Durability of 3 Expendables ($1.8 billion)

[storm99]

OK, I decided to have some fun as the game is a bit boring without the old battle I was in. I just spent $1.9 billion in equipment testing all 3 of these new Expendable airplanes, against a single target. Enjoy the read and the math.

Background

Illustris: Level 124, using a mix of IAI Harop (135 attack, costs $700k), MQ-8B (170 attack, costs $1.25mm), and BAE Mantis (180 attack, costs $2.1mm per)

Target: Level 181, no name provided here, as this thread could be a bit embarrassing for him. He and I are both using the max allies possible at our respective levels (he's 57 levels higher, so is bringing more defensive units into war). He has 43k wins, 3k losses, so let's assume he knows how to play as he has a decent win/loss ratio. He has 110k in defense buildings, which is an OK level for an under 100 level player, but rather weak in the 150-200 category, which made him perfect for this experiment (and he made the mistake of attacking me yesterday, lol).

Results


OK, I attacked him 25 times, with 24 wins for me and 1 loss.

The casualty rates were as follows, for the 24 wins:

Based on # of Units Brought (columns are average, max and min)

BAE: 2.2% 3.8% 1.2%
MQ: 1.9% 3.2% 1.1%
IAI: 2.0% 2.5% 1.5%

For the one loss, the loss rate was 3.8%, 4.6%, 4.2%, a little over 2x the loss rate in a win. So, for example, if you brought 1,000 BAEs, you would lose on average 2.2 planes per battle.

What does this say? The loss rates across the three disposable planes are about the same, so choose the cheapest one you can get away with that will ensure your victory. There's no need to use MQ or BAE, unless you cannot win with just IAIs.

Why? The loss % are similar at roughly 2%, but IAI's are cheaper in both cost as well as upkeep. So, buy a lot more of the cheap ones, lose 2% of what you bring, etc. If you expect to win 50/50 with the IAIs, it's better to upgrade to the MQs, and so forth.

Also, the average loss in units I paid in terms of dollars was $71 million, and the max is around $62mm, ensuring a loss in each battle to get just 2-5 exp points. I spent $1.855 BILLION, and the target was Vaulting, so I recouped basically nothing. Lol.

Enjoy the math.

Illustris

[soulpwner]

Awesome post! Now there's a thinking man.

[steve_d3]

Illustries,

thank you for the inside view as always its interesting. As you can see the Agents did a similar math and came to the conclusions it's better to keep double units. One heavy defense unit (expensive) and one of the mosquito (sorry expendable) units.

We now carry for both units a full set, if you attack you are not loosing your expensive units just the mosquitos.

Only if you get unlucky (see my other post), it is the most economic way.

Enjoy the game,

Agent Blue
1-800 JUSTKILL

[storm99]

Agreed, most people are carrying the duo-combo already as of the first night (either the FSF or CGx for 105 or 110 defense, higher than old Aurora), the question I was trying to think over was: which mosquito to carry? The defense is rather easy... the loss rate for attacks is harder to calibrate.

I started with the Dreads (as the 78k upkeep was a bit odd, in their original upkeep curve), but with the downward revised upkeep, FSF has the lowest upkeep per point cost. But, less than CGX in absolute def points.

This dual combo idea most people jumped to on Friday night was like in the previous version in the 60s-100, to carry the B2/Dread combo. I wrote a lengthy post somewhere back there about that.

In the new version, it makes sense to either have the heavy def of UK plus mosquitos if you can afford losing more in each battle (particularly over 120 level it seems, as the playing field really collapses and sanction targets are generally Vaulting). Or, if you are a cheapie and have less enemies, go Germany and go with tanks (at least there are some reasonable options unlike just the old Hellfire).

I may be in another war as of tomorrow, so I'll probably have to rotate into CGX, go heavy with Boeing's, and bump up my defense buildings, so go max def-max offense, and screw the upkeep for a while, lol.

Anyways, rambling, just goofing around tonight.

Illustris

[steve_d3]

Hello Illustries,

I know sometimes to have the firepower BOINGS are needed (and I know I have to stay under the radar if you come after me with them).

But I am not sure if you can effort to loose them as they are not really mosquitos. In every attack you might loose around 20-40 of them if you go after a highly defense equipped player.

So 10 attacks will set you back around 5 billion. Still ok, but how you going to keep that kind of loss up for a day (or two)?

