Combat Witdh

[Badesumofu]

I tried it with a few more different army configurations to look at deployments and I've found clearly that infantry deploy in a manner that is consistent with them not being able to inflict casualties from the back row. Yet it appears that when they do deploy in the back row they are inflicting casualties.

 

[Badesumofu]

The only way that what I'm seeing makes any sense is if either deployment mechanics or the fact of infantry causing casualties from the back row is not WAD. You'll see infantry units deployed out towards the edge of the back row where they do nothing when they could be moved to the centre of the back row where they'd inflict casualties. It's not just that it's not perfectly optimal, it's that it's totally nonsensical which is why I'm convinced that it's bugged.

 

[alexti]

The only way that what I'm seeing makes any sense is if either deployment mechanics or the fact of infantry causing casualties from the back row is not WAD. You'll see infantry units deployed out towards the edge of the back row where they do nothing when they could be moved to the centre of the back row where they'd inflict casualties. It's not just that it's not perfectly optimal, it's that it's totally nonsensical which is why I'm convinced that it's bugged.

Deployment mechanics definitely doesn't WAD. Regardless of back row considerations, it ignores ability of infantry to flank (unless infantry flanking is a bug too, but I don't think so since the game shows infantry flanking range in number of places). Besides, some units actually move during combat (for no rational reason I can deduce). At least I am glad it doesn't put the most damaged units in the centre any more.

That doesn't tell much about whether back row damage is intended or not though. Intuitively it feels like it shouldn't be doing damage since it usurps the role of artillery, but then since introduction of firearms infantry doing the damage from the back row would be fairly accurate. There was also so much written about artillery being "useless" in combat until it gets massive fire modifiers one would think developers would address the issue if it wasn't something they have intended.

Regardless, the game as it is is the only one we have, so the tactical advise (such as OP has asked for) needs to be based on the actual mechanics (whether everything WAD or not).

 

[Quaade]

It's a strange position to believe what wiki says about how the game works rather than believing how the game itself works.

Hehe... any player that are a bit skilled will only use wiki for reference but check the game files if need be, if it´s necessary to know the right answer... I always go for game files... Though pretty sure combat is hardcoded so that won´t help us here ;-)

They also deploy in a manner that is consistent with what I believe is the intended design (ie that infantry don't fight from the back row).

Well... To be fair... at least during later tech, they do fire with muskets... And you could argue that despite picking other unit types, that infantry also consists of crossbows or bows in the backrow... Which could be represented in that way?... But it should likely be posted in bug forum... @Trin Tragula you know who have knowledge of combat in EU4, the developers intention

I don't believe there is any in-game documentation describing back row combat mechanics, so it's impossible to tell if it's a bug or not.

There usually aren´t in a lot of cases though ;-) but combat is very lightly described... Not even sure it tells you properly what the difference between def and off pips on units and the impact of combat modifiers... Have not checked for quite a while since I have played this game too much :-/

That it doesn't behave as wiki claims is obviously not a reason to declare it a bug.

Nope... Wiki don´t always gets updated, especially if it´s not part of the current patch focus... Meaning, if it´s just an update in the patch, like balance changes or minor changes Wiki usually don´t get updated, hence my use of game files if I really need the correct answer

 

[Quaade]

Deployment mechanics definitely doesn't WAD. Regardless of back row considerations, it ignores ability of infantry to flank (unless infantry flanking is a bug too, but I don't think so since the game shows infantry flanking range in number of places). Besides, some units actually move during combat (for no rational reason I can deduce). At least I am glad it doesn't put the most damaged units in the centre any more.

Pretty sure infantry are supposed to "flank", as in not being restricted to only fighting in front of them but also cross-over to the next...

That doesn't tell much about whether back row damage is intended or not though. Intuitively it feels like it shouldn't be doing damage since it usurps the role of artillery, but then since introduction of firearms infantry doing the damage from the back row would be fairly accurate. There was also so much written about artillery being "useless" in combat until it gets massive fire modifiers one would think developers would address the issue if it wasn't something they have intended.

