Advance Wars Unit Analysis: Artillery
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Advance Wars Unit Analysis: Artillery
Welcome to my new series where I analyze units from Advance Wars. In this installment, I will be taking a look at artillery.
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As a kid I treated indirects as sacred and refused to allow one to take damage ever. I didn't understand the concept of unit cost
I'm sure the artillery men are thankful.
St. Barbara would be proud lol
At the very least, with the right tactics could actually be annoying against Md Tanks.
I still do that! Though I also don't think of things in terms of unit cost, just in how much damage they can do to other things. On high economy maps, I tend to spam battleships, lol! Probably get completely wrecked if I ever tried competitive play though, but I am a PVE guy.
I did the same thing when I played Command and Conquer...unless they were Prism Tanks. Those monsters destroyed everything on the ground provided you had enough of them.
I like to think of artillery units like knights in chess. They dont have the range of the other units like bishops and rooks, but they can sit in these nice spots and just deny unit/piece movement. You need to learn maneuvering to master them, but once you do, theyre deadly
That's surprisingly fitting considering, if you extend the analogy to make tanks bishops, they're similar in value with the bishop being slightly more valuable than the knight, even though the relative values are dependent on board position
I see them as the dragqueens of chess. With the rockets, being the diva :p :D
The one major thing to watch out for with DoR/DC's Artilleries is that they actually have a Vision range of 3, meaning they need almost zero spotting support for them to be effective in FoW.
With fog on properties, it became a lot easier to hide units regardless of vision though.
@@TheEmperorGulcasa including indirects. Which you can now have concealed and on propertys repairing/resupplying them.
@@TheEmperorGulcasa On the other hand scouting is easier since you can just run through an area to reveal it, or use a flare.
i do find funny that most indirects have no vision despite the animation showing they have a spotter.
@@ViridianVictoria while thats true YOU DO ALSO LOSE ACCESS TO something mangs DOES ALOT aka RESET SCUMMING where you deliberatly aim to trap a unit to reveal another unit thats something you cannot do in DOR/DC
"Artillery adds dignity, to what would otherwise be an ugly brawl" Frederick the Great, king of Germany
Well, that is one of the most heartless and appalling quotes of ever read
@@MrBoooooring Not really. He wasn't saying that men being blown up by artillery is dignified. It's more about what all goes in to properly utilizing artillery. A rifleman (or in Frederick's day a musketeer) and an artilleryman are both killing people. But only one of them is doing math to kill people.
And, at the time the quote is from, the alternative was waves of infantry massacring one another in a slow, grinding slugfest where the victor would largely be determined by which side had more young men to sacrifice. Artillery didn't completely eliminate that, or at least not at that time. But it did at least push people much harder towards trying to minimize the amount of time spent in that state. Frederick himself once won a battle against a force twice his size with most of his infantry never even firing their weapons by outmaneuvering his opponents. Now that wasn't all because of artillery, people were laying traps like that back when they were still using sticks and rocks. What artillery did was make that mindset essentially non-negotiable if you wanted to succeed. It's one of the primary reasons unga bunga human wave attacks went from being decently successful and popular throughout much of history to being considered insane.
Also, we're talking about Frederick the Great not Douglas Haig. The man personally led his troops. He had horses shot out from under him. This wasn't from a guy sipping tea while listening to cannons off in the distance. It's from someone who was out there rolling the dice on whether or not a lucky cannonball was going to tear him in half that day. So "heartless and appalling" is definitely missing the mark.
@@Kidneyjoe42 or you do what the swedish did and have a highly professional army that will charge the enemy and rout them while being outnumbered 3 to 1.
I'm rated 1250 and build more artillery than most of my peers. I agree that they have a high skill ceiling. I'll be the first to admit the times you build them are situational though. On open maps and in fog I build them a bit less. I also just personally don't like all out tank spam, just not as interesting to me. Artillery do great things like threaten lone bases by shelling them continuously, and they're a very strong punish if you can force the issue (e.g. start an hq cap and smack the cap interrupter with an artillery). Overall I agree with your assessment, although I have no idea which good players would think arties are categorically bad.
Situational doesn't necessarily mean bad! Anti-air are also situational, but I bet you'd be hard pressed to find someone saying they're bad...
Anyway just to add to what you said
@@gogobrasil7185 Situational is bad only when said situation are extremely rare: Anti-Air are situational in the sense that they are better used to counter air units and footsoldiers, which are common enough to be a pretty good response to them.
