Is it me, or are tanks worse now?...please discuss.

  • We have updated our Community Code of Conduct. Please read through the new rules for the forum that are an integral part of Paradox Interactive’s User Agreement.
I like my 1939 Medium Chassis with +9 Engine, welded armour, christie suspension, three man turret 1939 improved howitzer, armour skirt, sloped armour, radio and easy maintenance hatches.
Roughly 26 iC per tank, 100% reliability , 12 km/h speed. If designated as tanks I can do 5 mot, 5 tanks in a division for quite cheap and gettint the doctrine boni for armour.

Someone wants to go fast, it seems. :)

Would you spend army XP on MECH 1 to get it's speed up, or would you skip MECH 1 and go to MECH 2 later?
 
  • 1Like
Reactions:
By sheer accident fiddling around with stuff I also found a way to crank out tons of tanks. Like literally... probably give or take 2-3 times more than you should probably be possible to do but with half the IC. With the rate I am going I probably manage to do like 3000-5000 medium tanks and have 15-20 20width medium tank divisions if I can keep up with the truck production (which is more the limiting point now) by 1939 and could steamroll Poland true blitzkrieg style lolz. Or I could give most of my infantry divisions a TD for fun, and still have 10 medium tank divisions to toy around.

I knew that if I just toy around long enough I'd eventually find something they missed, and now I kinda don't want to post how I did it because it's for sure going to be killed once the devs catch on to the... oversight. I am sure someone else will post it eventually or maybe someone else posted it already but once majority of people find out I feel like they won't want it to be nerfed either. At least I know I wouldn't because the trick is aweseome. And I don't know if it even can be fixed without ripping the whole game apart again.
 
Last edited:
I agree with that even more.

As I wrote in other threads with the issue already they should have standardized all the armored battalions to have 2 width and for all battalions of the same tank size to have the same amount equipment.


Or even better yet... remove dedicated SPG/TD battalions in the division designer and tank roles in the tank designer...

... and instead in the division designer just have Light/Medium/Heavy/Modern Tank battalions and assign individual tags to each battalion to specify which equipment you want in that battalion.

That would give the most flexibility on how to design your divisions and make best use of the equipment you produce.

No more different battalion combat width mess, no more different battalion equipment amount mess.

The only way to save production cost then would be simply have less battalions per division or just make cheaper tanks... like it should be.


Would make it much easier to balance all the combat stats of various modules etc, because then you can directly compare the performance of everything... because then instead of fiddling with combat widths or amounts of equipment you simply nerf/buff the according combat stat on the module and be done with it.

I completely agree and I'd even simplify more all AFV battalions have the same number of vehicles. It is just silly that if they have this artificial tag, tank destroyers means I have 1/2 the number of vehicles. Is the Stug III a SPART, or TD.? In real life it was both and it given day very likely took on both roles. Similarly, the M18 Hellcat was classified as a tank destroyer, and yet effectively, it is the same as a later model Sherman tank with less armor and an open-topped turret (which is strangely missing the tank designer) and higher speed.

I also don't see any reason to have a different number of vehicles between light, medium, and heavy. I can put 105MM howitzers on either chassis and call it SPART, it should not require fewer vehicle to get the same soft attack, just because I'm sticking the howitzers on a medium chassis.

You'll still need a mechanism to say I want this battalion to have soft attack focused equipment and that battalion to have hard attack equipment.
But this will eliminate the silly meta of the cheapest tanks are battalion of super heavy tank destroyers with Heavy machine guns and a secondary turret.
 
  • 2Like
Reactions:
@Secret Master Using Mot with the +100% Hardness Tech from Mech I.
Later on either using Mech II/Mech III or directly going for Amphibious Mech II instead.

I am tending back to not using Maint. company anymore though. Captured EQ was always very little as long as you don't defend against a grinding enemy. Going for SF doctrine and Arty+Rocket Arty to compensate for lower Soft Attack of Tanks, which also works well with the combat width changes making 20W tanks more viable.

