[1.11] GodlikeDennis' In-depth guide to the soviet vehicle rush

[GodlikeDennis]

Ok guys, my first strategy guide for the Soviet Union. I only just developed this so it could be a little rough. If you feel something works better for you than what is here, mix it up a little. We all have different playstyles. It is also quite long, as I explain many of the theories in great depth. Understanding the principles behind the build is important in understanding why we do it. If you are well versed in competitive multiplayer though, you should be able to skim read as these are mostly quite basic things you should already know. Also, I know there isn't too many competitive games happening at the moment in EF but I'm hoping that will change soon due to this excellent patch.

First, a little background. I found that the most common strategy in use was to simply go as linearly as possible. Conscripts --> Tank hunters and strelky --> Tank mass . While not a bad strategy, I wanted to try out something a little different. This strategy will revolve around early control and harrassment of the fuel, as well as conservation of your troops. You will be running on very fragile units and it is recommended that you are well versed in the extended tier 1 sub-strat of blitz T3. Practice in using a few basic units to achieve great results will improve your general micro anyway, so I recommend everyone try it out.

I'll warn you that fairly good micro is definitely required, since the main unit you'll be using for a while will be conscripts. This strategy revolves around maintaining your conscript numbers throughout early and midgame and controlling as much fuel as possible. If you lose a couple squads, don't fret, but any more losses and you won't be able to maintain enough field prescence to hold on to those fuels. I'll get into this further on.

The general teching order should look like this:

Ing (barracks), Ing (Caps), Command, Conscript X3, Armoury, NKVD upgrade, NKVD scripts (as many as required), Tank hall, Light tankovy, T-70/T-90, SU-85 (as required), T-34s

As you can see, there are very few unit types to this build. This is to cut down unnecessary fuel costs which will delay your tank support. The strat is simply a variation of a tank rush but will take the fastest, most direct route while still providing strong field presence on the way. The only armoury upgrades you will ever get before tanks hit the field is NKVD scripts and possibly sturmovie ingenery. If you can do it without sturmovie, your first light vehicle can hit the field at 130 fuel. In comparison, an american M8 rush will hit the field at 125 fuel and a wehr puma rush at 155 (no vet). This can be a game changing moment as the enemy may not have a counter up by this point to your "shock unit" and he may be forced to abandon the entire field to you. This will leave you free to cap and further your advantage.

Your doctrine is up to you. Soviets are quite flexible, as with the US, and your doctine will most likely be chosen reactively to the Wehrmacht's strategy. For those unfamiliar with general competitive gameplay, Wehrmacht usually have the freedom to choose their strategy early and their doctrine choice will fall in line with this. This is because the wehrmacht doctrines blend extremely closely with the teching orders. For example, T2 med bunker spam obviously goes well with defensive doctrine, due to bunker bonuses, and also terror, due to an affinity with grens due to zeal and late game punch with a KT. Blitz complements T3 because the sturm comes late and the build lacks mid-game anti-vehicle that shreked stormtroopers can provide. US, as well as Soviets now, will usually choose whichever doctrine will counter the enemy strategy best. If a US player sees bunkers he will usually go infantry to make use of the arty powers to break up those concentrated defenses. Conversely, he wouldn't normally choose airborne because their bunker busting skills are lacking and airborne powers usually aren't too useful against a vetted zombie horde.

The Soviet doctrine choice is similar. If you see your opponent has a heavy concentration of defenses, breakthrough would not be too suitable but propaganda would be very useful because of katyushas. Still, it is up to you to decide what you're comfortable with.

Personally I find urban to be most useful for this strat. I would usually go down left side to make use of flame ingenery. These come early, at 2CP, and will help you to hold the field and more importantly, the fuel. They can also save you from having to research sturmovie ingenery in order to get flamers, which will allow your vehicle to come 30 fuel earlier. Because the strat is upgrade-lite, you will have relatively little to spend munitions on as well, making this an excellent way to spend them.

