Flanking and Rear Attacks

[Thufir]

One of the things I've been having a hard time with, on both offense and defense is making flanking or rear attacks work (or defending against them). In a recent battle against C'tis in an MP game, I was outclassed by his army, so I was not too surprised to be defeated, but I did expect that my Devils would reach his rear, and reak some havoc before getting killed.

Here's two screenshots, one showing the C'tis setup, and the next showing where my 25 devils attacked.

setup:


attack:



I guess I've had a hard time with setup positions ever since I started playing MP. I've read a lot of Posts, done a lot of SP testing, and done a little bit of MP testing, and at this point I'd say I've made some progress, but seems I have a long way to go. So, any general advice/pointers would be appreciated, but I also have the following specific questions.

1) In the above screen shots, C'tis had about 120 Tomb worms, and ~60 tomb guards positioned near the back, and I believe on "hold and attack" orders. His force was large enough that it covered nearly the full width of the field, minus 4 grid squares on either side.

Can anyone tell me why my 25 devils, with orders to attack the rearmost enemy attacked the tomb worms instead? I guess I would've expected cavalry to have a hard time to get around such a wide front line, but I thought fliers would be able to pull that off guaranteed.

Is successfully reaching the rear something that is dependent on relative sizes of attacking force and a front line force? Or is there a completely random element? Or might it have something to do with the positioning of the C'tis commanders that prevented my Devils from reaching the rear?


2) On the other side of the coin (mostly while playing Pythium, and trying to keep my mages safe from Abysia's devils), I had considerably less success than C'tis had in this battle. I am particularly interested in defending mages against flying enemy troops (devils being the obvious, but not only example),

One big difference between my Pythian deployment, and C'tis' is the fact I had usually had smaller armies (both in quantity and in quality) compared to what C'tis has fielded. Is the key to having your mages protected to have a big, huge front line to hide behind?

Or, does it in general work better to have your mages interspersed with the melee troops? Perhaps C'tis just got lucky that my devils didn't attack his mages in the battle above?


Edit:

3) I'm also interested in flanking attacks, which to date I've had limited success with. So far in my MP experience (which admittedly is limited to 5 games ), I've yet to see another player utilizing knights or cavalry, and every time I've tried to it's been cost-ineffective. The problem I generally have is that the cavalry always gets hung up on attacking the center, and never makes it to a vulnerable rear area or to a group of archers. In which case, I'd guess you would be better off mixing your cavalry in with your heavy infantry in order to have a larger unit, and get the improved morale bonus.

Is anyone out there (in MP play) taking advantage of flanking attacks, either with cavalry/knight type units, or other types of fast units? Is there a key to making this type of unit cost effective?

[Zen]

Thufir said:
1) In the above screen shots, C'tis had about 120 Tomb worms, and ~60 tomb guards positioned near the back, and I believe on "hold and attack" orders. His force was large enough that it covered nearly the full width of the field, minus 4 grid squares on either side.

Can anyone tell me why my 25 devils, with orders to attack the rearmost enemy attacked the tomb worms instead? I guess I would've expected cavalry to have a hard time to get around such a wide front line, but I thought fliers would be able to pull that off guaranteed.

There is a random element to the 'always attack rearmost' behavior of the command "Attack Rearmost". There is some variable that says: Attack Rearmost, Rearmost unit. Chance of attack = X. If failed, chance of attack second most rearmost squad = X. If failed, chance of attack third most rearmost squad = X.

The more squads that are there the more chance of not actually attacking a rearmost squad. I can't give you the X, but I do know from my personal tests and the way I set up squads it seems to be 20% that an actual attack rearmost will go to the very rear, and there seems (based on a few factors) that commanders are lowest on the priority of targeting when using "Rearmost" so there is no easy way to pick out commanders for flying quickstrikes.

Is successfully reaching the rear something that is dependent on relative sizes of attacking force and a front line force? Or is there a completely random element? Or might it have something to do with the positioning of the C'tis commanders that prevented my Devils from reaching the rear?

