Sorched Earth doctrine

[Frost]

Okay, as you all know, I was always opposed to the idea of joining the forums, but I recently had a "spiritual awakening" that mean moving from discord to forum so hopefully my ideas end up being constructive and equally entertaining for everyone.... a lot of "words" are said here, so buckle up lads, I will try to summarise my points and discuss with you how why when and where as i go through please correct me if i'm wrong.

Ok so let's begin by Scorched Earth recently my favorite doctrine just after RAF for obvious reasons
whenever i play this doctrine i feel like i'm suffering the events of great depression all over again like seriously everything is so inflated that you just don't know what to do and you end up staring at your units as allies keep throwing so many units at your doorstep and you begin to wonder "are they hacking resources?"

ok what do i mean by that? let's look at your costs want to get mg to cover your spot? 320 up front and ammo upkeep loser, do you want to deploy mortar? 360? or was it 420? and 70 ammo innit? FULL PRICE. do you want to use nebelwerfer your doctrine speciality? 450 MANPOWER and Panzer-support (which btw instantly get art back or ability used on it and dies because it's SLOW same thing with mortar that is why i don't use it and consider it a bad meme) do you want to get art ? 600+ and so on and so on.... this is on top of your already overly priced base units like panzergrendiers or assault pioneers which cost over 300+ manpower each and don't forget each one of those are effective only if your spend ammo on them otherwise you lose to base allies weapons and no don't bring elite kar96 status argument just try to use assault grenadiers without upgrades.... assault pios are reskinned volks and die if you shout on them your only way of surviving is spamming mg42s everywhere or making high veteran assault grenadiers asap to get 1 shot from HE sherman anyway.

ok now let's move to abilities and let's discuss the OVERPOWERED ability that everyone is so afraid of SECTOR ARTILLERY what does it really do? well after a certain amount of time once a certain unit enter the sector a meteor will drop at them but you see the thing is with meteors is they are not exactly accurate..... idk about you guys but like i lost track of games where a guy sit inside the sector with his sherman and forget that it's literally inside the sector goes afk drinks coffee talks with his gf comes back and the tank is still alive. and due to Alzheimer issues he also send engineers to repair the thing and riflmen to cap the sector and due to how sector art function it will only hit 1 target at a time and might not always hit the target... so the riflemen mostly cap the sector and this is all for 200 ammo literally 200 for god sake it's not even granted to hit most of the time aside from the questionable astronomy and cool asteroids it's definitely not worth the ammo or if they simply move around with a car then wait until it trigger then cap that can also work or if they kill the spotter.........

ok let's talk about FIRESTORM..... so for 200 you have the ability to use artillery anywhere you want but is it really worth the ammo? i mean yeah most of the time it tend to cover a good chunk of the area but i don't really think it deserves to be more expensive that howitzer shot it kinda function the same gives you a bit area and pretty much hit and miss mostly effective against mass infantry and if they retreat that's 200 ammo wasted right there pal this is on top of your massive ammo demand to mine area or to booby trap (which requires 1 CP for reasons unknown to mankind) and not to mention that you don't have the luxury to drop mines with many of your fast units which are supposed to have these abilities waggen can only drop incendiary trap which might not even kill anything.... i always find it funny how BK doctrine is much better suited at SE job thanks to their demo squad.

ok let's talk about the special infantry of the doctrine saboteur squad.... wait those exist? wow last time i used them the game was already over and i did not have enough CP to waste on them because i was too busy with tank vs tank combat and trying to unlock sherman and after that all my CP goes to fuel exchange because of reasons i discussed above (which does not fix the problem only makes you handicapped) because that's a lot of CP so you are mostly fucked without CP.

what do i think should be done about the doctrine well mostly a lot of price adjustments.

like for example nebelwerfer it should not be that expensive for it's role on the game it really isn't that insanely powerful because of how inaccurate it is on long range and the range of that thing is not big to begin with and that can at least save you manpower to be able to obtain hummel.

i feel like firestorm price should be adjusted right now it's a tad expensive 200 ammo too much currently for everything you need to pay for including nebelwerfer so about 150 is reasonable.

