So, I have already read both the Reddit post and the post here about this subject, and I apologize to the people who are probably getting sick of making the same points over and over, but there must be something to this that I'm missing...
First, I understand that specific situations make corps/armies/armadas/fleets (simply referred to as corps from here on out) a very effective choice. Namely:
-the map grants you a golden choke-point where you can block with the tankiest unit you have and fire from behind them
-you have so many of a unit that they can't attack the target because there are too few tiles that it can be attacked from.
-you've finished a conquest campaign and now the troops are just waiting, defending, or establishing peace-through-strength, and you can save maintenance (soon, resources as well) by consolidating.
-combining two brand new units with a highly promoted one makes a single unit with the best promotions.
-late game/well developed cities can churn out corps in a turn or three
In all these situations, the transition to corp is beneficial. however, each of these situations has a bit of a counter point, possibly specific to my style of play, both on deity and lower levels.
-the map often doesn't offer the golden choke-point
-I rarely have that many units. My typical game (and there are exceptions, sometimes extreme) has 3 groups of units: a group designed to conquer cities with enough support to not lose any units (starts with the usual archer rush then upgraded with tech, often initially 5 units and grows to 10 or 12 as the game progresses, rarely more) a second group of border patrolling peacekeepers (usually horseman because they're fast enough to both catch stragglers coming in from different directions and can frequently support the city-stealing squad then hop back on the border) and a third group of faster moving city-conquerors (i.e. when knights come out.) Yes, the groups often get big enough that not all the units can hit the city on the same turn, but usually a portion of the group is sitting out to heal, so too many units to hit the target doesn't come up for me that often.
-after finishing a conquest campaign, the borders of my empire are bigger, often much bigger, so I need more units to guard the borders. I'm not too concerned about maintenance because my style of play, unless I'm speedrunning, is usually 1.)units 2.)conquest and expansion 3.)development, often with a high emphasis on economy and production. As such, I generally make more gpt, almost exponentially, as the turns advance despite increased upkeep cost.
-I rarely have a few highly promoted units and a sloo of low level units. Generally, all my units are within one or two promotion levels of each other.
-As for churning out corps right out of the gate, I do this. It doesn't address my problem, though. My problem isn't with having corps in general, but sacrificing two or three units for a single unit that's 10 or 17 points stronger.
So then we get to the benefits of having more, weaker units. First, I already know about non-linear combat strength- I know the difference between a strength 5 unit vs. strength 10 unit is the same difference as a strength 100 unit vs. a strength 105 unit.So yes, since you're often fighting units of the same era (or l level higher or lower) advancing 10 points ahead on that line can even things out if you're behind, give you an advantage when footing is equal, or put you into 1-shot range if you're ahead.
But here are the internal arguments I make for not combining my units into corps.
1.) Admittedly a weak argument, but it ain't broke so don't fix it. Between experimentation to come up with my own tactics for combat and conquest and supplementing that with points I picked up here, I can advance a campaign with very few unit losses along the way. Part of that does involve having a certain number of units being placed in certain positions, and combining units may leave me short-handed.
2.) Battles of attrition - I'll usually go through an entire deity game with losing less than a half-dozen units over the course of the game, and on several games I went the entire game without losing a single unit. One of the keys to not losing units, at least for me, is to differentiate between situations where you're going to be able to smash your opponent against situations where you don't have that degree of an advantage. In the former, you do what I think is standard civfanatics warfare- concentrate attacks on targets so that you eliminate as many units as you can' it's better to end the turn with the opponent having two less units but all the rest are full health than it is to have all of the enemy units be slightly damaged. In the latter, though, this strategy will result in you losing more units. So you distribute your attacks so that the enemy will not be able to finish off any of your units during their turn. In this context, having a greater number of weaker attacks helps to spread the damage so that you won't lose any units.
