How to Build Space Marines... (2024)

Or the next best thing.

How do you build the best marine division? I'm playing as America and want to use my marine force to effectively invade/police all of the Americas backed up by my air force and fleet without having to use my heavier mec/arm divisions that make up my army.

As a note; "Space Marine" generally includes any 40 width leg division with artillery that had 1 Heavy Tank or Heavy Tank Destroyer regardless of weather it was Marines, Alpines, or regular Inf so these appear to be two different questions.

"Space Marine" = 13 (any of Alpines/Marines/Inf) -4 Artillery - 1 Heavy Tank or Heavy Tank Destroyer.

But while the Marine version of that design works great for river crossings there's an issue with that design for both strait crossing and amphibious landing: The Tank brigade would suffer a 99% loss in combat strength. In addition there's a combined special forces limit in 1.5 that includes all special forces and for quite some time, they don't go far at 40 width. I think 10 Marines with Engineer + Recon + Support Art would be better for the initial navy assault. Once the beach head with a port is secured, pour in the 40 width tank divisions and inf.

Policing the Americans: That same special force limit means that there's much more important things for Marines to do.
For MP purposes: 2 Calvary with optional MP.
For garrisoning ports: Just use your smallest starting Inf template; which is actually overkill, but there's not much point using XP to shrink any of them as the US since you'll have basically unlimited Inf & supply units. Also if as America you are in the allies you are highly unlikely to be naval invaded by the AI.

I would never have guessed that Space Marine was jargon for something so specific. When would anyone use such an insane division?

What I mean by "police" is that the Marines are able to capitulate small Latin American countries on their own without support from other, more unwieldy, land units and if there is ever a rebellion they can quickly respond. Obviously I wouldn't use them just as a garrison.

SacremPyrobolum said:

See Also

[Top 15] Hearts of Iron 4 Best Division Templates That Are PowerfulDoes the Space Marine template still work well against the AI?

I would never have guessed that Space Marine was jargon for something so specific. When would anyone use such an insane division?

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The conventional wisdom, especially before the 1.5 patch, is that 14 infantry/4 artillery is the basic "good" infantry division for attacking. Trading an infantry battalion for the heavy tank takes advantage of the fact that the AI rarely builds anti-tank guns, so you'll have some armor, hardness, and extra piercing which steamrolls whatever the AI throws at you.

SacremPyrobolum said:

What I mean by "police" is that the Marines are able to capitulate small Latin American countries on their own without support from other, more unwieldy, land units and if there is ever a rebellion they can quickly respond. Obviously I wouldn't use them just as a garrison.

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The two basic choices are the above 14/4 template or 20 width pure marines, depending on how strong the garrisons will be and how much benefit you'll get from air power and shore bombardment. If you've got Waking the Tiger, also consider that there's now a general trait for naval invasions you can earn that unlocks other bonuses.

Jon1972 said:

But while the Marine version of that design works great for river crossings there's an issue with that design for both strait crossing and amphibious landing: The Tank brigade would suffer a 99% loss in combat strength.

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AFAIK this isn't really how HoI4 combat mechanics work. What happens is that the terrain penalties are averaged for the final division and all stats are added together. So the Heavytank battalion still adds most of it's breakthrough and combat stats thanks to the Marines lowering the averaged penalty enough.

Alex_brunius said:

What happens is that the terrain penalties are averaged for the final division and all stats are added together.

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To add/be fully detailed: Terrain penalties/bonus is averaged on the combat battalions. Support Companies add their full terrain bonus/penalties to division.

Just use 14 INF / 4 ART and you'll stomp anything the AI throws at you, especially when you have air superiority and Close Air Support.

You don't even need a single tank to win this game.

Ironside121 said:

Just use 14 INF / 4 ART and you'll stomp anything the AI throws at you, especially when you have air superiority and Close Air Support.

You don't even need a single tank to win this game.

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No, but then again, most decent players understand that theorycrafting against the AI is somewhat of a moot point.

optimerad said:

No, but then again, most decent players understand that theorycrafting against the AI is somewhat of a moot point.

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No? Where am I wrong? Against such a braindead AI you don't need tanks, and the 40 width Inf/Art template with Support will easily kill anything. There's no challenge to the game.

You are wrong when you assume that all players play this game the same way you play it. Or that you enjoy the same things when playing. The way I see it, you should probably try finding a good MP group if you want the extra challenge. Either that or start playing small countries and go for world domination.

Also, I have seen some changes in the AI templates in the last patches wich would make it hard for you to only go for 14/4 divs (assuming the AI doesnt needlessly throw their entire army against a well defended position).

There are also some mods which increase the AI difficulty.

No matter what, I find it both childish and a bit dishonest to just scream "the AI sucks, this game has no challenge".

Ironside121 said:

No? Where am I wrong? Against such a braindead AI you don't need tanks, and the 40 width Inf/Art template with Support will easily kill anything. There's no challenge to the game.

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The point is with SHT or HT you get the armor bonus against all AI divisions, that dont have any large numbers of AT.
Thats what stomps them really hard.
Nothing more special behind that tactic.

SacremPyrobolum said:

Given how restrictive the special forces cap is, it looks like I'll need to add non-special forces units to my colonial police force. What types of units would you suggest that can hit above their weight and operate well in low infrastructure areas?

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For some countries with few civilian factories then you'd need logistics added to a standard 20 width template for ultra low infrastructure areas, but as the US you just use a normal 20 width template and as you conquer you just place boosting a port and infrastructure of the conquered area to the top of your queue.