Are SPG or SPAA worthwhile now?

[pro.gamer.69]

As of the most recent patch:

• Self-Propelled Anti-Air brigades now have a baseline +15% air attack modifier
• Self-Propelled Artillery brigades now have a +15% baseline soft attack value

It's pretty obvious that the old +30% SPG soft attack was not particularly worthwhile against a +50% combat width increase. SPAA also were generally beat by mot AA or just support AA. Does this feel like it's changed with the patch? Has anyone played around with it? Looking to see what the community think.

 

[cdub8d]

As of the most recent patch:

• Self-Propelled Anti-Air brigades now have a baseline +15% air attack modifier
• Self-Propelled Artillery brigades now have a +15% baseline soft attack value

It's pretty obvious that the old +30% SPG soft attack was not particularly worthwhile against a +50% combat width increase. SPAA also were generally beat by mot AA or just support AA. Does this feel like it's changed with the patch? Has anyone played around with it? Looking to see what the community think.

I think the width should be changed regardless. It is kind of a noob trap (arty in general) because of it.

I would be curious of the stat difference between howitzer tank and SPGs divisions. I can check in a bit but away from my computer atm

 

[pro.gamer.69]

I think the width should be changed regardless. It is kind of a noob trap (arty in general) because of it.

I would be curious of the stat difference between howitzer tank and SPGs divisions. I can check in a bit but away from my computer atm

I was under the impression the old SPG class gave +30% soft attack, meaning the new would give +45%, but I'm not seeing that reflected in game, funnily enough.

SPAA also receives just +30% air attack. Can someone confirm if the old numbers were just +15% modifiers? I'm almost certain it was 30% already.

Also interestingly, I could have sworn the TD class gave +30% hard attack before - now it just gives +15% piercing.

 

[cdub8d]

I was under the impression the old SPG class gave +30% soft attack, meaning the new would give +45%, but I'm not seeing that reflected in game, funnily enough.

SPAA also receives just +30% air attack. Can someone confirm if the old numbers were just +15% modifiers? I'm almost certain it was 30% already.

Also interestingly, I could have sworn the TD class gave +30% hard attack before - now it just gives +15% piercing.

Uh.... I thought the same too. That must be a recent change right?

 

[cdub8d]

I went and checked, it said+40% for me when switching to SPG. I compared divisions using 1940 tech across the board and similar width, tanks with howitzers still had more soft attack. So uh... don't think SPGs are really useful still.

 

[Silens]

They are useful, but we're talking lategame here. Very lategame. Like when you have too much industry, most tech unlocked, and enough xp to play around with.

A 2w modern tank with a heavy howitzer and Henschel as soft attack boosting MIO gets me 68.7 soft attack for 37.36 IC (for this particular tank model I built). That is the baseline against which you'd have to measure potential SPA models. The SPA I built here, at 3w, delivers 113.5 soft attack for 30.44 IC, also Henschel.

If we look at it from a pure per-width standpoint, you'll notice that 37.833 (SPA) are bigger than the tank's 34.35, and the SPA is also cheaper to make.

To fill 6 width, you'd need 150 tanks, but only 100 SPA, so you get slightly more soft attack per width considerably cheaper. And if you don't use howitzer on your tanks, but any cannon for the hard attack? In singleplayer not that important, but if you for some reason have to use cannons on your tanks, the SPA is a good solution. At least if you want armor. Art3 with full soft attack Rheinmetall will pull 71.2 soft attack on 3w, uses 36 pieces of equipment for roughly 5 IC, so the entire unit is cheaper than six pieces of lategame tanks/SPA.

SPAA is in a tighter spot, as it uses 2w, while normal towed AA uses only 1w. My lategame SPAA brings 68.0 AirAttack for 2w, the towed AA3 offers a good 52.4 for 1w. If you don't care for division armor, the towed AA will win and it's not even close. The opportunity with SPAA lies in adding the other stuff, not just armor, but also a bit of breakthrough, a bit of extra fuel, dozer blades etc.

It's also worth a discussion if you should put AA into the unit lines at all. And I'd generally agree, it has a rather comfy spot in the support line, despite lategame only having 44.3 AirA for using only 20 pieces of equipment. Still enough to do your thing, no need to change that. But lategame? Flametanks, Logistics, SPHH, armored engineers, heli recon, armored signal... there are lots of good things to slap into those slots, so it might be worth moving AA into the SPAA slot, increase your armor/stats while at it, get more AirA out of the deal, and use the flat +x% bonuses that the other support companies provide.