3.) The one-on-one example: it's hard to replicate this and I know my results are skewed because I'm a human that can think going against an (arguable poorly developed) AI that can't. That said, what would be the result if a single army went up against three of the same unit that were "individual" (i.e. base unit not in a corp or army.) It seems the three on one wins the majority of the time, even when the army gets first attack. If the three individual units get first attack, they each suffer more damage than they deal, but the combination of their three attacks leaves the army at mid-yellow HP whereas each of the individual units are at low green to very high yellow HP. Then the army attacks one of them, bringing himself down to low-yellow HP and the individuals have two units at low green and the attacked unit at red HP. Then the individuals attack, sacrificing the dying unit to bring the army down to red followed by attacks from the two other units which will either finish off the army or its counterattack suicides. If the army gets to strike first, he attacks one of the units bringing it down to mid-yellow and himself down to mid-green. The individuals attack, first with the weak unit bringing it down to red health or eliminated and the army drops to yellow, then the two fresh units attack bringing the army down high-red HP and each of the remaining individuals to high-yellow HP. If the army attacks, it will drop to mid-red HP and be finished off by the two remaining individuals-- there's a lot of estimation going on here, but my experience is that this is how it usually plays out.
Then there's some things that I know that I don't know the answer to:
a.) I'm pretty sure I remember cases where I could combine units of different types into corps- how does that work? If a core has both melee and ranged units, does it fight melee, ranged, or both. If a corp has cavalry and melee units, does it get 2 or 4 movement? If one of the two units has a bonus (not promotion), such as anti-cavalry and the other unit doesn't, does the corp get the bonus? or half of it?
b.)healing and saving units- if you combine two units with different HP at the time, how does their current state affect the HP of the corp upon creation? If the two units are both at 50HP, does the corp start there or slightly healed? Can I take a unit at red health, with no option as attacking suicides it and healing doesn't give enough HP to survive the next turn, and combine him with a full strength unit to save him? If so, how much HP does the corp start with? Further, if I take two units about to die and combine it with a fresh unit to make an army, how much HP does the army start with?
c.) are there any other bonuses to a corp compared to the same unit individually other than the 10 combat strength?
Sorry for the wall of text.
First, I understand that specific situations make corps/armies/armadas/fleets (simply referred to as corps from here on out) a very effective choice. Namely:
-the map grants you a golden choke-point where you can block with the tankiest unit you have and fire from behind them
-you have so many of a unit that they can't attack the target because there are too few tiles that it can be attacked from.
-you've finished a conquest campaign and now the troops are just waiting, defending, or establishing peace-through-strength, and you can save maintenance (soon, resources as well) by consolidating.
-combining two brand new units with a highly promoted one makes a single unit with the best promotions.
-late game/well developed cities can churn out corps in a turn or three
In all these situations, the transition to corp is beneficial. however, each of these situations has a bit of a counter point, possibly specific to my style of play, both on deity and lower levels.
-the map often doesn't offer the golden choke-point
-I rarely have that many units. My typical game (and there are exceptions, sometimes extreme) has 3 groups of units: a group designed to conquer cities with enough support to not lose any units (starts with the usual archer rush then upgraded with tech, often initially 5 units and grows to 10 or 12 as the game progresses, rarely more) a second group of border patrolling peacekeepers (usually horseman because they're fast enough to both catch stragglers coming in from different directions and can frequently support the city-stealing squad then hop back on the border) and a third group of faster moving city-conquerors (i.e. when knights come out.) Yes, the groups often get big enough that not all the units can hit the city on the same turn, but usually a portion of the group is sitting out to heal, so too many units to hit the target doesn't come up for me that often.
-after finishing a conquest campaign, the borders of my empire are bigger, often much bigger, so I need more units to guard the borders. I'm not too concerned about maintenance because my style of play, unless I'm speedrunning, is usually 1.)units 2.)conquest and expansion 3.)development, often with a high emphasis on economy and production. As such, I generally make more gpt, almost exponentially, as the turns advance despite increased upkeep cost.