Then there is no need for booby trap unlock and your katten or schimwaggen should have the ability to booby trap, or simply make your PG be able to booby trap as soon as you pick the doctrine along with your assault pios due to their combat role (another point with PG did you know that they lose their ability to build sandbags after taking SE doctrine? me too)

SECTOR ARTILLERY should cost 180 i would argue or even buffed to a degree i know everyone gonna cry about how op it but i'm ready for the fire can even provide examples if you really need, explanation is above.

now this one is a wild card but i feel like for SE artillery instead of being forced to wait for hummel you should be able to build something. so i suggest being able to build SFH 18 by assault pioneers similar to the rest of the art doctrines so now you can either build SFH art piece or wait for mobile Hummel or instead you can make the player choose between waspe or hummel.

this is what i gathered for now if anyone has any objections or another idea i would love to Hear, Cheers .

[kwok]

WELCOME TO THE BROTHERHOOD FROST. ONE OF US. ONE OF US.

[Warhawks97]

The doctrine is a meme doctrine to me and i prefer it over luft by a lot. You got incendiary grenades, Hetzers, super nasty sector arty and all that stuff. The sabotage unit is a pretty good combat unit. Get two of them and go ambush enemie inf. Playing vs SE can be super frustrating. I had a 3 vs 3 not long ago on goodwood vs erich and illla and a third one. They also took def doc. I never fought a game as nasty as that one. Our opponents kept wasting hetzers in towns and other units. They never had many units. Everything they did was OP every ammo point with Scout cars and spam sector arty and firestorm nonstop. Whichever sector we tried to enter or cap, we faced sector arty.

Sector arty:
Probably one of those ability most fun to use but also most annoying to play against. If you ever faced double SE doc, you gonna know. For me its pretty accurate and with some luck kills a unit instantly. Pretty cool when some expensive brits in caps a point and suddenly gets meteor-striked. The ability denies a sector or at least casues large casaulties to the enemie even when its already neutralized. It comes in handy when you have your own units fighting in this same sector.

In my opinion this ability should be worked into another branch for more CP rather than being an instant 2 CP ability.

Firestorm:
Worst move ever to bring it there. It doesnt fit the doctrine at all (idk why it got removed from terror doc). It sucks to have 2 nasty off map arty abilties for in total 3 CP. You can literally decide whether to use sector arty in a more defensive play or throw some firestorm after 3 CP at your enemie at a moment of the game where losses are still hard to replace. This ability shouldnt be in this doc.

210 Nebler:
yes, its slow and i dont use it too often either. But when you have a stable defense and a camper as enemie, this thing is pretty damn usefull due to its high damage vs any target.


Assault Pios:
Not the most sturdy unit for sure. But starts with two STGs. So they likely dominate all early infantry engagments and are less vulnerable to rifleman assaults as volks are.

Infantry:
As SE you have to get some infantry at some point. I usually try to get a solid defense with medic HT, 2-3 inf squads, a scout car for suppressive fire and some AT like 50 mm, Puma or Hetzer. Ofc you need to protect your inf vs shermans. But this doc doesnt really lack AT. Marder and Puma for 0 CP, Hetzer and Nashorn later. Luftwaffe has way harder times here. If you have a hauptsturmführer and infantry with weapon upgrades like lmgs and G43, it should be relatively easy to keep any enemie infantry at bay.



However, once you get pushed heavily and losing some ground and more importantly ammo, its pretty tough to fight yourself back into the game. So at best you keep inflicting high losses to your enemie so that they never even reach a clear lead.

[Consti255]

Sector arty needs to have more cooldown and lower uptime, but its cost can be reduced to 150ammo. Its one of the most boring and disgusting abilitys. Boring to use and boring to play against. It has its right to be included but it should be tweaked.

Firestorm has to come later if it wants to stay in SE and cost more CP.
I also would put it in a different branch and not 2 off map artys in one unlock tree.

Assault pios do not win every early engagement nor beeing that much better than volks early on, even if they have STGs. They are just so damn fragile.
I have to agree on Frost here, they are just reskinned Volks with 2 STGs yeah, but they also cost 360MP and not 285.
They fullfill the same purpose as Combat Engineers do, but come with a wack loadout.
Their abilitys are for pushing so you normally upgrade the 4 MP40s anyway and if you want even better strike forge you upgrade the flame bundle in the beginning aswell.
So you have a low HP unit, where all your ammo went in and which are lost pretty easily.
You also dont have the ability to give them CP upgrades like armor doc for their combat engineers. When you builded the motorpool you mostly got your one CP for the early dominat upgrade.
So, we come to Frosts (and mine aswell) concern. Every Infantry from SE despritely needs upgrades to be relevant.
So please, just give SE a CP upgrade for storm pios which turns them into SS pios... I know you Devs are tired of me saying it, but it would fix so much for SE and its infantry/cost balance. While also fitting immersion and the idea of the doc.

