Matrix Games Forums

Before I put this in the 'wish list' thread, what does everyone think of a way to remove troops (ie "men") from individual military units that have less than the "training pool" morale and move them into the training pool (where they would be processed normally)?

This would allow you to "train up" your military forces without marching/starving them to death so you could get higher morale replacements from the draft pool. The drawback would be, of course, that you would 1) have these soldiers unavailable while being trained (or re-trained in their case) and 2) the replacement of these soldiers would be limited to whatever normal replacement rate your divisions have (ie. it could take a year or more to refill the division with higher morale replacements)

Some kind of "drill" setting for inactive troops where a units morale would have a chance of increasing a slight amount each turn would be nice, but make it cost money for the powder/lead/extra shoeleather that would be consumed in hard training?

The Grand Armee was made Grand by drilling while encamped in preparation for the invasion of England which never occurred. The French Army never got back to the quality it had in 1805, that quality produced by idle time filled with training.

Ive also read that the British Army had their infantrymen train a great deal more than their contemporaries, said to be the reason why they were of better quality, yet you cant really model this in the game. Would like that to change.

To be honest sounds very micro-managing to me. I guess it wouldn't hurt as a 'wish' but I don't think I'd ever use it.
While not the same you do know that you can transfer troops directly between divisions right?

You can transfer troops between divisions, but for now if your replacements have higher morale than your current divisional troops, the only way to increase the morale of the division is to have replacements assigned to it from the draft pool.

Currently, the only way to find "slots" for the replacements to be assigned to a division (for example an infantry division at 10,000 strength) is to kill off troops in the division (by marching around through march attrition or putting them on ships without supplies).

Somehow, I doubt such things (ie. intentionally killing off your troops in such a way) would making serving in your army a popular past time. [:D]

I think Joram is correct. This is a "strategic" wargame, not a logistics simulator. If you want them to get some training, declare war on some poor sap and drag out the war while you give your troops live fire exercises at his expense. [:D]

Actually, this DOES work. [8|]

ORIGINAL: Joram

To be honest sounds very micro-managing to me. I guess it wouldn't hurt as a 'wish' but I don't think I'd ever use it.
While not the same you do know that you can transfer troops directly between divisions right?

You almost made it sound that micro-management is a bad thing?! Surely a mistake? [;)]

Maybe for you Type A's but .... oooh shiny button

The fact is that for some countries replacements from the draft pool set to enter service with 4.5 morale is higher than a raised unit's morale.

It is totally unrealistic that you have to KILL OFF your current troops to gain the benefit of these higher morale replacements.

I was talking about a simple slider at the bottom of your Military screen, allowing you to transfer men from your divisions back to the draft pool. Simply pick a division, add "men" to this slider (the 'retraining pool' perhaps?) and have these troops added to the draft pool at then beginning of next turn. Everything else is done normally (ie. training and sending replacement to the units).

Eventually, an army would have a morale minimum of 4.5 (which I assume is the highest morale you can gain from training alone).

I am not sure how this is any more micromanging that choosing the draft ages or training months for your troops. It also has absolutely nothing to do with gaining morale through battle (plus it seems kind of 'gamey' to keep a war going just to gain morale for your army).

You don't have to "kill off" your troops to raise thier morale. Troops gain morale by participating in combat. They are trained, as it were, on the field of battle.

You DO have to kill off your troops if your BASE morale is LESS than 4.5 (the morale of your best trained replacements). There is no other way to raise the morale of your units outside of war. If you can train replacements to 4.5 morale, why not your regular troops?

Note, this has nothing to do with combat. You can train replacements to up to 4.5 without combat.

If I am not making myself clear: you raise a division with 3.5 morale. It begins with 7000 troops. You also have a replacement pool set on ages 18-40, 18 months training, which gives a 4.5 starting morale.

Assuming your newly raised division is in supply, it will gain 4.5 morale replacements to take it up to 10,000 strength. During this period its morale will rise to around 3.8 and STOP. This is because the division is at full strength and no more replacements can be added. You CAN however, "empty" the division by marching it around and having soldiers die of march attrition OR not supply them for awhile and have soldiers die. You then can begin supplying them again and more 4.5 morale replacements will arrive, raising their morale even more towards 4.5.

