What use does cavalry, armoured cars & rocket artillery have?

[AFnord]

I'm trying to understand when I would actually use these three things (cavalry, armoured cars & rocket artillery). So far I've not come up with much. Looking at the individual units:

Cavalry
Cavalry is faster than infantry, yet does not use any fuel and (to my knowledge) does not suffer as badly in heavy terrain as motorized/mechanized/armoured units. This would seem to indicate that they could be used for partisan suppression duty, or by nations that don't really have the means to supply motorized infantry.

But, they fall under their own research category. 3 of the fields even lower their speed. Would a nation which does not have the means to support their motorized infantry really be able to focus on researching cavalry upgrades, when they probably would get more out of infantry?
Historically cavalry was something that was in the process of being phased out during WW2. While most nations still used horses through the war, it was mainly for transporting goods, pulling larger weapons and so on. It would seem like when cavalry was actually used as a fighting force, it was mainly because resources had not been allocated to make them motorized instead. So it might be appropriate, from a historical point of view, to make cavalry less desirable. Still, would it not be a good idea to at least partially make cavalry dependent on infantry research, as they would still be able to use a lot of the equipment that infantry use, and just make them scale a bit worse with technology, or am I missing something obvious here?

Armoured cars
Armoured cars are relatively cheap, fast and has decent enough soft attack. They can be used to make a rather cheesy setup which gives you a combined arms bonus with armour, without slowing it down (this was at least possible, though I don't remember the exact setup). I guess they could in theory be used for partisan hunting as well.

But borderline exploits aside, they are still really weak fighters, and don't really seem to be worth building unless you are really resource starved, and by that point you've probably more or less lost. Also, to make matters worse, you would have had to planed for this eventuality by spending valuable research on improving your armoured cars.
Historically armoured cars were mainly used as scouts & screens. They were the vanguard of the army, but were never really intended for engaging the enemy, other than possibly in a support role. There were even armoured cars produced without a main gun, which both helped make them cheaper to produce and helped discourage the crew from using it as a fighting vehicle. And while some armoured cars (like the Puma) were respectable fighting vehicles, this was still not what they were intended for. The game really does not simulate this very well though. Again, I might be missing something very obvious here, but would it not be more appropriate to have armoured car research give some form of bonus to other units, rather than having them as separate units?

Rocket artillery
Rocket artillery is cheap & fast to produce, and towards the end of the war, as superior soft attack compared to regular artillery. In particular non-SP rocket artillery has this advantage over its tube counterpart. Building rocket artillery also increase your practical artillery knowledge, which combined with the shorter production time means that you can raise this value quite fast.

But rocket artillery are expensive to use. They consume supplies like there was no tomorrow. They also require their own research field, and when rocket artillery is first introduced it's inferior to basic artillery. On top of all that, rocket artillery is more or less useless against hard targets, and while soft targets are more common through the entire war, it's still useful to be able to deal with harder targets from time to time. Due to the fact that you already need to have researched several levels of artillery before you can get rocket artillery, you can't just as a more backwards nation kickstart your artillery production with rocket artillery, which otherwise would have been a decent use for it.
Historically rocket artillery was quite devastating, allowing for massive concentrated fire in a small-ish area over a relatively short timeframe, which was great for breakthroughs, but it was also a logistical nightmare. It was a great tool on a tactical level, but as HoI 3 deals with warfare on a larger scale, I guess it's just very hard to properly simulate the difference between rocket artillery & regular tube artillery. Due to this though, would it not be appropriate to give rocket artillery some other bonus? And once again, I might be missing something obvious here.

 

[BattleMoose]

Cavalry are of very limited use. They are a mobile unit that doesn't use fuel, thats pretty much all they can offer. Good for capturing territory and killing rebels.

Armoured cars when attached in a brigade increase its overall speed, great for exploit divisions! If your enemy is speciasling in special forces, marines, paratroopers or mountain, AC can be a very cheap way to get an armour penetration bonus! Think island defence.

Rocket artillery is a bit cheaper upfront cost, thats about it really.

