Author Topic: C# Ground Forces Composition  (Read 14300 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Offline Whitecold

  • Commander
  • *********
  • W
  • Posts: 330
  • Thanked: 88 times
Re: C# Ground Forces Composition
« Reply #45 on: September 23, 2018, 07:32:01 AM »
I agree that the HCAP is probably is a little powerful in relation to other similar cost weapons. I'll reduce the base AP from 2 to 1.6.
Does that correspond to a decrease of power armor armor ratings as well, or is only HCAP that is adjusted? Heavy power armor seems pretty unopposed without any weapon that can reliably pierce its armor and not inflict massive overkill.
Generally power armor having superior armor to light vehicles seems a bit off, especially with the no overhead on their unit size.
 

Offline Steve Walmsley

  • Moderator
  • Star Marshal
  • *****
  • S
  • Posts: 11649
  • Thanked: 20350 times
Re: C# Ground Forces Composition
« Reply #46 on: September 23, 2018, 11:10:48 AM »
I agree that the HCAP is probably is a little powerful in relation to other similar cost weapons. I'll reduce the base AP from 2 to 1.6.
Does that correspond to a decrease of power armor armor ratings as well, or is only HCAP that is adjusted? Heavy power armor seems pretty unopposed without any weapon that can reliably pierce its armor and not inflict massive overkill.
Generally power armor having superior armor to light vehicles seems a bit off, especially with the no overhead on their unit size.

Yes, I'll reduce powered armour to 1.5 and heavy powered to 2, which is in line with light vehicle armour. As I play test I may well adjust a few other ratings.

When I created the infantry powered armour, there was no light vehicle, so it was below a vehicle. I would still like the idea of a 'space marine' style infantry, but it needs to be reasonable vs other unit types.
 

Offline Jorgen_CAB

  • Admiral of the Fleet
  • ***********
  • J
  • Posts: 2822
  • Thanked: 673 times
Re: C# Ground Forces Composition
« Reply #47 on: September 23, 2018, 12:34:16 PM »
I would like to see three levels of infantry personal weapons as well if possible. I also think that 20% reduction in cost of light personal weapons is not in line with AP 5 since most things will have at least Armour 10 and that weapon only penetrate light armour with 1 in 4 shots. Perhaps raise the AP to 9 since that correspond well with a 20% decrease in penetration against armour 10 or reduce size to 3 and make AP 8.
 

Offline Bremen

  • Commodore
  • **********
  • B
  • Posts: 743
  • Thanked: 150 times
Re: C# Ground Forces Composition
« Reply #48 on: September 23, 2018, 12:43:21 PM »
I would like to see three levels of infantry personal weapons as well if possible. I also think that 20% reduction in cost of light personal weapons is not in line with AP 5 since most things will have at least Armour 10 and that weapon only penetrate light armour with 1 in 4 shots. Perhaps raise the AP to 9 since that correspond well with a 20% decrease in penetration against armour 10 or reduce size to 3 and make AP 8.

Light personal weapons seem mostly useful if going after conventional tech races, or if you want lots of cheap infantry to absorb damage (possibly while your artillery hammers the enemy), and they work fine in those scenarios. I think the changes you're suggesting would make them considerably overpowered, especially with a tech advantage.

Weapon balance isn't as simple as "a weapon that weighs twice as much should be twice as effective" since a smaller weapon means you have more units; 25% more in the case of PWL infantry. This means that light personal weapons aren't just "do 75% less damage against equivalent tech enemies", they're "do 68.75% less damage to equal tech enemies, 25% more to very low tech enemies, and have 25% more health". Which I think is decent as a niche weapon.
« Last Edit: September 23, 2018, 12:53:15 PM by Bremen »
 

Offline Whitecold

  • Commander
  • *********
  • W
  • Posts: 330
  • Thanked: 88 times
Re: C# Ground Forces Composition
« Reply #49 on: September 23, 2018, 01:54:09 PM »
I would like to see three levels of infantry personal weapons as well if possible. I also think that 20% reduction in cost of light personal weapons is not in line with AP 5 since most things will have at least Armour 10 and that weapon only penetrate light armour with 1 in 4 shots. Perhaps raise the AP to 9 since that correspond well with a 20% decrease in penetration against armour 10 or reduce size to 3 and make AP 8.

