Heavy Tanks - What's the Purpose?

z00mz00m wrote:

In other words, the purpose of a heavy tank is to drive around the map long after the game should have ended.

That's not a good reason to build a unit, IMO.

You can make the same argument about nuclear bombers.

If you're dominating the map, and want to have a bit of fun dropping (expensive) bombs on (helpless) targets.

Sure, go ahead, knock yourself out.

But that's not what people need to know when they ask "should I build this or that".

They need to know how to survive, how to win a tough war, how to be more effective.

In this context, telling someone to build heavy tanks is just bad advice.

Players who follow this advice will be easily beaten by players who build more practical units.

Isn't Commitern HT good for their playstyle though? Meaning HT pushing front, eating tons of damage and protecting artillery from all the threats. Since they are quite cheap and have a lot of health in the doctrine i think they are great front line for tons of artillery in the back line. And you dont need much of them in a single stack so you can cover relatively long front. Paired with some aa which match their slowness they can buy quite some time for artillery to do the work. Add some interceptors to the mix so you dont need that much aa and that seems like a valid tactic.

Sewur wrote:

Isn't Commitern HT good for their playstyle though? Meaning HT pushing front, eating tons of damage and protecting artillery from all the threats. Since they are quite cheap and have a lot of health in the doctrine i think they are great front line for tons of artillery in the back line. And you dont need much of them in a single stack so you can cover relatively long front. Paired with some aa which match their slowness they can buy quite some time for artillery to do the work. Add some interceptors to the mix so you dont need that much aa and that seems like a valid tactic.

Afrikakorps wrote:

Sewur wrote:

Isn't Commitern HT good for their playstyle though? Meaning HT pushing front, eating tons of damage and protecting artillery from all the threats. Since they are quite cheap and have a lot of health in the doctrine i think they are great front line for tons of artillery in the back line. And you dont need much of them in a single stack so you can cover relatively long front. Paired with some aa which match their slowness they can buy quite some time for artillery to do the work. Add some interceptors to the mix so you dont need that much aa and that seems like a valid tactic.

Thing is heavies are very expensive in commie and you can also do the job with tds or even medium tanks, and they're so much cheaper than heavies. The game revolves around being efficient with resource and time management, and heavies are quite poor in this

I would argue they might be efficient with resources and time because you can build artillery which is slow and cheap. Infantry which is slow and cheap. AA which is slow and cheap. Interceptors which are cheap compared to offensive aircrafts.

More expensive would be only SPRA and ships. 1HT can stop stack of light tanks or motorized infantry for couple hours. So you dont need to build many of them to cover flanks.

And to come back to time they are not meant to necesserily attack they are there to cover artillery from fast troops and buy time so their slowness isnt all that important. Thats how i see this

Heavy tanks in commie cost around 1445 manpower even at level 1, and at max level 2295 manpower, which is still quite a bit even at late game. Compare this to meds (in commie) which cost 1.19k mp at level one and 1.955k mp at max level and tds which cost 1.02k mp and 1.785 mp at max level. Do some math and you'll see that meds out damage heavies in nearly every single category except heavy armour with decently close matching health and being nearly 40% fasyer while tds does not outpace the ht much in health/, they are way easier to research, build and maintain while being just 40% faster than ht, speed may not seem that important on paper but considering the extremely weak speed, it's a sitting duck to artillery fire and encirclement. It's even worse when compared to resources such as steel but i will not get to that.

Afrikakorps wrote:

Heavy tanks in commie cost around 1445 manpower even at level 1, and at max level 2295 manpower, which is still quite a bit even at late game. Compare this to meds (in commie) which cost 1.19k mp at level one and 1.955k mp at max level and tds which cost 1.02k mp and 1.785 mp at max level. Do some math and you'll see that meds out damage heavies in nearly every single category except heavy armour with decently close matching health and being nearly 40% fasyer while tds does not outpace the ht much in health/, they are way easier to research, build and maintain while being just 40% faster than ht, speed may not seem that important on paper but considering the extremely weak speed, it's a sitting duck to artillery fire and encirclement. It's even worse when compared to resources such as steel but i will not get to that.

