want to represent) in favour of Springfield rifles (squads you designate as “Paramarines” could use the M1941 Johnson Rifle, if you want variaty).
Nice detail about mixing the use of M1928A1 and M50 SMGs though, I would though try and standardize on one type of SMG per squad (even if you as a whole use different SMGs on different squads), to represent the real world logistical attempts on stadardizing maintanance parts (not always possible of course, but it was at least atempted).
The M1919A6 is quite late war, appearing first in 1943, I would caution against using it depending on the time period you’re trying to represent. I would advice you switch over to more BARs or M1941 Johnson LMGs as the more appropriate choices.
Early war pilots in the pacific would not have been issued with any SMGs, at all, only M1911s or .38 revolvers as personal defence weapons, so I’d recomend taking the M50 Reisings off and only giving them handguns.
Normandy
Less to say here, jolly good.
I would again urge you to choose one type of SMG per squad, but here for an additional reason. Where possible, vehicle crews (tankers, drivers, pilots) were given the more compact M3 whilst the more bulky (and better liked) Thompsons were recerved for the infantry and Paratroopers. So, give M1A1s to your regular squads, but M3s to your pilots, tankers and APC/Truck drivers. Also, the suppressed M3 is really out of place on a tanker squad, when it’s really more of a OSS weapon.
I would be a bit stricted when it comes to who gets a M1 Garand and who gets a M1 Carbine. Really, only pure riflemen should be recieving them, whilst any specialist soldiers (ie, anyone with duties aside from regular riflemen, so Engineers, Flamethrower troopers, AT soldiers and Radiomen) should be given M1 Carbines. Now, of course, you might want to give an exception here and there, so you still have some Garands in your units (such as your event Radio squad, who strictly speaking should all use M1 Carbines, but giving one of them a Garand is excusable because you do still want some variaty).
You sniper squad is solid, nice that you picked out the clearly more common Springfield in the job of the main sniping rifle, the M1 Garand was bairly used in this role during WW2. I would urge you to switch the Radioman to a M1 Carbine, for reasons stated above however.
As a sidenote, I know the game (for some reason) won’t let us do it, but it would be grand if we could give M1 Carbines to our pilots, APC/Truck drivers and tankers, as that was historicly done and the intended use of the weapon as well when designed.
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I try, but the most historical I get is researching what weapons were actually used and equipping all my squads with those. I don’t have the patience or knowledge on how to properly research, since I would actually like to see doctrine on how squads were supposed to be fitted during the war to get even more realistic.
Alas, it’s still more realistic running around with 3 G41s and a mix of Beretta M38s and MP35s in a squad than 9 FG 42s.
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Well, the most historical recreation of an actual combat formation is a Rifleman sqaud with 7 Riflemen, MG gunner and 1 Assaulter (could throw in an Engineer just to make the squad playable, rallies still need to be built). Sadly, you can’t really have both MG and Assaulter in one infantry squad, so we’re stuck at improvising for now… so you are at liberty to interpret as you wish (since we can’t get it 100% right anyway).
It’s such a tiny change, wouldn’t disrupt the games balance, just allow me to use 1 Assaulter and 1 MG Gunner in the same Rifle squad, I want my historicly accurate British Infantry Section!
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The thing that’s hardest for me is figuring out assault groups or urban squads. Would it be safe to assume as many as possible were given SMGs, or was that purely a Soviet thing?
And I guess pretty much the same thing for MG squads. In an ideal world I imagine as many as could be equipped with MG’s or SMGs would be. So my assumption is for a 7 man squad, there would be 2 MG’s, and for the same size squad maybe 4 SMGs. I’m also guessing MG’s were present in assault squads - being the backbone of firepower - but I could be wrong.