380 Base Soft Attack at 20 combat width is ok.
 
Tanks were way to strong prior so hopefully they have been nerfed. Tanks were so ridiculous and made it almost impossible to have any sort of long drawn out war. Tanks could plow through anything but other tanks so as soon as you got the tank advantage your opponent would be crushed in a couple of months.

The best thing for this game would be a tank nerf but aside from a cost increase I am not seeing much of a nerf tbh besides production cost. Everything else seemed to be buffed heavy tanks are now faster getting 8kph heavies, and they will have better stats. Not really seeing the nerfs...
 
Alright, starting with non-replies then moving to replies.

After some testing and faffing about, it's hands down unquestionable tanks are worse as a straight fighting unit. The fact armor has been nuked so heavily, even with upgrades, vs the fact both MATG and tanks/TD + sup ATG can get well into the 100~200 range means the benefit of armor is gone; You're never going to have enough armor to counter pen now. Add on the fact you need to increase the production cost to even get to that point, and it's not even a question.

Further, the lack of damage bonuses that can goto a tank with high SA/HA vs Art of any stripe means that even if they were the same value, 30, in the designer, art will double or triple in SA depending on the year. Remember, Art gets bonuses for anything that is Art specific, Infantry specific, division, and mot. Tank only gets buffs from a hand full of places.

However, Tanks have a use. Defense....Wait, no, come back. Let me finish first.

Tanks can get Dozer plows if you research Engi t2. They have a broken effect of giving every tank that you use +2 to entrenchment. Every.
Every light, medium, heavy you put in; every tank, SPA, SPAA, and TD; Every armor recon and flame supp. +2 entrench.

It is now possible to get over 75 entrenchment with a 20 width. This, is busto. Remember, 1 entrenchment = 2% of everything. SA, HA, Def, Brk, Per, AA, name it. Probing attack makes fights a joke now. But, the minute you lose entrenchment, you might as well be running around with a 40 width of infantry.

Additionally, flame units add +25% attack on forts, +20% on urban, and +5% on everything else. This includes while defending. Add in Engis, and you can get a +65% from an urban with 1 fort. On the flip side though, this means any unit with one is decent at nulling the fort benefits as well when attacking. Heavy tanks, and only heavy tanks, retain their 10% to attacking forts and urban, vs med and light tank's -5%. Add in a railway gun, and a heavy tank unit with some mot can ignore the magi line and roll over anyone.

But....That's pretty much where it ends. By and large, tanks are no longer comparable on attack, even if we disregard the production costs. With the changes to how combat width works, and the fact defenders can now choose how weak the attackers are by simply having smaller units, the large benefit of having a concentrated block of damage and armor is gone, and primarily warfare, when done properly, is a contest between who has better air, who has better supply, and who can recover faster. In MP, this means defensive nations with a decent airforce can sit and wait forever while the enemy breaks themselves against their units, all the while destroying their air units with units that have at least one dedicated AA unit-- remember, attack bonuses apply to AA damage as well-- and keeping their factories running. In SP, it's matterless currently due to the AI bugging out, but once that's fixed I highly doubt the AI will have the needed tactics to deal with the fact that combat width and supply have changed so drastically from what should be minor changes. As it stands, you can get the same benefit, offensively, of having a proper tank unit, mixed or otherwise, by simply replacing armored units with their relevant mot counter parts. Replacing SPA with Mart yields the same amount or more SA for significantly less cost, TD are outclassed by ATG until '43 while having larger production costs, supply cost, and 3x as much width [1 v 3].

Of note, super heavy tanks, the meme unit of old, while expensive isn't that much more expensive than the trains are. Given relevant combat modifiers, late game useage sees a single column of SHT supported by mot/mech fill the role of old tank units without too much issue. That said, it still doesn't compare to the new spirited cas.

Everything you just posted said they were CHEAPER, but not BETTER when compared to combat performance in the their respective games.

See you make a basic error. You are looking at the tanks in the older version vs. tanks in this version. But you leave out the combat mechanics. Those were also changed.

I can make a tank that the older version could never penetrate. And that alone shows they were NOT better.

