Blitzkrieg Mod 5.1.6 beta

[MarKr]

Hi,

a new update is here. I know I said last time that 5.1.6 update would bring some more changes but I wanted to finish tuning the artillery changes first before going to some more changes that will again require extensive testing. However this update includes several changes that should not need too much of testing to be able to say what impact on balance they have.

Change log:
General:
- Added PE markings on Bergetiger and Ammunition Halftrack (Thanks to Panzerblitz1)
- Made changes to various howitzer artillery pieces to make the shells hit a "circular" area rather than "line"
- Corrected AoE range brackets for several artillery units
- Barrage AoE UI indicator (the yellow circle) should now get properly bigger with range (the farther you shoot, the bigger the UI - to more accurately indicate the hit zone)
- Lowered the rear/side penetration chance of 75mm guns (Shermans, Cromwells, Churchills) against Tigers (max range 25%), King Tigers (15%) and Jagdtiger (5%)
- Lowered front penetration chance of 75mm guns (Shermans, Cromwells, Churchills) against StuG III/IV (max range 23%; 14% with skirts)
- Lowered the rear/side penetration chance of Axis Stubby 75mm guns against Churchills (max range 10%), Croc Churchill (5%), Jumbo (35%), Pershings (25%) SP (15%)
- Returned a kicker message when game registers a rear penetration on a vehicle (it says now "Weak armor point penetrated" to prevent confusion with pure "rear armor" hits)
- Changed aim times for snipers 0.75 - 1.25 second (from 0.25; on average it is +1 second but it can be slightly less or more)

US:
- Stuart no longer needs to buy upgrade to use HE mode (activation: 15 ammo, needs to wait at least 20 seconds to switch back to AP)
- Riflegrenade upgrade is no longer mutually exlusive with other Riflemen weapon upgrades
- Increased the range of HEAT riflegrenade to 60
- Fixed a bug where the "Straffing raid" ability in AB HQ (converted from neutral building) would dissapear after upgrading the AP bullets
- Fixed missing sandbags on M16 in AA mode

CW:
- Stuart no longer needs to buy upgrade to use HE mode (activation: 15 ammo, needs to wait at least 20 seconds to switch back to AP)
- Corrected AoE ranges of 95mm Churchill and Cromwell to 1/3/5/8 (from 1/3/7/7)
- Assigned a Hotkey "B" for 95mm Churchill's and Cromwell's barrage
- Lowered cost of Dingo to 240MP (from 300MP)
- Lowered cost of Dingo to 170MP 5F after Captain is built
- Lowered speed bonus of Flank Speed ability on Cromwells and Comets to +25% (from +50%)
- Increased turret rotation of Comet to 22 (from 16; now it is closer to Cromwell)
- Lowered turret rotation speed of M10 Achilles to 9 (from 13; now it is the same as M10 Wolverine)

WM:
- Applied arty changes to Grille (was forgotten before)
- "46mm grenade" ability of GrB39 squad now requires the Tank Factory to become available
- Increased cooldown of "46mm grenade" ability of GrB39 squad to 75 seconds (from 30)
- Increased cost of "46mm grenade" ability of GrB39 squad to 70 ammo (from 50)
- Fixed a bug where 46mm grenade missed a lot less than intended
- Lowered range of 46mm grenade ability to 45 (from 55)
- "HE grenade" of GrB39 squad now requires the Krieg Barracks to become available
- Increased scatter of missed GrB HE grenades (even when they missed they usually hit so close that they dealt damage anyway)
- Increased accuracy of Tiger's main gun to 1/1/0.9/0.9 (from 1/1/0.75/0.75)
- Increased basic damage of Tiger's main gun to 120 - 150 (from 110 - 140)
- Removed Flank Speed from Tiger tanks
- Accurate Long Range Shot on Tiger Ace now requires Vet level 1 (from 2)
- Fixed a bug where standard Geschützwagen shot had AoE similar to HE shots

