problem with artillery?

[Jawbreaker]

ok, this is rather anoying when playing a land battle. First I would like to say, very good game, it has alot of potential... but quite a few problems.

I have a normal battle line, and my artillery is setup in between my units, so they dont mow down my own guys.

heres the problem, my cannons dont open up on the enemy until they are nearly on top of me, my infantry starts shooting first before my artillery does. Even when I tell them to fire on the unit, they do shoot. but the shots always fall way short of what they should.

Arent cannons supposed to have a longer range than regular infantry? I mean crap, I dont even see the need for artillery in this game yet, because whats the use if they cant fire on the enemy when they are still approaching? im better off just getting more infantry and winning that way.

Secondly, is there any way to increase the size of my units? instead of just having 60 guys can I increase it to around 100? this would be nice so it actually fits the historical aspect of the era.

Thirdly, I find it quite anoying when im in the middle of a huge battle, and my infantry units start wheeling left and or right w/o my orders, leaving wide gaps in my battle lines which are immediately vulnerable to the enemy cavalry to come trotting through and destroy any artillery I have.

Also, just a question, why do the territories in the campaign mode only allow three army's at a time? This is one reason why the battles dont feel really that big.

Like I said, this game is a fun game, and has alot of potential, but it really needs to have these errors fixed. It would be nice to have my artillery be able to start firing on the enemy before my infantry does, to have greater numbers of men, and to have my men be able to Hold Formation, or hold ground or somethign, so they dont start wheeling like that.

Anyway, thnx for the time. Sorry if I sounded harsh in any of this :)

[Silent_Scope]

Artillary shoots but it takes time for them to lock on to the men and get decent hits in. I use artillary as supressers and then feint a cav attack forcing their infantry into squares and pounding them again with artillary.

[OGGleep]

Unit sizes are fixed. This issue has been discussed in numerous threads, do a search to get into the discussions.

The limit is 3 Commanders per territory. Your right, at the basic level, the battles are pretty small. But when you start getting Generals, 15 units and you got yourself a battle. Because there is no pause command, thats plenty of units to keep your self busy imho.

Artillary is a big dissapointment. When your in the early stages, a huge chunk of the enemy is made up of melee type units. Unless you want to sacrafice huge numbers of your men, cannons become useless very quickly. When you get more ranged enemy on the field, they start to become more useful.

They are especially useful for making your enemy come to you. I don't know if this is a flaw in the AI....but when you have enemy soldiers in well defended positions, and you start nailing them with Artillary, they quickly abandon their position and advance. This is a especially useful tactic if you have better artillary then they do. 12 pounders can attack outside howitzer and 6 pound range, so even if they are dug in with artillary support, you can save a lot of lives with 12 pounders.

As far as timing goes, I really don't have your problem. If you hit V you can see that artillary has a much greater range then rifles do. Your stanard Genadier has a 60 range, while the 12 pounder has 120 (if memory serves). Thats twice the distance. Also, your artillary can still hit troops out of range. I think the Max range is actually the maximum effective range.....that your guarenteed to hit. You can select a target out of range and your Artillary will fire at them regarless if they can hit them or not. If your relying on the AI to handle your targeting then ya maybe there is a problem, but I never let the AI handle my artillary.

As for wheeling.....if your troops are targeting an enemy unit, they will keep that unit in front of them. So if the enemy unit moves to its flank, it will wheel to keep firing at it. If you micro manage, you can avoid this most of the time by switching targets.

I would like to see the range of cannons increased, because it only takes 4 or so shots for an enemy to go from maximum range and into melee. Once this happens cannons are useless. Even less so for calvary.

[Sotos]

The first period artillery cannons are a dissappointment

but when you upgrade to 12pound cannons and more they are a lot more effective and with better range than you think

also it would be better to position your artillery in a strategic position (like hills etc) to be more effective and have a better maximum range and not close behind your troops in the same land level

[Cro_Knight]

if u look at the land scap where u were firing u probably would see a bump or small hill right in front of the cannons fire so it looked like it was not going far but actually since the cannon is flat shot then the solutuion is move your front line elsewhere or atleast your cannons