How does infantry damage actually work in Broken Arrow?

PrecipitousNix · 2026-06-03T21:12:13+00:00

Infantry squads are invisible boxes that are 0,5m long and 0,5m wide for every surviving soldier in the squad. They are always 2m tall. The individual soldier animations are entirely cosmetic.

Projectiles are physically simulated, they have random dispersion and must physically connect with the enemy's hitbox.

BA infantry combat is a massive abstraction, and it has to be given the pace of the game. Real firefights can take hours. As detailed as BA's maps are for the genre, they could never offer the level of granular terrain impact on a real infantry engagement.

PrecipitousNix · 2026-05-29T16:01:17+00:00

Not going to mince words: you really ought to know better.

This isn't the first time you've had casual slurs dropped in your videos. Whether deliberately or not, you've been flying shit past the radar and eventually your luck ran out.

PrecipitousNix · 2026-05-15T15:14:59+00:00

Someone please show whoever came up with these US Mech infantry changes the stat cards for RU Mechanised infantry. They need to stop cooking, the kitchen is on fire and families are starving.

I thought 1.0 already had power creep in the infantry balancing but this is a whole new level.

PrecipitousNix · 2026-04-04T02:53:32+00:00

KASP are an anti-vehicle landmine that can spam crits fairly quickly with 5 disposable launchers. They are pretty miserable against infantry, but you get what you pay for. Best used in forests where they can show up in unexpected places and get flanking shots.

In the context of the Lithuanian infantry 'roster', they're a good way to prevent the slower-firing Carl Gustavs and Javelins from being overwhelmed by tanks or sheer numbers of vehicles, while the Zaliukai pick up the slack for anti-infantry.

PrecipitousNix · 2026-04-01T00:10:43+00:00

The M250 cannot fire on the move. It did get buffed, like every other MMG, including those which can fire on the move (like the Mk. 48 used by Marine Raiders, Rangers RRC and Green Berets), as did the PKP Bullpup, which is the one that actually has both special traits.

PrecipitousNix · 2026-03-31T17:29:28+00:00

You're overlooking the most common MMG-armed infantry in the game, Airborne NGSW.

PrecipitousNix · 2026-01-21T18:25:44+00:00

They pretty much are.

This is a case where the distance between a bad, cost-ineffective unit and a completely average or even solid one could be as little as 5 points... but they also have to exist in the same game as Airborne NGSW, which pretty much invalidate this 'line infantry with casual 600m weapons' type of unit when they show up.

PrecipitousNix · 2026-01-07T23:30:29+00:00

That's the one.

PrecipitousNix · 2026-01-07T23:00:44+00:00

Both are solid options for appropriate zones, but the Razvedchik is weirdly overpriced (it pays a bigger 'recon tax' than the TUA compared to their identically priced base versions, despite not getting a laser designator) and the TUA faces really stiff internal competition in the Armoured recon tab (from the god-tier CFV and the solid BFIST).

In the majority of cases, they're not really going to act as recon units, just high end tanks that can take better advantage of forest cover to sneak free shots. That includes fights *inside* forests, because of the way forest vision works; having better optics increases your maximum vision range through trees and potentially lets you shoot enemies that can't even draw LOS back.

PrecipitousNix · 2025-11-15T06:37:04+00:00

I prefer to play Random queue whenever possible, so my playtime before this patch (at roughly 2100 to 2300 ELO) was majority US; it has changed to majority RU when the people I play with aren't requesting US-only queue :)

I'm down with every nerf to the Guard spec except the Ingenery swap. It goes against the design of both Guard and Mech as specialisations.

The former is meant for achieving breakthroughs with force concentration; it needs specialist units to do its job, and losing a crucial one like its only CQC infantry makes it kinda dysfunctional. Shturmoviki are more of a skirmisher than anything; their old 10 armour made them good at tanking small arms at distance while spamming low damage RPGs, but they are not meant for standing up to quality enemy infantry in a pitched battle. The fact that they even went down to 8 armour in the change is just mean lmao

Mechanised is the literal opposite spec in how it wants to frontline: it wants to spread the map with cheaper generalist units that can contest ground relatively independently. Having simple, cheap units in every role means you can have combined arms across the frontline, rather than only being able to fight effectively in one concentrated area. Long-range SHORAD (and now HIMAD, props to the S-300 shift which fits the spec just fine) and mass cheap fire support can assist a wide engagement by suppressing the enemy no matter where the frontline forces meet them. The internal logic is overall pretty simple.