I agree that it seems like backrow shouldn´t be doing damage, but it can be argued as you said with firearms and even bows being part of infantry regiments...

Early artillery is still deadly... Ask my army who got decimated by a stack of artillery which I outnumbered and defended against in hills... 13k against around 20 with 6 art... Had to scum that one since it was interesting to test the results... Not many times you see that... Even early artillery are deadly in fire phase, especially with lucky rolls... One test they dealt between 4-6k damage... There I had brought in my secondary army to see how much it would take to remove it... I did deal quite a lot more in shock phase, but despite being roughly same number in cannons even (12k) they still devastated my numbers... Really feel like this is either a bug or against the intention at the very least, since it´s a general conseption that artillery is very weak in front row... Yet they are only weak in shock and my earlier tests (earlier patches) as well as this one showed that the casaulties done to artillery, compared to the same enemy, same war, same terrain modifier, same genaral (both sides) the numbers artillery stack lost was roughly the same.

The change was marginal at best... However there is still the issues of artillery being way more expensive than infantry and you need infantry to make use of cavalry effectively (in shock phase)... But really feels like this is not intended... Could be argued that cannons are only a margin of the regiment and the rest are fighters protecting cannons... But that doesn´t seem to be the design of EU4 unit types... Since they should then have more different "unit" to chose from in order to have different "regiment" setups...

 

[Dominion]

Using the wiki as a source is a horrible idea in general. I remember trying to catch up on MoH mechanics by reading it and found 4 errors in the first two paragraphs.
And that was my first round with MoH. One of their statements was contradicted by the tooltip even.

I remember their ingenious "content contest" where at one point all top three participants were accounts that got created around the time the contest got announced. Always a good sign for high quality contributions.

Another good example would be the ZoC article. When it got created it was a 1:1 copy of something a guy on this board had written.
That was before anyone got the chance to correct him, add information or point out falsehoods.
Not saying he got anything wrong or that the current article is incorrect, but a thread with less than 1 full page of comments being copied directly into the wiki without anyone fact checking it just shows a certain mentality being in place.

It's basically "Write whatever you want. We don't care and we don't update."

Personally I only use wiki articles that I have confirmed as correct because I don't want to write several word documents myself.
If I haven't been able to confirm their information I assume it's wrong. Plain and simple.

 

[Quaade]

I remember their ingenious "content contest" where at one point all top three participants were accounts that got created around the time the contest got announced. Always a good sign for high quality contributions.

hehe... well... I know someone who won such a contest... Let´s just say... We were a whole group who was amazed at how little he knew about the game... Like... Which trade goods were good even

Another good example would be the ZoC article. When it got created it was a 1:1 copy of something a guy on this board had written.

to be fair... Quite a lot have screamed ZoC cheats and such while it´s fairly consistent what happens... There are some issues, but generally when I get surprised by ZoC I can narrow it down and see the reason... As in... I knew that would happen, I just didn´t think about it since the circumstances happen so rarely... Like the other day, when I split an army and the remaining army got jumped and stackwiped since they didn´t have a return point... Knew that can happen... Given, that example is likely a bug but it´s at least consistent

Personally I only use wiki articles that I have confirmed as correct because I don't want to write several word documents myself.
If I haven't been able to confirm their information I assume it's wrong. Plain and simple.

To get an overview... Usually good to see if there are any good missions or events to be aware of...

 

[alexti]

Pretty sure infantry are supposed to "flank", as in not being restricted to only fighting in front of them but also cross-over to the next...

Infantry does flank if it ends up in the flanking position, but the troops deployment doesn't seem to take into consideration that the infantry can flank.