-I rarely have a few highly promoted units and a sloo of low level units. Generally, all my units are within one or two promotion levels of each other.
-As for churning out corps right out of the gate, I do this. It doesn't address my problem, though. My problem isn't with having corps in general, but sacrificing two or three units for a single unit that's 10 or 17 points stronger.
So then we get to the benefits of having more, weaker units. First, I already know about non-linear combat strength- I know the difference between a strength 5 unit vs. strength 10 unit is the same difference as a strength 100 unit vs. a strength 105 unit.So yes, since you're often fighting units of the same era (or l level higher or lower) advancing 10 points ahead on that line can even things out if you're behind, give you an advantage when footing is equal, or put you into 1-shot range if you're ahead.
But here are the internal arguments I make for not combining my units into corps.
1.) Admittedly a weak argument, but it ain't broke so don't fix it. Between experimentation to come up with my own tactics for combat and conquest and supplementing that with points I picked up here, I can advance a campaign with very few unit losses along the way. Part of that does involve having a certain number of units being placed in certain positions, and combining units may leave me short-handed.
2.) Battles of attrition - I'll usually go through an entire deity game with losing less than a half-dozen units over the course of the game, and on several games I went the entire game without losing a single unit. One of the keys to not losing units, at least for me, is to differentiate between situations where you're going to be able to smash your opponent against situations where you don't have that degree of an advantage. In the former, you do what I think is standard civfanatics warfare- concentrate attacks on targets so that you eliminate as many units as you can' it's better to end the turn with the opponent having two less units but all the rest are full health than it is to have all of the enemy units be slightly damaged. In the latter, though, this strategy will result in you losing more units. So you distribute your attacks so that the enemy will not be able to finish off any of your units during their turn. In this context, having a greater number of weaker attacks helps to spread the damage so that you won't lose any units.
3.) The one-on-one example: it's hard to replicate this and I know my results are skewed because I'm a human that can think going against an (arguable poorly developed) AI that can't. That said, what would be the result if a single army went up against three of the same unit that were "individual" (i.e. base unit not in a corp or army.) It seems the three on one wins the majority of the time, even when the army gets first attack. If the three individual units get first attack, they each suffer more damage than they deal, but the combination of their three attacks leaves the army at mid-yellow HP whereas each of the individual units are at low green to very high yellow HP. Then the army attacks one of them, bringing himself down to low-yellow HP and the individuals have two units at low green and the attacked unit at red HP. Then the individuals attack, sacrificing the dying unit to bring the army down to red followed by attacks from the two other units which will either finish off the army or its counterattack suicides. If the army gets to strike first, he attacks one of the units bringing it down to mid-yellow and himself down to mid-green. The individuals attack, first with the weak unit bringing it down to red health or eliminated and the army drops to yellow, then the two fresh units attack bringing the army down high-red HP and each of the remaining individuals to high-yellow HP. If the army attacks, it will drop to mid-red HP and be finished off by the two remaining individuals-- there's a lot of estimation going on here, but my experience is that this is how it usually plays out.
Then there's some things that I know that I don't know the answer to:
a.) I'm pretty sure I remember cases where I could combine units of different types into corps- how does that work? If a core has both melee and ranged units, does it fight melee, ranged, or both. If a corp has cavalry and melee units, does it get 2 or 4 movement? If one of the two units has a bonus (not promotion), such as anti-cavalry and the other unit doesn't, does the corp get the bonus? or half of it?
b.)healing and saving units- if you combine two units with different HP at the time, how does their current state affect the HP of the corp upon creation? If the two units are both at 50HP, does the corp start there or slightly healed? Can I take a unit at red health, with no option as attacking suicides it and healing doesn't give enough HP to survive the next turn, and combine him with a full strength unit to save him? If so, how much HP does the corp start with? Further, if I take two units about to die and combine it with a fresh unit to make an army, how much HP does the army start with?
c.) are there any other bonuses to a corp compared to the same unit individually other than the 10 combat strength?
Sorry for the wall of text.
