How do native troops compare to regulars?

[unmerged(94581)]

Would like to hear thoughts and experiences on how to properly count your strength when using native divisions. Is there a rough ratio of equivalence, like 1 regular division is worth roughly 2 natives or something like that?

I find myself unable to afford enough regular divisions to have any sort of credible home defence for my Netherlands. The idea is to create two rings of forts around Amsterdam and garrison them with dug in native divisions, then use Dutch and French divisions as mobile reserve for support and counter-attacking.

 

[fbaker4]

When attacking, 4:1, when defending, 2:1. YMMV

 

[unmerged(174869)]

In my, albeit limited, experience, they're not worth having long term unless you have no choice because their low reliability makes them much more likely to spontaneously rebel.

 

[unmerged(94581)]

I like to pair them up, or better yet organize them into armies of 3 divisions each, like I do in HOI2. This way when one rebels, it immediagely has to attack the other, which is entrenched, so it wins against the rebel.

I must admit I haven't had to try it out in a real war so far, but in rebel control duties and small conflicts it works well.

 

[lizardo]

They are cheap, and if you give them a general with reliability they rebel less often.

If you have limited population though it's better to build regulars.

Holland, wow, that's tough. Have allies.

 

[unmerged(94521)]

Native troops are far superior to normal troops due to the simpel fact that they are many times cheaper. Unless you have a serious manpower shortage and need to sqeeze as much power out of your final 10 manpower, native are the way to go. Just keep a few things in mind:

1) Never have single divisions armies, if they rebel they won't be beaten.

2) Never equip them with a -reliability general, this will make them very likely to rebel. However with a general with +reliabilty they will almost never rebel. (Just make sure to have an adequate amount of officers, since you will probably need to go through quite a few generals to find the desired ones).

Otherwise just spam them mindlessly, and you should be able to garrison the Netherland completely, there are plenty of soldier POPs in Indonesia!

 

[unmerged(94581)]

Funny enough, my original reason for using native divisions was exactly that I have a small population. I didn't want to sacrifice national POPs, who are being productive in my factories (I ended up demobilizing many soldier POPs in the Netherlands proper). I'd rather take losses in native POPs, since the impact on my economy would be less.

It was like a snowball of sorts, actually. Initially, my Dutch troops conquered Belgium, which gave me a number of French soldier POPs, whom I judged to be less economically valuable than my national POPs. I used French-staffed divisions to go overseas and take over Siam, who in the process created a horde of Thai soldier POPs, trying to resist me. Now I have enough Thai soldiers to keep 12 native divisions of them around and use them in all sorts of minor battles, without worrying about their casualties. After all, they come out of native soldier pops, whom I can never convert to anything other than soldiers without Full Citizenship, and no major party in my country has that policy.

 

[henryjai]

nothing feels more cheating than fielding 50 native artillery divisions.... they crush everything.

 

[unmerged(94581)]

Yep. I thought it was odd that maintenance cost was still low for native brigades. Unless they use special native shells , I'd imagine a piece of artillery should cost the same no matter who is firing it.

If anything, better trained troops should cost, since untrained ones are likely to waste materiel more.

 

[unmerged(174869)]

I take back the negative things I said about natives. I just annexed China in 1853 with the help of 60 Inf natives. The war was 2 years and only 2 units rebelled on me in that time.

 

[RELee]

I take back the negative things I said about natives. I just annexed China in 1853 with the help of 60 Inf natives. The war was 2 years and only 2 units rebelled on me in that time.

That's a good use of them. I personally would not want to throw them up against the Prussian Army, however. Probably more of a lack of generalship on my part.

 

[henryjai]

That's a good use of them. I personally would not want to throw them up against the Prussian Army, however. Probably more of a lack of generalship on my part.

I am sure even 200 Prussian divisions would fall to 100 native divisions with artillery.

 

[RELee]

I am sure even 200 Prussian divisions would fall to 100 native divisions with artillery.

I would try it before making the claim. I'm not convinced.

 

[unmerged(94521)]

Funny enough, my original reason for using native divisions was exactly that I have a small population. I didn't want to sacrifice national POPs, who are being productive in my factories (I ended up demobilizing many soldier POPs in the Netherlands proper). I'd rather take losses in native POPs, since the impact on my economy would be less.

You are right, yet another reason why native divisions are superior!

 

[Polykrates]

I am sure even 200 Prussian divisions would fall to 100 native divisions with artillery.

There are multiple factors determining martial prowess in Vicky: technology level, experience, generals, brigades, entrechment, shore bombardement or fortificarion bonus, etc. Are the Prussians allowed to use brigades or do they even have enough manpower to bring their divisions to full strength in your scenario?
200 full strength regular Prussian divisions with artillery on the same tech level are usually a match for 100 native divisions with artillery. But even if the Prussian are "just" fielding a healthy mix of guards and engineers, victory over themis in no way guaranteed. What really decides this scenario is how the troops are used and lead and the AI doesn't always do a great job at that.
Defeating 200 AI lead divisions with 100 divisions of my own? Not really a challange.
Defeating 100 AI lead native divisions with artillary with 200 divisions of my choice? The only challenge is not too loose too many troops or go bankrupt.

The real advantage of native divisions is as has been said that they are much more cost effective, so you can afford to equip them with artillery, and you do not have to take your soldiers from the most effecive part of your workforce. 100 or more native divs with arty may not beat everone and anyone, but they will not cost you as much both in money and prime/accepted culture manpower as a regular army does, so you can destroy your opponents in wars of attrition if you have to - at a reasonable cost.
In other words native ary divs are geme-breaking when used extensively.