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Hey Folks,

So I am looking to try an figure out the most cost effective way to defend my planets without breaking the bank when playing a race with weaker troops.

I am playing DW:U with latest updates via steam and research unleashed mod. I play an edited low growth race on very hard or extreme, 8/10 other empires, 8x8 with 700/1000 stars, normal amount and strength pirates, aggression level at restless, research at 260k (high to extreme cost). So getting good value for money is essential long term for survival and paying the fleet costs. I allow tech trading but as a house rule I do not tech trade, sell bases or pay for trade sanctions/war.

I have done some google searches to try and find the maximum troop strength cap, I have seen some that say it is 30k (2011/2012), but then others that are saying they have troops with 51k attack strength (2014).

So can someone confirm if there is a strength cap for troops? If so what is it?
Does this affect the strength cap of the infantry and robotic troops, or only the infantry?

Do the research upgrades benefit robotic troops or only infantry?

The next issue is cost, can someone give me a break down of costs for the different troops (infantry, armor, PD, robotic)?
In my research I saw that robotic troops cost 600 maintenance for base cost.

As far as I can tell if you have the time it is better to train up infantry/robots with a few armor units for the breakthrough bonus when attacking colonies/planets, they will give you the best 'bang for buck'.

I am also looking for good ways to train troops?
Can you for example invade a colony that the pirates control, win the initial battle, then pickup the troop immediately after and leave, let the pirates take over again and then repeat the invasion?

Input from the community is much appreciated.

Regards,

The next issue is cost, can someone give me a break down of costs for the different troops (infantry, armor, PD, robotic)?

Armor and special forces cost twice what same-species infantry costs, planetary defense units cost four times what same-species infantry costs. I think the standard maintenance cost of infantry is 1000/year (so 2000/year for armor and special forces, and 4000/year for planetary defense units), with the upkeep cost being modified by the species-related modifiers of the species of the unit, not the species which founded the empire (so if you have Naxxilian troops in an Atuuk empire, the Naxxilian units get the -40% upkeep reduction). Note that upkeep modifiers stack multiplicatively between sources, so Naxxilian infantry with the full -50% upkeep bonus from the Logistics line of techs and +10% maintenance costs from the government type will cost 330 credits (1000 credits base, multiplied by 0.6 for the 40% upkeep reduction from the species, multiplied again by 0.5 for the 50% upkeep reduction from Logistics techs, and multiplied once more by 1.1 for the 10% maintenance cost penalty from the government type).

Does this affect the strength cap of the infantry and robotic troops, or only the infantry?

If I recall correctly, robotic troops do not gain experience and so are always at recruited strength. This makes it likely that robotic infantry will always be a poor deal, as highly-experienced regular units (or clones thereof) will likely exceed the strength/upkeep ratio of robotic troops.

I am also looking for good ways to train troops?
Can you for example invade a colony that the pirates control, win the initial battle, then pickup the troop immediately after and leave, let the pirates take over again and then repeat the invasion?

Several ways to train troops:
1. Use the same core group of units to invade any independent colonies you forcibly incorporate into your empire (I would suggest that you forcibly incorporate any independents that you choose to add to your empire, unless you really want to play a 'nice' empire with a spotless reputation; troops and transports are reusable and less costly to replace than colony ships are).
2. Find some colonies that are frequently raided by pirates, and instead of clearing pirates out of the area, garrison the colonies. Every raid survived grants your troops more experience, though you need to be careful if the raiding is particularly heavy and frequent.
3. Allow the pirates to gain enough influence over one or more colonies to construct pirate facilities (Hidden Pirate Bases or Fortresses), then use the forces on the planet (or, better for increasing the experience level of a core group but more difficult from a management perspective and probably slower, a core group of facility-busting troops that you shuttle from one world to the next for each facility attack) to attack the pirate facilities (go into the colonies menu, select the facilities tab and the world your troops are on, select the Hidden Pirate Base or Fortress, then click the attack button).
4. During wars with colonial empires, always remember to take the most experienced forces that survive an invasion off the planet to participate in the next invasion; less experienced units can be shuttled in (or even recruited locally, if the need for a garrison isn't too pressing). Make sure to give the units time to recover before launching the next invasion.

You cannot repeatedly invade a colony just due to pirate influence, unless the pirates manage to build all the way up to the Criminal Network after each invasion. You can repeatedly attack pirate facilities as long as the pirates have the influence and money to keep initiating construction on Hidden Pirate Bases or Fortresses.

