Ideal Marines template

[ProgramTheta]

Even though I have a ton of time spent on this game, I have very little idea of how marine templates should look. This is really because I never used them. I know marines are useful for naval invading, and I have a little experience so I realize their strength. However, I just never get around to making marines in my games. I usually just use light tanks to naval invade, and make up for the penalties with every bonus possible. CAS, coastal bombardment, n̶u̶k̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶p̶o̶r̶t̶ ̶g̶a̶r̶r̶i̶s̶o̶n̶, etc. Or just paradropping instead of naval invading.

I found that my special forces are most effective when made with small templates. My paratrooper template is 10 width but with lots of support companies. This is because paradrops are risky and if they are destroyed it minimizes the loss. I also make my mountaineers small templates to lower the supply cost to try to keep the attrition as low as possible.

Should my marines also be small templates, or do the advantages of a larger, more powerful template in a naval invasion outweigh the risks?

[Mack]

Note: Amphib 2's are equivalent to Medium Tank 2's.

My recent go to armour template has been:
3 Light Tanks that switch to Amphib 2s once they have been researched & built.
1 Light SPA
1 Light SPG
5 Motorised

This is an insanely good general purpose armour division especially for the Soviets or United States. Going with Light's for the SPG/SPAA makes them super cheap to build, they are really cheap to upgrade with XP. They don't even use too much special forces cap. I might try it with Germany as well.

These will absolutely flatten infantry even over Rivers.

As for actual naval invasions, put 2 Amphib 2's and then fill the 20 width with Marines. Add in Engineers, Recon, Artillery, Maintenance & Signals. There it is.

Amtracs are very expensive. Not sure if they are worth it.

I never bother with anything under 20 width for combat divisions.

When you have a large army, the special forces cap should be huge. And then if you have the 3rd naval invasion tech you can invade with an absolute ton of units, some of which you should use as distractions. The AI will absolutely swamp a small beach-head so you need to cause them to spread out both by setting up invasions in places away from your actual invasion, and then once you've sent your main force, those distraction invasions still happen even if all they do is try a small push or just camp ports.