Battle Strategy 101: harassment and provolking

[Speekerofages]

Good morning all my total war comrades.

Speekerofages back at it after a long long absence from playing the MTW stainless steel mod. i got up into Empire total war thanks to such shows as the ken burns civil war documentary ( great documentary sugest it to all ) and the patriot movie of course.

Here brings me stright into the game i love it . lovethe aspect of towns errecting outside the capitals not you build stuff with in a city i think its great, the way you need to adjust your economy and pair it with the taxing and happyness of the people is always so fun to the real strategic player. especailly when your country is boasting a massive army yet your skills in economics are keepig your money in the black and not the red.

On ward to battles. Love the cannonry ( pardon my grammar) but in this lay my tactic. cannons are vital in this here epicness of battling in ETW i have found the harrasment and provolking tactic works well. Now most of the time the enemy will set up lines just out of cannon range. do not cease fireing your cannons they do not have ammo as will fire all day if you let them . fix there positions to blast directly toward the whole line of enemy. your cannons may not hit them but will insight some fear as to whether or not your enemy to advance on your position. if the enemy still do not budge this is where your harrasment will take a little more flight. choose 2 -4 infantry lines and beguin flanking the enemy. one of two things will generally happen. the enemy will re position to face the flanks . or if you get close enough on there flanks you will engage them usually provolking the rest of the army to advance on to your main line. pushing them into the already roaring cannons and the already defending and dug in main line. generally with the chaos on the flanks the enemy will attempt to push on your main line to defeat it before the flanks loose. they generally march straight at the cannons ( as i re indicate targets to them i like to micromanage my guns for full effect) being blasted apart as well as there morale the small exchange of volley when they get to the main battle line is short lived due to there morale from the marching into cannon fire. this has worked for me time and time again as i faced spain in brussels flanders with the united provinces . 4300 spainish against 1500 dutch. yes i lost the battle but killed 2600 spainish in the wake of the battle. loosing only 1000


Do not rush your enemy lads. wait her out provolk her and bring her to where you have death laying in wait

[Speekerofages]

And this is what i mean by the post above

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

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i may start AARs

[Izsx]

I both love and despise this strategy, and i'll explain why. Acknowledging that it's an old thread, and that barely anyone will see this, I figured i'd still drop my two cents in and see if anyone gets a kick out of this.

Let's start with why I love it. You've mentioned cannons are vital, and I couldn't agree more. I made a brief post about French defensive tactics, and also touch on how absolutely paramount cannons are, so you're thinking well in the right way. Flanking your enemy is probably the wrong way of describing what you're doing; it's more skirmishing, but again, it's a point I completely agree on, although for different reasons to you. Overall, it's not the worst strategy in the world, and if it works, then hell, go for it mate!

But let's move onto why I despise this strategy. First of all, it implies that your enemy will never 'react' properly to your artillery, and that you're free to virtually pound away with artillery for hours on end, until they are little more than a shattered mob. If you're playing on Darthmod + VH/VH, I can almost guarantee that this will never work. While i've encountered games where the enemy will do exactly as you state, it's rare that it happens like that, and it brings me quite nicely into my second point; the number of cannons you have.

6 x 4 = 24 cannons in your army. Just read that number again, and then put it in perspective with your stack. You have 7 core line infantry regiments... with 6 cannons. Again, for certain situations, this can be perfect. However, as I stated, for certain situations this is perfect, but most of the time will leave you wondering what the hell just happened in battle. I always mention it heavily (because it's also heavily true), but there's already a huge lack of... *drum roll* - mobility. Couple a lack of mobility with shocking terrain (hills, mountains, slopes, rendering your cannons useless), and you're going to find yourself going from a bad battle, to a crushing defeat in minutes. If you can't position your artillery to fire on the enemy effectively, you've cut out 6 full units in your stack. Coming up against a numerous force like Maratha, or the Ottomans, you will lose. Guaranteed.

How are you setting this up also? Ideally, a good artillery set-up is to spread them out along a line so that you have your flanks covered by Cannister shots, and you aren't privy to suicidal cavalry charges straight into your stacked artillery batteries. Spreading out your artillery is also a good method also as you can re-position them as required. If your left flank is quiet, but your right flank is going to get hit with everything, you can easily position your left flank cannon to get a good firing line going, and only need to re-position 1 artillery piece as opposed to 5 or 6.

You also opt for 4 dragoons as opposed to a mixture of cavalry. Shock cavalry is superb for scaring off enemy cavalry charges, particularly into your artillery. While the dragoons will still give you mobility, and can react quickly if your cannons get attacked, they won't be able to break or rout enemy cavalry as effectively as a charge from say a unit of Cuirassiers. This is especially important when you come up against ranged horsemen such as Pindari Horsemen, or armed light cavalry, as the more shots they get off, the more you'll lose cannon crews.

I mentioned the number of cannons earlier, and i'll touch on it quickly before I finish this up. I feel it's wise to operate how numerous your artillery is based on your core army. I work with a ratio of 3/1. So for every 3 units of line infantry you have, support that line with 1 cannon. Treat your full stack army as a mixture of a couple of different armies, and you'll see what I mean.

For each 'group' of line infantry and cannon you have, support that also with at least 1 unit of cavalry, and experiment with the mentality of an 'army within an army.' So again, if you apply this thinking to a full stack, you'll end up with something like this:
9 regiments of infantry
3 cannon regiments

That's 12 units so far. Add in a unit of cavalry for each group (a group being 3 infantry regiments + 1 cannon), so you'll end up with:
9 regiments of infantry
3 cannon regiments
3 cavalry regiments

At 15 units right now, you still have room left over for your general, and then you can fill out the rest of what you need based on where you are weakest. So if you're fighting it out in America somewhere, fantastic, grab a couple of units of skirmishers. Feel like invading India for some tea? Even better, grab a few units of the Native Indian cavalry, and watch the spears shatter ranks.

Hope this sort of added something in regards to your cannon formations. I always end by saying i'm no military expert, nor a strategist, and there are plenty who will disagree with almost every single word i've said. Regardless, I still hope there's something to take away from it!