Infantry improving over time?

[unmerged(630)]

The manual says something about the fact that as the years passed, infantry became more and more powerful/important at the expense of the cavalry.

I haven't played the game enough yet, but I wonder is this actually represented in the game, or is cavalry better all the time?

 

[Hartmann]

Good question! The manual and ingame explanation of the army tech levels does tell us nothing decisive about whether improvements are equally affecting all army types or not. If improvements go mainly to inf, then (because cavalry is expensive) it would be really nice to know on which tech levels cavalry can be safely regarded 'outdated'.

Hartmann

 

[unmerged(13)]

'or is cavalry better all the time?'

Cavalry was only better in certain situations, and in certain parts of Europe. For example in the west, the emphasis was always more on footsoldiers due to the relatively high amount of population (compared to eastern Europe) and the fact that areas of habitation were very close together.

Cavalry was not 'better all the time', it's better in certain situations. But since EU simulates battles in a more abstract form (personally I want them to be more detailed, perhaps strategic or tactical for EU II) it's difficult to understand.

Cavalry is obviously faster, and players who have an advantage in cavalry in battle get certain attack bonuses. However cavalry is a complete waste when it comes to sieging operations, it simply bleeds away.

Personally I use cavalry throughout the entire course of the game, depending on who I'm playing I usually have one 3 foot soldiers compared to one horse, i.e. 3:1 ratio, but that can change depending on circumstances.

As far as I remember, the more you progress the more 'bonuses' you receive with regards to the infantry when gaining military tech's..e.g. better organization, better firing rate and so on.

Sapura

 

[Hartmann]

So the tech advancements do not affect cavalry as well (or at least not at the same rate)? And if so: from which levels on can we safely dismiss the expensive cavalry?

Hartmann

 

[unmerged(358)]

The best bet is to look into this file:
Paradox EntertainmentEuropa UniversalisDBLAND.CSV

Open it up in notepad and then you can see all the changes made to the different branches and effects...You just have to add the effects and see what they do..but personally I beleive Cavalry in nice and large numbers greatly increases your ability to actually kill your oppononts army as most of the kills happen in the shock phase and mostly moral loss in fire phase, though throughout the game this trend shifts towards more and more deadly fire phase...

Hope this helps..

Cobos

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If you are not part of the solution you are part of the precipitate.

 

[unmerged(372)]

And fire is very good if you play Prussia (or whatever other german powers get 1/0/3 default generals). And using few cavalry by Prussia is not only good in the game, it matches the crappiness of the real-life Prussian cavalry!

 

[unmerged(576)]

does an army made of purely cavalry travel faster than infantry around the map? if not, shouldn't it? cav only armies/groups were quite important. take cossacks. they were greater and running behind enemy lines and breaking supply lines.

this brings me to another question. did supply lines exist during these periods? i would have thought so, because i remember reading that napoleon actually rejected them a number of times and trained his troops to forage so he could cover greater distances. this seems to suggest that they had been implemented before his time.

it would pretty cool to have the idea of supply lines in game. strategy whould become even more important as you'd have to make sure the enemy doesn't flank you and cut of your lines, resulting in an army disappearing because of attrition.

just a thought.

 

[unmerged(548)]

Originally posted by whyamihere:
does an army made of purely cavalry travel faster than infantry around the map? if not, shouldn't it?

Yes, and they do.
Arty in a unit slows it down even more ...
A small tip, if you want to relocate a general to another army, breake him loose with just 1k of cav and race him to his new location at minimal attrition cost.

this brings me to another question. did supply lines exist during these periods?
...
it would pretty cool to have the idea of supply lines in game...

Yes, when your attrition skull turns red when your out of supply (and your men start dropping like flies).

Btw this is all present in the manual, try reading it...

strategy whould become even more important as you'd have to make sure the enemy doesn't flank you and cut of your lines, resulting in an army disappearing because of attrition.

Well try attacking Russia when playing as Sweden (you have to manually edit the game unless you have the swedish version).
The AI will try to cut your supply every chance they get.

A thing to keep in mind also. When moving into an area with an enemy controlled fortress, you have the option to storm it, besiege it or to leave a guarding force not large enough to besiege the fortress but enough to let you draw a supply line though the province so your bulk force can move on and still be in supply.

 

[unmerged(548)]

On the topic of cav vs inf taking a look at the original BG might be of use. Let me list a few general 'rules' from it:

1) If you have largly superior numbers of cav compaired to you enemy you get big bonus in combat resolution.

2) Througout most of the game cav do 0 fire 2 shock damage (or 1 in bad terrain like mountains, forrest, marsh etc). Infantery, except in the early part of the game do 1 fire & 1 shock damage.

3) Cav cost up to 10x more then an infantery unit

The general conclusion is, infantery are vasty more cost effective, but when fighting in clear terrain you do not want to be seriously outnumbered in cavallery numbers or the enemy cav will rip you to pieces.


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/ Stefan Huszics