Proposal: a mechanic to get width under control

[dermeister]

Players seem incentivized to make divisions have as high stats as possible, resulting is ridiculous division sizes.

In practice divisions tended towards a certain size because any more became un-wieldly (e.g. 1938-41 Soviet mechanized corps).

To control this, I propose the following:

Efficiency
Efficiency is applied as a factor to all stats. It starts at 1.28, and is reduced by 0.02 for every width above 6 (i.e. a bridgade, meaning a 3 battalion regiment with support companies).

Example table:

Width	Efficiency	Description
6	1.28	Weak brigade
10	1.2	Brigade
20	1.0	Division (neutral)
30	0.8	Heavy division
40	0.6	Weak corps

Maybe country specific boosts to efficiency would be in order... And maybe anything smaller than 20 width capped at an efficiency of 1.

This is only a proposal and there may be a better way to do this. But the main point is: let's not have 80 width mega divisions be the way to play / meta vs building divisions that have some resemblance to reality.

 

[Ilyasviel]

I don't think that it's necessary, because massive divisions already come with a major downside; reinforcement rate, especially on defense. For example, let's say that you're fighting a defensive battle of 45 width and you're using 45 width divisions. If you win, all is fine, but as soon as you lose, you will lose the tile and all the divisions in reserve will retreat, even if they haven't fought at all, because it's impossible for them to reinforce. 15 width divisions, on the other hand, would be able to permanently rotate and reinforce the battle, unless they're getting punished really badly. I quite like the overall balance regarding width right now, with bigger divisions taking fewer losses due to HP, but smaller divisions being more flexible.

 

[Cavalry]

Players seem incentivized to make divisions have as high stats as possible, resulting is ridiculous division sizes.

Well, you missed the topic on superior 8w division template!

Not many players notice that the support arty, support rocket arty have the attack of a tank battalion but the cost of an infantry. Use smaller width will use this advantage.

 

[marcelo r. r.]

Im in 1945 still using the 21 width.

21 width is insanely op atm, i don't think boost to it will be good. Its just work with any land doctrine.

Also u forget all they work to get rid of 20 width 7/2 stantard, to propose a comeback to it?

But the idea ins't too bad, what about a mix between the Officer corps system and the Air Ace system? i mean the officer of a divisions will apply bonus to a lesser width?

 

[Cavalry]

Also u forget all they work to get rid of 20 width 7/2 stantard, to propose a comeback to it?

No they want to get rid off the 40w. The 20w is the standard of Paradox and perhaps use on many tests and original game design.

 

[DeadEyeTucker]

But the main point is: let's not have 80 width mega divisions be the way to play / meta vs building divisions that have some resemblance to reality.

I don't think anyone is realistically rolling around with 80 width divisions. The biggest combat width I see recommended the most is 40-44 for your breakthrough tank divisions. Usually the numbers are much smaller than that.

 

[HugsAndSnuggles]

Doesn't ORG already represents this? Even before the change, orgwalls of low-width infantry were pretty annoying.

 

[Corpse Fool]

let's not have 80 width mega divisions be the way to play / meta

The current max (in vanilla) is 75w, and while it does have some 'features' (bugs) related to it, it is not very good. No HP, no org, generally nothing but soft attack. Most of the 'big' templates you'll typically see are 40-45. There are probably some non-homogenous exceptions, like 50w being supported by 10ws. But the reason you'll see up to 50w and not generally anything larger are two fold. One, the widths of combats you'll typically find yourself in, generally have a common-enough factor around that size. Two, you only get 25 battalion slots, the most usable battalions being 2 width, 25x2=50. Only arty/SPG are 3w (for whatever reason that is), and they are generally worse at adding stats per width to the template than tanks or tank destroyers

On the whole, this efficiency thing sounds like the older officer ratio stats, which have been obfuscated and abstracted through the new officer system. I'll also say that even if its capped at 1, balance is hard to get 'just right' so that things work out like you want. More often than not, balance attempts will make the needle jump to the extremes of 'always' or 'never'. I'm not strictly opposed to killing big/40w templates, but the more realistic/historically sized templates will probably still be wildly ahistorical in other gamified ways.

I also think its funny we're talking about width and realism, like those things apply to each other. Width in this game is absolutely nonsense to begin with, anything related to it will no doubt also be nonsense.

 

[Cavalry]

At the current mechanics, 45w is the same as 90w in 1 province vs 1 province. They have a basket of 90w of targets. 2 x 45w will choose the same divisiion and repeat attack only on that enemy division and kick them, before switch to other targets.

And yes, the 45w is effective, but at xp cost and not too much effective than the much smaller divisions. They are clear effective than the middle width (22-44 width)