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ScotlanD |
A Strategy Guide! Column tactics! |
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Talknight2 |
#1 | |||
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Not bad.
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meusli |
#2 | |||
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Hell I need all the tactics help I can get :) Gave me a few good ideas I will use in multi-player.
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ScotlanD |
#3 | |||
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Yeah its really designed for multiplayer games ;) hope it helps
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Sharpe55 |
#4 | |||
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very interesting as i wasn't sure if colomn tactics were that effective in empire. i will have to try these out in mp :)
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erebrus |
#5 | |||
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I was quite interested in checking out the use of attack columns, since I mostly use only columns for quick movement, and I'm still not sure how deep
should ranks be for a charge, but in the end, the video doesn't show attack columns either...it seems like the whole thing is just a bait for ppl to watch
the replay. It was a solid victory of flanking versus camping indeed, but doesn't say anything about the validity of using attack columns...
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Sharpe55 |
#6 | |||
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thats the thing i want to know! do ranks matter in a charge. Like does attacking in an attack column actually matter in any way or could you theoretically just
charge with one rank deep and it wouldn't make a difference. If someone has an answer to that, i would love the answer.
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RavenX |
#7 | |||
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Very interesting. I haven't really messed around with columns unless I was moving my formations. Never fought in that formation, figured I'd get
slaughtered. Very interesting indeed.
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Jeroen Hill |
#8 | |||
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Be sure to sent it to CA, the BAI can use it!
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Brazilski |
#9 | |||
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Right in the basics, but not as a whole. Also any elaboration on the real life and/or game mechanics are lacking. I will try and provide a very short turtorial
below:
Infantry, cavalry and general military formations and tactics were dictated by the technology available at the time. Smoothbore muskets were horribly inaccurate compared to even 19th century rifles. Basically a soldier on his own would hit sh*te. Therefore units were tightly packed to provide a concentrated volley, increasing the amount of lead sent flying and thus having more, though very small, chances of hitting a target. The downside was of course that your men grouped together posed a bigger target as well increasing the chances of any individual enemy bullet to hit a 'random' target. However as long as long as both sides suffered from the same technological limitations and sticked to the doctrine, all was well. By the time of the Napoleonic wars, the Brittish still deployed a tactical shallow single line. As such they had a continueous defensive and offensive line. The French used to deploy their troops in a segmented line (see below), which generally allowed for greater manoeuvrability at the slight expense of having a interrupted line. Ironically the latter is the only method of deployement available in ETW. There are ways to get around this, but we will return to that later.
Under Napoleon the French started to employ column tactics. A column genrally was a single narrow file placed between two segments. As the column had a very small front face, it was hard to hit and regardless of whether it was still, moving or gone, did little to (further) disrupt the integrity of the French line. As can be seen below, the volume of fire projected by the French host with column is roughly equal to what it would be without column
As the column marches onwards, the number of Brittish soldiers actually able to fire directly at the column is limited. Also as the French take casualties at the front of the column, each casualty is istantly replaced by the man behind him. This means the Brittish troops firing will only see a continueous wall of bayonets advancing towards them, no matter how many the kill off. At this point they are probably sh*tting it. The image shows some Brits below actually breaking from the formation. Furthermore it illustrates that flanking fire at the column is only marginally effective. Also it is questionable how many troops of the line can be diverted to flanking fire on the column as they are still under the same ammount of direct 'suppresive fire' from the French segments. Firing at the column, means they are not firing at the segments. Just count the number of yellow bars flying towards the Brits as opposed to the number of orange lines still going at the segments.
The column will now charge the remaining distance, bayonets forward. Shattering Brittish morale they drive a gap in the line, as the troops flee before them, or simply smash through, if the Brittish troops are disciplined enough to stay put. In either case the Brittish line is now broken, as shown on the last two images.
Image removed for profanity. Feel free to remove it from the image and re-edit post. For the love of God,.. you can't be serious. Is this better?
