Variant: no cost increase

[kalauer]

In WWW today around 14:20 we saw that the variant of the light tank Daniel created did´not take more IC to build nor resources. Was that because the changes were so small they are lost in rounding or are there no changes to production cost of better variants at all, meaning the only drawback of variants would be the decreased line efficiency?

 

[AapoAlas]

I believe it is the latter, ie. better variants cost no extra IC nor resources.

This is kind of a double-edged sword in my opinion. On one hand it is a great thing indeed as it makes variants a true option for small powers that cannot spare IC but instead rely on dispersed industry to produce high-end variants at every turn. If variants required extra investment a small power would lose out on using them.

On the other hand the problem does present itself that a lot of the time variants will be all that is produced. If you have experience it would be remiss of you to start producing a base variant of a new piece of equipment. This is somewhat offset by the unequal loss and gain of reliability from increases in variants, essentially meaning that base variants are more reliable than a variant that does not have significant investment into reliability.

 

[Sun_Killer]

another thing i saw today was that if you push all to 5, you no longer lose reliability, it stays at the base value.

 

[Thanik]

meaning the only drawback of variants would be the decreased line efficiency?

Agree. I expected this mechanic,to be more balanced.

another thing i saw today was that if you push all to 5, you no longer lose reliability, it stays at the base value.

Also:
If level of reliability is the same, as all others upgrades (armor, engine, gun)you will not lose too.
If level of reliability is higher , than all other uprades you actually "gain" some

 

[Denkt]

They have changed how experience cost work. Now each point get more and more expensive. The first cost only 5 experience now but all 20 points cost more then twice as much as previously. So it is much more expensive to make extreme variants but it is much cheaper to make variants with only a few points spent.

 

[AapoAlas]

another thing i saw today was that if you push all to 5, you no longer lose reliability, it stays at the base value.

Really? That's.... That can't be true. Need to recheck that ASAP as it would mean that 5-0-5-5 is the optimal strategy to go as the 5 points in reliability will not add any use...

EDIT: I had misunderstood and somehow construed that what was implied here was that the reliability value couldn't drop below the base value. Excuse me.

 

[Denkt]

5-5-5-5 cost over 1000 experience now and the last 5 points cost something like 400-500 experience.

 

[electriccat]

Really? That's.... That can't be true. Need to recheck that ASAP as it would mean that 5-0-5-5 is the optimal strategy to go as the 5 points in reliability will not add any use...

That's not true. The 5 points in reliability just bring it back up to the base value. Otherwise it was a negative to reliability. Same as increasing armor had a negative impact on speed.

 

[Maizel]

I think variants should have larger IC costs. Bigger guns, better armor, would cost more resources and or time.

 

[AapoAlas]

I just rechecked the reliability calculation and @Sun_Killer's earlier statement is completely correct but I misunderstood the meaning These seem to be the current numbers on tank division statistics:

Armor: Max Speed -0.12 km/h, Reliability -4.0%, +1.0 Amor per point
Reliability: Reliability +8.0%
Main Gun: Soft Attack +1.1, Max Speed -0.12, Reliability -4.0%, Hard Attack +0.6, Piercing +4.0
Engine: Max Speed +0.24 km/h

So an x-x-x-x tank does not suffer reliability loss and moves at the same speed as a the original model but has higher combat capabilities. The price of these type of models are:
1111: 50 experience
2222: 180 experience
3333: 390 experience
4444: 680 experience
5555: 1050 experience

 

[AapoAlas]

That said I think my future light tank variants will look something like this:

0-3-1-5: That is full speed, some reliability and one main gun. This brings the reliability up to 100% while giving 1 km/h extra speed and some attack stats. An excellent fast moving tank with perfect reliability with a bit of an edge in a fight. And for the cost of only 225 experience at that! Only 180 if you don't care for the gun.

 

[electriccat]

That said I think my future light tank variants will look something like this:

0-3-1-5: That is full speed, some reliability and one main gun. This brings the reliability up to 100% while giving 1 km/h extra speed and some attack stats. An excellent fast moving tank with perfect reliability with a bit of an edge in a fight. And for the cost of only 225 experience at that! Only 180 if you don't care for the gun.

I like it. Not sure how they would fare around German heavy armor but for most things that's going to be a kick butt tank.

