Solver's unofficial BtS 3.17 patch

[r_rolo1]

Missiles in my hand ultimately are economy wreckers. I like to use them to target cottages in those atrition wars: reducing their towns to villages is effectively delaying them a big deal ( at least until the towns regrow ). In fact I never understood why they don't have counter.... all of the other civ units have.

 

[Balderstrom]

@ kurtkage, they do collateral damage. Always have. That hasn't changed. I just had to peruse the code to confirm.

The whole Collateral/Tanks/Units w/o native ability appears to be a sticking point atm (as I have stated I don't much care Though this issue could easily cause a fork of the "unofficial patch".

Now perhaps I am missing something in the code, but the Barrage promotions indicate
that they increase Collateral Damage: (I): +20%, (II): +30%, (III): +50%
I cannot find this in the XML, nor in the CvUnit.cpp, the promotion doesn't seem to be referenced? Can someone point that out? Since if the Promotion "feature" hasn't changed...
Then Tanks/et al, should become iCollateralStrength == 20, after Barrage I ...

 

[SilentHunter]

Here is what I saw after playing a 3.17 full game:

* Removing Barrage from Tanks?
Doesn't make a big difference, but if it's what was intended by Firaxis... after all, there is no reason why they should be the fastest, strongest and still got a barrage promo line... Artilllery is useless with them + bombers and missiles, that's not normal.

* Capitulation: humm. I just finished an Emperor standart Terra map. Because of situation (I always play total random foes + civ), I started to conquer. I killed 4 foes before domination:
- Staline: never cap
- Joan of Portugal: cap when there was one city left of 10,
- Moussa: cap after 5 of 10 taken + huge army on his territory (I had say, he resisted until it was clear that he would loose -> he seemed quite human )
- Ramses II: Cap after loosing 7 cities, he had 3 cities left on old world + 2 on new world. I had at least 60 units attacking him and he had lost all his biggest cities.

So, I'm not sure you should change this. In this game, AI never capitulated before it was over. Just my 2 cent.

* Amphib assault

Now, it's really hard. I mainly used it to make 'backstabing' raids, using the powerfull ships to destroy walls and then taking the city in 1 turn, as big stacks are fighting elsewhere. It's a bit sad that this possibility desappeared. Maybe that giving ships an attack capacity against land units (just like a bomber) could really enhance the use of ships by players (even more than blocade).

* Paratroops:

This unit would be ten time better (I mean gameplay here) if it was able to drop, move and if needed attack. It can be intercepted and it's not a uber unit, so it would create interresting situation, whitout unbalancing the game.

 

[Caboose]

Missiles in my hand ultimately are economy wreckers. I like to use them to target cottages in those atrition wars: reducing their towns to villages is effectively delaying them a big deal ( at least until the towns regrow ). In fact I never understood why they don't have counter.... all of the other civ units have.

They have short range (4), so they only wreak havoc between border cities. And they give submarines and missile cruisers a very important job on sea maps. The counter is to take out the subs or the MC's.

EDIT: @SilentHunter: Paratropper boost? Nevermind. I don't know. Maybe? Dunno if Solver will include such a thing though.

 

[Balderstrom]

I use the paratroopers to drop and pillage, but definitely annoying that they can't capture workers at least. Actually - the MOST annoying thing, you can't select multiple troppers and Paradrop, they have to be selected one at a time, again and again and again. ugh.

 

[Caboose]

No France or Iraq air invasion then? =( Anyway, i don't know. For their base strength at that era, they're quite alright if they can avoid interception I guess. Espescially if you can land them in a forest or a hill. They could have had a slightly higher interception avoidance maybe? Like, say, 33%? Can't be very cost-effective to send them into an intercepted area. Or could you deal with the interceptors with fighters of your own? You'll have to forgive me, I'm quite new to Civ4 and espescially BTS, so I haven't understood completely how air combat work nowadays. (should read up though, I guess)

 

[Willem]

What about earlier amphibious assaults tho that I would have used trebs or cats with? I just don't want to see the deminishment of amphibious assaults go Too far.