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I think soviets had specialized smg squad while rest of the nations gave smgs only to NCOs and specialists
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When it came to SMGs:
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Soviet Union
Yes, they deliberately formed storm/assault groups for Stalingrad, Königsberg, Berlin, etc, these were groups were disproportionately (to a unique degree) armed with PPSh-41 and PPS-43 SMGs, satchel charges, flamethrowers, and grenades. No one quite pushed SMGs like the Soviets (fun fact: the AK 47 was originally intended as a replacement for SMGs, which just shows how much weight they put on them in infantry combat). By 1943–45, entire rifle companies or battalions might be reorganized with 50–70% SMGs for city fighting. -
Germany
The Sturmtrupp/assault detachment was a pre-WWII German idea (from WWI stormtroopers), but SMGs (MP-38/40) were relatively expensive to make, so they were mostly concentrated in squad leaders, assault engineers, and select “storm groups.” German “Sturmkompanien” for urban combat did try to pack in as many MP-40s, flamethrowers, and demolition charges as possible, but most riflemen still had Kar98ks. By 1944–45, some assault units (Volksgrenadier “Sturmzug”) carried more StG-44s (many atempted to standardize on them, hence why I regularly bring up that I want a 9 man event squad able to take Assault Rifles), but again supply was limited. -
United States
US rifle squads, in comparison to the other two did not re-equipped wholesale with SMGs (even if Germany only did it to a small degree) even in cities, the M1 Garand was considered good enough for most urban combat. SMGs (Thompson, later M3) were concentrated in squad leaders, scouts, and assault engineers. Assault units (engineer, paratrooper or Ranger detachments) might borrow a higher proportion of SMGs, but never to Soviet levels. By late war, the M1 Carbine filled the “short weapon” niche more often than SMGs. -
Britain/Commonwealth
The Sten Gun (generally Mk IIs, to a lesser extent Mk IIIs and Vs) were cheap and abundant, but doctrine still emphasized the Lee-Enfield as the infantry base. SMGs were common in commando/assault units (raids, urban fighting), but never a majority weapon, otherwise usually only relegated to squad leaders (and they sometimes chose to still use rifles, because enemy snipers recognized SMGs welding infantry as leaders). In “street-fighting” training, a mix of Stens, Bren guns, and grenades was considered adequate, so they did not re-equip soldiers for urban duty either.
When it comes to MGs:
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German doctrine put the MG-34/42 at the center of the squad; riflemen maneuvered to support/defend the MG whilst it would often do most of the actual fighting. In assault, multiple MGs from different squads were often grouped for suppressive fire while the riflemen closed in.
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Soviets massed DP-28 LMGs and Maxim/SG-43 HMGs in support while SMG troops rushed buildings. Assault groups often had attached heavy weapons platoons specifically to isolate strongpoints with fire.
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Americans kept the BAR as a squad automatic weapon but relied heavily on M1919 medium MGs at platoon/company level (only later in the war bringing in mobile M1919A6s to the squad level). In assault situations, multiple BARs or M1919s were often attached to cover advancing assault teams.
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British/Commonwealth had a interesting mix of US and German doctrines: Bren guns was the platoon/squad centrepeice (in a dedicated gun group of two men), whilst heavier and less mobile Vickers MGs were in support companies. Assault detachments did often carried extra Brens if available though.
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I think I’ll just stick with my semi-realistic loadouts - weapons that were widely used, but with my own tactical flair. I tend to find an even number of CQC / mid or long range weaponry tends to work best (although there are some exceptions).
It works better to have 3 SMGs and 1 MG in a squad in Enlisted than only 1 or 2 SMGs.
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Yeah, the game does not lend itself to rifle gameplay, and games are almost always won with CQC bullet spraying and HE spam (rockets, tank shells, artillery)… a shame really, but that’s what happens when you design a game around tight objectives.
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What is he doing?
But from what I’ve heard, back then for usa most men could choose themselves what weapons they used, provided their superior was fine with it.
So, very easy to make historically accurate usa loadouts.
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Yeah, which is nice, allows me to make a HA Early Marine squad basing it around BR2 (Minus BAR, hence I really want a somewhat nerfed 1918 BAR to BR2.)
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Sorry for the late answer. Your feedback is great and i made some changes based on it:
I wanted to keep some garands for my pacific units so i decided to make some of the squads army
These guys customization looked the most “army” so i moved all of my garands to them.
I reduced the amount of johnson rifles and put them all in one squad of paramarines
I made the smgs more standardized for my marines. Also i removed browning m1919a6 (I didnt know it was that late in the war) and i replaced garands with springfields.
I also got rid of smgs for pilots
For normandy loadout i also did some changes:
I gave At gunners and flametroopers m1 carbines. I decided to keep m1 garands for engineers since i have a lot of engineers in my squads and i feel like there would be too many m1 carbines if i gave 1 for every engineer. I decided to keep some m3s mixed with tommies for variety. I removed the silenced m3 greasegun from tank crew. I am now working on giving these guys ardennes clothes.
I wanted to make the clothes mixed to look like veterans
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From what I can see, he likely had a Winchester M1912 or some shotgun. I made a post about it when one of the earlier updates came out and broke how they held shotguns. I kind of liked it to be fair.
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The shotgun becomes invicible in this pose for some reason. I kinda like it because it looks funny
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mine no longer does it for some reason…I want it to come back
Did you move the guy? I think the poses change when the soldiers switch places in squad loadout
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Well, I’ve decided to run a British lineup at the moment. @OggeKing should be happy.
My British Lineup
AT Squad as a pseudo engineer squad (I need to upgrade so I can get 2 engis and an MG)
I figured I’d go the Grant instead of the Crusader because it saw more theatres. I would’ve gone less on the Assaulters and MGs, but I’ve tried doing just 2 or even 1 before and it’s rough.
I’m hoping to get 2 squad slots when they next go on sale so I can equip the event Spitfire and the Australian Guerrillas. Wish I had the Universal Carrier too, but oh well.
