Matrix Games Forums

I recombined all the components of the Japanese 48th division and then divided the unit to see what happened. The division split back into A, B and C units. I was surprised they did not breakdown again into the units I had to recombine in the first place. The 48th Division was made up of the following units prior to rebuilding:

1st Formosa Rgt.
2nd Formosa Rgt.
4th Inf. rgt.
48th Eng. Rgt.
48th FA Rgt.
48th Recon Rgt.

Why does the unit not breakdown into it's component units again, but rather into 3 equal units? Do many players recombine their divisions or prefer the flexibility of having the original components act individually, even if still stacked together in the same hex? Is there a benefit to recombining the units and how does that affect leadership? If each component had it's own leader prior to rebuilding, what happens to them all after?

It seems to me it's better to not rebuild a division if you then end up losing the use of the engineer rgt. and recon units as separate formations.

What are your preferences and why? [&:]

If you combine you cannot split them again like it was before, it will be only split into 3 similar sized parts. That is way it is unfortunately.

Back in WITP, divisions could break down to /A/B/C. Some could even start the game broken down and combine later.

For AE, they added code so that units that were so IRL could start with their historical breakdown and later combine to the parent unit as they also did IRL.

They just didn't have the man-hours to add (and test, etc.) all the code to make this more general so that units could break down to constituents. The /A/B/C breakdown is actually a simplified thing - it basically takes 1/3 of everything for each unit. A real unit breakdown requires more, like regiments, recce, artillery, div HQ, etc.

Generally, it is a good thing to recombine divisions. Quite often, the combined division will have extra devices show up in its TOE that did not exist in any of the individual pieces. If the PP cost is not extreme, I would recommend recombining every unit that starts out broken up, whether that unit is a division, an SNLF, or a port unit.

I've been working on recombining my at start pieces/parts LCU's into their parent divisions when I can, based on the reported evidence that a division can generally take more punishment than the same stack of it's component units.  With the smaller pieces, one or two of the parts usually take the brunt of the damage from combat and can become ineffective where the combined division can easily absorb the same amount of damage and still be at a high level of combat effectiveness. 

I mention that I'm recombining based on the reported evidence of this, as I've not progressed far enough into a game yet to see these results for myself.  I have to discount any results from the first few months of the war in China based on the overall pathetic condition of the Chinese army.

Edit: (Playing the Allies)

The one thing about recombining, I hate losing the Recon unit. But I agree the combined divisions have more staying power.

The 1/3 Units are also tough nuts; I guess combined arms has an effect.

Don't automatically recombine all the Bdes into Divisions though; some of them have a lower TOE combined than they do as 2 Separate Brigades. Leave those alone.

Large units, like divisions, seem to take less damage, period. In fights between large stacks that contain both divisions and regiment-equivalent units, it is not uncommon for one of the latter to get near-completely disabled in one combat. Does not happen with divisions save for routs or river crossing against strong opposition.

The A, B, C designation, the 1/3 split is really a pretty realistic way of abstracting things. It is pretty close to how things really worked. Rarely did units get task organized into "pure" units -- it was nearly always into combined arms groups. The start at WITP often shows garrison organization -- which would more likely be consituents in non-combat arms teams.

During the war:

The Americans called them Combat Commands -- and you could see a division break into CCA, CCB, so on and so forth.

Germans called them Kampfgruppe's -- but the organization was more variable (often because the parent unit was way under strength).

The Soviets called them Operational Maneuver Groups (OMGs). They tended to be much larger -- like a dividing a tank army into combined arms groups.

And the Italians, of course, called them FPW's (Future Prisoners of War). [:)]

Regards,
Feltan

I wish we could combine small units that don't actually belong together into divisions. Like all the little tiny artillery units, wish I could combine them into a artillery division heh. Or the billion and one engineering units flowing constantly every day out of Port Hueneme, such a pain handling them all individually. I want to be able to build an engineering division out of em.