What's your idea for conscripts in terms of design

There are a lot of complaints about conscript performance and the fact that they are currently not in the scope for the fall balance patch. That patch, however, does contain changes to other units that might effect the usage of conscripts, so it might not be a bad thing that we can see how things pan out before actually changing conscripts directly.

I'd like to know in what direction you would change them from a design perspective in potentially upcoming patches (if at all). Note, this is less about balance, but more about what your vision for conscripts is.

Let's start with a brief recent history of the conscripts (including stats from GCS):

Show Spoiler

The current iteration of the FBP buffs the Maxim back to be somewhat more reliable, nerfs the Penals and requires the AT upgrade for AT satchels, which all might help conscripts back into the spotlight.

I'd say it is also clear that the Molotov needs a buff as that one was not very popular even back when conscripts were. Common complaints are that the wind-up is too long, and maybe the tech could be merged with AT grenades.

The question is if those measures will make conscripts more popular again. Several people think that that is not the case. So, common proposals are that the conscripts should be able to receive a weapon upgrade, or to overall buff the combat stats.

I would like to propose a different approach, which would be more in-line with what I think what the original design idea for the Soviets and would help to keep the factions diverse.

Almost all Soviet commanders contain either some form of elite infantry or auxiliaries or a weapon upgrades for the conscripts (which results in the ability overlap of several commanders). And these typically kick in around the time when other factions unlock their weapon upgrades of elite infantry. On the other hand conscripts have a lot of utility: Apart from Molotovs and AT nades, they can build sandbags, flank with Oorah! and merge.

My interpretation of this is that conscripts are supposed to be either upgraded at some point, or relegated more into a supporting role when elite infantry enters the field and maybe even phased out to some extent.

The obvious drawback of that is that you would invest MP in something that potentially gets increasingly less effective as the game drags on.

Now, my suggestion is more along the lines of making cons more MP efficient by reducing their costs. This can happen by one or multiple of the following measures (the numbers are merely placeholders):

• Reduce the price to 220 MP, which inherently will reduce the reinforcement cost to 18 MP (down from 20).
  
• (if possible) set the squad unkeep to -1 for a total of 5 upkeep for a full squad.
  
• Reduce reinforcement time
  
• Maybe add a reduction of reinforcement costs to vet3.
  

Remove Molotov delay, and not at the second level of vet. Add non-doctrinal PPSh, replace PPSh in doctrine to SVT-40.

I think a better DPS would be good, but in terms of rate of fire, not accuracy, as buffing their long range would lead to overleaping with Penals and Guards and even Maxims... (shock troops dont exist )

there is no need from you to elaborate theory on how to fix conscripts :

1. As you noticed, they are not in the scope -> which means that they are not supposed to get fixed by any other way.
2. The Fall balance mod maker have already found ways to fix conscript, it's in their EFA revamp mod. They just didn't put it in Fall balance patch because of reason #1.

Conscripts won't get fixed with this patch, somedays when Relic get its shit together they might be ..

In the current implementation conscripts can receive minor buff like:

1) Target size to 1 so that merge becomes more attractive
2) A small increase in molotov animation. (this must be done careful since incendiary grenades is one of the reason Gv are OP)

The rest are issues of units from other faction over performing. Generally speaking the longer the small arm fire last the more tactical become and the less RNG.

If one was to redesign conscripts I would suggest the following:
Conscripts designed as defensive infantry:
Changes would include losing ourah, swapping molotov for normal grenade, increase AT grenade range, replacing tripwire with defensive ability like "hit the ground" or timed ability costing mu that increase DPS when stationary and cover.

Penal turned into an offensive infantry. Cost around 200-220 ourah (with penalties scaling with veterancy), molotov, PPsh and so on.

Those changes aim at giving Soviet the access to both a defensive and offensive infantry stock and leaving room for the elite infantries.

Can't decide between 'Conscripts should get more utility.' and 'Conscripts should get more utility.' Kappa
If serious, start from merging molo/atnade into one upgrade.

Weapon upgrades are a no-go; especially LMGs. Come on, think people; what is going to happen when LMG Grens have to face LMG Conscripts? A-moving from both sides? At least LMG Tommies have other obvious weaknesses.

No matter how much reinforcement cost reduction you give to Conscripts, that is still not going to fix Conscripts; it might break Conscripts though.

The major #1 design flaw of Conscripts is their Mosin Nagant DPS curve. This curve is completely nonsensical given the DPS curves of the weapons Conscripts have to face.

So, even if we want to go for the cheap conscripts idea, we would still have to fix the DPS curve to something that actually makes sense. Something like the DPS curve we have already created in the revamp mod (but scaled down, of course).

So, basically a viable solution will have to be:
- Revamp mod changes, or
- Revamp mod changes & additional cost-decrease/scale-down changes

Merging AT nade and Molotovs will reduce the strategic depth available to Soviets. It would still work; it just makes choice-making easier.

In the Revamp mod we mostly gave Conscripts more consistent DPS, especially as late-game defenders, which is what their niche should be (given Penals and Elite call-in infantry).