You've picked some of the most marginal units in the game and to be fair they can have some use but they are limited. But your questions are valid and fair. Maybe some of the other forum members will be able to contribute more uses for these lesser used units.

 

[misterbean]

In some parts of the world, Cavalry can still be useful, like the mountains in the Chinese interior, and possibly, in something like the Pripyet Marshes. Other than that, their primary role is to suppress rebels.

I too would be curious to know if anyone has a decent use for Rocket Arty. They just seem to only come into their own when my wars are usually winding down, so I have never build them.

 

[Rastrigin]

Cavallery has a limited role in secondary fronts with low infra and with a low concentration of units. It makes sense IMHO as it wasn't used much in the war and never performed very good.


ACs are very good support brigades for amour, motorized and mechanized divisions, it is not true they have no use. They are cheap, they are hard, they never slow divisions down and have a nice speed bonus. They give CA bonus and have decent stats. Probably one of the best self propelled brigades together with spart and TDs. I think your mistake is to consinder ACs a brigade for poor countries, while I believe they are helpfull to countries that can afford at least a motorized/mechanized force.
About you comments on AC role: in an armour division the ACs impact on the final stats is quite limited, they are mainly there in a support role for CA and speed bonuses and low softness. So they do have a limited "direct" impact on the fighting.
On a side note, about AC thechs: 2 of the 4 ACs tech are in common with Larm and (I think) mot. They share automotive theory with armours armours and mobile practicals with mot an mech. given than if you build arm cars you'll also have build some of those unit IMHO they are already quite well integrated. To build them you only have to research 2 easy techs when you'll most likely have all the practical and theoretical knowledge to speed them up. It's not different from other suport brigades like eng, art or AT.

I agree with you about rocket artillery. They are one of the less used brigades in the game, together with anti-air and, as misterbean said, it shouldn't be like that.

 

[misterbean]

Especially considering the fact that the Soviet Rocket Arty put the fear of God into the Germans every time.

 

[Kovax]

I use CAV in two roles: as a mobile "whack-a-mole" anti-Partisan unit, and to capture undefended terrain in those wide stretches of wasteland in places like the Middle East, inland China, or the east coast of Africa below the canal zone. Its freedom from dependency on fuel is a major point in those cases, where more powerful mobile units often end up sitting for lack of it.

As pointed out in the earlier posts, adding an AC brigade to a MOT or ARM gives it some additional firepower and movement bonuses for a relative pittance. Only a highly teched-up late-war LARM/MOT division will be slowed (slightly) by the addition of relatively basic AC, once you calculate the bonuses. If you tech up the AC, it can slow it down faster than the Light Tank Engine tech boosts it (AC gets less of a speed boost than LARM gets), so you need to be careful about how and where you use it and what you research.

I don't use Rocket Artillery, which only seems to make sense to build in a case where you need it immediately, and/or expect to lose it quickly, so long-term supply requirements are a moot point. I can picture the Soviets building a heap of them as soon as war breaks out, attaching them to divisions across the entire front, and not caring quite as much as with regular artillery whether or not those divisions get overrun or encircled and destroyed.

 

[Rastrigin]

Only a highly teched-up late-war LARM/MOT division will be slowed (slightly) by the addition of relatively basic AC, once you calculate the bonuses. If you tech up the AC, it can slow it down faster than the Light Tank Engine tech boosts it (AC gets less of a speed boost than LARM gets), so you need to be careful about how and where you use it and what you research.

Actually, the speed shown in the ACs stats only counts if you use AC as independent brigades. If you attach ACs to a division, the division will move at the speed of the slowest unit not cosidering ACs. So ACs don't slow down Larms and Mechs, which are the only brigades faster then them (in theory). I don't know if this is a bug or not, but even the speed shown by the division when it is moving is wrong is AC is the slowest division.

 

[Kovax]

Actually, the speed shown in the ACs stats only counts if you use AC as independent brigades. If you attach ACs to a division, the division will move at the speed of the slowest unit not cosidering ACs. So ACs don't slow down Larms and Mechs, which are the only brigades faster then them (in theory). I don't know if this is a bug or not, but even the speed shown by the division when it is moving is wrong is AC is the slowest division.