Missiles can one shot almost every air unit, but their range and movement is so piss poor given what they are against, they are only good to zone out a specific areas with a good set up, against some specific CO or with some specific ones (Against Eagle a missile can be a good investment to keep certain zones locked and Grit can greatly use its vision to direct the fire of other indirects of his)
Artillery are the middle ground: there are common enough situations you may want to build them but not enough they are staple of every match like Anti-Air: that's why I think they are average units, which is not good, because as Mangs stated again and again, being average in Advance Wars is bad
Artillery are one of the best units imo, you need to protect them and position them properly but even the presence of artillery will help caps/pushes
I think it's also because of the maps usually played. They are way more open than the maps Advance wars was originally designed for. In more closed off maps with lots of choke-points, forest in annoying locations and mountain ranges that create all kinds of locations hard to get to artillery can be absolutely devastating.
Their big advantage in rougher terrain is that multiple ones can shoot at a target without having to touch it.
The artillery works differently in the fog of war/non-fog of war maps.
1) In the Fog of War it's an ambush unit.
2) In the Non-Fog of War it's a territory control unit.
3) And of course, if your name is Grit, it's a versatile both offensive AND defensive unit - just keep your indirects clustered together, add some "meat-shield" infantry and you're good to go.
Actualy mechs can attack before an ennemy artilery attack, it's when they attack Max artilery :D
And on AWBW where the map has black tiles.
If someone has a Max Artillery they deserve to lose their unit to a Mech lol
@@sfs2040 Wella ctualy in FOW that can be a good tactic because nobody expect a Max to use indirects, so having your medium tank attacked by an artilery is pretty surprising.
@@sfs2040
They actually aren't completely trash, I've had to use them a few times in the campaign when in a corridor. Better to do some extra damage than have units sitting around doing nothing. . . Would absolutely never build rockets or missiles with him though.
Artillery: I brought someone with binoculars!
Also artillery: I can't see shit!
Artillery are great, they have a very high skill floor, like I remember when I started to play I was so bad at using them, it took me quite a while to figure them out but when used correctly they are a good unit
One of the things with artillery is that you have to be kind of disciplined when you use them, they are extremely good at controlling a certain area, but what this means is you have to play around that, like you can't just build an artillery, position at in back and then decide all of a sudden to move all your tanks forward outside of its protection range.
From my experience the best way to use it is initially to defend your territory (building one can mean you're a tank down, so you have to start on the defensive) then if there's no threat you slowly push forward, with support from the direct units and infantry blocking, patience is key.
One of the most frustrating parts of playing against artillery, and something you have to keep in mind when you use it, is that it only costs 6,000 so even if you're able to break through and hit it sometimes it's not worth it at all.
I have won games before because I have allowed my opponent to hit/kill my artillery and then absolutely destroyed them on the counter-attack with direct units I held back outside enemy range.
In fact if you want an example of this, you can watch mangs' analysis of my first match versus him when I use Drake and I exposed some of my artillery and counter-attacked with my healthy tanks after he went in.
Honestly I just love how deep this unit is, and I have improved in using them so much and I expect to continue to improve because whenever you think you figured it out there's always some way to use it better.
Basically no unit is truly "trash" - there are always the situations where every unit has a use - some more niche than others, but still.
One thing to note about artillery is that this is also your first truly "ranged" unit - infantry, mechs, tanks, recon - they all engage only at "melee" range - only adjacent units.
Arty - can fire at distance and this is what matters - arty is a force multiplier unit. Say, you have a chokepoint, where only one of your unit can attack? Arty or rocket is the solution.
With adjacent range, you can attack only 4 times with a perfect surround. With arty, such limitations are diminished.
In a blob situation - units at the back are functionally useless - indirects allow you to basically engage with more units at the time, if positioned well enough.
cruisers before DoR be like:
Missiles be like : and rocket in some situation...
Mangs! I'm shocked, you didn't talk about the giga brain strategy of max artillery. A truly devastating surprise to any enemy CO.
I'd like to see Rockets next, they're an even more polarizing version of Artillery in that they're harder to position, way more of an investment (so disastrous if played badly) but potentially extremely crippling when placed well.
I think he did make a video on Rockets
@@ShotgunRocket missles, not rockets
Rockets costly, bad mobility, supply, surely artillery much better
@@richard35791
I think that depends.
When using Grit Rockets are god like with good positioning. Like covering choke points you’re holding with multiple infantry units in a file or maybe a tank if the economy is high.
They’re also useful in FOW to me when you have good sight coverage (recons hidden in forests at key traversal points and battle copters doing Intel work).
I adore using artillery and having infantry as a meatshield for them. But I've noticed as well that the maps I tend to play are more cramped than the ones people usually play in AWBW.
Spotted the Grit player.
@@lancelindlelee7256 I use artillery with max; put one behind a md tank and you will win most engagements with land units
@@LopsidedMoz that's so costly, artillery infantry combo far more cost effective
@@LopsidedMoz
That’s a very expensive strategy.
MT is 16,000 with a 6,000 Arty.