Well, just consider the realism aspect. How are you supposed use Trebuchets or Catapults on the deck of a Galley or Galleon? Those things are big and can't be used effectively in that situation. There wouldn't even be enough clearance in the sails of the ships for the arms of the siege units to swing freely. If you really want to use collateral damaging units, it's not difficult to land them on the shore next to the city you're attacking and proceed from there.

 

[SilentHunter]

* Amphib assault

Now, it's really hard. I mainly used it to make 'backstabing' raids, using the powerfull ships to destroy walls and then taking the city in 1 turn, as big stacks are fighting elsewhere. It's a bit sad that this possibility desappeared. Maybe that giving ships an attack capacity against land units (just like a bomber) could really enhance the use of ships by players (even more than blocade).

Self quotation
This is really a balance issue, since ships are really quick and with capacity to attack land unit, they could be way too powerfull... After all, landing is always deadly, isn't it? I'm not so sure it's a good idea...

Improving paratroopers wouldn't provoke such an imbalance... and could help trying interresting tactics to shorten wars.

And there is another point that was never adressed, and I don't understant why: cavalry evolves only into helicopters. That's fine, but why not into tanks? In history, cavalry became both of them + sometimes air units. This odd choice has to consequences:
- AI ends up the game with tons of helicopters, because in medieval age, it uses lots pf knights,
- human player discard their cavalry because a stack of 30 helicopters that cannot enter ennemis cities is... useless.

 

[KaytieKat]

Kaytie,

Sure enough, generally having options is good. But in designing a strategy game, what you generally want is to have options that are approximately equally good and viable. To make an extreme example: say you could build Chariots in the Modern Age. It'd be an option, but not something you would ever want to do just because it's useless. Barrage Tanks have the opposite problem. If you want collateral damage, promoting some Tanks with Barrage is just much better than anything else. Artillery is slow and Mobile Artillery is weak in direct combat - so you can promote Tanks with Barrage and use all-Tank armies with air support, whereas one of the goals in Civ4 is to try and encourage the use of combined arms.

Well I don’t think all choices can or should be equal otherwise it would make for a very boring game. Some choices will ALWAYS be “better” than others. That doesn’t make the “better” choice over powered or game breaking though. I mean a few CR3 sword would be a “better” choice for attacking a city on a hill with walls defended by a CG2 archer than choosing a few combat3 archers.

I don’t think it means CR promotions should be dropped or that they should be modified so the exact same odds would result no matter which choice was made to make them “equal” Nor do I think it means combat promoted archers should be prevented from attacking a city if a playing has swords available in order to “encourage” them to make the “better” choice.

For example, that is why the Chariot attack bonus against Axemen was added in Warlords. Before that, Chariots weren't used enough and early armies would consist of exclusively Axemen too often. I feel this is somewhat similar.

I don’t think making armies of nothing but barrage promoted tanks in industrial era is or was exactly the same in terms of effectiveness as spamming only axes in pre warlords games. But even if they were I think there is a BIG difference between making a counter to strategy as in giving chariots a bonus versus axes to say changing rules so you CANT attack with axes unles you have at least 1 spear for every two axes in your army.

With one you still have the choice to go all axes if you want or to add spears if you want to be 100% safe and with the other the choice would have been taken away.

And Bombers can go anywhere, almost. The most important thing is to capture the first enemy city. After that, you can send 4 Bombers there and you'll have good air coverage that grows quickly as you capture more cities.

Oh I use bombers at times. I mean I LOVE tanks but for various reasons doing course of game if it gets to industrial and beyond there are times when I use other units for various reasons some just for preference and taste and fun factor and some because in that particular situation I felt tanks weren’t best units for the job.

I have never felt going all barrage tanks would be the best or only or even easiest way to go. I do feel they are better choices than others at times. Sometimes bombers cant get there sometimes , sometimes there are too many fighters or other anit air, sometimes I just plain would rather use tanks and having them barrage equipped makes them handier for it .

