T-80 Tank

The T-80 is a Soviet tank introduced in the March 2011 Version, replacing the Elephant Tank. It is the game's take on the RL T-80.

Stats

 * Type: Vehicle, Tank
 * Class: MBT
 * Lv:
 * HP:
 * Cost:

Equipment

 * 125mm tank gun
 * Tank missile

History
The previous soviet main tank, the Elephant Tank, had several flaws in terms of game balance - it had a large anti-tank main gun that would easily tear apart buildings as well, while being ineffective against infantry, even moreso than the AP warhead normally used on tank guns in C&C. It was intended to be teamed up with the T-34, with the T-34 complimenting it by playing an anti-infantry role with its HE weapon. Apart from the voxel being far too large to be comfortably used as a generic tank along with the other voxels in the mod (such as a much smaller Apocalypse Tank), the unit, the stats of which had been taken from the text file accompanying the voxel download, also turned out to be by far too effective in tank rushes to keep the game balanced, even against the notoriously overpowered allied base defenses (which have since been nerfed). It would be possible to simply ignore the enemy's base defenses with a substantial force of Elephant Tanks, drive right to essential base installations and destroy them with few rounds before the tanks could be destroyed, causing more havoc in the process. Thus, as soon as the idea came up of orienting Soviet tanks more closely to RL again, and the introduction of T series tanks sprung up, it was clear that a T series MBT would replace the Elephant Tank (the T-34 had been removed before due to it ill-befitting the time period in which the mod was intended to take place, as well as the general idea of using the unused unit ideas and voxels, hence it had been replaced with the Hydra Tank). Stat-wise, the T-80 is a straight copy of the Rhino Heavy Tank, including weapon stats.

Strategy
In terms of strategic doctrine, the T-80 is supposed to engage other tanks with its AP cannon, while the less-resilient T-72, armed with a HE cannon, is supposed to engage infantry. The T-72's armor is sufficient to withstand infantry weapons, while putting it in a serious disadvantage against tanks, which is why it has been relegated to anti-infantry combat in the "division of labour" in the armored forces.

It has been demonstrated that Conscripts of a given value can absorb more damage than the same value in tanks of either type, at least when facing allied base defenses (Patriot Launchers and Gun Turrets are both anti-tank based; Pillboxes are anti-infantry, but only inflict insignificant damage to a large group of infantry and Paladin Gun Turret's anti-infantry capacity had been nerfed). Thus, for a time, after combined groups of T-80 and T-72 failed to perform succesful tank rush tactics against allied bases (tested in Skirmish games against Easy AI with flawed build order - it would build both types of gun turret, but that should not affect the outcome a great deal), the dominant working tactic for an assault was to send tanks for firepower accompanied by masses of cheap infantry to absorb damage from base defenses. It is propable this type of strategy will remain effective as long as the ratio of cost to damage absorption for infantry is better than for tanks against the base defenses faced - given the anti-infantry nature of planned Soviet defense structures, one could doubt the strategy's effectiveness against Soviet bases; as for Allied bases, the planned re-introduction of the Prism Tower might change the balance as well. It is not expected to have great effect, but it is currently not foreseeable. As for planned Brotherhood defenses, it is not foreseeable how the ratio will be against these. Another condition is that base defenses do not suddenly "grow smart" and preferably target armor (TargetRatio, Warhead setting or ThreatRatio - there are multiple ways of making base defenses act "smarter" in this respect, and they will propably be implemented sooner or later)

This combined-arms approach to using tanks in battle is similar to the concept of the infantry tank, an abortive tank design doctrine of the inter-war period (RL) which called for slow, heavily-armored tanks to accompany the infantry and offer support. The faster, more maneuverable and independantly-operating counterpart to the infantry tank was the cruiser or cavalry tank. In RL, this concept of tank design seems to have died out over the course of World War II and infantry instead begun operating with fire support from self-propelled artillery. It might have some merit in the RA2 engine, I have yet to test this. However, it brings up the interesting point how a combined-arms assault of infantry and artillery, instead of tanks, would work in this mod. I will test this. Note that the T-80 is an AP build, the T-73 is an HE build. Neither of these are particularly suited in combating base defenses and buildings, so the use of artillery might actually be a big improvement over the use of tanks in this combined-arms approach. While the artillery is terribly-armored and more expensive than the tanks, the brunt of the base defense's firepower is to be taken by the infantry anyways, making heavy armor on the motorized units redundant, and the artillery range gives some stand-off, maybe the infantry wave will be just clearing shroud, while the artillery can attack from beyond the range of several layers of base defenses, something normally not possible with a tank-infantry assault at, say, a Construction Yard, where the forces would expose themselves to simultaneous fire of all base defenses around the Con Yard.

Note that this change of doctrine to "infantry as meat-shields" implies several other changes to Soviet unit selection: Firstly, the removal of the Flak Track. The unit long seemed anachronistic and misplaced - an utter guess could be made about the strategic value of infantry transport vehicles in RA2, and the frequency of their use by players. While in Tiberian Sun, they seemed reasonable, allowing the ferrying of infantry to otherwise inaccessible terrain, the Flak Track simply travels to the same places infantry can reach on foot. At that, it does not greatly increase their damage resistance; the unit is very fragile and in terms of transportation, its main use seems to be the speed increase, not the protection of transported infantry (to little wonder - it is not an APC), relying on racing past defenses and unloading its passengers quickly as a means of getting them to their destination, from what I've seen. It's main function is mobile air defense, along with some anti-infantry support, and the troop transport capacity was rolled into one propably for reasons of historic authenticity. Its placement with the Soviet side seems even more awkward - while the Soviet side is clearly the one to make use of more infantry-intense tactics, their infantry is not very valuable; its cheap price and sheer mass is what actually makes their tactics infantry-centered. Apart from specialized sabotage units (Ivans, Terrorists, Engineers), there seems to be little reason to invest into motorized transport for Soviet infantry, because their damage output is less per price than the Allied infantry - I can buy 10 Conscripts for the price of 5 GIs, but the damage inflicted is roughly equal (even though it is planned to nerf the GIs weapons, and to give the Alliance and European Union Guards as GI replacements). Yet, for the transport of the Conscripts, I'd need twice as much investment into transport vehicles, because both types of infantry still take 1 passenger slot per unit. Even more with the removal of the Terrorist and Ivan units (they were moved to the Brotherhood), the Flak Track has become redundant for the Soviets in its transport role. Given the new 'role' of infantry in the combined arms tactics described above, infantry now serves as the literal 'meat shield' to the vehicles, rather than the other way around. An assault would depend on the infantry to fight on foot to absorb base defense fire. The Flak Track was removed hence, and the ZSU-23 Shilka was added to replace it in its anti-aircraft role. Remember the Soviets retain their Hovercraft (for now), not to mention the Hind Transport (which does actually give an advantage, or so I like to think to justify it, because it can access otherwise-inaccesible parts of the map - and thereby actually being yet another point why the Flak Track is redundant at least in my mod), and I might add a Transport Truck... or something... as a token transport unit later, which wont have the pretense of being _anything more_ than a transport, even though it will likely cost just as much (or little) as the Flak Track, for reasons of cameo sorting and price continuity between truck-type units.