Not exactly economic with your IC, but oh well, it sparks joy when I look at it, so I don't throw it away!

Anyway, it really depends on what MIOs you have or don't have. If you don't have a good selection, like Germany certainly has, then those hyper-specialized high stat equipment variants will probably not be viable. That's the grain of salt I'd throw in here.

 

[pro.gamer.69]

I went and checked, it said+40% for me when switching to SPG. I compared divisions using 1940 tech across the board and similar width, tanks with howitzers still had more soft attack. So uh... don't think SPGs are really useful still.

I see the change now - the attack bonuses to TDs/SPGs/SPAA come from the artillery tech tree, they've just added additional +15% base boosts on top of it. With that, at max tech, switching from base tank to SPG(A) adds 50% SA, switching to SPAA adds 45% AA, and switching to TD adds 30% HA and 45% piercing.

 

[pro.gamer.69]

A 2w modern tank with a heavy howitzer and Henschel as soft attack boosting MIO gets me 68.7 soft attack for 37.36 IC (for this particular tank model I built). That is the baseline against which you'd have to measure potential SPA models. The SPA I built here, at 3w, delivers 113.5 soft attack for 30.44 IC, also Henschel.

You should definitely not be using moderns over heavies... Heavy 3 SPG with max top modules (3man - heavy howitzer - 4x HMG secondary) and default bottom modules/no MIO gets you 106 SA/battalion for 1008 ICs; modern 3 SPG with max top modules for soft attack (modern turret - heavy howitzer - 4x LMG, since there's no secondary turret slots) only gets you 88.5 SA for 960 ICs. The only other differences are almost negligible, namely 5% more hardness, 10 less base armor, around 10% lower terrain penalties and around 15% better supply use.

Anyway... the same heavy design, but classed as a tank has the same soft attack per width (makes sense, +50% SA and +50% combat width) as the SPG. The standard heavies do have about 20% less supply use than the SPGs, and obviously have actual breakthrough too. However they cost almost exactly 50% more. So your point still totally holds. It does seem like once you have the +25% from the <=1940 arty techs (so +40% SA total) the ICs saved are pretty hard to overlook. You don't need that much force concentration for killing soft stuff anyway, and again come 1943 you objectively won't be getting it.

Art3 with full soft attack Rheinmetall will pull 71.2 soft attack on 3w, uses 36 pieces of equipment for roughly 5 IC, so the entire unit is cheaper than six pieces of lategame tanks/SPA.

I'm just getting 54 soft attack in my game? At 71.2 why even use more than a single armor meme tank, but 54 vs 106 is pretty drastic

 

[Silens]

You should definitely not be using moderns over heavies...

Well, it's true that I can push a heavy chassis SPA to 154.8 soft attack that way, and despite low reliability get some decent speed (11 km/h) and armor (180-ish) out of it. But while I like to cheese things on occasion, the 4 cannon 30% reliability SPA is the Roquefort of cheesing the designer. It's here that I turn my nose, despite the absurdly high soft attack it yields. I do acknowledge that it's better than modern, yes.

Generally speaking, when talking SPA/SPAA, any regard for IC efficiency goes out the window. Same for any other deviation from the cheap simplicity of basic stuff.

It's only when you have the industry and are not in a close death match against another human, that you have the freedom to experiment with those exotic and expensive equipment variants. You don't do any of it if your goal is to save IC.

I'm just getting 54 soft attack in my game?

But again, lategame, so all tech is researched, all doctrines unlocked, Rheinmetall completely and fully leveled up, all old equipment variants converted, everything else deleted from stockpiles, so what you see here is around the upper limit of what is possible to push with normal line artillery.

The main appeal is the low IC cost, it's under 5 IC per piece, so the entire unit of 36 pieces is hard to beat in that regard. But the moment you want armor, you go expensive, and 0 armor artillery doesn't cut it anymore. I do it for roleplay mostly, to preserve manpower. I would agree with anyone saying it's not efficient.

 

[Barron of Gondor]

I almost never build SPG, SPAA, or TD.
In SP you almost never need them.
And in MP, you almost never have the time to design the things, and design the divisions. Plus if you’re making SPAA/SPG/TD’s you’re not making Tanks. Tanks are universal, SPG/TD/SPAA are niche. I’d rather have 30 universal tank divisions that I can put in almost anywhere, than 5 Divisions for X terrain, 10 divisions for Y terrain, and 15 divisions for Z terrain.

