Offensive Fire, Defensive Fire

[McNaughton]

From what I gather, Offensive and Defensive fire represents a "to hit" chance. For every factor, there is a +5% to hit chance against a target (10 = +50%). This is factored against terrain and unit protection I figure.

However, one thing boggles me. The description says factors between 0 and 10 are to be used here (+0% to +50%), but many units have greater than 10 (Columbiad CSA Artillery gets 28 Defensive Fire, or +140% change to hit). Assault, which works under the same premise (chance to hit assaulting) have ranges of just 0-10 (nothing above 10).

Can factors breech this range (0-10)?

Here's my obeservations.

Infantry, range from 15-20 Chance per hit defensively (+75-100%)
9-11 Chance per hit offensively (45-55%)

Artillery, range from 20-25 per hit defensively (100-125%)
15-24 per hit offensively (75-120%)

Another interesting thing are sharpshooters
12 Defensive (60%)
7 Offensive (35%)

Cavalry has (on average) 9 for offensive and defensive fire (45%)

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Artillery, which has an average of +100% chance to hit, also has a range of 6 (at lowest). This means it will hit virtually every time against opponents (unless terrain and other factors increase a unit's protection).

Infantry, which has about a +50% chance to hit attacking, but much greater defending, has a range of 3 (on average). Compared to artillery, which has twice the range, also twice the hitting chance, means that most ranged casualties will be from long ranged artillery fire. Although, I believe that frontage issues, initiative, and hits serve to make infantry tougher than artillery (20 hits vs 6 hits).

For assault, Infantry has the edge, with +50% chance to hit, with artillery being +25% (although artillery assault physical damage is 3, while infantry is 2).

Cavalry, not only has a poor chance to hit at ranged, and has no better than infantry in assault, also deals significantly less physical damage (1 at both ranged and assault), and cohesion damage.

Sharpshooters, it appears, are designed to be built solely for the sharpshooter ability. While they are scaled to represent historic sharpshooter battalions (half the firepower of a regiment), their chance to hit is minimal (even with sharps and whitworth rifles, and significant rifle training and experience).

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Questions I have, if anyone has the answers...

1) How accurate was artillery (rifled and smoothbore) compared to rifled musketry at 'optimum' firing ranges? Since you have 1000 men in an infantry regiment, and 6 guns in a battery (about 170 rifles per artillery gun), would mass numbers affect chance to hit of a unit? (i.e., would 170 men with single shot rifles have the same ability to kill the same number of men as 1 artillery unit firing various projectiles?).

2) What were the ratios of casualties based on weaponry? In an 'average' battle, what % were caused by infantry firearms vs artillery? (I know that some battles, like Shiloh, were so close as to mitigate the use of artillery and might spoil the results).

3) Did assaults 'kill' or 'route' enemy forces on average? (Here I am thinking of the difference between chesion losses vs manpower losses).

4) How close were assaults on average? Were they point blank firing range, or bayonette range?

*Hits per infantry unit are 50 men, hits per artillery unit are 25 men.

**Artillery and Infantry make 2 damage hits per successful attack, meaning 100 men in an Infantry regiment, and 50 men in an artillery battery are lost.

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At this point, I am unsure as to wether or not to downgrade artillery offensive and defensive fire to match closer to that of an infantry regiment in the mod I am developing, or if other game factors, or historic factors, warrant an increased chance to hit by an artillery battery vs. an infantry reigment during ranged combat.

[McNaughton]

I have found that Rifles of the era tended to have about 50% accuracy at 300 yards (basic range in AACW), so it appears that they are correctly modeled for their maximum effective range (at least attacking, defending they have 75-100%).

I haven't been able to find any information regarding artillery accuracy though.

[PBBoeye]

Added question: why do any leader units have an offensive or defensive firepower? A Colt .45 does not a firepower make on that scale.