PE:
- Changed the base speed of Hotchkiss to 3.6 (from 5.5)
- "Stuka Rockets" upgrade now reduces speed of Hotchkiss to 2.8 (from 4.4)
- "Stuka Rockets" upgrade now requires "Panzer-support" building
- Hummel's "Rapid shooting position" (static mode) now reduces the reload time by 25% (from 50%)
- Fixed a bug where Hummel in static mode was actually harder to hit
- Hummel should no longer land majority of shells on the far edge of the hit zone
- Fixed a bug where TH doc's "Periscope" unlock provided no bonus when TDs were in camo
- Changed "range distances" for Henschel cannon
- Lowered accuracy of Henschel aircraft to 1/0.9/0.8/0.7 (from 1/1/1/1)
- Lowered "ready for fire" delay of Hetzer to 0.75-1.25 second (from 1.5)
- Increased the cost of Panzer-Jäger Kommand building to 400MP (from 350MP)
- Lowered the cost of Panzer-Support Kommand building to 400MP (from 550MP)
- Lowered the cost of transport Halftrack to 250MP 15F (from 300MP 15F)
- Fixed a bug where standard Nashorn shot had AoE similar to HE shots

Now some more info on these changes. Appart from tweaks and fixes to previous arty changes (AoE brackets of Cromwell/ Hotchkiss changes), this update brings some changes to distribution of shots in arty hit zones. When you click on a barrage ability of any arty unit, you will see a yellow UI circle which should represent the hit-zone, in other words the shells should randomly land in a circlular area. However many arty units hit in a "line" rather than a circle, e.g. Priest barrage hit-zone is indicated like this (yellow circle):

But the shots most of the time land like this (line-shape):

Similar goes for hit zone indication of Wespe and the actual hit-pattern:

or shots in Hummel barrage very often landed at the far-edge of the hit-zone but the chance for a shot to land closer to center was quite low:

Green dots are from another barrage; ignore them

Red dots are where the shots from Hummel barrage landed

with this update the shots in every barrage should be more evenly distributed in a circular area. This does not mean that arty units are less accurate now, if the game calculates a hit based on accuracy, it is still a hit (and accuracy has nto been touched) but if the game calculates a miss, then the missed shot can also land to the sides instead of "just" landing short or far.
Please, during testing, focus your attention how the arty hits and if the shells don't land insanely far away (meaning off the screen) from the targetted area. Keep in mind that rocket arty is meant to have bigger scatter but it fires the barrage quickly, leaving less time to react, but Veterancy does not reduce the scatter, only reduces cooldown of barrage abilities. Shell arty, on the other hand, fires the barrages slower but each Vet level reduces the scatter so with more veterancy they become more accurate, but veterancy does not reduce cooldowns of barrages.

Also we tried to make all the yellow UI circles of barrage abilities bigger with distance, because for all arty units the scatter is bigger if they shoot farther away. The bigger scatter with range was the case even before the update but the UI did not get bigger for some units (e.g. Hummel or Priest) but some had this feature already (e.g. Wespe). However this UI circle does not show the borders of the AoE with 100% accuracy. It is impossible to set the UI to reflect the scatter zone with 100% accuracy. So it is possible that shot will land outisde the zone that is shown by the UI but at the same time the UI should give you better idea about where the shots can actually land.

A lot of changes are connected to the new WM AT squad. According to the feedback we've gotten from you the squad was able to completely replace PaK36 (which was intended) but also PaK38 and to some degree even PaK40 (which was not intended). The intention here was that this squad should work as anti- vehicle unit in early game, taking on the AT-duty of PaK36, but was not meant to become the primary counter to medium tanks later in the game, which was the case when players built 2 of these squads and kept killing tanks with the 46mm grenade ability. The ability is now available later, costs more to use, has longer cooldown, shorter range and we fixed a bug which made it miss less often than was intended. This ability should now act more like a "last resort" in anti-tank combat rather than the "main way of killing tanks".
Also there the HE grenades used to hit too close to the targetted squad even if you missed, which resulted in dealing damage almost every time. Now, if the game calculates a miss, the grenade has better chance to land farther away from the target, dealing no damage at all. As mentione before, the HE ability is there to mainly be used against garrisoned soldiers and emplacements, not as a general ability against infantry anywhere.

Riflegrenades for US Riflemen were changed few patches ago to provide an alternative way of dealing with early vehicles, giving to the US a chance to start the game without relying only on 37mm AT gun. It was deemed too strong to allow players to combine this upgrade with other weapon weapon upgrades for Riflemen so they were mutually exlusive. Feedback from players often said that the Riflegrenade upgrade became one of the worst in the game for several reasons. It prevented other weapon upgrades on the squad, the HEAT grenade had shorter range than the standard attack range of most units in the game, it would miss very often etc. Probably the biggest problem of the HEAT was the fact that the range was too short, which meant that the Halftracks and other early game vehicles could safely shoot at the squad while the squad could not use the HEAT grenade unless they moved closer which meant they would be without cover and die quickly (usually to the same vehicle they were meant to attack). The Riflegrenade upgrade no longer makes you unable to upgrade the other weapons and now the HEAT grenade can be fired at standard range of 60. The shot can still miss but it should be no longer possible to for Axis vehicles to just keep shooting at the squad without taking any risk what-so-ever.