Now, can we mimic this in game, and if so, how? As I said before selecting the 'standard single line' group formation puts your units in a French style segmented line. If you want a true traditional (Brittish) single line, group two or three units and select column; yes, column. There is a sense of irony in this, but in effect this is how the game works. Now draw them out to produce a single long file. If your units are not at full strength, the units will be packed very compact into a very tight double or triple continueous line. Place more of these drawn out columngroups next to eachother to be a real Brit :D Now how to make a effective French column? Select a single unit, or a small group for larger scale battles, which you place in 'standard single line'; again the irony. Mostly though a single unit will be enough for a single column. Draw them out, but keep them very very narrow. Three to five soldiers is enough when playing on medium unit size, maybe up to eight or nine for ultra, but no more. Place them between two segments or two groups of segments and select 'force melee'. Watch the Frnech miniseries about Napoleon, and specifically the episode at Eylau, and you'll see a column doesn't fire! When your segments have the enemy line halted or pinned down, double right click and charge! Relative distances and musket range between two firing armies are to small in ETW to require marching of the column first. I have already indicated before that when using multiple units in a column you should select 'standard single line', so to have several narrow three-five or eight-nine column segments packed together. Why don't we want to select 'column' and place these units in a file? Because the succeeding units will only smash into the friendly unit in front of them, rather than the enemy line. Friendly fire might not work for melee, but those secondary and tertiary units still don't provide any significant contribution to your charge and will only serve as cannon fodder as they break the column to swerve around your primary unit and get into the exchange of fire between your segments and the enemy's line. Generally though, you will want to limit the number of units in an individual column as the wholepoint is 'blitzkreig'. Have them wide enough to break through, but certainly no wider than necesary as a wider column will encounter more 'drag'. If you insist on a larger charging force, it is better to have several individual columns at regular intervals between your segments. Good luck, and have fun!
Last Edited By: Brazilski 05/09/09 08:11:39.
Edited 5 times.
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HappyRipper |
#10 | |||
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Actually,Brazilski's explanation is much better than the link and the accompanied movie. In the movie one could see the unusual column formation that has
no point whatsoever, as the columns flank the enemy and the soldiers turn and become a line. The only advantage is that the lines are not turning, but the
soldiers are just rotating in place. I just cannot understand why it is not default in the game. When I want to reposition my lines 90 degrees to the right,
the soldiers that stand on the left are running like crazy to the left side of the rotating line, while those on the right just make a step and turn to the
right. Then they wait until the entire line takes shape and only then do they shoot. I do not know the historical drill, but it would be much faster to make
the soldiers to make the soldiers repositioning according to their initial position:
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soylentred |
#11 | |||
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In the Napoleonic wars, the main explanation underlying the use of line and column by the British and French respectively, was that Napoleon's armies
largely consisted of green conscripts (with the exception of the Old Guard etc.). In column formation, the raw recruit would feel safer about being within a
dense block, with superior numbers, and they were constantly moving forward. In contrast, British armies were generally better trained and more disciplined,
hence why they were able to hold the line against these long columns, and often eventually stop them by piling endless rank fire into them.
In short - Britain owned this period. |
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HappyRipper |
#12 | |||
soylentred wrote:Yeah... that is why Napoleon owned the entire Europe and managed to conquer even Moscow. The Brits had one superiority - naval one. That is it. Trafalgar was the greatest luck for the brits. They lost basically in every major confrontation against Napoleon up to Waterloo, where Napoleon had 15 y/o boys standing in his lines. Although the real major confrontations were taken by the Russians, Prussians and Austrians (like always, the brits provided the conflict, logistical support and happy songs, while others were dying). In that sense - yeah, the brits owned the period, but not due to the greatness on the field. |
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wedgie2007 |
#13 | |||
HappyRipper wrote: If i am not mistaken, Napoleon (Meaning his armies as Napoleon never faced Wellington until Waterloo) did not know defeat until the British came along and fought in Portugal and Spain and drove the French back in to France and was it not only then that all the other European nations descended on Paris once the British showed that Napoleon can be defeated in battle. |
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HappyRipper |
#14 | |||
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Well, wedgie2007, take a look at the Napoleonic wars. One could assume that the Brits were offloading huge armies in the mainland to fight Napoleon, because
they were the first ones to organize a coalition against him (5 if I am not mistaken). However - this was not the case. The brits participated in the actual
fighting, in their hearts and minds, rather than bodies. The British sat locked up in Portugal up to AFTER Napoleonic invasion into Russia, where his army
broke its back on general winter. Of course - after that, the glorious English army started the offensive, but even then, not until Napoleon lost a third of
his army of children in Bautzen and Lutzen and not until all the germanic states, Austria, Prussia and Russia were eating off the empire in chunks. Only in
1813 (after 10 years of constant war and 10 million casualties on the OTHER european nations side), the Brits decided to enter Spain and as glorious victors
moved on France. Right guy, at the right time, in the right place. Nothing more.
