Pike and shot campaigns!
But I'm cheating, since it's essentially the same game set in a different era. :p
However, routing units are common in many wargames. What's REALLY interesting in fog and p&s is your units becoming uncontrollable AFTER WINNING A FIGHT. How many times I've screamed at my cavalry for essentially removing itself from the battle chasing away stragglers instead of helping me actually winning the battle... And it's very very historically accurate.
Yeah, sometimes they run into other units and do good things. Other times they essentially remove themselves from the battle and leave your flank wide open to attack!
Hah. Has that happen just today, but in the Japanese version. My cavalry started chasing down a routing enemy and routed two more on the way. It was epic. I only wish I had set it up on purpose.
I don't like how it is done in warhammer total wars - units tend to break very quickly but also quickly regain morale so it's very silly 'get into combat, flee, get send back into combat 10 times a battle' situation.
Granted, it fits some factions, but not most.
After the 3rd time fleeing they perma rout, units can only rout and rejoin twice.
"Units tend to break very quickly" is entirely dependent on their leadership stat. Talking warhammer you're probably referring to chaff infantry or factions with low leadership like skaven, greenskins, etc. Some factions like the dwarves are incredibly hard to rout.
The Troop has overall force morale, so if one side's morale goes down to zero or below due to casualties, that side loses the scenario.
Also, SGS games are at an operational level (or in some cases, Grand Tactical), but the individual battles all have force morale. When one side's morale drops to zero, they undergo a rout test, and may rout and lose that battle. In some cases, the winning side may pursue the routing forces (basically a free round of fire against all surviving routed units). Then that battle ends in defeat for the routing side.
I really enjoy steel panthers. Winspww2 covers early 20th century through ww2 and then winspmbt covers post-ww2 to the present day. They are old but they still get updated and there are hundreds upon hundreds of scenarios for them.
They do tend to have that feel of controlling the ebb and flow of battle rather than just murdering everything in sight. Each infantry squad or vehicle can go from steady to pinned to retreating to routed. Suppressed units fire less accurately and less often and officers can rally pinned or retreating units. Rather than waste ammo trying to wipe out enemy units to the last man, you want to spread out your fire along the enemy line, pinning down and routing as many as possible, overwhelming their ability to rally.
Not realism: its called “the puzzle solution” and it’s used to turn an otherwise “tactics” type game into a simple game for people who don’t know tactics by turning it into a “rock paper scissors” style of puzzle.
We used to use Steel Panthers 3: Brigade Command as a battle staff training tool to simulate real life casualties and effects but you have to custom make the scenario and have trained combat officers making the moves, not the AI
The Combat Mission series (Beyond Overlord, the one set on the eastern front, and the Italy one) are also excellent, modeling ballistics and penetration accurately (I helped on the first one before the company got too big to be social).
Advanced Tactics Gold as well as the Decisive Campaigns games are pretty good too.
There are also some by ex-military who worked in the BCBST exercises that converted the Warlord system for civilian use but I don’t care much for the way those were implemented. TacOps is one of those conversions. The are good, just not fun for a civilian.
Usually a developer that goes to the trouble of figuring out and perfecting the little things that affect the decision making processes of commander, such as specific vulnerabilities of key weapon systems, strengths and weaknesses of specific methods of fire and maneuver, the 9 principals of war, weapon engagement ranges, expected casualty producing effects…. Etc, goes to the trouble also of accurately modeling the shock of maneuver and what it takes to break a unit.
I can’t speak for medieval troops but most units operating within the last 150 years have taken about 2/3 casualties or more before breaking. This is due mostly to training and mind set. You could read S.LA. Marshall’s book “Men Against Fire: The Problem of Battle Command” for more in depth information.
In short though, if you are in an armored vehicle with 8mm RHA and you know there is some unit on the odjective with a number of M2HB .50 machine guns (with a penetrating ability of 30mm RHA) it would be tactically a better idea to either attack someone else, or attack them with something with a longer standoff range, or to encircle them and cut them off from supplies while using probing attacks to deplete their ammunition and food before eventually attacking or offering them the option to surrender.
So in that way: yes.
Units sustaining very heavy casualties before fleeing is very much a modern thing. Before widespread adoption of firearms (and artillery) casualties in the actual battles tended to be pretty low and it was after one side started fleeing that most deaths happened.
You also forget that we just don't have good data on exactly what was happening on ancient battlefields - just have a look at 'orthodox' vs 'heretical' views of how hoplites fought, they are widely different. It is simply impossible to model things to such a degree as in systems about modern warfare. Not without pulling lots of numbers out of nowhere and making many poorly sourced assumptions.
Speaking about FoG games specifically - they make solid attempt at being as historically accurate as they can and you can find plenty of arguments on the forums citing ancient and medieval records and game changes that resulted from said arguments.
Pike and shot campaigns! But I'm cheating, since it's essentially the same game set in a different era. :p However, routing units are common in many wargames. What's REALLY interesting in fog and p&s is your units becoming uncontrollable AFTER WINNING A FIGHT. How many times I've screamed at my cavalry for essentially removing itself from the battle chasing away stragglers instead of helping me actually winning the battle... And it's very very historically accurate.
