Slitherine

The linked PDF shows a simple test I did to check the effect that a unit's experience has on combat odds. It is only one test (Wehrmacht vs USSR Regulars) where the XP was 0, 100, 200...500.
The expected results were the same from 0-200 XP and slightly varied from 300-500.
My question is, does experience have enough effect?
Especially given how difficult it is to get a unit to 500 XP (see the gamerules.pzdat file for the growth rate 100% at 0-100 to 3% at 400-500) it seems not worth the effort. The gamerules.pzdat also has values that affect the attack and initiative effects of experience. Perhaps these should be increased to give experienced units more value.
What do you think?

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/16283408/Images/pzc_exp.pdf

Sure doesn’t look like much of a difference between the levels, does it? From the first compared to the last one, yeah; but not much from one level to the very next level.
I think your result either means you need to run the test many more times to get a better average of results. Or your theory is correct – unless you have a 200 or 300 experience over your opponent, it doesn’t seem to amount to much.

… Or then again, should it?
What is the game experience trying to simulate? The comparison of green troops just out of bootcamp compared to those that have been through one or two or twenty engagements. Or is it trying to simulate better training, the physical shape and conditioning of a unit at 0 compared to one at 300 experience? If it is how many engagements, then I think the experience is not as significant as it should be. If it’s simulating the conditioning of troops; then it might be about right.

...... at least this is my inital thoughts.

Interesting findings, I have intuitively sensed that experience doesn't matter as much in this game as it did in Panzer General. Truth be told though, I see that as a good thing. In the old games if you lost one of your beloved 5 star units, you were screwed. You would feel obligated to restart the scenario. In Panzer Corps, there is more incentive to simply "play the ball where it lies", and I think the game is richer for it.

Part of what I'm getting at is whether the over-strength button is ever worth using. If the value of experience is negligible why would you ever use it? This has been discussed before and it is generally advised to not use experienced replacements but to me anyway it's great to try to play a campaign and get units to higher experience levels but I always assumed they were much tougher than a green unit - this simple test seems to indicate otherwise. I'll try the same test with a Pz IV and see how it goes...

[Edit:] I did the same test with a Pz IVG vs a T-34/41 and updated the linked file. It still seems to me that experienced units are not worth their cost as the RDM can easily compensate for their advantages.

Interesting topic.

Personally, I avoid using elite replacements as a general rule, but this may be a result of the difficulty levels I choose to play on, where prestige is simple too tight and casualties too high.
Typically though, there are certain unit I will regularly feed with elite replacements. Any unit that experiences a low attrition rate (high armor, high initiative, or ranged attack) I will bolster with elite reinforcements. On these units, I typically don't end up constantly buying elite replacements, so they don't become a giant prestige sink multiple times per scenario.
High attrition units, such as infantry, pretty universally get regular reinforcements though, because a 15 strength 5 star infantry is stronger than a 10 strength 0 star infantry, but since they invariable sustain heavy casualties in nearly every engagement, the price to get a unit to that point is exorbitant.

In the end, there's no task a 10/0 unit can't do that a 15/5 unit of the same type can do, just the 15/5 does it better and faster with lower risk but at a higher maintenance cost.

Good point Condero, thanks for running these tests. I think there may still be some perks to over-strengthing units that might be harder to quantify. Just as an example, a 12 strength panzer is in a combat that that causes it to lose four points. that knocks it down to 8. If it had lost 4 points at 10, it would have gone down to 6 and it probably would have lost a turn for replacements. if it was still at 8, I would have allowed it to continue the offensive. I suspect that the cumulative effect of over-strengthening (and experience in general) might be a general strengthening of your overall performance that may be hard to quantify in raw prestige.

I am playing at General level and use a good mix of both replacements and elite replacements. I usually use elite replacements before the battle, and usually use normal replacements during the battle. Kerensky's tip about focusing your elite replacements on low-attrition units is a good one.

Your test is flawed.

you need at least 100 data points.

Ever flip a coin 3 times and get the same results?

That's what your test shows.

Thanks Razz. That's very constructive. The odds were not tested - I didn't actually attack anything. All that the screen shots show is the projected effects. The RDM has not even been factored in - all you're looking at is what the system projects to be the result. If I did the test 1000 times I'd get the same results.

El_Condoro wrote:Thanks Razz. That's very constructive. The odds were not tested - I didn't actually attack anything. All that the screen shots show is the projected effects. The RDM has not even been factored in - all you're looking at is what the system projects to be the result. If I did the test 1000 times I'd get the same results.

Ah – I was under the impression that what you were showing was the results of attacking not the prediction of the attack to come. I think Razz was as well.

