Supply Management - Tips

[mhardisty]

We have seen lots of posts about players struggling with the management of resources and supplies, once you reach the Strategic Map. With supplies needed to travel from settlement to settlement, it is important to manage your army efficiently.

So, we are looking to have a tweak to the supply requirements in an upcoming (soon) update that will make supply management less harsh (in certain circumstances, such as chosen difficulty levels). We will update you more when this will be available.

In the meantime, here are some points from the SUPPLY MANAGEMENT tutorial screen within the game:

Every day of moving your army consumes supplies. See the amount of Supply you have and the amount you need per day on the upper right side of the screen. There’s also information about how many days your army can travel with this amount of Supply. When you choose where to travel, you’ll see how many days it will take.

Each unit in your army has daily Supply consumption. Manpower also has daily Supply consumption (100 per person). Total consumption is the sum of these values. Decrease daily Supply consumption of your army by dismantling or disbanding your units and getting rid of Manpower. You can do this at any point on the Strategic Map.

In settlements where there is the opportunity to trade, the best way to maintain a balance of resources is to sell trophies and extra squads and buy Supplies using the received Goodwill Points.


So, in conclusion, to stop you coming stuck with a force that you cannot move, you need to manage who you keep and who you let go. We have tried to simulate the feel of struggling to survive in this Post Judgment Day world. It isn’t just a case of building a huge force and moving from settlement to settlement, because that will likely mean running out of resources at some point.
And I know it may be hard giving up that Bradley you found, or those 20+ militia squads that could back you up, but they need to be fed and fuelled, and may stop you reaching your destination.

To try to have a positive and useful discussion below, can players who have positive tips they have found on Army Management post them below, so this discussion can help T-Force fight back against the Machines. Thank you.

[PYRACOR]

I have a ton of time in a whole bunch of games including strategy and management type games. I love this game yet I didn’t understand how to manage the mechanic until I got to the cartel mission. That was about the time everything clicked. That being said I’m playing on medium difficulty and the game feels impossible without having to reload which is confusing for a strategy game.

I feel as if you consider this game a pseudo rpg with strategy combat mechanics then this is much easier to accept and then it allows you to have fun with what the game is.

Devs I am glad you are reading the comments. I hope you add tooltips into the game like the tutorials explaining the supply mechanic a bit more and add in the tips you provided there. Also please make a discussion board for ideas to add to the game. Like I said I love it but there is a lot of room for improvement/additional mechanics that I think wouldn’t be too hard to implement? Just a thought.

Lastly if you could add in armor values to the vehicles. The cartel tank says it has less armor in the description compared to some other vehicles but it’s kind of hard to find out if it’s worth adding armor to certain vehicles without knowing their base armor.

[zpc]

The main positive tip I can give is that new players should ~never~ give in to attach themselves to the abundance of units found during missions. Those are just trading goods.

What you want to keep is the Abrams and the Bradley one can find very early. Those are needed and the basis of your army. Without them, you stand no chance against the tougher enemy units.
Don't bother with fuel and supply vehicles and never have more then one infantery squad of every type of your starting faction. Decide between the Striker and the HumVee and pick only one. (I'd go for the Striker because smoke grenades).
Don't bother with the fancy truck and armored trailer - those are noob traps.
Use the first level-ups of your infantery to reduce their supply costs.

You can start experimenting with the new units from the movement faction if you feel like having total control over the supply scarcity. Which might be after 6-7 campaign missions.

Until then all captured vehicles and joining squads are just a trade commodity.

[mhardisty]

Originally posted by PYRACOR:

Devs I am glad you are reading the comments.

Yes, trust me. We do read all the comments, and try to answer back to what we can. But my brain would melt if I answered every single comment.......

[Auxipuya212]

Hey buddy first of all the game is great and thank you for this one there are few things i would suggest.Supply is a crucial thing for this game and i do understand about survival and hard making decisions but what if you have a unit that would carry out.

1.Scavenger or something that could carry dropped guns in each given mission like a truck with all guns and etc in it. It would be nice to lessen it for your Supply as you can just sell them for quick goodwill point.

2. I love the perks but how about loyalty and experienced fighters? What if you put "passive abilities" like the survivalist (which i would always pick first for my units) turn it into passive like when you reach able rank 10% of supply and as rank goes up it would be increment of 5%.

