New Terror/Propaganda Doc: Propaganda Path

[kwok]

The Propaganda Path:
This path branches into two sub-paths. The first path is dedicated more towards improving a brand new unit, Volkssturm. The role of the Volkssturm is to act as a filler unit to help capture and hold ground in mass numbers. However, no matter how large of numbers there are, they will still need the support of other units and abilities. The upgrades to volkssturm are meant to help keep their utility useable into the middle and late game. This does NOT mean that they will be viable solo units in the late game after the doctrine unlocks. Their growing strength will depend more on their veterancy while the unlocks give them access to weapons that can be used to at least put up a fight against various kinds of enemy units in the different tiers.
The second path is the propaganda path, unlocking different abilities that will either apply tactically or globally. For now, there are ideas where the abilities give buffs to your or your allies’ units OR debuff enemy units. Advancing down this path will scale the general efficiency of your propaganda capabilities. You won’t find the same abilities you may be use to in the older terror doc; it may require a bit more thought on both a tactical and strategic level.

This thread is used to discuss the propaganda path of the rework. This includes Volkssturm and ideas for propaganda abilities.
We know this is one of the more vague paths with a lot of new content, we are figuring out what/how to post new information and will return here soon.


Back to main thread: viewtopic.php?f=6&p=31183#p31183

[CGarr]

1. Assuming the volkssturm are going to be similar in offensive ability to volksgrenadiers with the durability of pios (forcing them to heavily rely on numbers and vet in scenarios where they don't have support from command units and weapon teams), would there be any options available in the HQ (possibly tied to tech level) or the command tree that would give them more models per unit so the terror player isn't completely screwed by things as small as unlucky mortar shells? I'd rather just see huge groups of trash models that rely on support running around late game then a horde of actually somewhat durable 6 man squads.

2. On a similar note, what will their vet look like? As I said above, I think it'd make more sense for this conscript-style unit's survivability to be tied mainly to numbers (like 6 man squads to start but capable of being upgraded to maybe 8-10 man squads late game, possibly with a corresponding slight reinforcement cost increase so they aren't as dirt cheap), and as such their vet should all be offensive buffs or unit ability unlocks. This would make the units more potent late game while retaining garbage durability stats that are instead to be supplemented by squad size increases and other supporting units.

Their strength would come not necessarily come from the individuals in the squad, but rather the experience/tactics that the squad as a whole has accumulated and passed on to new conscripts. As such, vetted volkssturm would pose a serious threat to allied troops through their ability to dish out increasing amounts of damage, and would have learned how to do more than just shoot (booby traps/mines/explosives, camo, building, etc.. but maybe randomized, more on this in point 3). They'd still be probably less disciplined or more quick to surrender than standard inf, which would justify low defensive stats when looking at the models individually.

3. An element of randomization in the volksstrum would be nice to see, could be achievable by making them a call in unit drawing from a pool of slightly differing versions the same unit. The differences don't have to be huge, maybe differing weapon upgrades or abilities. They would all retain a certain core in terms of model stats, vet, and more basic abilities.

4. If the changes I listed above in terms of defensive vet buffs being ignored in favor of squad size and reliance on supporting units, it'd make sense for the more global manually-activated propaganda abilities to be mainly increases to defensive stats. These global abilities would be stronger but would have a muni cost (think 75-80), and would function as a form of bracing for attacks that complements the volksstrum's focus on bite-and-hold tactics. The non-global buffs would be through units like officers, and would be passive (both free and not manually activated) to compensate for their lesser reach. Officer buff potency would be dependent on the veterancy of the officer unit itself, which brings me to my last point.

5. Officers should come in (relatively high-model-durability) 3 man squads, along with a bino scouting ability (that exceeds the range of any potential support abilities they might have so they're not completely self sufficient and a trade is made when using the binos). This would help them be usable on the front lines without making them unkillable, so there is still some risk to using them. Their offensive stats can stay around where they are currently (meaning the individual models in the squad are altered to collectively perform at the level of the current one man officer squads offensively).

[kwok]

Just adding in some info from the other thread:

As of right now, the officer upgrade will likely be propaganda abilities unlocked for an officer.

Former Inspired assault will likely be squad targeted buffs, former forced retreat will be squad targeted debuffs to enemies, the sector retreat will be sector targeted propaganda abilities, the final unlock will be global propaganda abilities.

These might change, they are just initial thoughts.

[CGarr]

Mark target is pretty much a targeted debuff, could just copy it from something like the recce over to the officer squad. An evasion ability similar to that of the command panzer (reduce incoming accuracy by a considerable amount for a period of time but lowered offensive capabilities to compensate) would be nice.

If by sector-specific abilities you mean something like a radius around the point at which the ability is called in, those sound fine but I've never been a fan of map sector targeting abilities since not a lot of maps are laid out in a way that would make them useful.

