Combined Arms Bonus

[scroggin]

One of the questions raised during the last WWW was is there a combined arms bonus? Daniel didnt seem to know the answer. He suggested asking podcat. Has ths question been answered?

What will the best build for an armoured division. Pure tanks for maximum hardness and penetration or a mixture of armour mechanized and mobile artillery as in HOI3. Is the armour piercing stat calculated by the division average or only calculated for the armoured component of a division

 

[Denkt]

Why should there be a bonus? A divisions stats is based on the sum of its battalions.

 

[bengast]

https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/foru...-seen-any-combined-arms.915413/#post-20853146

There's podcats answer

 

[Raptor83]

Why should there be a bonus? A divisions stats is based on the sum of its battalions.

Unit of mutually supporting tanks + infantry + artillery is much more effective, than sum of its parts.

 

[Zaku]

Unit of mutually supporting tanks + infantry + artillery is much more effective, than sum of its parts.

So they should balance the stats of those units accordingly. Tanks have good stats but are exensive, and bad in rough terrain. Motorized infantry is cheaper, but they are able to protect the tanks in a close combat environment. Arty gives huge amounts of soft attack, but is useless on it's own.

CA bonus was a good, but somewhat arbitary solution in HOI3, If the devs can balance the stats without using the bonus that's even better.

 

[fabius]

Unit of mutually supporting tanks + infantry + artillery is much more effective, than sum of its parts.

This, and there another thread on this like a page or two in where Podcat replies that they are still looking at it.

 

[Vidkjaer]

What will the best build for an armoured division. Pure tanks for maximum hardness and penetration or a mixture of armour mechanized and mobile artillery as in HOI3. Is the armour piercing stat calculated by the division average or only calculated for the armoured component of a division

The armor and piercing stat is an average for a division. Makes sense.
Defensive, breakthrough, soft/hard attack are sums.

 

[scroggin]

https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/foru...-seen-any-combined-arms.915413/#post-20853146

There's podcats answer

Thats great knowing podcat he will take the combined arms bonus of HOI3 and improve it

 

[scroggin]

The armor and piercing stat is an average for a division. Makes sense.
Defensive, breakthrough, soft/hard attack are sums.

Im a bit worried that could create a situation where a division of only light tanks could be better at
Killing tigers than a division with heavy tanks and mechanized. It wouldnt be good if having soft units in a division waters down the armour piercing stats of a division to the point where you dont want support arms with your tanks.

 

[blue_yonder]

Unit of mutually supporting tanks + infantry + artillery is much more effective, than sum of its parts.

But only one of these 'parts' which make the 'sum' can ever operate independently, so the 'greater than the whole' argument has no meaning at all. Adding tanks and/or artillery certainly makes infantry 'greater', and this will be reflected in the stats, but there is no whole it's greater than, because tanks and/or artillery can't fight effectively all by themselves. My reading of podcat's comment is that he is tweaking the stats to get them right, and not that he sees an urgent need to impose a combined arms bonus that once again leads people to do all kinds of weird gamey crap with a spreadsheet.

 

[scroggin]

But only one of these 'parts' which make the 'sum' can ever operate independently, so the 'greater than the whole' argument has no meaning at all. Adding tanks and/or artillery certainly makes infantry 'greater', and this will be reflected in the stats, but there is no whole it's greater than, because tanks and/or artillery can't fight effectively all by themselves. My reading of podcat's comment is that he is tweaking the stats to get them right, and not that he sees an urgent need to impose a combined arms bonus that once again leads people to do all kinds of weird gamey crap with a spreadsheet.

I'm going to have to disagree there.

Artillery cant operate without tanks or preferably infantry to protect them.

Tanks are vulnerable to ambushes without infantry support, but can operate far more effectively with infantry support.

Infantry find it suicidal to attack without tanks or artillery to keep enemy infantry cowering in their trenches.

Each of these types works more effectively in combination than they can on their own. None of them can do their own job well without the other arms to compensate for their weaknesses

 

[shri]

CA Bonus was the best feature in HOI3 and needs to be retained -

Infantry without Tanks - Trench Warfare
Infantry without Artillery- Chinese style Militia Banzai (results in half the army melting before the attack)
Tanks without Motorised Infantry- British type heavy losses to 88s in the early Desert Campaign.
Tanks without Motorised/Self Propelled Artillery- Tanks are useless against well dug-in infantry and against forts/cities etc
Tanks without Engineers- Useless to cross rivers, cannot assault, cannot clear mine-fields and tank-traps.
Ground Forces without Air Power - Half hearted offensive and forever ducking and weaving a.k.a Battle of Bulge (on the German side).
I can go on..

 

[Vidkjaer]

Im a bit worried that could create a situation where a division of only light tanks could be better at
Killing tigers than a division with heavy tanks and mechanized. It wouldnt be good if having soft units in a division waters down the armour piercing stats of a division to the point where you dont want support arms with your tanks.

Wait and see the final stats for units.

 

[blue_yonder]

I can go on..

I’m sure you could. But since no one is disputing the power of combined arms or would argue with any of your examples, there is no need to do so. The issue is simply whether this added power is best represented by stats, or by a mystical bonus conferred from on high, or by a little bit of both.

 

[Midden]

The game play presented to us so far ... seem to indicate the game design suits a simple division design ... all infantry, all marines.

It may be hindsight but we know that as the war developed, that:

- Artillery battalions were ubiquitous;
- Armored Divisions tended to get more infantry added as the war went on;
- Infantry Divisions tended to get more AT and Armor battalions even Marines get tanks added, German infantry liked Stugs.

I don't want the game to penalize me if I add ART or some ARM to a marine division, by ruining it's amphibious assault stats. Because in reality it seems adding those things made the Division better for it's role. I want the game to encourage me to make "combined arms divisions".

I really love the support company options, like recon, engineers, hospital etc.... but I think the dev's made a mistake when they made support companies of things you can already add as battalions. Like AT, Armour, AA. I think they have made these support company ART have different effects to adding a Battalions of ART, and that this has muddled there design thinking. A paradox results when we query why does adding a ARM battalion to a Marine division make it worse, but adding a ARM support company doesn't penalize it for amphibious role?

 

[Zaku]

A paradox results when we query why does adding a ARM battalion to a Marine division make it worse, but adding a ARM support company doesn't penalize it for amphibious role?

You can't add ARM to the support slot.

 

[Number 7]

You can't add ARM to the support slot.

not with that attitude! i like to imagine my officers have their morning coffee delivered by a group of panzer Is

 

[Zaku]

not with that attitude! i like to imagine my officers have their morning coffee delivered by a group of panzer Is

maybe it could be a British special support unit.
Tea-tanks.

 

[Lither]

the problem with the line of thinking that a combined arms division can be properly represented by adding its parts together is that combined arms doesn't really work that way.

combined arms combinations are in many ways a force multiplier, in that a division with integrated assets performs disproportionately effectively than a simple analysis of the divisional structure would imply.

sure, the HoI 3 system was a fair bit silly at times, but it did do a better job of representing the benefits of combined arms.

 

[Denkt]

If the stats are choosed with care you don't have to give extra bonuses for combined arms.

What happen then you take account for several divisions, maybe you use pure artillery divisions to attack the enemy while you have infantry divisions that can defend the artillery divisions from attacks.

You can not say that Im not protecting the artillery, but I wan't to maximize my firepower thus I only attack with artillery to make the most use of my width.