Organizing military into Divisions

[josephus]

I've devoloped a system to organize you military. It consists of creating and labeling units into groups that stick together always. The divisions always consist of the same unit type. (NOTE: I created this using BtS)

1. Infantry
Divide foot soldiers (melee and eventually gunpowder) into to groups of eight. Designate a spot on the map to keep these units, and place a sign labeled with that division's name.
For example...
8 axemen labeled "1st Infantry" stay on the plot with the sign "1st Infantry Division". These are grouped together and never seperate. They upgrade at the same time, to the same unit.
Once you have more than these 8 units, you start "2nd Infantry Division" and so on.

2. Mounted
Follow same instuctions as above, but label "[enter number] Mounted" and the spot "[enter number] Mounted Division" Also comprises of eight units per division.

3. Armor
Same, just labeled appropriately.

4.Navy
There should be 1 division per land based division. Each one should have 2 transports (to carry all eight land units), 2 destroyers (later stealth destoyer), 1 battleship (later missile cruiser), 1 sub/attack sub, 1 carrier with fighters, and an extra warship depending on your needs.
All stay together, except when en route, you should spread them out a little to get a better view.
Each naval division has a corresponding land division. "1st Naval Fleet" will be for "1st x Division" (NOTE: you should label each navy division to say what kind of unit it supports.)

5. Air Units
I only use air units to defend my cities, so i never really worked anything out for them.

6.Artillery
Same as other land units.

7. Anti-Air (SAM)
Same as other land units.

8. Guard
Divisions of units that will move into to newly captured territory to defend the cities. Use whatever defensive units you prefer.

You should keep 1 or 2 divisions of each unit type in each general region of your empire for defense.

Units defending your cities are not incorporated into any divisions.

This system is useful for attacking as well as defending.
when moving and attacking, keep divisions together; it will keep the organization together and make clean-up afterwards very easy. replace any lost units.

I think that pretty much covers it, any questions please post, or comments or suggestions too. Much appreciated.

 

[DMOC]

Interesting....just remember not to set these rules into stone as your situation varies from game-to-game.

 

[josephus]

right, i did this for a noble-difficulty conquest, and it worked quite well. also feel free to make any adjustments as you like if you use this strategy. thanks

 

[DMOC]

Also, don't forget to combine your proposed divisions together. You will NEED infantry and artillery in combination with one another, for instance, if you are attacking an enemy in the industrial era. Of course, this isn't necessary in 1000 BC when you're axe-rushing Boudica....

 

[Mercenary82]

I think its easier to be more flexible with your military, at first my main stack may be over 80 units, then may split into smaller stacks after the first few batles. You generally want half of your military siege, but by your formula has like 1/8 siege so you would lose a lot of battles that way.

 

[josephus]

seems reasnable enough, but i kicked butt with this. i took out 3 different civs in the scale of 15 turns this way. also remember that you can have a ton of units with this. i usually have about 15 divisions (atleast) of each type of unit so, really it's a boon for a fast conquest.

 

[josephus]

also, if you can pump out tons of units, you don't really need siege units as much because you can just use up your units, and make more

 

[civvver]

you only use air units to defend? Air are awesome at knocking out defenses quickly so armor units (and mech infantry) can advance. Late game I have zero artillery and usually 12-20 bombers. 4 bombers will pretty much level a cities defenses as your tanks move in position to attack, then you do one strike with them for a ton of collateral damage and the tanks walk through. "Blitzkrieg" is so efficient. A couple games ago I was playing darius and had just launched my spaceship when william van orange decided to break out of his vassel state to me... kinda weird since I was twice his size. He had about 12 cities left but I managed to capture all of them before my spaceship succeeded for the game win.

 

[nbcman]

also, if you can pump out tons of units, you don't really need siege units as much because you can just use up your units, and make more

But what about war weariness when you 'use up your units'? That is the point of using airpower and siege-to soften the defenders and lose less units.

 

[FlyinJohnnyL]

But what about war weariness when you 'use up your units'? That is the point of using airpower and siege-to soften the defenders and lose less units.

I know losing units increases war weariness but...

When I suicide siege, does it produce less WW than if I suicide any other type of unit, or is it just based on units lost in general?

Even if it's equal, it's still way more effective to suicide the siege because of collateral, though, so I guess I'm asking a question that really doesn't matter! Still, I'd like to know

 

[nbcman]

@FlyinJohnnyL

The WW cost for units is the same whether a siege or a non-siege unit is lost. But like you said, the collateral damage inflicted by siege will make subsequent attacks more effective.

 

[OutOfFaze]

I've devoloped a system to organize you military. It consists of creating and labeling units into groups that stick together always. The divisions always consist of the same unit type.

How do you label units? I know Alt + S allows you to label tiles, but I didn't realise you could label units.

 

[hecubus]

How do you label units? I know Alt + S allows you to label tiles, but I didn't realise you could label units.

You can click on the unit's name in bottom left unit info window (when unit is selected) to rename it. I started doing this in a game where I was building up a tremendous late-game army, I named units according to the civ I was going to be using them against.

Edit: I also tend to produce and group in fours, since transports carry 4 units,

 

[OutOfFaze]

You can click on the unit's name in bottom left unit info window (when unit is selected) to rename it. I started doing this in a game where I was building up a tremendous late-game army, I named units according to the civ I was going to be using them against.

Edit: I also tend to produce and group in fours, since transports carry 4 units,

Hahaha.

"Alright Shaka, nice to see you again. I've got an ICBM with your name on it."

"What?"

"Oh nothing, so tell me, how's that empire going?"

 

[MkLh]

Interesting role playing stuff, but from my experience I think attacking stack should be split only when you are considerably more powerful than the target (power rating more than twice as high or something). Especially if AI has an engineering, it quickly stacks overwhelming number of defenders in target cities or cripples your divided stacks before they even get there.

 

[semirami]

@FlyinJohnnyL

The WW cost for units is the same whether a siege or a non-siege unit is lost. But like you said, the collateral damage inflicted by siege will make subsequent attacks more effective.

Only to mention, that you gain WW if your units win, or withdraw too, altough you gain more WW, if they lose.