From the above screenshots, my guess is you had your Devils all in one squad, had them to attack rearmost and they happened to get caught up in a flanking Tomb Wyrm squad that was second or third to the most rear.

2) On the other side of the coin (mostly while playing Pythium, and trying to keep my mages safe from Abysia's devils), I had considerably less success than C'tis had in this battle. I am particularly interested in defending mages against flying enemy troops (devils being the obvious, but not only example),

My guess here, is that you probably didn't have a large number of squads, but one large squad with lots of troops (maybe a flanking squad or two, so you should have the same chance as C'tis based on "Attack Rearmost" orders). You have to also note that it is only the "Attack Rearmost" that has this issue. Attack Cavalry, Attack Largest Monster, Attack Archers, will choose the nearest unit of that type to fire/attack on. So if in your Pythium examples you had archers near your Mages or #mounted/Size4+ near your mages that would enable the opponent to target them a little easier with their flying squads.

3) I'm also interested in flanking attacks, which to date I've had limited success with. So far in my MP experience (which admittedly is limited to 5 games ), I've yet to see another player utilizing knights or cavalry, and every time I've tried to it's been cost-ineffective. The problem I generally have is that the cavalry always gets hung up on attacking the center, and never makes it to a vulnerable rear area or to a group of archers. In which case, I'd guess you would be better off mixing your cavalry in with your heavy infantry in order to have a larger unit, and get the improved morale bonus.

Depending on the opponents setup (if he has a screen of melee troops set to hold and attack) in front of his archers or mages, it can pose a problem to 'flank'. When I want to flank, or encircle an Enemy without trying to get my fast moving units too tangled up into the center formations, I keep my units as far out to the flanks as possible with Attack Rearmost or Attack Archer orders. Most of this time this will allow them to engage either the rearmost squads or their screening troops. Or it also allows the fast moving units to close on the sides of a big formation (though I wish they would go behind the formation and go for an attack from behind) while your front troops fan out in front. This is why Javelins are particularly useful because of the spread of a squad and the limited usefulness based on the game's design of a 'forward line'.

Is anyone out there (in MP play) taking advantage of flanking attacks, either with cavalry/knight type units, or other types of fast units? Is there a key to making this type of unit cost effective?

There isn't really a way to make the knight/cavalry cost effective, because of their extrordinary resource cost. Unless you require the Lance, or the Strategic movement, you are better off going to a more efficent infantry variety. This is why Tien Ch'i mounted units (a significant part of their armies) has so many problems based on this fundamental weakness in the game engines simulation of combat.

[Arralen]

Actually, the C'tis setup doesn't have a rearmost troop - commanders do not count (maybe even bodyguards, too, but I'm not sure about that).

The AI can attack commanders specifically, so don't be too surprised if the AI does attack the mages in the above setup.

Lacking the existence of 'real' rearmost troops, the Devils simply went for a randomly chosen squad which had some units to the furthest right.

Furthermore, IIRC troops have to pass morale checks for each squad they "pass" on their way to the enemies rear (inverse order of checks vs. Zens model), so it gets increasingly likely that they choose the wrong target the further they advance.

The key to get you own troops to flank effectively is the "hold and attack"-command. While holding for 2 turns, the enemy front line converges on you front line, so the likelihood of your flankers being "drawn" to the wrong target is smaller.
And use fast troops for flanking - mounted troops or flyers. They'll have to pass less checks, which are done at the start of each turn, judging from the comments of some dev.

T'ien Ch'i (or however they're spelled) mounted archers actually work great with the revised "hold and attack"-command (with v2.12 and later). While on hold, they use their compound bows on the nearest advancing enemy, then attack the flank of the enemy formation with their lances. If they don't reach them or the squad is big enough, they'll even fire three or more times. I have actually seen them use their bows when pursuing fleeing enemies - shooting them right in the back from 3..6 squares distance. A very cost effective way to cut off someone's retreat

They are vulnerable because of low prot value, so try to get either protection or at least Legions of Steel cast on them. Protection makes them vulnerable to fire, but anyone trying to toss fireballs at those fast moving targets puts his own troops into danger as well - most fire spells aren't terribly precise

[Thufir]

Thanks for the detailed reply, Zen. This is great stuff! I particularly appreciated your layout of the formula for successfully reaching the rear (even if you don't know "X").