Flamethrowers are VERY important to this strat. Your weakness early on to your conscripts will be troops in buildings and bunkers. Later on, they are helpful to kill vetted troops that can threaten your armour with their shreks. Also remember that flamers leave no bodies, an obvious advantage if the enemy has an abundance of med bunkers. You will not have snipers or mortars to deal with buildings, so make good use of these.

Hold the line can be very handy when you absolutely MUST hold a fuel point a little longer, essential to this strat. It can also be used to counter the irritating pathing of the conscripts without guns - they will no longer run out to the enemy during an engagement.

The KV-2 is also extremely good in this strat. Useful for bunker-busting and base wrecking late game, it can also make an excellent addition to your field army due to it's excellent suppression. It makes a good team with some SU-100s and NKVD squads. The other side of the doctrine is also quite good and overall urban is a well designed doctrine, although the game should be over by the time you put points there.

Now to a few principles of gameplay.

STALL, STALL, STALL
You want to hold on to your points for as long as possible, getting a good fuel income so you can get to your late game faster than the wehr player can. Soviet tanks are every bit as good as the German ones so make sure to strive for them. The heavier vehicles are also much more resistant to paks than the other allied tanks so they retain their usefulness even against a heavy T2 enemy.

To do this, constant harassment is the key. You want to keep your opponent constantly having to retake his points as it keeps him busy trying to take them back. A good US player should be able to adapt to this strat quickly as it is quite similar to harassment gameplay that the US may use to get his own fast vehicle out. Remember the lack of retreat though, as you definitely do not want to lose too many units from being isolated. Do not overextend in your harassment and make sure you have an exit strategy.

In general combat as well, try to stay at a distance. More time figting you is less time for him capping. You will also be more effective at this range because you will lose firepower quickly up close as scripts start dying. If you see the opportunity though, don't be afraid to charge and crush his field army.

NO RETREAT
You want to constantly have your units out on the field so they are an ever-present threat to the enemy, who will be less willing to send out cappers if he doesn't know where your units are. An outpost on a well positioned fuel is a great way to achieve this. It will give you this reinforcement point, an unassailable OPed fuel and an emergency bunker that will give you the edge in a close defensive engagement. Included in this point, is that you absolutely MUST try to keep as many full units alive as possible.

CHOICE OF VEHICLE
Your choice of vehicle is quite important but may come down to personal preference. T-70s should definitely be used if your enemy has a sniper, has lots of bunkers or you are expecting an enemy vehicle. T-90s should be used if you have the skill to circle strafe paks you discover (they are extremely effective against them) or if your enemy is using a lot of infantry in general, due to their greater killing power. T-70s may be preferable in this case depending on the infantry.

The phases of battle:

Early Game
As soon as the battle begins build 2X Ingenery and a command squad. Your first Ingenery out will build your barracks while the 2nd will begin capping. He will cap every point that is adjacent to your HQ, prioritising munitions for the moment. You will need much more munitions quickly to research NKVD but after this fuel should be the priority. Capping the points surrounding your base will allow your squad to stay close to base so that they can start building the armoury and tank hall quickly after their capping order is done. Once the barracks is built, send that ingy squad to cap the side of the map you expect the least fighting. We don't want him to die early. Start building conscripts as soon as the barracks is done. He should come out at the same time as the command squad.

Send them both to the side you expect most fighting. They will both be used to cap, but stay close together. Use their combined strenght to defeat the enemy's first squad, be it volks or a bike. Putting your conscripts in a building is an excellent idea as they benefit from this more than any other infantry in the game. It will also give you lots of sight range to spot the enemy's other movements. Save your commander artillery for use on a building with troops in it, or an mg. During this time, you will have been building some more conscript squads. Once you have three you should have about enough fuel and munitions to build your armoury and research NKVD scripts. After it is researched, queue up some squads.