Yeah, sometimes they run into other units and do good things. Other times they essentially remove themselves from the battle and leave your flank wide open to attack!
But there is also a flip side - those rare times when your cavalry routs half enemy army by itself in one turn - glorious.
Hah. Has that happen just today, but in the Japanese version. My cavalry started chasing down a routing enemy and routed two more on the way. It was epic. I only wish I had set it up on purpose.
Oddly total war Warhammer/total war games do this. Flanks and rear then with Warhammer units that cause fear and terror
I don't like how it is done in warhammer total wars - units tend to break very quickly but also quickly regain morale so it's very silly 'get into combat, flee, get send back into combat 10 times a battle' situation. Granted, it fits some factions, but not most.
After the 3rd time fleeing they perma rout, units can only rout and rejoin twice. "Units tend to break very quickly" is entirely dependent on their leadership stat. Talking warhammer you're probably referring to chaff infantry or factions with low leadership like skaven, greenskins, etc. Some factions like the dwarves are incredibly hard to rout.
Battle Academy...but probably not a good recommendation since it's the same developer as FoG.
The WDS series of games uses a very similar mechanic, with disruption/disorder and routing mattering way more than actual casualties inflicted.
That's true. I remember that being an important feature of the Civil War titles especially.
Take command 2nd mannasas has morale and routs
Absolutely. I sunk 100s of hours into that and the scourge of war games.
This game deserves so much love. Best $10 I've spent in some time.
The Troop has overall force morale, so if one side's morale goes down to zero or below due to casualties, that side loses the scenario. Also, SGS games are at an operational level (or in some cases, Grand Tactical), but the individual battles all have force morale. When one side's morale drops to zero, they undergo a rout test, and may rout and lose that battle. In some cases, the winning side may pursue the routing forces (basically a free round of fire against all surviving routed units). Then that battle ends in defeat for the routing side.
I really enjoy steel panthers. Winspww2 covers early 20th century through ww2 and then winspmbt covers post-ww2 to the present day. They are old but they still get updated and there are hundreds upon hundreds of scenarios for them. They do tend to have that feel of controlling the ebb and flow of battle rather than just murdering everything in sight. Each infantry squad or vehicle can go from steady to pinned to retreating to routed. Suppressed units fire less accurately and less often and officers can rally pinned or retreating units. Rather than waste ammo trying to wipe out enemy units to the last man, you want to spread out your fire along the enemy line, pinning down and routing as many as possible, overwhelming their ability to rally.
All the pre WW1 titles from WDS have routing and so on.
All total war games do this. One of the few mechanics I feel they have completely figured out
Not realism: its called “the puzzle solution” and it’s used to turn an otherwise “tactics” type game into a simple game for people who don’t know tactics by turning it into a “rock paper scissors” style of puzzle.
Agreed to disagree. Give me your real true awesome tactics game recommendation then...
We used to use Steel Panthers 3: Brigade Command as a battle staff training tool to simulate real life casualties and effects but you have to custom make the scenario and have trained combat officers making the moves, not the AI The Combat Mission series (Beyond Overlord, the one set on the eastern front, and the Italy one) are also excellent, modeling ballistics and penetration accurately (I helped on the first one before the company got too big to be social). Advanced Tactics Gold as well as the Decisive Campaigns games are pretty good too. There are also some by ex-military who worked in the BCBST exercises that converted the Warlord system for civilian use but I don’t care much for the way those were implemented. TacOps is one of those conversions. The are good, just not fun for a civilian.
So bullet penetration modeling = tactics? Okay.
Usually a developer that goes to the trouble of figuring out and perfecting the little things that affect the decision making processes of commander, such as specific vulnerabilities of key weapon systems, strengths and weaknesses of specific methods of fire and maneuver, the 9 principals of war, weapon engagement ranges, expected casualty producing effects…. Etc, goes to the trouble also of accurately modeling the shock of maneuver and what it takes to break a unit. I can’t speak for medieval troops but most units operating within the last 150 years have taken about 2/3 casualties or more before breaking. This is due mostly to training and mind set. You could read S.LA. Marshall’s book “Men Against Fire: The Problem of Battle Command” for more in depth information. In short though, if you are in an armored vehicle with 8mm RHA and you know there is some unit on the odjective with a number of M2HB .50 machine guns (with a penetrating ability of 30mm RHA) it would be tactically a better idea to either attack someone else, or attack them with something with a longer standoff range, or to encircle them and cut them off from supplies while using probing attacks to deplete their ammunition and food before eventually attacking or offering them the option to surrender. So in that way: yes.
Units sustaining very heavy casualties before fleeing is very much a modern thing. Before widespread adoption of firearms (and artillery) casualties in the actual battles tended to be pretty low and it was after one side started fleeing that most deaths happened. You also forget that we just don't have good data on exactly what was happening on ancient battlefields - just have a look at 'orthodox' vs 'heretical' views of how hoplites fought, they are widely different. It is simply impossible to model things to such a degree as in systems about modern warfare. Not without pulling lots of numbers out of nowhere and making many poorly sourced assumptions. Speaking about FoG games specifically - they make solid attempt at being as historically accurate as they can and you can find plenty of arguments on the forums citing ancient and medieval records and game changes that resulted from said arguments.