With the recent additional content for DAK, I’ve had a lot of ideas poking around in the back of my head about new battlegroups that could be developed and other related ideas for DAK. Having a creative bent of mind, I decided to do a write up of these ideas for publication, ideally to influence what comes out later, but mostly for my own enjoyment. This is what this post contains.

The perspective I’m coming from in this post is that, to me, it would be non-sensical for Relic to develop another sequel to Coh, as the release of Coh3 has demonstrated that you have to compete directly with the predecessors, leading to schisms in the playerbase. Moving to Coh3 made a lot of sense, as the technology required updating, but now that that is done, I feel doubling down on DLC for Coh3 in terms of new factions, battlegroups and content is the way to go, unless some fundamental technology leap happens in the next 10 years. Coh3 should be treated as the ‘platform’ on which Coh is developed. Even if we have to wait another 5 years for another faction, this probably makes the most sense. This way, the effort that would go to porting functionality to a new game, can be spent on creating new content and new features for the already existing game.

In terms of the design of the battlegroups, I wanted to make them thematic, different from existing battlegroups, unique and mostly historically accurate. The interesting aspect of DAK battlegroups is that you have a limited pool of units to work with.

Without further ado, here are my battlegroup ideas:



Central Idea: Logistics, augmenting Halftrack Deployment System. The battlegroup focuses on mobility and efficient resource expenditure.

Opel Blitz Fuel Truck: The Opel Blitz Fuel Truck should have two effects with the lockdown, when locked down on fuel, it should increase the rate of fuel supply, probably by more than a normal cache, however when locked down in base, it should reduce fuel cost of the vehicles in the selected structure, so kind of like officer supervision. This would encourage more active micro management of the unit. When it dies it should have a large AOE explosion, meaning friendly units should avoid it and also that it can be driven towards enemy units, kinda like a less efficient Goliath that you can't manually detonate, I can’t see this being anything but ludicrously fun. You really could go nuts with the audio design on that. Top Up Vehicle should be an ability that can be targeted on friendly vehicles. Once done, the target vehicle has faster speed, acceleration and deceleration for a fixed distance. Note this is a fixed distance, instead of time, so if the vehicle doesn't move, it won't 'expend' the ability.

Recharge Halftrack Deployment: This feeds into DAK’s tempo playstyle by allowing you to muster units rapidly. The situations where I see this being useful are early in the game when you want to get double call ins early to build out your composition at a discount or later in the game where you’re trying to mass late game armour quickly. For instance, calling in a P4 as a stopgap measure before calling in a Tiger 90 seconds later, especially if you build up a bank in the lategame.

Panzer III Munitions Supply Vehicle: Largely self explanatory, its like the Munitions Store for US, except mobile and provides different buffs. I could see this unit being coupled with ATGs and LeIGs being strong, as well as recharging snares faster, it compliments that infantry and support weapon playstyle nicely. The unit also can drop MG42s and Mortars, which give DAK manpower efficient access to more team weapons, diversifying potential builds.

Vehicle ROF Ability: Self explanatory. Could see it being strong on Marders, Tigers and Stug Ds. You could make this a global ability but here I’ve stuck with a unit ability.

Ability/Upgrades Discount: This essentially makes Unit Upgrades and Unit Abilities 50% cheaper for the duration. Its thematically appropriate and potentially a strong ability. If you could pair this with the Panzer III Muntions Vehicle, grenades would be cheaper but also recharge faster, although this combination could apply to a whole bunch of different things. Strategies where you rush this ability to ‘mass upgrade’ MG34s on the PGs could be a thing, although you’d need a fair bit of munitions banked up. One thing that could be experimented with is applying this to mines, where you could pop this to spam out mines, depending on how expensive the ability is, the calculus might add up.

Panzer I Command Tank: Feeding into that tempo style again, this early game vehicle would have roughly the potency against infantry as a 250, albeit with better armour. However, the main appeals are the capping and mobility bonuses, these would allow you to rapidly gain map control and would give you an edge when switching sides of the map. For flanking manoeuvres, this would also come in handy, one combination that would be strong would be your vehicles ‘Topped Up’ with the mobility bonuses from the Opel Blitz Fuel Truck and your infantry buffed by the Pzr I Command Tank, meaning your forces can get off flanks or respond to threats much faster.

Withdraw & Refit: Again interacting with the Halftrack Deployment System, this allows you to trade in vehicles that are not needed for resources, exactly like with Brits. I could see this being useful when you want to get rid of 250s that you have spare.

Panzer III S-Mine Launchers: This would be an ability on the Panzer III that allows it to launch S-Mines. I could see this being implemented in 2 ways, either exactly like the Tiger S-Mine launcher ability, which would be really strong for flanking AT Guns or chasing down squads, or if that’s too strong, more like the grenade ability on the Sturmtiger in Coh2. Again, this synergises with the Panzer III Munitions Vehicle and the Ability/Upgrades Discount ability.

Panzer III Side Skirts: Self explanatory, improves the armour and health of your Panzer IIIs after a unit upgrade is purchased. I wouldn’t be in favour of this being an instant upgrade to all units. This would again synergise with the Ability/Upgrades Discount ability.

Lorraine Schlepper Mobile Artillery: Finally, mobile artillery, not unlike the Wespe, giving DAK another tool in the box at their disposal.

Central Idea: Fire, anti-cover. It would be strong against team weapon camp gameplay.

Incendiary Grenade Assault: Its essentially the exact same as the Assault Gren grenade assault, except Panzer Grens have access to it and its better at denying cover. So I see this being useful when you want to dislodge infantry in cover or make a Team Weapon move, as they won’t be able to jump back into cover or move back.

Detonating Shot: This ability is available for; Paks, Marders, P3s, Tigers, P4s, Stugs, Flak 36s. While active, if you land a kill shot on a vehicle, that vehicle will blow up causing AOE damage to nearby units. How good this should be will need to be tested. The basic counter play would be just to split up your units, but that requires micro. On the flip side, using the ability well also requires micro and good timing, so there’s a skill factor involved. This ability can also be used on ATGs and Indirect fire units (including emplacements), and if you land the kill shot on these units while the ability is active, it not only explodes but also, importantly, destroys the weapon outright.