Reinforcments For Idiots

[Cid]

My 1st post and I'm still stewing over being X commed by His Holiness even though the perfidious French attacked ME and kept doing so even after being soundly wupped and MY sending repeated peace commisions, birthday and "Wish you Were Here" cards etc.Now I'm a social pariah and it's no use my saying "It's that French guys fault!".

Been at this game for over a week and have about 100 questions but I'll start with top 2--

1\ Reinforcements!-I can't get them to show up during battle while screaming Infidel hordes seem to have no problem. Thought that picking a routed unit or tired unit told to withdraw (ctrl. W), placing flag and hitting button would do it but it doesn't. As it is, whenever I reach point of multiple stack battle (usually against Almo...uh...those Muslim guys in Spain)I lose! Tried doing a search but keep getting "Telephraged" whatever that means.

2\ Why do English wear red? Spearmen look like D vorces on a night out and make me nervous.Should post this in the Mod/Patch section I guess.

Anyway, I think MTW is a great game with a sadly wanting manual but great forum. 3/4 of what I know about the game I've found out here.

Any help would be appreciated.

[Wart]

you can only bring on reinforcements when you have a spare slot at the bottom of the screen, i.e. when the routing/withdrawing unit has left the screen & their icon at the bottom dissappears.

Incidently, don't know if anyone else has noticed but the order that reinforcements come on is the same as the order that they go in when your swapping units in & out of your army before the battle. The first one that comes on as a reinforcement will be the one that was next after the last unit you swapped in pre-battle.
So it can be worth having a look at what you have available and then mucking around a bit to ensure that the right reinforcements are gonna come on when you need them (as opposed to you spare catapult crew http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/rolleyes.gif )

Does the above make sense? Its late & ive just finished 10hrs work staring at a VDU, my eyes are foaming, and the pubs are closed! http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/frown.gif
Oh well if not, im sure someone else will explain it intelligably

Edit: as for the english divorcees, I guess we had to settle for red cos black and purple had already been nabbed, and the other colours are worse! I mean, you're complaining about red? I guess you havent played spain yet then? http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/biggrin.gif

[This message has been edited by Wart (edited 10-21-2002).]

[hrvojej]

Reinforcements come in the same order that they are in their respective stack (I think http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif ), and you can review the order of units by cycling through them before the start of the battle. I am not overly sure about who's going to appear as the first 16, but my guess is the general's army mostly. When you replace unit A from the original 16 with unit B, unit A will be placed in the same spot in reinforcements that the unit B previously took up.

A good strategy for replacing shooters:
- put all the units that you want in your general's stack, but without any shooters
- put in your general's stack some units that you want to come last as reinforcements (either the crappy ones, or some that will give the final blow, like cavalry) apart from the ones that you actually want to have in your first 16; the number of unwanted units should be the same as the number of the missile units you want in your army
- put all shooters in a separate stack, to ensure that they all come one after another in the reinforcements
- when you start the battle, replace the unwanted units with however many shooters you want, but make sure that these shooters are *the first ones* in the sequence; this way you ensure that the first reinforcements you call for are the subsequent shooters, and the units that were replaced from original 16 will come to the battlefield last

Works for me http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif

[Wart]

Yeah, I think thats what I was trying to say http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/confused.gif

Not sure about the 'general's stack' thing though, I always keep my siege train in an ancillary stack away from the general, but they seem to get first refusal on being on the field (which kinda makes sense, & is maybe too obvious to even need mentioning, unless of course, you're foaming at the eyeballs & sleep deprived http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/biggrin.gif)

Oh yeah and if you're swapping siege engines out move them well away from any part of the battle field you might want to use, BEFORE swapping them out.
I've had excellent defensive positives almost ruined by the 'ghost siege engines' that they seem to leave behind when you swap them out! I see no siege engine, but it's there according to the cursor, and my men can't walk through the area.
Nearly lost me a battle, that one!

[Cid]

I think I get it which is surprising.

Thanks for your replies. This must be an old topic for you guys but it seems to me that this system puts the defender at an advantage since his tired/broken units have a shorter distance to go as do his reinforcements. Any suggestions for the attacker? I'm about to go against the Alm...Moors... to try and get back on the good side of His Holiness.

By the way, I didn't mean to sound critical of the game. It's really kind of amazing and there's always another "Well I'll be darned" moment each time I play.

Well, off to work- excommunicated or not.

Thanks again.

[Rnold]

i wish i could choose my reinforcements instead of the puter choosing them for me!

[TheViking]

They should make the routing units (those who u cant rally anymore) "disappear" from the bottom cuz as it is now u have to wait till they are out from the map untill u can bring on new reinforcement it take to damn long time b4 the reinforce coms. And usually its to late too, if ur not the attacker

------------------
There I see my father.
There I see my mother, my sisters and brothers.
There I see my line of ancestors back to the beginning.
They call on me and ask me to take my place with them in the halls of Valhalla where the brave may live forever.

[Wart]

Rnold
You kind of can, thats what hrvojej & I were trying to explian in our previous posts! http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif

[Rnold]

Wart, it sounds very complicated. it could have would have should have so much easier if there were pictos of all the reinforcement units available on your reinforcement screen.

Scanning the battlefield then cycling through my units, grouping them and setting them up in formation takes a hell lot of time. To make sure I get the right reinforcements sounds like another 5 minutes.

All this after I checked all the armies of the opponent in bordering countries and checked my own armies in bordering countries.

[TheViking]

In what thread did u talk about this Wart and Rnold, i cant find it.

------------------
There I see my father.
There I see my mother, my sisters and brothers.
There I see my line of ancestors back to the beginning.
They call on me and ask me to take my place with them in the halls of Valhalla where the brave may live forever.

[Wart]

Rnold
Yeah, it is a little bit of hassle, & it would have been nice if there was an option to actually set the order they arrived in, but this is better than nothing... if you can be bothered with the hassle! I only tend to bother if it looks like it's gonna be a close one! http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/wink.gif

Viking
The first few posts of this thread mate. Its kinda more complicated to try and explain than it actually is to do! http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/wink.gif

[This message has been edited by Wart (edited 10-21-2002).]