Late ware German/SS rifle squads vs. SOV SMG squads

[SDG]

I have started to replay the otherwise great "Broken Shield" campaign and experiencing that my rife squads do not perform very well against their Soviet peers.

This is especially weird due the below factors:

- the campaign features waffen SS rifle squads withe either veteran or crack (!) experience;

- the squads have high morale and good leaders (+2);

- with regards to weaponry a typical SS squad has two machine guns, 1-2 semi automatic rifles an MP40 and the good old Kar 98ks. A squad with the 2 MG42s should (in theory) mean a respectable amount of firepower.

And yet all of the above, I am getting mixed results when engaging (one on one) simple Soviet SMG squads with veteran experience. And I am not talking about about knife-fight range battles. These are mid range shootouts at around 200 m (if I get closer its even worse).

For the sake of the argument lets for now forget the fact that I should never 1v1 my enemies, and I should use tanks, supression, smoke etc. My main point is that we have the last remnants of the very best of the reich could afford at this point and time of the war and yet I cannot confidently engage (as the attacker) a bog standard Soviet SMG unit. The long bursts from the PPshs just tear through my men and once the machine gunners are dead (and they are the ones that get killed first) the engagements are good as finished, because I have lost the main source of my firepower.

Might be just a very subjective experience on my part or I am using German squads in the wrong manner.

Let me know what you think, or what is the proper way of employing late war German squads at this stage of the war.

[Anthony P.]

1 hour ago, SDG said:

For the sake of the argument lets for now forget the fact that I should never 1v1 my enemies, and I should use tanks, supression, smoke etc.

You've mostly already hit your head on the nail. If we're gonna talk about the "proper way of employing" anything against units armed with lots of automatic weapons, then it's gonna have to be specifically cooperating, mutual support from other squads, heavy weapons, AFVs, etc. in addition to simply keeping at a distance (IRL submachine guns aren't terribly effective beyond or even at 200m, and in CM they're hard coded not to engage beyond that distance).

The Soviets learnt the hard way from the Finns that small SMG units could tear their enemies to shreds, and the Germans learnt it the same way from the Soviets. Being experienced doesn't make the bullets coming your way much less scary, and it certainly doesn't make them any less dangerous.

[PEB14]

Based on my experience it's basically impossible to engage smg units below 200 meters without having them heavily suppressed, which makes fighting Russian squads very painful in close terrain (especially forest).

As @Anthony P. you'll need all the heavy weapons support you can…