An other idea if the devs wont add a CP upgrade for them, could be a slight HP increase and a loadout change.
I like the idea of STGs but what about swapping it arround?
So they beginn with 4 MP40s and 2 Kar98s and can upgrade 2 STGs or a flamethrower.
This could turn them into the same unit right now after upgrades, while keeping them more potent as a none upgraded unit.

[Walderschmidt]

ONE OF US ONE OF US ONE OF US

WALD

[Frost]

Thanks Lads One of us Alrightiyo back to the topic


are you guys literally trying to say that the only good things SE doctrine has need to be moved EVEN MORE BEHIND like what??? and once again making SE doctrine yet another "whatever fun i guess?" literally tell me what you gonna use nebelwerfer? that shit bleed you ammo like crazy you can never keep up the art and not to mention it's fucking slow i swear to god the memes never end with that thing same with mortar and on top of that EXPENSIVE just pray to god none picked infantry doctrine or canada otherwise it's dead before you even finish firing.

hummel? too expensive might as well alt-f4, and also you telling me move Sector art behind and what get 600 or was it 800? (i never unlock that meme anyway) for art that you cannot even keep up it's art strikes because price? and look at the CP costs, if you want to even use your abilities you so complain about you need ammo exchange unlock which takes even more CP and what about enemy tanks? you need 5 cp to get your ability captured sherman otherwise you need the fuel to use abilities and not to mention having to spend EVEN MORE manpower and fuel to build the other building which fuck it i never do because i don't want to give my opponent a lot of time to push me.

you guys are really looking at the abilities and completely forgetting about the biggest problem prices....... in so many games i was only playing with sector art and firestorm and shermans because everything else is either too expensive or it's impossible to keep alive so i really don't know what kind of games you play where you have all this luxury and resources to use these "OP" abilities i certainly don't have those maybe hacking resources?

[Frost]

Okay, how about a unique idea or, at the very least, something new. Isn't the Waffen SS  one of the best infantry for PE? or at least when they had sniper fine so how about making another unit like specifically for SE and similar to super pershing being that 1 call only.... once you lose them that's it.
What exactly do I mean? Well, in order to keep SE competitive with late game units, you now have these lads who can easily wreck havoc on the battlefield if used correctly and even more so if upgraded due to their abilities and what they offer, similar to a super pershing in some ways, but infantry I believe it would be an interesting idea to try and we can discuss what are the equipment of the squad but we can mostly copy them from waffen ss except having sniper in their squad and since they are 1 call only we can make them a tad better.

so here's what i think the squad should consist of mp44 x2 G43 x4 Sniper with scoped Kar96 x1 possible upgrades: Scoped g43 (75) MG42 (100) Scoped mp44 (50) abilities: Panzerfaust 100, Stielhandgranate, aimed shots (like KCH) "possibly after veterancy and 1 mp44 upgrade ", passive ambush, bundle grenade, after veterancy their sprint change to assault. method of unlock and requirement: officer and panzersupport or panzerjager, and 2 CP unlock for sabotage squad.

now i know maybe that's really strong but think of it it's a 1 call in squad and once they die that's it you get nothing else and also they replace waffen ss after they die you have you have to relay on your basic infantry also they require panzersupport or panzerjager and officer.

anything said here is subject to change, but I wanted to introduce this rather cool concept it's like old KCH but limited so it would make it fair especially for a doctrine that lack heavy infantry punch.

[Warhawks97]

Frost, i barely use Hummel, nebler or any heavy arty stuff in this doc. Mostly i just get inf, 20 mm car and 75 mm Puma and lots of krads. With vision you literally only need a handfull units to outplay your enemie and 20 mm, Puma and inf gives you everything you need. Then unlock sector arty, flame nades and res trade and Hetzer. Last time i got a Hummel was well late into the game but scored tons of kills.


The Squad you are talking about is the SS squad quite literally. The leader of the squad has i think an STG. The other dudes have i think all G43 or at least most of them. Its available from the Hauptsturmführer. It can upgrade schrecks, scoped STGS and lmgs (more than one even).

And i dont like stuff like SP and 1 time call ins from which your entire survival depends on. An Inf squad dies so quickly that it is outright insane to make it a 1 time call in.

[MarKr]

Okay, how about a unique idea or, at the very least, something new. Isn't the Waffen SS  one of the best infantry for PE? or at least when they had sniper fine so how about making another unit like specifically for SE and similar to super pershing being that 1 call only.... once you lose them that's it.
(...)