I mean 200 manpower difference is not that much. And MT outdamage HT on attack which as i said is kinda usless because Comintern doesnt have any offensive troops to match MT. So will you send MT alone way ahead of whole your army slowly marching forward? On defense they are bad though.

Also level 1 HT has almost 50% more HP that lvl2 MT. It kinda equals later but thats nice. And they have fewer researches so less time and resources wasted on them.

Comparing to TD:

Yeah they are quite cheaper and good on defense so they seem to be nice replacement. But they are weaker vs infantry which might be a problem when lets say someone attacks you with motorized infantry.

"it's a sitting duck to artillery fire and encirclement"

In my view Comintern has superior artillery to other doctrines and the HT is only a support for the artillery. So maybe they are sitting ducks but for good reason, they stop enemy troops so your artillery will do the work.

What else do you need steel for? A little for artillery and then only ships.

You should be able to attack forward with your meds vs enemy units and due to the roundness of the meds attack stats, it should be able to counter most things you throw at them so they're strong escorts with arty, you'd also want speed so that your arty moves faster to the front since they're a bit slow. While 200 mp may seem insignificant, it can mean an extra 2units for every 10 units in the early game which can be a game changer. For tds the counter vs infantry are acs so put like 5 acs and 5 tds though chance based on the situation. Overall tds and acs should be the main defensive units though meds also works well due to stat roundiness

Afrikakorps wrote:

You should be able to attack forward with your meds vs enemy units and due to the roundness of the meds attack stats, it should be able to counter most things you throw at them so they're strong escorts with arty, you'd also want speed so that your arty moves faster to the front since they're a bit slow. While 200 mp may seem insignificant, it can mean an extra 2units for every 10 units in the early game which can be a game changer. For tds the counter vs infantry are acs so put like 5 acs and 5 tds though chance based on the situation. Overall tds and acs should be the main defensive units though meds also works well due to stat roundiness

Mixing 2 units to achieve what 1 can do seems kinda pointless. Yes AC are quite important for vision but to upgrade them just to support TD seems kinda counter productive. And also you need boxes to spam artillery + supporting aircrafts.

I mean HT has perfect stat roundiness...

Okay i dont mean that its superior unit to all others in every situation. It just fits Comintern doctrine focusing on artillery. At least on paper.

ngl heavy tanks are much better than medium tanks in commitern.

Sewur wrote:

Afrikakorps wrote:

You should be able to attack forward with your meds vs enemy units and due to the roundness of the meds attack stats, it should be able to counter most things you throw at them so they're strong escorts with arty, you'd also want speed so that your arty moves faster to the front since they're a bit slow. While 200 mp may seem insignificant, it can mean an extra 2units for every 10 units in the early game which can be a game changer. For tds the counter vs infantry are acs so put like 5 acs and 5 tds though chance based on the situation. Overall tds and acs should be the main defensive units though meds also works well due to stat roundiness

My idea of Comintern playstyle is to destroy everything with artillery if possible. But to attack with MT tanks you need a lot of them. To defend artillery you need only a couple HT. The problem with MT being fast is that you will end up destroying everything before your artillery arrives so idk. With HT you can play entirely around your artillery which is superior to other doctrines.Mixing 2 units to achieve what 1 can do seems kinda pointless. Yes AC are quite important for vision but to upgrade them just to support TD seems kinda counter productive. And also you need boxes to spam artillery + supporting aircrafts.

I mean HT has perfect stat roundiness...

Okay i dont mean that its superior unit to all others in every situation. It just fits Comintern doctrine focusing on artillery. At least on paper.