3.Supply bases i know the map us big but what if you can stop and search for supplies and then you can put in special or side missions then the machines will try to kill you and loot them out something like thay

4.Just really lessen the supply of each unit LOL

Once again thanm you for the nice game I'm really loving it and would buy futute DLC to this one.

*Side Note can we just build a base so we can drop in units and train them or something (was hoping for this one to come out)

[Malecite]

I really don't feel like you need that much stuff to complete the missions. But having a 20-30% reduction in the supply upkeep would make it so you could field more mover units instead of instantly selling them.

As already mentioned you need to have the Abraham's and a Bradley, without them the game is basically impossible. I recently picked up a second Bradley.

I run a supply trailer and a secondary supply truck as I find you are frequently forced to setup hold points, and it's easier with a supply truck parked behind the garisoned building. Haven't needed an oil tanker yet.

A couple humvees are nice to have as well for the HMG support. 2 ATGMs, 2 Infantry, 2 rangers, and 2 sniper squads has carried me through 7 missions so far.

[Grotsky]

Thanks for the update and keeping in touch with the community. I hope that the supply update tweak will also look at rebalancing individual units instead of a flat increase/decrease. For example the big dozer thing uses a ridiculous amount of supply, I believe its double that of a truck, for not really any benefit that I can see yet. I know that there is some realism there, but I would much prefer it if supply usage was also linked to the utility of a vehicle. The founder vehicles could be more expensive to use and movement vehicles much cheaper - this could also give more of a meaningful choice to army comp rather than being forced to take the abrams or lose.
So that I don't derail a tips thread, this is my tip then too: if you have supply problems and can't figure out why, then look at the details and through each and every unit to note their supply usage and compare them to others. There might be some odd units that have a usage disproportionate with what you'd expect.

[vaaish]

I don't usually post on these kinds of discussions, but wanted to say there are a lot of different paths to a successful army. I took the army management part of Defiance more analogous to in mission base building in most RTS's. The supply mechanic immediately read as a force limiter when it showed up after Haven. It prompted me to scavenge everything I can from battlefields to sell so I can keep higher supply levels.

I didn't take the Abrams or Bradly, but kept the Stryker and the Movement artillery. After each mission I disband and sell anything that doesn't fit with my core force and doesn't have experience or special abilities. That's kept me going pretty good with a force made up of technicals I've upgraded to have better weapons and infantry I've picked up along the way.

I do think that it may be a bit too harsh and adds one more thing to micromanage that takes you away from actually playing the game, especially if you don't watch it carefully. Even a 10% reduction in supply use per unit or ability to passively generate supply from faction relations would be enough to make it less tiresome.

One thing that struck me as potentially helpful would be some form of indicator with supply consumption that could help players understand if they are over extending. On a first play through, you probably won't know how many days travel it is between regions and that can easily lead to over extending your supplies and creating a death spiral where you have to disband so many units that you no longer have a force that can complete missions.

[mhardisty]

Some interesting information from a team member that I thought I'd share:

Target Supply Consumption:
After Abiquiu - 40 thousand per day
After Albuquerque - 45-50 thousand
After Tortuga - 50-55 thousand
After Chihuahua - 65 thousand
After Vega - 70 thousand
After Oklahoma - 75-90 thousand

If the player sticks to this army size, then they will not have any problems with resources.
These are the current balance values. If the player does not collect a horde and does not exceed these values, then they will always have resources for upgrades, restoration of ammunition, repairs, training, etc.

If it exceeds, then they will have all resources spent on moving the army from place to place.

Hope this helps..

[Sandremo]

Originally posted by mhardisty:

Some interesting information from a team member that I thought I'd share:

Target Supply Consumption:
After Abiquiu - 40 thousand per day
After Albuquerque - 45-50 thousand
After Tortuga - 50-55 thousand
After Chihuahua - 65 thousand
After Vega - 70 thousand
After Oklahoma - 75-90 thousand

If the player sticks to this army size, then they will not have any problems with resources.
These are the current balance values. If the player does not collect a horde and does not exceed these values, then they will always have resources for upgrades, restoration of ammunition, repairs, training, etc.

If it exceeds, then they will have all resources spent on moving the army from place to place.