You asked on Discord for my opinion, so here it comes.

"1 time" units are really hard to ballance because they are 1 time units - people expect them to brutally strong (a.k.a. "one unit army" or "rambo unit"). Pretty much to the level of being able to change the tide any time and so it usually becomes the "always go for" unit. Super Pershing is already like this and in vCoH KT was pretty similar case. One problem with this is that we tried to reduce the number of "one unit army" units to minimum in order to encourage combining units and so creating such a unit contradicts the general standpoint of the mod about the "rambo units".

Another problem is that the unit would still need to be killable but with the setup you brought up here, it will be suicide to try to kill them with infantry, unless the allies outnumber this squad like 3:1 (with elite squads, vetted and with weapon upgrades), which nobody will want to risk. Attacking with tanks or vehicles will be most likely suicidal too because they have the Panzerfaust ability and so the only "safe" way to kill them will be arty. If we make them so that arty can wipe them, SE players will complain that "the unit is bullshit because it dies easily to a single arty hit" and if we make it so that the squad can survive a direct arty hit, allies will complain that "it is bullshit because arty cannot kill them and killing them with anything else is waste of resources".

You also already said something about "alt+f4" being pretty much the only option in certain situations and I really suspect that we would soon hear "if this squad dies, you can alt+f4".

In the first post you complained that everything is too expensive, and it is true that stuff is expensive in this doctrine, but at the same time the costs are pretty much the only thing that keeps it at leash. What will you need if ammo isn't a big factor in this doctrine? You would have Assault Grens upgraded with G43s/StGs/LMG, supported by vehicles, tanks, tank destroyers and also strong arty. I am not saying that all costs need to stay. Maybe it is not necessary to have expensive units that also have expensive abilities. Perhaps we could drop the cost of some units and keep the ability costs, or drop some ability costs but keep relatively expensive units, but making both units and abilities cheaper would most likely turn this doc into a steamroll machine.
I haven't discussed this with other devs, it's just my opinion.

[Walderschmidt]

Whenever I get a chance to play again I'll play SE Doc again.

My opinion from memory playing it is fundamentally the same issue that Frost mentions - how pricey everything is. Nebels are slow and basically fire 1 barrage for the cost of two in either the case of the Hummel or Wespe, without mobility. Despite not having a fuel cost, they're still quite expensive. I almost never see Hummels anymore and probably haven't used any myself since teamgames back in 2018? 2019?

Couldn't tell you when.

Secondly, aside from the Elefant nothing feels truly survivable - assault grens need muni for stgs or lmgs/g43s, nebels/arty need muni, and rarely do you have enough muni for both. Which, fair enough, prudent decision making should be a factor in the game. But I feel the muni costs are so high as to make it hardly any decision. For example, none of the arty costs got changed after the arty upkeep was introduced.

Making the nebel affected by the ammo carrying ht would be a start.

Wald

[MarKr]

Nebels are slow and basically fire 1 barrage for the cost of two in either the case of the Hummel or Wespe, without mobility. Despite not having a fuel cost, they're still quite expensive. I almost never see Hummels anymore and probably haven't used any myself since teamgames back in 2018? 2019?

Making the nebel affected by the ammo carrying ht would be a start.

Could be, I guess.

Secondly, aside from the Elefant nothing feels truly survivable - assault grens need muni for stgs or lmgs/g43s, nebels/arty need muni, and rarely do you have enough muni for both.

That's what I was talking - it is not intended for players to casually have enough ammo to be able to equip their infantry with top-tier weapons and also support that infantry with the strongest arty in the game.

For example, none of the arty costs got changed after the arty upkeep was introduced.

- Lowered Hummel barrage cost to 75 ammo (from 100)
- Lowered Hummel FERN barrage cost to 100 ammo (from 125)
- Lowered costs of barrages from 210mm Nebelwerfer to 75 ammo (from 100)

Yes, not after the ammo upkeeps but along with them. The FERN barrage got somehow reverted back to 125, which is not intended and will be fixed, but the basic barrage is 75 and with the ammo HT nearby it is 60 ammo for the strongest shell artillery in the game. Is it really so much?