On a high economy map that makes some sense. But awfully risky on normal economy maps.
I really like artillery. Very powerful when used right, but easily countered if you are sloppy. It is very favorable to maps with chokes and terrain, though. Not nearly as useful without fog and in open fields. A lot of the AW campaign maps and premade maps are pretty favorable to this, but a lot of AWBW competitive maps are very open and about controlling a wide and flowing front line, which isn't favorable to artillery at all.
Another great thing is that you won't get counterattacked.
My favorite unit in advance wars.
I used to make tons of them when i was a kid against the AI, on AWBW i don't think they are that good for most settings but on maps with a lot of terrain and more turns to play they can be extremely cost effective, also they are a must for fog of war.
Yup, choosing Grit whenever possible and spamming Artillery is how I got through the campaigns of the first two games
I still think that they're excellent. You get to harm an opponent without taking damage back, and you can strike the same spot more times than with melee-only units. As long as the unit in front of the artillery is tanky enough, the artillery gets another turn to deal damage to the front line, which is quite amazing considering it's "effective against everything".
Even in real life, most casualties in large open wars are by artillery (more than everything else combined). I think that with the low price and high damage potential, AW did well when designing this unit.
VS the AI I tend to spam battleships as Grit, lol! Think I've had like 15 battleships at the end of a war room match before! When it doubt, the answer is always MORE BATTLESHIP!!!
The artillery.
Excellent unit in the early game, for choke point control. Put an infantry in front and you can develop your capture game with ease.
It is also am excellent deterrent for engagements. For example, you and your opponent have 14000g funds and the foe chooses to go with tanks.
You can go with 2 tanks or, one tank one artillery and 1 infantry.
If it is in a choke point, the 2 tanks set up has a 50% chance of winning. Provided who hits first. But the tank artillery and infantry will always win if you put the infantry in front the artillery, if the enemy dares to attack the infantry will be heavily damaged, but next turn you fire the artillery, then finish off with a tank.
A normal person knows this and will try to either bring more directs to break through or bring a rocket to zone the enemy.
In DoR they received a major buff in their vision, as they see everything in its range. And there are more hiding places, including cities, bases and ruins. Of course, they need to be paired with a a flare unit to reveal those spots.
Treat these as your support units not as a main unit.
funny story about artillery and indirect units as a whole for me.
When I was a wee child, and also an idiot who could never get past mission 5 or so of any advance wars games, I never used Artillery and thought they were the most useless unit in the game.
"They have range, but they can't move and attack in the same turn? How USELESS!!!"
As a result, I actually thought Max to be a top tier CO for the longest time. "His indirects are weaker but everyone else is stronger!? I see no downsides here."
Nowadays I can't go a fight without getting at least 1 of them because holy crap they're really good and useful!!! They essentially are used in making "No u" zones and it's amazing.
He technically was in AW1 😂
I think it is worth mentioning that Jake's CO powers increase his artillery's range as well.
Artilerys our beloved balista of advance wars
Orange Star Artillery is M109 Paladin.
Blue Moon is the Hummel.
That's all.
Either way, Green Earth Artillery looks good.
I highly doubt blue moon is Hummel given they are soviets.
@@madogthefirst Using that logic, then Green Earth's Battle Copter is not the Hind because it is Russian and Green Earth is Germany.
@@JuanMatteoReal If they updated the artillery unit models then it should be
Orange Star: M109 Paladin
Green Earth: Panzerhaubitze 2000
Yellow Comet: Type 75 155 mm self-propelled howitzer
Blue Moon: 2S3 Akatsiya
Black Hole: Some futuristic SPG based on concept art
It has always been my favorite unit just because of the open fire animation and sound effects (in Dual Strike), so satifying to just send fire and see the destruction on foe's army.
Also the little binoculars' guy (during the animation) is just to funny to seen especially when all the units have been destroyed. I always wondered we he goes when it happens.
Artillery is one of my favorite units. (Probably cuz I am a Grit main)
If they get to shoot a tank or something more expensive, they earn themselves. If they get shot, you lose 6000 funds.
Interesting facts:
A normal artillery can shoot on 20 squares whereas a Grit artillery can shoot on 36 squares. They have 80% more range and 20% more firepower making them almoat twice as good.
A normal artillery only has one vision, so in fow it must be assisted by other units to fire but Sonja artilleries have 2 vision making them semi self sufficient. And when she uses any of her powers, her artilleries get 3 vision and can see into forests and reefs, making them self sufficient and allowing them to shoot without any assistance.
My 2 favorite uses for artillery:
1: softening up properties so that i can keep my infantry on full health
2: escorting md tanks so that they are less susceptible to enemy md tank attacks
Since MD tank cannot one shot infantry, just guard artillery with infantry, cost effective
14:39
"Anti-Air deal a surprising amount of damage to Anti-Air."
