Unit Naming

[Hussar91]

Quick legend for the (oldish) battle screenshot in spoiler:

Cav, Regiment - melee cavalry (with small c after their army corp roman organization number)

Dragoons Regiment - skirmisher cavalry (with small d ...)

Rifle Regiment - sharpshooters (on screenshot with little s, but this changed to r by today, as s was given to "skirmishers regiments" outfitted carbines or repeating rifles [once they "graduate the carbine ordeal - so usually there's only one or two in the whole army as you don't get a lot of colt's Model 1855's or spencers in general])

Art. Battalion - self explanatory? Their type depends on army corps organization number (3inch'es take I. and II. by default) followed by other more specialized guns - heaviest taking the last number by default in the army corp. And oh, they got little a in their organization prefix too!

At the same time, infantry brigade's are bunched up in divisions taking their divisional commander's surname and "Division" suffix. I used to name each brigade by their own commanders surname (+brigade) but I changed it for three reasons: 1. It prevented me from seeing which infantry brigades are in the same division on the spot. 2. Officer name pool is... well... limited and I was having troubles naming brigades since mid-campaign's. 3. It can be tiresome to have to rename units after bloody battle where a lot of your officers got hurt. This doesn't happen much for other units, but infantry brigades are most prone to that.

PS. Some units could be classified as Battalion instead of regiment if they had a smaller size. For example a sharpshooter unit between 200-300 I'd name as Rifle Battalion instead of Regiment. 

Also all non infantry-brigades I treat as Army Corp units instead of being divisional, as I can often move them between corps to suit my tactical needs for the battle. I keep their names then knowing on the glance that this unit was temporarily assigned to a division within a different corp when in battle. Anyhow, because of that they follow roman numerals while infantry divisions follow arabic numbers and then sub-brigades get roman organizational numer.

Also in rare cases if division have just one infantry brigade (and rest is filled with mounted troops or skirmishers for example) I sometimes titled that brigade with huge R (for Reserve) and gave the old style name. Like on the screenshot below, where you can spot NC/R Pratt's Rifle Brigade (notably equipped with Fayeteville's for some strange reason at the time).

 

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(For the curious - what you see is withdrawal of my mounted and sharpshooter units back behind friendly lines after piercing the front and totally destroying 2 union infantry brigades. They followed through and harassed some more union troops, and managed to capture 4 supply wagons and destroy an isolated artillery battery before I called them back for R&R. I could have keep pushing the Union but I did not deemed it worth cost in blood, as my main brigades in 1st corps took substantial losses and had to be combined to remain combat effective.)

 

Edited January 13, 2018 by Hussar91

[Yogol]

I name them something like "Ranged (1855) 55" to indicate they are a) ranged troops, they carry 1855-guns and they got 55 in the firearm stat.

I used to name them "1/1 Ranged (1855) 55" to indicate which corps & division they were in, but I stopped doing that, because I always handpick troops for each individual battle and put them in the fighting corps, changing the corps/division they're in.

[LAntorcha]

Quote

 

Best Random surnames EVER!

[Paul_KT]

I rename artillery based on the guns (10lb Rifles, 12lb Smoothbore), it makes it much, much easier to place units where you want them in a battle.  Names can be duplicates so no worries there.