[Consti255]

The thing with SE is, that it is just a deathloop when it comes to infantry gameplay.
I get the point of you Markr, but your infantry is pants down without weapon upgrades, since you do not even have a CP upgrade for them when you cannot afford any type of upgrade. So you are stuck (as Frost said) with elite Kar98s and thats it. No CP upgrades, no free/faster Vet nor cost reductions. Thats one big part of why everything feels so expensive, you just bleed so much MP when you cannot upgrade your Infantry.
You also have so much tools for mines, traps and stuff but not a single usefull cost reduction for them. (Why does DEF doc have cheaper mines than SE? This makes no sense.) Its just a struggle threw every game.
I also dont agree here with SE would be a too steamroll doc. You are way more defensive based than other docs, except maybe Def.
What makes you more capable of pushing than fir example Luft/PS when playing against tanks?
SE is way better to force enemys in a trap, than playing agressive. You have to keep your losses small and the enemys higher at all cost, if not you gonna bleed dry.


Even when the ammo HT makes the barrages cheaper, that thing as a own even cost ammo aswell.. Everything cost ammo and this ammo swap ability is just a meme.
100 ammo for 100 fuel, in a doc that even scales pretty good with fuel. Its a huge investment with SE.

What about giving the ammo HT after the CP upgrade the secure sector ability which provides more ammo income in such sector + a cost reduction in the sector? (cooldown reduction only when in a certain range of the HT)
So your ammo income is locked behind a massive wall of CP but it would also be a income buff for the desprite need of ammo in this doc

[MarKr]

Infantry Support building -> Veteran Sargeant gives +25% more XP to infantry, so there is a way to make infantry vet up faster. Weapons cost ammo but do you really need to have assault grens with 4x G43s and an LMG AND also be able to arty any enemy who is still alive after stepping on one of the many mines that you laid everywhere around the map? It really sounds like "everything is expensive, so make it cheaper so I can use everything all the time".

Def doc has cheaper mines, PE has the ammo swap (yeah, yeah, you think it is ridiculous) but one has way to use something cheaper and so save some ammo, the other has way to get extra ammo with an ability.

Ammo HT locking down sectors is redundant beause normal Scout Cars can do the same thing.

"Steamroll" was meant in the case that everything becomes cheap(er). Really, if you have infantry fully upgraded with weapons and upgrades (that means faster capturing, taking less suppression, getting vet faster, being able to fast repair any damaged vehicle nearby, possibly 7 men in squad) and also 150mm artillery and rocket arty that is so cheap that you can use it almost any time and also units with reduced build costs, what is actually the down side?

[Consti255]

Dont forget about the infantry support center upgrades which all cost a f*ck ton of ammo aswell. I mean sure the 25% boost is helpful, but i also cost 40 ammo andcannot compete with upgrades like free vet, health increase or stuff like that.

I am not saying you should be able to use all at the same time, but atleased beeing able to support 2 things.
Like upgrade inf but still beeing able to throw nades and lay down mines. or lay down mines and arty.

SE is like, you have to spend all your ammo in units, tiering and tanks that you actually cannot afford to spend ammo into mines or arty. The infnatry support center just consumes so much ammo that you can either upgrade your inf with weapons, or with other buffs from it. While every other doc can do the same but PS with far superior Grens (a heavy tank doc got better infantry than SE thats actually hillarious)
I know i am anoying Markr, but a CP upgrade for storm pios would help so much..

First of all, i wouldnt touch the arty cost to much, rather go for unit cost reduction and maybe more ammo reduction with the ammo HT.

Why is it redundant? The HT would be a VIP target to defend or to take out, since normally big ammo points are more centered, its mostly harder to defend/maintain. And dangerous since it is going to explode.

Also it would give the whole sector cheaper abilitys which could end up in a reasonable route to go.
Actually i never saw someone useing the HT CP upgrade since its not even close to worth 1 CP.

In think the ammo trade ability should somehow be revised, its not like the AB ammo trade where you can throw fuel out of the window (while also getting more ammo for less fuel btw).

[Sukin-kot (SVT)]

I can confirm the ammo problem. There are several scenarios to play SE:

1) Aggressive, equipe infantry with weapons and constantly use HE with your tanks + fire nades.

2) Arty, but 1 Nebel or Hummel literally eats ALL your ammo.

3) Offmaps + boobies and mines.

None of those scenarios can be combined. Do I find it annoying? Yeah, it’s not fun to play doctrines when you always have to choose, but not combine.

Btw, USA inf doc has exactly the same problem in my opinion. It always boils down to a choice - Rangers with weapons OR arty OR offmaps OR armor.

That is actually the reason why I hated the ammo upkeep from the start. It was intended to reduce arty impact, in reality I feel like players keep using arty just as much, sacrificing abilities and weapon upgrades.

