why buy armor?

[DRG]

In WinSPWW2 in 1946 a US M3 Halftrack costs 23 points in MBT in 1946 it's 22 points.

A standard US rifle squad in WinSPMBT in 1946 costs 20 points. In WinSPww2 in 1946 it's 26 points( with pretty much the same weapons etc )

In WinSPWW2 a M26 Pershing costs 156 points. An M26 Pershing in MBT in 1946 costs 78 points and that is to ensure that as tanks pregress for the next 70+ years that MBT represents will be not end up costing out of the ballpark

So, in 1946 in WW2 you can buy one Pershing OR HAVE 6 infantry squads. In MBT in 1946 you can have one Pershing or just about 4 infantry squads so for this example, and I picked this simply becasue it's one we can directly compare the two games with, the "infantry to armor cost disparity" IS lower in MBT than in WW2 which is the opposite of your claim for the two games

Don

[Uncle_Joe]

the "infantry to armor cost disparity" IS lower in MBT than in WW2 which is the opposite of your claim for the two games

For that one example, perhaps. But in GENERAL, this is not the case.

But again, at this point, I'm not going to try and argue it. If you want to believe that infantry are more expensive relative to armor in MBT than thats fine. Perhaps I'm just playing 'incorrectly'.

[Mobhack]

Thats what I see as the 'problem'. To me, the infantry to armor cost disparity should be LOWER in Modern than in WW2 (on average). Yet here its higher despite the ease with which most modern infantry can dispatch vehicles.

modern armour has enormous RF, FC, stabiliser, armour (including reactive, HEAT etc), speed and weapons that make the WW2 ones look like peashooters. And they have night fighting gear, often thermal imagers.

Modern APC are similar, with more steel armour than WW2 medium tanks often enough (And ERA and so on).

Infantry has real problems with an armoured opposition (even a ferret scout car) once it has used all 6 or so HEAT rounds up, assuming it had any MAWS in the first place,or if the armoured force refuses to close to effective RPG range. (See scouts, below).

On another note, are modern vehicles THAT much more lethal to infantry than their WW2 counter-parts? Yes, their firepower is superior in some ways, but they still have to find the infantry and they still have avoid AT weaponry. And this limits their ability to control the battlefield much the same as in WW2. They are more lethal, but 2x more lethal overall?

Finding the infantry is best done by not blundering into them. Use your mobility and the battlefield space to deploy scouts observing the likely approach routes of the OPFOR leg grunts. Once spotted, they will be toast for your arty. (But I note you never seem to mention arty in your posts at all??).

They will also be toast for e.g. a ferret scout car firing from 400 metres or so, keeping out of RPG range. Or tank co-ax.

Or, just blast away with arty on the likely approach routes anyway. If you are fighting on postage-stamp battlefields, this will reduce the guesswork involved.

However - post WW2 armour is more involved in the anti-armour aspect of warfare. This includes MICV - those TOW on a Bradley do not come cheap.

If you want to have cheaper armour for anti-grunt work, then investigate the close support (CS) tank formations many OOBs have. These emphasise HE over AP loadout - and HE tends to be cheaper. They may also be older model AFV with less "goodies" to pay for.

If you also want another advantage over leg grunts, then cover your approach with smoke, and use the thermal imaging sights on your APCS and MBT to spot the grunts through the smoke. It is rather good for that!. It is also a reason your vehicles cost more than WW2 armour which are somewhat lacking in the night fighting gear dept. (If fighting an "infantry horde" before TI, then do it in a dark night, say 3 hexes, if you have access even to IR searchlights, just advance your IR vehicles behind a beating line of infantry).

Note that I didnt go through and cherry-pick specific units to prove a point. I just randomly opened each game and looked at the cost for what I consider 'typical' units for those periods.

Like with like is a better test. Otherwise you are comparing a 1930 model T ford with a 2006 Ford Focus GTI.

If you think that modern armor/transport is worth more on the modern battlefield than WW2 armor was in its day, then so be it. Its obviously your call. What always brings me back to this issue is that buying all leg-infantry in SPWW2 does not seem to convey the same advantage as it does in SPMBT.

You get what you pay for in terms of goodies bolted on. Armour costs points, carry capacity costs points, FC costs points, stabilisers cost, RF costs points, Crew costs points, Armour (front/side (costs more as 2 off and larger area)/turret armour, Spaced cost on top of steel, ERA on top of all, etc all costs). Fancy night fighting gear costs, and so does swim capability. Fancy potent modern weapons cost more than WW2 ones.

In WW2 - steel armour is costed relatively more than post war in the CC.

From WW2 a Soviet T34/76 Model 43 (late model #168) costs 75 points
From MBT a Russian T34/76 Model 1943 #3 costs 52 points

From WW2 a USA M3 Halftrack (unit #32) costs 23 points.
From MBT a USA M3 Halftrack (unit #58) Costs 22 points.

So - modern (MBT) armour actually costs you slightly less, when you compare like for like, rather than model Ts with Focuses.

All points systems are a compromise, and need to be adressed to the entire game system for overall game balance, and ours does this. Ditto AI pick lists.


Cheers
Andy

[RVPERTVS]

RVPERTVS said: the AI tends to buy lots of foot infantry which is very resilient and tends to overrun almost any position no matter the combinedness of the opfor.

Well, no more of this issue, I´ve been playing around with v3 last weekend and after some experimentation I can tell you that the fix has finally arrived with this last update.

I don´t know if it was the AI picklist updates or the raised infantry cost, or a combination of both, but the AI no more buys insane amounts of foot infantry; I´ve even seen the AI buying more mechanized than foot infantry wich never happened before v3. So now battles against the AI look more like real armored confrontations than guerrilla skrimishes like they used to be.

This was my main complaint against the AI and now is fixed, I thought I couldn´t love this game more...I was wrong

Regards
Robert

[Marek_Tucan]

Played a first battle in v.03 (I mean first finished battle, not the feature-testing bits ), meeting Czech Rep. vs. Slovakia (to ensure identical opponents), 1993, with AI buy. Map was 120x120 and only 4000 points for each side to make things interesting and allow for some maneuvering. I bought several tanks (5 T-72M1, two T-55AM2B), a motor rifle co in OT-64's and a platoon of MVP-2 IFV's, plus scouts, artillery and ammo supply. The AI bought a company of T-72 and a mass of leg infantry with some ATGM teams. Those proved somewhat combat worthy, everything armoured I lost was to them - two OT-64's, DANA SPH and a BVP. Engaged only three of his tanks, with flank ambush by one T-72M1 killed them all, rest of his tanks was in reserve and actually didn't move prior the end of the battle.
The infantry was no match - I had too little dismounts so I used them in dense forests to guard flanks/gaps, and I used the OT-64's as mobile MG nests to shoot up his infantry in the open. Stayed out of RPG range and literally massacred the infantry with MG and mortar fire. Final result 20 casaulties on my side, 188 on AI side, mostly the infantry. My tanks didn't do much as I have kept them in ambush positions against his armored reserves.
So in this battle, even a very light armour proved to be effective against a mass of foot infantry, as long as it keeps its distance, and each of the OT-64's was definitely worth atleast twice its cost