Is the division design xp cost too high?

[PorkchopSandwiches247]

Currently, land experience cost to make divisional changes are:
-10xp for support companies
-5xp for a new/different battalion
-25xp to add a ‘new’ battalion type to a division, such as adding a tank to all inf division

Now first off, I don't wan’t the cost to be free or inconsequential, because it does add a strategic element to the game. But land experience is in very high demand and very difficult to come by for certain nations before major war breaks out. An army chief only brings in so much, and with land xp being needed for doctrines, tank design, equipment upgrades, and mountaineer special forces as well, it gets spread thin quick.

Division design is quite pricey with all that considered, and most nations start with pretty poor templates. Particularly since artillery is considered a separate battalion now for some reason. You can easily spend a full doctrine level making a decent tank division or even a simple inf/art division meant for defense. I find in particular making a worthwhile special forces template very pricey, since they only begin with like 4 battalions for some reason.

Do you think it needs to be toned down some? Maybe drop down new battalion type cost to 10xp, have support company only cost 5xp, etc.

P.S. I know there are specific ways to mitigate division design cost, like the Mobile Doctrine army spirit, but youd still have to switch doctrines and buy the spirit…thats a ton of investment to “save” army xp.

 

[marcelo r. r.]

Tank templates is now strangely expensive, i don't remind a tank template cost 50xp+ before. sometimes 80xp.

For minors the weirder effect is make AI minors output more divisions, that is something many players dont like.

I don't see a problem with support divisions cost less: it didnt impact division spam.

 

[blahmaster6k]

P.S. I know there are specific ways to mitigate division design cost, like the Mobile Doctrine army spirit, but youd still have to switch doctrines and buy the spirit…thats a ton of investment to “save” army xp.

This doesn't even save much experience if any most of the time. Those spirits cost 35 xp by themselves and are never what you want to stay on in the long term so you'll eventually have to spend another 35 xp swapping back. Unless the division you're designing costs over 70 xp, It's a net loss swapping to them.

Those spirits also don't work for one of the most important methods of making a tank template, which is to edit an infantry template into a tank template to preserve division experience. This is important as Germany can get up to seven divisions of level 5 veteran tank divisions to start world war 2 with by converting infantry volunteers from the Spanish Civil War. Sure, it doesn't cost anything to add or remove tanks or mechanized, but it does cost the normal amount to replace all the infantry with tanks when you're swapping a template over.

 

[Gefallener_Held]

Yes, the template costs are beyond ridiculou. There is a mid that puts one point at every thing, that's low but better than the alternative.

 

[Vigor]

RE: OP
Yeah it seems to me designing divisions is too basic a thing to come with restrictions. I feel pretty annoyed early game when every division I start with is an under strength division which is not something i want to use but i can't do anything about it either without spending a lot of PP, building a lot of equipment and also training my army, (need it or not). I suppose in some situations you can get into a war that won't be a burden to you to gain xp, but... you still need a lot of xp.

I have spent the first 6 years of most of my games just trying to twist what I have been given into something i actually want to use.

I think i would enjoy early game more if i could just go straight to building what I want or converting what i have to what i want.(as soon as necessary equipment has been produced of course)

 

[Vigor]

on the other hand you can just bypass all of that frustration by using the console command "xp (number)" e.g. ~ to open console then type xp 500 to get the maximum amount of all 3 types of xp. (as long as you aren't playing ironman) The only bad thing about doing that is it might unbalance the game if you spend xp on variants after you gave it to yourself for free.

 

[Voigt]

This doesn't even save much experience if any most of the time. Those spirits cost 35 xp by themselves and are never what you want to stay on in the long term so you'll eventually have to spend another 35 xp swapping back. Unless the division you're designing costs over 70 xp, It's a net loss swapping to them.

Those spirits also don't work for one of the most important methods of making a tank template, which is to edit an infantry template into a tank template to preserve division experience. This is important as Germany can get up to seven divisions of level 5 veteran tank divisions to start world war 2 with by converting infantry volunteers from the Spanish Civil War. Sure, it doesn't cost anything to add or remove tanks or mechanized, but it does cost the normal amount to replace all the infantry with tanks when you're swapping a template over.

I haven't tried in MP, but I like to use the Mobile Warfare Spirit as Germany for the SCW. If I pick Halder somewhat early, I can get the XP for the spirit before SCW starts, and with that create a 40W MotInf Template which I can send to the SCW. Maximizing manpower and earnable XP to Spain. Also the ability to get combined warfare expert. Finally if a MotInf divsions runs out of trucks or fuel, they still fight as regular infantry, just with slower speed.
With the spirit I can also create a 50W LARM template for garrison duty if I so desire, and already later copy the mot template for backup and change the existing one into a tank template.

 

[Xinamon]

Agreed, designing divisions now is way too expensive. It also encourages meta divisions because why should I spend so much xp to design divisions for regions/terrains when I can just make 1 and save the rest for doctrines/tanks/special forces.

 

[Anaraxes]

The template costs haven't changed from release, I don't think. The costs outlined in the OP are just what I remember them being.

The reason they feel "more expensive" now is that with some more recent features, there's more demand on army xp. Yet (unlike MtG, which vastly increased the number of things you had to spend naval xp on, but also increased the rate at which it was gained), there wasn't any increase in the rate of earning xp.

 

[General Tao]

Line Artillery used to be 5, now it's 25. MP mode reduce division designer costs to 2 or 3 xp, much more sensible, like the designers.

Personally I'd like for the army spirits to become free / heavily reduced when chosen once, so if you pick Portrait of Marx its 35 the first time, if you swap to Accomplished Heritage its 35, then to swap back and forth as required when you want to have cheaper medals or ticking mp, its like 5 or 10. Would promote active switching instead of just picking the "best" one and forgetting about it for the rest of the game.

 

[Colonel_Kraken]

Answer to OP question: YES

 

[Kanitatlan]

There are three issues here.

Firstly, the availability of army XP has, long-term, been steadily reducing over a series of patches. This has never been a major change but XP used to be more plentiful

Secondly, the demand for army XP has increased over recent (and not so recent) changes with, in particular, the introduction of MIOs demanding significant army XP.

and thirdly, XP for division design has increased with combat support, mobile combat support and armoured combat support now being new troop categories. In particular, armoured divisions may well included 4 categories of battalion when they used to only have two.

So, yes, some rebalancing is needed.