Light Infantry Tactics

Hi All,

I've been reading this forum for a while and can usually find the answers to all my questions. But when it comes to using Light Infantry in MP, I really can't figure it out.

When I go up against someone with light inf, they can mow down a good portion of my foot guard before I can get into range. When I try to use light inf myself, it never seems as affective – I.e. I never mow down my opponent as they struggle into range. I hardly if ever use light inf in SP, they just don’t seem worth it.

So can someone give me some tips on how best to employee light infantry in MP?

Thank you!

-EMR

There are loads of ways with which you can defeat light inf, one of the simplest is get a militia unit as a meatshield in front of your guard unit, they could rush the lights while your foot guard get into place. When they have routed, your foot guard are firing on the light inf, and from there it really is a no-contest. You can also use cheap cav as bait, especially if they are depleted.

keep your light inf out of range of his foot, and make sure your lights get the first shot on his lights. If you want some help feel free to friend me http://steamcommunity.com/id/underworld965/
I have nine stars on NTW, and I think that makes me the highest rated on this forum since tyler managed to lose his stars, which in turn clearly means I am the best player. (stars don't mean anything, but I like them)

Originally Posted by underworld965

I have nine stars on NTW...which in turn clearly means I am the best player.

.....

Originally Posted by underworld965

I have nine stars on NTW, and I think that makes me the highest rated on this forum since tyler managed to lose his stars, which in turn clearly means I am the best player. (stars don't mean anything, but I like them)

weak underworld..... weak. We all know that steam/Napoleon couldn't handle my 86,000 points and 12 stars so it crashed totally ruining my unmatched record and stars

try my hammer tactic...

Originally Posted by triphammer

try my hammer tactic...

bah, thats one of the things I was going to show him! Don't give out the secret online!!!

Originally Posted by triphammer

try my hammer tactic...

What is the hammer tactic? Is it something like this?

Originally Posted by Prince of Darkness

Flanking is crucial. In NTW melee system was based on 1vs1 combat and if you rush all your troops at the enemy front most of them will be bogged down and will not join the fight. To expliot your numerical advantage (or use your limited men to the fullest extent), it's often a great idea to try to surround the enemy and strike from the flank and rear.
The classic tactic is the ''hammer and anvil''. The hammer and anvil is especially useful against infantry. Use your main body of infantry to hold the enemy with either musket fire or melee (both have their disadvantages, musket fire will later inflict friendly damage on the striking cavalry force, while in melee the cavalry charge can wipe out your own men as well, but generally the Russians are better in melee while the British excels in musket duels).
With the enemy units ''fixed'', your first priority is to find the weakest spot of the enemy line (often unguarded flank/rear) and charge with your cavalry. Lancers are fast and devastating in this job. Be sure to withdraw your cav and charge repeatedly to inflict the heaviest damage.

Personally i just ignore the lights are even there, i see loads of players focus directly on them and waste valuable units and precious battle time dealing with them. Just take a meat shield to soak up shots get your lights and lines in range to fire and send all your cav in different areas of there lines to stop them firing. This would mean u have 2 lines of fire shooting at units in melee or squares it is a turkey shoot, when your cav alll die off your opponent will have to reform which means u will still get even more free shots. Also your opponent will 99% of the time send his cav to counter yours so they will also die under the fire.

As i say just ignore there range and get your army up really fast with a meatshield and use your cav well and the battle will be yours most of the time

Hope this helps.

@underworld I WORSHIP YOUR STARS

Thanks everyone. It sounds like the meat shield is the best way to assault through the light inf. @underworld - thanks!

What are some tactics for using light infantry? I don't usually use light inf because I really don't know how to use them aside for lining them up in front of my line inf, then running them away once the opponent's line inf gets too close.

My suggestion to using light infantry is to stick it infront of your line, and keep it there. The line will probably deteer alot of stuff that otherwise would have a go at your lights, also, try getting the first shot, or aproach through a forest with your lights.

Additionally don't run the light inf back once his line gets to close, run your line a bit closer, and you will have firepower superiority in that area, also the lights will act as a semi-meatshield for the line behind it.

All of these comments are very worthwhile however lets just take a step back to your original question.

You say -- When I try to use light inf myself, it never seems as affective – I.e. I never mow down my opponent as they struggle into range.

One thing I see repeatedly is players failing to use lights very well – a lot of this is due to just poor positioning and poor advancing into range as well as bad deployment at the start.

There are advantages and disadvantages to lots of formations for lights however I do favour a compressed formation of lights – (Lets say Grassy map on Large settings) best way to gauge how to setup lights is select all your lights and group them together side by side so as they are in lines about 8 -10 deep. This will effectively concentrate your fire into one area of your opponent. Then set either line infantry or even militia to either side of your lights. Then set your remaining line behind this first line – now your 2nd line should not be too close behind the 1st line as your 2nd line will take collateral damage if they are too close. I prefer my 2nd line to be just about on the edge of the unit firing arc or even a little bit more – you can easierly rush the 2nd line up a LITTLE bit if your 1st line is threatened by cav. Now your line should always be fully extended as only the front row fires. Now group your formation and move into position for battle like that. Once in position near range of your opponent you should pause and decide the best way to force the initial skirmish. From then on you can individually select units to do the fine tuning stuff in battle.

