Request for starting templates

[Jmland]

Pls post requests/suggestions for starting templates for various countries at start (vanilla 1936) here. I'm trying only to include "at start" templates, i.e. that which existed or could be built by the respective countries in 1936, not what comes available at later dates.

my suggestions

US-
Infantry Division
Mot Infantry Division
Lt Arm Bde
NG Division
Cavalry Division
Separate Infantry Bde (Regt)
Marine Infantry Regt
Marine Infantry Detachment

UK
Infantry Division
Home Guard Division
Arm Bde
Garrison Bde
Colonial Troops Bde

France
Infantry Div
Mtn Div
Garrison (static) Division
Colonial Troops Division
FFL Brigade
Arm Bde

Italy
Infantry Div
Alpini Div
CCNN Div/Bde
Berl. Bde
Cav Div
Coastal Def (static) Div
Colonial Troops Div

Soviets
Infantry Div
Mot Inf Div
Mot Inf Bde
Tank Div
Tank Bde
Cav Div
Mtn Div
NKVD Division

Germany
Infantry Div
Mot Infantry Div
(Lt) Pzr Div
Mtn Bde
SS Infantry Bde
SS Mtr Inf Bde


Japan
Inf Div
SNLF Bde
Sep (Mixed) Inf Bde
Imperial Guard Bde/Div
Garrison Detachment


I think the best way to use templates would be to start as many formation types as possible as "Brigades" (or Regt's if you will), and allow the player/AI to implement the upgrades as R&D and XP allow.

 

[HerrWeltkrieg]

I think we need to appreciate what devs are doing in terms of land experience, units need to evolve with war and as such the exp gain rate is fairly quick from what I saw..... What I would suggest is more possibilities for involvement like spanish civil war etc ( bigger involvement or more occasions, like helping Italy in etiopia ).

 

[CyberianK]

I think it is stupid that your army of 100 divisions can only consist of 5 different types of Divisions pre-War because you lack the experience to create new ones.

I think they should increase the number of starting templates. That would give more variety and not place the peoples at a disadvantage who want more variety in their army. Because if you have to create the other 5 divisions like different types of infantry divisions and light/medium tank divisions and so on with experience you are at a disadvantage versus the guy who upgrades his 5 first. So the system then is biased against a more diverse army which would actually be more realistic.

 

[Jmland]

I disagree, it is easier to account for the logistics requirements, manning, equipment needs, training requirements, doctrine, tactics, etc of fewer types of divisions than for greater numbers of types of divisions. Countries that develop both greater numbers of divisions and greater numbers of types of divisions do so because they can, AND they have made the investment in research of all things required. You are saying (as an extreme example) that Luxemburg and the Soviet Union should have equal numbers of types of divisions for their templates at start.
Again, this is "at start", you can create all the new division templates you want, if you are willing to pay the cost in XP. What country at start would have multiple types of Tank divisions at start? Soviets are the only ones I can think of.

 

[CyberianK]

I disagree, it is easier to account for the logistics requirements, manning, equipment needs, training requirements, doctrine, tactics, etc of fewer types of divisions than for greater numbers of types of divisions. Countries that develop both greater numbers of divisions and greater numbers of types of divisions do so because they can, AND they have made the investment in research of all things required. You are saying (as an extreme example) that Luxemburg and the Soviet Union should have equal numbers of types of divisions for their templates at start.
Again, this is "at start", you can create all the new division templates you want, if you are willing to pay the cost in XP. What country at start would have multiple types of Tank divisions at start? Soviets are the only ones I can think of.

Germany has 5 starting templates: Infantry, Panzer, SS(Mot), Cavalry, Mountain

If you have 100 divisions and about 60-70 of them Infantry in 1939 all of those 60-70 divisions will be equal. You have no chance of doing like 3 different ones, one lighter guard/militia one, one standard one and a more heavy/elite one with more meat in it. Sure you could possibly do it with experience from spain for example but that will massively cost you as you can't use that to upgrade your existing ones then. For me I would want about 10 different templates minimum anyway.

That is an innate flaw of the system that does punish going for a diverse army versus an army consisting only of a few template types. I think that problem could be eased a bit by just giving you more initial templates.

 

[Jmland]

Then make suggestions of templates for Germany that reflect actual divisions on the ground in 1936. That's what this threat is for; to gather suggestions.

 

[Rudolf Hessbart]

To all "HoI-conservatives", if i may say so, please be more open to new ideas from forumers. This is how mods are created and even if these ideas are not going to be implented to the game they will still be useful to modders.

As for the question:
Germany (at the start):
There should be the Kavaleriedivision. The last cavalry battle was fought between Germany and Poland in 1939. I guess that the cavalry division will later represent a mobile division operated by motorbikes.
Although it will not likely be used Germany should have the Seebataillon (Marine battalion)

For the Soviets:
There should be the Airborne Corps. The USSR had a huge paratrooper program and event tried to make glider tanks. They later converted their paratroopers into Guard Divisions as they couldn't use paratroopers in a defensive war.

France:
France should have the Fortress Division. They should have a lot of artillery and should be static.

 

[gunterdb]

I would like to see the Leichte "light" series available from game start for Germany. They were a mechanized unit intended to take on the roles of army-level recon and security that had traditionally been the responsibility of the cavalry. It included mechanized recon units, motorized infantry, and a battalion of tanks. Due to shortcomings in overall organization during the Polish campaign they were upgraded to Panzer divisions.

