How do you organize your armies?

[unmerged(57409)]

I'm a newbie as already everyone knows, and I would like to know how the experts organize their armies, do you group many units into a single general unit (9 divisions) all with the same unit type, do you group smaller units in Lt. Colonel, or do you group them into single units? Advice needed please

 

[unmerged(48534)]

I prefer smaller units mainly for armoured troops

 

[unmerged(24102)]

It depends on the purpuse.
If you ask for the most game efficient organisation - someone else but me got to answer you.

Me? I spend 20 houres finding out the historical OOB, resulting in another 3 houres reorganizing my forces into singel correctly named divisions and corps of 2-5 perhaps. And my groupings have nothing with effeciency to do. Then I unpause, play a couple of houres of game time before I feel the urgent need to spend some addisional houres reorganizing everything again or defining a new national strategi for the trade or something like that. But thats me.

 

[Helshad]

I build units of 4 in each... Generaly composed by 2 armor and 2 mot or mec infantry... all with anti-tank brigades and SP-Art or SP-rocket artillery..

Then a general to control them... I know the size isnt optimal but I find it very effective... Next time I am gona try 3 divisions with 1 tank and 2 inf units... and instead have a few more of those groups... not sure how well that will work though... but it will save some of my generals... so I dont loose so much experiance... when promoting generals...

 

[unmerged(57409)]

It's kinda complicated for a noob like me, personally I don't see any use in using very large groups, unless you have hq around, because of the overstacking penalty, and very small groups, having to choose every single division to take it's own path. I'm going to try out with infantry groups of 3, 6 and 9 and armored/mech divisions in groups of 3 and 6. I don't see any use of using Major-generals... Glad to hear your opinions!

 

[unmerged(13991)]

Let say in purpose of efficienty :

1) group 1 ARM with 2 MOT or 1 MOT with 2 ARM, you will get a 5 % bonus when fighting, and still have good speed.

2) Use brigades only with the expensive troops (ARM MOT MEC), do not build ART. SP ART can be used with INF also, but even if efficient in most case of fighting (you will have enought ORG to move and conduct another operation), it's ressources unwise (for the same amount of ressources used to build and maintain your brigades you can have more INF), so that is a choice that depend on how you play : if you love the caterpilar strategy, mass build plain infanterie and no brigades, if you prefer to use well made strategy that will turn banana your oponements and imply a lot of micromanagement then build brigades.

3)Mass building militia, grouped by 12 under FM is another good way to go , and it will be infact a middle way btw the caterpillar strategy and the Von Manstein/Napoleon way to do the Art of War. Mostly due the fact militia are weak units you have to precisely choose your schwerpunk and plan carefully what you will do if shit happend.

4) The way the game handle figting (include naval), better to privelegy small units (corp level) backed up by a big unit. One army (9 to 12 units) backing up 3 / 4 corps is a brainless way to be sure nothing really bad can happend.

5) Be sure to alway have enought ressources before to mass build ARM, MOT or MEC, and be also careful to the TC. To much Pz divisionen will in fact kill you.

6) Keep the special forces for special dury under Comando leaders. Mount are great when used in hills or mountains but are worth nothing in plain and they can kill your manpower.

7) Always retreat/stop attack when you see Org going down too fast. you will save on the MP.

 

[Delor]

Many People do it that Way:

In the Beginning of the Game concentrate on 3-Division-Corps or even Single-Division-Units.

That is because a Gen.Major or Gen.Ltn. will gain faster XP then a General or even a Field Marshall. With time, when they reached a higher Level, you can promote them to Generals or even FMs and increase their Corps to 9/12-Div. Armys. (ps. Use Doomsday 1.0 ... in 1.1 you can wait a very very long Time until a Gen.Maj. gets a few Points XP)

I usually build Only-Infantry-Corps attached with Artillery/AT-Brigades and armored Corps in a Ratio of 2:1 which means, 2 Tank Divisions and 1 Motorized/Mechanized Division with SP-Artillery/Heavy Tank-Brigades.

On Special Units like Marines, Mount. etc. i usually use only Engineers or a Art/AT-Mix.

HQs i usually use together with larger Formations (9Div.Armys) led by a General. Some use them also as "Stand-Alone-Units" but i don't like it (they are very fast and always shoot forward faster then other Units making them vulnerable to attacks)

But the Question how to mix up your Corps and which Brigades you use depends at the End on you and the Way you play. There are Players using almost only unbrigades Infantry in huge numbers or Players who only use Engineer-Brigades. But most Players use many different Brigades. Make your Choice ... just watch out not to attach slow Brigades like Artillery to fast Units like Tanks.

