Infantry Types a la Cossacks

**Robespierre** · 09-11-2008, 20:43

Remember the frenetic cossacks ?

In that game infantry came in 3 basic flavours:

Sharpshooter long-range types, poor at formation, very fine range.

Musketry jack-of all-trades, good at formations and fast rate of fire, not such good range.

Grenadier assault soldiers, lobbong bombs, good against prepared positions, rather expensive.

What are the odds that empires will work a like model?

**Sol Invictus** · 09-11-2008, 23:10

I doubt that Empires will be like Cossacks much at all.

**lars573** · 09-11-2008, 23:37

Originally Posted by Sol Invictus

I doubt that Empires will be like Cossacks much at all.

I wouldn't say that. Cossacks got quite a bit right, well the second game anyway.

**Sheogorath** · 09-12-2008, 00:17

Well, perhaps on a basic level, yeah.
I could go with a basic 'musketeer, grenadier, lifeguards, light' format, but I'd hope there would be different subtypes. Perhaps based on more famous regiments. Young, middle and old guards for the French, Lieb Guards, Pavlovsk grenadiers for the Russians, Footguard and Rifles for the Brits, etc. etc.

It'd be nice to see some less well known units as well. Princessa Grenadiers for the Spanish. Terrible uniform (mmm, purple and white), wussy name, some of the most utterly badass men in the Spanish army :P

**Martok** · 09-12-2008, 03:13

An interesting question, Tanaquil. I would hope to see *something* like this, although I admittedly have no idea as to what the best form would be for it to take.

**lars573** · 09-12-2008, 06:14

Originally Posted by Sheogorath

Well, perhaps on a basic level, yeah.
I could go with a basic 'musketeer, grenadier, lifeguards, light' format, but I'd hope there would be different subtypes. Perhaps based on more famous regiments. Young, middle and old guards for the French, Lieb Guards, Pavlovsk grenadiers for the Russians, Footguard and Rifles for the Brits, etc. etc.

Funny thing about Boney's Imperial guard. The titles of old, middle, and young guard are based on timing. That is how long the persons in said unit served Napoleon. Old guard only applied to whole units in the 1st Grenadiers and Chassuers. After that the old, middle, young guards are mixed up. All officers in guard units were titled old guard (IF I'm reading my souce right). The 2nd Grenadiers, Chassuers, and Fusiliers sergents were old guard. The corporals and ranks were middle guard. The 3rd Grenadiers was all middle guard. The young guard were Voltigeurs, Tirailleurs, Flanquers and National Guards. And the National guards (Marie-Louise infantry) were militia units of old men and young boys. And they won't exist until the end of the tech tree/campagin (however CA does the French revolution) anyway. Before the French revolution the household units of the French king are Garde du Corps (who are the decendants of the Scots guard and mounted archer units from Medieval 2), Gardes Françaises, Gardes Suisses, and the royal Musketeers.

But really you can divide infantry into 5 types. Militia (national guards, Yoemanry, landwehr, etc), line infantry, grenadiers, light infantry (although you might be able to split them into formed and irregular types like Cossacks 2 does), household (or guards) units.

A personal hope of mine is that CA includes Russian Streltsy infantry. Imagine Cossack musketeers armed with Bardiche's for musket props. A 16-17th century unit yes, but still around in 1700.

**anders** · 09-12-2008, 07:44

I thought there were two main types of infantry in the era, line infantry and light/skirmishing infantry.

Line troops use formations, fire musket volleys and fixes bayonets. They are the main fighting force of the army.

Light troops screen the line troops in loose formation, using aimed (individual) fire, and avoids melee at all cost.

Any further distinctions, such as guard or grenadier, are just different qualities of line infantry, not separate methods of waging war, although the guard units would be commited only under special circumstances. Even militia operate the same way as line infantry, although their quality in terms of drill, rate of fire and cohesion under fire would be drastically lower.

grenadiers did no longer throw grenades in the period, at least not often, instead using musket and bayonet, but were bigger men, traditionally chosen for being able to throw grenades at longer range.

when that is said, Im pretty sure all european factions will have the following troop choices; light, light w/ rifles, line, grenadier(bigger, stronger, possibly better trained line) and guard.

look at the troop types for NTW, pretty much the same.

