@andrewaagamer
Ah. I hadn’t understood that subtlety. It’s a bit like assuming that, as an attacker, I’m going to win - so, retreat isn’t an option. Thanks a lot for your help.
Most useless technology?
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I do have to admit that Paratroopers technology is perhaps the most under appreciated technology on the charts. I don’t think many players fully comprehend the utility of paratroopers in the grand scheme of things.
You can use them for island hoping, for sniping under-protected territories for additional income (territory and sometimes national objectives), you can use them to augment attacks where you don’t quite have the manpower and would like more infantry, etc, etc, etc. Meanwhile, you can still use the bomber in the attack, which is REALLY nice! Some incarnations in the past said the bomber EITHER bombed OR hauled paratroopers making the paratrooper ability pretty useless.
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None of the techs are useless if you know how to use them right. I have found that all of them contribute to the many different ways to play this game.
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This is all situational, and certainly varies on avg from country to country.
On Avg (for 41 w/ NO’s):
Ger: Improved shipyards. Unless you get Improved shipyards on T1 I see little value for it.
USSR: Supersubs/improved shipyards. If I had to chose the better tech, improved shipyards at least gives you a little more flexability
Japan: Adv Art/Rockets/Radar. They are in too remote a location for any of these techs to be amazing.
UK: Supersubs/Mech Inf. The only techs the UK can’t utilize that will be a major boon in most of my games. If I had to pick though Supersubs is worse on avg, particularly if I have a factory in SAF for the UK.
Italy: Adv Art. Italy’s 1 transport ship kind of hurts this tech, but still a fairly nifty tech for the Italians.
US: Rockets, Inc Fact Prod, Mech Inf, Radar: All of these techs can be of marginal use to the US due to the location and nature of the US. The worst though would probably have to be radar though.
On avg I am of the opinion that the overall worst tech would probably be supersubs: they have no use for Russia, little use for the UK, and mediocre use for US, Ger, Japan. Italy however could have some fun with them.
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Honestly… SuperSubs suck so much. Here are a couple things that could be done to make supersubs better:
Attack at 3, defend at 2 (simplest solution, but might be too powerful, thought I doubt it would still be more powerful than heavy bombers, or paratroopers,etc.)
Attack at 3, defend at 1, cost 1 less (so they would cost 5 instead of 6 normally, or 4 instead of 5 if you also have improved shipyards)
Attack at 3, defend at 1, may hit airplanes, and may be hit by airplanes unless user chooses to submerge them (could be interesting)
Attack at 3, defend at 1, unaffected by destroyers (may pass under destroyers, may submerge from destroyers, destroyers do not take away 1st strike ability)
Attack at 2, defend at 2, cost 2 less (so they would cost 4 instead of 6 normally, or 3 instead of 5 if you also have improved shipyards)
And lastly, Any combination of the above.
What could make Adv Artillery better? Or at least more interesting?
Instead of upping the attack power of one extra infantry, Adv Artillery may now be used to “bombard” an adjoining territory. This uses up the movement points of the artillery, so you can not also attack with the artillery after you bombard. Works just like a Naval Bombardment except you do not need to attack the territory you are bombarding to be able to bombard it with Adv Art. (example, germany has 2 artillery in Ukraine, and 2 artillery in the Baltic States, Russia has infantry in Karelia and the Caucasus. Germany decides to bombard both Karelia and the Caucasus with its artillery, and also attack Karelia with 5 tanks, but not attack Caucasus. Germany rolls double snake eyes. 2 russian inf in caucasus die immediately since there is no attack there. in Karelia, Russia moves 2 infantry to the casualty space, where they will still get their rebuttal against the german tanks. Now the german tanks and russian infantry get to roll the rest of their battle.)
War Bonds is boring and not very useful, while Rockets is a bit more interesting because you can purchase additional AA guns / Rockets (AA guns should cost 5 each again). War bonds could be made more interesting by allowing the person who own’s war bonds to purchase additional War Bond dice for 8 IPCs each (takes 2+ turns to pay back). (Germany gets war bonds on a research roll. Next turn, they choose to purchase 2 additional war bond dice for 16 ipcs total. at the end of their turn they will be rolling 3 total war bond dice, at 1d6 each, to determine total money received)
Improved Shipyards is crap if you are past the 2nd turn and are not the USA and you are not attacking Japan. That is a lot of IFs, which means Impr Shipyards sucks. How about this, when you get Impr Shipyards, you ALSO get a free Carrier next to your factory at the end of the turn? That might convince, say, germany to try it out.