Thanks. Good to know that I was being overly cautious with deploying them, and that they're actually slightly better than I thought. Instead of a handful, I may need to build two hands full (which might make it difficult to type).

Incidentally, if you use them as independent brigades for recon and province-grabbing, if they do encounter enemy units, they simply retreat automatically, since they're "support" units and can't fight. That beats having a MOT or CAV locked in combat and getting ripped apart by that HARM they spotted until you manually retreat them.

Another use I've found for AC is to send them to any airfields you manage to capture. They drag a modest fuel supply with them, so your planes can begin limited operations (with reduced ORG due to redeployment) as soon as they arrive.

 

[Less]

Cav is kind of out of place. It's a poor-man's exploitation division, which can't actually do the job it was meant to do thanks to very poor stats and not all that impressive speed over infantry. For partisan hunting over remote stretches of land you will be Strategically Redeploying anyway, and movement speed doesn't matter for that. If they shared the same upgrades as Infantry and had the same stats + faster movement I'd consider them, but as it is, meh.

AC is one of the most resilient brigades in the game, right below actual armored divisions and with a fraction of the IC cost. Superb defensive stats + Hardness is not to be trifled with. When you compare the return per IC-Day AC become one of the most valuable divisions in the game. In fact it beats SP-ART in just about every way. And they make your regiments absolutely fly through terrain that would normally slow them down. Nothing can escape being overrun against an 8 km/h division with 0 movement penalty in the mountains.

Rocket Artillery is also pretty useless. Saving a small amount of IC on an already cheap brigade just isn't worth getting worse stats and supply consumption in return.

 

[Secret Master]

Well, I'm sure everyone here knows my love for the AC brigade. You want speed, low softness, and better speed in certain terrain, then AC is the right brigade for you. Oh, and they have nice toughness values, so they help divisions sustain attacks a bit better. I prefer AC to SPART in TFH at this point.

I'm not sure that slower AC doesn't slow a division down. If the AC has a lower speed than the LARM, it should slow the division down because of the slowest brigade rule (show me a screenie if you can to prove me wrong, because I'd love to see it); however, because AC has speed bonuses not listed in its basic speed, the net effect of an AC in plains, desert, and anywhere else its terrain bonuses apply will be positive in many cases. So, while the listed speed should be slower, the practical speed might be higher.

I agree with Kovax on CAV. I will just remind everyone that CAV brigades are a source of mobile practical, and they can be upgraded to new unit types, including MOT and MECH. When playing nations that do not have MOT yet, I sometimes build placeholder divisions along LARM/CAV/AC/AC lines; when ARM and MOT are at the tech levels I want, I upgrade the brigades to an ARM/MOT/AC/AC configuration. The good news is that theater AI is great at using CAV to mop up partisans that rise up, as long as you design the theater properly. All that being said, I never research their techs unless I lack the prerequisites for MOT or something.

Rocket artillery is a supply hog. However, you might want to look at RART's speed and terrain modifiers. While I don't like RART at all, there is a case to be made that in some theaters, and under some conditions, RART is a better bet than ART. My biggest complaint with RART, though, is that it's tech is only unlocked after some ART research and at 1939 tech levels. Even as the Soviets, it's too late to crash convert the Red Army along RART lines by 1939. You have to commit to unit types earlier than in terms of research and division configurations. (No, I'm too lazy to build 2xINF divisions and then fill in RART's after 1939 on a massive scale.)