- Egg, 2021
I'm no pro at the game, but I think a huge chunk of people don't understand this unit. The artillery is NOT meant to go out and shoot things every turn. In fact, it's absolutely possible that your artillery won't shoot a single time in the entire match (probably why people say it's "garbage"). The artillery isn't even supposed to shoot, ironically enough. It's supposed to PREVENT the enemy from walking into its range. All the tiles your artillery covers, are YOURS (as long as you protect it).
Hell, you can even use it as a decoy for enemy tanks, since it's cheaper.
A good artillery unit can change the mood of the match completely. For only 6k.
They are really hard to use, but they're also really rewarding if you get to shoot with them.
I've found that having 2 next to each other makes it easier to be aggressive with them because one can take the hit and the other can shoot in retaliation.
"Uploaded 6 minutes ago"
Helllllll yeah.
Artillery is such a nice trap unit in fow, i always use a nice bait such as a crippled unit near a hiding arty and just watch a prey comes to finish it off only to get rekt
These guides are really quite helpful! If you run out of content, you could do some CO analysis beyond your tierlists in a similar style to these, as a more in depth look at each CO would be a good way to help newer players choose a main!
Watching voiceofakasha's ultra high MMR replay analyses, there's usually lots of artillery, so I'm going to say they have a place in most matches if not are necessary for good play, although the level of understanding at that level of play is insane so who knows if mere mortals have a chance of replicating it.
One thing about artillery and indirects in general is that they're the only type of unit you can make that starts to counter its counters and gets infinitely better the more you make of it. Like if you make 20 tanks in one area, you start to run into logistical problems. They can't all attack, they block each other. But indirects just cover for each other. Each extra one makes it that much harder for any sort of enemy attack to go off cleanly. You sometimes hear about Grit indirect deathballs, and black bombs should probably have been the counter to these, but people usually disable them.
The thing about artillery is you shouldn't ever expect them to actually hit anything of note. In practice I hardly ever see them actually shoot anything, at least out of fog, because no one actually moves into their range because they're not that dumb. No one is as dumb as that CPU. The only time your artillery are likely to fire is in fog, or when the enemy has the advantage anyway, such as when joint capping, they probably won't care about taking an artillery hit because it's totally worth it, or when wiping out a lot of your units, they probably won't care that much if there's one artillery left over to get a hit in, because they just wiped out your army. So yes it really is mostly about zoning. The thing is, any unit can zone, and also, you need to be zoning something that actually matters.
I think the thing is there just isn't that much difference between them and other units as it seems. If you separate out the parts that are similar and dissimilar to say a tank, the tank is basically an artillery but has a (usually) much wider threat range, if you look at only the instantaneous threat range on any turn. Unless very bad terrain is involved, Artillery can threaten a small diamond around them, but tanks threaten a huge diamond. Artillery have weaker armor as well, but that's not really the defining feature of them. So it comes down to are you really using the defining features of artillery, and if not, do you really need them? Those features would be things like no counterattack damage, and the ability to fire over terrain and other units, and the ability to damage hi tech units. If you aren't actively using those facets of the unit then yeah, they do basically suck.
So 1) No counterattack damage. Like I opined before, artillery simply rarely get to fire against humans in non-fog unless it's ultimately advantageous for your opponent to eat the hit, so this one kind of doesn't matter because honestly your artillery is unlikely to do damage in the first place. 2) Firing over terrain and units. As said in the video, there's often not that much terrain to fire over, and if the opponent is smart they will just push the non-zoned out parts of the map, making your investment in indirects useless. But there are some maps that are pretty chokey so this is a very valid part of artillery to leverage. And firing over units is always useful. Indirects ultimately help keep a deathball safe. 3) The ability to damage hi tech units. For me this is also a very valid part of artillery. I think artillery are first of all the canon counter to medium tanks. There's almost always enough terrain for 3 infantry (or less) and 1 artillery to completely stop a medium tank. The md will ultimately need support to break that, but then you bring in your own support and well advance wars happens.
As a Flak player, I find artillery is my bread and butter. As long as I'm not getting out-ranged by Grit, I can safely roll the dice with artillery without taking on the same risk as I would with my direct attackers.
Bro this series is literally my fav rn man. Keep it up! 💯
Can’t wait for that Piperunner unit analysis video. Who else wants to know just how useless they truly are?
One thing to note is that Artillery being 6000 funds means that Grit is somewhat of an economical CO.
Instead of having his "tanks" be worth the same price as normal COs, Grit can buy an Artillery+Infantry, which will add up over the course of a game.
Just imagine Max, but you also have your Tanks, Md. Tanks, and Neotanks cost 1,000 less.