Now how is building tanks worse than the "other options avaliable". Heck you never even state what those other options are.

SPA is 3 width and almost no breakthrough.

Iunno if you're just ignoring what was posted or misreading it, but what I posted wasn't cheaper. Even if it was, the issue is 'is it worth it compared to the alternative', which the rest of us have conclude is no. Armor is irrelevant now given how little of it you can stack and the new armor mechanics.

Mart-- Motorized Artillery-- is the other option, which does 30 SA on paper, and close to 45~50 SA when bonuses are applied in combat. All said and done, Mart will cost around 8~10 depending on tier, while tank/SPA of the same SA value costs 12~16 depending. That's assuming you build the lowest grade possible as well.

SPA uses 1/3rd of the equipment while having the same production cost. And further, all artillery units have 3 width; We've been using them for the better part of the last 5 years regardless of that.

But armor still works at 75% piercing.

Other way around; Armor stops working at 75%, and scale down from 100%. If you have 100 armor and the enemy has 75 pen, you start losing the benefits of armor. say they have 85 pen? They have a smaller debuff on them. So you don't need to match 100 to 101; getting close is well enough. More over, besides heavies, you never have more armor than pen options, which I think is an oversight; you need all 5 armor techs, on a heavy to beat out sup atg + matg, let alone dedicated tank hunters, in real combat conditions.

Also, armor doesn't work like before. It doesn't just half the damage by changing the damage dice; It debuffs like a fort now. There's something going on in the background under calculations, but we're still pulling those apart. But, the simple of it? Armor doesn't protect tanks by reducing the damage they take anymore. If you had a 0 hardness unit with 0 armor vs a 0 hardness unit with 1000 armor, they will both take the same damage when hit now.

Wrong. Infact, whenever my tanks smashed trough their line and went for their supply hubs the AI trew caution to the win and desperatly tried to get that hub back, i've never seen the AI be that agressive before. No, i won because i smashed trough with my tanks and rushed their supply hubs, depriving them of supplies before i made big encirclements :p
THe same is happening in the late game, its 1950 fo me now, i lost the airwar, peroid, i can't pull that one back. My infantry can't push because, well, its infantry, fighting in red air and udner CAS fire... but wherever my tanks show up i crush the enemy, so i'm basicly constantly putting out fires with those tanks and it works.

Tough today i'l be playing MP with some aquintances and promised i'd co-op play germany with someone, i'l try my tanks in MP and see how well they hold up against actual players.

Umm, not wrong. The AI is definitely not hooked up right considering people are complaining about it crashing trying to access old code that doesn't work anymore. Reddit is currently flooded with 'The AI isn't working' threads because of it.

AS it is, good luck in MP if they've done any research on tanks, likely they won't build any.

Without criticism, I would nuance your statement to make it more general. For "objectively worse" I would substitute "constructively worse depending on context". The context of course includes whether all nations are "nerfed" in the same way, especially in terms of its effects on strategy; etc.

So one takeaway might be that, if tanks are constructively worse "value-for-IC" than TD/SPG across the board equally for all nations, then (say) Germany following the historical path, and using military builds centering around medium tank divisions (as presumably the AI will continue to do so at least for the historical option!), would become relatively disadvantaged in the early years against France etc. With optimal play on both sides, this may even be a good thing in terms of game balance! I certainly hope so...

It'll be fascinating to hear about the experiments of German players in MP games!

This in a nutshell. If you have one nation building tanks in the new system vs one that doesn't, say Germany vs France, you see a world of difference now. Of course, depending on the situation, that changes, like having a bunch of armored cars pretend to be tanks with snow plows sitting on the magi line with dirt up to their turrets like it's Russia all over again. suddenly there's a 200% increase to damage against the incoming Germans, who have to fight with a -100% because. It's hillarious watching players go 'WTF, HOW?!' every time now XD

As it is, MP has more or less devolved into the China/Japan war because of the changes. Or more, the ground war has, it's mostly about cas and transport planes now.
 