The wehrmacht has a few options at this point. If you used your troops correctly, you should have beaten him on the contested side. Your mass of conscripts should have flanked and overrun his few early units. You will now be capping out but keeping your troops within calling distace of each other just in case of surprises. He can either:
1) Try to find some lone capping squads with several of his and make mince meat of them. Counter by keeping troops close enough to respond to emergencies.
2) Fortify the territory he still has. This is good news. It will allow you to move around the rest of the map with much more freedom.
3) Start attacking the lesser contested side. Possibly bad news. This means that the other player won't take crap from you and shows he can be quite mobile when he wants to be. He will most likely be quite effective at countering your mid-game harassment. Do your best to keep your troops together and make him pull off his attack. Eventually he may settle into bunker mode.

You should start having a few NKVD squads coming out now and should have a slight map control advantage. If you were having a little difficulty beating his forces before, now you can send these bad boys in to provide the firepower while the other conscripts take the hits. Remember that, although only new squads get the commissar and complete gun sets, all existing squads still get free molotovs. These have a reasonably short cooldown and are very effective at getting the enemy out of cover. Use them as you would a panzer elite incendiary nade. This should give you a decisive advantage in the field battles for the moment.

Mid-game
The time has come. The decisive part of the battle. He should have a little less map control than you and you will mostly likely start to see kriegs barracks units from him. Your NKVD should be able to go toe to toe with the infantry armour (vet0-1) grens but surviving vConscripts will get torn to pieces. Instead, use these to continue your harassment, gaining as much fuel advantage as you can. Their nades can still provide some decent firepower in a firefight however.

You will now have some decision making to do. You should have a good idea of the doctrine and strategy he has gone with and should choose your doctrine to counter it. A heavy bunker spam should not be met with breakthrough, as you will have less options against the vet 2 horde and bunkers. In this case, you should choose either propaganda, katyusha side, or urban (described above). These will give you the most anti-emplacement solutions. If you go with urban and the enemy has a ridiculous amount of defenses, judge your map control. If you have the majority of the fuel and will have no problem continuing on the fast light vehicle path it may be wise to build a firebase to barrage his bunkers. Prop should be able to work a kat or two into the build order easily as they only cost manpower and will not delay your vehicle. It may also be wise at this point to unlock sturmovie ingenery to give your engineers satchels. If you are prop, it will also give you your gren counter apart from kats, flamers, and urban should also unlock dual flamers by this point if you haven't already. Remember that every research you do delays your teching. If you see indications of blitz, such as an abundance of T1 units, OPed fuel or obviously, stormtroopers, continue full-steam ahead towards your vehicle. It should give you free reign over the field once you get it as shreks are rather ineffective against vehicles.

Also at this point, if you are losing and have less than 50% of the fuel and he has fortified his positions, ABORT THIS STRAT. You will dig a hole for yourselves. If you haven't yet built your tank depot, change over to a much more solid strelky/mortar/tank hunter build which will give you options to come back from behind.

Vehicle-stage mid-game
If you have had greater map control and pushed off any attack into your territory you will have done well. He should have settle into his bunkers and tried to vet up or tech up by this point. He may send out small forays of lightly vetted grens into your territory to try and claim some but by this stage, your mobile force should consist of many conscripts and a few flamers. You should be able to push him around easily. Your vehicle should come out now.

By this stage he will probably only have, at most, a pak and 1 or 2 shreked squads. He will instead have been focusing on anti-infantry power to try and take back some territory. The grens shouldn't be a threat as they are easy enought to avoid. The problem comes from the pak. You will need to use your commander binoculars often to try and find it's location before it cloaks and before you send your vehicle in. If you cannot find it, chances are that it is close to his bunker, or near to the main bulk of his forces. Paks are normally kept quite close to mgs, just a little behind, so keep this in mind if you did happen to build an arty piece. Although inaccurate, a lucky hit will destroy his pak and allow you to send your vehicle in to wreak havok. Target mgs first, and then send your blob in once that is sorted. The sight of your blob combined with your vehicle should send him running, leaving you free to satchel/flame the bunker. If he stays to fight, make sure you mass nade him and flame him rather than shoot him. You will not want to leave casualties for the medics.