In fact I will even submit that it is quite possible to win just as fast and just as effectively to win an industrial age war without ever building a SINGLE tank, much less a ton of barrage tanks. However to me that is not as much fun which goes back to the personal taste issue. The fact that it is viable to do so without em and some players even prefer to do so without em isnt a reason to say NOONE should. And the fact that some players may choose to play that way really doesn’t or shouldn’t take away from the fun of people who choose another way.

I definitely see your point, though. It's just that after giving it some thought now I believe that removing Barrage from armored units would be better game design, and apparently most agree to that. In any case, if I do it for this update, you can just not use that particular change if you really don't like it

Well like I said before I have NOOO clue about modding so wouldn’t even know where to begin to edit your patch to remove a change I would have preferred not to have been made. And like I mentioned before it is more than just allowing barrage promos available for armored units it would also mean doing something so that they would also be effective again. Whether that means modding the armored units themselves or completely overhauling how barrage now works I have no idea and in time it would take me to learn how to even BEGIN to do something like that civ 10 would be out

Here is what I have read so far about the reasons AGANST barrage being allowed.

1) They are overpowered.

My answer to that is I don’t thinks so. I mean any game I have won, not having barrage tanks would not have meant I would have ended up losing. And anyone who has seen summaries of my games in threads like nobles club now that even with barrage tanks I lose PLENTY of games .

Barrage tanks do not allow players to play successfully at higher difficulties than they normally would or help cover bad strategy or game play they some claim units like praetorians or traits like financial do.

In terms of like victory or defeat or how high a score you would get or how high a difficulty you could play having or not having barrage tanks do not impact the game at all.

Now maybe in a battle to take a city a barrage tank would do a better job that say combat 1infantry but that doesn’t make em overpowered I mean a infantry that used to be a CR3 mace would also do a better job that doesn’t mean upgrades shouldn’t be allowed. Nor does it mean a barrage tank will ALWAYS do a better job.

There ARE situations where even combat promoted infantry would be the stronger choice . And the fact that there are situations that even barrage tanks cant handle as well as other units shows they are far from “overpowered”

2) It is unrealistic.

My very first answer to that is hey this a game where you use production to “build” rock n’ roll hehe .

My more serious answer is I like the game to be realistic too. And I don’t see what is unrealistic about tanks doing col dam. I admit I am NO munitions expert but I will bet ya a nickel if a guy standing say 10 feet next to you gets hit with a tank shell you would be “damaged” a lil bit too . The realism argument would also mean chok ko nus shouldn’t be given col dam either. I mean if an exploding tank shell shouldn’t do it realistically neither should a crossbow right?

3) Not allowing barrage armored tanks encourages combined arms.

My answer is this argument might be valid IF tanks were so overpowered you could get away with building ONLY barrage tanks. But counter units like anti tanks. And units like bombers and fighters and helicopters strafing and attacking them even before they get to their destination and even other tanks all encourage combined arms.

4) A more specific argument to number 3. Eliminating barrage would encourage use of less used units like mobile artillery.

My answer is moblie artillery isn’t used as much NOT because of barrage tanks but because they come pretty much at end of tech tree. I mean you can get ICBMs before you can get mobile artillery.

If anything if I am in late modern age and want fast attacking war I use combo of stealth bombers for the col damage, copters to empty the cities then mechs to take and hold em. That’s a MUCH faster paced attack combo than mobile artillery and much more quickly available. And that’s if I just don’t decide to just nuke em and then move in hehe .