Sewur wrote:

Afrikakorps wrote:

You should be able to attack forward with your meds vs enemy units and due to the roundness of the meds attack stats, it should be able to counter most things you throw at them so they're strong escorts with arty, you'd also want speed so that your arty moves faster to the front since they're a bit slow. While 200 mp may seem insignificant, it can mean an extra 2units for every 10 units in the early game which can be a game changer. For tds the counter vs infantry are acs so put like 5 acs and 5 tds though chance based on the situation. Overall tds and acs should be the main defensive units though meds also works well due to stat roundiness

My idea of Comintern playstyle is to destroy everything with artillery if possible. But to attack with MT tanks you need a lot of them. To defend artillery you need only a couple HT. The problem with MT being fast is that you will end up destroying everything before your artillery arrives so idk. With HT you can play entirely around your artillery which is superior to other doctrines.Mixing 2 units to achieve what 1 can do seems kinda pointless. Yes AC are quite important for vision but to upgrade them just to support TD seems kinda counter productive. And also you need boxes to spam artillery + supporting aircrafts.

I mean HT has perfect stat roundiness...

Okay i dont mean that its superior unit to all others in every situation. It just fits Comintern doctrine focusing on artillery. At least on paper.

The thing with HT. If you don't like MT and LT, you still have to research it anyway. Whereas with TDs, all you need to research is LT. Research discipline and efficiency is very valuable.

6thDragon wrote:

Sewur wrote:

Afrikakorps wrote:

You should be able to attack forward with your meds vs enemy units and due to the roundness of the meds attack stats, it should be able to counter most things you throw at them so they're strong escorts with arty, you'd also want speed so that your arty moves faster to the front since they're a bit slow. While 200 mp may seem insignificant, it can mean an extra 2units for every 10 units in the early game which can be a game changer. For tds the counter vs infantry are acs so put like 5 acs and 5 tds though chance based on the situation. Overall tds and acs should be the main defensive units though meds also works well due to stat roundiness

My idea of Comintern playstyle is to destroy everything with artillery if possible. But to attack with MT tanks you need a lot of them. To defend artillery you need only a couple HT. The problem with MT being fast is that you will end up destroying everything before your artillery arrives so idk. With HT you can play entirely around your artillery which is superior to other doctrines.Mixing 2 units to achieve what 1 can do seems kinda pointless. Yes AC are quite important for vision but to upgrade them just to support TD seems kinda counter productive. And also you need boxes to spam artillery + supporting aircrafts.I mean HT has perfect stat roundiness...

Okay i dont mean that its superior unit to all others in every situation. It just fits Comintern doctrine focusing on artillery. At least on paper.

In a way you're on to something. With Comintern, I've had a lot of success using TDs to protect against tanks, AC to protect against unarmored. I also prefer SP arty and SP rocket arty to do the heavy lifting. I've honestly barely needed the TDs, to me they're mearly hypothetical due to the appreciation I have of the damage tanks could do if they catch me. Heavy tanks are my favorite to see any opponent use them. I literally get giddy. Easily the most overrated unit in the game. Just shoot and scoot with artillery.

The thing with HT. If you don't like MT and LT, you still have to research it anyway. Whereas with TDs, all you need to research is LT. Research discipline and efficiency is very valuable.

I can see TD working better than HT just saying they are not usless in the doctrine

Personally, I don't find much use for them except in one situation. I've beaten all the Ai players on one side of me, I build heavy tanks and medium tanks on that side, to defend in case of invasion from human players on that side, or a human to recently turned ai player attack. Because I have no use for a heavy tank when invading, it's too slow for my liking. But it can defend well, especially with some artillery and anti tank next to it.

DomDaBomb20 wrote:

Personally, I don't find much use for them except in one situation. I've beaten all the Ai players on one side of me, I build heavy tanks and medium tanks on that side, to defend in case of invasion from human players on that side, or a human to recently turned ai player attack. Because I have no use for a heavy tank when invading, it's too slow for my liking. But it can defend well, especially with some artillery and anti tank next to it.

Adding onto this topic - I’m in an HWW round right now where my ally the Soviet Union is using 10stacks of all heavy tanks. It seems to be working for him, as he’s steamrolling opponents with them.

