Pre-battle orders/formations were very popular requested features.
Does that mean the numbers to assign had to be removed? No. For just that the sliders are the problem, not the previous system.
Siege pre-battle formations possibility already proved, the sliders aren't the criteria to make these happen.
"Formations would be a mishmash of troops and it's not possible to represent that with sliders." Exactly. It isn't possible with sliders. Once again, slides are the problem, not the previous system. But It's possible to form them up the way they should based on what the player DID assign the troops into previously before battles.
Of course there are downsides to the old system. It defenitly had and has lackings if it was to be reimplemented. You cannot freely switch out troops between formations where you can do that for rough troop types with the slider system. But, to begin with, which player would intentionally assign missmatching troops in same formation?
Yes I am aware there is more than 8 potential troop types. Aka. 1 Shieldless infantry aka shocktroops. 2. Spear only. 3. Spear with shields. 4. Shield infantry without spears. 5. Skirmishers with shield. 6 Skirmishers without shields. 7 Cavalry heavy. 8 Cavalry light. 9 Cavalry skirmishers.
10. Horse archers. 11. Archers. 12. Crossbowmen. 13 Rangeds with a shield. Maybe I missed some more formations? Yes Thats too many Formations. But that applies to the new system aswell. You've got to make cuts and mix some at least. With the old system, the player could pick more detailed WHICH would be mixed. Example: Archers with pikemen. So archers are slightly better protected or pay back cavalry charging into them. That is ENTIRELY impossible in the new system, unless you transfer pikemen from a pike only formation into the archers by the transfer troops order. But thats just as possible in the old system, but easier to pre-setup for such scenarios. Also doing that through the ingame transfer system to begin with, leaves one formation empty and basicly wasted. So why not given an OPTION to mix diffrent troop types at least? Some players WANT to mix them. So let them. And thats just impossible in the new system, so another positive point for the old.
Most players wouldn't use both, archers and crossbowmen, unless somoene is just running wild recrutiung anything. Usually those "recruit everything" players don't even try to fiddle around with battle orders to begin with and just give simple engage charge or hold here orders depending on formations. The casual player isn't interested in in depth details anyway. So thats often more formations cut again.
Yes. Yes.. More formations to cut? You aren't going to make a dedicated formation for some 5 skirmishers that any party brings along if you form an army with 4 clan parties and 4 other kingdom member parties. You will still focus around your own units, so quit taking that as an argument "there can be random units in the battle". Have them default to "Infantry, Ranged, Cavalry melee, Cavalry ranged" where throwing weapons count into melee as default. Make these defaults moveable. Let me have my default melee cavalry at 7 not at 3 and everything is fine, as an example. It won't screw any of my dedicated formations for certain unit types if I personally can avoid placing random troops there. Of course. Real life works diffrently. These would be assigned in their own setups and split into not just 8 groups but rather split into 3 cavalry squads 3 skirmishers 3 crossbowmen 3 archers 3.... or even more than just 3. You cannot represent a real life battle in a game anyway. But let the player have most control over their formations.
OK. Another elephant in the room. "potentially 200+ dropdown menus for every single troop or unit type". Yep. Which player has it scattered like that in their own party? None. You'd need to deliberately TRY to have every single unit once to even make that possible. A player with an idea about the game, which this is aimed for, doesn't have 200 diffrent troops. You probably have at most 2 diffrent lines of horse archers, cavalry, foot rangeds, some shielded line. And even if you have more, you'll just put all the shielded in the same formation. Its entirely in the players control. So where was the problem with that? I cannot see that problem. To me the problem is that the developers insisted at having these damn sliders to change formations prior to battle without an extra menu if anyone would ask me. Again. Have a slot customizable default formation for all units that are unassigned. Aka all my infantry goes in formation ...5 if i don't assign them. I had the option to assign them, I didnt. I was too lazy to check.
