attack army costed 40k metal,8k oil
defender army 50k metal,20k oil

So ?

classic build prove it's worthiness in unbalanced battles 1.3 cheap squads win aginst 1 classic with 23 loses (20 A,3 D)
1.3 classic squads (13,27) win against 1 cheap squad with 13 loses all A..

but in order to quickly unbalance the battles in ur favor better build cheap then classic

As it was pointed out prior, in an even (even slight uneven) battle, damage will reign supreme. However, as you can see in the example given by devil, you're losses will be extremely high. You'll win the battle, but you'll likely lose the war if this is the kind of battles you take.

As said before, most experienced players do not look for an even battle. They look for an advantage. If the attack (or defense) will result in losses outside of armor, most experienced players will not take the battle. So in the case shown above, you not only lost 160 armor, but 133 (out of 160) or your damage units. Yes, it was a cheaper build... but want to know what's more cost effective? Taking advantage of a well set up battle. See the 2 examples below:



The 1st battle is evenly matched, but the attacker has taken advantage of a spy or nuke to put his enemy at 1hp. In the first scenario, not a single range was lost and he lost 100 armor (so 10k metal lost).

The 2nd battle is the same set up but with that damage based set up. It may have cost you less to make, but now you're power level has significantly dropped and you have more losses to pay for (16k metal for armor losses, 8k metal for damage units lost, and then about 3k oil).

So you may of saved on oil loss, but you greatly hurt your rank and in the end, lost 24k metal overall (so even if we take out the difference in how much the cost was compared to a range based army, you still end up with deficit). And all of this is NOT including the overhead costs that will be associated with rebuilding.

So once again, damage WILL be better in an even match. Any experienced player can tell you this. But any experienced player will also tell you NOT to take on an evenly matched battle if you can help it. You should always look for an advantage in numbers. Some may call you a coward for not taking on a battle. This is simply them taunting you into a stupid match up in which you'll lose a lot of units.

So going damage is not bad per say. Obviously if the enemy wasn't at 1hp, the ranged set up would of ended in a draw (both sides losing entire army). But you don't want an even match up.
Heck, even that damage set up was actually 320 vs. 300 units. I believe the point devil was making was to point out that the damage build can make more for less resources (which is true). But if you make it exact even numbers (150 armor and 150 dmg vs. 100 armor and 200 range) you'll see they also end in a draw. In that scenario, the attacker with the damage army technically comes out on top based on the resources lost (but in reality, both sides lost).

well what can i say,cheap build cheap performance ))

Haha, yup. In the long run, it's not worth it. However, short term, very useful.
I would say, early in the era (when you don't even have range structure yet) damage are supreme. Until you get nuke and spies up and running (along with everyone else) range aren't the best. At the beginning, everyone is fairly close to even, and as said, in an even fight, damage will come out on top usually (and as shown, costs a lot less). It's perfect to create lots of damage in 1 chassis and then switch to your new chassis with a range based build. Then just use your damage based chassis as spams/anti spams for the rest of the era.

So this is a battle from a very long time ago. It was like 2010 or so. I was leading my alliance in support of CME(under the tag SUGA). So as you can clearly see, we didnt win. But we were so outnumbered and outpowered that there was no way we were going to win. We were just taking a hit for our ally while they regrouped.

Take a look at the numbers. We had 2/3s the number of untis they had, but we cracked there army open like an egg. The misconception that damage only beats range in even battles is false. Damage can turn tides when your seriously outnumbered. It had more health than range units, so it takes more of those shots, and you dont need as many units to do they same amount of damage. But like all of the upgrades, never focus on just one.


This is my army on M2 currently. We havnt had a war all era, so iv taken my time to ensure that my numbers and ratios are all right. If you want real success and large scale conflicts, all 3 upgrades are needed.

What are your ratios Felgrand?? (range+armor:damage+armor)
I use 1 full concussive damage squad(30 damage units in infantry) on every 10 concussive squads of range+armor(20 range and 10 armor). It is same for all other weapons.

Waiting for malice to reply.

I try to keep 1/3 range to damage ratios with armor being built as needed. Typically i try to keep 1/4 of my total army armor. But ratios change depending on chassis. If im building mechs i will typically have less armor and more damage, where as if im inf it will be the reverse.

If you have ever seen any of my larger battles, you will notice i almost always have a larger amount of damage than most people build.

Something interesting need to spend some time on simulator.

Seth, you are right in a sense. Damage is useful, but you didn't bring to light anything different than what I stated. Only a different circumstance. You took that battle simply as a suicide against an enemy team. Yes, you did massive damage, but they still won and if it was a 1v1 situation, your alliance would have lost. However, as it was a different set up were you were simply trying to hurt the enemy as much as possible for another alliance, this battle seems extremely advantageous (seeing how much damage you did with less army). But if we look carefully at the builds, there was an enormous amount of Anti Inf Mech's in the enemies army, where as yours was more focused against their build. By normal means, based on the numbers I see in this battle, I would have never taken this battle (but once again, I'm coming from a stand point of trying to win, not trying to suicide).

So yes, you're right that damage can turn the tides if it's on a small scale battle compared to a large scale war. Especially if you ended up crippling the most active on the other team.

However, that is a coordination tactic based upon coalitions. One that has been argued to be extremely detrimental to BD (essentially, subs or brother alliances suiciding for the main alliance to weaken their enemies). The better team can easily lose the war if their enemy simply keeps suiciding army after army via their subs. You could win 100's of battles, but end up losing the one you needed to win because of the 100's you took armor losses for before. Recovery is just as important as the battles.