[Consti255]

I feel like inf got the upper hand when compared to SE.
You even have the ability to get cheaper wepons for rangers, while also beeing able to field infiltration rangers which are fully equiped right of the bet. The salvos are cheaper aswell.
You can also put down indirect 107mm mortars or other defensive structures.
SE can get a mortar bunker but guess what?
It costs ammo.. it gets to a point were it becomes just funny.


With SE you dont have a fully equiped multi purpose unit for 0 ammo. You could argue the SS sqaud, bit it comes without a AT weapon which costs 75ammo.

[Frost]

Nebels are slow and basically fire 1 barrage for the cost of two in either the case of the Hummel or Wespe, without mobility. Despite not having a fuel cost, they're still quite expensive. I almost never see Hummels anymore and probably haven't used any myself since teamgames back in 2018? 2019?

Making the nebel affected by the ammo carrying ht would be a start.

Could be, I guess.

Secondly, aside from the Elefant nothing feels truly survivable - assault grens need muni for stgs or lmgs/g43s, nebels/arty need muni, and rarely do you have enough muni for both.

That's what I was talking - it is not intended for players to casually have enough ammo to be able to equip their infantry with top-tier weapons and also support that infantry with the strongest arty in the game.

For example, none of the arty costs got changed after the arty upkeep was introduced.

- Lowered Hummel barrage cost to 75 ammo (from 100)
- Lowered Hummel FERN barrage cost to 100 ammo (from 125)
- Lowered costs of barrages from 210mm Nebelwerfer to 75 ammo (from 100)

Yes, not after the ammo upkeeps but along with them. The FERN barrage got somehow reverted back to 125, which is not intended and will be fixed, but the basic barrage is 75 and with the ammo HT nearby it is 60 ammo for the strongest shell artillery in the game. Is it really so much?

it's really never worth paying 800 manpower no matter what stage of the game you are in it's way way too much i had my last game where i was better off with literally anything because by the time i got to move my hummel to the right spot everything actually moved or died already to other things and not to mention that hummel range is actually pretty much meh even in 2v2 map i had to get in exposed position just to reach range where hummel was to put it mildly very inaccurate this is on top of it being actually slow (i believe this is the byproduct of self-prepared howtizers nerf because everyone was using royal art back in the days) also 1 side note ...... the only defensive building you have as SE is mortar bunker............. can someone tell me why is it limited to 1 i seriously didn't know that until now i mean sure it's very strong and have high caliber mortar but like honestly limitation of 1 kinda defeat the point of it costing 3 CP i would suggest pushing that to at least 2 or higher as your standard defensive line.

i think it really is the fact SE just lacks art spotters and pinpoint accuracy that royal art enjoy, you can never benefit from "strongest art in the game" as much as it was laid in paper (this is proven by how rare or ever players actually willing to pay for hummel) it might be the highest damage but honestly really not worth your manpower investment just get hotchkiss or whatsonot (which exactly what players do 90% of the times).

[Frost]

consti btw also a lot of manpower, which is on top of your evergrowing ammo and fuel needs and your best at gun is garbage 75mm is very unreliable against even shermans which is why i almost never bother to get anything other than 75mm puma (btw that thing is very very vulnerable to 81mm mortar if you land 1 meter away you still get engine damage somehow......) so yeah forced between a rock and a hard place and by the gods let's talk about your best gun ever nashorn............ i honestly think that thing need to be seriously reworked to something akin to jagdpanther because right now i had countless and i repeat countless cases where some micromanagement god step into my firing range and go back and this causes the nashorn to somehow steal the shot and they would just advance toward the thing and kill it..... it's so stupid the controls are insanely janky and unless you are ambushed 9999 miles away which you gonna get howitzer shot anyway you gonna die because it takes forever for you to turn and very luckily to die before firing because your nashorn is still aimming at the enemy while enemy just instantly fire and kill you.......

[Consti255]

What about giving SE acess to a JP or nashorns as a reward unit and move the elephant to PS doc in for the JP/Elephant reward?
It could give PS doc while going for the TD route, the ability to push threw defensives.

The SE JP should cost more as the PS one aswell, while also having no ALRS.

[Frost]

What about giving SE acess to a JP or nashorns as a reward unit and move the elephant to PS doc in for the JP/Elephant reward?
It could give PS doc while going for the TD route, the ability to push threw defensives.