The flank speed on Cromwells and Comets is still available but it provides less speed bonus than before. It used to give +50% speed, now it is +25%. Given the fact that these two belong to the fastest tanks in the game, this ability should still provide enough speed buff to catch up or flank any tank in the game, but they should no longer look like being rocket-propelled.
If the speed buff still feels too much, or on contrary too negligible it can be further tweaked.

Also there have been some changes made to Comet and Achilles. Many people said that there wasn't much of a difference between them appart from one being able to camo and the other not. Now Achilles has same turret rotation speed as Wolverine (which was actually the case in real life too but for some reason in BK we had Achilles with much faster turret rotation for years) while Comet has speed rotation similar to Cromwells. This makes Achilles more fit for ambush usage (where it has enough time to rotate the turret without being shot at, while Comet is more fit for flanking enemy tanks. Also with the changes to rear penetration of 75mm guns vs Axis heavy tanks this will make Comet more suitable for attacking heavy tanks than Cromwells.

Stuart tanks (both US and CW) are now able to activate the HE mode without any need for buying an upgrade first, however the activation now costs a small amount of ammo each time. Paying 45 ammo early game for a unit that could be easily one-shotted without even firing a shot was too much of a gamble. There is still a 20 second cooldown between (was 45 seconds) the uses so that it is impossible to keep mindlesly switching between AP and HE.

Most of the other changes are mostly just fixes or smaller things things based on the debates that have been going on here since the 5.1.5 was released.

Please, give it a go and report any issues you come across.

We hope you'll enjoy this one

[Krieger Blitzer]

Reading this change-log, i literally have nothing to complain about

Going to test and surely provide my feedback when necessary, either here on the forum or privately on Discord.. huge thanks for the efforts!

[mofetagalactica]

I still having problems to use HE on garrisoned "cammoed" units in buildings, somethimes it just dosn't shoot and stays aiming at the building is this how is supossed to work?

[The New BK Champion]

I still having problems to use HE on garrisoned "cammoed" units in buildings, somethimes it just dosn't shoot and stays aiming at the building is this how is supossed to work?

It is the same with grenades. Before enemy solders "uncamo" in buidling, your soldiers wont fire or throw grenades. It has always been like that

[mofetagalactica]

I still having problems to use HE on garrisoned "cammoed" units in buildings, somethimes it just dosn't shoot and stays aiming at the building is this how is supossed to work?

It is the same with grenades. Before enemy solders "uncamo" in buidling, your soldiers wont fire or throw grenades. It has always been like that

Yeah i wonder if this can ever get fixed someday

[MarKr]

I still having problems to use HE on garrisoned "cammoed" units in buildings, somethimes it just dosn't shoot and stays aiming at the building is this how is supossed to work?

HE riflegrenades or HE shots from tanks? In the last update there was a fix (or at least I thought it was fixed) for the HE shots of tanks which should allow to fire at "empty" buildings and thus hit camoed infantry inside those buildings.
If the HE shot doesn't work, does it apply to all tanks or only some specific ones? The abilities look same but some units use different files so it is possible I forgot some of them.

[Krieger Blitzer]

After some testing;

- AT grenade by PE infantry doesn't have any cool-down time for some reason.

- Airborne FHQs defensive strafe air-patrol does no longer disappear after the AP bullets upgrade.. however, the strafe patrol doesn't use AP bullets.
Not sure if this is intended or probably a glitch.

Now some questions:
- I was wondering about the "hold fire" ability. This ability exists in CoH2 for all tanks, it will be very useful in Bk Mod for as many tanks as possible.
Or at least just for any tank that has reload time longer than 6 seconds...

- Hopefully the special AP rounds damage bonus for ALL factions would be removed, are you planning to do this on 5.1.6 or future versions?

Lastly, the kicker message "Weak armor point penetrated" is cool.. but disappears VERY quickly.

That's all for now.

[MarKr]

- AT grenade by PE infantry doesn't have any cool-down time for some reason.

They have not been touched so there is no reason they should act any different. So it probably was like that before and you did not notice, or perahps you had the Defensive operations upgrade which reduces cooldown on most PE ablities in HQ sector by about 90%.

