General Tips to Further Micromanagement of Armies
Greetings,
In this "paper" I will be providing various tips to help improve your micromanagement, which is an extremely important skill to have in RoN. Micromanagement is the management of individual or groups of soldiers, and is tied in with the counter system and battlefield tactics. A very basic example of Micromanagement (which will be referred to as "Micro" from here on out) would be using shift clicks to move a group of cavalry around the enemy flank to strike their artillery and supply units.
However, Micro is more often used to refer to giving individual attack orders to units or groups of units, most often orders for them to attack different units (rather than ordering a mass of units to attack a single unit), the same unit, proper counters, etc. The very essence of Micro lies in the game's counter system, so lets examine that first.
The Counter System (Often called RPS[Rock Paper Scissors]) is a system which gives each unit a type designation, such as Heavy Infantry, Light Infantry, Heavy Cavalry, etc. There are a great number of these designations in RoN so here is a quick list of the types, and how I will be abbreviating them.
Heavy Infantry- HI
Light Infantry- LI
Foot Archer- FA
Gunpowder Infantry- GI
Modern Infantry- MI
Machine Gun- MG
Artillery- ART
Scout- Scout
Heavy Cavalry- HC
Light Cavalry- LC
Horse Archer- HA
Tank- Tank
Many of these are continuations of another type into a new age. For example, Tanks, and HC have basically the same counters. Likewise for GI and MI.
A few Hard counters include
HI>HC
HI<HA
HI<FA
LI>FA
LI<HC
FA>HI
FA<HI
A Hard Counter is something that beats something else by coding, rather than use, namely the entire RPS system is made of Hard Counters.
There is another form of counter, called a Soft Counter. Soft Counters beat things by their use, and are often less defined than hard counters. For example, though LC have no attack bonus against FA, they can easily run around the enemy force to hit their archers from behind and deal the extra flanking damage. Also, note that Aircraft will counter anything without AA capabilities.
Now that we have that out of the way, lets get down to business. The most common form of micro is to double click on a unit type to select all of them and then order the entire group to attack the unit they counter. This works well, but wastes a little time. It is easier to set each type of unit in your army to a separate control group for easy access, for example all FA in group 1 and all HC in group 2.
However, the problem is that this, "focus firing" as it is called, wastes damage against normal targets (though it should be used against targets of importance such as Patriots and Generals). The solution to this is daunting, ordering each individual unit in your force to attack a different unit in the enemy army, which they counter. It isn't easy (I still have difficulties with it to be honest) but it is better than selecting your entire army and right clicking an enemy unit by a long shot. The best way to improve this is practice, just work on it a bit and you'll get better in time.
Another form of micro is called "Kitting". When you Kite an enemy army or unit, you need to have superior range/mobility over them. The idea is to get the enemy to chase you, stop, fire a shot, then keep moving before they close into range. This is made far easier with HA and late game LC as they attack automatically while they move (though you cannot designate a target). A few good uses of kitting would be LI vs. HI, in which the HI would easily beat your LI if they got close, but LI have superior range and mobility and can fire once or twice and start moving before the HI catch up. The same tactic can be used with FA to minimize damage taken against HI. In general cases kitting is pretty easy, but when the speed/range difference is minor it can take a lot of skill and near perfect timing to keep your units from taken damage.
The last form of Micro that I will touch on is the fine art of scouting. It is often overlooked because of the autoexplore option, but using this is almost always a mistake. Autoexplore is high inefficient as it constantly passes over already explored area. You should instead use Shift Clicks to create a scout pattern around the map, focusing on likely areas to find ruins and likely areas to find other players. Try and practice quickly laying down patterns that explore as much of the map as possible without doubling back on themselves. Also, keep an eye on the minimap when your scout enters enemy lands, as it might see some buildings or units that will reveal their strategy, or at least the composition of their army. Also, note that Spies make excellent scouts because they are nearly undetectable and can lay down informers.
Greetings,
In this "paper" I will be providing various tips to help improve your micromanagement, which is an extremely important skill to have in RoN. Micromanagement is the management of individual or groups of soldiers, and is tied in with the counter system and battlefield tactics. A very basic example of Micromanagement (which will be referred to as "Micro" from here on out) would be using shift clicks to move a group of cavalry around the enemy flank to strike their artillery and supply units.
However, Micro is more often used to refer to giving individual attack orders to units or groups of units, most often orders for them to attack different units (rather than ordering a mass of units to attack a single unit), the same unit, proper counters, etc. The very essence of Micro lies in the game's counter system, so lets examine that first.
The Counter System (Often called RPS
Heavy Infantry- HI
Light Infantry- LI
Foot Archer- FA
Gunpowder Infantry- GI
Modern Infantry- MI
Machine Gun- MG
Artillery- ART
Scout- Scout
Heavy Cavalry- HC
Light Cavalry- LC
Horse Archer- HA
Tank- Tank
Many of these are continuations of another type into a new age. For example, Tanks, and HC have basically the same counters. Likewise for GI and MI.
A few Hard counters include
HI>
HI<
HI<
LI>
LI<
FA>
FA<
A Hard Counter is something that beats something else by coding, rather than use, namely the entire RPS system is made of Hard Counters.
There is another form of counter, called a Soft Counter. Soft Counters beat things by their use, and are often less defined than hard counters. For example, though LC have no attack bonus against FA, they can easily run around the enemy force to hit their archers from behind and deal the extra flanking damage. Also, note that Aircraft will counter anything without AA capabilities.
Now that we have that out of the way, lets get down to business. The most common form of micro is to double click on a unit type to select all of them and then order the entire group to attack the unit they counter. This works well, but wastes a little time. It is easier to set each type of unit in your army to a separate control group for easy access, for example all FA in group 1 and all HC in group 2.
However, the problem is that this, "focus firing" as it is called, wastes damage against normal targets (though it should be used against targets of importance such as Patriots and Generals). The solution to this is daunting, ordering each individual unit in your force to attack a different unit in the enemy army, which they counter. It isn't easy (I still have difficulties with it to be honest) but it is better than selecting your entire army and right clicking an enemy unit by a long shot. The best way to improve this is practice, just work on it a bit and you'll get better in time.
Another form of micro is called "Kitting". When you Kite an enemy army or unit, you need to have superior range/mobility over them. The idea is to get the enemy to chase you, stop, fire a shot, then keep moving before they close into range. This is made far easier with HA and late game LC as they attack automatically while they move (though you cannot designate a target). A few good uses of kitting would be LI vs. HI, in which the HI would easily beat your LI if they got close, but LI have superior range and mobility and can fire once or twice and start moving before the HI catch up. The same tactic can be used with FA to minimize damage taken against HI. In general cases kitting is pretty easy, but when the speed/range difference is minor it can take a lot of skill and near perfect timing to keep your units from taken damage.
The last form of Micro that I will touch on is the fine art of scouting. It is often overlooked because of the autoexplore option, but using this is almost always a mistake. Autoexplore is high inefficient as it constantly passes over already explored area. You should instead use Shift Clicks to create a scout pattern around the map, focusing on likely areas to find ruins and likely areas to find other players. Try and practice quickly laying down patterns that explore as much of the map as possible without doubling back on themselves. Also, keep an eye on the minimap when your scout enters enemy lands, as it might see some buildings or units that will reveal their strategy, or at least the composition of their army. Also, note that Spies make excellent scouts because they are nearly undetectable and can lay down informers.