[Black Panther]

Can we get instead of MP40, the MP44 upgrade for the volks? 1-2 weapons per squad should be fine.
Easy counterable by the new MG's rework

[MarKr]

As a few questions came, we wanted to share a bit more about what we've come up with for the new Propaganda doctrine so that we can see what you think about it and you can express your thoughts on the doctrine design.

We have not yet 100% decided on the effects of the abilities in the Propaganda path.

Propaganda.jpg (3.26 KiB) Viewed 12387 times

sector.jpg (3.01 KiB) Viewed 12387 times

We had to start somewhere so in our current pre-alpha build the Propaganda abiliby, the one that used to force retreat enemies in an area, provides a debuff on enemies in the area. The debuff applies 5% worse accuracy, cooldowns (delays between shots) are 5% longer, the squads are 5% easier to suppress and hit. The nerfs don't sound as anything powerful but it is needed to say that the nerfs get stronger with every phase upgrade so they gradualy turn from 5% to 10% and ends at 15%. At phase3 and 4 it also provides debuffs on vehicles (reload speeds, accuracy and movement speed). The debuffs apply to units in given "circle" area and last 20 seconds. The former "Sector propaganda" has same effects as mentioned above but they don't apply in a circular area but rather in the entire sector and it last 120 seconds. It acts as kind of "sector denial" ability, the oponent can stay in the area or decide to attack it but they will know their units will be less combat effective so they might rather choose to attack from a different direction or delay the attack.

Icons for these abilities improved with Phase upgrades

terror propaganda levels.jpg (19.59 KiB) Viewed 12387 times

The "global abilities" will probably remain the "Zeal" (passive which gives bonuses to your squads when they lose soldiers) and the Inspired Assault with changed stats - currently it makes all your infantry shoot faster but also makes them easier to hit and take more damage, so it might get changed to a weaker buff but without negative effects on your infantry, or perhaps something completely different - we're not sure yet.

[Black Panther]

Interesting, how much is denial ability will cost and which CD it will have, to prevent the spamming of this ability.
Anyway, there should be some other way to make it, than a worse version of arty denial (which US Def should get it, as priest ability).
Inspired assault should get no negative buffs, as ability already being useful only in green cover, only by playing it in defeinsive. Assault means, often you have only the way coming to the needed cover, crossing through the fire and negative buff, makes assault only worse.

[kwok]

Hi all, we are actually still trying to get ideas together. Please post ideas. The more specific the better, and we can work together to fine tune it to a useful and fun aspect of the game.

[MenciusMoldbug]

Thing about inspired assault is it's a damage boosting ability in our current BK and damage boosting abilities on stuff like volkstrumm and volksgrenadiers is not worth much. It was useful with grenadiers because of their high DPS output but volkstrumm are probably going to get the pioneer MP40 stats; Which are only good at very short ranges. At that range you don't need the inspired assault damage buff because the damage values at that range for the MP40 are high enough as it is.

So the re-work for inspired assault should be something that helps volksgrenadiers/volkstrumm close the distance/shift to better firing positions or flanks when needed. Could be something that reduces the damage they take when the ability is active and makes them suppression resistant (cannot be suppressed/pinned while ability is active); Kind of like an offensive 'for the fatherland' ability on enemy territory. Basically any re-work that makes it useful to pop on your volks infantry instead of your sniper because he will shoot faster or something.

[Black Panther]

What you just described is a copy of current blitzkrieg ability, so idk

[MarKr]

Returning back to this

Interesting, how much is denial ability will cost and which CD it will have, to prevent the spamming of this ability.

The sector propaganda is currently set to 200 ammo, lasts 130 seconds and has 130 seconds cooldown. This means that theoretically you could keep it running in the sector non-stop, but practically you are limited by the ammo cost. With 3rd and 4th Phase upgrades even vehicles in the sector get debuffs.
The duration, cooldown and cost values are set this way for testing purposes and will most likely change during alpha or beta based on feedback.

Anyway, there should be some other way to make it, than a worse version of arty denial (which US Def should get it, as priest ability).

The sector propaganda can be changed or replaced completely if it will prove to be pointless or extremely situational.

Inspired assault should get no negative buffs, as ability already being useful only in green cover, only by playing it in defeinsive. Assault means, often you have only the way coming to the needed cover, crossing through the fire and negative buff, makes assault only worse.

Thing about inspired assault is it's a damage boosting ability in our current BK and damage boosting abilities on stuff like volkstrumm and volksgrenadiers is not worth much. It was useful with grenadiers because of their high DPS output but volkstrumm are probably going to get the pioneer MP40 stats; Which are only good at very short ranges. At that range you don't need the inspired assault damage buff because the damage values at that range for the MP40 are high enough as it is.