**Knight of the Rose** · 09-12-2008, 08:18

I think there will be a rock / scissors / paper system around cannons, cavalry and infantry, and that each category will have slightly different flavors. There will be light cannons and heavy cannons, light cavalry and heavy cavalry, and there will be light infantry and heavy infantry. Specialist units such as "engineers" and sappers. Well, I don't think so.

Just my guesses.

/KotR

**Robespierre** · 09-12-2008, 11:25

Well part of what made cossacks a good game was the paths of development for these infantry types.
Muskets were your basic type, and further research made them cheaper to produce and increased their basic characteristic of withering medium/short range volley fire.
if i remember rightly, the others needed research to start off, were limited by slow and pricey production.

militia could be very basic low quality muskets or lights, wheras Guards could be high quality muskets or assault specialist grenadiers. the basic trio remains in place.

it interests me to see how statically an infantry/artillery force will play. if heavy guns have some manoevrebility then infantry will be very powerful.

**anders** · 09-12-2008, 12:38

good point tanaquil, militias might be both "light" or "line" type troops, typically european militias would probably operate in a line manner, while american frontiersmen or scandinavian farmers and other rural types from rough regions would operate as light.

**PBI** · 09-12-2008, 13:03

Originally Posted by lars573

Funny thing about Boney's Imperial guard. The titles of old, middle, and young guard are based on timing. That is how long the persons in said unit served Napoleon. Old guard only applied to whole units in the 1st Grenadiers and Chassuers. After that the old, middle, young guards are mixed up. All officers in guard units were titled old guard (IF I'm reading my souce right). The 2nd Grenadiers, Chassuers, and Fusiliers sergents were old guard. The corporals and ranks were middle guard. The 3rd Grenadiers was all middle guard. The young guard were Voltigeurs, Tirailleurs, Flanquers and National Guards. And the National guards (Marie-Louise infantry) were militia units of old men and young boys. And they won't exist until the end of the tech tree/campagin (however CA does the French revolution) anyway. Before the French revolution the household units of the French king are Garde du Corps (who are the decendants of the Scots guard and mounted archer units from Medieval 2), Gardes Françaises, Gardes Suisses, and the royal Musketeers.

That raises an interesting question; will we get different unit types depending on the government type? I suppose it would make switching to Republic kind of like the Marian reforms in RTW, for the French at any rate.

**Freedom Onanist** · 09-12-2008, 16:21

Originally Posted by anders

I thought there were two main types of infantry in the era, line infantry and light/skirmishing infantry.

Line troops use formations, fire musket volleys and fixes bayonets. They are the main fighting force of the army.

Light troops screen the line troops in loose formation, using aimed (individual) fire, and avoids melee at all cost.

Any further distinctions, such as guard or grenadier, are just different qualities of line infantry, not separate methods of waging war, although the guard units would be commited only under special circumstances. Even militia operate the same way as line infantry, although their quality in terms of drill, rate of fire and cohesion under fire would be drastically lower.

grenadiers did no longer throw grenades in the period, at least not often, instead using musket and bayonet, but were bigger men, traditionally chosen for being able to throw grenades at longer range.

when that is said, Im pretty sure all european factions will have the following troop choices; light, light w/ rifles, line, grenadier(bigger, stronger, possibly better trained line) and guard.

look at the troop types for NTW, pretty much the same.

I'd agree with you and take your point further. Certainly for the British "guard" was no indication of greater quality (except in the mess costs of their officers) or efficiency over other experienced line infantry.

Given the amount whingeing that goes on demanding this kind of "historical" unit be included and that "historical" I'm sure we will see plenty of unit types.

Also, shouldn't an imperial guard system have its counter point in lowering the usefulness of normal line infantry by depriving them of their best soldiers? It is what happened to the German airforce in WW1 when they formed special fighter "circuses" of their best pilots. Temporary and limited advantage where they are deployed and damaging inferiority where they weren't.

**Robespierre** · 09-12-2008, 19:07

One of the reviews linked somewhere round here claimed that The old paper scissors stone trinity is to be rather altered so that infantry formation is what counts rather than overall unit type. however the types outlined do specialize in formation types: the lights in open skirmish order, the line in hollow square and line, the grenadiers in column. So these basic types would reflect the dynamic of the game.

perhaps government type will directly affect the technologiesand choices of one unit over another. it is easy to imagine monarchies having strong cavalry and professional soldiers, and at the other pole republics doing the conscript mass armies. We will see.