(15:01) Battleships deal 80% to Artillery. So, there you go. Anyone reading this comment doesn't have to rewind the video.
Anti-air do not fire machine guns, they fire their main cannons. Anti-air are known to have effective guns to deal with armored vehicles, one famous anti-air gun is the 8.8cm gun mounted on the Tiger I. After someone discovered this gun does pretty well with ground targets too they decided to put in into a tank.
Artillery in general don't make much armor, the armor they have is really only to stop small arms and machine gun fire.
and machine guns generally have a mix of bullet and explosive to emulate the power of small arms, particularly longish barrel rifles.
Seeing you make these videos really makes me consider playing AWBW - it's been such a long time since I've played AW and I've never played PvP - and I think these videos can help others as well as myself improve skills no matter novice or pro :)
Honestly, I love artillery and indirects in general and Grit is one of my favourite commanders. I just wish they were more viable in PvP. I hope the reboot buffs them in some way, like a range increase or some kind of countering when attacked directly
Artillery?
But thank you I've been waiting for this! My favorite unit!
Not a pro player here but just to make an observation I think the reason why some pro players call the artillery trash is when compared to a tank is because an artillery will only be a more effective unit against Mechs (if zoning not attacking), Medium Tanks and Neo Tanks. Thing is how many times are you going to see those units next to every other unit?
Pure damage output as a measurement of usefulness is a pretty big novice trap though, and I think pro players don’t fall for that. As Mangs mentioned, without fog of war the artillery is a zoning unit, and that means its value is often earned when it’s not attacking - its deterring enemy units from getting close, and map space can be just as valuable a resource as money. A unit like a take derives most of its value from its damage output, but an artillery doesn’t and it still has pretty good damage output for something that may not even be used in combat.
Of course, it’s a different story in fog of war - an artillery can’t effectively zone if one or both players can’t see, and as an ambush unit it’s cost effective but situational. Its value becomes more tied to the damage output, but not entirely because there’s value in not receiving retaliatory damage as well.
Now I definitely wouldn’t call myself a pro player either but I would give credit to pros who say that and assume they realize that value isn’t based on damage alone. So I would guess it’s precisely because of the situational nature and high skill ceiling. An artillery is a gamble at the worst of times and extra planning at the best. It can be a psychological game, which not every pro player would necessarily excel at, and sometimes the best play really is just more tanks, especially since you know the tanks likely will be useful regardless of what happens. Some well placed artillery can be game changers, but if they aren’t well placed then you wasted 6000g and a full build turn for one base. That much wasted resources are trash.
In no way am I saying that those pro players don’t know what they’re talking about, though. People value riskier plays differently. To some, they see opportunity, while others see a trap. A lot of it is your mindset. And if you don’t have a good plan for those artilleries, they will indeed be trash.
@@jeffmatrachisia3827 Thing is that you don't have to babysit a tank, you don't have to consider where to put it as much compared to artillery, you don't have to consider which CO you are going up against because some COs have movement or bombardment powers that can sneak up on you. It also denies movement and capture within 6 squares on the turn it moves rather than needing to set up to fire on next turn and hope it does not get attacked by any unit. There are uses for artillery: mind games and countering big units if they push too far but that is it.
I love indirects... They're so important in gaining and protecting ground, pushing through walls, invading a "stronghold", etc. There's a lot of strategy with using them. They're my favorite units. I like rockets a bit more because their extra range can do wonders, but artillery are alright.
That's from my experience with single-player, btw. Multiplayer matches seem to be a lot more intense, there aren't as many opportunities to set up indirects, I think.
Ranged units are always my favorite, especially in team scenarios.
Hell even in my StarCraft(2) days, I’d rock Siege Tanks and Liberators lol. Area denial is my thing.
God I love SC2, probably one of my favourite games
I love the one sea tile that the battleship sits in.
"Nice little lake you have, Doug."
"Thanks. I'm gonna put a 40000-ton boat in it."
There's two words you NEVER want to hear in conjunction with Artillery because, if you do hear them, you are screwed...
"Possum spit!"
Grit + Artillery = total domination (but slow, sometimes going into war of attrition)
And now Mangs explains the magnificence of the piperunner!
12:40
That is something I had hoped they would change in the remake. I mean battleships have massive armor. They should take next to no damage at all from artillery. Given how expensive they are they should be a unit that is pretty much immume to all damage except from a handful of hard counters.
I think the artillery is a unit that is not that powerfull, but that you can make it become powerfull. Also I love artillery.
Do battleships, considering how they're essentially the 'white elephant' units in AW it would be neat to see what circumstances they would actually perform well in. If there's any at all that is given their insane costs.
If B.Ships are the White Elephant, the Carrier is the Albino Rhino.
you need a decent income (otherwise you will have less tank/heavy land unit presence), and Bship should be able to cover a good part of the contested area (otherwise the enemy can avoid it making Bship useless)
The War Room. Especially in The Trident to prevent an Airport from being captured by Nell.