The Inspired assault does not sound very useful and as you said, it was useful of Grenadiers because they had good basic stats. However, Volkssturm squads are cheap, quickly built and thus easy to spam, so once you outnumber the oponent even with their relatively weak stats, the increase in RoF in combination with their numbers can bring surprising results.
It also shouldn't be overlooked that the Officer will be able to provide useful buffs to the Volkssturms and so it can be presumed that people will build him more often than not, so the Volkssturms will have buffs from him + the faster RoF from the Ispired Assault + still the possibility to use abilities to debuff the oponent forces. It would be costly for sure but potentially tide-turning too (based on how and when you use that).

I also noticed that people sometimes said "It is 'Inspired Assault' so it should buff offensive capabilities" - this of course can be the way to do it, but it is not necessary to suggest an ability accordingly to its current name, it is possible (and encouraged) to suggest an ability which is useful and fits the doctrine theme and then choose for it appropriate name.

[Walderschmidt]

^What if there's was an extension of the sector propaganda - OP'd territories automatically apply level 1 sector propaganda to the territory? (or maybe the officer could do this, similar to def officer?)

Would make it easier to defend key points and put volks/sturms on slightly more level playing field with enemy troops without breaking the bank on muni. Speaking of which, Terror doctrine is looking to me to be very muni heavy. Why not give them an ability to trade manpower for muni? Or fuel for muni so it's a trade-off.

And perhaps make MP40/faust upgrades for sturms slightly cheaper to counter-act less effective?

Lastly, please give the officer or one or two of his body guards an MP40 so he has some survivablity in close quarters, given how he has to be close to the action to give buffs/debuffs.

Wald

[Walderschmidt]

Volksturm still don't feel useful at all. They're not THAT spammable at 190MP, can't get even 2 for 1 for volks, but they're not even half as combat effective and cap slow. Three of these guys and an officer lost to engies in red cover (see screenshot). Their HP being so low makes even 30. cal jeeps feel like 50. cals. They can't even build sandbags or wire. At this rate, if I play Terror I don't even want to get them. But then there's no point to 1/4 of doctrine unlocks.

3 sturm n off v engies in red cover.jpg

^nearly 900 mp vs 180mp in red cover and were capping at outset of engagement

Maybe give them slightly more HP/cost decrease to 150MP?

Or lower vet requirements like Mencius Moldbugn said here:

My problem with volkssturm is you want the unit to be an alternative to the volksgrenadier and not simply a weaker version of them. Because no matter how cheap you make volkssturm (you can make them 150 MP and 15 MP to reinforce) it doesn't change that volksgrenadiers are always going to be the better option because of their weapon upgrade choices. Volkssturm by stats/weapon upgrade perform the best at closer ranges and how many allied units also perform the best at closer ranges?

Actually, it's kind of funny to me that defensive doctrine pioneers are overall better than volkssturm even with all their upgrades unlocked. As they get 4 MP40's, increased overall HP with the the pioneer training unlock and defensive cover bonus. So I'm going to be comparing the volkssturm to them while I make the case for their buffs.

[First thing, they vet way too slowly; they share the same xp requirements as volksgrenadiers: Which is 8 > 16 > 32 > 64 > 128. Killing a riflemen model gives you 1 xp; killing a jeep gives you 3 xp. To get their first veterancy level unlocked they need to kill 8 riflemen or 3 jeeps. To get veterancy 5 they need to kill 128 riflemen or 43 jeeps. I would not have patience to get them to veterancy 5 in skirmish/ai-vs-bk-fun mode, and I don't think they will ever get even veterancy 3 in normal games because of this high xp requirement. Their weapons and weapon upgrades are simply not up to par to get them to even vet 1; no matter if they have the officer buffing them through a xp boost or not. I would personally change it to half of that of volksgrenadiers: Going from 4 > 8 > 16 > 32 > 64

Second, health is a bit too low; they should be at 40 HP each (squad leader to 45). You want them to become capable soldiers with veterancy so it shouldn't take 2 veterancy levels to get the same HP as pioneers.

Third, they should get more MP40's as an upgrade when they reach a certain veterancy requirement; so they don't lag behind completely later in the game if you manage to keep them alive.

Fourth, the faust upgrade should honestly be an ability they unlock instead of upgrading it. Fausts on volkssturm by itself isn't great because paying 50 munitions for the faust upgrade and then 35 to fire is too much for a filler unit. They shouldn't have to pay for the upgrade; only to fire the faust. Volksgrenadiers should also be affected by this having to no longer get the fast as a munition upgrade if unlocked in the CP tree.

That's about it for now, the propaganda abilities by themselves are good but most of your munitions are also going to be spent there instead of getting faust upgrades on volkssturm and stuff.