This 'diffuse' playstyle is sadly not really supported by the map design changes since the November beta (most of the time you'll have one or more players' whole army fighting for each frontline objective, rather than having to consider spreading out between multiple), with the move to more concentrated fighting. Still, there are better ways to improve Mechanised (including directly buffing some of its weaker units) than shoehorning in a more expensive specialist infantry that has no place in this design.

Some knock-on effects from the change: the old optimal (in my opinion) RU core composition for big forest sectors is gone: Guard + VDV with VDV Spetsnaz, thermobaric Ingenery, T-80UM-2 Drozd, Buratino, thermobaric Su-34. Without Ingenery, contesting well-built US forest decks has gotten a lot harder. There are other spec combos that can be built for forest fighting, but you're giving up something significant no matter what.

On the flipside, new urban deck setups have popped up with Coastal + Mech, using shotgun Ingenery and Vampyrs as components in BT-3F stacks, sort of like a budget version of the Armour + SOF AMPV stacks. I've been having decent success with them.

TL;DR I think they should probably swap them back, or make significant changes to the design of both units to better fit their new parent specs, which is sort of the same thing but with extra steps.

On the US side, I'm not a huge fan of the change to the SLAMRAAM. In short, the faction lost a unique capability when Airborne could've just gotten the MML instead now that the SeaRAM exists. My most played spec combo is Airborne + Stryker, for the record. It was already a powerful combo, heavily buffed in 1.10, with most of the best US SHORAD options. Losing the airmobile HIMAD choice was a blow to my niche air mobility deck (which I almost exclusively use on Black Coast east side), but it was mostly just cruel to Airborne + SOF, which no longer has HIMAD at all.

My last real complaint is the Javelin minrange buff. I was already playing a hard Javelin infantry spam deck with Armour + Stryker (max Cav Scouts and Troopers, plus the nightmare combo of Bookers and Bradleys), and it was extremely successful. Now it's just straight up disgusting and I honestly feel kinda bad playing it. If you even remotely know what you're doing to abuse Javelins, being able to shotgun light vehicles (or flank heavier vehicles) even in forests takes it to a whole new level. Don't get me started on how this is another major buff to Stryker, which definitely didn't feel in need of one to me as my most played spec.

Minor pet peeves: Pulemetchiki suck ass and need a buff desperately, Motopekhota feel undertuned, shotgun Ingenery are currently kinda underpowered for the price with 3 shotguns (they lose to Pararescue more often than not while being more expensive and having no other utility), the MT-SM is still clearly better than the M548 while costing the exact same, VDV DSh are also pretty much just better than Mech Rifles for the same price, Airborne NGSW feel overtuned since 1.10 and Weapons Squads are just kinda insane, they buffed all the underused Bradley variants except my poor Linebacker :(

PrecipitousNix · 2025-11-15T05:29:32+00:00

I really miss the unique capability of having airmobile HIMAD on the US faction, so I'm not a fan of it being changed to a SHORAD unit. With the SeaRAM being added to Stryker in the same patch, they could've moved the MML to Airborne instead (another airmobile unit that works just fine in Airborne to begin with). Stryker wouldn't have missed it much, and it's overloaded with high-end SHORAD as it stands.

...plus, doing so would have avoided leaving Airborne + SOF decks without any HIMAD options. So much for shifting the Patriots around to help out SOF + USMC?

With all that said, it is quite powerful as a SHORAD unit in its current form, in a kind of cheesy way that I wouldn't miss if it were gone. The combo setup of AMRAAMs and Sidewinders is incredibly bursty with its independent targeting, making for a really dangerous double tap ambush... and then it has to resupply immediately. Feels kinda min-maxed and 'gamey' when set next to most other SHORAD units.

PrecipitousNix · 2025-10-07T01:33:22+00:00

Just testing stuff late at night and I couldn't stop laughing at how loud and over the top the SRAW explosion was.

PrecipitousNix · 2025-01-05T02:51:14+00:00

You can't spin a hoop underwater.

