Multiple Units in a Hex

[brucha]

Is it smart - or rather foolish - to stack more than one infantry section in a hex? The reason I ask is that I often have trouble massing enough firepower in an advance or assault when I spread my infantry sections to one per hex on my front. When I position more than one section in a hex - and it comes under fire - I seem to take far more casualties. Often, not only does the section being fired one take losses but so does any other unit in the hex.

[vahauser]

brucha,
 
Here is a thread that discusses stacking in a hex.
 
http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=1391327&mpage=1&key=stacking&#1391327

[brucha]

Interesting thread, but that discussed more house rules than actual tactical situations of multi-units in a hex. As far as I understood, most people expressed the danger of stacking more than one unit in a hex - is that a correct assumption, vanhauser?

[vahauser]

brucha,
 
When playing against the computer, the human player gains an advantage by stacking because the computer is very poor at retaliating against stacked hexes.

[Poopyhead]

Combat is a risky business. Everything you do can be countered. The trick is to take big risks only when you have to and to do as much as you can to reduce the risks. Unlike the real world, direct fire in the game will not go through a smoke hex and it’s less accurate to call indirect fire on a hex without a line of sight to it. So you stack to achieve an urgent objective, use smoke to obscure your position and then use vehicles to get out of Dodge ASAP. Leg infantry are at the mercy of artillery, mech infantry cost more but have the advantage of mobility. Each has its advantage. Mobility allows you to move dispersed, mass at the point of battle to achieve overwhelming force and then disperse again to exploit your breakthrough. If you keep the pace up you won’t be eating artillery shrapnel.

[Five_of_Swords]

why would u stack infantry? stack tanks in those hexes. Tanks arent going to be mowed down that way by machine guns. They have more firepower anyway.I often put both infantry and tanks in the same hex...I was under the impression that the tanks also grant the infantry a defense bonus. But putting multiple infantry in the same hex seems like more of a liability than anything else because the firepower isnt going to be enough anyway.

[vahauser]

Five_of_Swords,
 
Did you read the linked thread I provided earlier in this thread?  It has an in-depth discussion of this topic.  Also, AFVs do not give any defensive advantages to soft units in the same hex.  The opposite is usually the case due to ricochets.

[Five_of_Swords]

Well I didnt see much of an in depth discussion.
Ive simply noticed that multiple infantry in the same hex are much more prone to casualties, because missing one might still hit the other.
Meanwhile, if this also is true for amror, its effect is barely noticabe, because even being hit is not usually a big deal, and especially, theres only a select few guns you need to worry about and if your tanks are in the area you generally know where they are anyway.

Furthermore, since the mobility of infantry is so poor, i find that spreading my infantry out is sortof the only thing you can do to get them to have a reasonable area of influence.

from smoke and terrain etc. theres often only a few select hexes on the map that offer good los to fire at stuff and tanks work great to zip around between them and concentrate fire. In the game, local majority has nothing really to do with how many units are in the area, but rather, how many have line of sight.

The manual suggests that tanks offer protection to infantry in the same hex, or at least i remember distinctly that a wrecked tank does. I think i remember it saying a non wrecked tank does also (and why would they implement the code for one and not the other). Anyway, i put tank and infantry in same hex all the time and I cant say I notice a difference in casualties. But you will notice that you accumulate a little more supression. Just make the units in these hexes the last to fire on your turn.

The computer stacks things all the time. When it stacks infantry its a juicy target. But if armor is stacked, I cant say I know how one would actually take advantage of that. Even if they are in LOS of your AT guns, you still only kill one at a time. Since they are only on one hex however, its rather more likely that NONE of them are in LOS. You see?

[planner 3]

Five I personnally love it when the AI stacks tanks in a single hex, for me its like shooting ducks in a barrel. I've had up yo 3 kills and 1 damaged recently that way.

[JEB Davis]

ORIGINAL: Five_of_Swords
...But if armor is stacked, I cant say I know how one would actually take advantage of that. Even if they are in LOS of your AT guns, you still only kill one at a time. Since they are only on one hex however, its rather more likely that NONE of them are in LOS. You see?

If you brew up one tank in the stacked hex, it is likely to cause large amounts of suppression to the other tanks in the same hex, thus making those tanks easier targets... and so on.