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I have played - and enjoyed - the game quite a lot but I am still unclear about the precise benefit (or penalty) an Army commander brings to the Corps under his command.

Excerpt from the manual: "The Corps commander's Strategic, Offensive and Defensive Ratings are increased
by the expertise of the Army commander."

1) Does it mean that if the offensive rating of a Corps commander is lower than the offensive rating of his Army commander, it increases to the exact same level? In the extreme, would a 1-0-0 Corps commander under a 6-6-6 Army commander get all his ratings bumped up to 6-6-6?

2) Now what happens if any of the ratings of a Corps commander is higher than the corresponding rating of his Army commander?

3) Also from the manual: "The Strategic Rating of an Army commander determines (...) his overall combat power". Again, I don't understand precisely what it means. Are strategic ratings used to compute bonus/penalty during battles?

Any explanation is welcome.

Hello and welcome to the forum.

1) If the corps commander has less stats than their army commanders then there is a chance each turn for their stats to increase. This is not guaranteed, each turn dice are rolled and the results will vary. The highest a stat can be increased is 4.

2) A stat can not be increased higher than the army commanders own stats.

3) The Strategic rating of a commander can influence his allowable frontage - the amount of troops he can have fighting on the field at once. However this only applies if the combat occurs in certain 'open' terrain types. I can't remember all of the 'open' terrains off hand, but I think they are: clear, woods, steppes, and desert.

EDIT: Cardinal Ape beat me to it.

Each full turn that a Corps is attached to an Army (i.e. not the turn you attach it) the Army commander makes a roll to see how much (if any) benefit he will provide to his subordinate Corps commanders. The better his stats, the more likely he will pass a benefit to his commanders, and the higher it is likely to be. (Poor Army commanders CAN pass negative ratings if they have low stats.)

To find out whether and how much a corps is receiving, select the corps stack and look in the bottom right. Above the supply ZOC, etc, there will be a tiny silver diamond marking that this is a corps. Hover over it and a tooltip will pop up telling you what benefit he has received.

These benefits apply to the corp commanders stats. So if it says he receives 1 to his STRAT rating, then that is what he gets, and his ratings when you hover over the commander reflect this bonus.

Specifically,

1) No, it is usually 0, 1 or sometimes 2 in the case of Lee or Grant. -1 is not uncommon in the case of early Union 3 stars, I can't recall having ever seen a -2.

2) This doesn't affect the calculation, only the Army commander matters. (AFAIK.)

3) This is a vague line in the manual that you can mostly just ignore because it is so handwavy and over-simplified that it is meaningless. Most importantly the STRAT rating affects the activity/inactivity roll and a commander's ability to withdraw from a battle if necessary. It also increases the frontage available to his side if it is very high, like a 5 or 6, but that may only be if he is an Army commander and his stack is actually fighting, I can't recall for sure. It affects a couple of other minor things that are not that big of a deal. However increasing the STRAT rating is extremely important so that the subordinate corps can be active more often, dramatically affecting the ability of an Army to function effectively. 3 STRAT commanders are inactive around half the time, 4 STRAT only around a third of the time (it's more complicated than that, but is a good rule of thumb).

The OFF and DEF numbers can in certain cases give all of the Corps commanders and the troops fighting under them +5% to their base chance to hit for each point the rating outnumbers the enemy's opposing rating. This is +5% of the chance to hit, not +5% to the chance to hit (i.e. *1.05, not +.05. If the base chance to hit is 15% you would be at 15.75% not 20%). This is 5% for each full point comparative advantage of the stack commander, the unit commander gives a corresponding 3% bonus but they are not affected by the Army/Corps bonus system. If the enemy still outclasses your combined OFF/DEF ratings you get zero bonus to-hit no matter how good you are and the enemy gets a bonus based on how much better he is than you.

Also, the Corps must be within the Army's command radius to receive this benefit. Higher STRAT Army commanders have a larger command radius.

Cardinal Ape and ArmChairGeneral thank you, this is very useful information.

ArmChairGeneral, you mention an additional 3% bonus that might come from the unit commander - to make it simple, let's call him general Johnson. Would you know if the 3% bonus is also dependent on Johnson's offensive/defensive rating being higher than the enemy's rating? If this is the case, will the game look at the enemy stack commander's rating or the rating of the enemy unit commander that Johnson is facing on the "battlefield" i.e. the commander of the elements that Johnson's own elements are shooting at during a battle?

Simple fact regarding CWII: The more you dig, the deeper it gets.

The 3% bonus is not dependent on having higher stats than the opposition. The bonuses for both sides will always be present, but they may be the same and effectively nullify each other.

If Johnson has an offensive rating of 3, troops in his division will always receive a bonus 9% chance to hit if you are in offensive posture. How hard it is to hit the enemy will depend on their defensive stats.

Do keep in mind that it is possible for both sides in combat to be in offensive posture at the same time. In that case, both sides would use their offensive ratings.

http://www.ageod-forum.com/showthread.php?38273-The-effect-of-leadership-during-combat&highlight=effect+of+command+on+combat+CW2

Actually, the opposing commander's stats can negate each other.

Now I get it - the formula in Gray Fox's past thread explains it all. Thanks again.

I deduced it from the AGEOD Wiki:

http://www.ageod.net/agewiki/Combat_Explained

ArmChairGeneral wrote:
To find out whether and how much a corps is receiving, select the corps stack and look in the bottom right. Above the supply ZOC, etc, there will be a tiny silver diamond marking that this is a corps. Hover over it and a tooltip will pop up telling you what benefit he has received.

Hmm...I can't seem to get that tooltip. Whenever I hover over the silver diamond I get the normal stack information, nothing on changes, and I know for a fact that my Commander's stats are being changed...I wonder what I'm doing wrong.

This is what it's supposed to look like:

[ATTACH]39100[/ATTACH]

Gray Fox wrote:This is what it's supposed to look like:

[ATTACH]39100[/ATTACH]

I think I know what I'm doing wrong. I'll check when I get home and play tonight.

Btw, you're army is very much out of its jurisdiction!

Yeah, I just tossed that together for the snapshot. I don't even think I have a Union army in LA.