Light personal weapons seem mostly useful if going after conventional tech races, or if you want lots of cheap infantry to absorb damage (possibly while your artillery hammers the enemy), and they work fine in those scenarios. I think the changes you're suggesting would make them considerably overpowered, especially with a tech advantage.

Weapon balance isn't as simple as "a weapon that weighs twice as much should be twice as effective" since a smaller weapon means you have more units; 25% more in the case of PWL infantry. This means that light personal weapons aren't just "do 75% less damage against equivalent tech enemies", they're "do 68.75% less damage to equal tech enemies, 25% more to very low tech enemies, and have 25% more health". Which I think is decent as a niche weapon.
I started some simulations, throwing together random army compositions, and PWL seems to do quite well as damage sponge. Against vehicles the difference between PW and PWL is tiny anyway, and CAP and HCAP deal most of the anti infantry damage.
The simulations are not exhaustive, but one clear tendency is that you absolutely want some infantry of some kind as damage sponge in your army. Unarmored if you can afford the space, armored if you are sensitive to transport requirements.
 

Offline Steve Walmsley

  • Moderator
  • Star Marshal
  • *****
  • S
  • Posts: 11649
  • Thanked: 20350 times
Re: C# Ground Forces Composition
« Reply #50 on: September 23, 2018, 02:20:03 PM »
Earlier today, as part of the infantry changes, I made PWL 0.5 AP, 0.5 damage and Size 3. I wanted more differentiation between PWL and PW.

This differences makes PWL-equipped infantry a serious choice for occupation forces (due to occupation strength vs cost), and for use as Militia serving as a damage sponge. However, they are significantly less effective offensively vs front-line infantry formations.
 

Offline Bremen

  • Commodore
  • **********
  • B
  • Posts: 743
  • Thanked: 150 times
Re: C# Ground Forces Composition
« Reply #51 on: September 23, 2018, 03:58:51 PM »
This differences makes PWL-equipped infantry a serious choice for occupation forces (due to occupation strength vs cost), and for use as Militia serving as a damage sponge. However, they are significantly less effective offensively vs front-line infantry formations.

That actually does surprisingly well against infantry (assuming either the same armor, or that they're matched based on cost instead of size). I mean, they do 1/4 the damage against anything with better than (Tech level modified) 5 armor, but there's also nearly twice as many.

Let's say there's 200 militia vs 120 infantry. Abstract away fortification and accuracy to be 50% of shots hit.

200 militia fire 200 shots, 100 hit, and 25 kill. 120 infantry fire, 60 hit, 60 kill. That leaves 140 militia vs 95 infantry, which becomes  98 vs 78, then 59 vs 66, 26 vs 52, and ends with 49 infantry left. The infantry won, sure, but militia nearly held their own, and are much better for absorbing damage and gain more for a tech advantage.

Not a completely unbalanced change, but I could see militia becoming quite useful with the new numbers.
 

Offline Jorgen_CAB

  • Admiral of the Fleet
  • ***********
  • J
  • Posts: 2822
  • Thanked: 673 times
Re: C# Ground Forces Composition
« Reply #52 on: September 23, 2018, 04:15:20 PM »
This differences makes PWL-equipped infantry a serious choice for occupation forces (due to occupation strength vs cost), and for use as Militia serving as a damage sponge. However, they are significantly less effective offensively vs front-line infantry formations.

That actually does surprisingly well against infantry (assuming either the same armor, or that they're matched based on cost instead of size). I mean, they do 1/4 the damage against anything with better than (Tech level modified) 5 armor, but there's also nearly twice as many.

Let's say there's 200 militia vs 120 infantry. Abstract away fortification and accuracy to be 50% of shots hit.

200 militia fire 200 shots, 100 hit, and 25 kill. 120 infantry fire, 60 hit, 60 kill. That leaves 140 militia vs 95 infantry, which becomes  98 vs 78, then 59 vs 66, 26 vs 52, and ends with 49 infantry left. The infantry won, sure, but militia nearly held their own, and are much better for absorbing damage and gain more for a tech advantage.