Hope this helps..

I might have gone way overboard with my forces then... xD

[Grotsky]

Originally posted by vaaish:

I don't usually post on these kinds of discussions, but wanted to say there are a lot of different paths to a successful army. I took the army management part of Defiance more analogous to in mission base building in most RTS's. The supply mechanic immediately read as a force limiter when it showed up after Haven. It prompted me to scavenge everything I can from battlefields to sell so I can keep higher supply levels.

I didn't take the Abrams or Bradly, but kept the Stryker and the Movement artillery. After each mission I disband and sell anything that doesn't fit with my core force and doesn't have experience or special abilities. That's kept me going pretty good with a force made up of technicals I've upgraded to have better weapons and infantry I've picked up along the way.

I do think that it may be a bit too harsh and adds one more thing to micromanage that takes you away from actually playing the game, especially if you don't watch it carefully. Even a 10% reduction in supply use per unit or ability to passively generate supply from faction relations would be enough to make it less tiresome.

One thing that struck me as potentially helpful would be some form of indicator with supply consumption that could help players understand if they are over extending. On a first play through, you probably won't know how many days travel it is between regions and that can easily lead to over extending your supplies and creating a death spiral where you have to disband so many units that you no longer have a force that can complete missions.

This is useful and you make good points. I agree, and I like the harshness of it because it drives the whole "on the run" feeling home. I wouldn't want them to make it too easy either. Maybe one thing that gets folks confused is that you actually start off with a hefty force quickly, especially if you are careful in the convoy ambush mission. But the usual expectation is for your supply usage to only become a problem later in a game, so folks are more reckless in the start assuming that you have a lot of room to grow. That was the mistake I made.

[vaaish]

But the usual expectation is for your supply usage to only become a problem later in a game, so folks are more reckless in the start assuming that you have a lot of room to grow. That was the mistake I made.

I tend to assume the opposite. Start with scarce resources to set expectations then gradually open it up as the game progresses by providing a mechanism to generate supply as you get established allowing for larger forces and better upgrades. Since it never really opened up, I kept a lid on consumption for fear of running out of resources.

[Mal0]

Originally posted by vaaish:

But the usual expectation is for your supply usage to only become a problem later in a game, so folks are more reckless in the start assuming that you have a lot of room to grow. That was the mistake I made.

I tend to assume the opposite. Start with scarce resources to set expectations then gradually open it up as the game progresses by providing a mechanism to generate supply as you get established allowing for larger forces and better upgrades. Since it never really opened up, I kept a lid on consumption for fear of running out of resources.

Agreed. I know and understand that they were going for a sense of, rag tag, scrappy fighters going tooth and nail.- But if I can't build into a strong Warband, and give legion or the cartel a black eye.... I'd rather be limited in what i can bring to a mission than what i can store for a big fight.

An example. I could buy a helicopter, but without a pilot i can't move it with my army.
Because I can't load it onto a flatbed or something? Egggh.

I REALLY LIKE THIS GAME. But I really think it needs some sort of in-between mission, Skirmish-esque ways to do supply gathering. It's asking a lot, I know, but a 'radiant quest' method of keeping your army moving would be nice. Even if it's a mix of overworld rpg choice based stuff, or actual skirmishes.

I went south. I want to go visit settlements up north. But to go back north i need supplies I don't have currently. Am I expected to turn around and say. "Okay guys. thanks for everything, take all our vehicles and manpower and dissapear." just to make ends meet?

[Samz]

One thing I've heard that I want to make sure is true or not.
Apparently (not checked) selling vehicles instead of scrapping them is a roughly x10 boost to the amount of money you get.

So maybe the tutorial could emphasis that?
I presume hanging onto vehicles after battle for *one* quick trip to the nearest place where you can sell them is the intended method as opposed to scrapping them on the spot. (unless supplies are critically low.)

[Samz]

Oh yeah, another thing.
If you can't take any trailers with you (such as ammo or fuel) then use them up before moving on.

it costs supply to refill ammo/fuel on the map screen, so use up any resources you can't bring with you on the battlefield before moving on.

[MrZeD9999]

i dont get that tho with have a small army cus mason is always on about we need to make our army bigger and stronger then change the voice over to make it have more of a hint to get rid of a lot of men as u go too