RE: Detailed Combat Initial Deployment (Full Version)

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ericbabe -> RE: Detailed Combat Initial Deployment (12/4/2005 6:13:32 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: jimwinsor
Now, I don't know if this is just my imagination or not...but I've been somehow under the impression from playing that army commanders play a role in setup. It SEEMS to me that better commanders generate closer, more compact. ie, sensable setups. Poor commanding generals tend to give me spread out setups...as if my army had just been ambushed on its line of march.


That is exactly how it works. There is a commander vs. commander check at the start of a battle. The side that fails the check is more spread out than the other side. If the check results are close then there's no advantage, or if both fail badly, then both are spread out more.

What we'd like to do in the sequel is give players some control over setup of units when the commander of the unit makes the proper check.


Eric



jimwinsor -> RE: Detailed Combat Initial Deployment (12/4/2005 8:27:29 PM)

Oh ho! So I was not just dreaming this then!! [:)] Very cool.



gdpsnake -> RE: Detailed Combat Initial Deployment (12/10/2005 5:30:01 PM)

No, this needs to be fixed. EVERY time I enter battle the enemy cav moves first and destroys/routs my artillery and supply. THIS IS SO INSANELY STUPID. My guns and 'butter' are always getting deployed up front or way out on the sides.
WHAT COMMANDER IS SO STUPID AS TO MARCH IN SUCH AN ORDER THAT THE HEAD OF HIS COLUMNS ARE ARTILLEY AND SUPPLY WAGONS or his flanks are composed of such?

FIX THIS. This is the absolute WORST thing about this game.

I suggest variable set-ups:
1). The attacker should be set up in column on the edge of the map where he enters along a road in the direction he entered the province and the defender on the other edge in column on a road from the direction he entered if both corps moved to this province this 'pulse'
2). The attacker on the edge if he moved this pulse and the defender in the center randomly deployed if he DID not move THIS pulse but does move THIS turn.
3). The attacker on the edge and the defender ALLOWED his own set-up if he NEVER moved this turn.

A random variable based on leadership initiative that allows the attacker and/or defender to deviate from this to an ALLOWED set-up in a specified area.



TexHorns -> RE: Detailed Combat Initial Deployment (12/10/2005 6:00:01 PM)

gdp, this all been hashed through already if you read this thread from the beginning. It is not a bug. It is the way the game is designed.

If you play enough games and detailed battle the deployments will even out. We have all experienced this frustration. Make sure you have leaders with good strategic ratings with your armies. Make sure you have a balanced corps/army (inf/art/cav). Use your cav to protect your art and sup. Your art and sup cannot be charged if the attacker is also adjacent to an ordered enemy inf or cav unit.

I played for a lengthy time last night with many detailed battles and only had one art charged before I could protect it and I never lost an art or a supply.



Khornish -> RE: Detailed Combat Initial Deployment (12/10/2005 7:10:26 PM)

I've not played CoG at all. Not that I don't want to, but having been laid off recently, the budgetary allotment for the game evaporated not long ago. Yet, I've been lurking here in the anticipation of some family member having pity on me during this Christmas season.

So far, my wife has failed to take the initiative in this regard...sigh.

However, I do have some thoughts about this issue, whether or not they happen in this game if something like it goes into a future product.

1) Why not allow the player(s) the option for random or manual set up? When the battle notice pops up and the player elects to fight a detailed battle, the very next question is for random or manual set up. Putting more logical decisions into the players hands allows them to rationalize various factors, not the least of which is how much time they want to spend on the battle.

2) Why not make screening forces a factor in how random the random set up is? If I have zero light cavalry in my corps (hey, it could happen) then should I not be at a disadvantage when forced to battle against an army that has adequate screening and scouting forces?

3) Why not allow the player to create a march order, where the divisions or corps arrived onto the battlefield in a player designated sequence?

I don't agree that battles of this period were all that random ad hoc affairs. Certainly there was an element of "friction" or "chance" that caused delays or allowed an army to react faster than expected. However, aside from these things happening, there still was an expectation of a logical order to the process of entering the combat area. Napoleon expected Davout to arrive along a certain road within a given time frame. It would have been a random event that would have caused Davout to enter the Austerlitz battlefield from the north, but it _could_ have happened. As it is, Davout arrived along the expected axis of advance and his forces that made it in time deployed accordingly.