So I am looking to try an figure out the most cost effective way to defend my planets without breaking the bank when playing a race with weaker troops.

The absolute most cost-effective way*, as far as unit upkeep is concerned, is to find a colony full of Naxxilians (-40% troop upkeep), take it over, ensure it has a stockpile of Jakantra Ivory (results in a base attack and defense strength of 13900 for infantry), and replace all of your standard-upkeep lightly-experienced units with Naxxilian units recruited from that location as quickly as is possible (infantry units with no species-specific upkeep modifiers need to have attack and defense strengths of ~23167 before they're more cost-effective than Naxxilian infantry recruited somewhere with Jakantra Ivory and without the benefit of any strength-as-recruited modifiers like the Fortress of Torak or the infantry attack/defense bonus techs). Ikurro (-30% troop upkeep), Boskara (-25% troop upkeep), Mortalen (-25% troop upkeep), and Sluken (-20% troop upkeep) are also good choices; all of these are also in the top 10 in unit strength at time of recruitment among standard playable species, whether or not you recruit them in a location with access to the resource giving a strength bonus (Jakantra Ivory for the Naxxilians, Aculon for the Boskara, Osalia for the Ikkuro, and Questurian Skin for the Sluken).

If you want to stick to the troops of your founding empire, though, your most cost-effective option is to get a core group of highly-experienced infantry and then use clones of them for garrison duty (and preferably use relatively few cloning facilities, shuttling the troops out to where they're needed using transports rather than building facilities everywhere). Armored and special forces units are not cost-effective for garrison duty (armored and special forces units cost twice what infantry units do but have the same defense strength; it's primarily the bonuses that they offer on the attack which make armored and special forces units worth having, though sprinkling them into garrisons isn't a terrible idea), and planetary defense units were never meant to be a mainstay of planetary garrisons but rather as a supporting component of the garrison and so you might see one or two for every five to ten infantry on the planet. Robotic infantry can work if you don't have a highly-experienced infantry corps to clone, though once again you probably shouldn't build the recruitment facilities everywhere or the upkeep on the facilities may cost you as much or more than you save on the troops, and it should be remembered that while robotic troops are cheap, they're also lower-quality than regular units.

*Technically, colonizing whatever world has the Fortress of Torak with Naxxilians and doing your best to ensure that they are the most populous species on that planet, ensuring that that world has an ample stockpile of Jakantra Ivory, and getting all of the strength-as-recruited bonuses from the tech tree or cloning highly-experienced troops is the most cost-effective way as far as unit upkeep goes, but that's a bit slower and can be somewhat problematic.

Edit:

Do the research upgrades benefit robotic troops or only infantry?

A quick test suggests that robotic troops benefit from the maintenance cost reductions offered by the logistics line of techs but not from the attack and defense bonuses.

Hey Aeson, thanks for the quick reply and the taking the time to test.

Ref cost - Interesting, I didn't know they still benefited from the troop maint savings if they were not the main race of your empire, and as it just so happens I already own a Ikurro (-30% troop upkeep) planet in my current game which I will make use of.

Ref Robotic troops - I will need to take a close look at them next time I get some game time to track their strength gains if there are any or if they do indeed not change.

Troop Training - Guess I will just stick with my core group of guys and move them from place to place but I will try leaving a smaller colony open to attack from pirates and have plenty of troops there as a training method to see how it works...

Depending on how my troop training goes I will then just have to closely monitor the gains and once they get to the 250+ move them to garrison duty until training and cloning a cheaper race is an option.

Thanks again.

Old thread with reference troop atks from base game. Should still be correct for the most part.

Can you for example invade a colony that the pirates control, win the initial battle, then pickup the troop immediately after and leave, let the pirates take over again and then repeat the invasion?

That sounds rather "gamey" for someone who sets house rules. If you're going to make it challenging then don't stifle it by using "exploits".

I noticed that BattleBots cost a quarter the standard upkeep (250 credits per year before modifiers), rather than the 600 credits per year (60% normal upkeep) that the OP found. That actually makes BattleBots somewhat cost-effective in strength/upkeep before strength-as-recruited modifiers and unit experience come into play, as they get 24 strength*year/credit to the Naxxilian with Jakantra Ivory baseline of 23.17 strength*year/credit (i.e. an infantry unit that costs 1000 credits/year will need to have a strength of 24000 in-game or 240 as listed in the chart that HerpInYourDerp linked before matching the cost-effectiveness in strength/upkeep of a unit of BattleBots, or 23167 before matching baseline Naxxilian infantry recruited somewhere with stocks of Jakantra Ivory). I am however quite certain that the BattleBots do not get any of the strength-as-recruited bonuses from techs (unsure of whether or not the Fortress of Torak ruin site will help them, though I doubt it), which means that if you can clone highly-experienced troops or stack up the strength-as-recruited bonuses, BattleBots lose ground quickly.