- Airborne FHQs defensive strafe air-patrol does no longer disappear after the AP bullets upgrade.. however, the strafe patrol doesn't use AP bullets.
Not sure if this is intended or probably a glitch.

Intended. It would require reworking all neutral buildings in the game which would lead to the update having several hundred MBs which is not really neccessary for something as little as this. If you want AP ammo on straffing raid, build the FHQ instead of converting neutral buildings.

[Mr. FeministDonut]

I'm a bit of sceptical rifle nades not mutually exlusive now, because players with enough ammunition could easily spam this from the green cover, to other squad sitting ducks behind cover or in buildings, having multiply advantages with more squads equipped with them, as CD was too short.
But lets see.
By the way, why was rear pen chance of 75mm against heavy kitties was lowered, as more important, against stugs too? (50% before?). I don't really get that, because it was really a player interest, to keep your rear armor hidden from the any enemy tanks!

[MarKr]

The accuracy of those grenades vs soldiers in green or yellow cover is very low. It is there to clear buildings from safe distance. If it overperforms, it can be further tweaked.

The percentage numbers in changelog are at maximum range and when you tried to flank the heavy tanks with these 75mm tanks you rarely attacked at max range, usually closer ranges because while circling the target players usually got closer. So in praxis if you get closer the chances go higher (as always). As for StuGs - the rear armor is still as vulnerable as it was (I think it is 100% penetration even from maximum range) the front was a little problematic. Before 5.1.5 the chances of 75mm guns frontally vs StuGs were very different. 75mm on Shermans had 22.9% chance frontally, 75mm on Cromwells had 19.6% pen.chance frontally and 75mm on Churchills had 43% - which was especially weird since the gun on Churchill and Cromwell are exactly the same guns. At first they were all unified to the Churchill level (43%) but it seemed a bit too much, especially when these 75mm guns are there to take out infantry and light vehicles. So it was put to the "middle" value of the 3 - 23%. Again, if you move closer, you have higher chance but these units are mainly anti-infantry, StuGs are anti-tank so they should not be so easily destroyed by anti-infantry units, at least not frontally.

[Warhawks97]

Hi,


- Lowered front penetration chance of 75mm guns (Shermans, Cromwells, Churchills) against StuG III/IV (max range 23%; 14% with skirts)

Why that. I mean from a realistic point of view thats acceptable. But i dont see a balance reason. Stugs have already a great cost-efficiency ratio, are non cp-multirole tanks with very low upkeep.

Also its armor is still quite decent vs 76 rounds and the 50 mm armor unslopped Tank IV´s are afterall insane in their armor-performance.
So i dont get this move that comes out of nothing.

Edit: Ok, got it now.
But do you really think that skirts alone shall make such a big difference? 23% and 18-20% would be ok.

- AT grenade by PE infantry doesn't have any cool-down time for some reason.

They have not been touched so there is no reason they should act any different. So it probably was like that before and you did not notice, or perahps you had the Defensive operations upgrade which reduces cooldown on most PE ablities in HQ sector by about 90%.

I havent tested it yet. But i also had the phenomenon that things changed or got bugged without touching them. It helped sometimes to simply save that file again without changing anything and problems got solved.

- Airborne FHQs defensive strafe air-patrol does no longer disappear after the AP bullets upgrade.. however, the strafe patrol doesn't use AP bullets.
Not sure if this is intended or probably a glitch.

Intended. It would require reworking all neutral buildings in the game which would lead to the update having several hundred MBs which is not really neccessary for something as little as this. If you want AP ammo on straffing raid, build the FHQ instead of converting neutral buildings.[/quote]
One quesiton about that: Why do we still need that AP unlock at all? And why does it makes your strafe cooling down. You unlock AP, then unlock strafe and the first thing that happens is a cooldown before you can use it.
Planes always got loaded Tracer, Armor Piercing and Armor Piercing-Incendiary rounds. They never even loaded ammo against soft targets since they had to face planes and vehicles. Why not simply making the normal strafe having AP at default and the HQ strafe keeps it anti soft target ammo due to ammount of work required for a rework.

I mean germans got a strafe that has a 20 mm canon that can whipe out vehicles as well. I dont get why this AP upgrade is needed. The CW cluster bomb is better vs inf due to its great AoE, the german is better due to its ability to kill vehicles (and somehow kills inf better than US one).