Actually the ONE unit I think the change MIGHT encouraged a little more would be the aircraft carrier. But I disagree as this being the way to encourage it. I mean I don’t use carriers much solely for the reason they are SOOOOO sucky. I mean they cant carry bomber and they can only carry 3 fighters? That means you need 3 carriers full of fighters to take out a city with full compliment of its own fighters guarding it and that’s assuming each fighter wins so the defenders don’t fight anymore before you can even BEGIN to damage the other city defenders which would mean at least a couple more extra carriers for that and THAT is assuming their or NO other units capable of intercepting aircraft in the city. I

mean talk about micromanagement headache. I don’t know about you but I would just rather land artillery along with other land units and take city that way instead of messing with carriers and fighter like that.

Which brings me to this point. Often it seems a game and not JUST Firaxis will do something like notice lots players tend to choose playing a certain way when they for whatever reason would rather they play another way. And time and time again they way they “encourage” play in the direction they prfer is to make playing any other way impossible or at least unfun instead of doing something to make their way more desirable.

I mean if Firaxis wants me to be encouraged to use units like mobile artillery or aircraft carriers more make mobile artillery come earlier, make aircraft carriers have a higher capacity or allow them to carry bombers or something so I would WANT to use em.

If Firaxis wants me to have fun using those units , again make em so they are actually more desirable to use and NOT because other choices are taken away and I have NO choice but to use em.

And since I DO agree that scope of unofficial patch SHOULDN’T be a mod, something like moving units down tech tree or changing carriers should wait to when/if Firaxis decides to do it in an official patch. So until then I would just rather go back to having choice of barage tanks as substitute.

This brings me to argument 5 and my answer to it.

5) This is a patch NOT a mod and allowing barage would go into realm of mod.

My answer--barrage tanks have been around since original game, 2 expansions, and every ptach for them up till now. So it is not like saying there should be barrage capable tanks is like saying the patch should add something totally new, unheard of and out of the blue like flying saucers with death rays or something.

Also I would agree it would approach mod status if it radically changed how tanks could be used. But again it is not like it is making tanks able to go on water or intercept aircraft.

A non barrage tank is mostly ideal for attacking cities and attacking other units in the field as long as said city or units don’t have antitank counters.. And in a pinch if necessary they can also be used to defend cities once taken. Not the IDEAL for that but handy to do so until better city defenders can move in as long as they not attacked with anti tank units such as anti-tanks, copters or other tanks.

Barrage capable tanks are best suited for attacking cities and units in open field they can do so more effectively than non barrage tanks, true but NOT overpoweringly so. And in a pinch they can hold cities taken, Again not IDEAL choice for that but can handle it long enough until better garrison units arrive as long as they are not attacked by anti-tanks, copters or other tanks.

So the change back isn’t HUGE and I definitely don’t think it approaches mod status.

But it is a change back and that brings me to next argument.

6)Firaxis INTENDED for tanks to no longer do col dam and who are we to change it back.?

My answer, will I don’t have any mind reading powers so personally I have NO idea what Firaxis intended Best I can do is just guess. Some mention someone named axel or alex as saying that is way to go and I gues he is one of the developers or connected with firaxis somehow since they say his saying that shows their intent.

But even if Sid himself came down in form of burning bush saying “this is what we intended” uh so what?

Changes have been made in unofficial patches before that at the time may have gone against what firaxis “intended”

For example the glance screen. I think it very clear firaxis intended for, in their own word “the ugly glance screen” to be removed from the game. But despite this every unofficial patch since it was removed puts it back and most agree with that change even though it is very clearly NOT what firaxis “intended”

Another example would be in solvers first unofficial patch before BH’s. At that time overseas maintence costs and effect of inflation on costs of corps were HUGE. Now it was obvious firaxis INTENDED for those costs to be higher but it was arguable at the time on whether they intended for them to be THAT high and in end it was decided whether it was intended or not the costs were just TOO high for game to be fun so changes were made that made em lower.

In fact sometimes when unofficial patch goes against what firaxis intended it can be enough for them to say "hey yeah that is better than way we made it" an example of that can be how spies no longer damage a town down to nothing in one sabatage but instead it just lowers it one level at a time.

So JUST saying its what firaxis intended isn’t a valid argument all by itself. Other factors like does the change make game more fun or not are to me more important.