Soviets already have multiple flavours of cheese and cancer.

Reducing the price of cons will simply see the reemergence of con spam which may be fun for some but in general its braindead and tedious at best. Its a troll strat and the game could do without it.

My personal idea, if i had all the time in the world and Relic let me do whatever i wanted would be as follows:

I would swap penals and conscripts roles almost entirely, Penals would be available from HQ and would have Mosin rifles. They would have no weapon upgrades (however i would allow them to upgrade to the doctrinal PPSH). Penals would retain the satchel. They would be cheap to make and to reinforce but they would lack combat effectiveness. Vet would bring them up to a pretty good cheap defensive infantry unit.

Cons would go into Tier one, they would retain the AT nade and Molotov. They would also get the Mosin rifles but would have much better combat ability. Vet would make that better and with each level of Vet the unit would gain access to upgrade to two SVT rifles. So at vet one they can get two SVT with 4 stock Mosin's, vet two they get four SVT and vet three they can upgrade to six SVT. At vet three conscripts would effectively become what Penals are currently (probably toned down).

Each SVT package would cost 30 muni, so for all SVT would cost 90 muni vs grens 60 for the MG42.

I would leave the molotov as a slowly thrown ability and the AT nade would be unchanged.

I would predict Penals be used to grab map and destroy buildings, cons would be 'okay-ish' at the start but become quite potent towards the end. Ideally they would still lose to Pgrens in close range with medium depending on RNG.

I might also increase reinforcement cost of Con's when once they get to vet three.

The major #1 design flaw of Conscripts is their Mosin Nagant DPS curve. This curve is completely nonsensical given the DPS curves of the weapons Conscripts have to face.

Care to elaborate? I made some calculations (based on the DPS calculator in your signature) and did some simplistic simulations.

You mentioned in the other thread that the best distance for Cons is 25 meters. While that's accurate, the curve relative to the Gren and VG one is basically flat to 25 meters before dropping off quickly; yes, strictly the cons loose a tiny bit in relative DPS when they are closer, but the difference is so small that it probably doesn't matter at all for practical purposes. No idea if it is possible to achieve a flatter line unless you want to use more than three digits for the accuracy values.

In my simplistic simulations, it turns out the Cons should win on average up until 25 meters (in my simulations with 2 models left, regardless of the distance, but they won quicker the closer the fight happened).

With your new damage and accuracies (assuming that I plugged them in in the correct parts), the relative DPS indeed increases the closer the cons get. However, while the increase is somewhat more pronounced that the decrease was before, it still is pretty small. The main difference is that the relative DPS doesn't drop off as steeply beyond 25 meters.

In my simulations this barely made any difference up to 25 meters (the cons still won with 2 models left, albeit maybe 2 seconds faster than before (we are talking about 5% faster, again not sure if that makes a difference in practical terms). Beyond 25 meters, the grens still won like they did before, only that now the fight took significantly longer (because gren models dropped earlier, reducing the gren squad dps faster), so that probably is noticeable.

Again, my simulation was pretty simplistic, you probably have more in-depth ones. Do those give you similar results, and if not, how do they differ?

TL;DR:: Certainly, the new damage/accuracy combination makes cons more consistent. Further, the new values indeed remove the tiny maximum in relative DPS at 25m and replace it with a slightly less tiny increase towards shorter offsets. However, I'd say this hardly makes any difference in practical terms. What probably does make a difference is the less steep drop beyond 25 meters.

So, what is it exactly that you think is non-sensical?

Your simulation results are correct when Kar98 is involved.

Now, however, consider what happens when you plug G43 in the equation.

G43 is a strict upgrade over all range from Kar98, with the addition of being way stonger at short range (and, of course, moving DPS shenanigans).

If you don't fix the drop-off for Mosins at max range, how are you supposed to have Conscripts fight G43? They can't win at close range, of course; therefore, they should win at long-range (by Vet3).

Then you also have the issue of when LMG42 are involved. LMG42 should (and still do) absolutely shit on Conscripts at long range. To compensate, Conscripts should win decisively (without too much RNG) at point-blank ranges.

Similar with Volks STGs. STGs wreck conscripts at short range, and STGs are still superior to Kar98 at long; therefore, by Vet3 Conscripts should be more efficient than Kar98-wielding infantry at long range. For STGs in particular, Conscripts need to shift their focus from received accuracy to offensive accuracy, so that they can deal some damage to advancing STG Volks.

PS: Note that in the mod, Conscripts are a bit weaker in closer ranges at Vet0, and rather stronger in all ranges by Vet3
PS2: I didnt have the time to write a simulator. So I just looked at the curves, picked the values I picked using a conservative educated guess, and then I tested on cheatmod and on actual matches to see how it felt

Your simulation results are correct when Kar98 is involved.

Now, however, consider what happens when you plug G43 in the equation.

G43 is a strict upgrade over all range from Kar98, with the addition of being way stonger at short range (and, of course, moving DPS shenanigans).

If you don't fix the drop-off for Mosins at max range, how are you supposed to have Conscripts fight G43? They can't win at close range, of course; therefore, they should win at long-range (by Vet3).