After some testing;

- Hopefully the special AP rounds damage bonus for ALL factions would be removed, are you planning to do this on 5.1.6 or future versions?

yes, pls. it makes "healthy" tanks quite usless. I want to remember that the main reason for the US 76 mm gun losing its damage boost from AP shots was to make it less often happen to two shot tigers and heavies. That was good and i supported that.

But apparently its ok when "healthy" churchills, now also healthy shermans and tanks like jumbos and Pershings as well as certain german tanks when facing 17pdrs still have that issue. AP rounds are there to increase the chance of penetrating heavy armored targets easier, not to boost the chance of oneshoting any tank on the field.

[MenciusMoldbug]

Very good patch, I am very happy stuart got its HE rounds changed to be more useful, will definitely be used a lot more now.

2 bugs unrelated to current patch but still worth discussing on the US side:

- When M10 gets its bulldozer upgrade and you put it into ambush position, the bulldozer ability hides the 'hold fire' button on the tank. So you can no longer hold fire on ambushed M10's if you have the bulldozer upgrade.

- Captain riflemen squad that is 7 man and 2 BARs for 300 mp cost 18 to reinforce every model. It is actually lower than inf doc riflemen when they get their last cheaper infantry squad unlock which lowers riflemen reinforcing cost to 19. Should be matching the normal rifle squad so there isn't a complete incentive to just use them over the normal one.

- Changed aim times for snipers 0.75 - 1.25 second (from 0.25; on average it is +1 second but it can be slightly less or more)

I would have liked it to be 0.25 milliseconds longer(1 - 1.5) as that +1 second change doesn't require changing the camouflage mechanics because after a while a sniper will still be revealed for over 2-3 seconds.

Also on a somewhat related note, since the Tiger Ace is getting indirectly buffed. The Pershing Ace still has that sort of 'null' ability that is boosting its co-axils MG's at the cost of reload speed. I don't really notice the difference the co-axil MG's do but I do notice the reload speed penalty and It feels like its more of a 'cripple your tank' ability than something worth using(costs munitions too). I think this ability can be changed to be more useful if the co-axils got buffed even more, or if the reload penalty wasn't as heavy, or something else entirely.

[Walderschmidt]

- Captain riflemen squad that is 7 man and 2 BARs for 300 mp cost 18 to reinforce every model. It is actually lower than inf doc riflemen when they get their last cheaper infantry squad unlock which lowers riflemen reinforcing cost to 19. Should be matching the normal rifle squad so there isn't a complete incentive to just use them over the normal one.

SHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Also - the the Captain Rifleman Squad doesn't have the suppress ability, despite having two bars.

Wald

[MenciusMoldbug]

So I just started to use the Stuart again after a very long time in this beta patch and I noticed something very confusing.

The Stuart needed like 90+ infantry kills to get veterancy 4, it felt way longer than the sherman. So I checked corsix and found that Stuart requires 25 XP for vet 1, with 55, 90, and 135 for the ranks after. Meanwhile a sherman requires only 15 XP to reach vet 1 and 30, 60, 120 afterwards. This veterancy requirement appears to be the same for both US and CW Stuarts.

I think it should be put around the Recce's vet level requirements which are currently 6, 12, 18. Something like that but slightly higher, because 135 XP to reach vet 4 is insane. It actually took me a good 5 minutes just straight up shooting shells at infantry with no pause to get there vs a skirmish AI.

[Warhawks97]

- Captain riflemen squad that is 7 man and 2 BARs for 300 mp cost 18 to reinforce every model. It is actually lower than inf doc riflemen when they get their last cheaper infantry squad unlock which lowers riflemen reinforcing cost to 19. Should be matching the normal rifle squad so there isn't a complete incentive to just use them over the normal one.

I think that is intended. Its been discussed over two years ago already and once it got also affected by the cheaper build cost and dropped to like 14 MP per men. That got removed and now it stays stable at 18.

In general that reinforce cost had been a bit thing in the past bc we had many expensive squads that cost very little to reinforce.

So we got a general rule that a full reinforce of a squad costs at least 50% of the build cost.

As example i take volks here: 265 MP (build cost)x 0.5 (minimum reinforce value) : 6= 22,083 per men. Volks cost 22 per men so it fits.

