tpg0007

I translated this article from the Relic forum, originally in Chinese.

General Changes

Engineers from all countries will be able to dig foxholes, and most infantry (including HMG, mortar, but of course not AT) will be able to hide in them, and take half damage from artillery and bombing, though at the same time their own attacking power will also be halved. HMG inside foxhole cannot suppress enemy infantry.

Mortar range and accurage will be decreased.

Jeep and motorcycle crew can be killed instead of having the vehicle explode. Other infantry can take over unmanned jeeps and motorcycles.

All countries can make a gunner class in their light vehicle production facilities. Gunner takes 1 population, is cheap to make and have 1 attack. His function is to replace killed gunners on other vehicles, such as tanks.

Flak 88 and other anti-air weapons have increased AA capability. Area protected by such weapons will be immune from air strikes. However, for this to work the AA weapon must not be engaging ground targets at the time of the air strike. For example, if the Flak 88 is hitting a tank, the area it's in can be bombed by planes at the same time.

All infantry can use special attacks inside buildings, including "automatically throwing grenades." (without using ammo or what?)

Snipers can turn on hold fire inside buildings.

Soviet troops will be numerically superior to Allied and Axis and take comparatively less population.

Soviet Build List

Engineers
Upgrades: wirecutter, motolov cocktail
4-man squad. Instead of flamethrowers can only use motolov cocktail, which is less effective against moving targets but more effective against stationary ones. Soviet engineers will build sandbags and foxholes at twice the speed of other countries'. They cannot build bunkers but can upgrade buildings into bunkers or aid stations. These upgraded structures will have the same limited arc of fire as other bunkers/MG nests. With the necessary command abilities they can build 57mm AT guns that are immobile.

Recruiting Station

Militia
3-man squad that has both female and male soldiers. Can pick up dropped weapons but will only use them to 1/3 effectiveness. This is upgradable to 2/3.

Recruit
6-man squad, but only half have rifles. Other 3 men can quickly pick up dropped weapons.

Armored Truck
Better protected than jeep or motorcycle but slower. Driver cannot be killed. Has two loudspeakers.

Red Army Camp

Red Army Assault Troop
5-man squad.
Upgrades: grenade, either bayonet or LMG
LMG can suppress, bayonet excels at melee range.

Political Commissar
Single man. Expensive, low attack.
All non-armored troops including AT Within the area of roughly a grenade toss of this unit will have attack power increased by 3. However, troops under the effect will attack retreating friendly units that come into range first rather than the enemy!

HMG Team
3-man squad.
Can hide behind natural terrain features (so no buildings, wrecks, etc.) The effectiveness is less than the camo ability of the sniper.

AT Team
2-man squad.
Uses man-portable weapon instead of regular AT gun. Faster, has longer range and more accurate. However damage is lower. Cannot blow up tanks but rather only destroy parts such as main gun, engine, etc. Useless against heavy tanks and only somewhat effective against medium tanks.

Sniper
Same as other countries'.

Truck Battalion

Special troops of the Soviet side. Cheap trucks that have weapon mounts. Can carry 1 squad of infantry. Very weak armor. Below are the different mounts:

Quad MG
Can suppress; carries 1 squad.

45mm Cannon
Very fast, effective against light-medium armor; carries 1 squad.

76mm Flak
Expensive, effective against all armor; carries 1 squad.

Katyusha
Costs 700 manpower, out-ranges other rocket weapons and concentrates hits in smaller area. Like all other trucks are vulnerable against even HMGs.

Armored Battalion

T-70A Light Tank
Slow; can upgrade with bulldozer.

T-34 Medium Tank
Can use ability to temporarily increase AT attack; can be upgraded with bow and coaxial MG.

SU-100 Tank Destroyer
Expensive. Effective against even Tigers. Fixed turret and very slow. Low accuracy.

KV-1 Heavy Tank
Expensive. Slowest heavy tank in the game. Upgradable with up to 3 MGs.

