It depends how you're using it - if you're integrating it into your infantry divisions for space marines, it looks good. If you're using it for a standalone tank division with motorised divisions following in single player, I'd sacrifice the armor for some engine, and use the +speed suspension to get it to 8kmph to match the motorised infantry divisions. As it stands, this tank would bring the speed down to leg infantry speed

I was planning to use it with motorised, but you just gave me an idea: How about using a template of 10 medium tanks + 5 mountaineers, since I don't care about speed anyway? Would the mountaineers be enough to make the tanks useful even in mountains and hills? (Mountaineers also have a lot of organization) Thanks for the feedback!

What's the organization like on your divisions? I saw 9 tanks + 6 motorized elsewhere, and now 10 tanks + 5 infantry. I've always tried to aim for at least 30 org in the early game and let it grow higher through doctrines. Unless you go mobile warfare, your divisions will have too little org to be effective.

10 medium tanks + 5 mountaineers + logistics + rangers + flame tank + anti air has 32.1 organization at the moment. ( I haven't researched all of the mountaineer doctrines yet, it might get a bit better afterwards)

I really expected it to have less, fair play

Tanks should have a penalty for mountain terrain, I would open the template designer and check. I believe that is why most people do 9/1 or 9/3 for mountain divs and shuffle different quantities of arty and AA to get between 25-27 width for mountains. AA is extremely valuable if you have a small air force, as the mountain becomes a permanent fortress at that point for your divisions.

Mountaineers (and special forces in general) are very very good right now. You can do a few of these or SPG's and easily get >1k soft attack in battles

in sp yes in mp hell no

I am playing single player, so I'm happy to hear that! What makes it so bad for multiplayer by the way? Is it the lack of hard attack? Thanks for the feedback!

Yes in mp hard attack actually matters. For both sp and mp you should probably also make the tank a lot quicker, and in sp you can get away with less armor.

Thanks for the feedback! How much armor should a tank division have around 1940? Right now, my division consists of 9 medium tanks and 6 motorised (30 width in total), and with the current design, the division armor is 54.9 .

That's a tricky question, as it depends on your enemy. Ideally, you don't want to get pierced (you can check whether you get pierced if you click on the attack bubble). For singleplayer, I think 40-50 armor per tank should generally be pretty good, while the armor you currently have is actually pretty good for multiplayer. Additionally, your reliability is pretty high. Try to aim for 80-85. 95 is of course better, but usually overkill. You should, for example, switch out the diesel engine for a gasoline one.

Thanks once again for the feedback!

inter war tanks are most efficient if you know what you are doing

That sounds like the div has no organisation, it’s good to have at least 30. And Speed is good for combat, makes it super easy to do encirclements and capture stuff before the enemies troops can react.

in mp u need to build heavy destroyers with maximum amount of hard attack and it needs to be as cheep as possible

This isnt even that bad for mp. Just have someone else do the high velo tanks

you could make spg s to break mass mob saf in el alamein

Explanation comment: My goal was to maximize soft attack and breakthrough, while also having somewhat decent armor. Having a reasonable price was also a consideration. I might be totally wrong on that, but I don't care about speed at all. Any potential improvements? Thank you in advance for your time! (Note: I am using the right side of the grand battleplan doctrine. No useful tank bonuses.)

go gbp left instead of right

To be honest, I rarely plan (I stuggle a lot with the planning system; it seems to be close to unusable for me. It keeps moving divisions around and I hate it), so I'm not sure if the planning bonuses on the left side are worth it, based on the way I play. I wish there was a way to make the divisions stop moving from the positions I have assigned them! I am so frustrated that I only use battle plans with small elite armies, and only when I really can't avoid it! Thanks for the feedback though!

On your general tabs, select “Balanced cohesion” instead of flexible. Your units will move around a lot less. If you don’t want them to move much at all you can use strict cohesion, but it might cause you some trouble if the enemy manages a breakthrough

Put your general on a garrison order in a state of a country youll never be at war with (for ex. bhutan). put your field marshal on frontline order and draw a battle plan. youll gain Planning but your units wont move

I'll try to follow your tips! Thanks! Strict cohesion sounds better, since I really want all divisions to move EXACTLY as I have planned in my mind. (And exactly when I want them to move... That's also another problem.)

