Strategies/How To Get Powerful Military Modifiers

Community Strategy

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This is a strategy page made by players of the game. No information on this page is guaranteed to give the player success.

An example of powerful military modifiers.

Extreme defense upgrades with the Guerilla Warfare operation.

This strategy will explain how to obtain extremely overpowered military modifiers. Powerful military modifiers are crucial because they are the only way to effectively either attack or defend against your enemy. Weak military modifiers will result in an underperforming military, allowing your enemy to crush your forces.

This strategy will be divided into six crucial aspects for achieving powerful military modifiers: Technology, Doctrines, Political Leaders, Readiness, Operations, and Formable Modifiers. Additionally, the guide will provide a list of modifiers that don't directly affect global military modifiers.

Global Military Modifiers Scale

WORK IN PROGRESS.

• Infantry
• Tanks

Infantry Modifier Chart

Global Infantry Military Modifiers Ratings Chart
Unit	Type	Percentage	Rating
Infantry	Attack	<99%	Terrible
		100% - 300%	Mid
		301% - 551%	Average
		552% - 650%	Good
		651% - +1000%	Overpowered
	Defense	<99%	Terrible
		100% - 400%	Mid
		401% - 650%	Average
		651% - 799%	Good
		800% - +1000%	Overpowered
		+2000%	BROKEN
	Mobility	<99%	Terrible
		100% - 115%	Mid
		116% - 140%	Average
		150% - 200%	Good
		+201%	Overpowered

Tank Modifier Chart

Global Military Modifiers Ratings Chart
Unit	Type	Percentage	Rating
Tank	Attack	<99%	Terrible
		100% - 249%	Mid
		250% - 349%	Mid
		350% - 699%	Good
		700% - +800%	Overpowered
	Defense	<99%	Terrible
		100% - 300%	Mid
		301% - 451%	Average
		452% - 850%	Good
		851% - +1000%	Overpowered
		+2000%	BROKEN
	Mobility	<99%	Terrible
		100% - 129%	Mid
		130% - 145%	Average
		146% - 199%	Good
		+200%	Overpowered

List of Military Modifiers

All negative modifiers are excluded because this strategy focuses on achieving strong and positive modifiers, sufficient to create overpowered global or regional military effects. Additionally, modifiers that are beneficial to the military but don't impact attack, defense, mobility, or military experience, such as reinforcements, upkeep reduction, cost reduction, and manpower increase, are excluded.

Global/Direct Modifiers

Modifiers that positively apply to global military attack, defense, or mobility.

