Alavaria

That would be a hilarious game, where you play as the logistician, and you scream at the AI commander for moving the guys you're trying to resupply into a bad location so that doing so is dangerous.

Hey, infantry brigades go up to 3000 so go for it

Sadly to capture these you need to actually capture the routers. Because apparently they can run at top speed with their guns, and after that, even rally and continue using them....

If they're bad enough to qualify as some sort of newbie trap, maybe remove them from the store etc and instead have them in those units that "visit" in battles (which you command but won't keep after the battle).

Only if someone had sat down and though about the very odd mechanics at work (or not at work as it might be)

Cheaper veterans sold seperately.

You know I always wondered if rifled barrel -> longer range -> longer canister range. Does rifling your cannon really make canister go further?

Maybe if you try to model the trenches as lines with sections of "fortifications". And made the standard infantry unit use a loose formation as the current skirmishers does. Of course barbed wire would use the slowdown mechanics of swamps etc?

It looks like forts can also stretch out your unit's firing zone, so a single unit can shoot at targets in a larger area. Since they also can't run around while in a fortification, I wonder if it would be useful for those long-range skirmisher units (have line infantry in front of them in that tree cover etc to protect them). Instead of their little dancing they can stay put and simply shoot shoot shoot.

I often wonder why the fortifications are placed in such "interesting" spots. Though the Ai doesn't always realize it can just stroll up and start meleeing.

So what is the minimum scale # for line infantry, skirmishers, cavalry, artillery for Antietam anyway?

Cap on supply... another good reason to be really sparing with the numbers you bring to that battlefield I guess. (Also when considering artillery)

It's about how the benefits of mecidine accrue specifically to things you lose, if you're careful and only lose rookies being used as bullet catchers and carefully coddle your real killers then it's not that great. It's interesting because if buffed it would help people who lose a lot of veteran men, which... yeah....

I think the one that gives you just more cash and recruits and the one that gives you cheaper veterans is probably better by far than the medicine one, really.

Do fortifications work just as well when you're shooting the enemy in the back or side? Especially the ones like fences and the like. (It's amazing how far soldiers can shoot if they're in a fortification, you can shoot all the way across it and still have as much range as another soldier on the opposite end does.

Yes, instead of AI scaling, you complain about stack spam.

What the AI doesn't know is when all its soldiers die your guys get experience from the turkey shoot and you pick up the dropped guns. Either that or you've trapped its soldiers against the side of the map so it can't do anything either way

So that's the thing, people never form square in this, seeing how skirmishers can get owned by horsemen (even in deep forests) I wonder if they never learned about how to form square... then again others have pointed out that skirmishers weren't sent out by themselves far on the flank like players like doing.

Well, sniping annoying artillery and enemy generals is a handy thing to be able to do

Well you need all the guns you can get, and at least it doesn't weaken the AI facing you in future battles.

AI wars does escalation in a nice manner, Building a small system around war progress might work. Eg: Based on your performance (not too fine-grained so say Victory/Draw/Defeat) you build up the other side's Desperation meter. Since this is a fairly large war, the issue of resources isn't just your guys taking on the entire enemy country, but parts. Handwavy perhaps, but if you get the meter high, the enemy diverts resources to you which perhaps leads you to a better ending (eg: some sort of Legendary Commander ending would mean your allies managed to sweep the country while you broke the enemy head on, as it were). So you might be able to have an "easier" big fight if you accept a Draw rather than a costly Victory... Also, changing things based on Desperation would be amusing eg: you are defending. At higher desperation the enemy brings a larger force, but it's recruits perhaps with a morale penalty. But it would be the case be it if you had a large army or a smaller one (it scales based on your victories, not your army number or composition). A high desperation attack mission might have the enemy with better fortifications, making better use of skirmishers but reduced numbers or supplies. Your own losses affect your army (more or better vs less/worse). As for the enemy side, more losses you inflict on them reduces what they have to bring, but if you win it increases their desperation. Explicitly showing the Desperation meter might not be very useful, but something like "War Progress updates" showing how you are (or are not) drawing all the enemy's attention and resources, thus allowing the other NPC generals to make gains elsewhere would be nice.