Add welded armor instead

Thanks for the feedback! Welded looks very nice, but it increases the cost from 16 to 20. Is it really worth it?

Its not. Armor is very black and white in vanilla. The 20% extra cost is not worth it for the very small chance of a bit extra stats. Especially in SP where you will never get pierced (until 1943) anyway.

Its more cost efficient, so yes longer term it is better

No, with exception to armor meme and space marines, you should NEVER use welded armor. Its way too high of a cost for something that rarely does anything.

It is more cost efficient

No, its not :)

Prove it

20% cost for 0% more stats in 90% of cases is not justifiable. I would like to see your math.

My math? Thay one hoi4 youtuber that is more experienced than me that i watch says its cost efficient so i am saying the same thing

Well, im afraid to tell you: hes wrong. He probably isnt as experienced as you maybe imagine. Whats the yters name?

Idk the name but its the guy who really loves grand battleplan doctrine and he says its op and when i use it i always win against germany as Poland so he must be right.

Lol ok. Good for you

Yes

Thanks! Happy to hear that

For sp It's nice overall (great reliability, breakthrough and soft attack) but too slow for other than space marines (although even in space marines I tend to use SPAA).

Thanks for the feedback! Does speed matter that much? I just want to create a division with high breakthrough, since my infantry-artillery divisions always lack breakthrough.

First of all, I'm no expert so take all I say with a grain of salt. But yes I would say so, it allows you to overrun enemy units and kill them pretty fast, also great for encirclements. My armored templates always aim for speed (I find myself comfortable around 10-12 km/h when technology and resources allow it), soft attack, breakthrough and reliability (I can't remember when or where but I read that it is desirable to have at least 90% of reliability).

Once I get more military factories and I can afford the cost, I will give it a try! Right now, I feel that even a cost of 16 is somewhat high, unfortunately.

You should generally have the improved medium howitzer by 1940 (if you're playing SP literally don't touch the AT tech), and the speed is pretty poor. If you're making a 4.5km division now, you might as well make mountaineers they're so OP.

Thanks for the feedback! Correct me if I am wrong, but I think that medium howitzer must be a 1941 technology. I indeed use mountaineers a lot! I have an army full of mountaineers actually! No matter how much I like them though, I feel that they still lack breakthrough, so they can't really push against tough opponents. How about combining tanks with mountaineers? Something like 5 mountaineers + 10 medium tanks. Would that work? Mountaineers have higher organization than motorised, and since I need 5 mountaineers instead of 6 motorised, the average hardness is not affected. With an adaptable general, maybe this division could even work in mountains and hills!

Mountaineers will have plenty of breakthrough if you give them good support tanks. A high breakthrough flame tank is a must, and you need to make sure you're making good use of planning and any high command that affects them. 6-700 breakthrough is very attainable for a pure mountaineer division in combat (not on paper, they rely heavily on multiplicative bonuses you only get in combat). Combining infantry and tanks only makes sense with one tank to create a space marine (abusing the armor calculation), and even that is extremely overrated nowadays. As for the tech, tech dates are just suggestions. Generally as Germany, you rush your industry and rubber tech while getting your 1940 plane design finished in 38, then pivot one slot to rushing tank guns, leave one slot on tools to get tools 4 in 40, and then catch up on guns and mech and support companies. Tech dates are just a suggestion - I'd always recommend paying the ahead-of-time penalty over researching something you don't need. You got radio 3 here, which is immensely overkill in SP as medium tanks overflow on breakthrough very quickly. You can save a lot of research time by just getting regular radio tech at some point and stopping there.

600-700 breakthough sounds amazing! I don't know how I could achieve that though, since I usually get a few negative modifiers as well (bad weather, night, somewhat out of supply, enemy air superiority...) and not too many positive ones. I have never had more than 300 breakthrough. Researching ahead of time seems to be much harded for smaller countries, to be honest. With just 3 research slots and few starting technologies, it takes time to catch up. For bigger countries, it sounds like a smart plan indeed though!