In DoR, Cities are much more powerful than Forests because not only do they repair and refuel Artillery, they also hide them in Fog of War. Works for all indirects.
Essentially makes them broken.
I would love to see a revisit to the Neotank now that you've had your mind sufficiently changed about them!
Grit allows artillery to threaten an extra 16 tiles all around themselves day to day, 20 more than that with his normal power, and 24 more than that with with his super. This totals up to 36 tiles day to day, 56 with his power, and a whopping 70 tiles threatened total from a unit worth 6000, with the ability to delete two thirds or more of a unit's health against anything but battleships, landers, medium and neotanks.
This is one reason why Grit is phenomenally strong.
Also, if you are struggling with using artillery in fog of war you can pair it up with Sonja for a good time, as she passively grants them the ability to fire without support by pushing their vision just far enough into their minimum range, and under the affects of either of her powers artillery can now see out to their own maximum firing range, and this also denies the ability to take cover from them in woods like you might against other C.O.'s.
They don't get the counter attacks which is a shame, but they are otherwise amazing and considerably more self-reliant than those of other C.O.s.
They can also supplement her lackluster offense by striking the enemy and weakening them before the rest of the army takes their shots, somewhat offsetting Sonja's biggest weakness.
Hey Mangs, another note about using animations to sniff out some artillery(or any other ranged) is that if it's strait up or strait down from the unit being shot. While I haven't picked up non-AWBW in a while, I remember using the side of the screen the animation played out to help sniff out the shooter.
14:45 those SPAA are shooting 20 to 40mm shells. (Possibly up to 57 actually for the blue moon one) they can pen anywjere from like 80 to 150mm of armor. They will cut those artilery in half and blast the crew into bits. Realisitcaly they should do more damage than the tanks.
Yeah, calling an autocannon a 'machine gun' like calling a firehose a garden sprayer. :P
Ironically I posted something similar before I found this comment.
I love how much armor the Artillery has, and I'm always cheering for anyone who utilizes some sort of "wall of artillery" strats. Even Grit players! :)
Also, for a meme of the main game:
*Advance Wars 1&2 War Room A.I.* : Nooooooo~ you can't just counter my Day 2 Mid Tanks by massing artillery as your main army units, s-stop...!
*Me* : Heh heh disposable artillery go brrrrrrr
When I build artillery, they need way to long to get in position and be effective. When my opponent builds them, they seem to be way better. So yeah it depends on skill
0:11
"We take a look at units it GRIT detail"
Idk if that was intentional but it's funny
My all time favorite unit
"Artillery are blind without a recon or an infantry to spot units."
*AI:* Aww, isn't that cute?
Actually, the cartridge AI cheats for _knowledge,_ but cannot truly break the rules of spotting
The thing I always seem to find artillery are great at is teaming up with tanks to guard bridges or mountain passes, particularly if there's a property. There seem to be a surprising number of maps designed for this. Basically, cap a property that's at the end of a bridge or in between mountains, put a tank there and then put an artillery behind it. It takes a surprising amount of work to dislodge the two. Even MD tanks struggle.
1:23 I think the one of the advanced differences with tanks is that you don't get to attack and move on the same turn with arty. And in PvP, I've found units to be very mobile, darting in and out everywhere, and tanks with their 6 move range almost ended up with greater range than the arty in most situations! Caveat that I tend to play quite reactively (and on standard vision) so this was a big downside for me.
(more in reply-comments to avoid clutter)
The experience I had was that unless I was literally sitting on a mountain there would be some crazy way for the enemy to yeet a light tank at me, while the enemy tanks were really hard to pin down. And in that situation not being able to attack on the same turn was a really big tradeoff unless the units were already stuck down attacking stuff and the arty happened to be guarding them or in the neighbourhood. And because I'm a noob this guarding situation didn't really materialise until I had a deathball going lateish in the game, after I had my medium tanks out.
So yeah, my _review_ of them in the early to midgame was basically a nah. As powerful as indirect combat could be, it was so situational it didn't feel right for me 75% against light vehicles wasn't enough over similar damage from more mobile tanks. But that being said... they're great against the AI, and they had a niche use for me attacking pipe seams dealing 40 damage (the Mangsvance mod Wurm showcase shows this). And when the enemy started rolling their own medium and neotanks... I guess 40% damage to those would be pretty good too!
To explain and build on why, I just don't want anyone else thinking these are do anything close to tank in *role* , because they're really not, even if they have similar power levels they hit completely different targets. They're the mech of the vehicle world; great on defense, in a bind, and when things are bogged down close to your factories. Mangs said this in the video, and at the timestamp in my OP he pretty clearly highlights the tradeoff, so it's not his fault, I'm just a noob lol.