Global/Direct Modifiers Chart
Technology Technology is the most crucial aspect for achieving strong military modifiers. For example, if you research the entire middle branch of infantry technology up to Cybernetic Implantations, you will receive a massive +205.1% attack and a +90% defense increase for all of your infantry. If you combine this with anti-tank technology and the Static Lines doctrine, you can crush enemy tanks almost instantly if they lack sufficient modifiers. Once you acquire Quantum Computing, prioritize military technology as swiftly as possible. Begin by researching infantry technologies unless you prefer focusing on tanks; in that case, prioritize tank technology. However, infantry is generally better than tanks. Support, naval, and aerial technologies should come after infantry or tank upgrades. Alternatively, you can directly unlock military technology at the start of the game, specifically infantry or tanks (tanks are generally better than infantry early game) if you're playing a short game and aim for swift and decisive victories during player wars, particularly in Europe .
Doctrines Ground Doctrines Doctrines are the first military modifiers you should focus on, specifically ground doctrines, if you are not prioritizing a military leader, because they are crucial for implementing radical changes to your military. When selecting a doctrine, it is best to choose Static Lines because of its versatility: it provides powerful defense modifiers to every ground unit, benefits your nation as a whole (e.g., Stalwart increases stability), and can be used by any nation at any skill level, whether you are a professional playing as an island nation or a newbie playing as a large country. Additionally, it provides zero drawbacks in exchange. Its flexibility is limitless. Aside from the Static meta, you can also consider Specialization and Manoeuvre Warfare, but these are typically not recommended due to their significant drawbacks. For instance, Adaptability and Advanced Training in Specialization triple (3x) the recruitment duration for infantry, while Armored Fist and Steel Division triple (3x) the upkeep costs for tanks. Additionally, Static Lines offer similar buffs to these two doctrines without increasing recruitment time and upkeep costs, meaning Static Lines can effectively produce troops in one-third of the time and at one-third of the upkeep costs compared to Specialization infantry and Manoeuvre Warfare tanks. Nevertheless, Specialization is decent late game as by now you should have massive amounts of manpower assuming you grew your nation significantly. Additionally, Specialization is considerably useful for military experience growth (infantry automatically spawns near the Veteran/Skull military experience threshold without external modifiers). The 2x (+100%) attack modifier is also valuable when fighting on the terrain or biome you chose after Adaptability. For Manoeuvre Warfare, the doctrine strengthens tanks, a very effective unit early game, but you need an adequate economy that can offset the 3x tank upkeep. Never choose Massed Attack out of all doctrines for combat purposes, because it significantly reduces starting military experience for infantry by a massive -73.75%, basically making you spawn with extremely weakened troops. While it does provide significant manpower buffs, allowing you to recruit more troops and mobilize faster with larger numbers, this strategy is about obtaining powerful military modifiers, not manpower gain strategies. Naval/Air Doctrines Naval and air doctrines are quite straightforward compared to their land counterparts. For naval doctrines, Grand Fleet is typically the best choice because it buffs battleships and aircraft carriers, which are crucial as capital ships in the navy. For air doctrines, opt for Special Training for performance buffs (the power of Mass Production is disregarded because this strategy specifically involves increasing military modifiers, not mass construction). Then, choose whether you want to focus on fighters (Aerial Supremacy), attackers (Close Air Support), or bombers (Strategic Bombing).
Political Leaders The best political-military leaders are typically the General of the Army, Chief of Staff, and Fortification Expert. The reason for prioritizing ground-related leaders, besides the Chief of Staff, is that ground units are the most important in the game. They are usually at the center of conflict when capturing enemy cities or confronting enemy units and therefore need strong and effective modifiers during engagements. The General of the Army focuses on buffing all ground units, while the Fortification Expert provides defense power specifically to ground units. The Chief of Staff increases the attack and starting military experience for all units. Other military leaders like the Admiral of the Fleet or the Marshal of the Airforce are only useful if you are bound to engage in naval or aerial warfare in the future. Political-military leaders, like any other ordinary leader, can have their modifiers expanded through leveling up. This process can be accelerated by education spending, high stability, or the corrupt Favor the Political Elite policy. However, political leaders are vulnerable to succumbing to permanent corruption as they gain experience.
Readiness Throughout the game, military readiness should be set to maximum, especially when you are engaging in multiple wars simultaneously, involved in one massive war, training your military leaders, or staying neutral with a lack of military units. Maximum readiness increases attack and defense for all units by 1.5x (+50%). This boost is very useful during player warfare. While increasing readiness does provide attack and defense bonuses, it also raises military upkeep as the readiness level increases, which could be a major financial burden to many. To avoid such burden, you can keep readiness at level 5 only during peace or invading weak AI nations, but should be set to maximum when engaging in a player war. Never go below level 5 military readiness because it takes a while to refill depending on how low you set your military spending. For example, it takes around a minute to recharge back to level 5 if you set readiness to its lowest point, level 1, which reduces attack and defense by a massive -80%. The only time to go below level 5 spending is during special circumstances; otherwise, never go below.
Operations Operations are designed to be quick but radical modifications to your military. Most of the time, operations are rarely used until the later stages of the game, as doctrines and military leaders are prioritized due to the high cost of implementing operations in terms of military power. The only time you might see a military operation in the early years is during a private event, especially in wartime. Aside from their rarity, operations can be extremely useful for your military, but they can also have drawbacks. For example, the only operations that provide little-to-no harmful effects are Shock and Awe, Naval Swarm Tactics, and Maginot Theory. Shock and Awe buffs bombers and attackers, Naval Swarm Tactics capitalize on frigates, and Maginot Theory prioritizes defense and entrenchment, but with the cost of reduced ground speed and attack. Other operations can be extremely harmful yet extremely useful. For instance, Lightning Warfare (combined with Blitzkrieg) provides a +50% attack bonus to tanks but also comes with defense, entrenchment, and war exhaustion drawbacks, while Guerilla Warfare offers a substantial +165% increase to defense but comes with a massive -80% reduction to attack. Therefore, operations are only an necessity if you truly need it, otherwise, it is not much of a priority compared to doctrines, political leaders, military leaders, technology, readiness, etc.
Formable Modifiers Formable Modifiers can give military bonuses to either a certain unit or all units. All formable modifiers that includes at least one attack, defense, mobility, and military experience buff to the military are: Arab League British Empire Byzantine Empire Czechoslovakia Empire of Japan Frankish Empire French Empire German Empire Holy Roman Empire Macedonian Empire Mexican Empire Mongol Empire Napoleonic Empire Persian Empire Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth Roman Empire Ottoman Empire Ostrogothic Kingdom Republic of China Spanish Empire Swedish Empire Timurid Empire Almohad Caliphate Fatimid Caliphate Islamic Caliphate Almighty Don Host Cossackia Kuban People's Republic Austrian Empire Austro-Hungarian Empire

Regional/Indirect Modifiers

Modifiers that are not applied to global military attack, defense, or mobility.

