Availability Rework

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[EIRRMod]

Here is an example of what we are doing with Availability for the next patch.

There has been heated discussion on Availability, and how it stifles your company creativity rather than 'just' limiting spam.
While the most common retort is 'You can buy more with PP' this ends up being a costly and at most times, ungainly, approach.

Therefore, we are going to try a Supply pool system, where each unit is part of a larger pool of availability.

Infantry, Vehicles, Armour and Support.
Once any pool is used up, it then costs 1PP per point over to purchase said unit.

The numbers are not final, and we are asking you, the community for your input.  Give your comments or post up some example builds that you would use.

US

Next to each pool is the amount each doctrine has available in the pool by default.

In Reserve for Infantry/Airbourne/Armour

Infantry - 28/28/20
Engineer - 2
Riflemen - 1
Airborne - 4
Rangers - 4
Airborne Riflemen - 3
American Officer - 3

Light Vehicles - 12/16/18
Jeep - 1
M3 Halftrack - 1
M3 Halftrack Quad - 3
M8 Greyhound - 3
Staghound (T17) - 3

Armour - 12/10/18
Crocodile Sherman - 3
M10 Wolverine - 2
M18 Hellcat - 2
M4 Sherman - 3
M26 Pershing - 6

Support - 18/16/14
Allied HMG - 1
Allied Mortar - 1
Allied Sniper - 4
57mm Anti-Tank gun - 2
Air-Drop 57mm Anti-Tank Gun - 2
Airborne Heavy MG - 2
Airborne Medic Team - 2
Airborne Mortar Section - 2
Airborne Sniper - 4
Howitzer - 4
Calliope Sherman - 4

Reserve Pool - 10

[Freek]

So, if infantry has 20 pool...

He can get 20 rifles
5 rangers
10 engineers
or any combo

Same with other groups?

[EIRRMod]

So, if infantry has 20 pool...

He can get 20 rifles
5 rangers
10 engineers
or any combo

Same with other groups?

Correct.

But the pool is 26 in this example ;p
I understand, you mean the Infantry pool, not doctrine... oops.

I may just the Doctrine pool totals to maybe 80 rather than 70.

[Jazlizard]

Does this mean that no units will cost PP as long as you have enough in the 'pool' to spend on it?

[LuAn]

So the entire supply system or so will be changed to this? awesome!

Though thats defintly gonna be alot of number crunching across all 3x3 Factions!

Mhm on second thought: Things that currently dont have any reserve but only supply, like the priest, will have its pp cost removed via this system right?
So this will actually free up alot of PP from units, this gonna be very interesting.
However this will be hell of balance nightmare.


Mhm on third thought:
It might not be such a good to make the "Pool Points" the same for All Factions, keep them variable to make this whole system easier to balance.

@ Jaz:
As soon as the Pool Points are used up, any additional point used up will cost pp

[Mgallun74]

hmmmmm, dont get it, does that mean rangers cost 4 per set towards that 26??? so if i get 3 rangers thats 12... leaving me with 14 to work with?

[LuAn]

hmmmmm, dont get it, does that mean rangers cost 4 per set towards that 26??? so if i get 3 rangers thats 12... leaving me with 14 to work with?

Yes, and everything above those 26 will cost 1pp per point.

[EIRRMod]

Does this mean that no units will cost PP as long as you have enough in the 'pool' to spend on it?

Thats correct.

One of the biggest flaws with the Availabilty (as it is now) was that the more we split out units (such as the Halftrack / Quad) we then had to change / tweak availability on each unit.

With this system, they all come from their respective pools, and still limit spam of certain *Types* while not stifling flavour.

[Mgallun74]

hmmmmm, dont get it, does that mean rangers cost 4 per set towards that 26??? so if i get 3 rangers thats 12... leaving me with 14 to work with?

Yes, and everything above those 26 will cost 1pp per point.

neato... interesting. hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm... guess no more 14 rifles per company now.. lol

[Unkn0wn]

I'll give some exemplary 'builds' that I could make

I'm an infantry player and want to purchase my infantry, there's 26 points worth of units that I can purchase without having to pay PPs.
So I can take:
20 Riflemen
5 Ranger squads (= 5 x 4)  and 8 Riflemen (6 x 1) = 26
OR 10 Riflemen (10 x 1), 4 engineers (4 x 2) and 2 ranger squads ( 2 x 4) = 26
OR 6 Riflemen (6 x 1), 5 engineers (5 x 2) and 3 ranger squads (3 x 4) = 26
....