Radar is useful only for Germany, Italy, and Russia. And 2 of those will never ever be able to afford researcher dice, so that means Radar is only useful for Germany. How about this: Radar also improves the defense of Carriers by 1. Or alternatively, Improves the range of all Fighters you control, that began their turn on a Carrier you control, by 1-2 (5-6 movement points instead of 4). Or another alternative, all your cruisers or carriers also count as an AA gun, so they get to take an AA shot at the beginning of battle (limited to 1 per territory, just like aa guns). Or another alternative, America starts with this tech that way they never have to worry about getting the most useless tech for them.
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I don’t get the hate for Adv Artillary. For the US/UK it is a wonderful money saver and probably more useful than mech inf in the long haul being that the majority of your land forces are just being used for amphibious assaults. For Russia it is probably more useful than long range airplanes It is good for any allied power, but kind of worthless for any Axis power.
I would also say that Germany could probably use super subs liberaly to put decent pressure on allied shipping. You have something that attacks way better than a fighter and ignores enemy airplanes so it can get to the transport ships quickly all while being 4 IPC’s cheaper. I’m not saying it’s a game breaking tech for Germany, but still I can see the use. Really I would rather have super subs with Germany or Italy than Japan.
Also the UK starts off with 3 AA’s, that alone makes radar not worthless for the UK. 2 US fighters on Australia, and a stiff defense in Persia and all the sudden you may stall Japan for an extra turn or two more than you would have normally. Also, I am used to the German bomber(s) being on france to put pressure on allied shipping, when they aren’t being used for an attack I am used to seeing the UK get bombed; radar would end that. Once again, not game breaking, but hardly worthless for the UK.
As for warbonds, i don’t see how extra cash to spend could ever be considerd a bad thing. This is the most flexible tech out there. That being said if you spent 30+ IPC’s to get it, I could see how it wouldn’t pay off.
Also whoever said paratroopers were underated: anyone who finds it a useless tech/ non game changing concept ought to re evaluate this tech. Paratroopers can make everywhere in the world (except europe) your personal playground, this can change the entire landscape and strat of everyone once this tech is recieved by any power. I do think it benefits Russia the least, simply for the fact that Russia would have to buy a bomber it may not be able to afford.
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I voted based on “how many powers would make use this tech if they got it”, and came up with in no particular order:
#1 Super Subs
#2 Ship Yards
#3 Paratroopers
#4 RadarI can see an application for all the air tech for any power; as for War Bonds, every single nation can make use of them and see some gain, so I can’t see how they make the list of “the worst”
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I feel super subs are pretty darn useful for anybody but Russia. Unless of course you are Germany and the U.S. decides to concentrate its fleet in the Pacific and the U.K. does what sometimes ahppesn in our games. Build a factory in South Africa and India and put all resources to holding it with russian support for india thus depriving german subs of targets. but even if an enemy fleet gets destroyers it doesn’t negate the fact that your subs still atack at 3 for only6 IPCs. and improved shipyrads can be quite aweomse, each bship 3 IPCs cheaper etc
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@Cmdr:
I do have to admit that Paratroopers technology is perhaps the most under appreciated technology on the charts. I don’t think many players fully comprehend the utility of paratroopers in the grand scheme of things.
You can use them for island hoping, for sniping under-protected territories for additional income (territory and sometimes national objectives), you can use them to augment attacks where you don’t quite have the manpower and would like more infantry, etc, etc, etc. Meanwhile, you can still use the bomber in the attack, which is REALLY nice! Some incarnations in the past said the bomber EITHER bombed OR hauled paratroopers making the paratrooper ability pretty useless.
Agreed. Getting them is the problem. :-D
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@Emperor:
@Cmdr:
I do have to admit that Paratroopers technology is perhaps the most under appreciated technology on the charts. I don’t think many players fully comprehend the utility of paratroopers in the grand scheme of things.
You can use them for island hoping, for sniping under-protected territories for additional income (territory and sometimes national objectives), you can use them to augment attacks where you don’t quite have the manpower and would like more infantry, etc, etc, etc. Meanwhile, you can still use the bomber in the attack, which is REALLY nice! Some incarnations in the past said the bomber EITHER bombed OR hauled paratroopers making the paratrooper ability pretty useless.
Agreed. Getting them is the problem. :-D
And also having bought the bombers necessary to paradrop them.
