rails and experience

[Jaq Pike]

okay, one last post (for now) of newbie questions.

1. if i give a unit some rail (say, just as an example, I give a rifle division 2 rails), as I understand it, the unit can speed along my railways....however, is it immobilized off the railway (even if it also has halftracks or trucks or horses?)... e.g. is it carrying a couple of trains around with it while it heads offroad?

2. I noticed something about experience mentioned over at Victor's ATG lessons, but I don't remember it from the manual. Do my units gain experience as they fight? If so, that's very cool and really improves the game for me!!

[ernieschwitz]

ORIGINAL: jaqpike
okay, one last post (for now) of newbie questions.

1. if i give a unit some rail (say, just as an example, I give a rifle division 2 rails), as I understand it, the unit can speed along my railways....however, is it immobilized off the railway (even if it also has halftracks or trucks or horses?)... e.g. is it carrying a couple of trains around with it while it heads offroad?

Yes, it will be carrying those trains along with it. To get around this, you might want to create a new unit when the infantry arrives where it is supposed to be, and transfer the trains to that unit.

ORIGINAL: jaqpike
2. I noticed something about experience mentioned over at Victor's ATG lessons, but I don't remember it from the manual. Do my units gain experience as they fight? If so, that's very cool and really improves the game for me!!

Yes, they gain experience as they fight as well.

[henri51]

It's not a big deal to "disembark" the infantry by creating a new unit and moving either the infantry or the trains to the unit. Sure the programmers could change it so that units would "board" trains like they do ships, but that would be a lot of trouble for little gain.

Henri

[Josh]

Concerning 1) no need to Ernie, every HQ with trains has a Strategic Transport capacity. ( I think 2000 points per train or so). ( This was more directed to Jagpike...)
 
@ Jagpike, so no need to put trains in an unit, as they are only a hindrance to the movement capacity of that unit. For movement you only use foot/horses/trucks or halftracks, you can even use tanks for transport. With the latter I mean every tank has a carry capacity of... five I think, meaning one tank can carry five soldiers. I usually give every armoured unit some soldiers for recon (well it ain't much recon any recon is better than no recon ) and protection as well.
The Strategic Transport capacity a HQ uses costs you no oil when you move that unit! You can check that out by looking at the oil number at the top of your screen. Be aware that every movement type has its pros and cons, halftracks are fast and deadly, but expensive, oilguzzlers and they can't enter mountains... I think paddies as well. Horses are cheap, cost no oil, can go everywhere, cost no oil, and are vulnerable to Arty. Also giving 20 soldiers 1 halftrack (=10) and 10 horses (also 10) still makes it movement type horses. Also, Heavy Arty needs trucks or halftracks, no horses [:)] (I made that mistake myself, wondering how many horses it would take to move that damn Gun... LOL)

[ernieschwitz]

ORIGINAL: Josh
Concerning 1) no need to Ernie, every HQ with trains has a Strategic Transport capacity. ( I think 2000 points per train or so). ( This was more directed to Jagpike...)

Ah yes. I was thinking he was using Trains as mobilizers (you can do so in certain scenarios)... but you are of course right, normally you would use the trains for strategic transport.

[phatkarp]

Re: XP - not only do your sft's gain experience, so do the Staff at their HQ.  Which I think is really cool. 

[Jaq Pike]

thanks josh and phatkarp and all...

yeah, i found my hq immobilized at the start of a no road game because of its trains....I'll have to figure out (go read the manual) how to do strat move....

I do like the experience gain, as it makes my units have a personality.

cheers, all!