Zen said:

From the above screenshots, my guess is you had your Devils all in one squad, had them to attack rearmost and they happened to get caught up in a flanking Tomb Wyrm squad that was second or third to the most rear.

That is correct. Based on your formulation, I wonder if you have sufficient troops if there's not a point where you're better off having 2 squads attacking rear rather than 1. Likely 25 Devils is too few to split due to morale problems, but if I had 50, might it be better to have 2 squads of 25 going for the rear?

...
This is why Javelins are particularly useful because of the spread of a squad and the limited usefulness based on the game's design of a 'forward line'.

I don't understand the usefulness of javelins. Are you saying that a javelin squad is more likely to engage an enemy attempting to flank, than a say, light infantry squad with same number of troops? And if so, is this because they tend to physically spread out on the field, or because of their firing javelins?

There isn't really a way to make the knight/cavalry cost effective, because of their extrordinary resource cost. Unless you require the Lance, or the Strategic movement, you are better off going to a more efficent infantry variety. This is why Tien Ch'i mounted units (a significant part of their armies) has so many problems based on this fundamental weakness in the game engines simulation of combat.

It would be very nice to see cavalry/knights/serpent cataphracts/etc. come into play more often, and I'd certainly be a fan of any improvements in the engine that permit that. Within my limited experience, it really does seem to be more of an issue with the combat engine implementation than with the stats of these units.

I've been wondering if it might be helpful to simply widen the field of combat. In particular, if there were 5-10 squares on either side that existed in combat, but that could not be pre-deployed on, then I think that might make things more interesting. I think it might be good to widen the field by an additional 5 squares that could be predeployed on, as well. From what I've seen, some of the larger battles can really fill up the battle screen pretty quickly.

[Thufir]

Arralen said:
The key to get you own troops to flank effectively is the "hold and attack"-command. While holding for 2 turns, the enemy front line converges on you front line, so the likelihood of your flankers being "drawn" to the wrong target is smaller.

I like the hold and attack, I'll try that one out.

And use fast troops for flanking - mounted troops or flyers. They'll have to pass less checks, which are done at the start of each turn, judging from the comments of some dev.

Of course. I'm using Devils in my example.

T'ien Ch'i (or however they're spelled) mounted archers actually work great with the revised "hold and attack"-command (with v2.12 and later). While on hold, they use their compound bows on the nearest advancing enemy, then attack the flank of the enemy formation with their lances. If they don't reach them or the squad is big enough, they'll even fire three or more times. I have actually seen them use their bows when pursuing fleeing enemies - shooting them right in the back from 3..6 squares distance. A very cost effective way to cut off someone's retreat

They are vulnerable because of low prot value, so try to get either protection or at least Legions of Steel cast on them. Protection makes them vulnerable to fire, but anyone trying to toss fireballs at those fast moving targets puts his own troops into danger as well - most fire spells aren't terribly precise

This sounds interesting, and I like to play T'ien Ch'i, so this is particularly relevant. But I have to ask, have you used this successfully in MP play?

[Arralen]

Ah, umh, you see, T'ien Ch'i is such a slow-starter, especially Spring&Autmn, that it's considered the weakest nations by some ... .
I'm not shure about that, but they are to slow to be competitive.
I tried to do a Spring&Autmn speedup mod, but, honestly, I don't really know what to change to make them stronger at start. Other than using that standard SC pretender to do the expansion during the first 6 turn or so. Changing the national summons spells would be a possibilty, but IIRC even with 2.14 we can't mod how much "effects" a summon spell has. (Should add that to the wishlist thread...)

So, with two words:

Never tried !