[McNaughton]

Added question: why do any leader units have an offensive or defensive firepower? A Colt .45 does not a firepower make on that scale.

Well, when you look at any possible damage done it is zero. It may be there for a gameplay reason (same as to why other support units have some offensive and/or defensive to hit ratings).

[Jagger]

Here is the best explanation of the combat process that I have seen.

http://www.ageod-forum.com/showthread.php?t=1024

Note there are many factors which will reduce the effectiveness of fire.

Note the base hit percentage is 4% rather than 5% in BOA. I don't know if it was increased to 5% in ACW. Also cohesion now has an impact on combat resolution which was not used in BOA.

Here is a short but incomplete discussion on the addition of cohesion to the process.

http://www.ageod-forum.com/showthread.php?t=4971



Can factors breech this range (0-10)?


I believe it can.

Infantry, which has about a +50% chance to hit attacking, but much greater defending, has a range of 3 (on average). Compared to artillery, which has twice the range, also twice the hitting chance, means that most ranged casualties will be from long ranged artillery fire. Although, I believe that frontage issues, initiative, and hits serve to make infantry tougher than artillery (20 hits vs 6 hits).

For assault, Infantry has the edge, with +50% chance to hit, with artillery being +25% (although artillery assault physical damage is 3, while infantry is 2).


Weather and terrain will both adjust the longest range available in a battle.

I personally think artillery should have higher assault values and have an artillery mod which has higher assault values.

Artillery only produced mass casualties at cannister range which is basically the same range as infantry fire. But the unit models do not give you the capability to adjust fire effectiveness by range except between normal fire and assault combat. Assault combat is at 0 range. Which is one reason, I think artillery should have higher assault values but balanced with lower TQ values. As TQ must be passed before an assault can occur.

Also cohesion hits are very important in determining when a unit routs out of the battle. IMO, artillery should inflict more cohesion damage than actual casualties until cannister range. Unfortunately, it is not possible to actually model cannister range except by using the assault value which is at too short a range. So a compromise.

[Jagger]

I have found that Rifles of the era tended to have about 50% accuracy at 300 yards (basic range in AACW), so it appears that they are correctly modeled for their maximum effective range (at least attacking, defending they have 75-100%).

I haven't been able to find any information regarding artillery accuracy though.

Rifles might have an accuracy of 50% at 300 yards in non-battle circumstances but much, much less during actual combat. Accuracy goes way down when someone is firing back at you.

When you have the opportunity, you may want to look at terrain and ground conditions factors and their effect on combat. They can have a significant impact.

[McNaughton]

After much searching I think I have found that I do like the existing AGEOD AACW ratings for accuracy in scoring a hit for Infantry. In lieu of terrain/weather effects, it gives rifle equipped infantry about a 50% chance of successfully scoring a hit on the attack (75-100% while defending). I may decrease defending slightly, as regardless of anything, you cannot get above and beyond target shooting accuracy (which at maximum effective range was about 50%). In reality, accuracy will be much reduced given that terrain will always affect it, and weather and other factors will come into play as well.

Artillery, however, is another factor. I have read that a Civil War Infantry Regiment was comparable to that of a Civil War artillery Battery, based on potentially determining who will be a victor in an engagement scenario. Rifled muskets exceeded the range of cannister, meaning that Infantry could finally engage artillery (and hopefully suppress them) before they got within cannister range. Indeed, artillery was less 'effective' in this role during the Civil War than it was during the War of 1812 (just finished reading a few chapters which talked about cannister, but even there it didn't totally decimate). I have also read up on many civil war engagements where artillery crews were decimiated to the point that they called upon infantry to man guns.

So, my changes will probably be...

Infantry
- Reduce Defensive accuracy
- Late war models add some protection (representing loser formations)
- Decrease Conscript initiative (trained artillery should have equal or greater initiative than untrained infantry)
- Decrease offensive and defensive accuracy of elite infantry (elite tended to weather more fire and route an enemy over outshooting them)
- Increased cohesion damage done during assault phase of elite infantry
- CS Conscripts will use Smoothbore Muskets (range 2, but can use buckshot so higher assault values).