The Rifles cost 255 per men. Here the reinforce factor is 0.6. Thus each men cost 25 to reinforce. The feeling i have with standard rifles is that you "bleed out" in the long run and esspecially within the first 20 mins when fighting Volks. Thats why these 7 men are so valuable. Its simply bc you can on the long term bleed out the cheap WH infantry and Volks spam. The high reinforce cost and upkeep of rifles compared to counterparts makes it diffiuclt to field them "in numbers" as fire superiority and to send them more than 1-2 times into combat. So you make a decision between repeated reinforce or tec up for tanks. WH has here way smaller issues as it can tec up and reinforce more often.

As for Reinforce cost i would take the reinforce factor 0.55 perhaps. A Standard rifle squad would cost 23,4 per men which makes 23 at the end. For the 7 men squad it would be the same: 23,571. Perhaps we can take 0.53 or 0.52 which would mean approx 22 per men to keep this unit a bit special since it requires more tec and a special (captain). Currently this squad has (when compared to its call in cost) a reinforce factor of 0.42.

Since call in cost and unit cost in corsix is a different (reinforce cost is based on cost in the ebps while call in ability cost are set randomly) i presume that the actual cost of this 7 men unit is 255 as well. Thus its 255x0.5:7=18. That way the calculation is correct and the cheap reinforce cost result of the additional 7th men. So the unit costs 255 mp just that it has one men more and that its reinforce cost are at 0.5 reinforce multiplier (you find that in sbps).



But as i said, i think its a valuable factor to keep rifles in the long term at that low reinforce cost in order to maintain its long term stay in the game. Else you would bleed out in long term use (coh2 as that very problem as well with US rifle squads).



I would also like to remove that cheaper inf thing in inf doc and replace it with something more valuable. Spam isnt the favoured choice in BK anymore since quality and veterancy beats spam in the long run. The slightly cheaper cost do also not justify these ammount of CP´s.

I would like to suggest to remove mass production with for example 25%-50% faster vet gain rate for rifles and engis and perhaps also weapon crews. Or 25% harder to suppress or 25% less taken damage for rifles and basic inf or a mix of all that just like WH CP unlocks does it or the PE vet seargent upgrade that makes squad earning 25% more exp and 25% harder to suppress.



Perhaps i would also suggest to ultimately remove rangers from all but Inf doc and making it more a special force such as Commandos or Stormtroopers (intended to be a special assault force that got trained by commandos from 1942 onwards). That way the 7 men squad could stay at 18-20 MP per men since it would become the only available infantry force to Armor doc just as it was in vcoh (i really liked vcoh in this point) and a real backbone for US Infantry. But devs repeatedly denied such a move and told us that this might come with BK2 based on coh2.

So I just started to use the Stuart again after a very long time in this beta patch and I noticed something very confusing.

The Stuart needed like 90+ infantry kills to get veterancy 4, it felt way longer than the sherman. So I checked corsix and found that Stuart requires 25 XP for vet 1, with 55, 90, and 135 for the ranks after. Meanwhile a sherman requires only 15 XP to reach vet 1 and 30, 60, 120 afterwards. This veterancy requirement appears to be the same for both US and CW Stuarts.

I think it should be put around the Recce's vet level requirements which are currently 6, 12, 18. Something like that but slightly higher, because 135 XP to reach vet 4 is insane. It actually took me a good 5 minutes just straight up shooting shells at infantry with no pause to get there vs a skirmish AI.

wow, didnt knew that. Thx for that info. And i agree.

[MenciusMoldbug]

I always wanted some of the early squads to be cheaper to reinforce or be worth it in a cost efficient way. The squad I most especially wanted to have
a cheaper reinforce are Panzergrenadiers. Which are set to 28 and they are nowhere as good as Tommies who cost the same amount to reinforce. It should have imo gone down to 25-26 so there's more of a reason to use them as a 'recrewing' or 'auxillary' squad since PE doesn't really have anything they can use as a cheap buffer inf.

And yeah, Infantry Company doesn't really focus on 'infantry' as much as emplacements, artillery, and some jumbo tanks with M10s. Late game inf doc using infantry is rare other than the Ranger Infiltration Teams because of that DPS they can get with crawling to enemies at point blank. Or the one-off CQB squads from buildings. Never liked that top right tree for infantry because of how negligible it is for the amount of CP's you spend there.

Also the Stuart vet requirements appear to be the same as the Chaffee, so the Chaffee can have its vet requirements looked at too.

[MarKr]

- When M10 gets its bulldozer upgrade and you put it into ambush position, the bulldozer ability hides the 'hold fire' button on the tank. So you can no longer hold fire on ambushed M10's if you have the bulldozer upgrade.