7) It’s solver’s patch and he can do as he pleases and if you don’t like it go make your own patch.

My answer-- I don’t have one since it is true, Its his patch and nobody can make him do anything if he decides barrage is out in his patch then it out.

But to his credit he does invite other people to express their opinions and that’s what I have done. Especially since I have been on this target he has been saying things like “this is what I am leaning towards’ NOT this is final decision and that’s that so shut up about it.

So that’s what I have been doing. And since for all I know about coding and computers this is done with killing chickens over pentagrams and black candles and nooo way I can mod it myself, I am arguing as persuasively and hopefully as politely as I can.

But I am thinking if I havent made an impact yet I never will so I will drop this topic now and accept whichever way solver ends up deciding.

Not that I wont bring up other issues as long as solver says he is open to opinions and suggestions on what should be done for unofficial patch so I wont be shut up completely. I like giving my opinion hehe

Kaytie

 

[Balderstrom]

void CvUnit::collateralCombat(const CvPlot* pPlot, CvUnit* pSkipUnit)

...
...
	iCollateralStrength = ((((getDomainType() == DOMAIN_AIR) ? airBaseCombatStr() : baseCombatStr()) * collateralDamage()) / 100);

	if (iCollateralStrength == 0)
	{
		iCollateralStrength = ( baseCombatStr() * getExtraCollateralDamage()) / 100;
		if (iCollateralStrength == 0)
		{
			return;
		}
	}

Instead of:

	iCollateralStrength = ((((getDomainType() == DOMAIN_AIR) ? airBaseCombatStr() : baseCombatStr()) * collateralDamage()) / 100);

	if (iCollateralStrength == 0)
	{
		return;
	}

 

[DanF5771]

Balderstrom: This will apply the Barrage promotion TWICE for tanks and is more or less a return to the old formula, where the promotions modified iCollateralStrength before the calculation of iStrengthFactor and iCollateralDamage which comes with all the trouble (rounding, lower/no effect) discussed in the broken Barrage thread.

 

[DanF5771]

I would instead try something like this (though I don't really speak cpp):

	if (collateralDamage() == 0 && getExtraCollateralDamage() == 0)
	{
		return;
	}

	iCollateralStrength = ((getDomainType() == DOMAIN_AIR) ? airBaseCombatStr() : baseCombatStr());

	...
	
				int iModifier = collateralDamage();
				iModifier += getExtraCollateralDamage();
				iModifier *= (100 - pBestUnit->getCollateralDamageProtection())/100;
				if (pCity != NULL)
				{
					iModifier *= (100 + pCity->getAirModifier())/100;
				}
				iCollateralDamage *= iModifier;
				iCollateralDamage /= 100;

				iCollateralDamage = std::max(0, iCollateralDamage);

Example: Barrage II Tank vs Drill III Infantry:

iCollateralStrength = 28
initial iCollateralDamage = 11 hp

int iModifier = collateralDamage() = 0
iModifier += getExtraCollateralDamage() = 50
iModifier *= (100 - pBestUnit->getCollateralDamageProtection())/100 = 50*(100-40)/100 = 50*0.6 = 30
iCollateralDamage *= iModifier = 330
iCollateralDamage /= 100 = 3 hp

no bunker protection (which is -50 btw) for tank attack

 

[DrJambo]

I must admit, two other things bother me greatly -

1. The low range of paratroopers and missiles. It should be at least 7 or 8. Missiles with collateral would be interesting too.