 

[IrationalFear]

I'm a bit outdated, still running vanilla HOI3, but unless ART got a buff or RCT got a nerf, the following should still be valid:
Besides the supply and IC comparisons between ART and RCT, RCT has other advantages than what most people notice, which surprisingly goes unnoticed considering the love for AC around here over movement.

rct:
maximum_speed = 5.00
amphibious = { attack = -0.80 }
marsh = { attack = -0.10 }
jungle = { attack = -0.20 }
forest = { attack = -0.20 }
woods = { attack = -0.05 }
fort = { attack = 0.10 }

vs
art:
maximum_speed = 4.00
amphibious = { attack = -0.80 }
river = { attack = -0.10 }
marsh = { attack = -0.20
movement = -0.30}
jungle = { attack = -0.30
movement = -0.20}
forest = { attack = -0.15
movement = -0.20}
woods = { attack = -0.10
movement = -0.10}
mountain = { attack = -0.20
movement = -0.20}
hills = { attack = -0.10
movement = -0.05}
plains = { attack = -0.10}
arctic = { attack = -0.10}
fort = { attack = -0.10}

Notice that RCT travels faster than both INF and ART, and that it has ZERO movement penalties.
Additionally, has reduced terrain penalties in marsh, jungle, woods, has an attack bonus against forts where ART is penalized, and has ZERO penalties on mountains and hills.
As far as obtaining RCT, if the ART techs are already researched, the unlock tech can be completed by Jan-April 1938, and only one of its following techs is worth researching, meaning if you want to research ahead of time to beat-out ART in soft attack, there are fewer research slots needed.
The speed of RCT initially seems wasted when pair with infantry, but the lack of movement and terrain penalties for mountains and hills means you can attach them to MNT divisions for a force multiplier against other players in the mountains, and then detached after combat to relocate the supply hogs. RCT can also be attached to MAR divisions for use after amphibious landings if you so desire, as the operate similarly in the same terrain and lack river crossing penalties.
If you're fond of your CAV, RCT will not cause a movement penalty to a combined division while you decide what to do with the outdated brigade.
Notice with INF and Spec Forces
inf:
maximum_speed = 4.00
No terrain penalties beyond game constants.

vs
mar:
maximum_speed = 4.33
amphibious = { attack = 0.50}
river = { attack = 0.40}
marsh = { attack = 0.30}


vs
mnt:
maximum_speed = 4.33
mountain = { attack = 0.30
defence = 0.10
movement = 0.10}
hills = { attack = 0.20
defence = 0.05}
Occasionally, a player may produce HARM/RCT combinations of divisions, as early HARM has the same speed, and the resulting division has extra hard attack from HARM (I'm aware the combined arms system has changed, but I don't know how, but this kind of division used to qualify).
Furthermore, SPRCT is always 1kph faster than SPART, making the choice between an SP brigade and AC worth considering (at least, more than normal).
Yes, you're opting out of hard attack with RCT, but the IC saved during production could also be spent on ground attack aircraft, if that is your preferred anti-armor method.

 

[Rastrigin]

SM: I never tested it, an expert player explained that to me a bit ago. However I tested that now and it looks like it doesn't work that way ...

 

[ltccone]

I use CAV in two roles: as a mobile "whack-a-mole" anti-Partisan unit, and to capture undefended terrain in those wide stretches of wasteland in places like the Middle East, inland China, or the east coast of Africa below the canal zone. Its freedom from dependency on fuel is a major point in those cases, where more powerful mobile units often end up sitting for lack of it.

As pointed out in the earlier posts, adding an AC brigade to a MOT or ARM gives it some additional firepower and movement bonuses for a relative pittance. Only a highly teched-up late-war LARM/MOT division will be slowed (slightly) by the addition of relatively basic AC, once you calculate the bonuses. If you tech up the AC, it can slow it down faster than the Light Tank Engine tech boosts it (AC gets less of a speed boost than LARM gets), so you need to be careful about how and where you use it and what you research.

I don't use Rocket Artillery, which only seems to make sense to build in a case where you need it immediately, and/or expect to lose it quickly, so long-term supply requirements are a moot point. I can picture the Soviets building a heap of them as soon as war breaks out, attaching them to divisions across the entire front, and not caring quite as much as with regular artillery whether or not those divisions get overrun or encircled and destroyed.

I like CAV for anti-partisan activities. The starting techs (for Germany) are good enough for the whole war to fight partisans.