  • 5
  • 4Like
Reactions:
Other way around; Armor stops working at 75%, and scale down from 100%. If you have 100 armor and the enemy has 75 pen, you start losing the benefits of armor. say they have 85 pen? They have a smaller debuff on them. So you don't need to match 100 to 101; getting close is well enough. More over, besides heavies, you never have more armor than pen options, which I think is an oversight; you need all 5 armor techs, on a heavy to beat out sup atg + matg, let alone dedicated tank hunters, in real combat conditions.

Also, armor doesn't work like before. It doesn't just half the damage by changing the damage dice; It debuffs like a fort now. There's something going on in the background under calculations, but we're still pulling those apart. But, the simple of it? Armor doesn't protect tanks by reducing the damage they take anymore. If you had a 0 hardness unit with 0 armor vs a 0 hardness unit with 1000 armor, they will both take the same damage when hit now.
For some reason I thought like you before but re read the diary it said otherwise.
And someone test that armor still yes-no damage.
 
  • 1Like
Reactions:
Gee I don't even know where to start on this one. Remember the goal is to show that tanks are worse in the DLC than before. So you don't compare tanks from before to tanks in the DLC but you compare combat performance from before to now. BTW do you realize you can just disable the DLC and get the old tank variant system?

After some testing and faffing about, it's hands down unquestionable tanks are worse as a straight fighting unit. The fact armor has been nuked so heavily, even with upgrades, vs the fact both MATG and tanks/TD + sup ATG can get well into the 100~200 range means the benefit of armor is gone; You're never going to have enough armor to counter pen now. Add on the fact you need to increase the production cost to even get to that point, and it's not even a question.

Can another tank penetrate a tank in the DLC? Of course yes. But so could other tanks before the DLC. This is a strawman argument. Infantry even with an AT gun can't penetrate some of the heaviest tanks. So this is your first comment that is an error.
Further, the lack of damage bonuses that can goto a tank with high SA/HA vs Art of any stripe means that even if they were the same value, 30, in the designer, art will double or triple in SA depending on the year. Remember, Art gets bonuses for anything that is Art specific, Infantry specific, division, and mot. Tank only gets buffs from a hand full of places.
The artillery techs have not changes. Beofre the DLC and with the DLC there never was mention that SPA's got any bonus. Since the techs haven't changed what are you talking about?

Tanks can get Dozer plows if you research Engi t2. They have a broken effect of giving every tank that you use +2 to entrenchment. Every.
Every light, medium, heavy you put in; every tank, SPA, SPAA, and TD; Every armor recon and flame supp. +2 entrench.

It is now possible to get over 75 entrenchment with a 20 width. This, is busto. Remember, 1 entrenchment = 2% of everything. SA, HA, Def, Brk, Per, AA, name it. Probing attack makes fights a joke now. But, the minute you lose entrenchment, you might as well be running around with a 40 width of infantry.
Yea it's a bug but the bug goes against your statement that tanks are worse now. And you can have regular engineers and flametank dozer blade engineers so tanks are BETTER.

Additionally, flame units add +25% attack on forts, +20% on urban, and +5% on everything else. This includes while defending. Add in Engis, and you can get a +65% from an urban with 1 fort. On the flip side though, this means any unit with one is decent at nulling the fort benefits as well when attacking. Heavy tanks, and only heavy tanks, retain their 10% to attacking forts and urban, vs med and light tank's -5%. Add in a railway gun, and a heavy tank unit with some mot can ignore the magi line and roll over anyone.
Again more proof of being better.
But....That's pretty much where it ends. By and large, tanks are no longer comparable on attack, even if we disregard the production costs. With the changes to how combat width works, and the fact defenders can now choose how weak the attackers are by simply having smaller units, the large benefit of having a concentrated block of damage and armor is gone, and primarily warfare, when done properly, is a contest between who has better air, who has better supply, and who can recover faster. In MP, this means defensive nations with a decent airforce can sit and wait forever while the enemy breaks themselves against their units, all the while destroying their air units with units that have at least one dedicated AA unit-- remember, attack bonuses apply to AA damage as well-- and keeping their factories running. In SP, it's matterless currently due to the AI bugging out, but once that's fixed I highly doubt the AI will have the needed tactics to deal with the fact that combat width and supply have changed so drastically from what should be minor changes. As it stands, you can get the same benefit, offensively, of having a proper tank unit, mixed or otherwise, by simply replacing armored units with their relevant mot counter parts. Replacing SPA with Mart yields the same amount or more SA for significantly less cost, TD are outclassed by ATG until '43 while having larger production costs, supply cost, and 3x as much width [1 v 3].
So it's the COMBAT mechanics that causes this change. You can use the same old tanks and get the same results. Disable your DLC and use the old system. Guess what? The combat mechanics are the same. So tanks are not worse. And you also mention the supply mechanics.