2. The ineffectiveness of the Drill promotion line. What's the deal with these First Strike Chances... :/

 

[Calder]

The issue of encouraging combined arms by taking away collateral damaging 2-movement units (ie tanks) doesn't make sense to me.
One would assume the following scenario: Pre-Flight you could move a stack of 10 tanks into enemy territory, 4 promoted with Barrage, 4 with City Raider, and a couple of combat/drills for defense and here you have the makings of seige, city attack, and defense, all with one unit type! And meanwhile all those elite infantry upgraded throughout the years to CRIII, and successfully upgraded Accuracy/Barrage seige stand by and watch unable to catch up with the fearsome stack of tanks. With the advent of Flight, the Tanks job becomes easier and wars would be so speedy, the term 'war weariness' only applied for the AI's inablity to wage wars efficiently against each other. But where combined arms come to the fray in the age of the tank is when you need to hold what you've taken. Those ten damaged tanks can't successfully hold against a counterattack by themselves.
However I find in most of my warmongering games, the age of the tank is rather short lived (if you call a few hundred years of peace after the battering ram to regroup and confide in the economists, short lived) when I find suddenly all I need are a few paratroopers, lots of air/naval support and a lot of Gunships, and airlifted defense, to quickly wipe out an unsuspecting civilization or 2. I think combined arms is always relevant in any situation, barrage tanks or not.
My argument against taking away the barrage promotion for tanks is that the ten tanks scenario won't work, you will have to rely on the slow movers, war weariness does become an issue, and, well, its just not as much fun.

 

[PieceOfMind]

2. The ineffectiveness of the Drill promotion line. What's the deal with these First Strike Chances... :/

Drill promotions are great. You're probably just not using them properly. They are indeed not very useful for city raiding units. Their main power comes from when the odds are stacked. When you have the advantage with a defensive position (eg. infantry on a hill or in a fort etc.) the drill promotions really shine.

There's also the observation made a long time ago that unit with drill promotions tend to have full hitpoints far more often after battle, but they may die a little more often. I don't put them on my tanks too often (maybe one of every 10) but I frequently put them on gunpowder units - especially machine guns. Machine guns are collateral immune and have bonuses against gunpowder so drill promoting them is very worthwhile.

EDIT And also, with drill promotions you are more likely to get more xp from battle for the same battle odds. If you have 96% odds on a rifleman attacking a city, for example, drill promoting him instead of combat promoting means he will get 2xp instead of 1xp from battle.

 

[Balderstrom]

Yeah, I missed the part with int iModifier further down, I was thinking the STR/Damage would then get multiplied by a max of 1.0 if the tank had all the way up to Barrage III. but iModifier gives everyone 100...

	iCollateralStrength = ((((getDomainType() == DOMAIN_AIR) ? airBaseCombatStr() : baseCombatStr()) * collateralDamage()) / 100);

	if (iCollateralStrength == 0)
	{
		if (getExtraCollateralDamage() > 0)
		{
			iCollateralStrength = baseCombatStr();
		}
		if (iCollateralStrength == 0)
		{
			return;
		}
	}

And further down, instead of "int iModifier = 100;"

	int iModifier = 50;
	if (getDomainType() == DOMAIN_AIR || collateralDamage())
	{
		iModifer += 50;
	}

A Barrage 1 Tank: 70%
A Barrage 2 Tank: 100%
A Barrage 3 Tank: 150%

A Barrage 1 Siege: 120%
A Barrage 2 Siege: 150%
A Barrage 3 Siege: 200%

 

[Balderstrom]

Are people even reading this thread, DrJambo is the second or third person now to say Missiles with collateral would be interesting.

Missiles DON'T DO Collateral damage. Much to my chagrin

 

[frekk]

Well, just consider the realism aspect. How are you supposed use Trebuchets or Catapults on the deck of a Galley or Galleon? Those things are big and can't be used effectively in that situation. There wouldn't even be enough clearance in the sails of the ships for the arms of the siege units to swing freely.

Catapults were used from galleys (galleons had cannon), frequently. Galleys are rowed, so it's an easy matter to stow the sails and still be able to maneuver (sails were usually stowed during battle, anyway).

And there is another point that was never adressed, and I don't understant why: cavalry evolves only into helicopters. That's fine, but why not into tanks? In history, cavalry became both of them + sometimes air units.