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This will be interesting to go through, since we don’t have the full range of squads to support a Commonwealth line-up (I still want my infantry squad, what’s more I want my legacy squads). Lets see how you got on.
Very good, I see you’re using the PIAT, you can get away with US M1 or M9 Launchers because of lend-lease, but the PIAT is absolutely the more common choice.
Once you get your MG up (and the extra engineer) this squad could represent either your companys dedicated AT detatchment (handheld AT weaponry were typicly carried by support teams, the regular infantry section would not typicly have had one), or a understrenght mixed infantry section (combat losses requiring the merging of support units in to the infantry section itself). The last one would mostly require the presence of someone wielding a SMG (to represent the Lieutenant), however as I believe I stated previously this practice was not universal, and section commanders did sometimes choose to continue using No. 4 Rifles to avoid looking like an officer to enemy snipers.
Needs must when the Devil drives.
The Assaulter squad you could in theory get away with as is, just rebrand it as a Commando section and suddenly you got a lot more room to customize as you see fit.
The MG squad really are just a gameplay nessesary addition, rather than anything based on historical squad compositions. The best thing you could argue here (as I belive I brought up before here) is that you could argue this is a represenation of a group of Bren groups assembling together to concentrate fire and help cover a assault (which did happen). Since this squad also builds HMGs, you could argue that this is also supposed to represent the MMG support section of the company, it would typicly have used Vickers MMGs but the M2 50. cal could be comfortably written off as lend-lease supplementing the Vickers. This last one would be a bit trickier to justify, as such a support section would likely not have had Brens of their own, and the M2 has a slightly different tactical niche than just as a static MG, but as I said before, needs must when the devil drives.
I would like to add though that you’re using Mk I Brens, which would be very rare after Dunkirk (almost all Mk Is were lost there), the Mk II would be the standard LMG for all non-parachute formations post Battle of France.
A dedicated Engineer squad would have represented a support MG section way better, but yeah, no legacy squads… either way solid work on the Assaulter, and almost great for the MG.
Solid reasoning for the choice of tank, really highlights the lack of authentic options in the tech tree. You could get away with a Sherman II though, unless this is a strict BR II (and early-war) lineup, since lend-lease tanks don’t appear to be a problem for you.
Also going to point out that I HATE the current black berets in the game, the green band is awful and the shade is wrong, this looks more like rear-line service troops berets than proper tanker ones. It needs to be a darker black and the bands colour to match the rest of the beret!
Solid choices for the future, Australian commandos would be best represented with SMLE Mk III Rifles (“No. 1 Mk III” is the correct name come WW2, no idea why the game uses the early inter-war and WW1 name it’s incorrect for the time period) and your choice of Stens, Astens, Owens or M1A1 Thompsons (and some pistols, they’d have used whatever they could get their hands on so you’re free to take whatever and even mix sidearms), the pilot just featuring a Sten and a Webley revolver.
That’s so sad.
I got mine on the first ever draw from the loot boxes, only luck I’ve ever had with them. (The squad is not set up in any perticular way, I’m refusing to play the Allies until we got equal Commonwealth/US representation in the game, call it a “faction strike” if you will).
I think they should add more UC to the game, as Rider II vehicles in the tech tree, so many unused weapon compositions on the UCs that would be so fun (Bren + Bren, Vickers K + Bren, Flamethrower… not just the Bren + Boys ATR which is my least favourite), I also think that the UC serving as a Armoured Personnel Carrier in game is dumb as hell…
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Still not as rough as Italy. From the squads that I will at least use, there are 6 Commonwealth squads. Italy in comparison has 2. I feel they need at least 4 squads. Preferably an assaulter squad and some other squad added, AT or Radio, to match the Commonwealth.
But then there’s the Italian tank and plane problems…we need at least:
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1 engineer
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1 MG
(both already present) -
1 assaulter
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1 tank
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1 plane
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1 radio
(present as legacies)
Italy deserves the same playability as the Commonwealth.
I never knew that, but it makes sense. I guess it would also be weapon familiarity too, especially for those that started out as privates and worked their way up.
Yeah, it’s more of a preference thing. I really hate the sights of the Mk II for whatever reason, even though they’re technically the same as the Vickeres Berthier. Still, I might try it again just to see.
I’ve decided to keep the Commonwealth as my dedicated low BR loadout as to me the squad selection is stronger than the equivalent US squads. I much prefer BR III US, since they get Garands and BARs.
(Compared to BR II US, Commonwealth is still superior).
I’ll see if I can change it. I know absolutely nothing about uniforms for any faction.
I’m quite familiar with that, being Australian myself. There are tons of them in our museums, RSL clubs, and they even make appearances during Remembrance Day. It’s practically our national symbol.
The luckiest draw I got was my first one too. And it was…
A portrait.
Honestly it wasn’t that bad, being as I’m F2P, so portraits aren’t something common for us.
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