Gen. Smit wrote:

DomDaBomb20 wrote:

Personally, I don't find much use for them except in one situation. I've beaten all the Ai players on one side of me, I build heavy tanks and medium tanks on that side, to defend in case of invasion from human players on that side, or a human to recently turned ai player attack. Because I have no use for a heavy tank when invading, it's too slow for my liking. But it can defend well, especially with some artillery and anti tank next to it.

it will not do much against RRG, just eat the shells,... and die

6thDragon wrote:

Gen. Smit wrote:

DomDaBomb20 wrote:

Personally, I don't find much use for them except in one situation. I've beaten all the Ai players on one side of me, I build heavy tanks and medium tanks on that side, to defend in case of invasion from human players on that side, or a human to recently turned ai player attack. Because I have no use for a heavy tank when invading, it's too slow for my liking. But it can defend well, especially with some artillery and anti tank next to it.

it will not do much against RRG, just eat the shells,... and die

That's what usually happens to heavy tanks. They aren't fast enough to catch arty so they just die trying. Only exception is if the enemy uses attack bombers. Heavy tanks excel at dying my attack bombers too.

6thDragon wrote:

Gen. Smit wrote:

DomDaBomb20 wrote:

Personally, I don't find much use for them except in one situation. I've beaten all the Ai players on one side of me, I build heavy tanks and medium tanks on that side, to defend in case of invasion from human players on that side, or a human to recently turned ai player attack. Because I have no use for a heavy tank when invading, it's too slow for my liking. But it can defend well, especially with some artillery and anti tank next to it.

it will not do much against RRG, just eat the shells,... and die

That's what usually happens to heavy tanks. They aren't fast enough to catch arty so they just die trying. Only exception is if the enemy uses attack bombers. Heavy tanks excel at dying my attack bombers too.

I really like Heavy Tanks to be honest.

Late game on most maps, manpower is often the limiting resource for unit production. Heavy Tanks provide the most combat power and especially HP for their manpower cost, it's not even close. The only weakness they have are air (attack planes esp) and anti-tank/tank destroyer. Even then, because of their very large HP, they can still "steamroll" over enemy stacks.

Build time is an issue, but with all the resources, you should be able to get high level tank plants built in multiple cities to make it not an issue.

Heavy Tanks are slow as well, but this makes them stackable with infantry and anti air without being slowed down.

With Comintern, I often make kill stacks of 5 Heavy Tanks and 5 Infantry, maybe a few anti Air if you don't have air superiority with interceptors, and these stacks can take out most everything. The infantry makes it decent in urban and woods and mountain terrain, and makes the stack relatively cheap and more well rounded vs 10 heavy tanks. These stacks will simply overpower your enemy just by having a huge HP pool, and with Comintern they don't cost all that much to make.

It's hard to catch the enemy army with these stacks if they don't want to be caught. However if you are heading straight into their core cities and capital, they either have to fight you or lose their production.

Thundaxe wrote:

Late game on most maps, manpower is often the limiting resource for unit production. Heavy Tanks provide the most combat power and especially HP for their manpower cost, it's not even close. The only weakness they have are air (attack planes esp) and anti-tank/tank destroyer. Even then, because of their very large HP, they can still "steamroll" over enemy stacks.

When comparing the maximum levels of Heavy Tanks with Medium Tanks without any Doctrine bonuses:

Heavy Tanks have 24% more HP than Medium Tanks, but only cost 16% more manpower.

When comparing the sum of all resources, Heavy Tanks cost 22% more than Medium Tanks. But they also deal more damage in total. If we only look at the damage vs land armor classes and take an average, then the Heavy Tank does 9% more offensive damage than the Medium Tank, and 63% more defensive damage. 31% more in total. Anti Air values is also 25% better for the Heavy Tank.

The downside is of course the slow speed, but the argument made in this thread makes sense that in certain troop combinations (like when combined with alot of artillery) it does not matter that much.

I am always a bit sad when some unit is under represented so here I just wanted to make a point that they can be useful when used right.