I don't think any actual cavalry units ever became "air cavalry". As far as I know, all "air cavalry" units were either created new, or were revived from defunct units, or were actually transformed into infantry-based recon units prior to becoming air cavalry. Most famous example being US 7th Cavalry, which was an infantry (recon) unit through the 40s and 50s.

"Air Cavalry" was a term briefly used by the US, and unique to that country; nobody else used it, and the US doesn't use it anymore, and even in the case of the US, it was never a matter of swapping out horses for helicopters.

My 2 cents is that all cavalry should be upgradeable to tanks, because cavalry units around the world actually did swap out horses for light tanks and armoured cars. Another option is to allow cavalry to be upgraded to paratroopers ... since cavalry units which did go the cavalry-infantry recon-aircav route were never gunships, but airborne assault.

 

[DanF5771]

Missiles DO Collateral damage. They always have.

uhh, my CIV4UnitInfos.xml says:
<Type>UNIT_GUIDED_MISSILE</Type>
<iCollateralDamage>0</iCollateralDamage>
and they certainly can not be promoted to BarrageX, so?

 

[Wodan]

2) It is unrealistic.

And I don&#8217;t see what is unrealistic about tanks doing col dam. I admit I am NO munitions expert but I will bet ya a nickel if a guy standing say 10 feet next to you gets hit with a tank shell you would be &#8220;damaged&#8221; a lil bit too . The realism argument would also mean chok ko nus shouldn&#8217;t be given col dam either. I mean if an exploding tank shell shouldn&#8217;t do it realistically neither should a crossbow right?

Actually, it's unrealistic to not allow tanks collateral damage.

In military terms, "collateral damage" means doing damage to other than the intended target. In CIV terms, it simply means doing damage to multiple targets. In real life, this is usually accomplished either by using explosives, cannister, or grazing fire (or richochets).

Without a doubt, a tank can load an explosive round. It can also load a cannister round. It can also do grazing fire.

Here is a whole list of modern tank munitions. Most are explosive. Here's a zoom in on the cannister one; page down and take a look at all the ball bearings and imagine shooting that at stacked infantry units. That's exactly what collateral damage is in CIV.

3) Not allowing barrage armored tanks encourages combined arms.

My answer is this argument might be valid IF tanks were so overpowered you could get away with building ONLY barrage tanks.

Personally I find that barrage tanks end up being underpowered vs the hard targets. It's necessary to have the first few have bonuses that increase combat odds to take out the strongest defenders. Once you get past that, then you're into the "soft underbelly" where collateral damage is really useful.

The collateral damage doesn't even change anything. It doesn't mean you win more battles, it just means your barrage tanks come out of the battle with more health.

So I tend to have a mix of combat/CR and barrage tanks. The combat/CR tanks hit the first 2-3 defenders in each city. Then the barrage tanks clean up the weaker defenders. So, if there are 8 defenders, I need 2-3 combat tanks and 5-6 barrage tanks. The combat/CR tanks then have to rest and heal, while the barrage can go on to the next target. In practice this means I need about equal numbers of combat, CR, and barrage tanks.

4) A more specific argument to number 3. Eliminating barrage would encourage use of less used units like mobile artillery.

Personally I don't see mobile artillery as an option. It comes too late. That leaves normal artillery and bombers. Artillery may be useful in some few circumstances, but if I'm going to limit myself to 1-move units I'll use those CRIII infantry I have sitting around and not use tanks at all. Bombers won't really substitute for barrange tanks because of how the barrage tanks end up getting used (see above).

5) This is a patch NOT a mod and allowing barage would go into realm of mod.

That argument is dragged out every time there's discussion on patches. Frankly, it's ludicrous.

While in some sense it's seemingly logical that there is a baseline that is established by any "official" patch (that's why so many people have been clamoring to have the official patch for the past 6 months), it's also true that even the smallest change diverges from the baseline. Even a minor tweak to AI actions can have a huge impact on games. Much more than whether tanks get barrage or not.

Wodan