Reminds me a bit of the Normandy invasion, only AFTER the main army of Hitler started to break down with the loss in Stalingrad. In Napoleonic times british soldiers were not seen anywhere near the massive, experienced, fresh and with high moral french armies. |
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wedgie2007 |
#15 | |||
HappyRipper wrote: Am i correct in saying Wellington landed in Lisbon in 1809 and the first battle against the french was in 1809 at the battle of Talavera, and wasn't the invasion of Russia in 1812 three years after the first british battle against the french in Portugal. |
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HappyRipper |
#16 | |||
wedgie2007 wrote:The one after which the brits lost Spain? Yeah.. great success. And after that glorious day, if I am not completely wrong, the Brits did not show their nose out of the safety of Lisbon, until the french army became practically a dead body. Like the Miracle of Dankirk. Yeah, sure the brits fought the germans before Barbarossa. But it is hard to say that their military "owned the era", eh? |
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Bennieboy |
#17 | |||
HappyRipper wrote: i think you are both being a bit extreme. Yes Britain did not have the massive armies like those on the continent but to simply rubbish the efforts of those in the peninsular is a bit unfair at the end of the day Wellington did defeat French armies time and again during the campaign despite being outnumbered and facing quite a lot of political trouble back in London back on topic i thought the guide was really good. i did try using columns before and it didnt really work (ie disaster... ) but now i will have another go
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DruidUK |
#18 | |||
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Posts: 80 05/09/09 11:41:34 |
CA need to sort out the respective buffs and debuffs for columns and other formation use. I remember, pre-release, that columns were meant to be able to move
faster? How can this be done with the drag&drop formation UI? Could national formations be standardized? A button for attack column, line, open order etc,
as there is for square? Every nation, depending on it's training procedures, used different columns using different amount of men... the Brits never even
used attack columns per se.
Cohesion should play a major part in the effectiveness of a unit in any formation which would immediately mean that a line disorganized by a solid column contact (effectively breaking the unit in half, seperating ncos from their men etc) would suffer severe morale and effectiveness debuffs in relation the more cohesive column. Of course, the column should lose momentum through good defensive musketry, the men trying to cross the bodies of their fallen comrades up front, and suffer the appropriate morale penalty dependent on their training class...so the assault column may never hit home and falter..or the line, seeing it has not slowed the oncoming mass, may decide it's better if they run rather than be run over and cut to shreds. I use columns as a matter of course in mp to get numerical superiority in melee, however, with the morale system as it is (unmodded that is), it still takes forever to finish the fight by which time half yr opponent's army has had time to reinforce. |
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HappyRipper |
#19 | |||
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But to be fair I did forget about this battle, that was fought against the brother of Napoleon. It is just that it's significance was minor, the losses
were not large on both sides, Spain was lost as an ally, the brits were running away from the reinforcing Soult so fast, that their hats flew off and they
were sitting so quietly in Portugal, that their existence on that western front is not mentioned in many sources until 2013. The same is with the battle of
Corunna, where the brits were attacked while escaping Spain
It is a joke to compare these almost skirmishes to the clashes like Austerltz, Auerstadt, Eylau, Ulm, Aspeen-Essling (where Napoleon was actually defeated by the Austrians), Wagram, Borodino, Lutzen and Bautzen. The Brits owned the seas - it is true... |
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coopahp |
#20 | |||
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attacking in column is a good idea in principle but in the case of Napoleon and his use of column against the British was a disaster think on it this way you
have a well trained British battalion in a long line of two allowing ever man to fire and fire fast they did 5 shots a minute. now imagine you are in a column
of men march across a field that could be a couple hundred yards long. You are exhausted already from marching in column at a slower then walking pace to keep
order, with all the equipment you had to carry into battle. Then the whole line of British troops open fire on you watching as time slows down when the first
volley of some thousand guns go off in unison. The first volley rips the entire front row and decimates a large part of the row the second row and you begin to
move forward trough the blood and guts of screaming dieing men to see as the smoke clears enough for you to see the British line and oh Snap there already
ready to fire another thousand of rounds into your ranks now tell me if you were anywhere in that column of french troops would you wont to continue on in the
attack? Now if you did you would probably be so morally beaten that a long melee engagement against a force of troops that didn't even get much of a
scratch would be the last thing you would wont to do so you would want to do some damage to the enemy line before you charge there lines. but oh wait only the
front 2 to 3 lines of a column can shoot that's about maybe 40 to 50 men the rest of the men are just place fillers until then but oh wait the men that can
get close enough to shot get cut down by the murderess platoon firing of the British. That is why France lost the war to Britain. so the column is a good
tactic on paper but in actual practice it sucks unless your fighting other men in column of course it works better like that but by no means should it ever be
implemented against a line of 2.
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