Regional/Indirect Modifiers Chart
Military Leaders Military Leaders provide bonuses to their respective military branch, depending on the leader you recruit: ground, navy, or air. Leaders inherently boost attack, defense, and XP bonuses, while traits such as geographic specialization (terrain and biome), mobility, military upkeep reduction, attack/defense bonuses, and more, can be obtained as they level up. Leveling up occurs during combat, city captures, standard training, and other activities. Deciding whether to prioritize military leaders before doctrines is ultimately up to you. However, in general, it's better to prioritize doctrines over military leaders since they offer better bonuses and modifiers, depending on the chosen doctrine. Choosing a military leader after doctrines depends on the leader's traits. For instance, if you are fighting in Arid territory, you should pick a leader with the Desert Fox trait. For versatility in combat, choose traits like Aggressive, Frontline Leader, Defensive, Logistician, or Organizer. If focusing on tanks, select a Panzer Commander, and so on. However, it wouldn't make sense to pick a leader with a trait that doesn't align with your unit focus. For example, avoid choosing a leader with the Support Leader trait if you have little-to-no artillery or anti aircraft, or avoid Logistician leader if you follow Nationalism or Fascism ideologies, as these decrease military upkeep by default. You can find a comprehensive guide for picking the best traits for military leaders here. Unfortunately, military leaders are vulnerable to dying during combat. There is no fixed chance for this occurrence, as it depends on a random number generator.
Military Experience Military Experience is extremely vital and important for all units in the military, besides the nuke, as it determines the attack and defense bonuses for your units. The more experience they gain, the greater attack the defense bonuses become, while less experienced units will have reduced attack and defense bonuses. Experience is acquired through various factors such as standard training (not advanced training), leaders, military leaders, doctrines, conscription laws, formable modifiers, and more. It is a crucial in gaining an advantage over opponents, as units with higher experience and modifiers can effectively defeat less experienced enemies. Even when facing enemies with powerful modifiers, significant military experience, combined with limited external modifiers, can perhaps lead to victory. However, as valuable as military experience is, it's important to avoid unintentionally granting your enemy more of it. For example, sending a large stack of poorly-experienced troops to engage the enemy, resulting in their quick defeat while granting the enemy considerable combat experience, can make them stronger in combat and harder to kill.
Entrenchment + Fortifications Entrenchment Entrenchment is a tactic involving a ground unit maintaining a static position to gain additional defense bonuses. However, if the ground unit moves, it loses these defense bonuses. The effectiveness of these defense bonuses can vary based on factors such as terrain, biomes, and other modifiers, like doctrines, traits, operations, etc. For instance, Mountainous terrain provides a defense bonus that quadruples (4x) maximum entrenchment compared to flat terrain. These defense bonuses enhance survivability during direct combat against other units, as well as against enemy bombardment from sources such as artillery, aircraft, and ships. Fortifications If a ground unit is entrenched on a fortified city, they will receive a 2x defense bonus to their entrenchment, though fortifications does not apply to entrenchment directly, but stacks on a unit's base defense modifiers.
Flanking Flanking is a tactic that involves one or more divisions attacking an enemy from the side or the rear. During a flank, the attacking divisions receive a 1.5x (+50%) attack bonus against the targeted enemy. However, flanking grants more military experience to enemy units compared to a head-on attack, which can lead to severe consequences if the flank is unsuccessful.
Infrastructure Infrastructure is a building that can maximize ground movement boosts up to 2x (+100%) at tier X (10). However, conflicting infrastructure levels among cities in the same tile will determine the movement speed based on the average infrastructure level of the tile. Infrastructure is vulnerable to damage from bombers, scorching, nukes, or enemy attacks during war. Additionally, infrastructure can be constructed on occupied cities in enemy territory.
Advanced/Geographic Training Advanced Training, also known as geographic training, geographic specialization, or advanced specialization, can be a critical feature for training only ground units based on the environment, such as terrain and biomes, where they will be fighting. For example, if your tanks will be operating through rough, Mountainous territory, then you need Mountain Specialization to gain attack, defense, and mobility bonuses in such harsh landscapes. Specialized units fighting in their specialized biome will receive a 1.5x (+50%) boost to attack and defense, as well as a movement speed increase. However, biome specialization does not increase military experience compared to standard training, and likewise to standard training, biome specialization also increases military upkeep costs for the unit divisions that are training/specializing. To reduce the loss of money from high upkeep during training, you can train your units on terrain or biome matching their specialization, which decreases training duration by 0.5x (-50%). For instance, training troops in Jungle with Jungle Specialization takes half the time compared to training in non-Jungle territory. Additionally, Adaptability in the Specialization doctrine can expedite advanced training, doubling the speed by 2x (+100%). However, this doctrine also increases infantry and ground upkeep costs, potentially creating heavier financial burdens during training, compared to without the doctrine.