WC3 update (july 2022)

Vatutin.

My standards are simple. A good tank general must have the following: deals high and consistent damage from 100% to 0% HP, and high mobility.


For high damage, a tank general should boost the tank's damage to the enemy by at least 28 points. Rommel, Guderian, Manstein, Vatutin and Patton passes that. Even Weygand. A customized general could be given 3 stars in panzer and Lvl 3 plain fighting and he deal 31 points of damage on plain, higher than Rommel at 28 on plain. You forgot to mention what makes Guderian, Manstein and Vatutin strong: plain fighting. Aside from having 5 stars in panzer, they have plain fighting and plains are everywhere. Guderian has 28 + 20 = 48 points, Vatutin 28 + 10 = 38, Manstein 28 + 15 = 43. Also, it is cheaper to give our custom tank general the fourth level in plain fighting than the fourth star in panzer. Patton and Manstein both have Explosives which are useful on cracking cities open. Patton is great at defending cities. Weygand has none of those.

What about consistent damage? Remember that a tank general will deal less damage if its unit has below 50% damage. As the tank general loses HP, he loses damage points. This is where Tide of Iron comes in. Tide of Iron can give +6 DMG per level when the unit HP of the general falls below 50%. My standard is at least level 2 Tide of Iron. Guderian, Rommel and Vatutin have those, so it is safe to say that their expected damage output is constant all throughout their run. But Manstein, Patton and Weygand does not have Tide of Iron. This is where survivability comes.

What about survivability? Patton has Ace Forces. Ace Forces makes the unit level up faster as they deal damage. When units level up, they gain HP. That means Patton can have HP higher than 50% for a longer time. Rommel also has ace forces. Manstein is a Marshal. Vatutin (never mind his measly Lvl 1 Supply) can be upgraded to L General and he will still cost less to hire (2830) than Rommel (3300) in the same rank. Weygand? Camouflage has no effect against aliens for they are neither artillery nor airplanes. Fortifications has way too low benefit. Upgrading him to M General (2890) costs more than an L General Vatutin (2830) for being just a Major.

What about high mobility? Sure, all five star-tank generals in WC3 has at least 3 stars in mobility, except for Vatutin. But give Vatutin two Lvl 1 marching medal and he now beats Rommel in every aspect. Many players chose Rommel over Vatutin because Vatutin has only 1 star in mobility. But the medals update fixed this issue. Sure, Weygand can run as fast as Guderian, but what does he have?

Desperate? To demonstrate how unreliable this skill is, consider that sometimes there are no super tanks to put Weygand in, only a heavy tank. Super tanks, field artilleries and rocket artilleries will feast on him and he would not have a chance to retaliate, let alone against an actually strong general. Put him on a super tank and artilleries will still be a problem. Unlike Plain Fighting which is an all rounder, Desperate is too conditional. Even in human conquests he is too weak. You won in many conquests using him? I won in conquests using Meyer and Chung when I was a beginner.

And to top it all off, I haven't even mentioned Devers yet.

Devers has 3 tank stars + Lvl 2 Plain Fighting, 4 marching stars, Lvl 1 Explosives, Lvl 2 Tide of Iron, costs 2090 medals in total if you promote him to M General. Give him two tank medals and you have a tank general that is cheaper than Weygand but offers something more than Weygand could.

You can have Weygand if you really like him, but I will not see him as strong against humans, let alone against aliens.

Thanks, what do you think about him?

A better Donitz