And it appears you have not played a single MP game with the DLC yet. Go ahead and try that tactic of small defensive units. See wher ethat gets you. LMAO.
Of note, super heavy tanks, the meme unit of old, while expensive isn't that much more expensive than the trains are. Given relevant combat modifiers, late game useage sees a single column of SHT supported by mot/mech fill the role of old tank units without too much issue. That said, it still doesn't compare to the new spirited cas.



Iunno if you're just ignoring what was posted or misreading it, but what I posted wasn't cheaper. Even if it was, the issue is 'is it worth it compared to the alternative',
Do you even read what you post. Just in this post you use the terms production costs and expensive multiple times and that is the same as the word cheaper.

which the rest of us have conclude is no.
Gee nice to know you were appointed spokesperson for everyone else. So EVERYONE has concluded no? Show me your poll.
Armor is irrelevant now given how little of it you can stack and the new armor mechanics.
Again so wrong. Yes combat mechanics changed and there is partial penetration. But you can get FULL protection from all units that are NOT tanks. And this is no different from before the DLC. Tanks could ALWAYS penetrate other tanks.
Mart-- Motorized Artillery-- is the other option, which does 30 SA on paper, and close to 45~50 SA when bonuses are applied in combat. All said and done, Mart will cost around 8~10 depending on tier, while tank/SPA of the same SA value costs 12~16 depending. That's assuming you build the lowest grade possible as well.
You get hardness and armor.
AS it is, good luck in MP if they've done any research on tanks, likely they won't build any.
Can't wait to see you do that one. LOL
 
  • 10
  • 1Like
Reactions:
Fear not, the mods will take of this.
Probably.

But modding is not a (good) solution. (also answering to @Desatanica 's question here)

Unless the game is completely abandoned by the devs (e.g. Imperator). Even then the modders can’t fix everything.

Fixing a game via mods can cause problems:
  • lack of compatibility between various mods.
  • need to wait for mod updates after new patches.
  • risk of mods being abandoned. (much higher)
  • loading mods with the PDX the launcher is APITA (for some players)
 
  • 4Like
Reactions:
Hi, long time reader first time poster. and sorry if this comes across a bit geeky :)

I like the idea of NSB tank builds but the execution is baffling, it has exposed how completely unrealistic guns are in the game. The idea that the German 3.7cm was an excellent high velocity tank killer is about as historical as Hitler having a Sky dish on the Berghof.

It is important (at least to me) because without the shortcomings of the 3.7cm and 5.0cm v Russian T34s and KVs led to the whole family of tank destroyers using captured 7.62s etc; so without it what's the point in developing tank destroyers?

Sticking with Germany... what is the heavy cannon I supposed to represent? Also if the 7.5 kwk 40 is supposed to be high velocity cannon 2, and the 12.8cm the high velocity cannon 3, then where does the 8.8cm fit in? The 8.8 kwk 43 L/71 in the tiger II had a velocity at a whopping 1100+ m/s but isn't represented in the game.

It's all screwed up.

As far as I can tell the armoured component of a 1941-42 'historic-ish' Pz Div template would have PZ3s with small cannon II (representing the 5.0 cm) perhaps some PZ4s with medium cannon II (representing the 7.5cm kwk 40) and some Marders with high velocity cannon I (representing the 7.62cm). No idea how that would play out, or how it compares v just spamming light tanks with the high velocity I.