 

[Mahrabal]

It's kinda complicated for a noob like me, personally I don't see any use in using very large groups, unless you have hq around, because of the overstacking penalty, and very small groups, having to choose every single division to take it's own path. I'm going to try out with infantry groups of 3, 6 and 9 and armored/mech divisions in groups of 3 and 6. I don't see any use of using Major-generals... Glad to hear your opinions!

I only use Major-generals for defensive purposes, because stacking works differantly on defence. You can have as many units in defence without a stacking penalty so long as no individual commander is in charge of too many units. eg. 10 major-generals commanding 10 units in defence= no stcking penalty, 1 major-general commanding 2 units in defence = stackign penalty.

 

[unmerged(56550)]

for me it's 3-div corps all the way, 1-div is too much micromanagement and anything above 3-div is not flexible enough for dynamic combat, you can't for example easily switch one corpse out and replace it with a fresh one in an ongoing combat.

Brigades: depends on your country, low IC but high manpower? few brigades and focus on building divisions.
High IC but low manpower pool: build brigades to give your divisions more punch for few manpower costs.

 

[Soulitaire]

HoI - never stop learning

So when will universities offer degrees in Hearts of Iron play?

 

[Zebedee]

The only single divisions in my army are garrison units and HQs.

Everything else is grouped in 3s. I used to have single mountain divisions but decided that having them vapourised was not particularly cost effective - HQs have AA brigades to stop this happening to them

For every 2 groups of 3 with Lt. Gen in command, have a general or FM commanding the 3rd. It's a flexible system.

 

[unmerged(57044)]

Vary varied depending on what troops are available, what country you are and what type of action you are fighting.

I tend to keep all armour and mechs in their own armies, usually 3+ in each. Dont mix them with infantry as this removes their best attribute which is speed.

Infantry I usually group in 3's when generally low troop numbers are involved or when on a large front. With hard points of 6-9 or 12 units for solid def or counterattacks.

Where I have 2 or more 3+ armies tho I have a general about or you may as well just have 1 army of 3 (unless using waves)

 

[unmerged(55451)]

I normally use the principle of "The more, the better". May be uneffective, but fits vs. AI

 

[Mork]

Let say in purpose of efficienty :

1) group 1 ARM with 2 MOT or 1 MOT with 2 ARM, you will get a 5 % bonus when fighting, and still have good speed.
.

Oh, and 15% on defence.

 

[blue emu]

... you can't for example easily switch one corpse out and replace it with a fresh one...

Errrr... was that a fresh corpse (ie: a dead body) or a fresh corps (ie: a military unit)?

... I suppose one leads to the other...

 

[Valdez]

I set up my armies around spearhead groups. I tried 8 of them way too many, pushed my war with russia back an entire year big mistake. 6 is fine with a moderate spearhead group. My main spearhead groups are 6 tanks, and 6 mechnized infantry. My moderate spearhead group is 3 tanks, 3 infantry and 6 mechnized infranty. I have several groups of 3 infantry to be right behind my tanks, and bunch of 1 division infantries to move around when needed.

Each HQ is 1 HQ and 2-3 mechnized infantry. Also in France I set up "reserve" divisions, which range from 3 tanks 6 mechnized optimial but tend to be smaller. These sit in the back and wait for an comming to the rescue.

This has worked perfectly for me. The quick spearhead groups slice right through any defences the enemy can muster, each group of 2 meet up cutting of countless infantry divisions with my own infantry divisions just close enough behind to contain them till one or even both of my spearhead groups go in to crush the remaining troops. I place my top and best generals in the groups, such as Rommel. I also try in the poland campiagn get rommel Urban specialist for he's assigned the central core of my army duty is to capture Moscow.

One note about this army. It's a gas guzzler, I real gas guzzler, when my full army is on the move my drain can be 300 to even 400 oil a day.

 

[Valdez]

The only single divisions in my army are garrison units and HQs.

I want to make a note that the AI and human players will spot this single unit HQ and bomb it to hell. I've lost several HQ's that way, why it's always good to have a mechnized unit attatched probably 2 to soften their blows and keep HQ's good speed.

 

[unmerged(51418)]

I normally group infantry in stacks of 6. My spearheads are composed by 2 tanks with SParty and one mot with eng brigade.
While war goes on I start to add one mech infantry with SParty or SProcket for each armored corp (losing the bonus but, hey, it's too cool) and in 1946 I add also an armored cav division with SPAT. By the time cold war starts I have some very powerful spearheads ready to conquer Moskow or Washington in no time.