When To Shoot It Out And When To Charge...?

Just a question, but in your opinion when is it a good time to let your infantry sit back and shoot it out, and when it's a good time to charge the enemy in melee?

Like let's say you have a regiment of Fusiliers fighting a regiment of armed citizenry. Will you lose more men shooting it out with the armed citizenry, or would you lose more in the initial charge and melee?

Opinions welcome.

Maybe it's my hormone-indiced adolescent brain, but the title of this thread is one hell of a euphanism

It depends on weather, range and terrain as ever, but the objective is ever to cause a rout, not go for kills in my opinion. As a result you want to break their morale, so with Fusiliers against Armed Citizenry, I reccomend two musket volleys then the bayonet! Failing this, just wait for their morale to go to steady or wavering, then charge. Just make sure they fire a volley first so they can't shoot at point blank, or you will take heavy casualties.

Hope this helps

Against AI, best to avoid melee at all cost if your battle difficulty is set to higher than Normal. The AI melee/defense bonus will cause way more losses than if you stayed in the shoot out. Fusiliers in a melee with citizens, for example, will still win, but the fusiliers will take quite a lot of casualties on H and VH. If they stayed at range (even retreating if the citizens charge), they'll barely lose any of their number. Seems the AI doesn't get as much of an accuracy bonus from difficulty settings. The exception is if the enemy line is starting to waver. A well-timed charge will break the opposing unit on contact, especially against citizens and militia -- as long as there isn't a prolonged melee, it'll still be ok.

Against humans, I probably wouldn't charge unless I commanded Russians and was fighting superior enemy line infantry, or if in broken terrain where finding a coherent line of battle is difficult.

Yes, wait until the enemy's morale is showing orange, then give them the bayonet. It helps no end though, if your assaulting unit has decent charge & melee stats !

I only charge when my ammo has run out of when counter-charging.

Well hypothetically speaking. Let's say a small army of fusiliers engage some armed citizenry. Fusiliers are pretty much the most basic unit there is. Unlike previous total war games weather and landscape plays a huge role in deciding a battle.

For starters you want to line your troops up in a 2 file line going sideways so they can get more shots in. You want to get closer then maximum firing range so everytime you fire a volley you get more percentage of hits. Tactics varry from person to person but you can choose to tear them down volley by volley or charge. Fusiliers vs armed citizenry it would be smart to fire one volley then charge because a bullet is a bullet ofcourse but most of the citizenry have never been up close with professional soldiers. So combined with flanking and correct charging the fight will be over very quick once the citizenry break and turn.

So answering your question. You would take more casualties going toe to toe firing instead of melee, as for other professional armies.. it's really just the right combination of firing and charging at the right moment. I think the key is distributing your units of troops efficiently.

In campaign i only really charge when the enemy are getting really close and clearly going for melee but i will often charge a large portion of my line at once cos u can cause a chain rout. In multiplayer I find if you are russia on a snow map and you can lure the enemy up a hill then a volley followed by a bayonet charge can prove highly effective, especially against exhausted troops. This is where most unicorn campers go wrong, they spam unicorns then try and shoot it out when the far superior enemy infantry get close. The trick is just take 1 or 2 unis to lure em in then decide the issue with the bayonet.

i tend to avoid charging with infantry... i try to always have some heavy cav loitering for that purpose

I usually don't charge my infantry in either.
BUT although not entirely topical, two units of light cavalry will easily rout 1500 armed citizens, just bring some of those.

Replay in attachment related.