Not a completely unbalanced change, but I could see militia becoming quite useful with the new numbers.

But the Militia in this instance only do 0.5 damage so a penetrating hit only kills half the time... or is that not how it works?!?

So if you have 200 Militia against 10 Armour, 10 HP infantry you will only kill 12.5 Infantry since the gun only do 5 damage not 10.

The main role for Militia would not be combat oriented for the most part but to garrison some type of planets for a cheap cost. Serious garrisons meant for defence would be using at least normal infantry.
« Last Edit: September 23, 2018, 04:17:32 PM by Jorgen_CAB »
 

Offline Steve Walmsley

  • Moderator
  • Star Marshal
  • *****
  • S
  • Posts: 11649
  • Thanked: 20350 times
Re: C# Ground Forces Composition
« Reply #53 on: September 23, 2018, 04:20:25 PM »
But the Militia in this instance only do 0.5 damage so a penetrating hit only kills half the time... or is that not how it works?!?

Yes, that it is how it works.
 

Offline Bremen

  • Commodore
  • **********
  • B
  • Posts: 743
  • Thanked: 150 times
Re: C# Ground Forces Composition
« Reply #54 on: September 23, 2018, 04:35:54 PM »
Opps, missed the damage changed as well. That does seem more balanced.
 

Offline Bremen

  • Commodore
  • **********
  • B
  • Posts: 743
  • Thanked: 150 times
Re: C# Ground Forces Composition
« Reply #55 on: September 25, 2018, 04:58:35 PM »
I was curious and decided to try my hand at figuring out the math of weapon balance. Some things are easy, like number of shots - a weapon with two shots is exactly as effective, in all circumstances, as two weapons with the same stats and 1 shot.

Other things are harder, like size. It might seem like a weapon that's twice as effective should be twice as large, but in practice it's more complicated. This can be seen by comparing a hypothetical Size 5 1 shot weapon to a Size 10 2 shot weapon of the same stats. Infantry would never want to use the Size 10 weapon, since they'd have half as many units with twice the shots, giving the same firepower but half the hp. However a light vehicle would probably want to use the Size 10 weapon, since it would result in 55% more firepower for 23% less hp. Complicating this is that sometimes you want tanky units, for example if they're providing cover for artillery, and other times you want glass cannon units, like the artillery itself.
However, you can set up a general rule based on whether a unit would win a fight with itself:
(New Firepower/Old Firepower) = (New Size/Old Size)^2
So if a weapon doubles the firepower (having 2 shots instead of 1, for instance) it becomes an upgrade in a straight fight if it increases the unit's total size by 41% or less.  This also applies for vehicles with multiple weapon slots (I think you can choose not to fill a slot?) - plugging in the numbers shows that a vehicle with one medium anti-vehicle weapon will beat an equal size/cost of vehicles with two medium anti-vehicles.

Lastly, I decided to take a stab at damage. Damage is even weirder, since it depends on how many hp the unit you're shooting at has; if you do 6 damage to 1hp infantry, the weapon is effectively dealing 1 damage. However, going on the assumption that you can't predict what kind of units you'll be fighting, we can make a rough (emphasis on rough) estimate by averaging the results against every unit type in the game; this gives us how much damage we would expect it to do if fighting a truly random enemy, or one equally (by size) made up of every unit type. Additionally, since technology alters both hit points and damage, I tossed in a chance of a tech difference - 1/3rd chance the targets are lower tech, 1/3rd even tech, and 1/3rd higher tech. The results give how much damage, on average, we might expect an x damage weapon to inflict on a hit that gets past armor:
.5: .5
1: .99
2: 1.86
3: 2.62
4: 3.23
6: 4.05
9: 4.97
These numbers are probably off in a lot of ways, but it's also notable they don't consider armor piercing. A weapon with a higher armor piercing value is going to be more likely to inflict damage to a unit with high hit points, so there's some synergy between high damage and high AP, but that isn't reflected here. I'll reiterate that it's only meant as a very rough estimate.
 

