There’s been a lot of complaints about Carbines and low run/used weapons being common place.
The Carbine was intended as a low weight weapon to be used by rear and soldiers carrying a lot of weight or operating in closed quarters (Tanks, trucks, etc.) In game I use the M2 as basically a poor man’s SMG on squads that don’t have a lot of flexibility. Flamer, Radioman, Engineer, Mortar, Bomber, basically any squad that isn’t LMG/Assault.
My suggestion would be two things…
1.) Give Most specialty classes the SMG/Light weapon instead of rifle.
2.) Move all carbines to the SMG/Light weapon classification.
This would give all these specialty Units more flexibility, increase their usage, it would put the carbine where it was traditionally used, and reduce the reliance on them in end game.
SMGs were used in this role also… /looks at tank crew and pilots.
Also, I’ll guarantee the predominately used squads in this game are MG and Assault squads for the added flexibility until you get the M2, then the M2 allows those other squads to be more adaptable.
I like my soldiers… I try to shoot for a balanced squad of 3 ranged and 3 CQC.
A perfect balance would be 2 Garand, 2 SMG, and 2 LMG personally… That’s darn near impossible to build into a squad though. I have to shoestring and duct tape it in there.
If this was implemented I’d use more Troopers with Garnands/Rifles in my Squads as the support classes wouldn’t have access to long range rifles.
Carbines were historically used for support/specialty classes and for Close Quarters fighting in WW2 and this would mirror that and actually give the Trooper more value to me. It would also give the non-LMG/Assault Squads more utility and flexibility in early game.
Earning the M2 changes the dynamic of the classes and fixes this issue; although, the Trooper still is more of a last resort currently as any support class has both long range and short range capabilities also. I guess that “Trooper” blurs a bit with me and I think of it more as what weapon I’m using (Bolt Action/Garand.)
Trooper being a Rifleman without a skill… I like my Rifleman.
The US has the M1 and M2 carbines, even if the M2 is better than most full sized rifles.
Russia has the Mosin 1907 and 1938 carbines.
What does Germany have?
IRL I believe they would have SMGs or stocked pistols, but SMGs would defeat the purpose of assaulters, while stocked pistols would be too bad compared to even the M1 and 1907.
Do you have the M2 and if so, why do you think it’s better than full sized rifles?
I only find it useful to use as a SMG in a Squad that doesn’t have any access to SMGs. In squads that have SMGs… I use the SMG as they’re more controllable and usable out to a longer range for those slots.
The Garand is better in every way outside of trying to use the Garand in room clearing. I was just thinking I would have used the M1 Carbine for an engineer on my Assault squad if this was this way while leveling up. Right now, the M1 Carbine is worthless as the Garand does twice the damage and can fire just as fast.
Move Carbines/HG classification to SMG/light and give those to Specialty classes instead of rifles. Meaning all specialty classes Bomber/Radio man/Mortar man/flamer are carrying a light SMG or carbine.
I like your idea, except the SMG part.
I think it makes a lot of sense to have lighter weapons and carbines on support troops. Not sure about SMGs in general, perhaps older SMGs that where going out of service. Like MP28 for example.
But this would indeed improve usability of troopers.
In addition, could tweak other classes to improve role of troopers. Like for example, giving a “materials” backpack to engineer, kind of how radioman have radio, so it would block usage of engineers as TNT haulers or “medics”.
It would resolve an issue with having to game squads to use SMG’s or CQC weapons. Each specialty SQUAD would have slight CQC functionality, not as good as an Assault, but decent functionality.
It’d probably also stop the “Bail a tank” to use SMGs need.