Captured weapons

[pfcjking]

I started a new confederate campaign on 9/23, and I am having a new issue. I never seem to capture weapons like I used to.
My best example was at Port Republic. I capture Tyler's Brigade and Carroll's Brigade, both with over 1,500 men still alive. One brigade was carrying Lorenz rifles, the other was 1855 Harpers Ferrys. I was excited about the supposed spoils. When the battle was over, all I had was 271 captured Lorenzes, and 303 captured Harpers Ferrys..... Gimme a friggen break....
Both brigades were between 2,500 and 3,000 men at the start of battle. I should have gleaned at least 4,000 rifles from the field... No sir... All I got was less than 600 rifles....

Is this new? WTF....

[CrashToDesktop]

Captured brigades never drop weapons it seems (not even the regular drop rate, just nothing at all). No idea why, and I have no idea if this mechanic is intentional or a serious bug, the devs don't really say much about it.

Also, on Major General, the drop rate is something like 10% compared to 25% on other difficulties (if that happens to be the difficulty you're on).

[Rochefort]

Captured units yield the same amount of loot as if you'd killed them, IIRC for balance reasons. I don't know when this happened, but it was true for my campaigns ~6 months ago.

Your best bet for capturing lots of fancy rifles is to just wipe out their army to a man.

[CrashToDesktop]

Originally posted by {ALPHA}Rochefort:

Captured units yield the same amount of loot as if you'd killed them, IIRC for balance reasons. I don't know when this happened, but it was true for my campaigns ~6 months ago.

Your best bet for capturing lots of fancy rifles is to just wipe out their army to a man.

Don't think so. Me and some friends compared capture rates against the same battle where we captured units and didn't capture units. The battle where they were killed instead of captured yielded a notable amount more weapons.

[Rochefort]

Originally posted by The Soldier:

Don't think so. Me and some friends compared capture rates against the same battle where we captured units and didn't capture units. The battle where they were killed instead of captured yielded a notable amount more weapons.

I think the difference is between units that are killed in combat and shattered. Shattered units seem to yield less weapons, and affect the overall casualty count in odd ways. I think captured units fall in this category.

I've seen captured units yield weapons (got some skrimishers to surrender with <50 casualties and I still got 50 spencers from them) so they definitely yield *some* weapons.

[pupupupu]

It should be fixed or draw developers' immediate attentions. Otherwise, it is an insult to us players all, like many other out of sense bugs in the game.

[pupupupu]

Originally posted by {ALPHA}Rochefort:

Originally posted by The Soldier:

Don't think so. Me and some friends compared capture rates against the same battle where we captured units and didn't capture units. The battle where they were killed instead of captured yielded a notable amount more weapons.

I think the difference is between units that are killed in combat and shattered. Shattered units seem to yield less weapons, and affect the overall casualty count in odd ways. I think captured units fall in this category.

I've seen captured units yield weapons (got some skrimishers to surrender with <50 casualties and I still got 50 spencers from them) so they definitely yield *some* weapons.

Captued units should yield ALL their weapons.

[Rochefort]

Originally posted by pupupupu:

Originally posted by {ALPHA}Rochefort:

I think the difference is between units that are killed in combat and shattered. Shattered units seem to yield less weapons, and affect the overall casualty count in odd ways. I think captured units fall in this category.

I've seen captured units yield weapons (got some skrimishers to surrender with <50 casualties and I still got 50 spencers from them) so they definitely yield *some* weapons.

Captued units should yield ALL their weapons.

This is how it used to be. IIRC they changed it because it completely broke the game. Which is still a whole other issue, but I think it's balanced as-is,

[CrashToDesktop]

Originally posted by {ALPHA}Rochefort:

I think the difference is between units that are killed in combat and shattered. Shattered units seem to yield less weapons, and affect the overall casualty count in odd ways. I think captured units fall in this category.

I've seen captured units yield weapons (got some skrimishers to surrender with <50 casualties and I still got 50 spencers from them) so they definitely yield *some* weapons.

There is no difference in the kill count - the kill count is what determines weapon drop. On Easy and Normal, you get the 1 weapon for every 4 (or 5, can't remember the exact number) enemies killed (or 1 cannon for every 4 disabled, 25 men per cannon on an artillery brigade). Once a brigade is shattered (say 2000 men and they shatter at 500), you're going to get 375 weapons, which is a quarter of the 1500 enemies you killed (I believe it's 1/4 at least, been a while since I looked at that specific thing).

Still fairly certain that Captured units yield no weapons whatsoever. You probably killed 200 other skirmishers along the way to capturing that one skirmisher unit that had Spencers.

[Wolfen]

Thats part of what i hate about this game.

The gamey-gamey at all ends that takes away most of the immersion of realism the game gives you on other ends.

The out-of-hand-scaling (it matters a sh*t if your brigades have 1500 or 2000 men in it, just experience that myself).

The desolate aquirement of weapons after battle.

The already so good and still for no reason sometimes so frustrating army builder (will never understand why i can't make units smaller again, disbanding is so moronish).

The whole freedom-of-choice immersion the game gives us is simply that, an illusion.
Freedom only happens on the battlefields, what makes the campaign not much more but a railshooter sadly.

Still one of the best games of its kind, but with some very sad flaws.

[CrashToDesktop]

Out of hand scaling...? Haven't seen that since the update with the Intelligence Service came out (which changed how enemies grew in difficulty).

