Routing?

[spelk]

Once a unit is routing I don't really know how to rally them back, short of setting the Brigade orders to Rally. But when I have other units engaged in Assaulting, I don't really want to toggle them back to Rally and incur penalties.

I've tried urging the routing units, but that doesn't seem to make a significant morale shift, to stop them routing.

I've tried putting commander units near them, again that doesn't seem to have any effect.

Independant routing units, I've been able to put into Rally orders and they usually pull out of it, but if they're part of an assaulting Brigade (and I don't want to alter the whole Brigades orders to Rally) thats it, I've more or less lost them. They rout every turn, until they're off the map, or their morale drops below -2.0 and they surrender/are removed.

Any tips on recovering routed units?

Any way to detach them as independant and then Rally? I suppose after they rout its all too late to attempt to manage them.

I guess the answer may ultimately be, don't position your units so that they will rout.

[zakblood]

change brigade orders to rally for that brigade and urge the unit as well, mostly works if your HQ is near and in range, can move HQ closer to be more effective, unless it has took massive damage it will always recover, depends on settings mind you as if you put the difficulty too high they will leave the map and you wont be able to recover them, hope that helps

[Rekm41]

I believe spelk was hoping for another way other than changing the Brigade orders.

[zakblood]

if enough damage hasn't been done, and rest of brigade is good, sometimes they rally on there own, but again not always, and not in all battles either, so it's Difficulty + commander + brigade + starting morale and current morale times damage caused for the % chance [:D][;)]

[AlessandroD]

Usually after some turns they came back to duty but they are very fragile, but order brigade you can use a commander (the unit must be subordinate to him) within 2 hexes with good Leadership and the "Urge Unit" fuction.
What is the status of the units? Because is badly beaten up they are out of business.

[RobearGWJ]

Can't wait to see the effects of morale and experience in the later war battles. I suspect that'll be a whole different kettle of snakes...

[barkhorn45]

Since each turn is 20 minutes in length I figure it would be difficult to stop
500 or so men who are running for what they perceive to be their lives.
Much less organize them,turn them around and return them to combat
in a relatively short time.

[AlessandroD]

Can't wait to see the effects of morale and experience in the later war battles. I suspect that'll be a whole different kettle of snakes...

Yes, I remember that Gil wrote something about it on Twitch stream presentation, quality unit with a 5-6 value should be veteran/elite units...

[ericbabe]

The brigadier's urge is the main way to attempt to rally a routing unit.

I was also thinking of adding a sort of rally attempt at the army level, mainly because it seems from a game-play perspective that army commanders don't have enough active things to do right now, and also because historically it seems that one of the things the army commander did was to direct emergency support to those parts of the line that were starting to break -- sometimes the army commander would even ride out personally to visit the parts of the line that were wavering, for instance.

[barkhorn45]

I'm going to defend the current system,when a unit broke/routed it was lost to the current battle.
Show me an example of the opposite.
As for a bonus for the army commander to rally,I think a army commander
would be to busy to go around rally'ing regiment's

[zakblood]

on failed attacks, the men withdrew, while they sometimes broke and routed, in war you can't run for ever, so if enough morale and strength and willpower of the leaders are left, they will recover, rally and fight another day, but to use them in anything but defence will more than likely make them rout again where recovery isn't even an option

[Gil R.]

Parenthetically, I'll note that these are battles fought early in the war, and the men were quite green. So it's not the worst thing if they fall apart like Humpty Dumpty and can't be put back together again.

At some point a modder might try turning the units at Manassas into veteran units (quality/morale of 4.5-6.0), which will make for much longer, more hard-fought battles. Completely unrealistic in terms of history, but certainly fun.

[Rosseau]

Thanks for bringing up this point. I totally agree with barkhorn45's comments. Besides his logic, it's just another layer of micromanagement for the player and mostly doesn't work in the time frame of the game.