So in summary... whenever light tanks are free to roam far and wide, my rule of thumb is definitely not be trading off for these and _wait until the mediums hit the field_ ! When deployed before their time, all too often the enemy will find some way behind or across to the arty, and then the investment will be wasted without firing a single shot in return. :(
My friend and I do AWBW and I always review the turns I don't get to watch in fog because you get to see troop movements and at least can know when indirect fire is hitting your units.
Grit and Max fighting over Nell again.
The only reason someone would call Arty trash is because they're used to playing on massive, open AWBW-style maps that don't do indirect units and the game as a whole justice.
5:58 😱 genius
The _one_ thing I give credit to AWBW is that you can see the enemy turn... but I was able to do that when I had my GBA so it's not really an improvement. And on the rare case I get to find someone who knows how to get the emulator to work right, I get the best of all worlds for multiplayer.
I think the thing about some pro players considering artillery to be trash probably comes from most competitive maps being specifically designed to discourage artillery, with relatively few chokepoints and plentiful airports, because big ol' WW1 stalemates aren't that much fun. I guess the other thing is that the biggest draw of artillery is their crazy cost-effectiveness against medium tanks and neotanks - units that don't see that much play outside of High Funds. But then again, one of the reasons these units don't see much play outside of High Funds is the threat of artillery! So it all kind of goes in a circle.
They're still a fun and important unit though, and there's still no thrill quite like lining up a neotank in your sights...
Artilery in fog is so good but it seems the advance wars competitive is mostly focuses on non fog of wars matches which make his perk irrelevant but a good place artilery can cause a good destruction
Yeah I'm bad at non FOW maps, I dunno since you can just count and/or counter what your opponent have it's pretty boring, while in FOW if you didn't build an anti air and your opponent have 2 Bcoptters......... also when in the bloody heck will you ever use a missile in non FOW map ?
But FOW makes all the COs usable.. it's like the default engagement.
artillery is better outside of fog
@@audiosurfarchive What is Flak, chopped liver?
Fog mode has more players in AWBW league
I think artillery are a very situational unit and rely fairly heavily on what you intend to use them for to be effective. Like, you probably shouldn't deploy them for the sake of it like you can a tank or recon or because "well I'll find a use for it" but rather should have a fairly specific use in mind for them like "put in a forest to ambush an enemy unit" or "place behind tank to protect against counter-attack" or "put behind mountain to lock down area", etc. I think it also depends on your play-style, like I've always favored a fairly aggressive play-style so I don't get nearly as much use out of them as people who favor a more stealthy or defensive play-style, but I've had my ass handed to me by good artillery usage far too often to discount them as a "bad" unit like I do with missiles.
Artillery is just a value unit. Its main job is zone control. Any ambush shot is just pure profit. The best and most unrated usage of arty is as a bait.
Arty rage is real! So many of my opponents over extended to just a tank shot on my arty, which is surprising sturdy. Then process to lose that wing of force
question since the custom CO thing for deadline had already passed would there be a CO that can change game mechanics or add new mechanics and tricks work for the game engine or so? if it does work can people send them in to you for review to see if the game engine can work and handle it or no?
Artillery units are definitely cost-effective because they are pretty much good on anything they can fire upon, even Neotanks. And for an unit that packs a punch for 6000 credits, it can pay for itself with 2 salvos provided they don't target infantry. The only unit they do scratch damage to is the Megatank.
Regarding what you said at 6:40. The artillery also attacked from the left side so if there was a forest right of the medium tank, you know that the artillery was not in that forest
5:38 I have never once seen a little pirate show up on screen. I need to be looking out for that little guy.
I usually use artillery escorted by md tank, its a great unit when I'm rallying
oho boy, my favorite unit
I love spending spare change on artillery, even if I have no real plan for it.
Something about an artillery that is just perpetually out of position seems to just call out for people to exploit the misplay, and end up spending way more than the artillery's value in overextension to kill it.
Sonja's artillery can self-scout for Max-equivalent range, and they can fully self-scout during her power/super.
Anti-Airs use Vulcans, not machine guns, which is why they're more effective against armor than recons.
Ah the Death Ball, what I used to call the Gordian Knot strategy : almost impossible to defeat except if you are able to do a very strong push and break their positioning 😅. I remember making my gf crazy by using that kind of move in FoW, she had to resign after a few days.
I'd make this cost 8000 because the problem I have is that if you're reckless with the artillery and someone gets a shot with a Tank (or god, somehow get attacked by a Mech) before it gets off it's first shot, you're not that bad off if you have a tank nearby. It's almost as if you had a built a tank which the enemy got a first strike off. In my opinion if you have tank + tank or tank + artillery and the opponent gets a first strike on you, it should be more devastating if he attacked the indirect with a direct unit.
