Running away!

[HarryInk]

Played a nifty 1000pt TH battle with Woodman. He kicked my A in a very workman like way such that after losing most of a village and seeing my flanking counterattack get punched out by a very tough little Greyhound (an AFV which is gaining my respect), I dropped smoke on no man's land and ran my troops for my edge of the board. About 15 poor buggers were suppressed and stuck on the map with the various carcasses. So...what's my question?

Does withdrawing troops safely off the map affect victory points/outcome @ the end of the day, or am I just indulging a little conceit of mine about being able to run away to fight again another day?

[K Jonsson]

Originally posted by HarryInk:

Does withdrawing troops safely off the map affect victory points/outcome @ the end of the day, or am I just indulging a little conceit of mine about being able to run away to fight again another day?

Yes! And no!

If you leave the map then those troops can't be killed or captured by your opponent. So if you are sure you would have lost them it helps to run them off the map because your opponent won't get any points for them.

But if they stay and survive the effect on your points is the same. You should also remember that running them offmap lowers your global morale (unless they are meant to exit), getting you closer to the dreaded autosurrender.

Hope that answered your question?

/Kristian

[Cameroon]

Originally posted by K Jonsson:

[snip]

You should also remember that running them offmap lowers your global morale (unless they are meant to exit), getting you closer to the dreaded autosurrender.

Hope that answered your question?

/Kristian

Actually, even if you are supposed to exit them for points it lowers your global morale.

[Caesar]

Slightly off topic here, but how do you use the withdrawl command successfully. I tried to use it to get my men to back off in an orderly fashion (hopefully with covering fire) and instead they just bugged out, got panicked by some incoming fire and kept on going. Is it supposed to be used as a 'flee screaming, the big bad monster is coming' command or as a 'withdraw in an orderly manner' type command. Did I just have bad luck or is it just the same as giving a run command in the opposite direction

[ryddle]

Caesar, I believe you hit the nail on the head with your 'flee screaming...'. There is a much greater chance that a unit will poop in its collective pants on a withdrawl and you end up with a PANIC or something. I'll use it when I see a spotting round come in on my supposedly hidden reserve platoon... get the heck out before the rest of the arty arrives.

fwiw,

-r

[Redwolf]

Originally posted by Caesar:

Slightly off topic here, but how do you use the withdrawl command successfully. I tried to use it to get my men to back off in an orderly fashion (hopefully with covering fire) and instead they just bugged out, got panicked by some incoming fire and kept on going. Is it supposed to be used as a 'flee screaming, the big bad monster is coming' command or as a 'withdraw in an orderly manner' type command. Did I just have bad luck or is it just the same as giving a run command in the opposite direction

The morale drop is intentional.

I would like that feature, but I don't really like how much influence global morale has. From mid-game on the command behaves differently.

[Dirtweasle]

RW you said;

From mid-game on the command behaves differently...

I think you must have meant something like the effect of having X number of squads suffer a moral check later in the game could be a problem for some. As far as I can tell there is no different behavior to the feature at differnet times in the game.

One thing to note is that with the editor you can set the map sides to allow using this command to other than straight back. In auto-generated maps this is not possible and nota problem. But it can have play balance implications with designed scenarios if you take advantage of it. It is an advantge to one player to be able to use the withdraw command side to side.

[Redwolf]

Originally posted by Dirtweasle:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />From mid-game on the command behaves differently...

I think you must have meant something like the effect of having X number of squads suffer a moral check later in the game could be a problem for some. As far as I can tell there is no different behavior to the feature at differnet times in the game.

</font>

[CombinedArms]

Originally posted by redwolf:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Dirtweasle:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />From mid-game on the command behaves differently...

I think you must have meant something like the effect of having X number of squads suffer a moral check later in the game could be a problem for some. As far as I can tell there is no different behavior to the feature at differnet times in the game.

</font>

[CombinedArms]

Oops. Double post.

[ July 08, 2002, 12:33 PM: Message edited by: CombinedArms ]

[Redwolf]

Originally posted by CombinedArms:

If I'm reading various tests I've run and other evidence correctly, panicked or broken troops have no effect on global morale. The only influence on those numbers are killed or exited troops. So you don't need to worry about lowering your global morale by withdrawing troops (unless you withdraw them off the board.) Anyone have confirming or contradicting info?

I agree on all this, but meant something else.

What I meant is at the beginning of the game you are free to use the withdrawl command without fear of getting the withdrawn units paniced. With lower global morale, these squads will be paniced more easily, too easily for my taste, although your are right that global morale does not sink by doing this.

[CombinedArms]

Is it true that units will panic more easily if global moral goes down? I hadn't realized this. Would be interested in seeing confirmation. If true, it's not totally illogical, but I haven't observed it.

[xerxes]

I was unaware of the global morale effect on withdrawing but it makes great sense. If your troops are alreay shaky, doing a withdraw (i.e bug out) it makes perfectly good sense that they are just going to keep running in some cases.

[Redwolf]

I don't say it doesn't make sense.

I say the effect is too big, it effectivly prevents you to use "withdrawl" from mid-game on. Preventing withdrawl this way makes no sense.

[MrSpkr]

Originally posted by redwolf:

I don't say it doesn't make sense.

I say the effect is too big, it effectivly prevents you to use "withdrawl" from mid-game on. Preventing withdrawl this way makes no sense.

