Supporting unit losses and arty size and othe newbie questions

[grenadier98]

Hi there, I'm new to this game and like it so far. But now I've learned that there are a lot of hidden mechanics in the game which makes it quite confusing for a new player.

After my first battles with each side it seems like there is a benefit if your own additional trops (not your core army) suffer more casulaties because it doesn't hurt your overall manpower pool and you can recover their weapons too. More dead - more weapons.

It seems like killing/shattering enemy units is better than taking prisoners, because it seems that you don't capture the prisoners weapons. The prisoners were traded for additinal troops in my manpowerpool, but do they traded prisoners join there side again and increase the enemies manpower pool?

I've read a lot about the scaling and decided to start a new campaign on easy with points in reconaissance to better understand this aspect. But now I've heard that the equipment is also scaling. So if you equip your units with better rifles, the enemy will also have better rifles - is this true? Is there a way to see what weapons the enemy is using?

I've also read about a maximum efficiency size for artillery-brigades, but what is the right number? 12, 14, 16?

Tanks for any help you cold give me as a new (and confused) player.

[pandakraut]

When playing on easy you can really just not worry about a lot of these mechanics. Scaling especially barely has an impact before Major General difficulty. 

Getting your allied troops killed to recover their weapons is an option, but not necessary.

Due to a bug, shattered units gets you more weapons, surrendered gets you more recruits and hurts the AI's army strength more. Though the army strength is also not a mechanic that needs to be worried about on easy. The UI & AI Customizations mod does fix the weapon return so there is no weapon recovery downside to capturing units.

Equipment scaling based on your troops weapons was a feature of earlier versions, but is no longer in the game. 8-10 points in recon lets you see what weapons units before a battle, but is usually not a good investment of career points. Most people just find out what the AI was using in the post battle screen when they see what type of weapons they captured.

Maximum damage for artillery is 14 guns. Skirmishers is ~375. This is also fixed by the UI mod.

[grenadier98]

Thanks for your answer. I'm tempted to continue my Brigadier General campaign with the CSA, because Colonel might get boring. You said I don't need to worry about scaling and AI army strength on easy. Is this true for medium as well? I don't want to play on hard.

I play the vanilla version, no mods.

By the way, what determines my starting abilities on my commander and my brigadaes? I have endurance course on my Inf brigades, before I had discipline and my commander had trainer. Can I change this somehow?

Edited July 27, 2019 by grenadier98

[pandakraut]

Scaling applies slightly more on BG but still not all that much.

Starting perks for your avatar and your starting brigades are all randomized. Changing them would either involve restarting the first mission until you get the perks you want, or disbanding and recreating your units. Unless you have cleared out your recruit pool entirely when you disband the unit your stats will get averaged with those of the pool though.

Being able to choose the avatar perks is something else that has been modded in.

[grenadier98]

I've downloaded your UI and AI Customizations Mod v.17 and set replaceSizeDegradationCurves, false. Guess this is the right way to disable it. I'd like to play with the vanilla setting for my first campaign. Thanks again for your answer and of course for the mod!

[grenadier98]

Hi Pandakraut.

I've some questions about the perks. I've read that some are bugged. You mentioned some bugs in the comment section of your first video of your CSA lets play. Like the charge bonus on the melee cav perks and endurance course would miss the speed bonus on all types, but in your next video during the camp phase you mention that you don't care about morale from discipline but rather take the speed bonus of endurance course and before amush convoy you said you want to take the charge bonus. So, I don't know what to take right now. I don't want to take stuff which has no effect.

By the way if all this perk bugs are still in the game - and there was no patch after you mentioned them in your youtube video - this is really lame when it comes to the work of the company. These perks are an important part of the army management aspect and they should work as suggested. Making such a nice game and not fixing such little, but for the players important bugs. I hope they do this, as I said - otherwise it's a very nice game.

Edited July 29, 2019 by grenadier98
Forgotten something

[contact]

On 7/27/2019 at 1:23 PM, grenadier98 said:

Hi there, I'm new to this game and like it so far. But now I've learned that there are a lot of hidden mechanics in the game which makes it quite confusing for a new player.

After my first battles with each side it seems like there is a benefit if your own additional trops (not your core army) suffer more casulaties because it doesn't hurt your overall manpower pool and you can recover their weapons too. More dead - more weapons.

It seems like killing/shattering enemy units is better than taking prisoners, because it seems that you don't capture the prisoners weapons. The prisoners were traded for additinal troops in my manpowerpool, but do they traded prisoners join there side again and increase the enemies manpower pool?

I've read a lot about the scaling and decided to start a new campaign on easy with points in reconaissance to better understand this aspect. But now I've heard that the equipment is also scaling. So if you equip your units with better rifles, the enemy will also have better rifles - is this true? Is there a way to see what weapons the enemy is using?

I've also read about a maximum efficiency size for artillery-brigades, but what is the right number? 12, 14, 16?

Tanks for any help you cold give me as a new (and confused) player.

With regard to using points on reconnaissance.

Must admit I never use points on this. What ever the enemy has I will find out at sometime during a battle.

I would prefer to use points on reducing cost of weapons or better quality replacements and weapons etc.

But just my own opinion. Sure others will have their own views.

Best of luck. Stick with it. It’s a sharp learning curve. Most of us have been there. But suddenly it all starts to make sense.

Regards