Offline Jorgen_CAB

  • Admiral of the Fleet
  • ***********
  • J
  • Posts: 2822
  • Thanked: 673 times
Re: C# Ground Forces Composition
« Reply #56 on: September 25, 2018, 05:08:45 PM »
A good use for these PWL would be for rear guard and support formation security forces. These forces would basically be there to soak any damage done to the back line for a very low price. Their weapons will hardly matter much since they are rarely going to attack anything anyhow as long as your defences hold strong. This would mean that each artillery or support regiment would also get a sizeable force of security personnel using lighter weapons.

A question... are there any rules about how many front line formations that can attack or are front lines basically infinitely large. I mean a very small force should perhaps be able to at least hold out for a while before being overwhelmed by a numerically superior opponent, it would also give tanks and power armoured infantry a strategical advantage over regular infantry that seem to be a bit too god cost wise otherwise. Perhaps some rule that you can't put more than say four times your enemy in the front line but at least double amount to the total size of the enemy army.

Example...
If I have a total size of 1500 and put 500 size on the front the opponent could put at least 3000 size on the front line, if I put 1000 on the front they could put 4000 size on the front line.
 

Offline Jorgen_CAB

  • Admiral of the Fleet
  • ***********
  • J
  • Posts: 2822
  • Thanked: 673 times
Re: C# Ground Forces Composition
« Reply #57 on: September 25, 2018, 05:19:24 PM »
I was curious and decided to try my hand at figuring out the math of weapon balance. Some things are easy, like number of shots - a weapon with two shots is exactly as effective, in all circumstances, as two weapons with the same stats and 1 shot.

Other things are harder, like size. It might seem like a weapon that's twice as effective should be twice as large, but in practice it's more complicated. This can be seen by comparing a hypothetical Size 5 1 shot weapon to a Size 10 2 shot weapon of the same stats. Infantry would never want to use the Size 10 weapon, since they'd have half as many units with twice the shots, giving the same firepower but half the hp. However a light vehicle would probably want to use the Size 10 weapon, since it would result in 55% more firepower for 23% less hp. Complicating this is that sometimes you want tanky units, for example if they're providing cover for artillery, and other times you want glass cannon units, like the artillery itself.
However, you can set up a general rule based on whether a unit would win a fight with itself:
(New Firepower/Old Firepower) = (New Size/Old Size)^2
So if a weapon doubles the firepower (having 2 shots instead of 1, for instance) it becomes an upgrade in a straight fight if it increases the unit's total size by 41% or less.  This also applies for vehicles with multiple weapon slots (I think you can choose not to fill a slot?) - plugging in the numbers shows that a vehicle with one medium anti-vehicle weapon will beat an equal size/cost of vehicles with two medium anti-vehicles.

Lastly, I decided to take a stab at damage. Damage is even weirder, since it depends on how many hp the unit you're shooting at has; if you do 6 damage to 1hp infantry, the weapon is effectively dealing 1 damage. However, going on the assumption that you can't predict what kind of units you'll be fighting, we can make a rough (emphasis on rough) estimate by averaging the results against every unit type in the game; this gives us how much damage we would expect it to do if fighting a truly random enemy, or one equally (by size) made up of every unit type. Additionally, since technology alters both hit points and damage, I tossed in a chance of a tech difference - 1/3rd chance the targets are lower tech, 1/3rd even tech, and 1/3rd higher tech. The results give how much damage, on average, we might expect an x damage weapon to inflict on a hit that gets past armor:
.5: .5
1: .99
2: 1.86
3: 2.62
4: 3.23
6: 4.05
9: 4.97
These numbers are probably off in a lot of ways, but it's also notable they don't consider armor piercing. A weapon with a higher armor piercing value is going to be more likely to inflict damage to a unit with high hit points, so there's some synergy between high damage and high AP, but that isn't reflected here. I'll reiterate that it's only meant as a very rough estimate.

You also have a few other important thing that size provide which is the rate at which the enemy will engage them or something else. Such as a Vehicles with one medium gun being better then vehicle with two guns, that only holds true when compared with each other. When you mix troops together you will then see that the smaller size of the the vehicles with two guns meas they will use their firepower more effectively when they have other units shielding them, having less size for more guns will give them far more time to use them effectively.

You basically always want glass-cannons being as small as possible so they are not hit as often while you want something heavily armoured and beefy OR cheap to soak enemy shots.
 