Haven't tried Russia yet but imagine it is equally a muddle.
 
Last edited:
  • 2Like
Reactions:
Hi, long time reader first time poster. and sorry if this comes across a bit geeky :)

I like the idea of NSB tank builds but the execution is baffling, it has exposed how completely unrealistic guns are in the game. The idea that the German 3.7cm was an excellent high velocity tank killer is about as historical as Hitler having a Sky dish on the Berghof.

Please don't take this the wrong way and I'm not directing this at you.

The game mentions the 3.7cm gun but in reality that means nothing. All guns for all countries are identical for the same tech year. It's all an abstract. There is no German gun or UK gun or US gun etc. There is just a 1936 AT gun. Calling it a German 3.7cm is completely meaningless in the game other than to give it flavor.

Too many players look at the name and think of the RL weapon. That is complete BS and the wrong way to look at things. The devs wanted to give flavor to a completely abscrat weapon that ALL countries get to use once the proper tech is researched and they are all identical.
 
  • 9Like
Reactions:
Please don't take this the wrong way and I'm not directing this at you.

The game mentions the 3.7cm gun but in reality that means nothing. All guns for all countries are identical for the same tech year. It's all an abstract. There is no German gun or UK gun or US gun etc. There is just a 1936 AT gun. Calling it a German 3.7cm is completely meaningless in the game other than to give it flavor.

Too many players look at the name and think of the RL weapon. That is complete BS and the wrong way to look at things. The devs wanted to give flavor to a completely abscrat weapon that ALL countries get to use once the proper tech is researched and they are all identical.

No offense taken :)

I get that it's abstract, that's kind of the problem. Focus tree, geography, resource, starting forces, population etc aren't abstract. Why is tank tech? It wasn't abstract historically.
 
  • 2Like
Reactions:
No offense taken :)

I get that it's abstract, that's kind of the problem. Focus tree, geography, resource, starting forces, population etc aren't abstract. Why is tank tech? It wasn't abstract historically.

But planes, INF weapons, artillery, ships, trucks, AA guns are all abstracted. While it would be extremely interesting not to do it(abstract them) doing that then prevents almost all of the ahistorical options. Countries wouyld be forced to use thier historic weapons and I guess if a country didn't develope something they would be prevented from doing it in the game.

Or the US would have the M1 Garand in 1940 and not need anything after that.
 
Last edited:
  • 5Like
Reactions:
Gee I don't even know where to start on this one. Remember the goal is to show that tanks are worse in the DLC than before. So you don't compare tanks from before to tanks in the DLC but you compare combat performance from before to now. BTW do you realize you can just disable the DLC and get the old tank variant system?

-snip-

Right, I get you're here just to tear people down and throw shade, yes we can still see you on probation, but I'll answer all the same.

Yes, you can disable the DLC. I'm glad you pointed that ou seeing as no one will do that after paying money for it and more or less doesn't apply to MP. If the Host wants the DLC on, it's on.

Art techs have changed, as they gatekeep tanks now. You can research 100% of the tank tree, and it won't matter for tanks, as you need to research Artillery to have any weapons for them. Which brings up the point, why waste time with Tanks when you need to put more resources, tech, and buffs on them to make them better, when the Art you have to research to make them better is already more powerful out of the box?

And no, Armor is no longer relevant. Even heavy tanks with max armor get out penned by 1 art now. Bluntly, go play multiplayer and try and use tanks in any effect; people are now using mot/mech units with 0 tanks in them and walking over tank units like they don't exist now.

now you've had your fun; Go Away.
 
  • 4Like
  • 2
  • 1
Reactions:
And no, Armor is no longer relevant. Even heavy tanks with max armor get out penned by 1 art now. Bluntly, go play multiplayer and try and use tanks in any effect; people are now using mot/mech units with 0 tanks in them and walking over tank units like they don't exist now.

now you've had your fun; Go Away.
I'm on probation because in the past I had serious issues dealing with comments like this one. BTW I used to say "Go away" and that was an infraction so please be careful.