ORIGINAL: HerpInYourDerp

Old thread with reference troop atks from base game. Should still be correct for the most part.

It should be noted that those strengths have to be multiplied by 100 to get the in-game attack and defense values for infantry, and that BattleBots (which aren't included in that list) have a strength of 60 (6000 in-game). Armored, special forces, and planetary defense units have their own sets of multipliers (according to the game manual, armored units multiply by 300 for attack and 150 for defense, special forces units multiply by 200 for attack and 100 for defense, and planetary defense units multiply by 50 for attack and 75 for defense).

@HerpInYourDerp : Thanks for the link, I saw a similar list when looking for info prior to the post.
In the same thread it also shows the difference in opinion in regards to max strength of a troop. Fishman implies max strength is 300k in post 2 then Jeeves (post 13) is saying he has veterans gaining experience at the 629/616
level.
So my question remains, is the an experience/strength cap on troops? If so what is it?

@aaatoysandmore : Yes I am sure that it can be seen as 'gamey' and it probably is but I am by no means claiming to be a regular or skilled player. My previous games have been won with packing troop transports with as many troops of the strongest I had available at the time with not much attention paid to the cost, however as I have reduced race growth and increased the difficulty I am finding it much more important to manage the cost of my decisions/troops/fleets/bases.

@Aeson : Hmmm, 250 per troop is a significant saving if you can get them to gain experience / strength. But if not then as soon as you invest time in the other troops identified in your first post then it seems to be a better option.

Thanks again for the input folks.

Hmmm, 250 per troop is a significant saving if you can get them to gain experience / strength. But if not then as soon as you invest time in the other troops identified in your first post then it seems to be a better option.

I'm pretty sure BattleBots don't gain experience. Regardless, they're still the cheapest units you can use for garrison duty, and since in many cases you're not going to have a large enough army on any given world to successfully resist an invasion without reinforcements it may be the case that having four BattleBots is worth more than having one standard-upkeep unit even if the standard-upkeep unit has a better strength:cost ratio. Also remember that having more units on the field means that incoming damage gets spread out more on average, which means that BattleBots could be useful as cannon fodder or 'chaff,' protecting more valuable units by taking a part of the damage that would have been concentrated onto those units in the absence of the BattleBots (attacks against units participating in a terrestrial engagement appear to be distributed following a roughly uniform random distribution; therefore increasing the size of the army from four units to seven units by replacing a standard-upkeep infantry unit with four BattleBots should reduce the damage incoming to each unit by about 40% until one or more units die, which allows BattleBots to potentially be cost-effective for preserving the strength of more powerful units or as speedbumps on colonies that you're unwilling to garrison strongly enough to resist invasions without reinforcements but might try to reinforce should they be invaded or even just to tie up the invaders for a longer period of time).

Correct me if i am wrong, but isn't duration of ground combat based on pure number of troops, not strength?

Which is why you can land overwhelming troop strength against a smaller defending force, but it still takes time for the battle animation to reduce the defending force. If so, then using cheap robotic troops for garrison duty for most worlds if you have huge empire seems best cost effective way to buy time until you can land your real defending troops.

Either the attacking force will be minor, a pirate raid for example in which case the small garrison of robotic troops will be just fine, or the attackers will be significant enough it wont matter if you had a small, less expensive robotic garrison or small, more expensive stronger troops. Either way the small garrison cant win and requires a much larger defending force to land and help.

So might as well just use cheap cannon fodder to delay attackers till you land your troop ships.

AFAIK (not 100% sure though), max ATK power including all bonuses & techs for a full hp ground unit is 90k (900 per 'soldier'), DEF strength has no cap.

Or you can keep a core of good 'sentient' troops on the planet supplemented by robotic troops for numbers. For example, perhaps you have 3 regular troops on the planet (1 Inf, 1 armor, 1 defense) supplemented by 7 robotic troops.

Another good use for the robotic troops would be as cannon fodder during invasions. You could land a large number of these cheap troops to weaken enemy defenders before committing your more experienced troops into the fray.

In other words, the cheap robot troops while not strong are still quite useful.