does unit scale affect tactics?

[penance_of_discord]

well, ive tried out battles on all different scales, from the small scale where there is 13 men in a cav squad and 26 in an infantry squad, to the huge where there is like 320 men in an infantry sqaud. my main Roman game i beat on normal, but ive been having a lot more fun with my partian campaign on smallest. It just seems more fake to me when you have it set so theres like a thousand people per battle. it makes each individual death seem pointless and inconsequental. At least, that the way i see it.

So guess my question is, what are some of the tactical differences that go along with scale changes, and what are your opinions on scale?


:knocknock

[Kraut]

it makes each individual death seem pointless and inconsequental. At least, that the way i see it.

I don´t want to be nasty, but the death of a single individual IS pointless in a mass battle.

At least, it was back then. Today, we (Westeners) live in democratic societies with free press. Pictures of dead soldiers have an impact on public opinion, far beyond their real military meaning. Small casualties may end a war, although the military would be able to fight longer without any problems.

This was not true for ancient ages. People died in battle. Nobody really cared about it. (well, their families did, of course)..

They mostly were peasants back then, not citizens in our meaning. They had no value.

[penance_of_discord]

well, the way i see it is the deaths would be inconsequental to the commoners and maybe even the rulers. but one thing you notice about all the greatest generals (alexander for example), is that their mens fate was important to them. i see myself as the semi-omnicsent general, and what happens to those troops is important, wether it is to live or to die nobly.

i lose alot of that feeling when i play huge scale. *shrugs*

[vikrant]

in the society which beleived in afterlife
{rome ,greece etc}
death of soldiers in battle was acceptable

[GORE]

So guess my question is, what are some of the tactical differences that go along with scale changes, and what are your opinions on scale?

i play on huge, always (the bigger the battle line the better :happy0144 ). the difference isnt much with regards to tactics, except when assaulting towns, it takes a long time to squeeze 2000 men through one gate. also 1 unit can hold a path, which releases alot more men so you can afford to attack the town from 2 or more different sides. and you may find yourself a bit cramped when fighting in and around forrests

the major difference having the setting on huge is that it is more demanding on your population when recruiting, dont know if it affects upkeep, i doubt it does.

[carl-the-conqueror]

some places the only way to die (and to live on) was to die in battle, people didnt care about, or even ooked forward to, death back then as there lives were miserable anyway.

[Shqiponja_Hayabusa]

the truth is that the game is really different from huge to small or normal scale.I think that on normal or small plays better and the game captivates you more. :character

[Shaun]

Well I am not too sure if it has any affect on tactics, but I would imagine that the bigger the more real it is, the only problem is that you need a good computer to play it on hige with out getting crap fps and low quality skins.
With the ludacrisly high kill rates and kill speeds in RTW, I would imagine that on small setting the battle would be over in less than a minute, but othewise no different to tactics.

[Spadicus]

I think unit scale has a huge effect on in-game tactics. For one thing, small Roman maniples are so much easier to manoevre round the battlefield, and excellent for squeezing past phalanxes.

On the other hand, huge sized phalanxes are much more solid and harder to break down.

Im pretty sure that larger unit sizes benefit Hellenic factions more and their anvil/hammer tactics, while Barbarian factions would probably also benefit, with warbands capable of wrapping round opposing units more.

[Janitorius Adeptus Maximus]

Unit scale also has an effect on the campaign map as well. How, you ask? Simple, when you train a 20-man unit, you take 20 people out of the town's population. On the other hand, when you train a 240-man unit you take 240 people out of the town's population. This can make quite a difference in how fast your cities develop. Also, using the peasant trick to get people to "migrate" is done easier on the higher unit scales, naturally.

[peter3594]

It also depends on what kind of unit u are using. Lets say u use peasesnts like about 3000 of them against 40 horses. The peasents will flea because they have very low morale. So it depends on who ur using.

[General Sun]

More men per units, longer battle lines, more walking, more tired soldiers. That means the defenders are favored more typically if the defender chooses to sit and not move.

[Professor420]

More men per units, longer battle lines, more walking, more tired soldiers. That means the defenders are favored more typically if the defender chooses to sit and not move.

Which is why, as noted earlier, phalanx/hellenistic factions do better with larger unit sizes.

[Severous]

Good point General Sun.

Artillery. How many pieces do you get per unit on small and on huge ? if its the same on each scale then I suggest they are more effective on small than huge. A ballista bolt seems to take out a couple of men per shot. Much more deadly to a small unit than a huge one.

Battlefield movement. Full stacks facing each other strung out in a line are very long on huge settings. Lots of movement required to reform the line (as General Sun said above). You can exploit this if you know the enemy AI is engaged in trying to reform their line. Attack them whilst moving. You wont be fired on by their missile units.

A disadvantage of huge is there is relatively less room on the map to move around the enemy.

Command radius of Generals. Offer a benefit to all who are near. Bit hard for a huge army to all be near the General. Some will be too far away to gain the effect.