AT Crew vs. Infantry

[Timodelphia]

I would like to start a discussion regarding the pros/cons of AT Crew vs. Infantry. They are both from the same era (Modern), and both have the same strength (70). Cost of AT Crew is less (400 vs. 430 cogs), and maintenance of AT Crew is cheaper (4 vs. 6).

AT Crew also gets an anti-cavalry bonus, but I don't see any bonus for melee Infantry unit.

What am I missing? It seems that the AT Crew is the better choice in all circumstances.

 

[teks]

Infantry have a +10 bonus vs. AT troopers, and all anti-cav units for that matter.
Infantry are coming from a stronger line of predecessors. Spearman and pikeman are weaker then AT-troopers in their respective ages.
Infantry have a stronger promotion line.

That's it on paper. The remaining issue is unit roles.
Is a slow moving unit a legitimate counter to mounted units? Not really.
AT-trooper is one of the better-balanced anti-cav units, the previous ones are actually more expensive then their melee brothers, but even considering that, the AT-trooper is a slow unit with an average attack that is countered by ranged units, melee units, and, in practice, mounted units (tanks have 80 strength). Infantry aren't great either. In that era, with observation balloons ranged units can strike from 3-4 tiles away, and infantry at least have tortoise, which gives them a bonus against ranged attacks. At-trooper is cheap at least, which isn't a terrible thing at all.

 

[Timodelphia]

Thanks, teks, for the reply.

I figured the infantry would be a counter to anti-calvary, but didn't see the +10 in the wiki. I'll have to pay more attention to the tooltips.

 

[PeteBDawg]

I wonder if one of the things that I think kind of works against AT Crews is getting them around the same time (very roughly) as you are consolidating your troops into armies. The difference between an army and standalone units is much bigger than the difference between Infantry and AT Crews - but you can only make armies out of the same units, so you have an incentive at the time to make more of a troop you already have and to not mix your troops up between too many different kinds. Since the upgrade path for Infantry is so much better than the upgrade path for AT Crews, it just seems like even controlling for cost and stuff you'd tend to build all Infantry rather than build a mix, and you certainly wouldn't build all AT.

This is reinforced even more by how experience works with armies - it's great to have that level 3 or 4 infantry from the beginning of the game to make into an army and elevate two fresh infantry, that really amplifies the experience bonus. You're not going to get that with an AT unit unless maybe you're Greece, so the army bonus is effectively smaller.

 

[gimper42]

Given that the tech required for pikemen is a deadend and gives nothing else at all, and that pikemen are overpriced on upgrade and become obsolete very quickly, I never build spearmen and never research the pikeman tech in any of my games anymore.

Unless I'm playing Gorgo.

 

[Chibisuke]

AT Crew sucks in most situations. They are really only good against Cav and other AT crew, and will get anihilated by mech inf (even the advanced AT crew.)

In deity play, the AI grabs AT Crew primarily because it is in their research beline for Rocketry as they all tend to beline science victory. However, once they have Mech Inf that is all they use. Thus, there is a small window of usefulness for AT Crew right after AI gets it, but in practice this has never lined up for me. Usually, machine gun and infantry are in play by this point for me so I'm not wasting cogs producing AT Crews.

At most, I might make a single one just to boost my wall defenses if I didn't have infantry yet.

 

[ShinigamiKenji]

Also, planes are already in place, and nukes come not much later (if you got at this point, the end techs are probably taking only 5-ish turns). Given that and Tanks are stronger and ignore ZoC, I'd pass on AT crews just as I passed the Spearman and Pikeman*.

*Which is a shame, because pikes were pretty much the staple of any European late medieval army before the advent of (reliable) guns.