Offline Bremen

  • Commodore
  • **********
  • B
  • Posts: 743
  • Thanked: 150 times
Re: C# Ground Forces Composition
« Reply #58 on: September 25, 2018, 05:44:21 PM »
You also have a few other important thing that size provide which is the rate at which the enemy will engage them or something else. Such as a Vehicles with one medium gun being better then vehicle with two guns, that only holds true when compared with each other. When you mix troops together you will then see that the smaller size of the the vehicles with two guns meas they will use their firepower more effectively when they have other units shielding them, having less size for more guns will give them far more time to use them effectively.

You basically always want glass-cannons being as small as possible so they are not hit as often while you want something heavily armoured and beefy OR cheap to soak enemy shots.

This is only the case with bombardment weapons where the infantry are more likely to be targeted than the artillery; when both the tanks and infantry are front line units, having infantry to "soak" the hits doesn't change the equation any.

Let's consider a hypothetical tank with 2 weapons that's size 75, and a tank with 1 weapon that's size 50.

If we assume 750 size of tanks on both sides, those 2 weapon tanks fire 20 times (10*2), and the 1 weapon tanks fire 15 times. The 2 weapon tanks are inflicting 33% more damage, but have two thirds the health - they'll lose.

Then give both sides 750 size in tanks and 3000 size in infantry. The 2 weapon tanks fire 20 (10*2) shots, 4 hit enemy tanks, and 16 hit enemy infantry (are ignored for this scenario). The single weapon tanks fire 15 shots, 3 hit enemy tanks, and 12 hit enemy infantry. The 2 weapon tanks are still inflicting 33% more damage, but still have two thirds the health. The existence of the infantry might make the battle last longer, but it doesn't change the ratio of losses - the 2 weapon tanks still lose.

You could argue that the 2 weapon tanks are inflicting more losses to the infantry, but the inverse is also true - those 3000 size worth of infantry will sometimes hit and kill tanks instead of infantry, and each 2 weapon tank they kill is a much bigger loss than every 1 weapon tank they kill.
 

Offline Hazard

  • Commodore
  • **********
  • H
  • Posts: 643
  • Thanked: 73 times
Re: C# Ground Forces Composition
« Reply #59 on: September 25, 2018, 06:41:31 PM »
A good use for these PWL would be for rear guard and support formation security forces. These forces would basically be there to soak any damage done to the back line for a very low price. Their weapons will hardly matter much since they are rarely going to attack anything anyhow as long as your defences hold strong. This would mean that each artillery or support regiment would also get a sizeable force of security personnel using lighter weapons.

PWL troops will largely be limited to soaking incoming enemy fire for back line troops and garrison duties.

A question... are there any rules about how many front line formations that can attack or are front lines basically infinitely large. I mean a very small force should perhaps be able to at least hold out for a while before being overwhelmed by a numerically superior opponent, it would also give tanks and power armoured infantry a strategical advantage over regular infantry that seem to be a bit too god cost wise otherwise. Perhaps some rule that you can't put more than say four times your enemy in the front line but at least double amount to the total size of the enemy army.

IIRC the size of the frontline is defined by the size of the troops you place there. If your enemy frontline is sufficiently larger than your own he will gain a greater chance of Breakthrough attacks, modeling your positions getting overrun in tides of steel and men.

You could argue that the 2 weapon tanks are inflicting more losses to the infantry, but the inverse is also true - those 3000 size worth of infantry will sometimes hit and kill tanks instead of infantry, and each 2 weapon tank they kill is a much bigger loss than every 1 weapon tank they kill.

This is true until the 1 weapon tank is replaced by a tank with both an anti vehicle and a crew served anti personnel weapon. It will still be notably smaller than the 2 main weapon tank, if by a small margin, but it's murdering the enemy infantry in droves. The ability to take more actions, more shots, per turn is a major advantage in any turn based system, and Aurora C# ground combat rules are definitely very turn based combat like. The only exception would be if the actions taken are sufficiently without effectiveness, but with size 750 tanks and size 3000 infantry 80% of the shots would hit infantry, so with the standard 6 shot firing rate of crew served anti personnel weapons you can expect 4.8 shots per round per tank to successfully threaten to kill an enemy infantry unit.