Typical number of GU for defence.

[ManOfTheMoment (OP)]

What would be a typical number of GU per billion of pop for defence?

I'm pre TN so I thought I should build up my GU, while I'm waiting, but I've no idea what is sensible.

[Father Tim]

Enough so that unrest due to overcrowding, lack of PPV, and other factors is fully suppressed.

- - - - -

But really, I just design a single 'Government Oppression' battalion of infantry and train them non-stop in my one GFTF until my empire becomes TN capable.

[DFNewb]

I've been asking myself this too.

I think 1 way of looking at it (I haven't actually gone around to try this yet or the other one) is to look at unit sizes in tons in comparison to your transport sizes.
Another might be to look at construction time of troop v your ground construction rate. Maybe make them take 6months or a year to build so you know they are decent sized at least in game time construction terms.

Personally I haven't done ground combat yet except for STO point defense and STO's firing against Precursors. Fun fact 100 particle beam STO's make short work of precursor ships and doesn't cut too hard into the massive free ship/ground unit pool you start with in a normal game.

[Alsadius]

Conventional forces have very low combat power multipliers, so they'll rapidly be made obsolete by TN techs. You start with x1 to attack and defense values, and in my current game I'm at x10 with 20cm lasers and delta shields. A medium anti-tank gun at the start is weaker than light personal weapons at my current tech level.