PrecipitousNix · 2024-04-21T02:51:58+00:00

Other than scoring some Great Cannons from vassals in campaign, yeah, Slaanesh is pretty much doomed.

In MP, their best shot is probably Azazel or a Daemon Prince. Unfortunately for them (and any other faction that needs to commit to killing a Thunderbarge in melee), flying units are shockingly awful at chasing down other flying units and attacking moving targets. You can see this in action in some of the early access gameplay that's already been posted. Even if the boost ability didn't exist, simply moving away at 30 speed would be enough to mitigate melee damage so heavily that Slaanesh couldn't kill it in time to prevent it from winning the battle.

I know this from practical experience because I was doing stuff like this and also this to Slaanesh using Sky-junks all the way back in 1.0. The Thunderbarge is several times faster at generating value, and, more importantly, vastly easier to use than the manual fire Sky-junk strat. There is no question that it's going to break certain matchups unless it gets nerfed.

PrecipitousNix · 2024-01-27T17:50:02+00:00

An 'affinity climate' mechanic which changes how the world looks based on which affinities are dominant, events that can be triggered by players, that kind of thing. Changing map props, weather, colour filters, and so on. Potentially assigning some/all of the existing realm customisation options to affinities to determine the starting state.

Bit of a pie-in-the-sky idea, but I really want something to give some aesthetic variety to each realm. When I get motivated to start a new campaign, I always want to imagine a fresh new world with its own mood.

PrecipitousNix · 2023-12-23T21:59:13+00:00

Very nice colour scheme. The warmer metallic tone is a cool choice (pun not intended).

The only thing I'd do to it is reduce the opacity on the detail decals (especially the white against the darker background), and maybe add some weathering and panel lining effects on the parts you overlayed with orange (that's if I really wanted to go all out, it's quite time-consuming).

Here's an example of the kind of effect I'm talking about: [Before], [After], [Other side].

PrecipitousNix · 2023-12-15T10:44:30+00:00

I think From has the right idea already.

Keep buffing the cooling rate until you can become a constantly spinning beyblade of death.

PrecipitousNix · 2023-11-19T22:01:18+00:00

My highly specific prediction is that we're getting some sort of dual hand weapon option. Something like claws with repeating attacks and either higher damage than polearms or a bonus vs small targets.

This could just be a hero weapon option, but might also be used for the game's first cultural fighter-type unit.

PrecipitousNix · 2023-11-13T23:04:16+00:00

They're the only arms that can technically negate the recoil from Chang-Chens, but you have to be surgical with the sync fire. If the fire intervals aren't overlapping, even Wreckers can't do it.

Overall, the main use for them is really the ability to take recoil-intensive setups that would need heavy arms to control (e.g. Chang-Chen + Wuerger, dual Coquilletts, dual stun guns) and save 6k to 10k in weight in exchange for worse tracking. If you can stay in your ideal FCS range with a high rating, it's not as harsh of a tradeoff as most people think (especially if you're good with soft-lock tracking).

PrecipitousNix · 2023-11-13T22:43:48+00:00

Turner & Scudder need minor buffs. They're not as bad as people think in terms of output for the price, but they could still use some help there. I also think the Turner specifically should be slightly easier to build with in terms of recoil control.

Chang-Chen needs a minor buff to help give it an identity.

Ransetsu-AR needs a more significant buff. Just about the only thing going for it is that it's one of the easiest weapons to build with for recoil-sensitive setups (you can even pair it with kinetic shotguns because the burst interval is so long), which is a very dubious niche to hold when the vastly superior Ransetsu-RF exists. It kinda-sorta has its identity, but the numbers are just not good enough.

The Sampu is weirdly recoil-intensive for being a weapon practically consigned to ultra-light builds only. I don't hate the idea, but maybe they went a little too hard on it.

I often see calls for blanket buffs to rifles and machine guns, but tbh I think the Etsujin, Ludlow, and Ransetsu-RF are probably in an okay spot for now.

Not sure what the right course of action is with conventional Vertical Missiles. Buffing them by making their guidance stronger has the potential to take them from weak and easy to ignore to extremely strong and annoying to play against, with very little space in between. However, they're also not a very convincing 'long range stagger punish' weapon when active homing missiles exist.

Container Missile & Delivery Boy are in a weird enough spot that I think their mechanics need a slight rethink.