Early artillery is still deadly... Ask my army who got decimated by a stack of artillery which I outnumbered and defended against in hills... 13k against around 20 with 6 art... Had to scum that one since it was interesting to test the results... Not many times you see that... Even early artillery are deadly in fire phase, especially with lucky rolls... One test they dealt between 4-6k damage... There I had brought in my secondary army to see how much it would take to remove it... I did deal quite a lot more in shock phase, but despite being roughly same number in cannons even (12k) they still devastated my numbers... Really feel like this is either a bug or against the intention at the very least, since it´s a general conseption that artillery is very weak in front row... Yet they are only weak in shock and my earlier tests (earlier patches) as well as this one showed that the casaulties done to artillery, compared to the same enemy, same war, same terrain modifier, same genaral (both sides) the numbers artillery stack lost was roughly the same.

I don't think there is any penalty for artillery on the front row. The only downside is that it is expensive and since it will take damage on the front row, the reinforcement will be expensive too. Until MIL 16 artillery and infantry are fairly close in their efficiency, bit infantry costs 3 times less.

 

[misiceman]

Is it possible that the inf is sharing pips to the front row (in a matter similar to art defense pips)?

I know the logic from PDX was supposed to be no damage from the backrow for inf or calv, barring them moving to the front. Their deployment works exactly like this and the deployment is WAD as per the intention (by doing a reverse spill over starting from the flanks).

@alexti Front row Art deal full damage, back row 50%. So in the front row at 100% they deal INSANE damage in the first fire phase. Its just their defense pips arnt the best (I think like half off the top of my head compared to Inf) so they will take heavy casualties, so it falls of rather quickly due to non full strength units. That and Art giving defense pip bonuses to the units in front of them.

I don't know who at paradox to tag with a question like this as it seems odd in its behavior. maybe @DDRJake can relay it on to the appropriate place or even answer the over design intention so we dont make bad assumptions. I've been playing this game for a long time now and inf and calv doing damage from the back for seems like a bug though.

 

[alexti]

@alexti Front row Art deal full damage, back row 50%. So in the front row at 100% they deal INSANE damage in the first fire phase. Its just their defense pips arnt the best (I think like half off the top of my head compared to Inf) so they will take heavy casualties, so it falls of rather quickly due to non full strength units. That and Art giving defense pip bonuses to the units in front of them.

In the early game infantry and artillery are doing roughly similar amount of damage (either from front or back row). Infantry does more damage cumulatively, but artillery benefits from having the damage much more focused in fire phase (which comes before the shock). Pips aren't actually that significant at that point. 2 pips vs 1 pips is only about 12% more damage on average. So while it looks like you're doubling amount of pips, the net effect is relatively small. Besides, in the early game for some tech groups (like Western) artillery actually have better or equal defensive pips than infantry. With the low tactics of the early game anything of the front row takes a lot of damage, infantry is just cheap to replenish.

 

[ecrurudesby]

With the low tactics of the early game anything of the front row takes a lot of damage

I've always operated under the assumption that the Wiki is correct when it states that artillery regiments receive double damage when in the front row. I vividly recall my full artillery stacks getting stackwiped when the AI caught me napping.

 

[alexti]

I've always operated under the assumption that the Wiki is correct when it states that artillery regiments receive double damage when in the front row. I vividly recall my full artillery stacks getting stackwiped when the AI caught me napping.

From my experience, information on wiki only weakly correlates with how the game works, but this case might be worth testing. It's a rare situation since putting artillery on the front row is too expensive (even if it doesn't take double damage); on couple of occasions where I've seen an artillery getting on the front row I haven't noticed it taking more damage than infantry, but that could have been due to other factors (such as unit in front of it being significantly damaged in the earlier rounds of combat).

 

[misiceman]

I generally operate that the wiki (if update recently) will be accurate as to the intent of the design. They did do a push for updating it a while ago so a good amount should be accurate barring bugs.

Also I am not sure early game tactics matter compared to late game tactics (assuming same tactics) since they changed disc. I think i remember reading in a forum thread that the multiplier was changed to tactics of the attacker/ tactics of the defender, but looking at the wiki it still says discipline/tactics but the page hasn't seemed to have changed from 1.15, however it does mention the disc effecting tactics. Clarification on that would also be nice, as that feels wrong from the way the game currently plays, but I could be wrong remembering that.

