Condition and The First Land Battles

[GizmoDuck]

Hi, all.

Two questions here. What exactly is "Condition"? I understand Morale, but the Condition confuses me. It doesn't seem to correspond with the ship or unit's health.

Second part. I've started the British campaign a few times and I get absolutely destroyed on the first Land Battle, every time. This is the one were you have to take a village from the Spanish and then hold it for about 5 minutes while the Spanish send reinforcements at you.

If I'm lucky, I have a few hundred Fusiliers and maybe about 80 marines and I've picked up a cannon from the Spanish alone the way, however, the reinforcements the Spanish send to retake the village are insane. I keep fighting swarm after swarm of 80+ Spanish musketeers and I'm always flanked and I'm thinking, "Bloody hell. This is the first land battle, how many troops do you think I have?"

I find it odd that a group of 32 Spanish musketeers and seemingly hold my 200 unit of Fusiliers in a firefight for about 8 minutes. How does my 200-strong volley not just obliterate the 32-strong unit?

Any advice, guys?

[albrightwillie0]

Condition relates to fatigue. Resting recovers condition which also affects morale (I think). Not a good idea to charge with low condition.

For the scenario, detach skirmishers and try to flank the Spaniards. I also use hold a lot as it enables more muskets to shoot.

[Ninjasquirrel]

When your men are below 50% morale, they will no longer be able to fire cohesively as a whole unit. Full volley fire will not be available until you bring your unit back over 60% morale. Morale will slowly recover over time if not being attacked but the quickest way to regain morale is to fire volleys at the enemy. If your unit falls below 50% morale, there is no way for them to regain morale since they cannot effectively fire back while constantly having their own morale being reduced to enemy fire.

This is how a very small unit can hold a large unit for a long time. The small unit is not doing enough dps to outright reduce the morale to where your unit breaks and runs, but doing enough dps to overcome passive morale gain, keeping your large unit basically in a state of limbo.

Flanking/rear fire is very devastating to morale in this game, especially from artillery. In this particular map the Spanish come out from all directions to surround you if not dealt with, but they don't all come at the same time. That means you can more or less deal with each group that pops out with the majority of your force before the next group comes out. If you're not sure where they're coming from, send out your skirmishers to spot them. Also note artillery needs units to spot for them in order for them to shoot at their full range most of the time.

Generally you never want to trade volleys one on one with the AI. You either want multiple units firing on 1 enemy unit or you want to have your men in higher cover than the enemy unit if you really must trade one on one. Even if your army is outnumbered overall, you can deploy your army to outnumber and outgun the AI locally and take them out piecemeal. This way you can significantly reduce your casualties.

And lastly, if you're given allied troops to command like in this battle, use them to tank instead of your own units. Save your own units to do the flanking.