Army organization

[MrLatency]

I'm wondering how people generally organize their armies. It seems that anything over 5 units in a flank (not incl reserves) gives you a frontage penalty. As a result even in my biggest armies I generally try to keep just 5 units per flank with the rest of the forces in reserve. While this does seem to be effective in battles, keeping this formation at its most effective can be a lot of work, especially in MP where pausing isn't an option. Basically after heavy battles the front line units in the flank naturally soak up a lot of casualities. This then means that I need to spend time reorganizing, manually pulling fresh brigades from the reserves to strengthen the battered flanks. I also greatly dislike doomstacks - thus I keep my armies in Corps of between 20-40k, with the occasional strong force of 50-70k. Rarely if ever do I go over 70k in a single stack unless generals are in particularly short supply in comparison to my available manpower. This results in a great deal of army management as I find myself going through all my corps after battles/campaigns sending depleted units to the reserves and replacing them with relatively fresh brigades.

What I'm wondering is, am I causing myself an unneccesary amount of work, or is it really worth it to keep on top of things like this? And is it really a good idea to have just 5 units per flank? Those brigades take so much damage, assigning more units to each flank may give a frontage penalty, but seems to have the advantage of spreading the damage over a wider range, thus maintaining the combat efficiency of each individual brigade. I also often find after heavy battles/campaigns that many of my front line units have taken severe damage and no longer count when working out which tactics can be used or not - thus sometimes the tactic I've chosen is disabled due to too much damage on one or more units. On SP its not such a problem, but on MP where pausing isn't viable and you're stuck in a gruelling war with plenty of battles and maneuvering it saps precious micro time and can be downright dangerous at times to concentrate on reorganization as you can't see whats going on!

So, is it a good or bad idea to keep ~5 units per flank? Has anyone done any extensive testing with different setups? What are your thoughts on combat efficiency over micro management (Particularly in regard to MP)?

 

[Herr Dak]

Greetings!

After my first experience in MP where France literally steamrolled me (I was Austria)... I develop a Theorical Army Organization for both Defensive and Offensive Strategies based in unit atributes, brigade strategies and Austrian advantages. I design 3 kind of korps for a defensive Armee and 4 kind of korps for an offensive Armee. When i finish all my Theory i will post it so the experimented players could give me opinions.

Then i will put in practice in our next mp campaign =]

 

[frigger]

In my current game as Spain I use two kinds of stacks. Firstly full Entrenched Defense Armies of around 40k(~ 3 Inf, 1 Linf, 2 Art per flank, some cav in reserves) which i could build out of the starting OOB with adding some Linf and Art. Newly built armies are Up the Guard/Entrenched Defense stacks, usually the center uses Entrenched Defense and consists of mainly Inf, one unit of Light inf and artillery. Guard Flanks are Guards and artillery, maybe some Linf. In a Prussian game I used the second composition pretty exclusively as Main Battle armies. In both games they performed extremely well so far. I have yet to fight France as Spain, as Prussia they were easily slaughtered(slight numerical and positional advantages in those battles though).

If i am not mistaken by some observations from joining up allied armies it is important to keep your armies compatible when throwing stacks together. Since the usual form of maneuver for me is to have several armies with MttSoG on fanning out they shouldnt have incompatible compositions/tactics on the respective flanks because then you get stuck without the huge advantages the Tactics give you.

 

[Thanik]

1. You got enough frontage to get more than 5 units per flank.

a) 50 - clear (desert too)
b) 40 - march, coastline
c) 30 - hills
d) 35 - woods
e) 15 - forest, mountain
f) 9 - breach
g) 3 - fort


2. Also idea and leader traits can give your units max. -45% frontage ( -60% for French).


3. Also frontage affect only attack, not defense -> with proper tactic and leader even -99%(I think this is max) attack modifer (300k stack) can be neglected (like guard attack + napoleon + french idea +50% guard attack + experience for example).


4. Did you run some test before? -10% attack modifer is not bad, when you add more 10% pure attack attribute (counted by others modifiers). When you hover mouse at these arrows in battle you can see how many dmg each flank do to enemy. For me it is better to give 600 damage than 500, even with negative modifiers.


5. Maybe lot of micro can give good results, but if you start making annoying moves (like 1k army chasing enemy supplies, or non stop retreating and waiting for enemy attriction, 2k light cavalry besieging cities and start retreat when see enemy), you can lose friends easy I played one game with Russia player (after taking all Sweden, lots of Turkey), when he move his army to Moscow and waiting for Napoleon there.


6. As you wrote managing these troops all the time in MP is almost impossible,espiecially in full scale war. Maybe in low scale battles (or against AI)


8. March of the sound of guns not always work properly -> Sometimes 800k army can be anihilated by 300k army just by bad timing, or overrun factor when you got less than 30k army per corps


9. It is faster way to replenish 50 brigades from 80% to 100% health, than 5 brigades from 0% to 100%
If you have time, we can do some test MP game.