Note: Some things are also very difficult to test due to the fact some information in the UI is either bugged or out right missing.... so yeah there is that too.

 

[Quaade]

Infantry does flank if it ends up in the flanking position, but the troops deployment doesn't seem to take into consideration that the infantry can flank.

An excuse could be... battles are chaotic?... It could be a neat little addition to have maneuver factor into unit placement and "moving" units during battles perhaps?...

I don't think there is any penalty for artillery on the front row. The only downside is that it is expensive and since it will take damage on the front row, the reinforcement will be expensive too. Until MIL 16 artillery and infantry are fairly close in their efficiency, bit infantry costs 3 times less.

Front row Art deal full damage, back row 50%. So in the front row at 100% they deal INSANE damage in the first fire phase. Its just their defense pips arnt the best (I think like half off the top of my head compared to Inf) so they will take heavy casualties, so it falls of rather quickly due to non full strength units. That and Art giving defense pip bonuses to the units in front of them.

There is a misconception that a) early artillery sucks b) artillery take double damage in front row... Personally I have tested it in many playthroughs, the last time was just where I had the possibilities to save-scum and do a number of tests and comparisons with roughly same circumstances (can´t really control die rolls) and where army didn´t get reinforced... They did a shitton of damage in fire phase as Misiceman said... However they in turn can´t defend well in shock where they took most of the damage... But by then, my armies no longer outnumbered them and fought with less effective regiments.

It´s the same with ppl saying cavalry are worthless later on... They are quite effective later on due to their flanking and shock damage... They are just not as beneficial to their costs as in I rarely go up to 8 cav in larger armies... Had the opportunity to stream a game as observer with players who had this misconception... A tunis player who bragged about the tactic to use no cav to beat all, where he was losing until he bought a few cav (he didn´t have much cash by then, but even the small number changed outcome)... And a giant war with Austria Ottoman which were on par in military modifiers... One had no cav and he got wrecked with same sized armies until he began taking in cav...

I've always operated under the assumption that the Wiki is correct when it states that artillery regiments receive double damage when in the front row. I vividly recall my full artillery stacks getting stackwiped when the AI caught me napping.

From my experience, information on wiki only weakly correlates with how the game works, but this case might be worth testing. It's a rare situation since putting artillery on the front row is too expensive (even if it doesn't take double damage); on couple of occasions where I've seen an artillery getting on the front row I haven't noticed it taking more damage than infantry, but that could have been due to other factors (such as unit in front of it being significantly damaged in the earlier rounds of combat).

I generally operate that the wiki (if update recently) will be accurate as to the intent of the design. They did do a push for updating it a while ago so a good amount should be accurate barring bugs.

It´s a neat reference... If you don´t know where to look for it in game files mostly I use it to fresh up... Or to get an idea of where they are hiding them in game files... Just love it when you "lose" an argument because wiki tells you are wrong, despite game files saying something else :-D

Also I am not sure early game tactics matter compared to late game tactics (assuming same tactics) since they changed disc. I think i remember reading in a forum thread that the multiplier was changed to tactics of the attacker/ tactics of the defender, but looking at the wiki it still says discipline/tactics but the page hasn't seemed to have changed from 1.15, however it does mention the disc effecting tactics. Clarification on that would also be nice, as that feels wrong from the way the game currently plays, but I could be wrong remembering that.

hehe... always goes by the assumption that discipline is damage and morale is battle length which makes me more confused at the latest modifiers to infantry and shock :-D but at least I get the gist of what is going on... and where they work best

 

[SolSys]

Regarding the wiki information validity:

Most articles/pages are based on the game files [unless the mechanics are hard-coded]. However, that is not to say the information on them is true for the ''current'' version.

This is the reason why the S/Version tags exist for. Unfortunately, some of the more newer editors tend to delete these tags instead of updating the versioning which can later-on seem as "updated" even though they are not. While we try to reverse these changes some will slip through the cracks.