If you are not able to find the pak, you may have to send the infantry in first from multiple directions. This will flush out his pak and you can safely send in your vehicle afterwards to help mop up. This method leaves you open to more casualties however.

If you are unable to defeat his position, use your vehicle instead to counter his raids on your territory, as well as aid your own efforts.

Late game
At this stage, you can continue to build light vehicles and infantry or build true tanks as needed. First, you should get a few SU-85s. They are an excellent counter to a surprise vehicle from the enemy (they 3 hit stugs) and are quite effective against buildings. They are also surprisingly good against infantry, though vulnerable to shreks. You should now work towards getting T-34s, upgunned if possible. You can also retire your conscripts in favour of red banner strelky with tank hunter support. Your fast vehicle should have put your enemy into disarray and your options will widen up. Go for any unit you feel compliments your playstyle. Just remember to keep the focus on tanks for now as the enemy will likely be lacking appropriate counters for the moment and will have difficulty teching for anything stronger than a pak.

From here you should win. Your light vehicle should have had the same shock effect as those of other armies and given you a decisive midgame advantage, allowing you to reach your endgame easily. Your tanks and elite infantry will be too much for your opponent and you should be able to gain complete map control.

[nomad52]

I have used almost this exact build before and it worked perfectly.Victory was assured about 10 minutes in.

[wordsmith]

Well written mate, I like it and I can confirm that it works too

In short story it's about getting Light tankovy upgrade fast and then spam T90/Su85 combo. And to hold ground and cap use cheap infantry - which Conscript suits the best.

I'm now making an analysis of Soviet army and compare it to Axis armies. Many players are now complaining about Soviet players that they just spam some units only BUT you must realize that Soviet doesn't have other option since tech system is designed to spam.

It's simple: if Soviet builds Support barracks he has 2 options, he pick one, upgarde it and now have 2 units which can build or research another upgrade. Of course he will use only those 2 units and spam those, another tech would be pointless. And almost same situation is in Tank hall - 2 options to upgrade, but only one really used. Doesn't matter if Ligh or Heavy, both have solid AT and AI capabilities. I will explain it more when I finish my analysis and post also some suggestion how to balance it better.

[GodlikeDennis]

I agree that most factions, including Soviets, usually have to pick a pool of units and stick to it. But I find that Soviets do have some leeway as to expanding their available units. The upgrades are fairly cheap after all. Nothing compared to say PE who have to get a whole new building and the main upgrade from it (which probably won't fit in their base area anyway ). That's why I sort of imply that this build is useful for getting you in a very good position within 10 minutes and then you can expand onto whatever unit pool suits you.

[Artillerist]

Hmmm....

Start:
Sappers, Major, Sappers. Barraks, Conscripts (to support Major). Upgrade building.
Support Building, Artillery upgrade. ZiS-2.
Strelki, Strelki, Strelki.
ZiS-3.
Then rule with Major and 3 x Strelki + 2 upgraded ZiS-2.
In that time, Mortar upgrade, and 2-3 mortars.
An endgame, Guards (4-5 packs) + 3 ZiS-2 + 3 PM-38 - rule all

Usually I dont use tanks ( dont like that chaps, as I served in anti-tank artillery )

[TacticalNuke]

wow

[GodlikeDennis]

Thanks for the input nuke...

[TacticalNuke]

Wasn't trying to seem rude. Your detail level is amazing.

[GodlikeDennis]

Thanks, I tried to put in as much insight into the "why" of doing things because I think that's the problem players have when they see a strategy and try to emulate it. As I said in the guide, it also talks about many of the general thoughts a competitive player has during a game (percentage of fuel control, enemy player teching etc). You didn't seem rude either by the way, I'm not easily offended. Just thought you could have elaborated a bit more.

[javy52]

excellent strategy