Soviet Troop Experience

Different from Allied and Axies veterancy programs, Soviet uses the Propoganda Station to increase the experience of troops. At the start 1 of the 4 troop classes (infantry, heavy weapons, light armor, heavy armor) can be designated Combat Hero 1st Rank. From there on, resources must be spent to upgrade that class from 2nd Rank up to 4th Rank. When the Combat Hero class has increased by 1 rank, the other three troop classes will automatically increase by 1 rank as well, up to Rank 2. So if heavy weapons were designated Combat Hero 1st Rank and later upgrade to Combat Hero 2nd Rank, all other troop classes will become Combat Hero 1st Rank automatically. So at any time Soviet can have 1 Rank 4 troop class and 3 Rank 2 troop classes.

Soviet Doctrine

Guerrilla Combat

Sharp Shooting
Level 1- Increases experience of snipers by 1 rank. 4th Rank snipers will become 5th rank.

Level 2: Increases sniper sight range.

Level 3: Calls a hero sniper that starts at Rank 4 and has increased range. Moves fast under camo.

Ambush
Level 1: Increases defensive cover of all infantry. Red cover will become yellow, and yellow will become green.

Level 2: Increases the non-special attack power of infantry inside buildings (not grenades, bazookas etc.)

Level 3: Calls special AT team. 5-man squad, moves fast and cannot be suppressed. Cannot destroy tanks totally but can destroy tracks and engine easily.

Propaganda Combat

Propaganda
Level 1: Increases commissar effect range by 1/3.

Level 2: Uses resources to decrease manpower production rate of opponents by 50% for 30 seconds.

Level 3: Uses manpower to increase ammo and oil production by 50% for 30 seconds.

Development
Level 1: Increase production rate of Truck and Armor Battalions.

Level 2: Calls special combat team. 6-man squad all with SMGs. Can upgrade with 1 HMG. Abilities include anti-suppression and grenade.

Level 3: Calls IS-II heavy tank, equipped with 85mm main gun and 4 MGs. Can go head-to-toe against the Tiger but moves slower.

Human Wave Combat

Support
Level 1: Calls a free light infantry squad and a free heavy weapon team.

Level 2: Calls 3-man nurse team. Cannot attack but have good defense. Can only be attacked manually like medics. Heals wounded soldiers slowly.

Level 3: Spend 1000 manpower to call up a militia squad in each controlled sector that has a building. Within 2 minutes militia will use picked up weapons with 100% effectiveness, decreased to 2/3 after 2 minutes.

Tactics
Level 1: Infantry can hide inside buildings. While in hiding they cannot attack or be seen by the enemy, not even when enemy garrisons the building. If building is destroyed hidden infantry will be killed.

Level 2: All infantry will be immune to suppression and move faster for 30 seconds.

Level 3: Calls 3 AI-controlled Katyushas to attack a designated area. The Katyushas will have to first drive to a firing area from the edge of the map. Once there they'll launch 3 waves of rocket attacks 1 minute apart and then leave the map. They can be destroyed while they're on the map.

Original source then says that this is an early beta but that it feels fairly balanced amongst the three sides.

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B. Clawhammer

This sounds real cool, but I'm surprised their working on an expansion when they still many issues with their servers to fix.

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|TG-33rd|Clawhammer
[squadl] [sniper][unit]


BF2 Rules & SOPs

Magnum50

good find, thats for the info.

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Magnum
www.gettacticaldammit.com

TychoCelchuuu

Wow, thanks for translating this! It's pretty neat.

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|TG-Irr|TychoCelchuuu

Acid

That sounds exactly like a thing EA/ DICE would do.

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TychoCelchuuu

I highly doubt the same people that model tanks and design new buildings are the people working on the server architecture and the netcode. It's not like there's 3 people who work on the game or something. There's a division of labor, which is why we still get Battlefield 2 patches even while they work on 2142.

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|TG-Irr|TychoCelchuuu

B. Clawhammer

Yeah I'm sure you're right Tycho. Just doing a little rant on an otherwise awesome game IMHO. Don't mean to hijack the thread or anything tpg0007, the expansion does sound pretty cool

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|TG-33rd|Clawhammer
[squadl] [sniper][unit]


BF2 Rules & SOPs

BaneII

Nice find. I'm actually looking forward to it because we need more maps. Moooooooore maps!

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-33rd- BaneII
Smokers & Jokers

flux

The General Changes section sounds like stuff they should just release in a patch. Especially the Sniper ability to hold fire.

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flux
[tg-c1]