Idk that’s just me tho

 

[Kanitatlan]

Well, it's true that I can push a heavy chassis SPA to 154.8 soft attack that way, and despite low reliability get some decent speed (11 km/h) and armor (180-ish) out of it. But while I like to cheese things on occasion, the 4 cannon 30% reliability SPA is the Roquefort of cheesing the designer. It's here that I turn my nose, despite the absurdly high soft attack it yields. I do acknowledge that it's better than modern, yes.

What the hell have you got against Roquefort, it's a perfectly fine cheese. I don't think that's quite what you were intending to imply.

 

[Silens]

What the hell have you got against Roquefort, it's a perfectly fine cheese. I don't think that's quite what you were intending to imply.

The cheese is fine, but the smell makes it an acquired taste (since we do taste using our sense of smell).

Some love it, some don't. And the smell of 4 small cannons + howitzer on 30% reliability, just to maximize soft attack in a gamey fashion, just isn't my taste. I don't hold it against anyone if they do.

But if you like, we can swap Roquefort against the Stinking Bishop?

 

[blahmaster6k]

• Tank Designer: Anti-Air cannon 2 now has 32 Air Attack from 36, and 18 piercing from 20
• Anti-Air cannon 3 now has 24 piercing from 30

They also nerfed AA2 for SPAA in the same patch as they buffed SPAA air attack as a whole, I'm not sure why.

I still don't see SPAA competing with Motorized AA in terms of air attack per width, but SPGs are probably more viable now if you don't have to worry about enemy tanks.

 

[blahmaster6k]

Yeah, even with the new buffs and all AA tech, medium SPAA is still about 25% weaker in terms of air attack per width compared to just motorized AA.

One thing I think would be great that might even the odds would be the addition of RADAR modules for regular SPAA. They added them for the Land Cruisers to buff their air attack should you design them that way, but not for regular SPAA. We already have the technology.

 

[cdub8d]

SPGs might make sense in SP to add a few battalions in your tank divisions to make them cheaper? Still get good enough stats and fits proper width while being slightly cheaper?

 

[toegut]

I see the change now - the attack bonuses to TDs/SPGs/SPAA come from the artillery tech tree, they've just added additional +15% base boosts on top of it. With that, at max tech, switching from base tank to SPG(A) adds 50% SA, switching to SPAA adds 45% AA, and switching to TD adds 30% HA and 45% piercing.

interesting, so at max tech SPART is now equal to tanks, 50% more SA for 50% more width. With the German MIO that buffs SPART, it may even be better than tanks in SA/width. You can get +25% SA for tanks (from Henschel) but +32% for SPART (from Alkett).

 

[pro.gamer.69]

all doctrines unlocked

that'd be the difference, everything else's numbers were without doctrine.

 

[William9113]

I think SPG's feel a bit better for minor nations trying to conserve fuel and IC while still wanting stats. They do use less fuel but more supply per width so there's some tradeoffs worth considering

Alkett MIO is also really good for buffing these things on Germany

If you throw in the artillery tech from proximity fuse special project, they do get higher SA per width than tanks, useful for SP

 

[TheMeInTeam]

I almost never build SPG, SPAA, or TD.
In SP you almost never need them.
And in MP, you almost never have the time to design the things, and design the divisions. Plus if you’re making SPAA/SPG/TD’s you’re not making Tanks. Tanks are universal, SPG/TD/SPAA are niche. I’d rather have 30 universal tank divisions that I can put in almost anywhere, than 5 Divisions for X terrain, 10 divisions for Y terrain, and 15 divisions for Z terrain.

Idk that’s just me tho

players routinely use td in lieu of regular tank role in mp because you get more of the stats that matter. in sp hard attack does not matter, so regular tanks are used.

If you throw in the artillery tech from proximity fuse special project, they do get higher SA per width than tanks, useful for SP

it still bothers me that spg need turrets or ridiculous investment to match the breakthrough stat of regular artillery. makes no sense. also makes no sense that superior firepower's dispersed support does not count spg.

 

[Terracos]

I wonder how good a 1938 Stugg III with full Alkett does now compare to a SA optimised henschel Medium. I ask becaue i can only check on tuesday.