In short, always check version tags of articles/sections.

 

[misiceman]

yeah but last i checked things like the battle formula are not readily available in the game files (either in the txt files or lua files), as i think its baked into the engine. I could be wrong on this and would love to find some new places to poke.

@Quaade Yeah moral for length, except when stackwiping everything due to routes

Also most of these arguments about which unit is good or bad tends to be based on pips ignores the multipliers. Pips are nice and all but combat multipliers are really the bread and butter of damage. People also tend to think as pips being all important when the die roll has WAY more weight then pips (dont get me wrong pip advantage is nice but not game breaking in anyways). Like in your Tunis example, cav has about double the multiplier as inf... they are literally worth 2 to 1 in the shock phase where only at techs 6 and 7 its closes then suddenly its double again. They are expensive but they deal the damage, especially while flanking. Same goes for Cannons. Early game fire multipliers are crazy at techs 7 and 13 specifically that they can really out damage equal inf in the fire phase by a large margin. They do creep back but the values can put them as almost a tactics level difference in multipliers. However its dependent on the rolls as well. Have the low fire roll and a bad shock roll while they have a good one... bye bye cannons.

I think we see this all the time in horde territory where they run full or almost full cav and just destroy everything in the early game (not to mention the 25% shock bonus..... ) but tend to think oh its just hordes, when in reality the game is not "that" different across the tech groups. There is an advantage but its not game changing like one tactics level tends to be.

 

[Dominion]

as i think its baked into the engine.

Wish I was baked rn.

Also most of these arguments about which unit is good or bad tends to be based on pips ignores the multipliers. Pips are nice and all but combat multipliers are really the bread and butter of damage.

Yea... no

Try fighting Muscovy on tech5 with any western tech nation. Their pip advantage will crush you.

Like in your Tunis example, cav has about double the multiplier as inf... they are literally worth 2 to 1 in the shock phase where only at techs 6 and 7 its closes then suddenly its double again. They are expensive but they deal the damage, especially while flanking. Same goes for Cannons.

Extremely broad overgeneralization...

You overestimate rolls in general and give no credit to literally any other modifier, like tactics and discs influence on them.

 

[Quaade]

@Quaade Yeah moral for length, except when stackwiping everything due to routes

Love stackwiping... When it´s not on me my casual game as France where I answer questions from those who are fairly new to EU4 I didn´t pay much attention to my england war and mismanaged my armies ending in both my armies getting stackwiped :-D

Also most of these arguments about which unit is good or bad tends to be based on pips ignores the multipliers. Pips are nice and all but combat multipliers are really the bread and butter of damage. People also tend to think as pips being all important when the die roll has WAY more weight then pips (dont get me wrong pip advantage is nice but not game breaking in anyways). Like in your Tunis example, cav has about double the multiplier as inf... they are literally worth 2 to 1 in the shock phase where only at techs 6 and 7 its closes then suddenly its double again. They are expensive but they deal the damage, especially while flanking.

Well... Pips are important, most pips with most modifiers (stacking) will be OP... But that´s just pure logic ;-)

Same goes for Cannons. Early game fire multipliers are crazy at techs 7 and 13 specifically that they can really out damage equal inf in the fire phase by a large margin. They do creep back but the values can put them as almost a tactics level difference in multipliers. However its dependent on the rolls as well. Have the low fire roll and a bad shock roll while they have a good one... bye bye cannons.

Oh... which is where I was able to make my latest test... Which were funny since at the same time I saw the discussion about cannons early be crap... Yet... My army was decimated despite being better ratio and defending in hills...

I think we see this all the time in horde territory where they run full or almost full cav and just destroy everything in the early game (not to mention the 25% shock bonus..... ) but tend to think oh its just hordes, when in reality the game is not "that" different across the tech groups. There is an advantage but its not game changing like one tactics level tends to be.

they are not "that" different... They can just "afford" and are able to field cav with a higher ratio meaning they can deal out a lot of damage...