- Captain riflemen squad that is 7 man and 2 BARs for 300 mp cost 18 to reinforce every model. It is actually lower than inf doc riflemen when they get their last cheaper infantry squad unlock which lowers riflemen reinforcing cost to 19. Should be matching the normal rifle squad so there isn't a complete incentive to just use them over the normal one.

These things have been in the game forever it is actually nothing new. Though as you speak about it...it should be possible to hide the bulldozer ability while the camo is active so that the hold fire remains available. I will check it.

Also on a somewhat related note, since the Tiger Ace is getting indirectly buffed. The Pershing Ace still has that sort of 'null' ability that is boosting its co-axils MG's at the cost of reload speed. I don't really notice the difference the co-axil MG's do but I do notice the reload speed penalty and It feels like its more of a 'cripple your tank' ability than something worth using(costs munitions too). I think this ability can be changed to be more useful if the co-axils got buffed even more, or if the reload penalty wasn't as heavy, or something else entirely.

The ability buffs the hull and the coaxial MGs to approximately same strength as the .30cal Jeep has in terms of accuracy and suppression (jeeps no longer suppress but the values are about the same as it used to be for Jeeps) it is enough to kill infantry that is trying to rush you but it can kill/suppress even infantry in cover. This is offset with the slower main gun reload. The ability is meant to be used when the enemy is trying to rush you with infantry and there are no armored threaths around you so the lower reload speed is not much of an issue. If there is no down side to this ability, there will be almost no reason (except for spent ammo) not to use it every time you see an infantry around.

The Stuart needed like 90+ infantry kills to get veterancy 4 (...)

Yes, it is possible that more units have it like this. It is often the case that the Veterancy requirements were taken from other units and forgotten because the unit wasn't used too much (or at all). I will have a look at it, Chaffee and the CW Stuart too.

The squad I most especially wanted to have
a cheaper reinforce are Panzergrenadiers. Which are set to 28 and they are nowhere as good as Tommies who cost the same amount to reinforce.

I think it was set this way because Tommies are the same throughout the entire game and their role is pretty much only combat, while Panzergrenadiers are are also a builder and repair squad and most of the upgrades from the infantry support building apply to them too, so later they can gather veterancy faster, take less suppression, cap points faster (I think that after upgrade it is even faster than Riflemen), reveal mines when standing still, gain advanced repairs and also can have 7 men squads. So basically you start with infantry that is sort of overpriced in terms of reinforcement cost (perhaps even built cost) at the start of the game but later on all these improvements add up and then they become better than comparable infantry and the reinforcement costs become justified too.
If you lower the costs then people might complain later on that "PGrens have more utility than Tommies and with upgrades are also cheaper than Tommies but their upkeep is lower". The only solution I had for this in the past was that they would start with lower upkeeps but each upgrade from Infantry support building would increase the upkeep a little bit so that they become better but not too cost-efficient. But internally it was dismissed because people would rant that "upgrades give nerfs".

[mofetagalactica]

I still having problems to use HE on garrisoned "cammoed" units in buildings, somethimes it just dosn't shoot and stays aiming at the building is this how is supossed to work?

HE riflegrenades or HE shots from tanks? In the last update there was a fix (or at least I thought it was fixed) for the HE shots of tanks which should allow to fire at "empty" buildings and thus hit camoed infantry inside those buildings.
If the HE shot doesn't work, does it apply to all tanks or only some specific ones? The abilities look same but some units use different files so it is possible I forgot some of them.

Well... both of them, even normal grenades dosn't seem to work often again cammoed units in buildings.
So, so far the last time i remember having this problem was with the Comet HE and somethimes with the grenadelauncher of CW and USA, as bkchampion also said "It is the same with grenades. Before enemy solders "uncamo" in buidling, your soldiers wont fire or throw grenades. It has always been like that".

Is this an engine limited problem? Why somethimes when the infantry gets inside buildings it gets insta-cammo until you get at point blank range into the building or make them shoot you so you can shoot them back ,Had huge problems that were pretty frustrating againts mg's in the buildings from example by trying to drop grenades or HE tank shoots into the building, i had to let them shoot me back so i can just trow a grenade into the building were i already know that there is an mg, and its pretty much a shit 'cause if you let an mg42 shoot you for 1 sec just so you can trow a grenade at it will disintegrate your squad in milisecs.

Maybe the only unit that should be available to do this are the AT squads since they got an "ambush" hability and cammo after a few sec?, and since you can get close with infantry to reveal them without blowing up to pieces.