The initial attack I prefer to start the ball rolling so I either look for a mismatch – like if I move up 2 lights only 1 of my opponents will return fire or maybe move up a militia to take the first volley (Meatshield).

What is important though is the overall time it takes for your lights to get into position to fire.

So here are a couple of tips
I use the space bar throughout the game so I can see where my troops will end up
Also recommend the unrestricted camera if you don't already use it.

Now moving into range is CRITICAL – I select my lights and use movement arrow on the game screen to move forward then select run – I find this the most efficient to move the short distances quickly. AND you don't need to move your lights so the whole unit is in range – just move so the red range line covers the front men of your opponents units. That should be enough for your lights to open fire. BUT it can take a few goes to get use too. You really are wasting precious seconds moving any closer. (UNLESS your opponent has placed stakes – this needs a totally different tactic)

Once your lights are shooting – TRY HARD not to move them around too much while they are shooting – that takes away precious time and your opponent is getting free shots.

Also bear in mind if you want to attack with lights use either Prussia or Portugal as they are the best by far. So probably use Prussia if your newish to Multiplayer. Also I don't think its been pointed out on these thread yet – but rifles suk – just use lights.
Also as all these guys who have made comments here are probably in the top tier of players I would recommend you try and get some games with some as we all play slightly different and you can pick up little things which makes big differences. Also a lot have youtube channels and always save and review your games to see what worked and what didn't.

Good luck

In ETW i used my lights as my left with 2x horse batteries and light dragoons. My center and right were line infantry only with maybe one howitzer to support them. Their role was to flank on the left extreme.

I loved it and worked so well.

In NTW i stopped using it because i play way more MPCs than online battles and thats a whole different game.

Thanks Terminator. I've always deployed light inf in their loose formation. I'll give the compressed line formation a try with the tactics you suggested.

Are rifles just too slow? At least that is the reason Napoleon gave for not wanting light inf with rifles.

Thanks again everyone.

Originally Posted by EMR

Thanks Terminator. I've always deployed light inf in their loose formation. I'll give the compressed line formation a try with the tactics you suggested.

What he meant was is you keep your light inf in loose formation, but you position them close together. This is known as hammer tactic as trip mentioned before. With it you concnetrate all your firepower of your lights on one section of an army, as terminator said before.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Whaaaaaat! I can't even get that many!

I guess in order to defeat the enemy you must become the enemy.
Think about how the enemy is trying to use his lights. Good positional awareness helps a huge amount, and as Terminator said, pressing space helps with that. For me anyway, half the time I go around with the space bar permanently down, just so I can see where everything is going, and that helps especially with getting your units into the right place, and helps lights maximise their range advantage. If the enemy delays in coming forward, don't "follow it up" and move further in, thats about 10% losses guaranteed as they just have an open target in you.
Just carry on firing and maximise any advantage you have.
So I guess when defending against lights, you must also react quickly, not only to present threats, but potential ones too. To do this, you yourself must position well, you can take advantage or terrain (on Pyramids this is damn useful) and you can use meatshield.
The hammer tactic is basically where you overpower one flank with all your lights and so ofc you absolutely rape that part of the enemy's flank. Once you've done that, the rest is quite simple. I suppose triphammer is the best guy to ask for that.

Originally Posted by Y@$!N

I guess in order to defeat the enemy you must become the enemy.
Think about how the enemy is trying to use his lights. Good positional awareness helps a huge amount, and as Terminator said, pressing space helps with that. For me anyway, half the time I go around with the space bar permanently down, just so I can see where everything is going, and that helps especially with getting your units into the right place, and helps lights maximise their range advantage. If the enemy delays in coming forward, don't "follow it up" and move further in, thats about 10% losses guaranteed as they just have an open target in you.
Just carry on firing and maximise any advantage you have.
So I guess when defending against lights, you must also react quickly, not only to present threats, but potential ones too. To do this, you yourself must position well, you can take advantage or terrain (on Pyramids this is damn useful) and you can use meatshield.
The hammer tactic is basically where you overpower one flank with all your lights and so ofc you absolutely rape that part of the enemy's flank. Once you've done that, the rest is quite simple. I suppose triphammer is the best guy to ask for that.

Nooooooooooo! you gave out the secret noob beating tactic online! what am I going to do for 90% of my games they will all be using this! NOOOOO0000ooooooooo

Originally Posted by underworld965

Nooooooooooo! you gave out the secret noob beating tactic online! what am I going to do for 90% of my games they will all be using this! NOOOOO0000ooooooooo

Sorry