This would play right into the "hand" that Paradox has been trying to get us to play. We have a early template that doesn't quite work for what we want so we upgrade the units to another template. Then we still have the "old" template that we will need to use XP to modify into another division form of our hearts content.

Just a Thought .... Maybe after the annexation of Austria and Czechoslovakia Germany would inherit some of those countries division templates?

Also I would like to see a standard Motorized division template in addition to the SS Mot. template that is currently in the Army builder. In reality the Waffen SS were merely a collection of heavily reinforced regiments and standarten which were only formed into divisions in 1940. They played a minor role in Poland and their true baptism of fire came during the invasion of France.

 

[jamesd]

I'd suggest that all major powers at least should start with basic 3, 6 & 9 battalion templates for infantry types. This allows players to create detached regiments/brigades for small tasks and medium sized divisions for garrison duties etc. In 1936 the German 3 infantry battalion template could be called a Grenz Command and the 6 battalion template a Landesschutzen Division.

From what I've seen so far there's going to need to be a lot of modding of starting templates due to deficiencies in Paradox research. For example German infantry divisions had AT battalions assigned prior to 1 Jan 1936, but from the WWW videos Germany doesn't even start with the first AT gun tech researched. Similarly the infantry divisions don't start with any artillery when historically they had full regiments assigned at game start.

 

[HerrWeltkrieg]

Or there could be national focus unlocking some new compositions, maybe with pre requisite of some research or just unlocking them with doctrines.... or doctrines and NF would just give experience in their respective areas??

 

[griffor]

Or there could be national focus unlocking some new compositions, maybe with pre requisite of some research or just unlocking them with doctrines.... or doctrines and NF would just give experience in their respective areas??

i think this will probably be the most balanced way of doing it if paradox was to do it

 

[chemonaut]

What does it cost to add a new template? The brigades do not seem to cost a lot, what, 5 to 10 xp?

 

[jamesd]

What does it cost to add a new template? The brigades do not seem to cost a lot, what, 5 to 10 xp?

From what I've seen, unlocking a new brigade costs 25 XP and I think that also unlocks the first battalion in the brigade. Battalions after that are 5 XP each. Each support company is 10 XP.

I think that will make a division with full support from corps/army troops (ie 25 battalions & 5 support companies) 275 XP.

 

[gunterdb]

From what I've seen, unlocking a new brigade costs 25 XP and I think that also unlocks the first battalion in the brigade. Battalions after that are 5 XP each. Each support company is 10 XP.

I think that will make a division with full support from corps/army troops (ie 25 battalions & 5 support companies) 275 XP.

Anyone have an idea of how quickly XP is gained?

 

[tommylotto]

I plan on modding the templates extensively. However, increasing the number of templates creates problems too. Let's say you have three infantry templates and you want to add a support battalion to each. You would be required spend the XP to add the support battalion to each of the three divisions. That is 3x the necessary XP. Although there might be ways to game the system. I do not think it takes XP to duplicate a template or to remove a battalion. So, you could start with an infantry division with three regiments, spend XP to add the support battalion to that one template, then duplicate the template and reduce it to a brigade of two regiments, and then duplicate it again and make it a separate regiment. So, you added a support battalion to three templates for the cost of one. However, once you create the new templates any further changes would require separate XP expenditures, unless you get tricky and repeat the trick again and reassign the existing divisions to the newly created templates.

 

[chemonaut]

Anyone have an idea of how quickly XP is gained?

In WWW part 1, the Germans were gaining about 2-3 xp per month with 30 divisions in exercise. UK was gaining about 1 per month with 20 divisions in exercise. It took about 5 months to get their fresh armies trained to where their exercise gave them xp.

 

[mdmusti]

here is the mobilized order of turkish army: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkish_Army_order_of_battle_in_1941

at least, it gives an opinion for developers

 

[jamesd]

I plan on modding the templates extensively. However, increasing the number of templates creates problems too. Let's say you have three infantry templates and you want to add a support battalion to each. You would be required spend the XP to add the support battalion to each of the three divisions. That is 3x the necessary XP. Although there might be ways to game the system. I do not think it takes XP to duplicate a template or to remove a battalion. So, you could start with an infantry division with three regiments, spend XP to add the support battalion to that one template, then duplicate the template and reduce it to a brigade of two regiments, and then duplicate it again and make it a separate regiment. So, you added a support battalion to three templates for the cost of one. However, once you create the new templates any further changes would require separate XP expenditures, unless you get tricky and repeat the trick again and reassign the existing divisions to the newly created templates.

I'm pretty sure one of the devs said that it costs XP to add, change or remove battalions from a template, but they didn't say whether there is a smaller cost to change or remove. Hopefully it will be pretty easy to reduce the XP costs of modifying templates.

 

[tommylotto]

I'm pretty sure one of the devs said that it costs XP to add, change or remove battalions from a template, but they didn't say whether there is a smaller cost to change or remove. Hopefully it will be pretty easy to reduce the XP costs of modifying templates.

You may be right, but is from the DD on division design, though it is rather old.

You can use Experience to swap out Battalions, or unlock either new Brigades or Battalions, but you cannot simply optimise your division makeup on day 1

This seems to indicate that you spend XP to change battalions or to add new battalions or unlock a new regiment column. It does not seem to cost XP to leave an available battalion slot empty. But then maybe removing a battalion and leaving it empty falls into what podcat means by "swap out". I'm not sure.