Actual Formulas for Readiness And Supply

[Altaris]

Tried building the readiness and supply formulas from the manual in Excel, and the results I'm getting back cannot be correct based on what I've seen in game. Would it be possible to get the actual formulas the game uses here?

I'm trying to determine how best to plan my forces and HQs to keep my units at high readiness. I get the general gist of it, but sometimes I've had plummetting Readiness really come back to bite me, and just wanting to figure out the mechanics behind it to plan better in the future.

Also, I'm unclear in what cases a trench level gets reduces. Do lvl 1 and higher arty always reduce trenches by 1 level each time they hit, or is there something else that goes into the equation? It seems like I once tried to use Germany's starting artillery to bombard Verdun, but didn't actually make any headway reducing the trench level (that's a good thing, IMO). Also, do corps attacks reduce entrenchment level, and if so, does it always occur or is there some randomness to it?

[Bill101]

Hi Altaris

A quick answer on your second question for now: level 1 and higher artillery will always de-entrench by 1 per shell fired, as will attacks by infantry Corps.

Detachments, Cavalry, and artillery without upgrades will never de-entrench, so if these are to attack, it is best to use those units that will de-entrench first.

[Altaris]

Thanks for the info, I hadn't realized that Corps could be used to bludgeon through entrenchments.

Regarding the other formulas, I"d be interested to know how they work. Morale in particular is throwing me for a loop. The formula given in the manual can't be right, it would end up with morale dropping about 2/3 each turn. Readiness doesn't look quite right either (it ends up with readiness dropping 50% a turn, but I think I am close to the calculation on it by removing the final /2 from the end). But since morale is one of the key ingredients to readiness, I'm desperately trying to figure out the best way to keep morale as high as possible.

Morale = Old Morale * 75% + (Strength – Old Morale * 75%) * Supply / 10 * Old Morale / 100

Readiness = ((Strength + Command Rating) / 2 + Morale + Combat Morale Bonus) / 2

[Bill101]

There are some other factors that can impact it too:

• If units have operated, forced march, or swapped.
  
• If their HQs are at less than full strength.
  
• If they are being affected by any STRENGTH scripts. For instance, Austro-Hungarian units serving in Russia will suffer minor penalties to their unit morale.

I don't know if any of these could be a factor here?

[Altaris]

No, don't think any of the conditions you've listed would be applicable. HQs are all at full strength. Some of these may have moved during the course of the turn, in which case I would guess that action points somehow factor into the equation?

But what I'm getting at is that morale formula can't be correct. If I take

Morale = Old Morale * 75% + (Strength – Old Morale * 75%) * Supply / 10 * Old Morale / 100

and then plug in Old Morale = 95, Strength = 10, and Supply = 10, the new morale comes out at 13.065. That's obviously not correct, and lowering supply actually makes this value go up. I've tried tinkering with the order of operations in the folder, but I'm still not getting anywhere near what I see in game. In game, it seems like morale is roughly strength times supply (so a 7 str 8 supply unit usually seems to be around 55% morale, while a 10 str 8 supply will usually be around 80%). What's not clear to me is how the old morale factors in, so there seems to be a recovery period when morale drops (say when a severely understrength unit is reinforced to full strength, it takes time for their morale to fully recover).

Similarly, the Readiness formula doesn't work either with the results in game. If you take this formula:

Readiness = ((Strength + Command Rating) / 2 + Morale + Combat Morale Bonus) / 2

and put in Strength = 10, Command Rating = 8, Morale = 90, (I did not put Combat Morale Bonus, as I'm not sure exactly what this value stores) and divide that by 2, it comes out to 49.5. In game, this value seems to be in the 75% territory for those conditions. Most telling to me, the leader command rating in that formula seems to have almost no effect on the final outcome, which hasn't been my experience in game.

Just trying to figure out what the most important elements are in determining readiness and morale. Especially during a sustained offensive, these numbers can drop quickly, and figuring out how to recover them is absolutely crucial to plugging a gap in the lines. I'm fine not knowing the exact numbers, but would be nice to have an idea how the general formula worked and where best to address getting a unit back up to fit.

[Hubert Cater]

Hi Altaris,

Looks like a bit of a typo in the Manual... here are the correct basic formulas.

Morale:

morale / 10 * .75 + (strength - old morale / 10 * .75) * unit.supply / 10 * morale / 100

Readiness:

((strength + HQ Rating) / 2 + morale / 10 + Parent HQ Experience Value) / 2

Hubert

[Altaris]

Yes, that's looking better! Thank you so much!

[Hubert Cater]

No problem

[yoyodyne]

Hello. Could I ask a question just to clarify please? Is there a difference between morale and old morale in this equation? Answers appreciated. Thanks!

[Hubert Cater]

Oops, it should all read as 'old morale' in the formula.