4) Rather than total randomness within the described area, why not have several weighted options part of the deployment equation based upon choices the player has made as compared to choices his opponent has made?

5) Why not allow the player to tell off some units as escort to the supply wagons and thus are deployed with the supplies and not with the rest of the battle line?

Anyhow, I hope to, in the not too distant future, be able to participate in a PBEM game (or 6) of CoG.




gdpsnake -> RE: Detailed Combat Initial Deployment (12/11/2005 6:28:37 PM)

Tex,
By your definition, then all the battles of the Napoleonic era were simply random ad hoc affairs where no commanders followed any basic rules of warfare in the use and disposition of their troops.

I don't mean to sound mean or callous, it's just that the idea that you play enough battles and it will even out is not even close to reality.

BTW, I've played several campaigns over at least 200 hours and I've NEVER had the opportunity to charge his guns and butter at the beggining usually because I can't even see the enemy. Truly, the AI is gifted to always know exactly where and how I am set-up. I know the AI is because his cav troop movements throughout every battle I've ever played are always geared to positioning to charge my guns and butter. When protected, his cav just sits and never moves.

Perhaps the AI is flawed as well because the AI only ever produces massive units of guerillas and irregular cav and cossacks. As mentioned in another post, I've seen armies exceeding 250,000 cossacks roaming Europe and 200,000 Spanish guerillas just in France. Then is battle, all they ever charge is guns and butter or sit still or run to the end of the map.

Back to my point on deployment,

Wellington spent days preparing his battles - was reverse slope depolyment just an accident? Napoleon never sent orders on the disposition of troops? And so on and so forth. Total absurdity.

How many times did it happen in the period or in all of history than most of the battles fought started with the supply wagons and the camp followers getting trashed at the beggining (to quote a famous movie - "you said rape twice" - "but I like rape!").

Did it ever happen? I can't think of a single instance in Napoleonic period history where any battle started with the enemy charging supply wagons but then I can't think of a single incident where anybody ever deployed his supply at the head of his troops.

I don't care how many times this issue has been discussed. I feel very strongly that this is just way too wrong not to complain and hope Eric will change the detailed battle issue. One does not have to eliminate the randomness that might occur by simply allowing a set-up before battle based on the events leading to the battle.

Again, I suggest some kind of variable set-ups:
1). The attacker should be set up in column on the edge of the map where he enters along a road in the direction he entered the province and the defender on the other edge in column on a road from the direction he entered if both corps moved to this province this 'pulse'
2). The attacker on the edge if he moved this pulse and the defender in the center randomly deployed if he DID not move THIS pulse but does move THIS turn.
3). The attacker on the edge and the defender ALLOWED his own set-up if he NEVER moved this turn.

A random variable based on leadership initiative that allows the attacker and/or defender to deviate from this to an ALLOWED set-up in a specified area.

My two cents again as an owner and player.





TexHorns -> RE: Detailed Combat Initial Deployment (12/11/2005 9:15:19 PM)

gdp,

If you had read previous posts about this exact topic you would know that I agree with you. In fact I began a thread about this very topic awhile back. I was just saying that if you read the previous posts you would have read information, opinions and explanations that had already been posted. That way you don't have to wait on the response to your post. I suggested many of the same things you did. The response was that the way it is now is how the developer wants it. I don't see it changing for COG. It may change in future games using the COG system. We are on the same side on this arguement bud.



1LTRambo -> RE: Detailed Combat Initial Deployment (12/12/2005 3:41:20 AM)

I totally agree that detailed battle set up is an issue that should be resolved. Probably not by the official release of the current patch, as I will purchase the game soon. However, from all the posts complaining about this issue, it should be part of a 1.3 patch.



gdpsnake -> RE: Detailed Combat Initial Deployment (12/12/2005 6:40:37 PM)

Tex,
I've been on this issue from the begining as well. The squeaky wheel gets the grease or the egg. LOL!