And now the mammoth for this system..... Reinforcments. Haaah.... Where should I start? "Now one way to overcome that is locking eachs formations troop type...." - "but we didn't want to restrict the player to these pre selections" Yeah. It wouldn't be a pre locked restriction if you can pick the formations that these are pre locked to instead of making them static at 1 2 3 4 in the first place.
Currently thats still the case. The restriction is still here. Because of the reinforcment system. Example for this... A battle 2000 vs 2000 units, 500 each side simultanosly could only be on field. I as the player i am like.. Yeah nice i can pre adjust them where i want to have them! I will have cavalry at slot 1 and 2 for both flanks, 3 and 4 are my infantry one of them skirmishers, remainigns are filled diffrently. Ok. The first 400 units die of those 1000 on field, 200 of those are from the player, 200 new units spawn, "uhh this isnt looking too good lets command my cavalry to this posit... Why the FRICK is there infantry in my first cavalry formation!?! HUH Theres archers in my second cavalry formations?!! Why are there cavalry in my infnatry formation 3!? EHH Horses archers in my fourth infantry formation!?! You are still Pre-restricted to keep first formation to infantry, second to ranged, third to cavalry and fourth to horse archers. The fricking reinforcment spawns, get put into DEFAULT formations for that troop type! EXACKTLY what they meant to avoid?! Why does THIS happen then in large scale battles? Any explanation? The new system ONLY registers units that are spawned at battle start. It doesn't check anything that the player customized for reinforcements. At least thats how it is for me. This ruins the whole battle order and tactics you can kick out of the window again and retaliate to a 0 -> F1 -> F3 because you cannot keep your formations the way you want them anway past the first reinforcment spawn. Is there a way to prevent that? I'd gladly like to know. For the old system, the unit types simply spawned where they should and were meant to or set to. Formation 5 6 7 and 8 wouldn't be empty at the end of battle just because nothing spawned into them. They were only empty becaus the player himself didn't prepare it previously which is the players own fault then.
Also reinforcments now spawning one by one, taking the new system as example, reinforcements spawn, and the game can check the formations once... and simply assign the unit to the formation where most "equal" troops are in. If theres 2 formations with only this kind of shielded infantry, put in formation with less units. That way formations would stay balanced in size aswell, not suddenly the latter 5 6 7 and 8 turning empty either(I have no idea how much processing power that would take so I won't know if thats a restricting factor). Default shielded skirmshers and shielded melee only infantry as same category. At least make them a own category. I dont want my line breakers to spawn into my shield wall. They are free arrow food before they achieve anything. The current system just throws every single infantry without a ranged weapon in the same formation 1 regardless if the first slot is filled with cavalry. It just doesn't care. At least my game does that, is that a bug? Anyone else has that problem?
And now how about one ridicolously easy fix to whoever complains about the new system or the old system: Make a menu option which would be prefered which can be only changed on main menu screen? Just like picking legacy layout or newer default as battle orders? Like whatever you pick, the datas linked to the other will simply get ignored so the player sees what the want in the game. The old system didn't need to be deleted, but could have been simply hidden behind an option that is changeable, defaulting to the new system. Noone could complain, neither the "newies" nor the "oldies". It's their own decision what they'd use. Like, its as simple as that. Also to me myself it's not a problem to have any drop down menus, maybe others do? who knows. I personally see no issue with opening 500 drop down menu's just to pick formations for each unit type. I'll only do that ONCE for the entire campaign anyway. I'll gladly use that time to then battle without a second thought with units exacktly spawning into the formations I want them to be, not the system restricting me for them to be in. I bet I am not alone on that.
As a sum up: I really see no problem with the old system. The problem is the new system implementing filters and sliders to change the party setup right before the battle without another menu to open. Once again, a simple menu option "gimme the old or gimme the new" system just entirely prevents ANY complaints. Focus developing on the new system first though if you see it as better. And I am pretty sure someone would have come up with ideas to improve the old system too without replacing it entirely. Especially after one by one spawns where the system could simply run a formation check to place them in similar formations for unset troops aka random joining armies.