A 6000 Roadblock is certainly not a _good_ investment considering you have infantry and Mechs. But considering that in the absolute worst case scenario where they get hit before they get a shot off it comes off as a roadblock, the downside just isn't worth the insane damage you can do. I don't think it's objectively OP since the game should be balanced on the average case and not the worst case, but I feel that a player should be punished harder for getting his artillery hit than someone attacking his tank with a first strike.
Oh yeah, and I'd also reduce their damage to Neotanks, Battleships, and Crusiers to 30%. Or heck the battleship to 10% I feel like only Rockets and Battleships should be the only indirect units that should be allowed to do massive damage to Neotanks and ships.
I gotta say I do use artilleries for zoning mostly. Most of the time I build them as support for tanks in order to punish anyone to get in range.
They're cost effective, I wouldn't say they are outright trash as much as it requires more skill to use compared to other units.
in awbw some "pro" only play specific mode and not all and in awbw there are some setup that doesnt always happen in aw classic game
Artillery is very map dependant, the chocky the map is, the better it is (and he can be considered a very bad unit in a very open map).
In awbw, standard mode has kinda close map to make indirect viable while fog mode map are very open map so they are worse in awbw fog than awbw std.
Great video as always, Mangs! I do have a follow up question though on this.
I have seen you talked a lot about cost effectiveness when a cheap unit deals significant damage to an expensive unit, and this is a pretty simple math. But how would you calculate cost effectiveness with the number of turns you have to invest to get that unit into position? New AW player here, btw
Cheap units are produced early in the game so they can take their time to get to the frontline.
I don't PVP but against A.I of the base game you position them in range of a neutral building and wall them off with APCs or tanks the AI will all in to capture and it's like sheep to the slaughter.
Well I wouldn't call artillery trash, I don't like using them due to the fact that they are so situational and require so much babysitting that it negates their low cost. While rockets are more fragile, they hit harder and can sit further back on the frontlines and thus require less protection making them more cost effective in my mind, despite costing almost 3 times more. In my experience, a rocket battery will being firing more often than an artillery battery which means at most I'd only ever use one artillery unit on the frontline as mobile close range support.
Ah yes, the unit Mang's Max can't go without
The good thing about Artillery versus Tanks (indirect versus direct) is Artillery don’t get counter attacked. But they don’t counter attack either.
(Laughs in ainti-tank)
Outside of FOG the value of arty is hard to discern. They can not get to shot at anything for a game and still have felt valuable as a zoning tool.
But even in FOG Arty feels a little bit like a *win harder* unit. Incredibly cost effective, but how do you get to use it?
It is usually a decent pressure tool on the advantage, while grinding out on an income lead, to create a lose-lose scenario for your enemy.
But if you have to retreat and deathball a skilled player will scout your intentions and avoid taking chances. While on the losing end, you also usually have less units already to cover your arty.
So I get why it feels so divisive!
Shota-llery might get ara ara'd if they get caught, but if used properly their small range can still be quite effective to the bustiest of tank-chans.
Artillery is a Rocket's best friend!
Can you move and shoot with indirects?
Top-level Grit and Jess players can destroy you with these, or even Sonja users (jk they don't exist) in FOW. It doesn't happen much, but these things hit like a train in the right hands. If you consider their damage isn't THAT much less than Rockets and they cost so so much less and have treads instead of tires, they're actually quite a good unit.
YES
Any plans to cover DoR exclusive units like the anti tank?
Massive ball is hard to organise . If your oponent use a transport copter it s do or die for your HQ
I think it makes sense to talk about Rockets next?
Show the Von Bolt match! :3 egg vs eggs machina
Out of curiosity, are you willing to discuss how the Black Cannon, Mini Cannon, Laser Cannon, and Death Ray structures would perform in competitive, even though they could never appear in competitive?
I acknowledge that how well the structures would perform would be affected by layout of the map and positioning.
`14:45 The A-Air is probably using an autocannon, a rapid-firing weapon that fires explosive shells rather than bullets.
When me and my buds play this artillery is unit number 1
The logic is really simple. If map has choke points indirect is good. If the map is about making walls indirects are good. Any other case avoid at all costs since they are too slow and defenseless if left alone meaning 90-95% of the time you should not be building these. They are also great at defending units as well and have a high rate of damage against any unit they touch so its not that they are bad, they definitely have their uses, they just aren't as useful as other units most of the time.
The BEST unit, may struggle outside FOW but the artillery can make taking certain areas of the map hell. Funnily enough, the unit the blue moon artillery is based on (SU-76) Could actually make direct attacks. A unit that could both direct and indirect attack (sort of like days of ruin's anti tank) is a unit concept I like alot.