I just recently read about old ancient battles. Basically when armies faced each other they had various strategies how to line up their troups on the battlefield. This also depended on the topography (hills, rivers, bridges, forest etc).
Basically there where light-fast troups and heavy-armored slow troups. Then the troup type (ranged, horseback, infantery with spears or swords)
The cavallery was usually set to the outer flanks, as they needed the open area to operate. The infantery was aligned in long lines, and a certain depth.
Where a deep line is hard to break apart (by storming it), and a narrow line was able to spread out more (using the same number of soliers) and encircle the opponents.
Lightly armored troups where placed in front, as they could move fast and rush-attack the enemy, where heavy armored troups kept in a close formation, thus supporting earch other (less area to attack a single soldier, so a soldier can concentrate at the immediate front)
Without going into detailed tactics: the troup composition and formations by themself already form a topography of the battle that each opponents generals have to dynamically take into account.
In LT there could be specific roles assigned to those troup formation, that the AI then positions on the battlefield, with a specific general order (like move out to the right flank, circle around and attack from the back).
Also its important to know when to do a tactical retreat. If a formation is heavily decimated, and there is space to back-out, the troups should flee and assemble at a predefined retreat location.
To make this controllable for the player (and ai general) there could be few simple command for setting up the stage and control the battle:
assignment: create groups (fast A, fast B, heavy A, ranged A, ranged B, support A), assign ships to groups, (selected ship to ranged B)
staging: fast A -> left flank, fast B-> right flank, heavy A -> center front, ranged A-> center back etc.
Attack: fast A-> circle ant attack back of enemy, heavy A-> close in slowly ....
reform: fast B-> fall back to start position (relative to the center groups)
reatreat: fast B (45% left)-> retreat to assembly point. .. ALL retreat..
Or something like that, using relatively simple commands, and feedback. So the player can be involved in the battle directly while sill have the tools to guide the forces.
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Thu Aug 03, 2017 11:34 pm
#31
Re: Saturday, July 29, 2017
Last edited by Damocles on Fri Aug 04, 2017 12:04 am, edited 1 time in total.