Its been ages for me I was wondering if anyone used MIL really effectively as your main unit and what strategies you employed. Im currently playing alot of games as China and playing around with different builds and ways of playing.
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militias cant prevail against all other pro divisions, i think (except very rare cases maybe ?).
i dont think it can help on serious fronts...
but have some to conquer empty big zones of ennemy countries can be possible, i suppose, depend where u are and wich u fight, etc...
personnaly, i dont build MIL, never. (like many others i completly stopped using: GAR, MOT, AC, AA & AAMot, SHARM, LARM, etc...)
but they could probably help with some "limited" (poor) nations for empty zones to conquer... (?)
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i dont think it can help on serious fronts...
but have some to conquer empty big zones of ennemy countries can be possible, i suppose, depend where u are and wich u fight, etc...
personnaly, i dont build MIL, never. (like many others i completly stopped using: GAR, MOT, AC, AA & AAMot, SHARM, LARM, etc...)
but they could probably help with some "limited" (poor) nations for empty zones to conquer... (?)
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you can do great job with militias, you just need to have aprox 250% of infantry you would have. then you can do it. but it will cost you more MP than regular INF strategy.
If you reduce their combat width to 0.5 and unlock superior firepower 5 brigade militia divisions can be rather effective if used “en masse” assuming you´re not fighting against AC or any other kind of armor.
actually, you dont want to use militias in divs of 5. rather 2-4 depending on role, with/without added support-arty for soft and so on. that way you can controll very easily stacking penalty and can swap damaged units with fresh ones. also, forgot next use-HQ defence unit. it wont make big idfference in fight, but it can slow down enemy bay day or two, and in the big picture it can make big difference.
True but some people like to use only MIL, so under those circumstances 5 brigade divisions can do rather well even against regular infantry if one overwhelms them by using 5x 5 brigades divisions in a frontage of 10. Btw if I go the 2 MIL brigade route+support then it won´t really be a MIL army because the ART would provide the real power in such division and if I can afford having that much ART then IMHO MIL makes very little sense too.
problem comes with stacking penalty. 25 brigades add up ALOT of stacking penalty. thats why i have 10 brigades tops fighting and cycle them. more experience is gained and looses are sustainable, and if i come to conclusion that enemy has too much units i can withraw from battle with fresh full strength units ready to defend.
Not really we can use up to 6 divisions (2 width+support) in a frontage of 10 that the added firepower will outweigh the stacking penalty (especially with a good Theater commander and after unlocking the doctrine that reduces the stacking penalty).
Edit: sometimes it even pays off to use 7 divisions but that is not very cost effective.
whats why i said in previous comment that i use militias sometimes with support units-arty or AT really, using eng is just waste of resources.
I was referring to straight Militia, if im adding support brigades i would go with Infantry.
then use divisions of 5 militias then. or 4. also, dont underestimate militia with supports. also, you can use militia in jungles and low infra places. its really hard to make them OOS
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I *really* like using MILs as my default garrison forces. I mean, yeah, actual GAR has suppression and MILs don't so if it's occupied revolt risk territory, sure, GARs are fine, but if it's just for standing in a port - especially nations with lots of ports like NAT CHI, UK, Japan, Mils make a lot of sense - they're so cheap you can even afford to flank your ports with a 3x MIL divs usually to prevent the enemy from landing directly adjacent to your ports without it costing much IC/time lol.
I also like them for "gap fill" jobs where you have some crappy front you don't want to mess with for a while, but probably ought to garrison (like the USSR's front with Japan - plus you can upgrade them to INF/MTN/MAR/PAR later if you want).
I've played a few NAT/COM CHI games with pure MIL armies - it can be frustrating because your MP will drop quite a lot, they have a *really* nasty habit of falling out of supply (because you need oodles of them to push the Japanese around) and they move more slowly than INF which *really* annoys me for some reason lol. Especially if you're trying to mix (or end up having mixed) INF and MIL, your INF will be like that light tank DIV you accidentally selected to attack instead of support attacking, and it'll be first to the new tile and get completely de-orged by the opposition and then your mil will show up, fail to reinforce, and all ger-gillion of your divs will be forced to retreat, and the MILs can potentially be overrun by basic INF divs.
