Paratrooper Beta Feedback

What would the SBDE be on paras?

SBDE would be a concern after you build many, which - my guess - will not happen any time soon in a regular game.

Research that would go before researching paratroopers, would be ACs, artillery & SPA, AA & SPAA, Fighters & Tactical bombers, and possibly missiles (at least need level 3).
Only when these are already at their maximum achievable levels, I would divert the resources and a research slot to paratroopers.

Assessment of paratroopers:

I am producing paratroopers with production orders in HC waiting list.
Production takes place in a city with level 5 factory + barracks (max. production speed)
Per unit produced, it takes 21hrs and 20min, with no time lost between productions due to HC wait-list.

After several days, I know have 4 units, which are level 2, but soon going level 3.

Being Yugo on that map, the range hardly suffices to cross the Adriatic into Italy. Italian positions reachable all have AA and multiple units. In short a definite no-go for the para's, since they are way to costly in resources and time to risk on such an attack.

Contemplating a useful deployment, I have decided to attack Greece and use the para's to take Iraklion.
However, at level 2, I cannot reach Iraklion. Not even if I had an airfield at Sparta...

So how is this going to go?
I will blast the Greek troops with artillery and tactical bombardments to bits.
Within hours my fast troops will take all of Greece, except Athens, which I want to take last.
Oops....Iraklion...
Let's bring in the paras to take Iraklion and then finish this little war before reset by taking Athens (assuming by now my para's are level 3 and can reach Iraklion).
Ouch....
No airfield in Sparta...

Have to build an airfield first after taking Sparta = 18hrs wait time (or at least 9:00hrs to 50%)
Fly paras there = ... errr.... lets assume I built more air fields on the way to reach Sparta, some 3 extra stops? = say another hour fly time with long refueling stops because no airfield is yet at 100% = totalling 2-3hrs to get to Sparta.

So, with with almost 4 days pent on producing the paras (resources+time), and some 20hrs (or 12hrs at 50% air field capacity) later for 3 extra airfields built (resources+time) , the paras take off to Iraklion, which is defended by 1 inf.
They beat the inf (with losses?), take Iraklion and ... finally... I can take Athens...

Wait... that can hardly be done in a day!

Isn't it way faster to take that small AI country by:
1. pre-war ship 3 ACs over there and invade Iraklion at war start
2. bombard and speed march my way through the rest of Greece
3. and end the war in Athens?
All well within 24hrs btw...

Dumb question... Oh, it was a rethorical one?

But: Yes! The latter is way faster, cheaper, more efficient and can all be done within 24hrs, never incurring the 5% malus for the war, while cashing the 10% moral bonus. Much much much faster, cheaper & efficient than with paratroopers that even need to go level 3 first to make it possible.

IMO:
Para's need a lot of work to become a useful unit, starting with range & research effort adjustments and reducing production time & costs. Balancing of fighting values can follow later.

If not, they will go the way of nuclear weapons: lots of lesser players spent way too much on their development and by the time they are almost there, their only problem is that they no longer have a country.

As it is: I will not be building paras in a regular game, unless somewhere at the end. Like I sometimes produce nukes to clean up faster, while raking in the missing points for victory on a big map.

Nevertheless, I love the idea of the unit and want to see it become a useful one!

I just submitted a bug report. I went to rebuild my capital in the city where I have been gearing up for paras (level 3 Airport and Barracks), and received an error message and the game will not allow me to move my capital. Hopefully they can fix the bug before I leave for work tomorrow so I can kick off Capital movement as the para's are in the research cooker.

I agree with _Pontus_, and would like to add, That paratroopers could help the game get more gold. In return, helping game makers make more improvements.

Very disappointing, all the barracks and airbases are upgraded and there is a bug that will not allow me to move my capital. Unless they fix the move capital bug, I will be a week away before my current capital city will have everything for the build.

To add insult I received a survey today asking how I like them, and most of the required questions can't be answered as I can't move the Capital. sigh

I had researched paratroopers and built one. Without using gold, it took me eleven game days. They don't seem to be transportable on an aircraft carrier. I come back today and all my research is gone; I need to do it again. I know this is a beta game environment, so that is not a problem.
What I have learned:
1. I probably will not use the paratrooper. It is too expensive, resource and time wise.
2. Developing and using paratroopers will generate a fair amount of income for Bytro. That is the goal of this whole game. It has to sustain itself. I'm not a big gold user, but I do understand business.
3. Because of the ever changing game environment, I wish the games a FP plays were unrated (e.g. the stats do not count). It can skew the numbers. It was my understanding, in a beta testing world, you would want the testers to do things above and beyond the standard game play. Push the envelope, so to speak. We can't do that and maintain the respectability of the stats.

You can certainly create a game with Frontline Pioneer features enabled and with Anti Cheat disabled which would make the game unranked.


Part of the paratrooper testing is to see how they perform in the real world, not just in the laboratory.

Yep, I just found the same thing. Need to do the research all over again.

Capital problem either got solved or did not exist on mobile devices. I was able to build with my mobile device, but have not retried on PC.

What I found is that I built level 1 paratroopers and kept developing but it did not upgrade the level 1 to level 2 so I have two groups of them in the city.

The problem is they are also one use. The only use I was able to make was an invasion of Denmark's two islands otherwise they are fairly a waste of resources and time. Better to use your capital to make Commandos unless you want to take over Denmark.

Wow, quite a set of boosts.... I hope you're not overdoing it! Range is the most worrying of those...

You should also require one to research the airplane. It is comical that you can build a paratrooper and never know how to build a plane.

Game Id 2671716
Game name Paratrooper test

Map, Europe road to war

After a successful paratrooper test from London to Brest via Plymouth, captured Brest with no problems.

Today the game won't load up - 404 not found

Correction, It's working again.

The 404 error is back for this game.

There are intermmittent beta issues today. It should now work properly again, let us know if you are still having issues.

Note there is now a loop in Beta. I went to load and received the "we just improved the game, reload....." and every time I reload it tells me the game has just been improved and to reload.