Pyrrhic Victories

[NecroRenegade]

Hey there, new to the mod here. I've been having fun playing as the Seleukos dynasty but I've noticed something quite annoying, it seems that most battles I fight end up with huge casualties on my part. This is despite me having both numbers and great generals on my part (my character himself having 32 marshal, brilliant strategist, inspiring leader, formidable fighter, etc). Check this battle for instance:

Spoiler

16k on my side attacking 6k enemies. They lose all troops but I sustain 9k in casualties. It isn't really pyrrhic since I have more in reserves, but I've experienced other battles where the difference was less extreme, but with me losing the entire battle. Is this not supposed to be happening or is it WAD and I'm missing something? If so, what can I do to avoid losing so many troops? Any input would be great.

 

[Furion Matsuya]

I've been getting situations like this as well, I'm assuming terrain and tactics are a big part of the outcome

 

[riknap]

tactics have indeed been revamped, but not fully. currently, only skirmish tactics use a new (composition and terrain -biased) system, while melee tactics use a modified vanilla-esque system.
IIRC, I do recall reports about a tactic that was causing increased casualties somewhere. I can't recall the details of the report, so I'll need to investigate it more once I get free time again
if you find the problematic tactics, please report them to my ABCDE project linked in my sig. it'll help me consolidate reports more

 

[NecroRenegade]

Thanks for the replies. I haven't looked too in-depth yet but I've noticed that in a lot of these battles, I for some reason end up losing several thousand troops suddenly near the beginning. For instance in the battle I posted, my army went from like 16k down to 12k in an instant, and from then on the battle took a lot longer with less casualties per day. It's really strange.

 

[riknap]

aye, it really must be the not-very-well-tested-out skirmish tactics project I've been working on then, if that's the case.

 

[Inexnn]

It is possible to replace combat_tactics.txt with with this file from version 6J, for example.
Otherwise version 6K is unplayable because of skirmish phase bug.

 

[Inexnn]

And it is also necesary to set in defines.lua FERTILITY_BASE_MULT = 0.5 or all dinasties will die out.

 

[richvh]

0.6k1 already has that define (and a few other fertility related defines) reverted to vanilla value.

 

[Inexnn]

OK. Thanks. I had just 0.6K

 

[Ivashanko]

Marshal has never been important enough in determining the outcome of battles IMO.

 

[richvh]

The marshal is rarely in the battle, usually back in the capital or another province doing a job action.

 

[DarkReborn]

The marshal is rarely in the battle, usually back in the capital or another province doing a job action.

I believe he means martial.

Unless that's a pun I'm not catching.

 

[richvh]

This is why spelling is important. (And no, I wasn't trying to pun. If he meant martial, I completely misunderstood him because he used the wrong word, which happens to sound the same.)

I believe ABCDE tries to make martial more important (riknap will have to weigh in) along with other factors.

 

[Ivashanko]

This is why spelling is important. (And no, I wasn't trying to pun. If he meant martial, I completely misunderstood him because he used the wrong word, which happens to sound the same.)

I believe ABCDE tries to make martial more important (riknap will have to weigh in) along with other factors.

Sorry- I was trying to make a pun (and failing, apparently!)

But I still stand by what I said- though this time with no pun to confuse matters!

 

[riknap]

well, I did make martial score a way to differentiate tactics. Namely "better" tactics variants require a certain martial score minimum (and in future versions, a higher martial score even more likely to get the better version and less likely the "regular" variants of a certain tactic ... not that I've managed to code that part yet.)

 

[Seimour]

Anything I can do to reduce casualties in battles? Any engagement turns into a genocide no matter the terrain, martial score or numbers involved. It's unplayable. What am I doing wrong?

 

[Ezumiyr]

Anything I can do to reduce casualties in battles? Any engagement turns into a genocide no matter the terrain, martial score or numbers involved. It's unplayable. What am I doing wrong?

I wouldn't say it's unplayable. It's a rather good way to show that even with a big empire it will be difficult to do many wars at the same time. In a battle, it's normal to loose some troops even if you win.
So it's more difficult if you have to defend against more than 1 opponent, but iy's not unplayable.
At the beginning, try to attack only weakened adversaries, who already lose their troops against someone else (even if they won!). You can either kill their remaining troops or just go sieging. Later, if you have more and/or better troops, you can try to attack opponents at full strength but be careful because if you loose too many troops you'll be confronted to both factions and invasions, and the only way to not be totally destroyed in this case is to have a good marshal that will boost levy replacement. And also good tactics. And luck: because what just happened to you might happen to the invaders.
As the Kingdom of Sigindun - Serbia, I invaded Makedonia after their conquest of Egypt. The Avars tried to invade me. The Hungarians tried to invade them. Then the ERE tried to invade me while being at war with Sparta...
Results: I won Makedonia and Egypt and just lose 1 province to the ERE. It has been difficult to convert the Makedonians to Christo-Zalmoxianism but now I can marry Argeadiai and my heresy is now the dominant Zalmoxian faith.

My tips would be to be an opportunist in the early game, then to set priorities in order to keep your state strong even if you loose some lands. Make one war at a time if possible.

 

[Seimour]

Thanks, ive been pondering this issue in the past few days and your answer has shed some light into the problem. The outcome of the battles does feel very random and uncertain which is hard to get used to. You might bring overwhelming might and better commanders to a battle and end up losing all of your troops to something that is completely out of control since you cannot control the battle. Retreating seems to be catastrophic as well, almost no soldiers ever escape.

It's a bit puzzling to me because you can now raise huge armies(3-5k) at game start for a single county and that is a lot. If you couple that with the high attrition in sieges, low levy replacement and high casualties no matter what you do(3/4 of your army being massacred in a victory is a lot for medieval warfare in my opinion) its hard to get used to. This will require some getting used to but I do think casualties should be toned down somewhat.

Edit: Ive been playing in Ireland. Druidic low land organisation but massive armies appears to partly responsible for my issues.