I also like them for "gap fill" jobs where you have some crappy front you don't want to mess with for a while, but probably ought to garrison (like the USSR's front with Japan - plus you can upgrade them to INF/MTN/MAR/PAR later if you want).
I've played a few NAT/COM CHI games with pure MIL armies - it can be frustrating because your MP will drop quite a lot, they have a *really* nasty habit of falling out of supply (because you need oodles of them to push the Japanese around) and they move more slowly than INF which *really* annoys me for some reason lol. Especially if you're trying to mix (or end up having mixed) INF and MIL, your INF will be like that light tank DIV you accidentally selected to attack instead of support attacking, and it'll be first to the new tile and get completely de-orged by the opposition and then your mil will show up, fail to reinforce, and all ger-gillion of your divs will be forced to retreat, and the MILs can potentially be overrun by basic INF divs
.Militia just suck. You essentially have to use them pure in order to utilize their officer/supply advantage vs. Infantry. But as a pure division they are far too weak for the frontage they take up, even if you fit the max of 3x4 militia divisions into battle you'll never beat a single infantry division on the attack (due to horrible toughness), and on the defense you'll lose to 2 infantry divisions (who can happily support attack from separate provinces and destroy you). Large Formations could fix this if you started with it, but you don't and by the time its 1940 you could have already built an actual effective army rather than a crappy militia army.
As it is even China can go full infantry with ART/AT support and get a decent officer ratio before Japan attacks. It would be different if the Prepare for war decision didn't exist, but since it does and China can get War Economy just a few months into the game the Militia are useless.
Yeah, MIL are decent at garrisoning at least. Just nothing that has a chance of seeing actual combat.
As it is even China can go full infantry with ART/AT support and get a decent officer ratio before Japan attacks. It would be different if the Prepare for war decision didn't exist, but since it does and China can get War Economy just a few months into the game the Militia are useless.
Yeah, MIL are decent at garrisoning at least. Just nothing that has a chance of seeing actual combat.
You seem to forget that Militia can have only .5 combat width which makes them twice as good because you can fit up to 25 brigades of pure MIL in a frontage of 10. This won´t magically make them amazing but they are not pushovers either unless they are fighting an armored division (AC, etc.) or several divisions designed to kill them like INF+4 ART.
I addressed that. They can only have .5 combat width in 1940. How many countries are so bereft of IC/leadership that they can't form far more capable INF/INF/ART/ART or INF/INF/ART/AT divisions by 1940? As China I can easily have 100 such divisions with >100% officer ratio by 1938, at which point I don't even need more foot soldiers. What would I even do with MIL in 1940 compared to that? By the time you've just unlocked the ability to throw 25 brigades of MIL at me I've already been throwing 6x4 brigade divisions for years, and with superior firepower I can throw 6x5 brigade divisions at you.
If you could start with Large Formations in 1936 then I'd be more likely to consider them a decent choice for China. Even still, that horrible toughness kills them for anything offensive.
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My bad I somehow missed the "large formations" part of your post (oops). I never said that MIL was better not even for Nat. China so ofc I agree with your analysis. Btw my 2nd LP on YouTube was exactly with Nat. China (at very hard difficulty) and I used 2xINF + 2xART.
you cant have above 100% ratio with china and 100 INF INF ART ART divs. not possible in either LS or IC. trust me. i played alot for china. also, ART cloggs supply routes which are bad even if you dont use them.
100 x 400 officer divisions = 40000 officers needed, requiring about 36000 more from the starting amount. Under service by requirement 1 leadership = 6 officers per day, three year draft = 5 officers per day.
China starts with about 15 leadership, united it has around 25 leadership.
36000/(15*5) = 480 days to reach 100% officer ratio as standard Nat China and three year draft.
36000/(25*6) = 240 days to reach 100% officer ratio as united China and service by requirement.
As for supply cost, INF/INF/ART/ART is as good or more effective in supply cost per Soft Attack than standard infantry.