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[evilcherry]

Well.. turbos make something +1 expense, so in order to make it ordinarily expensive, it needs to be 1 ore/2 oil.  It would also be useless in the mountains and nearly useless in the jungle.

How about we go all-in in the jungle this round?  Get a mountain gun and AP/flak ammo, that'll let us hold or better in the mountains and hold in the jungle.  A mountain gun shouldn't cost more than 2/0 or so.  Then next round we can make a new fighter or something, say something diesel, turbocharged, and 3/4, making it 3/3, and rendering it cheaper one ore by revision.  That'll give us an expensive fighter that can beat their fighter straight up, and let us win the plains again, getting an extra resource the turn after that.  We'd get the ore back from the rebels, and then we could pick an oil or an ore out of the jungle.

That's a lot of assumptions, but we have ground to give on the desert.

Convince me why a mountain gun is useful against their armor.

[Devastator]

because it's cheaper than our now Very Expensive artillery, and you can haul a mountain gun through jungles.  It can defeat their SPG for sure, for instance.  Mountain guns are proper artillery cannons after all, if shorter range and slower firing.

Although I'm wondering if recreating their camo would be better, along with AP rounds.  That might be a better choice, despite the two not building on each other.

I'm very much melancholic about our chances right now, though.  I can't help but think that next round will be "Arstotzka gains two or three territories, and we gain one or none."

If we do go for camo, though, it should include canvas tarps for our LMGs, tanks, arty, trucks, etc.

[LordSlowpoke]

we can just spend a revision phase magically making our arty cheaper?

actually, why is the mortar not a thing yet

let's make our own mortar, with liberated design inspiration and stronkness

[Devastator]

we can just spend a revision phase magically making our arty cheaper?

Because that would put us in the identical situation to last round, where we lost ground already.

[evilcherry]

because it's cheaper than our now Very Expensive artillery, and you can haul a mountain gun through jungles.  It can defeat their SPG for sure, for instance.

Although I'm wondering if recreating their camo would be better, along with AP rounds.  That might be a better choice, despite the two not building on each other.

I'm very much melancholic about our chances right now, though.  I can't help but think that next round will be "Arstotzka gains two or three territories, and we gain one or none."

If we do go for camo, though, it should include canvas tarps for our LMGs, tanks, arty, trucks, etc.

"In the jungle, the two tanks are about equal"

Did you really read the turn post? We don't have an armor problem in the jungle. A mountain gun is not going to help our chances there, and they are yet to find a counter to our glut of small-arms fire.

You are right about the camo, but there is a cheaper source than designing them, and crucially we have an advantage to gain by doing so by the prescribed way. I would rather want the AT mine to attire down their tank columns.

PM for details.

[Devastator]

Did you really read the turn post? We don't have an armor problem in the jungle. A mountain gun is not going to help our chances there, and they are yet to find a counter to our glut of small-arms fire.

You are right about the camo, but I would rather want the AT mine to attire down their tank columns.

If we have a solution to them other than trading them 1-1 for our tanks, it means we blow up a tank.. and then still have a tank of our own.

I'm definately not against an AT mine, either.  Design one and I'll vote for it.

[evilcherry]

Did you really read the turn post? We don't have an armor problem in the jungle. A mountain gun is not going to help our chances there, and they are yet to find a counter to our glut of small-arms fire.

You are right about the camo, but I would rather want the AT mine to attire down their tank columns.

If we have a solution to them other than trading them 1-1 for our tanks, it means we blow up a tank.. and then still have a tank of our own.

I'm definately not against an AT mine, either.  Design one and I'll vote for it.

"Final Solution" Anti-tank mine
Based on our stolen plan of their tank, we should know its dimension and weight. This opens an avenue to a very un-Moskurger solution to the tank problem.
As our tanks are smaller and lighter than theirs (I have high confidence its a given), what we need is an explosive device, designed to detonate when a AS-T25 rolls over it, but safe for T2s to move through (by means of a precisely measured spring on a needle, for example). Its HE charge must be capable of killing the AS-T25.

[Devastator]

That might be a little too specific.  We'd want it to blow up for their new SPGs, too.  Trading a mine for a SPG is just fine.

[Iituem]

At this point I'm split between suggesting Sandworm either hunt down the rebels being clearly supported by Arstotzka or have him just go bomb the Arstotzkan weapons design bureau (or factories).

We are currently losing on every front.  Nothing we build this turn to counter their existing offensive will work, because if we stop them on one front they'll steamroll us on the other two.

Unfortunately, I'm running a complete blank.  Can anyone suggest something beyond the usual step-by-step evolution of the same damn guns we always build that will make a difference?  Bearing in mind that filthy Arstotzkan spies are watching everything we say!