10. Not having doomstack on enemy territory, without proper scouting can be devastating. Napoleon + forced march + French 300k army - good idea to be anihilated soon

Edit:
11. I think troops gain experience from direct combat (not in reserve), and lose when reinforce. So it is better idea to get more troops -> so all will get exp (and lose less due to lower casaulties per brigade), than "5 brigades system", when some troops got experience, but died, and other didnt participate in combat so no experience gainded


If you want we can do some test MP game to try this things on speed 1.

 

[MrLatency]

Thanks for the input people. I have generally been organizing all purpose "Tactical Corps" but I should experiment with different offensive and defensive formations. Thanks for the information Thanik. I don't have much time for testing these days, when I have time to play MOTE I play MP usually! I had read on the forums that more than 5 units gave you frontage penalty but hadn't looked into the mechanics of it really, so thanks or clarifying that. I have a much better understanding now, so be ready for harder battles next time sir ^^

You make a good point about doomstack overrun threat. I haven't had a problem with this yet, the biggest doomstacks I've encountered have been 250k and I've always grouped up my corps to face them but its true that the threat is very real. Overrun occurs when you outnumber the enemy 10 to 1 right? So I should be aiming to have at least 40k per corps. Though ideally I would never want to face a doomstack with individual corps anyway. As you mentioned Thanik, proper scouting is needed and this is something I notice tends to be neglected by a lot of players. I think I will always keep a number of independent light cavalry brigades ready for pure scouting purposes. I normally use a single cavalry division of about 10k for this purpose, which I then use to reinforce any ongoing battle, but more scouts in independent brigades would be more useful I feel.

 

[franc001sher]

My Composition:

A. Infantry Army:
Each Flank: Elite + Line + Marine (another kind of line but 1.8 k man each) + Light + 2 Cavalry + inf art, 12 k man.
Reverse: 2 Supply + 8 Inf Art, 11.8 k man.
Command: default strategy, delay, counter punch, deliberate assault, hold, feint, refuse, up the guard. (All but except the entrenched defense because of the lack of normal infantry).

B. Cavalry Army:
Each Flank: 2 Light Cavalry + 2 Cav Art, 4.8 k man.
Reverse: 2 Supply + 6 Cav Art, 9.4 k man.
Command: delay, counter punch, refuse.

C. Guard Army:
Each Flank: 2 Guard + 2 Light + 2 Guard Cav + Cav Art, 12 k man.
Reverse: 2 Supply + 8 Cav Art, 11.8 k man.
Command: default strategy, delay, counter punch, hold, feint, refuse, up the guard.

D. H. Cavalry Army:
Each Flank: 2 Heavy Cavalry + 2 Cav Art, 4.8 k man.
Reverse: 2 Supply + 6 Cav Art, 9.4 k man.
Command: delay, counter punch, refuse.

If the guard art can be used, I would change the cav art into Guard art in C and D.

BTW: these armies would be called as "Artillery Corps" in the realistic in fact.

 

[Herr Dak]

Greetings: This is my Armee Composition. Its designed to maximize the flank strategies.

1. Defensive Armee: Infanterie Armee: This Armee is designed to take advantage of the Infantry strong defense and to take offensive actions when its needed.

Each Flank: 3 Line Infantry Brigades. 1 Light Infantry Brigades: (Jägers and not Grenzers in Austrian Empire case). 2 Cav. Brigades (Normal or light).
Reserve: 2 Grenadier Brigades and 1 Heavy Cavalry Brigade. (No supplies because we dont need the offensive bonus).

Defensive Flanks: Entrench.
Offensive Flanks: Counterpounch.

2. Regular Armee: This Armee is designed for a balance porpuse, offensive and defensive actions can be taken.

Each Flank: 2 Line Infantry Brigades (2 Infantry Brigades for Austria, not Line Infantry). 1 Light Infantry Brigade (Grenzers for Austria). 2 Cav. Brigades. (Light or regular). 1 Artillery Brigade.
Reserve: 2 Grenadier Brigades, 1 Heavy Cav. Brigade. (plus Supplies).

Defensive Flanks: Delay.
Offensive Flanks: Deliberate Assault.

3. Guard Armee: This is an Armee designed for elite offensive and defensive actions. Its the best of all your forces.

Each Flank: 2 Elite Infantry. 1 Light Infantry (Grenzers in case of Austria). 2 Heavy Cavalry Brigades (if the country has, then Guard Cav.). 1 Artillery Brigade.
Reserves: 2 Grenadier Brigades, 1 Heavy Cavalry Brigade. (plus supplies).

Defensive Flanks: Feint.
Offensive Flanks: Up the guard.

4. Blitz Korps: This korps are designed to operate behind enemy lines and cut the supplie lines of the enemy. Best for defense.

Each Flank: 1 Light Infantry brigade (Grenzers for Austria). 1 Light Cav. Brigade.
Reserve: 2 Light Cav. Brigades.

Defensive Flanks: Hold.
Offensive Flanks: Refuse.

Hope it helps. Works fine for me in Multiplayer.