Military organization and groupings

As of now, our current plan has the player making two choices when they train a unit...

1. Unit type: Which unit design do I want to train (Common Footsoldiers, Advanced Bowmen, etc).

2. Grouping Type: How large of a squad do I want? A 'Squad' only requires 10 population units, but a 'Company' of 40 troops will last even longer on the battlefield, with a 'Legion' (300 troops) putting up an even better fight in open war.

Most 'Grouping Types' will require a Logisitical understanding to be met (through Technologies or base racial ability), with some of the larger groups unable to join in dungeon exploration (I would imagine only 'Squads' could realistically traverse most dungeons).

Also, in this system, you couldn't mix-and-match unit designs within the group. That's not to say an Army can't have a variety of bowmen, calvary, and knights, but they would be seperate groups traveling as one body (think Fleets from GC2).

Again, all subject to change, but that's where our our current path takes us. 

Thanks for the info; I had anticipated some logistics requirement for the larger groups but would I be mistaken in saying that the actual appearance you describe sounds similar to King’s Bounty the legend where if you have knights in your army regardless of the number they are all represented by one avatar on the map or are you saying that each group I make will be represented by an individual avatar in the army? 

A units representation is dependent on a number of factors...

1. Computer Specs: Higher end machines will be able to show more units, lower end boxes condencing said visual representation.

2. Zoom Level: Zoom in to see an army in all it's glory, zoom out and it'll be represented via the Champion unit they're grouped under.

3. Game Mode: You'll be seeing fewer units on the main map then in the tactial battle.

But in general we're really trying to keep away gross under-representation of units....'lots of troops on the screen' is more fun than 'one troop next to a large number'.

Hm, can a unit have more than one weapon? Like in: can my legionair throw his pillum and then use his sword for close combat?

edit: rephrasing

I would also be interested in having units which do more than  just one type of weapon.

Perhaps for the expansion you could evolve that into a Kohan-style system where you can have support with the army- like paladins to improve morale, clerics to heal and speed recovery, etc...

I'd like to see that down the road if it can't be done at launch.

As for fast and slow units- that will lead to a system where people will use nothing but cavalry, unless forced to do otherwise by the system.  Speed kills in TBS.

Well, a pike wielding unit would be the hard counter here. Perhaps it even has a special ability: The pikemen form a hedgehog like circle and thus can't be outflanked by cavalery.

I think, it all comes down to balancing (and thus beta testing).

Which will just get whittled down vs ranged mounted units.

Then again in medieval history those were the most dangerous units.  Hopefully there will be a counter to that.

Testing will indeed be required as one unit type becomes dominant, you have to find a counter for it.

Armoured knights - longbowmen and/or pikemen.

Cavalry bowmen - armoured knights

Dragon - ???

Once you add combat spells and creatures to the mix it will be lots of fun (and time) to test.   

Interesting. But about grouping: is more always better ? Is a bigger unit always better than smaller ?

It would be interesting to have some limitations, narrow swamp/mountain passes which have limited bandwidth and only allow smaller units to pass. Or a path on a frozen river or lake, which can't be crossed by a big squad. It shoudln't be too common or it would become an interface/logistics nightmare.

Fantasy General had an interesting concept - it distinguished between light and heavy infantry, and cavalry. It even distinguished between ordinary light infantry and skirmishers ! Some units supposedly had 'loose' formation making them relatively good in tough terrain like woods, swamp or mountains. Light infantry and cavalry actually had an edge over their heavy counterparts in rough terrain ! Aside from combat modifiers, heavier units had movement penalties in such terrain. And siege machines were simply awful anywhere except open fields and roads. Perhaps Elemental could use something similar ? Squad size affecting how well it performs in rough terrain ?

So how will you decide "computer specs"?  I mean will it be an option in the video options menu?   or will it scale itself based on frame rate?

Personally,  I think there is a limit on number of troops and fun.   There is a point where I can't watch guys be crushed by a dragon on a per-person basis or watching guys fly away from an explosion.  But looking at current shots I can't see that being much of a problem.

This would be an interesting dynamic I would like to see included in military engagement. I would also like the ability to mix and match unit types in a given squad for the reasons I gave in my original post. 

On a side note from one of my other threads I'm still wondering if there is a limit to how much training a soldier can receive and the quality of equipment you can create for a soldier.  

I take Scott's reference to GC2 fleets to mean that you *will* be able to mix and match 'unit types' in a larger group/stack, just not types within a unit. A 'unit' seems to be roughly analagous to a ship design in GC2.

I understand that you will be able to include different units in the larger groupings that would be completely insane if you couldn't. All I'm saying is I would like to have the ability to include multiple types of units in a squad I created. So for example I could have a squad of 9 spearmen and one dismounted Hodarian Knight to make a 10 man squad. 

I think homogenous unit groups ("fleets with one ship design") are fine so long as you can use unit combinations effectively.  For instance:

1. Having archers stand directly behind spearmen and fire between them (warning: only attempt with well-trained archers).
2. Having skirmishers retreat through friendly lines (again, a professional army is probably needed here

I guess in general, lots of "cool" mixed-unit tactics would probably have a prerequisite in terms of training, and possibly even Kingdom/Empire.

Boogie - any chance we can get a glimpse into thoughts on tactical options?

I guess (and absolutely hope) that you train individual units which you can form into groups (GalCiv 2s fleets) if you want to and that you can also disassemble squads to individual units again.

Having only a certain number of units moving through f.e. a mountain pass is a good idea and I just know it's gonna be incorporated in the campaign in that there are a squad of superpowerful troops guarding a pass which you can only engage with another squad of superpowerful troops.

But for MP it sounds very exciting. Like Age of Wonder: Shadow Magic where a tile surrounded by mountains (or some other impassable terrain) could only have 2 stacks fighting at the same time. Together with "raise mountain" or "wildfire" it opens up for interesting strategical possibilities.

Sounds like someone watched '300' recently.   Spartans at Thermopylae, anyone?

Hmmm, a Kohan type army creation system could work for making squads.

I mean, an army would have several main, support and special slots for different types of troops.  When forming the army, you could even leave some slots empty if $/time is in short supply.

So for example, your battalion creation could consist of a front line of footmen, a back line of archers, and a special slot filled with a leader or hero.

*The Battalion would travel at the slowest troop component speed as well.