The SE JP should cost more as the PS one aswell, while also having no ALRS.

nah just fix nashorn, i don't think anyone gonna go on with this idea even when i personally support it because elefant is not that good imho 90% of the times dies to immobilization due to massive enemy art generally same issue with Jagdtiger only 10% of the situations the thing is even usable and armor company can still immobilize you using howitzer shot lol i don't know any doc that can accept elefant and be happy using it without being replaced with nashorn or otherwise.

[Consti255]

Lets be real, the elephant is just a useless ressources eating machine, its absolutely senseless to build and as you said just effective in just 5% of the scenarios.
For me its just a unit thats still in the game because we have the model, it doesnt add anything usefull for the docs.

I think a introduction of more JPs would be way more suitable for the game.
I am gonna make a post about it.

[Warhawks97]

Well, funny enough when reading this i feel like i am reading stuff about inf doc. The Number one doc i struggle with ammo is inf doc followed by SE. Both have the same issue. Inf doc has to pay ammo on upgrades, off maps, on map arty, abilities. SE in my opinion has it a little bit easier as squads live a bit longer usually (less often upgrades required), stubby Tanks have HE by default wheras inf doc has to pay 90 ammo+35 over and over again and the upgrade that makes weapons cheaper and zooks actually usefull cost another whooping 120 ammo in total. And i dont need HVAP/APCR rounds all the time with my Hetzer/Nashorn. Inf doc also has no res trade like SE doc.

Arty in SE is also the smallest concern in terms of usage cost. 60 ammo for 150 mm arty or 75 for freaking 210 mm rockets isnt expensive.

However, lots of the mentioned issues exist (not only in SE doc) and funny enough many of my general suggestions would have solved the issues:


Infantry cost:
- Inf cost a lot in PE. Thats a fact. Many times i dont have more than two squads on a field. I even had games during which i didnt build a single infantry squad in the entire game and only played with vehicles and TD´s.
- Infantry needs upgrades to actually perform well. As with inf doc, i often have to spare with infantry upgrades.

Solution:
- PE 5 men squad Grens and assault Grens: Would save up to 60 or more HP per unit. So replacing full squad losses would be easier to replace. And lets be honest, Tanks dont care if you show up with 5,6 or 7 men. An HE shell and a follow up burst kills your entire squad nontheless.
- Assault Gren squad would stay at 6 men but cost drops to 320 MP. Also an vet upgrade gets added (watch my Doctrinal unlock suggestion thread: viewtopic.php?f=15&t=4546)

- Lets make the Heavy assault grens start with 1-2xSTG and 3-4x MP40 while making it 5 men. It would save tons of MP as well as enabling the squad to perform its task even without upgrades if necessary.


Tank/TD cost:
- Tanks cost a lot to afford and also eat up tons of ammo each time you wanna use them.

Solution:
Make tanks cheaper in terms of MP, increase fuel cost, Ammo types by default:
- viewtopic.php?f=15&t=4552
TD´s could be cheaper, too. Only change their ambush power in exchange for lower cost to be affordable. A Nashorn would need to cost as much as it does if it wouldnt be for its ambush power.
- viewtopic.php?f=27&p=41160#p41160


Hummel cost:
- I remember when Hummel could be build for 580 MP and 100 fuel. Why isnt it the case anymore? 800 MP in an MP hungry faction is absurd.


Tec upgrades ammo cost:
- I think i already said it before, but the current tec system is weird. Stuff like Sandbags cost you fuel to upgrade but most other stuff ammo.
- All tec cost fuel. Simple as that. Most tec upgrades boost infantry and infantry focused docs already eat ammo like shit. Like vet Sgt, sticky bombs etc etc. Usually in coh all global tec costs you fuel as it is tec and not an upgrade. I dont know why BK doesnt handle it this way.

Solution:
- ALL Tec cost fuel, ALL upgrades and abilities cost ammo.




BK has an overemphasize on ammo in my opinion. Except docs like RE that always sits on endless Ammo. But generally BK wants ammo more than anything else. Upgrades, weapons, Tec, abilties.... Like often times i feel like fuel is only there to reach max tec to unlock units. The units themselves barely cost you any fuel in an ammount that you really have to worry. But ammo is always the key factor since its sooooo vital for everything you do. If that would be changed, stuff like res trade in SE would probably not even be needed anymore.

[MEFISTO]

I am strongly against any squad reduction size. No matter if it’s a Axis squad or an Allies squad, I am strongly against it. The size of squads is one of the most things I value from this mod compare to vanilla and other mods.

[Walderschmidt]

Secondly, aside from the Elefant nothing feels truly survivable - assault grens need muni for stgs or lmgs/g43s, nebels/arty need muni, and rarely do you have enough muni for both.