This is just a SWAG on my part, but I would guess that the increased likelihood of panic when your global morale is already down is based in part on the perfectly logical explanation that psychologically, a squad told to beat feet early in the battle is more likely to keep their cool and view the withdrawal as a sensible tactical manuever than a squad that has already seen several minutes of death and destruction or experienced some heavy fighting -- they would probably view the 'run like heck' command as 'omigosh we are about to be overrun - run for your lives'.

Or somefink.

Steve

[Dirtweasle]

Steve said -

...the perfectly logical explanation that psychologically, a squad told to beat feet early in the battle is more likely to keep their cool and view the withdrawal as a sensible tactical manuever.

I agree with that, it makes quite a bit of sense. Good point.

[ July 08, 2002, 02:43 PM: Message edited by: Dirtweasle ]

[xerxes]

I couldn't disagree more redwolf. The withdrawal command is far too powerful as it is. A good defender can use withdraw to create murderous, perfectly formed, instant action lines of defense. I really hope BTS tones it down in CMBB.

[Redwolf]

Originally posted by xerxes:

I couldn't disagree more redwolf. The withdrawal command is far too powerful as it is. A good defender can use withdraw to create murderous, perfectly formed, instant action lines of defense. I really hope BTS tones it down in CMBB.

That would actually be fine by me, as long as it doesn't get drastically different over time. I think people don't understand what my point is.

Let's say we start at 2/3 of what it is now, but never fall below 1/2 (which we do with low global morale).

[Dirtweasle]

I think your point is that the further in the game you are your global moral has the potential to be low. This low moral is somehow translated to squad moral, (which BTW I'm not sure is accurate). That when you use the WITHDRAW command the squad takes a moral check, and if failing becomes paniced (sp?) Therefore, the utility of the command feature is less later in the game and can acually be dangerous to use later, because of the reasoning above.

Pretty close?

[Caesar]

I couldn't disagree more redwolf. The withdrawal command is far too powerful as it is. A good defender can use withdraw to create murderous, perfectly formed, instant action lines of defense. I really hope BTS tones it down in CMBB

Why is it so powerful? Is the withdraw command faster than the run? Could you elaborate a bit on this - I truly suck at the art of fighting retreats. I think I am going to have to break out my manual to get an explanation of this command. I had presumed that it would have provided an abstracted orderly covered withdrawl.

BTW on the morale side of things, every type of wargame I have ever played that modelled morale has penalised nearby units for other units retreat. This does seem logical especially if this command is a high speed bug out.

[xerxes]

Caesar:

The huge benefit of withdraw is that it starts immediately with no delay. Particularly with lower quality troops this is critical for getting out of a position that is about to be subject to massed fire. Because you can control where they are moving to, you can use the withdraw to move an entire platoon from one set of defensive positions to a fallback position with zero delay.

Once you are taking heavy fire it is quite easy for your unit to just break when given a withdraw command.

The attacker, on the other hand, has to use fast/move/sneak which are all delayed commands. So basically, as a defender you have access to an immediate response that the attacker can't match. As a defender in closed terrain, you have much more mobility than the attacker.

The key is to use if BEFORE you are under any significant fire.

For example, you have a platoon in cover and it ambushes an advancing 1/2 squad eliminating it. At the end of the turn your platoon has LOS to a squad that is following the scout and you have sound contacts for 3 more "?" squads. This is the turn to withdraw to your next set of positions. The attacker knows where you are and will move to engage you with his superior force. If you try to use "run" you may very well already have a squad or two pinned by the time your "run" starts. (note: a good attacker will have plotted sneak/move over your positions and will adjust as necessary to keep the attack tempo up once he has a target). The net result then is that 1 or 2 squads escape leaving 1 or 2 under fire against a significantly superior force. This is a disaster for you.

If, on the other hand, you withdraw, you can often get all of your squads out with very minimal losses. Then the attacker has to advance again against unknown defensive positions. If he scouts, you kill his scouts. Basically, withdrawing allows you to whittle down his scouts while avoiding the knockblow the attacker is trying to land. The attacker then is faced with advancing a large amount of his force blindly which can have disasterous consequences for him.

[Ron]

The effects of Global Morale are pretty subtle and don't kick in until it has reached around 30%, as remarked upon by Moon a few weeks ago. I believe it was also mentioned that has been reworked for CMBB, ie a more realistic representation upwards. I think you would be hard pressed to notice any discernible change before that. Personally I have only noticed a difference when trying to press home an attack, the squads being a little more fragile when the Global Morale starts dropping below 30-40%, though at that point you have been hit pretty hard already. It would stand to reason however that would have an added morale effect also when using the Withdraw command.

Regardless, and as noted above, the time to use Withdraw safely is before your troops are taking fire, any fire. Whether your overall morale is 100% or 50%, if your troops are taking fire when withdrawing you will suffer the consequences,ie Pinned/Panic/Routed. While the *realistic* implementation of Withdraw in CM is open to debate, I don't think it is overly powerful, just a useful tool at times. You will only have a narrow zone to retreat back to and if the Attacker is competent he will be suppressing that area with arty anyway in conjunction with his infantry attack, withdrawing in that circumstance will actually make the Attacker's job easier. I guess it all comes down to timing and the situation, stay long enough to get the Attacker to commit but get out before the hammer falls. I usually find it is better to stay and fight in most cases, unless I have a more elaborate plan or enemy arty is simply prep firing alone. For what it's worth.

Ron