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ORIGINAL: Uncle_Joe

Beatrix Kiddo:

10-10 is not a fair comparison to 8-8 Infantry.

I took that straight from your post #39. If you had just stuck with 11-11 there'd be no argument, but saying, "11-11 Armor is just so much better than 8-8 Infantry!!!" is pretty obvious and doesn't provide all that much support for changing the World Standard for armor evasion.

Now I'm convinced there's a problem with WA Heavy Bombers and support that change, but I'm not quite there yet for armor.

1) 11-11 armor is about the same level as 8-8 Infantry in terms of research cost...a little higher most likely, thus why I amended to 11-10. The reason? The World Standard is at 8-8 for Tanks and 6-6 for Infantry. The added points to get the Armor to 11 come from the penalty applied to Infantry research based on number in the field and in the queue.

2) 10-10 Tanks and 8-8 Infantry are almost on par for combat and it depends solely on Pop. For every nation but Russia, Tanks are better. But for Russia, its a LOT more expensive to get to 8-8 Infantry so its moot. Tanks are easier on supply and are capable of getting massed up for decisive attacks. So, at 10-10, I'd still go with Tanks over 8-8 Infantry, but it doesnt become a total no brainer until 11-10 in which case the Infantry really cant hope to match a in realistic time frame.

Both Tanks and Heavies are being tweaked in the patch as are a few other data changes.

Uncle joe

First off, i was convinced way back that 8-8 as WS for tanks is imbalanced. That is why i was talking out of the frame of reference of armor evasion already taken down by one point. In that case, artillery becomes a very good counter to armor. (That one point is very significant). Sorry if the frame of reference wasnt repeated in the last post. [&o]

About the 15 inf : those were supposed to be the inf that you started the game with, to illustrate the effect (or lack thereof) of bringing in un-teched fodder. My point was that teching just 1 unit is dangerours, as your other units (the 15 inf) become more or less worthless. This is within the frame of reference where every unit has a counter-unit. (Which for armor depends on taking down evasion by 1).

About militia: Most powers start the game with a significant number of militia. Russia gets lots if they loose only limited territory during the first turn, and militia is a pretty good build for russia before they are at war, as they done have production to both tech up and spend their manpower (manpower pools max at twice your per turn gain). Building militia is a possibility for the US, too, prior to entering the war, for the same reason.

Late in the war, you will likely not produce infantry Edit: it is militia you dont produce late, of course, as manpower gets limited. By that time, however, the side that only teched one unit (and thus was counter-teched) should already more or less have lost the game. (Still assuming that all units have counter-units, and that armor evasion starts out 1 lower.)

About tech costs: Equal number of arty vs tanks was assumed, so research costs would be equal. In fact, that was why i chose 10 vs 10 in the example.

About same artillery hitting the same unit twice: I didnt notice that. Will the arty always shoot at the same unit at both ranges?

Btw, the purpose of my previous post was not to prove that armor was or was not an imbalanced unit with 8-8 WS. I took it for granted that it was. (We agree on this)

Rather, the point was to show that as long as a counter unit exists, spreading your research out is better than concentrating, at least until the enemy starts concentrating, at which time you are at an advantage as long as you concentrate on the counter unit.

hakon:

Ok, so it seems we agree across the board then! [;)] Personally, I think Combined Arms is well rewarded if the WS for Armor evasion is lowered by 1. I think you demonstrated that as well.

On Arty:

Its something we were puzzling over for a while. The -1 Evasion modifier applies only if you are shooting at a unit that has been previously shot at by a different unit. So, if an Arty fires at R:2, and then happens to fire at the same target at R:1 (and no one else has fired on it), then its Evasion will not be lowered. I dont believe that Arty prioritizes the same unit any more, but it was another advantage to armor...less units means more chance of an arty 'double up'. It is apparently working as intended though, and is not a bug.