Now you seem to claim that an artillery piece (howitzer) can pierce a tank. Please show the world how wrong I am by posting a screenshot of a howitzer tank having enough penetration to pierce a medium or heavy with max armor. You won't because you can't.

Come on any screenshot that supports this outlandish claim of yours: "Even heavy tanks with max armor get out penned by 1 art now."

I also call you out with this statement: "people are now using mot/mech units with 0 tanks in them and walking over tank units like they don't exist now." That is 100% BS as it's not happening. Come on you can easily prove me wrong by posting a link or video.

I figure you were probably trying to bait and troll me in the hope that I would say something to risk my probation. Instead I'm just asking you for any type of proof to support your wild claims.
 
  • 3Like
  • 1
Reactions:
Alright, starting with non-replies then moving to replies.

After some testing and faffing about, it's hands down unquestionable tanks are worse as a straight fighting unit. The fact armor has been nuked so heavily, even with upgrades, vs the fact both MATG and tanks/TD + sup ATG can get well into the 100~200 range means the benefit of armor is gone; You're never going to have enough armor to counter pen now. Add on the fact you need to increase the production cost to even get to that point, and it's not even a question.

Further, the lack of damage bonuses that can goto a tank with high SA/HA vs Art of any stripe means that even if they were the same value, 30, in the designer, art will double or triple in SA depending on the year. Remember, Art gets bonuses for anything that is Art specific, Infantry specific, division, and mot. Tank only gets buffs from a hand full of places.

However, Tanks have a use. Defense....Wait, no, come back. Let me finish first.

Tanks can get Dozer plows if you research Engi t2. They have a broken effect of giving every tank that you use +2 to entrenchment. Every.
Every light, medium, heavy you put in; every tank, SPA, SPAA, and TD; Every armor recon and flame supp. +2 entrench.

It is now possible to get over 75 entrenchment with a 20 width. This, is busto. Remember, 1 entrenchment = 2% of everything. SA, HA, Def, Brk, Per, AA, name it. Probing attack makes fights a joke now. But, the minute you lose entrenchment, you might as well be running around with a 40 width of infantry.

Additionally, flame units add +25% attack on forts, +20% on urban, and +5% on everything else. This includes while defending. Add in Engis, and you can get a +65% from an urban with 1 fort. On the flip side though, this means any unit with one is decent at nulling the fort benefits as well when attacking. Heavy tanks, and only heavy tanks, retain their 10% to attacking forts and urban, vs med and light tank's -5%. Add in a railway gun, and a heavy tank unit with some mot can ignore the magi line and roll over anyone.

But....That's pretty much where it ends. By and large, tanks are no longer comparable on attack, even if we disregard the production costs. With the changes to how combat width works, and the fact defenders can now choose how weak the attackers are by simply having smaller units, the large benefit of having a concentrated block of damage and armor is gone, and primarily warfare, when done properly, is a contest between who has better air, who has better supply, and who can recover faster. In MP, this means defensive nations with a decent airforce can sit and wait forever while the enemy breaks themselves against their units, all the while destroying their air units with units that have at least one dedicated AA unit-- remember, attack bonuses apply to AA damage as well-- and keeping their factories running. In SP, it's matterless currently due to the AI bugging out, but once that's fixed I highly doubt the AI will have the needed tactics to deal with the fact that combat width and supply have changed so drastically from what should be minor changes. As it stands, you can get the same benefit, offensively, of having a proper tank unit, mixed or otherwise, by simply replacing armored units with their relevant mot counter parts. Replacing SPA with Mart yields the same amount or more SA for significantly less cost, TD are outclassed by ATG until '43 while having larger production costs, supply cost, and 3x as much width [1 v 3].

Of note, super heavy tanks, the meme unit of old, while expensive isn't that much more expensive than the trains are. Given relevant combat modifiers, late game useage sees a single column of SHT supported by mot/mech fill the role of old tank units without too much issue. That said, it still doesn't compare to the new spirited cas.