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- super-subs for USSR (now, if you’re USSR and you’re rolling for naval/air you should had been murdered during Stalin’s purges)
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Super Submarines for Russia is not useless, it’s just very limited in use.
I’ve found a good role for my Russian submarine, and if I happened to get Super Submarines (and I do not know how or why since my Russia never goes tech anymore, and when it did, it was chart 1, not chart 2) it wouldn’t be bad, it would just enhance the duty of my Red Oktober submarine.
I used to think it’d be fun to have heavy artillery for Russia, but it’s never really helped as much as I thought it would. (how often do you send 10 IPC worth of gear to trade a territory? Inf/Arm would trump 2 inf/art + getting the technology I think. At least most of the time.)
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I don’t get the hate for Adv Artillary…
With advanced artillery it allows you to save ~1 ipc out of every 21 you spend on arty and inf. For numbers sake lets say w/o you attacked with 15 arty and 15 inf which would cost you 105 ipc with advanced arty now you need 10 arty and 20 ipc for a measly savings of 5 bucks. Considering you most likely spent more than 5 bucks to get it and you didnt get one of the other techs it really sucks.
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I don’t get the hate for Adv Artillary…
With advanced artillery it allows you to save ~1 ipc out of every 21 you spend on arty and inf. For numbers sake lets say w/o you attacked with 15 arty and 15 inf which would cost you 105 ipc with advanced arty now you need 10 arty and 20 ipc for a measly savings of 5 bucks. Considering you most likely spent more than 5 bucks to get it and you didnt get one of the other techs it really sucks.
Yeah, I don’t know where my head was at, it would most likely take too much to make that tech pay off. I will still defend adv art for UK/US as better than mech inf, assuming you are more concerned with landing troops than sending troops over large areas of land, on top of that it is going to force you to spend 24 IPC’s for 3 tranny loads with mech inf vs 20 IPC’s for 3 tranny loads with adv art. The only time I see mech if of marginal use for UK/US is in Africa, and that is only if you can’t clear out the Italian fleet (otherwise the transports move at the same speed as the mech inf anyway).
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I think super submarines is the most stupid technology, not the most useless. I mean common, 5 IPC units that attack as good as a 12 IPC cruiser? (Imp Ships + Super Subs.) If that wasn’t good enough for you, they also get to sneak shot! No, that’s a bit too powerful.
I usually recommend swapping Super Submarines out for Super Destroyers. Your destroyers may now attack at 3 and may shore bombard (if you have the technology) at 3. That’s a bit more realistic. Now you have an 8 IPC unit attacking like a 12 IPC unit, not a 5/6 IPC unit attacking as well as a 12 IPC unit and sinking the enemy before they can return fire.
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@Cmdr:
I think super submarines is the most stupid technology, not the most useless. I mean common, 5 IPC units that attack as good as a 12 IPC cruiser? (Imp Ships + Super Subs.) If that wasn’t good enough for you, they also get to sneak shot! No, that’s a bit too powerful.
I usually recommend swapping Super Submarines out for Super Destroyers. Your destroyers may now attack at 3 and may shore bombard (if you have the technology) at 3. That’s a bit more realistic. Now you have an 8 IPC unit attacking like a 12 IPC unit, not a 5/6 IPC unit attacking as well as a 12 IPC unit and sinking the enemy before they can return fire.
I don’t see how that’s stupid. In a way that is one of the few techs that may really end up paying off. Even so, they are submarines, which means they are not really acting like a better cruiser. They have no bombard, defend at 1, and can’t hit airplanes. I don’t know if I would value a super sub at 12IPC’s. Or at the very least, they are still a gimmicky unit that can’t be built as arbitrarily as a cruiser.
Rockets/heavy bombers/paratroopers/increased factory production all yield a better IPC output than supersubs ever will. Add to the fact that they aren’t as gimmicky makes their value to tech ratio far superior to the super sub. If you are saying the super sub is stupid because it is underpriced, I don’t think the math adds up vs the techs I mentioned, even assuming super subs are worth 12.
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Imo super subs are not THE most useless tech, but I would rather have many other techs. The strongest techs also depends on that the power that got the tech have a lot of money, so any tech for Italy is almost useless anyway.
And super subs will only be useful for either US or Japan, if the US attacks Japan in the Pacific.Heavybombers, paras, long range, and mech infantry is very powerfull for right nations to get it.
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I got super subs today against my son. He laughed in my face. :|
I still beat him. :evil:
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