Melee Combat

[Adonnus]

I want to like this game but nonsensical melee combat is really a pain for me in that regard. Generally whenever I play melee combat with start with a charge, result in 5-20 casualties on both sides in brigades of 1500 - 2000 men and end when one side runs out of morale or condition. How is this at all realistic? What's the point of melee combat when it doesn't inflict any casualties but just lowers the stats of your units? Also, it means that it's impossible to beat skirmishers except by shooting at them.

 

And when the enemy unit "routs" and my unit is ordered to attack them in melee, still no casualties are inflicted. 

[Nick Thomadis]

Hi Adonnus,

 

You are absolutely right. Melee combat has issues from the start of the development, because of bugs that were following this mechanic that we had to address later. So we had to make the melee to last less and do as much damage as necessary. In the patch that comes today melee will be quite devastating, at least comparing to previous versions. We will continue to try to make melee mechanics and its impact as good as possible for the final release.

[Harnis]

While I'd agree that right now melees don't have enough casualties, I would also caution against too many casualties, since the total war approach where two units of 200 soldiers get into melee and one side only breaks after taking more than 75% casualties is also not realistic, and is more unrealistic than a melee resulting in 20 deaths. Soldiers are not berserker banzai charging suicide warriors. They generally don't want to die, and they generally dont want to die from a bayonet. Do not overestimate the amount of casualties that melee combat causes. I mean, we have historical medieval battles with thousands on each side fighting in melee for hours with only a few hundred dead.

 

I dont want to see a brigade drop from 2000 men to 1000 in the span of a 5 minute melee.

[JamesL]

I think after hand to hand contact a unit should loose more condition than it does at the moment due to both exertion and the physical-mental comedown off a peak of adrenalin.

[JamesL]

With 0.94 there has been a definite improvement in the casualty impact of melees.  But I've noted some things that still don't seem right:

 

-  The AI can start its charge from too far out resulting in it being spent by the time contact has been made.  It seems more realistic to march until 100-200yds off perhaps fire a volley then charge.  (Historical note - most of Pickets charge was done at marching pace!)

 

- I've noticed it happen 3 times in one battle in the open where a melee is in progress and one side ends up behind the enemy lines.  In reality either the attacker wins and the defender retreats away from the attack or the defender wins and the attacker retreats the way they came!  Part of this problem is that in UGG formations still disperse and mix somewhat in hand to hand combat.  This I believe to be wrong as crowds of men in melee tend to instinctively bunch up for safety and fight as a group rather than seek single combat. Look at any painting or eye witness sketch of hand to hand fighting of a civil war battle you'll see this.

 

- Hand to Hand battles still seem to be a bit too long.  I can understand this being the case if both sides had high moral with neither side wanting to give in first.  But when there's medium and especially low moral in one or both sides the fight would be brief - in the case of low possibly running before contact or not charging home. 

[RichardMcCor]

I also see the AI doing very long charges in this release.

[blueakomoon]

One thing I am glad to see.  When a charge occurs, the two units get mixed up and when one side or the other retreats, it takes them a while to untangle themselves.  I enjoy knowing that my soldiers are not robots that can immediately fall back into their assigned units, that it takes them a while to untangle and reorganize before they can volley.

[Adonnus]

One thing I am glad to see.  When a charge occurs, the two units get mixed up and when one side or the other retreats, it takes them a while to untangle themselves.  I enjoy knowing that my soldiers are not robots that can immediately fall back into their assigned units, that it takes them a while to untangle and reorganize before they can volley.

 

Personally I am a little bit annoyed that this happens. Didn't soldiers stay in formation at all during these types of battles? I hate to say it but I think maybe a system where units engage each other in formation like in Total War would be better. And it's not like Darth doesn't know what I'm talking about 

 

I like the new melee system that was updated the other day though, it makes things much better. Though I wonder, sometimes my units will take massive casualties, about 100 in five seconds when they aren't even being fired upon, what's with this?

[Nick Thomadis]

Melee is not yet finalised. It will be improved, especially in multiplayer where it is way overpowered and buggy.

The next update will have this improvement.

[Smily]

Nick mentioned elsewhere that the drastic casualties (dropping to 0 very quickly) represent a surrender of the unit.

[Technopiper]

Nick mentioned elsewhere that the drastic casualties (dropping to 0 very quickly) represent a surrender of the unit.

I'm glad to hear that, and I think it makes sense. It is my believe that "kill" in the game has always meant "casualties". Perhaps a change of wording in the game? I'll give it another few tries to confirm the situation in which that happens.

[Harnis]

Nick mentioned elsewhere that the drastic casualties (dropping to 0 very quickly) represent a surrender of the unit.

yes exactly. When a routing unit is caught in melee, they take casualties extremely rapidly, and yes, it's meant to simulate surrendering as well as being killed, captured, injured, whatever.

 

I'm glad to hear that, and I think it makes sense. It is my believe that "kill" in the game has always meant "casualties". Perhaps a change of wording in the game? I'll give it another few tries to confirm the situation in which that happens.

I think that's a pretty reasonable assumption. I mean, historically, there were around 46 thousand casualties at the Battle of Gettysburg. But only around 8 thousand of those were actually deaths, with 27 thousand wounded and 11 thousand captured/missing. In a game at this level, there's not much point in simulating the difference between those 3 possibilities.