forage modifier--bug or feature?

[ndrose]

I don't know whether to report this at Mantis, since I'm not sure whether it's intended behavior.

If I move several corps to the same area and forage them at the end of the phase, they all get the +2 modifier, regardless of the order in which they arrived.

But if I forage the first corps to arrive before moving the others, it gets no penalty; and I can do the same with the second corps to arrive and get just a +1 modifier. (Subsequent corps get the +2 of course.)

Is that as it should be, or is foraging supposed to take place only after everybody's moved?

[bresh]

Thats how EIA does it, so yes its how it should be.
Its the reason why you move corps seperately and not as stacks.

Regards
Bresh

[MarshallEllis]

Bresh is correct here.
You could put a lot of planning to how your force forages.
 
 
 

[Jimmer]

Bresh,

Even though you are correct in the order, the game figure out the optimum forage order for you. The game doesn't force the forage until the end of the land movement phase, rather than doing it corps by corps after each moves. Since it is doing things out of order, it should forage a stack:

First, the most valuable corps forages, discounting any corps that moved into the area this player's land phase.
Second, a second most valuable corps would forage, counting only the corps that has already foraged (plus any corps of other powers, of course).
Finally, the remaining corps would forage using the -2 modifier for extra corps.

"most valuable" would be defined as having forage-eligible troops that cost the most money. So, if one has a corps with only cavalry, it goes first. If guard, it gets second priority. If artillery, third priority. Corps with no militia or minor nation factors next. Home nation corps with infantry as the losers, and finally minor free state corps.

Players should be able to assign their own priorities, however. France might be more willing to lose 1-2 artillery than 1-2 guard, for example (if he is somehow forced into such a decision).

What do you think, Marshall?

[Grognot]

You'd want to base it on expected loss, not just unit cost -- for instance, a cavalry corps that only moved a single region will have much better forage odds than an infantry corps that just forced-marched.  The problem is somewhat simplified since you only need to choose two corps to forage before the others; the order doesn't matter for the rest.

[bresh]

Im still not for stack move(or stack forage) in land phase, sorry.

Your land move takes maybe 3-5 minutes, atleast for pbm games the gain is negatable.

How do you weight Turkish feudal cav vs Turkish regular with few inf and the Feudal-Cav-corps is low in factors and your dont have any other cav ? etc, what of Ottoman corps with many Cav ?

Then you have forage in own territory, where eighter MP-corps or Minor-state corps get a additional -1 modifer.

I still think its best to do at hand, than letting the game choose.

Regards
Bresh