I have a question regarding command points (CP) and the 50% out of command penalty. My understanding is that a stack that is neither an Army nor a Corps (i.e., an "independent" stack) suffers a 50% reduction in CP provided by leaders. This is described on page 38 under the heading "Out-of-Command Chain Penalty – Important." This seems simple enough and I am familiar with it from other games such as CW2. However, I don’t see this penalty being applied in this game.
Take Prussia at the beginning of the Grand Campaign in August 1805. On starting the game, the player is told Prussia starts with 1 army and zero Corps. Therefore, I am expected to see the 50% penalty applied to all Prussian stacks with the exception of the single army corps. But this is not what I see.
Consider the stack that starts in Magdeburg, the VI. Armeekorps Westfalen. This stack has a single two star general (Blucher, [4-4-3]). So before applying any penalty, this leader provides 12 CP. However, it is not a Corps nor an army (the single army is in Berlin), so it is an independent stack, so it has the 50% penalty, so Blucher only provides 6 CP. But the tooltip shows a total of 14 provided command! How is this possible?
I understand being part of the chain of command can provide additional CP, but this stack is NOT part of the chain of command so that can’t explain it.
I see the stack includes some sort of “HQ” unit. I am unable to find any information about these units. Removing it from the stack reduces provided CP by 2 points to a total of 12. Which is equal to the CP provided by the leader without any penalty being applied.
Can anyone please explain what I am missing?