There's Bad Guys in Dem Der Hills!

[tinjaw]

I would like to option to allow my motorized infantry to leave their trucks behind so they can move into hills/mountains to pursue the enemy. I would like dismount/mount buttons to separate my infantry from their transport. The (welcome) side-effect of this is that when dismounted, the transports are vulnerable on their own. So either another unit may guard the trucks, or, possibly provide a dialog to leave a certain percentage of troops mounted to remain and protect the vehicles.

[Malevolence]

Agree.

I will add this is complicated, given the current design. It adds quite a bit of complexity.

The operational logistics points do not appear directly related to the unit's action points. That makes such a change only slightly less complex.

Imagine the unit crosses the mountains, arrives in the plains on the other side of the range, and then re-enables its vehicles. That seems like an exploit. Many such conditions with the change.

[tinjaw]

ORIGINAL: Malevolence
Imagine the unit crosses the mountains, arrives in the plains on the other side of the range, and then re-enables its vehicles. That seems like an exploit. Many such conditions with the change.

I don't see it that way. I don't envision disabling/enabling transports. I see it splitting the unit into two counters. They can only "reenable" transports by occupying the same hex as the vehicle counter.

IOW they would have to hoof it back to the trucks.

[Vhalor]

You can already do this, just split off the transports to a new Battlegroup. You can rejoin them later too.

[tinjaw]

Yes, but it is something that is best automated. IOW, the game should have it "built in" to make it easy.

The job of a great UI is to make it easy to carry out your plans.

[Malevolence]

ORIGINAL: tinjaw

I don't see it that way. I don't envision disabling/enabling transports. I see it splitting the unit into two counters. They can only "reenable" transports by occupying the same hex as the vehicle counter.

IOW they would have to hoof it back to the trucks.

ORIGINAL: tinjaw

Yes, but it is something that is best automated. IOW, the game should have it "built in" to make it easy.

The job of a great UI is to make it easy to carry out your plans.

Oh? You can do that.

Even easier than a split--just change the OOB back to light infantry. The trucks, equipment, etc. disband back to the SHQ. You can then reapply original motor/mech OOB, and get the equipment back from the SHQ when done--without reconstruction. They even keep their XP--but lose feats. It's all automated.

If you didn't know, you can use this to modify the OOB. Move a unit from motorized to mechanized for example. It's all automatic. You just change the OOB to the one you want to use. Logistics handles all the work.

I will add, myself and others have asked for some efficiency changes to this process as well. Like using super-types instead of such hard coded OOB's. We also asked that it not be necessary to drop to the base OOB, before going back up the upgrade chain. Little QOL changes.

[tinjaw]

ORIGINAL: Malevolence

Even easier than a split--just change the OOB back to light infantry. ... You can then reapply original motor/mech OOB, and get the equipment back from the SHQ ...

That hadn't even crossed my mind. Will it take a turn to send the transports away? (As they can't head off into the mountains until the transports are out of their stack.)

[Malevolence]

ORIGINAL: tinjaw

ORIGINAL: Malevolence

Even easier than a split--just change the OOB back to light infantry. ... You can then reapply original motor/mech OOB, and get the equipment back from the SHQ ...

That hadn't even crossed my mind. Will it take a turn to send the transports away? (As they can't head off into the mountains until the transports are out of their stack.)

It requires a turn to reorganize the unit to the new OOB -- to its final selection. You can change the OOB multiple times during your orders phase. The actual reorganization takes place during the automated AI phase. I think that's fair and also ensures that mistakes or misclicks can be corrected before implementation. You can experiment some.

Finally, remember that number of troops change in many OOBs. You may need additional manpower (infantry) to come to full integrity with a light infantry unit. Have some ready in your SHQ to assist with reorganization before you end the orders phase.

Check out the war room sub-forum. A number of smart and prolific players have provided tricks and tips there you might find interesting.

[Hazard151]

Shifting from or towards a Mechanized/Motorized equivalent of the same formation only shifts the transport allocation, everything else remains the same.

[tinjaw]

After applying this to my current game, the changing of OOB doesn't work. I had an assault army that contained light tanks and trucks. I could leave the trucks behind via an OOB change, but not the tanks. So, I would have had to do a manual split. Again, doable, but if this is going to be helpful more often than not, it is worth automating. Not with high priority, give you. But on the ToDo list.

[Hazard151]

That's because the game's definition of an Assault unit includes tanks, and tanks can't deal with mountains just as much as trucks can't. High Mountain terrain fighting forbids the use of any wheeled or tracked vehicle, including trucks, buggies, motorbikes and tanks. If you want vehicle support in high mountain combat you need Walkers, or pray for a connecting road you can exploit at a hefty penalty.