Ridiculous morale lost if unit is hit by canister

[ENRL]

a 2000 men brigade get hit by canister and lost 20 men. and they routed after like 10 or 20 minutes in-game time. shouldn't there be a patch to fix this?

[Duck]

actually this has been consistent throughout EA. Cannons make your guys route. Whether people agree or disagree, it does seem to be the part of the dev's vision for this game. Personally, i think they got arty right in this game. They dont do huge amounts of damage (historically, something like 10- 20% of casualties were inflicted by artillery), but they do have an impact on the game.

[Fred Sanford]

Colonel says "Charge", and then imagine 20 friends (work with me here) of yours getting turned into pink mist and flying hamburger before your eyes. Your enthusiasm to charge those cannon might suffer.

I think cannon are done about right. Just wish they had a "LOF blocked" notification when you try to target an enemy unit.

[Fail_Knight]

Artillery inflicts more morale damage when shooting the closer you get, and that distance based morale damage does not care about casualties or calliber, so in a way all artillery is equally scary to be close to when it fires.

Once rifled muskets become more common it is less of a problem, as those allow you to shoot at artillery from longer range. Not the healthiest course of action, but an improvement morale wise.

[Duck]

Originally posted by Fred Sanford:

Colonel says "Charge", and then imagine 20 friends (work with me here) of yours getting turned into pink mist and flying hamburger before your eyes. Your enthusiasm to charge those cannon might suffer.

I think cannon are done about right. Just wish they had a "LOF blocked" notification when you try to target an enemy unit.

i think you perfectly encapsulated the morale situation.
the underlying issue here is too many war movies and war games make everyone think their brigades are full of John Waynes

[superfluke128]

I think artillery is decently balanced. Artillery is important to have but not broken, neither too weak to ignore or too strong to have a counter. If you use it smartly, often concentrated.

One way to see battles improve is helping the AI better use their artillery.

[Kemal]

Originally posted by superfluke128:

I think artillery is decently balanced. Artillery is important to have but not broken, neither too weak to ignore or too strong to have a counter. If you use it smartly, often concentrated.

One way to see battles improve is helping the AI better use their artillery.

I mostly agree - I think the only issue I have may have to due with effective ranges and scaling casualties/morale loss at greater ranges. One thing I run into is an inability to approach cannons with soldiers armed with generic muskets, because the canister range is equal to max musket range. Therefore, I have to resort to a sort of "gamey" tactic of detaching skirmishers to deal with the cannons before the infantry formation advances.

But if the current situation is pretty historically accurate, I would accept it as is.

[superfluke128]

And that is why weapon upgrade is such a critical thing. Having every brigade with those 400 yd rifles that fire 3 times a minute makes such a huge difference.

One thing I try to never do is attack artillery directly. I always like to find another place to push and turn that will roll into artillery.

[ErgoQB]

Or charge with your cavalry, especially if the battery is isolated. Rested horsemen are usually in melee long before the cannister can have its effect

[rogersdrums]

Originally posted by Kemal:

Originally posted by superfluke128:

I think artillery is decently balanced. Artillery is important to have but not broken, neither too weak to ignore or too strong to have a counter. If you use it smartly, often concentrated.

One way to see battles improve is helping the AI better use their artillery.

I mostly agree - I think the only issue I have may have to due with effective ranges and scaling casualties/morale loss at greater ranges. One thing I run into is an inability to approach cannons with soldiers armed with generic muskets, because the canister range is equal to max musket range. Therefore, I have to resort to a sort of "gamey" tactic of detaching skirmishers to deal with the cannons before the infantry formation advances.

But if the current situation is pretty historically accurate, I would accept it as is.

Yes...detached skirmishers armed well and used wisely, can wreck havoc on enemy artillery especially if you hide your skirmishers in heavily wooded areas before the battle commences and wait on the artillery units to pass by or position themselves......this is a hardcore gamey tactic though.

[Oubley]

Originally posted by superfluke128:

I think artillery is decently balanced. Artillery is important to have but not broken, neither too weak to ignore or too strong to have a counter. If you use it smartly, often concentrated.

One way to see battles improve is helping the AI better use their artillery.

I would agree with the AI statement.

I would agree with others saying routing a brigade seems a little silly giving the time frame. It would make more sense if it was a regiment and not a brigade. Then again it is a contingent of guns.

The last I played the AI didn't do a good job of protecting it's artillery. It's easiest to route with pinning the artillery down with your artillery and using skirmishers but any two brigades did the job just as well most the time. Basically use 1 as decoy at range and use 1 or 2 other units to flank.

[DL]

Well I just charged a division of cavalry (4 Brigades) into a battery....cavalry 280 casualties in melee, artillery 2. Silly.

And all four brigades routed

[ErgoQB]

Through what kind of terrain did you charge? Fences and breastworks usually force cavalry to go around. Also, was that battery supportet? Unsupported cavalry can't really charge anything in proximity of unengaged infantry.

[DL]

Originally posted by ErgoQB:

Through what kind of terrain did you charge? Fences and breastworks usually force cavalry to go around. Also, was that battery supportet? Unsupported cavalry can't really charge anything in proximity of unengaged infantry.

I had a line just under the crest of the hill. Infantry dug in. Two lone artillery batteries came rolling through. I sent 4 brigades into the artillery over my trenches. The enemy artillery fires once before my cavalry get there, they enter melee, all 4 brigades rout, the two batteries took a total of 2 casualties, my guys, 257. Just seems like 10,000 horseman should be able to charge 500 artilleryman and take the position.

[DL]

The biggest issue I really have is with army comp. Ive noticed that if you keep the 3 brigades per division in the campaignpref file, it usually is 2 infantry brigades and one artillery. If you move that number up to 5, its 3 to 2. Ive faced battles where the enemy has 500 cannons on the field. Worse more, if you are able to break some of the batteries, the AI just sends infantry detachments to reman the guns. Im not sure if there is a penalty with this (slower reload, more inaccurate), but it just seems like there is too much artillery, and I believe it stems from the AI recruiting full 3000 man brigades, never willing to recruit a half brigade. When the population of a state gets below 3000, say 2000, they recruit 2000 men worth of batteries. If they have an army of 25 artillery batteries, and I have 25 infantry brigades, and anytime my troops get close, they get canisterred and rout, theres very few ways of winning.

[ErgoQB]

Originally posted by DL:

Originally posted by ErgoQB:

Through what kind of terrain did you charge? Fences and breastworks usually force cavalry to go around. Also, was that battery supportet? Unsupported cavalry can't really charge anything in proximity of unengaged infantry.

I had a line just under the crest of the hill. Infantry dug in. Two lone artillery batteries came rolling through. I sent 4 brigades into the artillery over my trenches. The enemy artillery fires once before my cavalry get there, they enter melee, all 4 brigades rout, the two batteries took a total of 2 casualties, my guys, 257. Just seems like 10,000 horseman should be able to charge 500 artilleryman and take the position.

Then either inexperienced cavalrists or just plain bad luck

Infantry detachements manning guns are a lot worse then the actual artillerists