Too many men getting killed (Macedonia)

[SaxonCamel]

Playing as Macedonia I find that when I fight the starting war with Tylis I lose around 18,000 men if I'm lucky. It takes decades just to get all the manpower back.

Each time the army moves province, it loses up to 3000 men - what kind of attrition is that? And I always get double the losses when fighting against Tylis - as if every victory is a Pyrrhic one. The army is mainly heavy infantry and archers with cavalry and has a commander with decent martial skill.

Any ideas how to get around this?

 

[unmerged(114757)]

Each time the army moves province, it loses up to 3000 men - what kind of attrition is that?

This sounds like a 10% attrition on a 30,000 men army. Quite common when large armies occupies the same province, especially in unfriendly areas.

A commander can supply an army equal his (martial strength) + (province supply limit). It gets a bit messier when more armies are in the same area but a rule of thumb is that the army who has the greatest commander gets fed first and all the others must take the leftovers. (Rome_Manual.pdf page 81, not exactly the quote)
So if you have a 30k army with a 9 martial commander in a province who only yields (lets say) 6 supply, you only feed half the army. And receive (lets say) 5 % attrition penalty.
The enemy doesn't suffer the same attrition since they are on friendly soil and has higher supply limit.

Any ideas how to get around this?

1) Fight on own soil. Unpopular by your citizens but you spare your troops the attrition. After a few victories you invade and attack the garrisons immediately since your loss on the attack would be lesser than months of siege attrition.
2) Split your army into smaller stacks with commanders who can supply his stack by himself and invade.

(Note, a province has a supply maximum so if there are more troops than supply some of the stacks with lesser commanders will still get attrition even if the commander has greater martial than number of troops. Ehh, and I have never played as the Macedonians so my advice should be read with that in mind.)

 

[Searry]

The military system should be more balanced. If you could push reforms early, there should be some kind of supply trains in the national ideas. Of course there would be some kind of upheavals, if you have no reasons for reforms. (Like in the Marian ones the Roman army just got destroyed completely.) The tech system is so arbitrary.

 

[SaxonCamel]

Kuhnrat, thank you for that info, it definitely clears up some confusion. my only problem is, i can't take on Tylis's army without at least a 25 unit stack - i assume two armies attacking at once is less efficient??

 

[unmerged(114757)]

i assume two armies attacking at once is less efficient?

I'm not sure. When I attack with multiple armies it seems that the greatest commander takes command of the battle. So as long as the attack is coordinated it seems as effective as one larger.

i can't take on Tylis's army without at least a 25 unit stack

As it should be, war is costly. So what is your strategy?
- If Tylis has more than 2 provinces you can't annex them in one war.
(I'm not sure but Tylis start with 3 provinces, right?)
Do you claim first one province and in the next war annex two, or opposite.
- Manpower / armies, what's the ratio between yours and theirs?
To annihilate their armies or not that's a question. Destroying armies are not the highest priority in a war that can end in a total annexation.
- How large is your navy and how active is it in your campaign?
Those who rules the sea has greater mobility.

The military system should be more balanced. If you could push reforms early, there should be some kind of supply trains in the national ideas. Of course there would be some kind of upheavals, if you have no reasons for reforms. (Like in the Marian ones the Roman army just got destroyed completely.) The tech system is so arbitrary.

It's part of the game. That an army can move into occupied areas and live gives a indication that some kind of supply is integrated in the game. But in this age didn't armies on the prowl usually forage their supply more than being supplied from their own. The higher supply limit in own land takes in account that supply trains are in effect when armies moves in friendly provinces.

 

[unmerged(218780)]

Try a different Stratergy perhaps. Take a good look at your opponent, you will quickly notice thier culture is Celtic but all but one of thier provinces do not even belong to the same culture group. This should tell you something about how to combat them. The longer you wear them down with attrition and fights that dont end up too costly for yourself. (ie defending river crossing bonuses)
You can quickly deplete thier limited manpower down to a more managable level. Furthermore positioning boats of thier only 2 coastal provinces will slash thier income.

It might not be a glorious way to win, but then the glorious way is the way Ptolemy went for and that didnt exactly pan out accorging to plan .


/\ Bearing the above in mind is also important when you move on to combating larger countries later on. Rome will have almost limitless manpower by the time you face them on Macedon beware the same pitfalls.

 

[Annibal]

You should defend after you declared war. Let them come to you. When this happened attack on them. Sweep all enemy armies. After that seperate your armies into small pieces and siege all enemy provinces. And dont forget appoint high martial skilled generals.
But I must say that replenishment rate of manpower is ridicuolus. Attrition is possible even in your own territory. Many times I play with below maximum manpower.