Then that makes my previous statements even more leaning towards the side that experience isn’t as important as you might be lead to believe. Except for the point that monkspider makes – if you over strength then you have the luxury to loss more and still continue on.

Gentle ribbing. I wanted to remove any random element to show only what the game was factoring into its calculations before the RDM.

I believe the game needs another round of tweaking in general. Which is exactly what I am expecting a 1.01 patch will do!

If we make experience any more valuable, then you are going to have people all upset on how game-breaking experience is, so we are going to run in circles here. Not to mention, experience + the bonus of leaders already means some people will bitch & complain how overpowered some units are (ALREADY).

Obsolete wrote:If we make experience any more valuable, then you are going to have people all upset on how game-breaking experience is, so we are going to run in circles here. Not to mention, experience + the bonus of leaders already means some people will bitch & complain how overpowered some units are (ALREADY).

It's expected that elite units should be overpowered, that's what being elite means. Given how expensive elite replacement is, I don't see people maintaining a huge army of 15 strength units. If you are doing so in your current campaign, move up a difficulty level.

Experience effects initiative. It adds 1.

Shooting first makes a big difference as suppressed units can not shoot back.

dumbttt wrote:

Obsolete wrote:If we make experience any more valuable, then you are going to have people all upset on how game-breaking experience is, so we are going to run in circles here. Not to mention, experience + the bonus of leaders already means some people will bitch & complain how overpowered some units are (ALREADY).

It's expected that elite units should be overpowered, that's what being elite means. Given how expensive elite replacement is, I don't see people maintaining a huge army of 15 strength units. If you are doing so in your current campaign, move up a difficulty level.

But if you combine making experience worth more with getting that experience a longer process; I believe it would make for a more “well rounded” game.
And by getting experience longer I mean obtaining stars. Perhaps 150 to get your first star (picking number out of the air).
... but if you only change the way one of these works and not the other - for sure people will end up upset over it.

Razz1 wrote:Experience effects initiative. It adds 1.

Shooting first makes a big difference as suppressed units can not shoot back.

Then why does that not show up on the combat prediction chart? At least not with the Wehrmacht. It does with the Panzer though.
Bug? Flawed tests? Incorrect in that initiative changes? Initiative only changes for certain units?
I’m not sure it can be anything else to explain the charts El_Condoro has posted.

According to data\gamerules.pzdat there are two factors that affect initiative - an absolute value of 1 and a relative value of 10% (of the base stat of init, HA, SA etc)and the lesser of these two is used. So the units with the higher initiative will get a bonus for experience more than those with lower stats (makes sense). That's why the bonus shows in the tank example but not in the infantry one at lower experience levels.

El_Condoro wrote:According to data\gamerules.pzdat there are two factors that affect initiative - an absolute value of 1 and a relative value of 10% (of the base stat of init, HA, SA etc)and the lesser of these two is used. So the units with the higher initiative will get a bonus for experience more than those with lower stats (makes sense). That's why the bonus shows in the tank example but not in the infantry one at lower experience levels.

Ah, so we can’t make a blanket statement that initiative goes up with experience. It depends on the starting initiative of a unit; which with the Wehrmacht (and other infantry units) you won’t see an increase at each star.

Thanks for the explanation.

El_Condoro wrote:According to data\gamerules.pzdat there are two factors that affect initiative - an absolute value of 1 and a relative value of 10% (of the base stat of init, HA, SA etc)and the lesser of these two is used. So the units with the higher initiative will get a bonus for experience more than those with lower stats (makes sense). That's why the bonus shows in the tank example but not in the infantry one at lower experience levels.

Depends on how the engine rounds

A unit with a base 10 stat: 10% or absolute of 1, at 1 bar experiance equals 11

A unit w a base stat of one, is , uh 1.1 or 2....... So either no change at all if rounds down or a 100% increase!!
My guess is the engine rounds up to the next whole #, otherwise a unit w a stat of one wouldnt get any benefit until it was 5 bars (1*1.50) Of course then it would leap to 2 at one bar and never change no matter how more experiance it gets , oye Im confused.

Seems lower stat units probobly benefit more from experiance than higher stat ones but then again, i was never good with stats/proboblity.....

I think using the editor will quickly solve how the engine does it.

TheGrayMouser wrote: a unit w a stat of one wouldnt get any benefit until it was 5 bars (1*1.50) Of course then it would leap to 2 at one bar and never change no matter how more experiance it gets.

... and this is what the combat predictions are showing too.
experiance doesn't matter for infantry -- as far as gaining the initiative.