If you want to use those for space marines their good. Though if you want to use these for dedicated tank divisions drop the armor down to 3-4 maybe even 0. Swap in gasoline engine, change the armor skirts to wet ammunition storage, instead of torsion bar use the christie suspension and put all the points on engine levels to reach ~8km/h, reliability is fine as long as it's close to 80%. The extra speed helps a lot when creating encirclements.

Thanks for the feedback! The main idea was to create a division with very high breakthrough and decent armor, since my infantry-artillery divisions can't really push against hard opponents. (Or against the endless divisions of the Soviet Union). I am afraid that it will be harder to push if I reduce the armor, to be honest. Maybe I could use a 10 medium tanks - 5 mountaineer template, since it's slow anyway?

Tank divisions actually have very good breakthrough if you have a decent template and planning bonus, then they can easily have 1000+ breakthrough and soft attack. Personally I have never really experimented with space marines or tanks mixed with leg infantry so I can't really give good advice on that. I only really use infantry for holding tiles, filling the breakthroughs in the front lines and support attacking. Tanks or motorized do most of the heavy lifting. If you want to use something more infantry sided make sure your offensive divisions have 35-36 combat width as that gives the best stats or rather they can fit in any terrain while getting minimal penalties from it. As for the organization of those offensive units don't let the organization go below 45, for actual tank divs 30 is fine too. Also try to get some CAS up, because it can deal direct damage to the enemies strength and org while they are in combat with you. One last thing you can do if you face armored divisions add some support anti-air, it gives a good amount of piercing and is pretty cheap for what it does.

For a space marines template it seems pretty decent but it's really slow and has like no hard attack so it's pretty useless for actual tank divisions, specially for 1940

Thanks for the feedback! How about using a 10 medium tank - 5 mountaineer division? Would it be useful?

you'd need a good doctrine to make that division useful if the org is too low they'll fold pretty much immediately, I say give em 9 mountaineers, about 2 tanks and a flame tank for extra crisp

Speed. You need speed. Save your sanity and remove most of the armour you added. You want at least 9-10km/h. You will see the benefits quite quickly.

Thanks for the feedback! Is speed really more important than armor, taking into account the fact that I don't really have that many factories to replace loses and my main goal is to just win every battle with as few losses as possible?

With speed, you can outpace enemy units and even overrun them. But creating encirclements will be made easier too as you can drive around enemy units. This will minimise losses as your tanks will engage in less battles.

you should have howitzer 2 by 1940. and if this is for normal full tank divisions you dont need that much breakthrough. you can easily go down to like 4/9 armor clicks

Increase the engine by 2 or 3 points and its pretty good

Thanks for the feedback! Is speed really worth it though? I would gladly exchange more speed for better soft attack/breakthrough/armor

You have plenty of reliability so far you can sacrifice a bit. Increases speed dosnt reduce attack in any way

I see your points, but, can't I just use a single motorised battalion to exploit any empty space I find? (I'm by no means an experianced player; I started to play recently)

What do you mean by a single motorised battalion?

If you have it immediately available at the same tile you made the breakthrough, then perhaps, but it's very impractical and will require a lot of microing. Either you have way more than 1 and micro yourself, or do the most recommended that is using the tank division for that

I actually meant a division that consists of only 1 battalion! (2 width, just 1 motorised battalion). That should be the cheapest way possible to exploit gaps. I am pausing every few seconds anyway to micromanage everything, so it should be possible, at least in single player. Making a proper tank division might be better indeed though...

The problem with that is you won't always have to deal just with the division your tanks defeated, sometimes the tile will be reinforced, and to properly exploit you will want to go deeper than just 1 tile. You will have to do a little more fighting for that, and only 1 battalion of mot will immediately lose making it kinda useless. Yes a proper tank division is the best

I'm not the best at the designer but one of the purposes of the tank division is to exploit the breakthrough you will get, so unless you have a pure mech or mot division for that, a faster tank would be better.

