Effective Army Composition

[DerRitter]

I am interested in what you guys find to be an effective army comp. I use a 5 Infantry, 4 Artillery, and 1 Dragoon setup.

[Lembley42]

4 Infantry, 1 Husar, 5 Artillery is the best stack.
Later on just double those numbers.

You want equal frontline and equal backline so the infantry doesnt clog up the battle when the width is used up.
Husar adds recon to the stack, which kills off enemy dig-in boni.

[DerRitter]

Yes, but wouldn't it make more sense to have the one more infantry in order to plug gaps created by casualties? I find that when I take a good amount of casualties, the artillery is moved to the front row and is swiftly slaughtered whenever I have equally filled rows.

[DerRitter]

Is the hussar good for the entire game (obviously not late game)? I'd assume that early game I should use more cavalry with higher stats (like Dragoons or Cuirassiers), due to flanking and higher combat width.

[Zsrai]

Hussars are best pretty much the entire game, only replaced by Airplanes. Dragoons are cheaper Hussars, only worth it if you are far down the rankings and can't get any Luxury Clothes at all. Cuirassiers don't fulfill the same purpose, they are more like tanky Infantry really. They don't seem worth the cost either. I haven't run any numbers, but I NEVER hear about people using them. Basic Cavalry are good until you get Hussars, or at least Dragoons, unlocked.

Originally posted by Lembley42:

4 Infantry, 1 Husar, 5 Artillery is the best stack.
Later on just double those numbers.

You want equal frontline and equal backline so the infantry doesnt clog up the battle when the width is used up.
Husar adds recon to the stack, which kills off enemy dig-in boni.

I tend to keep my back row 1 or 2 units less than my front, so that no Artillery ends up in the front row if things take a turn for the worst. Also so that enemy Cav can't flank my line and hit them... which is also why I tend to use 2 Cav units (one goes on each flank automatically). I think that may be more of a carry over from earlier in the game's development though...

[DerRitter]

@Zsrai, do you find it more efficient to have equal infantry and artillery with 2 cavalry (one for each flank)? It makes sense to me, both in terms of realism and from other games (like Total War or EU4), but I wonder how it is in this game

[Zsrai]

Originally posted by 9887fallenangel:

@Zsrai, do you find it more efficient to have equal infantry and artillery with 2 cavalry (one for each flank)? It makes sense to me, both in terms of realism and from other games (like Total War or EU4), but I wonder how it is in this game

I do, but I've been playing off and on since the Vanilla release so I may be holding onto a relic of the past. I know units were overhauled a lot with the HoD release. I do like Cav on each flank, because if the front line is long enough then they have the Maneuver to actually loop around and double up on the ends.

[Hornblende]

3 infantry, 1 guard, 1 dragoon, 2 artillery, 1 engineer. Works wonders for me

[Lembley42]

Well, in bigger battles you rotate troops around. If alot of your soldiers are dying, the ranks are broken and artillery moves front, you simply rereat the one stack with low strength out of to replenish and reorganize.

Additional inf to reinforce sound right on paper, but its ♥♥♥♥ because of how the game battle logic is. They will reinforce 2nd rank, making your army simply less potent while you get the same casaulties as otherwise.

4/1/5 with cycling is the best. Cav is only worth it early game due to quickly declining width.

This isnt my random guess, its the standard in all MP groups because thats what people figured out was the best after hundreds of wars.

@USS Tennessee that stack sounds horrible - it doesnt know what it wants to be. Whats the guard doing there, why the dragoon, why an engineer in such small stacks. Why only 2 artillery?

[Zsrai]

Originally posted by Lembley42:

This isnt my random guess, its the standard in all MP groups because thats what people figured out was the best after hundreds of wars.

Yeah, I've never played MP so I've never needed to be 110% efficient. How does that hold up to the AI megastacks though? I tend to combine armies later on instead of cycling, just making sure I stay below the supply limit.

[Lembley42]

Combining armies and cycling is in no way contradictory.
Like I said above, I'll just merge two of those stacks into one bigger stack later on.
Just to make sure : I mean you take the broken stack away from a bigger battle, so that it may both replenish and allow fresh stacks that previously waited in reserve to fill up the ranks again (with infantry front and artillery in the back again).
This ofcourse demands that there are several stacks committed to a battle.

Megastacks are only a problem early on, when combat width is high and attack and defense are equal. But as the AI is stupid, you can easily make it attack you in hills over rivers or something, or just win by using a superior general + you having more artillery and techs.

Later on, the AI usually just meatgrinds into me while I suffer almost no casaulties (like 5k casaulties to 200 or something) - if any of my troops are tired, I just let them replenish and let the next reserve fight :)
Especially with Machine guns, all you need to do is to make it to attack you - for example, you "offer" a small stack to the AI, but hold several ready stacks around it. The AI will attack that small stack, you will reinforce a bit, make the AI committ all troops to it, and just grind it away while cycling around. Then when its done, the replenish troops can easily track the broken AI stacks down and annihilate it.

[Zsrai]

Thanks. I tend to play smaller countries (Sweden/Scandinavia, Argentina, Brazil, Portugal, etc) so I tend not to have enough troops to really cycle through a meatgrinder late game. I'll keep that in mind though when I do a more militaristic playthrough.

[DerRitter]

Interesting info guys, thanks for your input!

[after hours]

4 inf 2 cav 4 art + engineer

[Downright Cynical]

Vouch with Lembley, some of the other pros like to use 1 Dragoon and 1 Hussar aswell.