[pfcjking]

I understand the inherent difficulty factor that they are trying to implement in order to keep the game fun, but what's fair is fair. I cornered these 2 beefy brigades up and pounded them with volleys that were almost unanswered until the clock almost ran out, then I charged to make them surrender before time expired, all with the intention of having 5,000 new rifles to show for it. Seems logical.

I'm on my last campaign as Brigadier General difficulty. I've sacked Washington twice already, and I am trying to perfect it further before I make the game harder.

I can get by without those weapons. I am already passed Malvern Hill again, and I have an army of 45,000 infantry , 2,000 cavalry, and about 180 guns moving forward. I just feel like I'm owed, and I'm sideways about the fact that 3 veteran brigades are still carrying pumpkin slingers when new rifles should have been on the menu.

[CrashToDesktop]

Logical? Yes. Balanced? Hardly. That would mean, for the most bang for your buck, you'd need to capture every single enemy brigade possible, which would be exceedingly difficulty, which would also prompt people to complain that the system isn't "predicable enough" or "exploitable enough" or some other reason as an excuse to make capturing brigades easier.

Specifically made so you can't just capture the entire enemy force and make money and rifles for ad infinitum. Reasonable for balance reasons, not so much for logical "stack arms and bugger off" reasons.

[pfcjking]

Originally posted by The Soldier:

Logical? Yes. Balanced? Hardly. That would mean, for the most bang for your buck, you'd need to capture every single enemy brigade possible, which would be exceedingly difficulty, which would also prompt people to complain that the system isn't "predicable enough" or "exploitable enough" or some other reason as an excuse to make capturing brigades easier.

Specifically made so you can't just capture the entire enemy force and make money and rifles for ad infinitum. Reasonable for balance reasons, not so much for logical "stack arms and bugger off" reasons.

Well, Perhaps there should be, or maybe there is, a cap on weapons gleaned from every field. And perhaps this cap should have windfall level where I can capture lots of guns if I play my cards right, but not lots of guns like I am going to re-arm half my army....

Seems like a while back, I was on Cedar Mountain as CSA, and I captured like 6,000 Harpers Ferry rifles... I am wondering if this latest patch has made captured weapons less attainable.

[maniacalpenny]

Originally posted by pfcjking:

Originally posted by The Soldier:

Logical? Yes. Balanced? Hardly. That would mean, for the most bang for your buck, you'd need to capture every single enemy brigade possible, which would be exceedingly difficulty, which would also prompt people to complain that the system isn't "predicable enough" or "exploitable enough" or some other reason as an excuse to make capturing brigades easier.

Specifically made so you can't just capture the entire enemy force and make money and rifles for ad infinitum. Reasonable for balance reasons, not so much for logical "stack arms and bugger off" reasons.

Well, Perhaps there should be, or maybe there is, a cap on weapons gleaned from every field. And perhaps this cap should have windfall level where I can capture lots of guns if I play my cards right, but not lots of guns like I am going to re-arm half my army....

Seems like a while back, I was on Cedar Mountain as CSA, and I captured like 6,000 Harpers Ferry rifles... I am wondering if this latest patch has made captured weapons less attainable.

Loot rates for weapons are 25% of enemies killed, dropping to 12.5% on MG/Legendary. This has been and is still the case.

I don't see how a cap on the guns that can be captured makes any more sense as you are just breaking immersion in another way. And if it was indeed possible to have a "windfall" as you put it then people would horrendously break the game by abusing this mechanic. Perhaps you can argue that captured units should give the same loot rates as regular units, which is reasonable, but full looted weapons on captured units would absolutely break the game and the new goal of every battle would not be to "win" or even "annihilate the enemy army" but to play in a way that allowed you to capture the most units possible (which would be heavily obnoxious as the capture mechanic is unreliable and poorly understood)

[pfcjking]

Originally posted by maniacalpenny:

Originally posted by pfcjking:

Well, Perhaps there should be, or maybe there is, a cap on weapons gleaned from every field. And perhaps this cap should have windfall level where I can capture lots of guns if I play my cards right, but not lots of guns like I am going to re-arm half my army....

Seems like a while back, I was on Cedar Mountain as CSA, and I captured like 6,000 Harpers Ferry rifles... I am wondering if this latest patch has made captured weapons less attainable.

Loot rates for weapons are 25% of enemies killed, dropping to 12.5% on MG/Legendary. This has been and is still the case.

I don't see how a cap on the guns that can be captured makes any more sense as you are just breaking immersion in another way. And if it was indeed possible to have a "windfall" as you put it then people would horrendously break the game by abusing this mechanic. Perhaps you can argue that captured units should give the same loot rates as regular units, which is reasonable, but full looted weapons on captured units would absolutely break the game and the new goal of every battle would not be to "win" or even "annihilate the enemy army" but to play in a way that allowed you to capture the most units possible (which would be heavily obnoxious as the capture mechanic is unreliable and poorly understood)

Obnoxious?

You play to win the game. Killing and capturing the enemy both result from the same tactic: pressing and pursuing the enemy.

Sometimes, the best defense (esp when dealing with an overly aggressive enemy, is a good offense. Passive defense to maintain a position can lose the battle if the enemy outnumbers you by a wide margin. In that case, I always take the offensive, and for me, that generally results in massive enemy casualties and POWs.
Encirclement is a prime tactic, regardless of whether you want to capture or route an army. once they realize they are in a trap, they run. And when they run, they panic. And when they panic, they get killed or they surrender.

Bottom line: When a unit actually surrendered in the field, they didn't keep any guns. The moment they asked for quarter with the white flag, they cannot destruct anymore equipment. There is no reason why a 1,000 man brigade surrender should not net you 750 muskets.