I wouldn't have such a gripe except the game isn't advertised as a fictional game like warcraft or something else but as a representative Napoleonic Era game and as such, should be more 'representative' and not so 'lax' in the battle representations of the time.



Russian Guard -> RE: Detailed Combat Initial Deployment (12/12/2005 6:44:58 PM)


As the starter of this thread, I obviously agree with your point.

Having said that, there's always Control/Alt/Delete Autosave

I'm not suggesting this is a "preferrable" way of handling this, but it seems to me - from the response we get from the Admin guys here - that this is not something they feel needs to be "fixed", for several reasons. So when I get a completely unacceptable set-up, such as the other night when my forces were strung out in a vertical axis right in front of a horizontal line of French units, I simply C/A/D and hit autosave. I re-run the turn and usually get a better initial deployment, although I have on a few occasions had to do this several times.

For what it's worth, I only do this when the initial deployment is completely ludicrous (from my perspective), and often go ahead and struggle through with a less-than-pleasing initial set-up. In those cases, I accept the notion that I was "out-maneuvered strategically" and just deal with it.

Of course this option only works when playing solo - I doubt an opposing player is going to accept a reset when he has your forces by the throat with a lousy initial deployment [:D]

Admin has made one point about this that I agree with. I am not sure what the answer is, either. That is, if both sides are allowed to pre-set up their forces optimally, using the terrain and etc, then weaker Armies like the Turks or Spanish will have virtually no chance of winning most battles.

My thought - and this is obviously something that's not in the cards for this game - would be to have an EiA-style "chit pull" prior to the battles. The side that "wins the chit pull" would have advantages in set-up options - for example, a larger area to deploy forces, and knowledge of the hexes the enemy can deploy in, whereas the loser would have a more restricted "block" of hexes to initially deploy in, and less intel of enemy deployment options for example.

But the easiest fix would likely just have the opposing armies begin the battles further away from each other. This will, however, increase the time for resolving detailed battles - something they also do not want to have happen, and I agree that could be an issue.










TexHorns -> RE: Detailed Combat Initial Deployment (12/12/2005 9:51:25 PM)

I must say though that 1.216 seems to handle the set up better. Either that or I've just come to accept the hand I'm dealt and play it. LAst night in a large battle vs the Spanish my 180k French army was set up in a long line facing the enemy and I had to do little more than deploy into line and fire. It was great for me, awful for the Spanish.

As I have continued to play this game this issue has actually become less significant to me. But like I said I may have just come to accept that it is what it is.



jimwinsor -> RE: Detailed Combat Initial Deployment (12/13/2005 1:14:39 AM)

I've had much better time with my initial deployments now that I've learned the role commanders play. I try hard now to spread out my better leaders, and not to have my corps and armies led by nitwits...and these efforts pay off.



TexHorns -> RE: Detailed Combat Initial Deployment (12/13/2005 2:24:53 AM)

I agree with you Jim. I put three star generals in charge of armies and put 2 and 1 star leaders with Corps. Lafayette has no strategic rating for the french, so he gets garrison duty, or when I;m marching units to reinforce.

Another factor I've wondered about is movement points. Instead marching a long distance to engage. I try and stop one province short of my target to consolidate then attack next turn.

Either way I;m getting better results.



siRkid -> RE: Detailed Combat Initial Deployment (12/13/2005 6:36:19 PM)

For follow-on games how about a system something like this:

1. Determine who is the Attacker and who is the Defender (attacker is the one who moved into the proviance and the defender was in the hex.
2. If both parties moved into the province that turn, the set-up would be a meeting engagement with both sides in column.
3. Leadership/Surprise Check
4. If Attacker’s check is passed, he chooses one of the following:
a. Frontal Assault
b. Enfilade Left
c. Enfilade Right
5. If Attacker’s check is failed, his set-up in column as if he was just arriving on the scene.
6. If Defender’s check is passed, he chooses one of the following:
a. Defense
b. Refuse the Left
c. Refuse the Right
7. If Defender’s check is failed, his set-up is as if he was in garrison (spread out around the towns and forts).


Frontal Assault and Defense set-up. Infantry and Artillery in a line with Calvary units on the flanks
Enfilade Left – More units positioned on the attackers left than on right
And so on and so on.




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