Iunno if you're just ignoring what was posted or misreading it, but what I posted wasn't cheaper. Even if it was, the issue is 'is it worth it compared to the alternative', which the rest of us have conclude is no. Armor is irrelevant now given how little of it you can stack and the new armor mechanics.

Mart-- Motorized Artillery-- is the other option, which does 30 SA on paper, and close to 45~50 SA when bonuses are applied in combat. All said and done, Mart will cost around 8~10 depending on tier, while tank/SPA of the same SA value costs 12~16 depending. That's assuming you build the lowest grade possible as well.

SPA uses 1/3rd of the equipment while having the same production cost. And further, all artillery units have 3 width; We've been using them for the better part of the last 5 years regardless of that.



Other way around; Armor stops working at 75%, and scale down from 100%. If you have 100 armor and the enemy has 75 pen, you start losing the benefits of armor. say they have 85 pen? They have a smaller debuff on them. So you don't need to match 100 to 101; getting close is well enough. More over, besides heavies, you never have more armor than pen options, which I think is an oversight; you need all 5 armor techs, on a heavy to beat out sup atg + matg, let alone dedicated tank hunters, in real combat conditions.

Also, armor doesn't work like before. It doesn't just half the damage by changing the damage dice; It debuffs like a fort now. There's something going on in the background under calculations, but we're still pulling those apart. But, the simple of it? Armor doesn't protect tanks by reducing the damage they take anymore. If you had a 0 hardness unit with 0 armor vs a 0 hardness unit with 1000 armor, they will both take the same damage when hit now.



Umm, not wrong. The AI is definitely not hooked up right considering people are complaining about it crashing trying to access old code that doesn't work anymore. Reddit is currently flooded with 'The AI isn't working' threads because of it.

AS it is, good luck in MP if they've done any research on tanks, likely they won't build any.



This in a nutshell. If you have one nation building tanks in the new system vs one that doesn't, say Germany vs France, you see a world of difference now. Of course, depending on the situation, that changes, like having a bunch of armored cars pretend to be tanks with snow plows sitting on the magi line with dirt up to their turrets like it's Russia all over again. suddenly there's a 200% increase to damage against the incoming Germans, who have to fight with a -100% because. It's hillarious watching players go 'WTF, HOW?!' every time now XD

As it is, MP has more or less devolved into the China/Japan war because of the changes. Or more, the ground war has, it's mostly about cas and transport planes now.
Interesting observations thank you. Motorized and Mechanized units were everywhere historically. I believe the Germans produced more mechanized equipment than any tank, in second place was the Stug… So maybe this is more historical.

can you elaborate on the templates people are currently using, and do think this makes the game better or worse.

also … does this equation change with the plane nerf today?
 
Last edited:
The artillery techs have not changes. Beofre the DLC and with the DLC there never was mention that SPA's got any bonus. Since the techs haven't changed what are you talking about?
They did change how division vs battalion bonuses/doctrines work, however. Since modifiers are frequently multiplicative, this can have a significant effect on the soft attack values you can achieve with different units for example. It's why there were sweaty tactics to manipulate what "type" a division was in earlier patches. You could make "infantry" divisions with different types of tanks and get all the "infantry" benefits applied, or make something technically an "artillery" division just to stack more bonuses for nations that have that adviser type. Or stack both infantry and cavalry bonuses while using a number of battalions that were neither.

This patch changed how that works, and in so doing altered the balance/bonuses available to artillery (and other battalion types).
Again so wrong. Yes combat mechanics changed and there is partial penetration. But you can get FULL protection from all units that are NOT tanks. And this is no different from before the DLC. Tanks could ALWAYS penetrate other tanks.
Non-binary pen makes AT more viable than previously. In earlier patches, armor-stacked heavy tanks could not be penetrated by any similar-tech inf/line AT division. With partial penetration, that isn't true and these types of divisions/partial countermeasures which previously did minimal damage can cause more problems.

I haven't played around with SPAA/other AA options this patch, but AA getting massively buffed is part of what made the previous tank meta take over. Prior to that, HOI was an air war because CAS ignores armor and let ORG walls severely punish expensive tank divisions.