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Effective Tank Design for NSB
By thaelmann
This is a work in Progress.

So far, I've sucked at both designing a worthy BT7 Replacement. And a working heavy tank batallion has yet to materialize.

If you know anything, feel free to post! I will integrate all knowledge in this guide and attribute the contributor.

Generally, it seems to be a good idea to max out stats where it makes sense, while keeping reliability around 80%. Or you're producing really expensive coffins that spontaneously combust as they approach the enemy,

Nota bene: Either I totally suck at tank micro, or tank design, or both, but Germany currently wipes the map with my soviet ass. And that's even though I built a level 5 fortified railway from Leningrad to Vladivostok. Overkill, I guess.

What seems to work is advanced Chassis types giving enough reliability bonus to really drive those stats up.

Update: After clocking a quite insane time in the last weeks, I have made progress in understanding proper tank design. My findings will be shared below.

   
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Created by
thaelmann
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Category: Crafting, Gameplay Basics, Weapons
Languages: English
Posted
Updated
25 Nov, 2021 @ 10:47am
3 Dec, 2021 @ 8:44am
3,163 Unique Visitors
32 Current Favorites
Guide Index
Overview
Basic Tank Design 
Tank Design: Speeds 
The Snapping Turtle: An Example of a Light Infantry Tank 
Comments
Basic Tank Design
Wet ammo storage is great, giving you a flat 15'% bonus to reliability. 'Skirt armor also useful, since upgrading to a different armor type (cast, e.g.) is way more expensive than just slapping 20% on there. One point! OP

Anyway, Electric hybrid engines will not make sense in any scenario I can think of.
Tank Design: Speeds
Now, with exception for very fast scout tanks for encirclements and supply hub grab, you will always want to pair your tanks with something that drives organisation up, i.e. Infantry, motorized Infantry, or Cavalry.

This gives you a speed to aim towards, if pairing with cav, try to get 6,4 kmh speed, when pairing with motorized infantry, you need 14 kmh, and leg infantry, of course, only needs 4. It's theoretically possible to design light, medium and heavies for all speeds (except speedy superheavies, that doesn't work).

Working with speed and reliability as your cornerstones, you can juggle armour and special components at will. A heavily armoured but poorly armed tank will not fare too well, though. Try to get the best gun for your year. Additional MGs and turrets are mostly just a debuff to reliability, I recommend going for other components.
The Snapping Turtle: An Example of a Light Infantry Tank


So, in my current Japanese Playthrough, I decided to splurge a bit and get a really heavily armoured light tank with an improved light cannon. It will be tested against the Soviets soon, in the default unit of 5 infantry and logistics, maintenance and engineering companies - and some arty for the soft attack.
12 Comments
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papabusche 2 Apr, 2023 @ 5:10pm 
the snapping turtle one is criminally expensive
[EoK]Bloodhawk 31 Dec, 2021 @ 10:52am 
nice.
seashell 8 Dec, 2021 @ 7:46am 
https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/threads/we-need-standardized-tank-numbers-per-battalion.1501190/
seashell 6 Dec, 2021 @ 12:09pm 
i still do not understand stats.

if you have a vehicle that does 30 soft attack in production
how much does it do in a battalion?
do you multiply the amount of tanks in the battalion?

when do designers, advisors show up?
WalrusJones 3 Dec, 2021 @ 11:50am 
Its not a big deal, but yeah, just doing straight up minimum cost/maximal firepower TD's (I am talking like 9-16IC by weight class, for a divisional cost of approximately 300 IC per TD division,) can result in it becoming inexpensive enough that infantry+ tanks is **EXCLUSVELY cheaper** then motorized.

As opposed to the above divisions you showed off where you have 120 21 IC cost tanks (For a net cost of 2520 tank based IC.

(Mind you, I am using turreted tank destroyers here.)
thaelmann  [author] 3 Dec, 2021 @ 11:21am 
Thanks for the insightful comment! I will test this, and add a new section on TDs soon! Thanks for contributing!
WalrusJones 3 Dec, 2021 @ 10:23am 
So the tank destroyer one is actually really interesting.....

So tank destroyers have 1 more combat width, but use 24-30 less tanks then a line tanks division, have 5% to 30% more fort attack (Based on weight class,) and have 10% to 70% higher hard attack and piercing then tanks (Same gun, based on tech level.)

So in short.

- Cheaper then tanks in bulk.

- Generally higher attack and terrain modifiers.

- Wider, can't easily replace line divisions, but trivially replaces artillery divisions.

So tank destroyers are best used in piecemeal deployments in infantry tank like ways, like the above infantry tanks pictured, with the best tank destroyer guns being regular medium/heavy/superheavy cannons.

You can get stats similar to the above infantry tanks division at *700-900* ic cost if you use heavy tank destroyers, this gives you spare budget that you can spend on more motorized divisions.
Shawtyfreude 30 Nov, 2021 @ 9:56am 
Nah you don't get it, Hybrid is best because it protects the environment
Aven-0ul 29 Nov, 2021 @ 11:02am 
by 2022 we will have reddit, youtube and steam guides full of new tank design metas
seashell 29 Nov, 2021 @ 8:36am 
but stat wise?