[Warhawks97]

The squad I most especially wanted to have
a cheaper reinforce are Panzergrenadiers. Which are set to 28 and they are nowhere as good as Tommies who cost the same amount to reinforce.

I think it was set this way because Tommies are the same throughout the entire game and their role is pretty much only combat, while Panzergrenadiers are are also a builder and repair squad and most of the upgrades from the infantry support building apply to them too, so later they can gather veterancy faster, take less suppression, cap points faster (I think that after upgrade it is even faster than Riflemen), reveal mines when standing still, gain advanced repairs and also can have 7 men squads. So basically you start with infantry that is sort of overpriced in terms of reinforcement cost (perhaps even built cost) at the start of the game but later on all these improvements add up and then they become better than comparable infantry and the reinforcement costs become justified too.
If you lower the costs then people might complain later on that "PGrens have more utility than Tommies and with upgrades are also cheaper than Tommies but their upkeep is lower". The only solution I had for this in the past was that they would start with lower upkeeps but each upgrade from Infantry support building would increase the upkeep a little bit so that they become better but not too cost-efficient. But internally it was dismissed because people would rant that "upgrades give nerfs".

Yes, thats the problem. You cant make them much cheaper if you dont want any late game "elite-unit spam" or unless you nerf their stats which wouldnt fit in this faction design.

One way i "solved" that issue in how i could keep them as Elite unit or rather elite soldier performance without being trapped in that cost question was to lower the opening squad size to 4 men. Normal grens cost 220 MP, required in total 30 sec to field (6 men riflemen need 36 seconds) and cost roughly 27 MP to reinforce. They can get upgraded completely with G43.
The Assault Pios cost 260 MP, 30 per men to reinforce and come with two STG and two MP40 right away (no weapon upgrades). The Assault grens cost 280 MP to get, have one default STG and can be completely upgraded by them or a mix of G43, stg and one lmg. They cost initially 35 per men. After The upgrade of veterancy officer they might be able to passively hide in cover. The capture boost of the upgrade boosts this particular squad to 175% or 200% cap speed (rifles have 150% as comparision) which means that this squad is perfect for quick and deep assaults and quickly neutralizing and capturing ground.

The infantry company building and the Infantry support center can be build right at the beginning. There you can instantly upgrade the 5th men for the squads. In trade off you wont have vehicles, no ammo for HMG at start or grenade throw right at the start and must later reinforce the 5th men. However all squads did remain at the exact same build cost. The Reinforce cost went down when i remember correctly bc a 5 men got added while cost remained same (so total squad reinforce cost remained at 50% of the build cost but each men got cheaper). So at the end even the heavy assault squad dropped from 35 per men to 28 men when squad was 5 men large while the basic squad drops to 22 per men to reinforce.
In Conversations with others there were quite many who liked that "vcoh approach" as a PE factions design with a lot more flexibility and away from that "comp-stomp-orientated" PE design of large squads of BK that doesnt provide a huge combination for tactical infantry gameplay throughout the game bc each infantry unit costs so much.

So you have Elite soldiers afterall but its a way easier to compensate losses since no squad you want to replace exceeds 300 MP.
Its just an idea that has its drawbacks and advantages.

[Krieger Blitzer]

BUG:
When the Comet and Achilles are ordered to fire HE rounds, the old turret speed returns!
So, the Comet turret rotation slows down.. and Achilles turret becomes faster, only with HE rounds.

[kwok]

17pdr for RE coming out of the glider starts with AP rounds pre-bought? Was this always a thing?

[Krieger Blitzer]

17pdr for RE coming out of the glider starts with AP rounds pre-bought? Was this always a thing?

Yes, I'm pretty sure it has always been like that.

[MarKr]

BUG:
When the Comet and Achilles are ordered to fire HE rounds, the old turret speed returns!
So, the Comet turret rotation slows down.. and Achilles turret becomes faster, only with HE rounds.

OK, writing it down. It will be fixed. Thanks for report.

[MenciusMoldbug]

Something I noticed but never really mentioned, the 37mm at gun for US will automatically shoot at unfinished enemy sandbags and with every shot it takes like 1 HP of the unfinished sandbag away. Either it shouldn't shoot at it automatically, or it should instantly destroy the unfinished sandbags or both.

[The New BK Champion]

Paks (for example axis 50mm) now target infantry automaticaly. This is very annoying. Is this change intended?