That's what I was talking - it is not intended for players to casually have enough ammo to be able to equip their infantry with top-tier weapons and also support that infantry with the strongest arty in the game.

I understand the point and agree in principle - but I think it's a bit too much. I don't think SE is that viable as a 1v1 doctrine by itself - I think it's still only really viable in team games. But that said, I haven't played with it so much, so maybe I am wrong. Take my words with a grain of salt for sure.

For example, none of the arty costs got changed after the arty upkeep was introduced.

- Lowered Hummel barrage cost to 75 ammo (from 100)
- Lowered Hummel FERN barrage cost to 100 ammo (from 125)
- Lowered costs of barrages from 210mm Nebelwerfer to 75 ammo (from 100)

Yes, not after the ammo upkeeps but along with them. The FERN barrage got somehow reverted back to 125, which is not intended and will be fixed, but the basic barrage is 75 and with the ammo HT nearby it is 60 ammo for the strongest shell artillery in the game. Is it really so much?

I see I was working with wrong information. My bad.

Wald

[MarKr]

it's really never worth paying 800 manpower no matter what stage of the game you are in it's way way too much i had my last game where i was better off with literally anything because by the time i got to move my hummel to the right spot everything actually moved or died already to other things

As I said - we can make unit cost adjustments. If you feel 800MP is too much, make a suggestion and we can consider it. I just said I would not want to go with "cheaper hummel AND cheaper barrages" - barrages already got cheaper with the upkeep changes (mentioned above) but I guess people don't even know it because they don't use hummels (probably for some of the reasons mentioned here), so one step at a time - first come up with a hummel cost that will make players consider actually getting the hummel, then barrage costs if still necessary.

and not to mention that hummel range is actually pretty much meh even in 2v2 map i had to get in exposed position just to reach range where hummel was to put it mildly very inaccurate this is on top of it being actually slow (i believe this is the byproduct of self-prepared howtizers nerf because everyone was using royal art back in the days)

It was changed so that static howitzers have the most range, self-propelled howitzers have less range than statics and arty tanks have less than SP howitzers. Otherwise static howitzers were always counter-artied immediately by SP howitzers from a range where the statics couldn't hit them. Arty tanks have some armor so they can afford to get closer to danger to fire arty.
Inaccuracy is quite relative because the hummel shots have rather high AoE and so even "missed" shots can still deliver rather high damage. Also veterancy lowers the scatter on shell artillery units so if you manage to get a few kills with hummel, the accuracy goes up.

i think it really is the fact SE just lacks art spotters and pinpoint accuracy that royal art enjoy, you can never benefit from "strongest art in the game" as much as it was laid in paper (this is proven by how rare or ever players actually willing to pay for hummel) it might be the highest damage but honestly really not worth your manpower investment just get hotchkiss or whatsonot (which exactly what players do 90% of the times).

As I said, the accuracy is rather two-fold. Canadians have mostly 25pounders and 105mm on Priests that deliver much less damage and have a lot lower AoE. In details:
- 25 pounder has AoE of "7" and deals 225 damage on direct hit and 37.5 damage at the edge of AoE (basic damage, can be further adjusted vs specific targets)
- 105mm on Priest has AoE of "10" and deals 603 damage on direct hit and 100,5 damage at the edge of AoE
- 150mm Hummel has AoE of "12" and deals 720-1080 damage on direct hit and 120-180 at the edge of AoE
- 280mm Nebel/Hotchkiss rocket has AoE of "15" and deals 630 damage on direct hit and 70 damage at the edge of AoE

So their weaker damage output is compensated by accuracy. SE has mostly rockets or 150mm hummels and these deal a lot more damage in larger area.

also 1 side note ...... the only defensive building you have as SE is mortar bunker............. can someone tell me why is it limited to 1 i seriously didn't know that until now i mean sure it's very strong and have high caliber mortar but like honestly limitation of 1 kinda defeat the point of it costing 3 CP i would suggest pushing that to at least 2 or higher as your standard defensive line.

It would be good to keep each suggestion in a separate topic. It is much easier for us to find and see what people think about a specific suggestion. If in a few days I remember that "somebody suggested something about the limit on heavy bunkers in SE", I will have to read through all the the posts in this topic that are not related to the bunker and then find some reactions to it scattered across several posts as side-notes. It is possible to do it with a single topic but when you have to do this for 2, 3..7 or more topics at a time, it gets messy and makes the whole process take a lot longer.