Can we get rid of the general requirement for armies?

[Hetairos]

I really hate it that army movement, recruitment and more is limited to generals and admirals while governors have so little to no influence + the absence of a population system.

The problems I have with the entire mechanic:
- One can not recruit units in provinces without a general.
- Hence, it is not possible to send reinforcements let's say from the capital to another province without moving your generals back and forth.
- The result is doing not only a one way trip, but doing all ways twice until being able to move new troops over again.

- One can not split troops.
- Hence, it is not possible to shuffle units around according to the necessity.
- The result is to either move an entire army from one battle frontier to another instead of sending single detachments without having to leave one location completely defenseless.

The same problem I have with garrisons bound to buildings and settlements. All dynamic and strategy play about movement is killed with those limitations.

It would be really cool to lift off this limitations completely.

[crucify_ego]

Yeah but having dozens of 1-2 unit armies all over the place sucks as well.

[Condottiere 40K]

Probably why they have more powerful provincial garrisons.

In Shogun, I always thought that army size should be optimized depending on character; anything larger should have a moral penalty, anything significantly smaller should have a moral boost.

[Humble Warrior]

I'm sure CA had to `fix` something that didn't need fixing again. But they should always stick to the reality rule of thumb: If you can make as many armies as you want without needing a General in real life, then you should be able to ingame. This works for 3 reasons.

1. It's intuitive. We know we can make armies without Generals in reality.
2. We also know that armies without generals aren't usually as good as armies with them, likely to be beaton (have less gravitas too) by a General with an army.
3. Hence we are more likely to make armies and get a General to it as quickly as possible.

The fact is, armies through-out history have always had to do without a General at some point, so it feels really artificial wierd to be forced to have a General in every army. That's simple not how it works.

Again, yes, it's better to have a General in an army, but you should not be forced to have one. RTW had it right.

[Riekopo]

Yeah but having dozens of 1-2 unit armies all over the place sucks as well.

One doesn't equal the other. I agree with the OP completely. Requiring every army to have a General is annoying as .

[Causeless]

I do think the current system is a little more authentic in many ways. Generals and armies were often tied to the extend that a general was considered to own an army - this is part of what allowed the civil war to happen.

However, I do miss the freedom...

[.Mitch.]

Requirement of a General in an army, not really needed.
Limited army count, very much needed. I can't play any TW game without this system anymore.

[cherryfunk]

Agreed. Not only is it an unfun, horribly implemented solution for stack spam, it's also unhistorical:

A vexillatio (plural vexillationes) was a detachment of a Roman legion formed as a temporary task force created by the Roman army of the Principate. It was named from the standard carried by legionary detachments, the vexillum (plural vexilla), which bore the emblem and name of the parent legion.

Although commonly associated with legions, it is likely that vexillationes included auxiliaries. The term is found in the singular, referring to a single detachment, but is usually used in the plural to refer to an army made up of picked detachments. Vexillationes were assembled ad hoc to meet a crisis on Rome's extensive frontiers, to fight in a civil war, or to undertake an offensive against Rome's neighbours. They varied in size and composition, but usually consisted of about 1000 infantry and/or 500 cavalry.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vexillatio

[Revan The Great]

It's my opinion that the only reason this was implemented is because CA couldn't figure out a way to -not- make the AI spam little mini-stacks that run around everywhere. So this was a way to force it to use big stacks of units instead.

[crackerjack1348]

The only thing I don't like about the system is that I can't recruit units to garrison in my towns so that they could actually withstand a large attack. But the fact that the AI will use full stacks now is a HUGE improvement for the TW series. I used to find it so annoying that the ai would just make 1,000 3 unit stacks and suicide into your full stacks.

[Karnil Vark Khaitan]

Guys wait for how the new civil war will work out, and you can maybe turn the army limit up to 10000 without having a rebel army on 500000.

But I like it its a nice challenge

[The Useless Member]

I liked having that aspect of a 'small skirmish in the mountains' between a few hundred bowmen while also having battles with thousands of men on a beach during the same turn. Not every battles in history had 1000's of men in one area.

[Cope]

It's my opinion that the only reason this was implemented is because CA couldn't figure out a way to -not- make the AI spam little mini-stacks that run around everywhere. So this was a way to force it to use big stacks of units instead.

lol, even though they still do make mini stacks anyway heh.

[Toho]

I remember shogun 2's 1 unit spams running all over the place.

very annoying.

[Taskeen]

This is why the family tree system was superior, which was tied directly to the way Generals worked.

The absence of that system is what we see in RTW2. Unimportant Generals that instantly teleport to your Armies when replaced. And unable to order individual Generals around to govern cities. Unable to move around armies without a General, to led by less experienced Captains instead. The Captains had the potential to be adopted into your Family and promoted should they survive a battle against all odds.

[LestaT]

Requirement of a General in an army, not really needed.
Limited army count, very much needed. I can't play any TW game without this system anymore.

Well technically having a general in an army is not a requirement since armies can still be lead by captains if general died on the eve of battle.

However, I do miss the freedom...

There are 7 or 8 (I lost count) previous Total War games that have this freedom.

[.Mitch.]

Well technically having a general in an army is not a requirement since armies can still be lead by captains if general died on the eve of battle.

Having a general in an army is a requirement, because if yours dies you need to replace him. Have you played the game lol?

[karamazovmm]

Having a general in an army is a requirement, because if yours dies you need to replace him. Have you played the game lol?

he is probably arguing that for historical purposes there were armies without generals.

while my military history is rusty, I don't think that this is either the norm, nor a common place recurrence during any period of history and those detachments don't count much.

its the same old adagio of people complaining that CA uses some things that aren't the norm, and thus is ahistorical. however when we do it, its quite fine.

anyway, I prefer the new system.


PS: and if this devolves around family tree I never used that and it was quite uninteresting for me. If you guys want that back its your problem and not mine.

[osros]

The alternative of 1 or 2 unit armies running around is worse. The current system makes sense and it works for the most part, Armies had generals to lead them, that's it simple. Leave armies in keys areas so you can respond to changes, when things are settled, secure and happy in an area move the army out, don't have to be full stacks just a force to bolster a garrison in a key town or city. I had
plenty of armies with generals to take the map I think 16 was max.

[Pushupbrah]

Didn't CA say something about being able to make certain provinces into border garrisons?

It would be really nice to maybe recruit units in Rome, and send them to a border garrison to buff it a bit. Make it so that neither the player, nor the AI can control these units as they make their way to the garrison and are only able to leave it if a General arrives and takes them out.