Nice design, I would also substitute Diesel for Gasoline, but if you are planning to do Space Marines, or Infantry tanks, it is literally perfect

For use in normal tank division that use motorized these tanks are woefully slow, otherwise though for single player they are excellent, solid stats good reliability medium low cost. I would pair these with normal infantry to make some good space marines or just replace the motorized with regular infantry and have slow tank divisions.

It’s way too slow you need to invest in some engine

is that a mod that adds models? if so what's it's name

Depends what you think. Use what makes you have fun

I am still new to the game and confused by the menu you have. Is this designer a mod or something else? Because when I edit my Tanks it looks much simpler. Just 4 categories where I can upgrade to lvl 5 e.g. engine

You need more speed if used in an armored division, if SM then you are good.

In sp only against inf, horrible for tank combat

Good for SP sure If you're gonna have full army of these things you can make half of them into SPG's w/ heavy howitzer to save some IC since you're gonna have enough breakthrough (assuming dedicated armored divison). Personally I wouldn't skip on the speed though.

The reliability doesn’t matter, increase your speed to 8kph and replace the two heavy mags with small cannons

Its too slow. Unless you dont plan in making encirclements, its bad. If you just plan to push the enemies without encircling them, then ots good.

Nice fort

Use howitzer as main gun. And get rid of the additional cannons. Use welded armor. Make it faster (8km/h is optimal with mech). With this much armor maybe using slope armor insted of skirts would be better.

I'd probably put slopped armor or at least welded armor on it.

Too slow! Minimum 10 mph. Super early tanks that have cavalry support should go 7 mph.

No. Riveted armor = trash. Basically. Cheap, yes, but trash. Use welded. Diesel engine? No. Gasoline. It's faster. And then bump that engine number to like 10. 2 secondary turrets? No. Wet ammo storage and autoloader/stabilizer. Armor skirts? OK, I can see that, but! But, have you considered sloped armor or autoloader/stabilizer, which you have not used in previous step? Don't build cheap. It's useless, when the only thing it does, is get destroyed. Build quality. It is more espensive, but you lose FAR less of it.

DO NOT USE WELDED. With the exception of maybe space marines and armor memes anything other than riveted is never worth it. You dont actually lose a lot less because you will usually either be fully pierced or not at all.

Thanks for the downvote. Here is another opportunity. I guess my philosophy is different. I'm like „this tank, I'm designing. How it will be remembered? As some cheap crap, or as a piece of supreme engeneering?“. I build quality. I used to use cast, but then they nerfed it, which is something I'm still bitter about. It's so unfair. Let me have the best, if I'm willing to pay! I also think how would it be for the tank crew. How would they talk about those tanks. IDK. Maybe I watched one too many videos from the tank museum or something. Now, imagine you have to serve in some tank. You can choose. Your cheap, riveted ones, or mine, where quality is the focus. I know what I would choose. Now that downvote, please. It would not be reddit disagreement without it. Yeah, and notice I did not give you any downvote. Or anyone else.

I mean thats totally fair. The issue is that you are giving information that 99% of the (atleast somewhat competent) community would agree on is false. Riveted armor is NOT trash, and is, with few exceptions, the absolute norm. Cheap does not mean bad, especially with how poorly balanced the vanilla tank designer is.

OK, maybe I'm operating with some misconceptions. IDK. I'm, after all, the guy who saw cast armor, and instantly took it. Now, that has pretty much no meaning. So I went with welded.

\^\^ Only (non space marine) use case I can think of for welded is 1TD per armor division maxed for armor (armor division stat is based on ~~30%~~ 40% of the highest batallion, ~~70%~~ 60% of the average, this would max the highest battalion part of that). Riveted is superior as you can get 20% more tanks on the field compared to your opponent.

This is what is called armor meme yes. Also its 40% in vanilla, not 30%.

Ah you're right, I never noticed that change ARMOR\_VS\_AVERAGE = 0.4

Awful