So what you are saying is that conscripts biggest problem is gren g43s dps curve...

Adjusting G43 close range aimtimes and cooldown to bring it closer to kar98ks at close range should take care of that concern foe tou. G43s are all about long and moving accuracy anyway.

I think instead of buffing raw stat, Conscript needs better utility
- Fix Molotov animation and increase the cost to 35 muni
- Merge Molotov and AT-nade in the same package, also Penal Satchel charge will only be available from this upgrade too.
- Trip Wire will be research through HQ (replace AT-nade) - it will be something like "Defense Ops Upgrade" which will give Cons and Penals ability to build small sand-bags like US, wires and trip wire mine
- Give them Hit the Dirt at vet 1
- Ppsh will be available at T3
- Ppsh upgrades from doctrines replaced with Guards-profile Mosin Nagant rifle, effectively upgrade your Conscript to stock Guard squad

The idea is to have a squad that while does not have lots of raw power can still be useful the entire games.

So what you are saying is that conscripts biggest problem is gren g43s dps curve...

Adjusting G43 close range aimtimes and cooldown to bring it closer to kar98ks at close range should take care of that concern foe tou. G43s are all about long and moving accuracy anyway.

RIP G43 upgrade vs all 3 factions (especially Brits).

Now, how do we fix STG curves for Cons to make sense? Do we also make them unusable?

RIP G43 upgrade vs all 3 factions (especially Brits).

Now, how do we fix STG curves for Cons to make sense? Do we also make them unusable?

See my suggestion above, the idea is that Cons at long range with Hit the Dirt should be equal to StG Volks and win with Mosin Nagant upgrade.

Not sure how adjusting point blank dps on gren g43s to be closer to or match kar98k invalidates it's utility across the board in all cases. You and I both know that is hyperbolic.

And you know very well my opinion on what to do with volks stg upgrades. I've explained it many times, built it in multiple mods as well.

Weapon upgrades are a no-go; especially LMGs. Come on, think people; what is going to happen when LMG Grens have to face LMG Conscripts? A-moving from both sides? At least LMG Tommies have other obvious weaknesses.

How about making PPsh non-doctrinal then (--> upgrade is available as soon as t1 or t2 is built) and replacing the commander ability with "2x DP 1928 upgrade for conscripts" where the player must choose between both upgrades if he picks such a doctrine

Not sure how adjusting point blank dps on gren g43s to be closer to or match kar98k invalidates it's utility across the board in all cases. You and I both know that is hyperbolic.

In order for moving DPS to contribute anything, you need to be moving forward (you can't shoot while moving backwards).
In order to be moving forward, this needs to lead you to a higher-gain situation than you are currently.
In order to have a higher gain situation while moving forward, this means that you need to be able to trade more cost-efficiently at close than you do at far.
In order for this to happen, you need something like the current G43 curve.


Conversely, if you don't plan on moving at all, then the best choice you have is find some green cover, stay there and wait for the enenmy to come.
Once the enemy is too close to you, and you are no longer trading well, you hit retreat and you did your job.

So, my question is:
- If G43 only contributes to long-range DPS, why would you ever forgo the best and most cost-efficient LMG (LMG42) in the game for the G43?

- Note that LMG42 also increase DPS at all ranges; therefore G43 might be a downgrade compared to LMG42 at close-range.

In addition to everything else, we also have OST design that already makes the faction near helpless in close-quarter maps. G43 commanders and AssGrens kinda help to mitigate that.

And you know very well my opinion on what to do with volks stg upgrades. I've explained it many times, built it in multiple mods as well.

What about PGren STGs, then? The amount of distance PGrens have to cover to be cost efficient vs Cons is tiny.

How about making PPsh non-doctrinal then (--> upgrade is available as soon as t1 or t2 is built) and replacing the commander ability with "2x DP 1928 upgrade for conscripts" where the player must choose between both upgrades if he picks such a doctrine

The game already has more LMG blobs than it can handle.

if you buy DP1928 for your conscripts, wtf am I supposed to do with my Grenadiers?
At least Tommies don't have oorah and AT nades.

SVT-40 in late game with option for doctrinal PPSH-40 package. That's what i'd like to see

Move demo to Penals.
Swap Penal and Con.

*NEW* You can only lay Demo Charges on enemy or neutral territory.

PENAL BATTALION

-> Better damage while closing in and CQ(expect vs smg squads) but very low resistance. AT satchel remains.

-> 240 MP but low reinforce cost.

CONSCRIPTS

-> Merge molotov and AT-nade with reasonable price.[Not (Molotov + AT Nade) / 2]

-> Good at charging(High hp, resistance) and long range but shit at CQ.

-> Can build barbed wire.

-> Move PTRS to Cons. If they upgraded with it, shitty AI. They won't lose AI(Or maybe will gain?) if using Tank Hunter ptrs.

-> If you don't want to lose your AI you have to choose Guards or Tank Hunter doc or make good plays with AT satchel against LV play.

-> If MGs or SMGs giving you headache, you have to choose Shocks(They need some buffs ofc).

Pretty Easy.