 

[AapoAlas]

I like it. Not sure how they would fare around German heavy armor but for most things that's going to be a kick butt tank.

I have a fair idea of how they would fare around German heavy armor and that is: Badly Light tanks, even well developed ones, are definitely not the right tool against heavy tanks

With a heavy tank against me... Hmm... Maybe medium tanks with 2-5-3-0 or 3-5-2-0. Again a 100% reliability tank but with no regard to speed, just punching power and armor. If that does not do it then I guess a heavy tank is needed.

 

[electriccat]

I have a fair idea of how they would fare around German heavy armor and that is: Badly Light tanks, even well developed ones, are definitely not the right tool against heavy tanks

With a heavy tank against me... Hmm... Maybe medium tanks with 2-5-3-0 or 3-5-2-0. Again a 100% reliability tank but with no regard to speed, just punching power and armor. If that does not do it then I guess a heavy tank is needed.

Or at that point you just go full historic on it with medium and lights and then just completely out produce them.

Needless to say, I really can't wait to try some stuff out in this game.

 

[AapoAlas]

Or at that point you just go full historic on it with medium and lights and then just completely out produce them.

Needless to say, I really can't wait to try some stuff out in this game.

True enough and seconded.

What I wonder about though is how does a 100% versus say 80% reliability affect the division. An 80% rate of failure in combat without any supply issues seems pretty horrible so I'm guessing it isn't quite that simple.

 

[electriccat]

True enough and seconded.

What I wonder about though is how does a 100% versus say 80% reliability affect the division. An 80% rate of failure in combat without any supply issues seems pretty horrible so I'm guessing it isn't quite that simple.

I don't think they have really said what reliability does in a hard sense. Don't know if I missed them saying it or what.

 

[LordOfWar16]

I dont see why better variants should nessesaierly cost more. Its not like you can put an 88mm gun on an pzII or something like that. You cant put an 2000hp engine into an tank with an 500hp engine aswell. The changes of variants arent so drastic that they will affect production cost on such an scope that it would affect it in HoI IV. Infact, sometimes a variant got cheaper to produce due to optimized designs and optimized production of componments, irl.

It will cost you alot of experience to create an variant that doesnt tend to break down all the time. Then there is the production efficiency loss of course, which will infact make each of the new variant more expensive untill the efficiency goes back to 100%.

 

[Cpack]

I think variants should have larger IC costs. Bigger guns, better armor, would cost more resources and or time.

Well......due to the values are very low (1 metal and 1 oil f.e) a better gun or armor make less then 10% of resources. Not sure if they use tens for ressources like 1.1 metal or 1.2 oil

 

[AapoAlas]

I dont see why better variants should nessesaierly cost more. Its not like you can put an 88mm gun on an pzII or something like that. You cant put an 2000hp engine into an tank with an 500hp engine aswell. The changes of variants arent so drastic that they will affect production cost on such an scope that it would affect it in HoI IV. Infact, sometimes a variant got cheaper to produce due to optimized designs and optimized production of componments, irl.

It will cost you alot of experience to create an variant that doesnt tend to break down all the time. Then there is the production efficiency loss of course, which will infact make each of the new variant more expensive untill the efficiency goes back to 100%.

Indeed. The only downside I see to better variants not costing more IC / resources is what I said originally in this thread: There's never a point to produce the original model if you have experience to use when you switch over. On the other hand that isn't such a bad thing. It is just your country using practical experience to improve a design before it is laid down on the production line.

Well......due to the values are very low (1 metal and 1 oil f.e) a better gun or armor make less then 10% of resources. Not sure if they use tens for ressources like 1.1 metal or 1.2 oil

They do not.

 

[LordOfWar16]

Indeed. The only downside I see to better variants not costing more IC / resources is what I said originally in this thread: There's never a point to produce the original model if you have experience to use when you switch over. On the other hand that isn't such a bad thing. It is just your country using practical experience to improve a design before it is laid down on the production line.

Yeah. Well, you always have to be carefull when you swap out production. Even tho you get an 100% penalty for switching to a new variant, you still will notice the drop in production. I personally would probably rather slowly gear up production of the new equipment while at the same time slowing down production of the old equipment. That is very situational of course. During Peacetime i dont see a reason to not straight up switch, but when an war is on the horizon or already going on, i rather play it a bit safe and start them out in paralell and let the old stuff run out of production eventually.