[zakblood]

if you don't like the ability to rally your men, you can always ramp up the difficulty to full blown general, then not only do you get more wrong moves by your men, and also more activation failures, so you will never be sure if they do as asked or move at all (don't get the orders etc) then the ability to rally is mute tbh, as on this level of difficulty you may not be able to do anything to routed troops unless you act right away as next turn they will be at the edge of the map after going walk / run about, and will be out of the battle for good, while you will get and receive more casualties, you also get more rout's and surrenders as well, with the ability to rally going down to such an extent some of the time or most if you are attacking in brigades, every other turn or so you will have to be in rally mode to keep your morale up so won't be attacking every turn, so will slow the whole game down in the process.

i've played on all settings in all battles over the time to 200+ battles, there is no micro management, it's move, fight, either win or lose, then either follow move and fight order again or hold or rally, it's not rocket science, it's war, and for pure fun it's great imo.

i can't see many not finding it easy after 5 to 10 battles fought, just drop the difficulty down while your beginning, then set back to default, then when you know how to play and want more of a challenge, alter your plan and play style regarding tactics etc, and when you want to really get challenged and have to delve deep to even survive, full blown General will push you, as everything becomes harder, you may think it's not, but wait until your at half way or 3/4 into any of the larger battles, when your morale drops to breaking point for a few turns, then come back and say it wasn't fun or feel real.

[&o][&o][&o]

fanboy no, just a war game lover[;)]

[spelk]

Thanks for all your comments. I wasn't really questioning whether you should be able to rally your routing units, more whether there was a mechanism I was missing for doing it?

I enjoy the historic nature of the battles, and if rallying routed troops is something that didn't happen then its fine by me, I just wondered if there was another mechanic for helping keep the troops on the battlefield and in your command.

I realise now that the battle I'm struggling with is Blackburns Ford on Lt. Col. difficulty as the Union, and the odds are stacked against me - which is probably why some of my troops are routing.

[zakblood]

morale and HQ in command is almost the game, next is formation and stance, to win and win well with less casualties than the other side and also have a higher score, you need to master all of these, but that won't come for a long time for many, i started on the lowest settings and can honestly say it without feeling ashamed, next up from tutorial level until i started to win, then and only then have i upped the difficulty level for more of a challenge, all AAR are done on default difficulty levels to get more correct casualties reports / numbers etc while my own play can be on full General for either side in any battle, have learnt by continued playing and testing that all battles can be solved in at least 4 plans / ways, but the larger ones have loads more of options, not only historic ones so can or could be done in any numbers of plans / strategies.

morale and routing and combat losses can be managed,

morale, get good or better ground than the other side, when attacking and defending.

stance, be in the correct stance and in the right facing for combat.

be next to your own brigade units while in combat, applies to attack and defend.

don't be afraid to give ground for better ground, alter facing and stance in battle, and use all brigade orders in turn, advance to contact, alter to attack by assault brigade order, then either rally or hold, recover then move, if you loose, it's rally or hold, or really badly then withdraw, as you can move but keep facing the attacker, works wonders tbh...

support and HQ's are key, use all above and you win, use only some and you can draw or lose, use none and work your own play style out that works better, then post it, as i haven't learnt everything, and no way know it all, even though reading through my own posts it sometimes sounds like i think i do[:D][;)]

oh and nearly forgot, never charge or may charge unless you are 99% sure it will work, or the damage you get isn't worth the effort and losses you will receive in men or morale, for me it's 3 to 1 odd's or better needed for attack and charge, and yes i've not even mentioned mass brigade charge either order, that's because unless your 99.9% sure of victory, it's the biggest killer of men and morale in the game / sim so as yet have only used it a few times in 200+ games, can be a winner, also can lose you the brigade, so needs to be used with caution[X(][:-]




break down is,

March, used to get you there quick if you know route is safe, if not use advance if your not sure...

Rally use when your brigade needs it, you know when first unit rout's unless you check them all the time..

Hold great for holding onto something and taking less damage while you do it, but can still be broken or routed so needs to be used with care and support in line to work well, Cav units are good in hold when dismounted.

Withdraw next to best brigade order to use, one of my fav's, lets you get away to fight another day, while still facing your attackers...

Advance advance to contact, used to move close when you know or think the other side is near, but maybe not seen.

Assault for me this is the standard attack orders, but if it's given to a Brigade then i guess it's a assault order..

Mass Charge or as i call it the nuke key, used to kill high volume of both sides, once tested it on a clean none attacked fort with pre setup troops for testing, and almost got 800 killed in one action, so to use this, the other side must have been pre attacked and prepared by support and other troops before using, as if there strong with high morale, you pay the price for hitting a brick wall and a high butchers bill, aka WW1 style