If I'm an Airbourne player I even get 28 points worth of infantry units!
If I'm an Armour player I only get 20 points worth of infantry units

I'm an armour player and want to purchase light vehicles, there's 20 points worth of units that I can purchase without having to pay PPs
So I can take:
20 Jeeps (20 x 1) = 20
10 Jeeps (10 x 1), 10 Halftracks (10 x 1) = 20
OR 6 Greyhounds (6 x 3), 2 jeeps (2 x 1) = 20
...

Hope that clears it up

Now we'd like to encourage you, the community, to come up with a bunch of imaginary companies that you could create with this system. This could help us find potential flaws.

[Mgallun74]

Iam a Armor player with AP Rounds (AmPm) and just want to own all the Axis tanks in game..

i gets 9 Hellcats  -- 9x2=18

neato.

[LuAn]

For US, Brits, Wehr categorizing will be easy, but how are you gonna categorize the PE Vehicles?
Man this new Reserve Pool System is a entire new dimension for balancing.

[Jazlizard]

I understand, just wanted a bit of clarification, thank you for that.

I think it's an interesting system, I don't like the oversupply system at all though, which was part of the problem before. Put some hard caps in there and see if you really need to let people over supply things for extra "variety".

I think as a mod you just have to look at an extreme and decided if you want that to be a option or not. For example one extreme is buying 26 riflemen (assuming you can even afford that many), another is buying 3 Pershings. This is without using any PP (using the posted infantry and armor doctrines respectively).

I think what might be a good idea is to make an 'elite' category or some such for certain infantry and vehicles. That way if you want to keep it as a PP system they have to pay the 4 or 6 PP for the elite unit, vs gaming the system and just buying the few extra infantry at 1 pp each or that extra tank at 3 or 2 PP.

For example, take some of the allotted points, make a Elite Infantry, and a Heavy Vehicle Category, figure out a good number of these units that is good to allow, and set the pool costs accordingly. Perhaps in addition to this, if you stay with the pay with PP oversupply system, set a hard cap to the over supply amount, essentially creating a oversupply pool for each category. This allows for more of a granular control of the maximum amount of unit types allowed.

[Unkn0wn]

How are you gonna categorize the PE Vehicles?

Not all PE vehicles are being categorised as 'Light Vehicles', quite a bunch of them will be categorised as support.

just buying the few extra infantry at 1 pp each or that extra tank at 3 or 2 PP.

This is a very valid concern actually.

[LuAn]

I like jazlizards idea.

Another way to make those "special" units cost pp with this system but without new categories would be to give them a "special tag", which means that even if you are still within reserve pool points they have a pp cost to them.

Pershing, Tiger, Priest, KT, Calliope, Jagd would be the first candidates for such a "special tag"

[EIRRMod]

I understand, just wanted a bit of clarification, thank you for that.

I think it's an interesting system, I don't like the oversupply system at all though, which was part of the problem before. Put some hard caps in there and see if you really need to let people over supply things for extra "variety".

I think as a mod you just have to look at an extreme and decided if you want that to be a option or not. For example one extreme is buying 26 riflemen (assuming you can even afford that many), another is buying 3 Pershings. This is without using any PP (using the posted infantry and armor doctrines respectively).

I think what might be a good idea is to make an 'elite' category or some such for certain infantry and vehicles. That way if you want to keep it as a PP system they have to pay the 4 or 6 PP for the elite unit, vs gaming the system and just buying the few extra infantry at 1 pp each or that extra tank at 3 or 2 PP.

For example, take some of the allotted points, make a Elite Infantry, and a Heavy Vehicle Category, figure out a good number of these units that is good to allow, and set the pool costs accordingly. Perhaps in addition to this, if you stay with the pay with PP oversupply system, set a hard cap to the over supply amount, essentially creating a oversupply pool for each category. This allows for more of a granular control of the maximum amount of unit types allowed.

Good post.

The old Availability is the same way - this way however, there is a penalty if you have an oversupplied infantry pool - if you lose the Ranger OR a Rifleman squad.

This system may not be perfect by itself.  I do believe it needs a second part added, like a hard cap on units.

[VERTIGGO]

Iam a Armor player with AP Rounds (AmPm) and just want to own all the Axis tanks in game..

i gets 9 Hellcats  -- 9x2=18

neato.

There's no way they are removing individual caps as well... there's enough spam as it is.

[AmPM]

For reals, every game I play all I see is wave after wave of grens and volks. Stop the spam!

[Sharpshooter824]

Dont forget P4s..! STOP THE SPAM 

lol its endless, people can spam if they want.. its not gonna stop unless you limit units to small amount which I think is lame tbh, I say let people spam units if they want.

[EIRRMod]

Iam a Armor player with AP Rounds (AmPm) and just want to own all the Axis tanks in game..

i gets 9 Hellcats  -- 9x2=18

neato.

There's no way they are removing individual caps as well... there's enough spam as it is.

The individual caps will be removed.