*Splitting weaponry between two classes. Springfield rifles (range of 3) and Enfield and Lorenz rifles (range of 4). From all accounts, Springfield rifles fired a shorter maximum effective range than Lorenz and Enfield, but was desirable due to interchanging parts (plus early batches of Enfield and Lorenz were of mixed quality). Currently the system has early units with a range of 3, with late units using a range of 4 (I plan to have 3 and 4 range rifles used throughout, but early Enfields and Lorenz will suffer from decreased reliability (similar to how the Parrot gun is modified).

Artillery
- Reduce Offensive and Defensive accuracy
- Have 6 gun Federal Batteries and 4 gun Confederate Batteries (CS gun batterys have 2/3 the killing power of a US gun battery, also 2/3 the cost)
- Increase number of hits to 8/12 (each gun can take 2 hits, most hits killed crew)
- Lower CS Offensive and Defensive accuracy to a greater extent (representing poor quality fuses and powder)
- Smoothbores increase Assault and Assault Damage (physical and cohesion)
- Smoothbores reduced initiative (represent being outshot by rifled guns)
- US inititaive greater than CS initiative

Sharpshooters
- Increase offensive and defensive accuracy
- Add SKIRMISHER trait (in effect, they were primarily used as skirmishers)
- Reduce the number players can build drastically (very few 'sharpshooter' battalions were fielded)
- Create a US Sharpshooter Regiment (2x the size and power of a sharpshooter battalion) representing the 1st and 2nd US Sharpshooter Regiments (I have tested this formation, it has a power value of 40!).
- US Sharpshooters have a rate of fire of 4 (representing sharps rifles)
- CS Sharpshooters have a range of 5 and greater accuracy (representing whitworth rifles)

Cavalry
- Primarily increase rate of fire of US cavalry to 4 (representing Sharps carbines) but reduced range to 2
- CS Cavalry retains a mix of weapons, but has greater assault value representing a close combat cavalry doctrine employed by most units (primary ranged weapon will be a Enfield Carbine, later utilizing captured Sharps rifles).

Militia
- Split between two classes, State Militia (seen as local units raised for specific town service) and State Troops (Currently called Volunteers, seen as forces raised but deployed outside of their locality but generally within the state). State Troops are close to Conscripts in ability (slight improvements over the current unit).
- CS State Troops all use Smoothbore Muskets (range 2, low accuracy).
- US State Troops use a mix of Smoothbores and Springfields
- Greater use of 'Militia Brigades' of more than one unit (currently a lot of scenarios model 'Militia/State Troop Brigades' as a single militia regiment).

[Pocus]

The firer value can go far above 10 yes. See

cbtHitCoef = 125 // is the % chance, in 1/100 (meaning 1.25% here) to hit the enemy, for each final firepower point.

In the combat.opt file

So an element with 10 to offfensive fire has 12.5% to hit. But this is modified by a ton of factors thereafter. With the right conditions, your 12.5% can be 30% in the end.

[PBBoeye]

Ideally I'd like to see the grapeshot effectiveness at Range = 1, and absolutely no value at Range = 0 (I recognize that we can't have decreasing or increasing values based on range). Mainly that Range = 0, to me, means assault on the level of hand-to-hand combat, at which point most crew are dead, engaged with the enemy, or 1/4 mile behind their own lines. The infantry has to be able to close and get out from under the firing arc of the guns, making infantry support for artillery very important.

McNaughton, I especially like your ideas for Conscripts and Militia.

[PhilThib]

At range 0, the offensive / defensive fire values are no longer used during combat reslution.

We use the Assault value instead...so it's rather easy to set it to 0, if justified (i would rather set it for a lower value, but not zero, the guys can still fire one or two shots at point blank! )