I swear, I'm at the point of suggesting we make design votes via PM now, although that would annoy everyone (including Sensei) to high heaven.

[/incandescent rage]

[Devastator]

To be honest, I'm tempted to surrender right now.  We're not quite as hosed as they think we are, but we're permanently down three resources, and I'm not sure what's the point in stretching this out.

That said, thinking about it again, we have exactly one hope, winning the jungle so we get +1 ore and +1 oil from it, despite losing the mountains.

That probably calls for camo after all, with a redesign for something solely on the same front:  A truck redesign into a bulldozer, letting us properly block the jungle roads.

So yes, changing my vote.  +1 to Camo, aiming for tarps and uniforms, and then +1 to making bulldozer trucks, so we can properly block the jungle roads.

Oh, and Sensai, what sorts of things would we be able to do with an engineering vehicle?

[Sensei]

With an engineering vehicle- you mean like a bulldozer/backhoe? Not much, I assume that you have some civilians producing that sort of thing normally, and so does Arstotzka. After all, both nations have no difficulty building cities, trenches and roads.

[Devastator]

okay, never mind then.  Hmm.

[Taricus]

Go send sandworm to hunt down rebels. But yeah, our lack of AP shells is hurting our tanks, we need to get close to actually do anything to theirs.

As for now? I think we start developing our AT/AA gun.

A1 'Frog' 1.5-inch AA cannon

A semi-automatic anti-air cannon, which relies more on rate of fire than shrapnel, the frog is intended to utterly smash any dive bombers (OR any other aircraft) out of the sky with it's high velocity shells. Mounted on a four-wheeled towable carriage to allow the gun to operate on a 360 degree traverse, and mounting Moskurg's first reflector (Reflex) sight to make shooting down aircraft easy and simple.

[Happerry]

To be honest, I'm tempted to surrender right now.  We're not quite as hosed as they think we are, but we're permanently down three resources, and I'm not sure what's the point in stretching this out.

That said, thinking about it again, we have exactly one hope, winning the jungle so we get +1 ore and +1 oil from it, despite losing the mountains.

That probably calls for camo after all, with a redesign for something solely on the same front:  A truck redesign into a bulldozer, letting us properly block the jungle roads.

So yes, changing my vote.  +1 to Camo, aiming for tarps and uniforms, and then +1 to making bulldozer trucks, so we can properly block the jungle roads.

Oh, and Sensai, what sorts of things would we be able to do with an engineering vehicle?

Much defeatism I detect here. Basically the only reason we didn't enter into the plains this turn was because we lost the hero write in, you know? It's a bit early to be calling us doomed. And once we do break into the plains they're going to be in trouble because a lot of their stuff would get more expensive. Honestly, loosing the mountains for entering the plains is basically a net gain for us, we loose one resource and they loose two. And unless they have another tactical genius move this turn, we should break right into those plains.

- We don't really need specialized AP ammo to defeat their tanks, as our tank gun is good enough. If you want to go that route you should be better served by a mobile SPG.

...Are you reading the battle report? Let me quote the relevant bits at you.

Engagements between main battle tanks are very important this year. Battles between two tanks often go to the better pilot, but Arstotzka has a few things to their advantage. The T25 has slightly more range, and moves faster, as well as having well-angled front armor, tough that doesn't apply to its turret. Most of all, its cannon is loaded with armor-piercing rounds. A T25 can typically penetrate a Breaker's armor at long range, whereas the Breaker has to get in closer. The T2 Breaker has its electrically-powered turret which helps in tracking targets which move quickly, but it takes a very good shot to penetrate an AS-T25 at the range a T25 gunner will start taking confident shots against a Breaker.

AP gives them the range advantage. We get AP Ammo of our own, that goes bye bye and our better accuracy from turrets really starts taking effect.

- FlaK is not really useful against anything except level bombers, mainly to prevent them from accurate bomb-laying. Stukas are better countered by fighter aircraft, which for some reason our dedicated fighters couldn't.

They're dive bombing us. Flack is perfectly able to blow Dive Bombers to bits, or at the very least make them spend more time dodging then aiming. And the reason our fighters aren't winning is because our fighters are taking a single heavy machine gun verses an enemy autocannon and four other machine guns on their fighter. And they have incendiary bullets to set the wood parts on fire and armor piercing bullets to breach our armor and we have neither. Which is another reason to get AP ammo of our own, besides letting our fighters strafe their vehicles.

Go send sandworm to hunt down rebels. But yeah, our lack of AP shells is hurting our tanks, we need to get close to actually do anything to theirs.

Indeed, we can't afford for them to keep messing our resources up.

[Iituem]

Can we design only one of these, or can we:

AP, Flak Rounds - A selection of armour piercing and flak rounds and shells.  Since this would consume a whole Design phase, could we extend it to all of our munitions?