 

[Pro_Consul]

My biggest complaint with RART, though, is that it's tech is only unlocked after some ART research and at 1939 tech levels. Even as the Soviets, it's too late to crash convert the Red Army along RART lines by 1939. You have to commit to unit types earlier than in terms of research and division configurations. (No, I'm too lazy to build 2xINF divisions and then fill in RART's after 1939 on a massive scale.)

If you start simmering artillery practical early, then when your first coupla runs of IC are done heat that up and start really cooking, then you can have RART researched by mid-'38 and switch to producing those, then go back to upgrading the ART you built earlier if you should feel the need, though I doubt that would be anything like a priority. Anyway, once you activate the RART tech and switch to producing those instead of ART, it is rather like discovering a whole new gear. The high practicals you already built coupled with the faster build time of RART ramp things up just that much faster, enabling you to have a very heavily supported Red Army in plenty of time to greet the Germans most warmly.

I would recommend deploying all the original ART and early ART builds to the divs that will be manning the Vladivostok, Balkan and Finnish fronts, so that the divisions on the German front get mostly RART. That sector has the best throughput and can most readily handle the higher logistical burden.

But as you say, SM, one needs to have the patience to reorganize fairly extensively at the outset...or use a good OOB editor like the Army Restructuring Tool.

 

[AFnord]

It would seem like I've been quite unfair to ACs, thanks for opening my eyes on their use. I never even considered using them as island defense, but now it makes sense. I'm going to start a new game soon, and I'll give them a fair chance this time around.

As for RART, they still seem to be a bit niche, but now I can at least see during which conditions they would be very useful to focus on.

 

[KyrionMyrthar]

Offhand, I don't recall the stats, but it seems to me that RART should do more org damage, breaking units faster. As mentioned, those katyushas scared the hell out of the front-line German soldier.

 

[misterbean]

Also, the higher supply cost isn't what happened in real life. The Soviet rockets were basically flawed arty warheads that they just happened to find a use for. At least early on. So, if anything, they should have better terrain modifiers and lower supply costs than arty. Maybe different stats, since they were not meant for accuracy, but for "saturation bombing" from the ground.

 

[Secret Master]

Offhand, I don't recall the stats, but it seems to me that RART should do more org damage, breaking units faster. As mentioned, those katyushas scared the hell out of the front-line German soldier.

Also, the higher supply cost isn't what happened in real life. The Soviet rockets were basically flawed arty warheads that they just happened to find a use for. At least early on. So, if anything, they should have better terrain modifiers and lower supply costs than arty. Maybe different stats, since they were not meant for accuracy, but for "saturation bombing" from the ground.

Maybe HOI4. Right now, since unit firepower is so generic once you get past the HA/SA dichotomy, there's no real operational difference between units like this.

 

[Jamey]

SM, are you winding up with ARM/MOT/AC/AC as one of your standard armor builds?

I was just doing a comparison with ARM/MOT/TD/SPART and realizing how much cheaper it is, and with similar Hardness. You'll lose out, especially in Defensiveness and HA, but that isn't the end of the world for an ARM division which costs around 75% as much IC.

 

[Secret Master]

SM, are you winding up with ARM/MOT/AC/AC as one of your standard armor builds?

I was just doing a comparison with ARM/MOT/TD/SPART and realizing how much cheaper it is, and with similar Hardness. You'll lose out, especially in Defensiveness and HA, but that isn't the end of the world for an ARM division which costs around 75% as much IC.

When I don't want to run something more expensive like ARM/MOT/TD/TD or ARM/MOT/TD/AC, yes. ARM/MOT/AC/AC is a cheap, relatively fast division that packs a decent punch. Those ACs also have nice toughness, which I think offsets the defensiveness. You get more SA with SPART, but you pay for it, too (both IC and fuel and supply).

It's a cheap way to stack low softness, too. That's the thing I don't like about SPART anymore; the high softness makes the division more vulnerable to SA, which kind of grates on the chalkboard of my soul when it comes to armored divisions.

That's also why I sometimes feel it's worthwhile to go MECH; the lower softness and increased firepower, even with the increased cost, has advantages. But cheap low softness comes from AC, no problem.