My suggestion was to AVOID this unrealistic method of raising morale (ie. killing off your troops during peacetime) and simply allow a player to retrain troops.

ORIGINAL: bjmorgan

You don't have to "kill off" your troops to raise thier morale. Troops gain morale by participating in combat. They are trained, as it were, on the field of battle.

In battle is a pretty bad place to learn the basics.

[;)]

The ability to drill your troops up to a regular standard outside of combat would be awesome.

Training your troops up to a reasonable standard through a darwinian process like combat sounds like an awesome way to lose a war.

The goal is winning.

[;)]

ORIGINAL: Joram

To be honest sounds very micro-managing to me.

I wouldnt have it be micromanaging at all. Have it take money out of your draft budget (a certain number of units trained per level of draft) and any idle unit in friendly territory (not moving or participating in combat that turn) and in supply would have a small percentage chance to have its morale increase until it hit 4.5.

We might be able to do something like this just with the military readiness and draft size/training time parameters.  Maybe something like setting military readiness above 100% (so that cost increases above normal) could have the effect of training all idle divisions at rest in home territories.  Of course if we do this we'd have to remove some of the intrinsic national advantages.

What kind of intrinsic national advantages are you talking about?

Also what would you think would be the upper end of the quality you could get by training and drill if you implemented a system like that?

You DO have to kill off your troops if your BASE morale is LESS than 4.5 (the morale of your best trained replacements). There is no other way to raise the morale of your units outside of war. If you can train replacements to 4.5 morale, why not your regular troops?

Use the target practice I and II upgrade to kill off your low morale troops and increase their overall morale. [:D]

I wouldn't worry about it. Historically your french mixed order upgrade represented the french using 2 battalions of green recuits in colunm with one veteran battalion in line between as a regiment . The idea being that the best training for green recruits came from veterans. Which worked until the veterans got wiped out in the retreat from moscow.


My pet peeve is I tried to save money by not building the supply depot chain for a few turns and build up the trained pool before rebuilding the supply depot chain. But it stopped drawing population factors for training. Ya just can't get an edge in this game, besides the labour allocation sliders.

My other pet peeve is that textile eating population and unit price inflation.

1792 france went from 26% to 126% inflation and killed my dream 12 combined arm corps (including one guard corps) +4 cav corps and 1 arty corps. The combined armed guard corps was going to serve with the arty corps as the swerpunkt.

Fat chance in hell with all those inflation events and people who consume textiles when it's over 100 and National morale is at 1000.[&:] I can hack the inflation but not the textiles being consumed when it's greater than 100.

It will surprise no one to hear that most (if not ALL) armies DO have some bad units in them. If you don't dare to use them in battle just stick them in garrison somewhere, or, disband them.

I've found that my most inferior units come from feudal levies. These I have no compunctions about disbanding. After all, they'll soon be replaced by other feudal levies..heh.

If you can't bear to disband them, just nurse them through their battles by giving them weak/previously damaged targets to contend with. A simple way, when available, is to pit them against rebels and conduct detailed battle so they won't do anything stupid.

HiHi

Warning, don't rely on Feudal levies, at least in PBEM games they ain't showing since the Patch.

ShaiHulad, gotta ask coz it's been bugging me for Yonks, you named after Sonias 'Great Worm' in Dune ? Got the books somewhere (been here 5 yrs and still haven't finished unpacking!) but quicker to ask [:)]

All the Best
Peter

Aye, from Frank Herbert's Dune.

HiHi

Brilliant writer I have most of his stuff, shame he couldn't have finished the prequels, his son Brian & co-writer sadly just dont have the same narrative style.

All the Best
Peter

ORIGINAL: ericbabe

We might be able to do something like this just with the military readiness and draft size/training time parameters.  Maybe something like setting military readiness above 100% (so that cost increases above normal) could have the effect of training all idle divisions at rest in home territories.  Of course if we do this we'd have to remove some of the intrinsic national advantages.

I like this idea.