RE: Ground Assaults, how many Grounds Units to use?

[xenoscepter (OP)]

How far do my Battalions go?

How many is "a lot"?

How many is "Average"

How many is "only a few", or "too few"?

I know their numbers vs. my numbers factors in along with the types of Ground Units, PDCs, Ground Force Power Techs and such, but a ball park estimate.

I put three Battalions on a Battleship in Cryo and was wondering how much mileage that would afford me.

[ZimRathbone]

As always with Aurora it depends....

This would be OK to pick off listening posts with no problem, and possibly very small (startup?) colonies, (especially if there are little defending forces), but most major colonies will have a bit more than this and unless the tech of the attackers is much higher than the defenders they will likely lose in short order.  Don't even think about homeworlds. I have found that of the order of 3:1 odds is enough to guarantee a win (albeit very slowly), with 5:1 getting things done faster with fewer casualties and less collateral damage.

The effects of PDCs on ground combat  are much more difficult to estimate.  I haven't seen any NPRs with them that I have felt able to conquer, and when I use them on player managed races its quite rare that I get to ground combat. You need a lot of troop capacity to attack major worlds (I use a divisional transport that carries 22 or so battallions - 1 Divsional HQ, 4 Brigade HQs, 16 combat battalions and 1-3 replacement battalions (depending on the particular design).  I often have several of these doing multiple runs before an attack.

[Father Tim]

For a quick, decisive victory in ground combat you want a ten- or twenty-to-one advantage in combat strength over your opponent.  In practice, this is impossible unless you're fighting significantly lower-tech troops.

Personally, I send "all" my troops. . . although I always lack the trooplift capacity to do so in less than about ten years, so really I just constantly ship troops (and replacements) to the fighitng until I win.  I usually have a one-battalion transport and a five-battalion transport class in service, so my troops tend to arrive five battalions at a time.  If I can, I send five Garrison, five Replacement, and then five Assault Infantry or Armour battalions -- so my elite attackers don't get overwhelmed and wiped out before the replacements and defenders arrive.  Sometimes you get lucky and the NPR chooses not to attack your initial troops (I never attack then until I'm ready).

[Garfunkel]

ZimRathbone is absolutely correct that as always in Aurora, there is no correct answer because "it depends..."

NPRs do not build PDCs so you don't have to worry about them. But an NPR might have an absolutely colossal ground army waiting on their homeworld and unless you significantly out-tech them, you'll need several divisions of HVA plus dozens of Garrison brigades to pacify the population.

I usually have 4 Ground Force Training Facilities that are always active, so I build 4 divisional headquarters, then 16 brigade headquarters, then enough heavy assault/assault infantry/mobile infantry battalions to fill them out. Generally I build two types of brigades, heavy brigades with 3x heavy assault and 1x combat engineer battalions, as well as light brigades with 2x assault infantry and 2x mobile infantry battalions. Because I do conventional starts, I have enough time to build up the four initial divisions before I need them.

Don't overlook the need for Garrison battalions to pacify conquered populations as well as the cheap REP battalions to bring your expensive combat units back to full strength.

As for transport, I would recommend two ships: as fast as possible single battalion transport for those cases when you urgently need to capture a listening post or something, and a big divisional transport that can move 22-25 battalions at one go: a DHQ, four brigades and few REP.