Try fighting Muscovy on tech5 with any western tech nation. Their pip advantage will crush you.

Did that recently... Also saw Sweden around tech 5-6 beat back an opportunistic Muscovy beat them back... Despite they had been in a longer war against me... As I peaced out they fought them back and WP a lost war... Could likely have taken more if it was player and kept going a bit longer.

You overestimate rolls in general and give no credit to literally any other modifier, like tactics and discs influence on them.

They still have influence, and pips are nearly the only thing we can control... In that we pick which units to field

 

[alexti]

I generally operate that the wiki (if update recently) will be accurate as to the intent of the design. They did do a push for updating it a while ago so a good amount should be accurate barring bugs.

Wiki is not maintained by developers and articles are posted by regular players, so unless some developer sources are quoted there is no reason to think that authors have any better insight into developers' intentions. In general wiki articles fall into 2 broad categories: (1) content auto-generated from the game files and (2) author's opinions on how the game works. The former is almost always accurate. The latter can be wrong (because it got outdated or because it was never right) and that is quite common.

Also I am not sure early game tactics matter compared to late game tactics (assuming same tactics) since they changed disc. I think i remember reading in a forum thread that the multiplier was changed to tactics of the attacker/ tactics of the defender, but looking at the wiki it still says discipline/tactics but the page hasn't seemed to have changed from 1.15, however it does mention the disc effecting tactics. Clarification on that would also be nice, as that feels wrong from the way the game currently plays, but I could be wrong remembering that.

I think wiki is correct in this aspect. Perhaps you are thinking about discipline modifier also applying to the tactics?

There is a misconception that a) early artillery sucks b) artillery take double damage in front row... Personally I have tested it in many playthroughs, the last time was just where I had the possibilities to save-scum and do a number of tests and comparisons with roughly same circumstances (can´t really control die rolls) and where army didn´t get reinforced... They did a shitton of damage in fire phase as Misiceman said... However they in turn can´t defend well in shock where they took most of the damage... But by then, my armies no longer outnumbered them and fought with less effective regiments.

Good to have confirmation about (b). Regarding (a), I suppose people have some justification in that because early artillery is not nearly 3 times better than infantry. In the early game nobody can defend in the shock phase, not just artillery. But unlike other units artillery can't do any real damage in shock phase, so it's kind of useful only in a half of the battle.

Early game fire multipliers are crazy at techs 7 and 13 specifically that they can really out damage equal inf in the fire phase by a large margin.

Tech 7 and 13 are actually the only ones levels before MIL 16 where artillery is marginally better than infantry (at tech 8 and 14 infantry gets boost to fire modifier which puts it well ahead infantry). The lack of good shock modifier really hurts artillery. A simple way to compare infantry vs artillery efficiency is to compare the sum of its fire and shock modifiers. It is not entirely accurate, but it's a good approximation that is easy to calculate.

 

[Quaade]

Good to have confirmation about (b). Regarding (a), I suppose people have some justification in that because early artillery is not nearly 3 times better than infantry. In the early game nobody can defend in the shock phase, not just artillery. But unlike other units artillery can't do any real damage in shock phase, so it's kind of useful only in a half of the battle.

I can get behind that arguement, that cannons in combat are not 3 times more effective... However, not having cannons in the fire phase and battling something with cannons... That is more costly as far as I have experienced it, since I lose way too much in comparison to the other.

Tech 7 and 13 are actually the only ones levels before MIL 16 where artillery is marginally better than infantry (at tech 8 and 14 infantry gets boost to fire modifier which puts it well ahead infantry). The lack of good shock modifier really hurts artillery. A simple way to compare infantry vs artillery efficiency is to compare the sum of its fire and shock modifiers. It is not entirely accurate, but it's a good approximation that is easy to calculate.

It´s always difficult for me to get the "end" combat modifiers... All I go by is basically realizing that modifiers stack and they make my units better