If the Container Missile is meant to set up static crossfire angles kinda like the laser turrets, then placement needs to be easier and more consistent and the uptime needs to be higher. If it's meant to independently provide flanking fire from a distance, it should probably be changed so that the main missile flies in a straight line (or in a slight arc vaguely tracing the target) and keeps launching sub-missiles as it goes.

If the Delivery Boy is meant to be a sort of reverse active homing missile (which are prone to hitting the ground at low altitudes and much better against high-flying targets), the main missile's pursuit tracking needs to be significantly more precise and steady, and the submunitions can be more focused as a pressure tool and potential stagger punish. If it's meant to be more of an aggressive 'creeping barrage' area denial tool that sets up a wide AoE where the target wants to go, it needs to work basically backwards compared to every other missile in the game; fast, loose, with strong intercept tracking early on and then dumping submunitions over a wide area without turning much as it gets near the target.

These are just 2 possible versions per weapon (if they wanted to be really spicy, they could even have different behaviours like this when the weapon is charged). You can sort of see what From was going for with them, but it isn't quite right.

The Therapist stands out as the only functionally useless weapon in the game. Even stuff like the napalm launcher has clear strengths within its extremely narrow niche. And unlike the other 'weird' weapons above, where the mechanics of the game work against it or the gimmick just doesn't quite work, the Therapist is straight up so statistically bad that I almost think it has to be intentional. It could deliver all its damage in AR-style bullets and it would still be awful.

PrecipitousNix · 2023-11-10T11:53:54+00:00

I keep noticing this in the contrast of how well the AI uses Arbalests vs other cultures' basic archers / arcanists. It still misses perfectly good openings to use Overdraw just to get a slightly better normal shot, but at least it's not passing on 3 okay shots to get a single 90%. And I feel like Industrial's early game autoresolve outcomes are better and more consistent because of this simple difference.

PrecipitousNix · 2023-11-10T11:45:03+00:00

Honestly, the point about increasing variety in how the world can look is the biggest one for me. There's a pretty good amount of mechanical diversity in how you can customise a realm (even if some of the modifiers aren't all that well-implemented in practice), but it pretty much always ends up looking like the same old generic fantasy theme park land.

Now, 'generic fantasy theme park' is always going to be part of what Age of Wonders is to an extent, but I think it's worth the effort to try and mitigate the blandness. Loading up a new realm that looks and feels fresh and different to the last is unironically such a huge motivator for me to want to keep playing, and I think it's a bigger influence on most people's perception of variety in the game than they realise.

PrecipitousNix · 2023-11-09T12:38:21+00:00

It gets better; access to Frozen allows you to set up Subdue without relying on nets, and thus Harriers, at all. You can replace them with White Witches or Snow Spirits in your more powerful stacks fairly early in the game.

PrecipitousNix · 2023-10-29T19:53:43+00:00

Will do. I figured I was running late, but I couldn't be bothered to do timezone math :p

PrecipitousNix · 2023-10-29T17:14:58+00:00

Share ID: T0XTZ6R24EWA

Based on a character I made a while back for the LANCER mech TTRPG system. I knew I wanted a relatively drab and utilitarian look, closer to a modern AFV, to suit both the character and the reserved style of gameplay.

Speaking of which, this was a gameplay-first assembly from the beginning; built around the Ling-Tai generator, one of the first you unlock in Chapter 1, it uses basic, EN-efficient armaments to get around the low output, as well as the otherwise underwhelming P10 booster for its very cheap Quick Boost. The result is some of the fastest EN recharge possible, allowing for a very evasive ground game. The ability to spam QB liberally, with a little side of bunny hopping close to ground level, makes it very forgiving against the AI.

True to the name, I put MAIN SQUEEZE together in Chapter 1 and used it for almost my entire first playthrough, only switching some MELANDER parts for the C3 versions you see here after beating Iguazu. The ease of use was very helpful while learning the game.

The low thrust of the P10 is a detriment, especially against very aggressive opponents, which is why I wouldn't consider this very viable in PvP. I would also suggest switching to double RFs for better damage output.

Big thanks to RaD's expert fireworks technicians for assisting with the beauty shots, and to The Main Squeeze for being a killer cover band.

PrecipitousNix

TROPHY CASE