Give conscripts a new member for every new vet level

[krupp steel]

Just an idea to buff their veterancy since they scale very bad at the moment, and losing a vet 3 conscript squad is not much worse than losing a regular, so lets change that. You wouldn't care at all if your vet 3 conscript squad just died, BUT you WOULD care if your vet 3 strelky/guard/naval or even vet 3 riflemen would have died. Not asking for much, no buff to accuracy/health/damage, only an additional man per vet would be good.

Each new member may or may not be equipped with a rifle, depending on whether the weapon reserve rifle upgrade from the armoury is chosen or not.

So
vet 1 - 8 members
vet 2 - 9 members
vet 3 - 10 members

Its will make the squad more unique since it will be the largest one, and also with the most unique veterancy there is out there. Not overpowered considering how fast each guy falls like flies but it does the purpose of cannon fodder much better than it initially did. And the weapon reserves will be worth getting since they will get 10 rifles at the max, making them decent squad late game.

[SchlagtSieTot]

Very interesting suggestion! I would like to see how that would work out.

[Hendrik 'DarcReaver' S.]

Good suggestion, I'll see what we can do, afterall it fits their role role as supportive meat shield units. Next patch will lower the veterancy requirements for them for vet 1. I guess we'll test it on sandbox and put it in if it works.

[chaosval3]

I hope the pathing won't become too much of an issue. Otherwise, it looks like a good suggestion.

[Hendrik 'DarcReaver' S.]

I hope the pathing won't become too much of an issue. Otherwise, it looks like a good suggestion.

Same here. But testing will tell I guess.

[krupp steel]

yeah and since you cant have more than 4 squads on the field (28 men) it would make sense that this would later on increase somehow lategame wise (28 -> 40)

[chaosval3]

Conscripts are still kind of supposed to die if you don't turn them into penal troops. I wonder how that will go. A 10 men squad with smgs sounds scary haha.

[Hendrik 'DarcReaver' S.]

Conscripts are still kind of supposed to die if you don't turn them into penal troops. I wonder how that will go. A 10 men squad with smgs sounds scary haha.

still only 3 smgs. But still you'll have quite some firepower. 3mgs + full rifle 7men squad. Or 10 rifles. Even tho they deal 8 damage only with lowish accuracy they'll still deal more damage than a Grenadier squad then

Let's test and see then. If it works it will be included in the next patch and if not we Abandon the idea. Afterall, Navals and Gaurds also get a 5th and 6th squad member with vet 3.

[chaosval3]

I actually thought this could work for the entirety of the faction. Increasing numbers of the squad with vet. This would be quite a significant overhaul though. More numbers also allows more tweaking I guess.

[krupp steel]

Maybe there could be a doctrinal upgrade where it allows for an increased squad size by 1-2 men on all units?

[Hendrik 'DarcReaver' S.]

This is not possible because of the way the game engine works. As soon as you have more than one soldier type per squad (i.e. you have 5 soldiers and 1 squad leader who uses a different model) the "add squad member" action will add one new soldier for each soldier type present in the squad. In my example you'd get +2 squad members (a 2nd leader and a 6th soldier). For other squads which use even more different models (like partisans) you'd get 3 or 4 additional soldiers with that action.

This can only be avoided by removing the squad leaders from soviet squads. Which affects their combat behavior and animations. For guards and Navals that wasn't a large problem, but for Strelky it would be (because you'd get 2 squad leaders or more that will carry the red flag, essentially removing the point of having additional soldiers.

[Blackbishop]

Changing Strelky into that isn't possible due to the way the squad is set up. First of all the leader has most of the abilities so when it is gone, most of the bonuses are gone (including the red flag). The leader is important because it is a different entity than the rest of the squad, and in that way we can know for sure when he dies so the flag is gone. If Strelky is formed up by the same type of entity* when the guy getting the flag dies we won't know so the flag will never be gone and we won't know when to return it either in case we manage to pull the former off somehow.

We cannot make the flag a drop-able item because we don't intend to make anyone else to pick it up, and we cannot make the flag only be pick-able for Strelky. I have some crazy ideas of how to make Strelky work without two different entities so the reinforcement bonus is possible and keeping how the leader looks right now, however, it would be quite complicated so I'd like to avoid working on something that won't be needed.

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* Entity means the soldier object, it has nothing to do of how the unit looks, in example: Landser and Landser leader are the same entity yet one has a different uniform when getting an upgrade.

[krupp steel]

What about making all the entities the same and doing something similiar how relic implemented the radio box on the sargent of the US riflemen squad? Maybe import the same techniques to the strelky squad BUT instead of using a radio, implement the soldier model instead or atleast the basics (The ushanka hat and uniform, etc)

[Blackbishop]

Strelky are already set up like Riflemen, 1 leader + 5 soldiers so what you say doesn't apply ... try adding an additional squad member and you will get two, but for discusion's sake, let's say they are ok and are a good example, we cannot do it due to the stuff I wrote above .