Agent Blue

[Ilc72]

Just thought I'd let you know my experience so far, as based on the original post I thought I'd give it a go.

At my level (69) I have deployed around 350 IAI units (out of 2070). With a sensible attack strategy it is possible to make a profit using these units.

Based on my experience it should be used as a complementary force, rather than a full force.

If you go for the 5% discount bonus (from missions) it may also make more sense!

In terms of the overall game upgrade experience, whilst my first reaction was negative I'm now coming round to thinking it was a good idea. What has surprised me though is the lack of attacking and sanctions!

[Ricochet]

Thanks for the update, that is definitely useful info even though I'm not able to deploy all three units yet.

My question is how do those unit loss stats relate to comparable non-expendable units?

Why not deploy F-15 Eagle Fighters over IAI Harups? Sure the initial cost is higher, but that won't matter in the long run. Upkeep is higher sure, but if you are attacking frequently the unit loss ratio is considerable better wouldn't it make sense to go that route?

Not to mention the F-15's have a slightly higher attack.

[Unregistered]

The lack of atks and sanc comes from one reason: money (or the lack of it).

Almost everyone is very short of money due to the following reasons:
-- the huge def gap (the difference of atks unit total points minus def unit total points, which need to be filled by def building points)
-- and the doubled cost of maintaining atks and def fleets
-- and the VERY high casulty rate of atks forces, win or lose
-- and last but not the least, EVERYONE is vaulting their cash now, so chances are: after suffering costly hardware losses and win the battle, you found the cookie jar empty

[Unregistered]

The first two days after the big bang was a rare window of opportunity for hunters, as people were totally stunned, especially those who previous had "invincible" defense and always leave their money unvaulted. At level 40s, I have cracked a few piggy banks with 15+ mils per knock. But it's over now.

[storm99]

Hello Illustries,

I know sometimes to have the firepower BOINGS are needed (and I know I have to stay under the radar if you come after me with them).

But I am not sure if you can effort to loose them as they are not really mosquitos. In every attack you might loose around 20-40 of them if you go after a highly defense equipped player.

So 10 attacks will set you back around 5 billion. Still ok, but how you going to keep that kind of loss up for a day (or two)?

Agent Blue

I rarely use the Boeing's (225 attack). My experiment above was comparing the three Expendables: IAI, MQ and BAE Mantis. Their attacks range from 135-180. I tend to calculate the minimum attack needed against any enemy.

Today, I'm going toe-to-toe with a few level 160-200s right now, and I just needed to add some Boeings and PAKs which have 225 and 190 attack but I expect to fade back down to the expendables soon. But, I only needed to add about 600 PAKs and about 25 Boeings, to make sure my attack power was sufficient.

Yes, as shown above, the cost of battling was and is still very expensive. I wasted $1.9 billion on the experiment above and get near zero for 24 wins so, let's say 75 experience points. The people who get farmed and whine and just Mission away, never really understood that attacking is a much harder way to level up. Sanction targets are even worse, as they tend to be Vaulting, so even less $.

On the other question, the loss rate on the durables are much lower than the expendables, but I haven't checked the dollar-weighted comparison as I don't intend to keep the durables for too long.

Illustris

P.S. Storm8 should have raised the cap in battles to $130mm or so, instead of $62mm. That would make the math work for attacking. By the way, I think after the upkeep got revised back down, I think the max income per battles was lowered back to the $30-$32mm... anyone still getting the $60mm anymore?

[drjecod]

By luck or by fate I just reloaded the page and ended up with this thread (along w/several others from '09) on the 1 of xxx page. Was like revisiting an idol in a time machine... :)

[bafflingodyssey]

By luck or by fate I just reloaded the page and ended up with this thread (along w/several others from '09) on the 1 of xxx page. Was like revisiting an idol in a time machine... :)

Yes, except the loss rate for Harop UAV is more like 0.75% now. The other two seems to be about 1%.

[quod]

Results


OK, I attacked him 25 times, with 24 wins for me and 1 loss.

The casualty rates were as follows, for the 24 wins:

Based on # of Units Brought (columns are average, max and min)

BAE: 2.2% 3.8% 1.2%
MQ: 1.9% 3.2% 1.1%
IAI: 2.0% 2.5% 1.5%

For the one loss, the loss rate was 3.8%, 4.6%, 4.2%, a little over 2x the loss rate in a win. So, for example, if you brought 1,000 BAEs, you would lose on average 2.2 planes per battle.

Got any standard deviations?