I am sorry up front that this will be a bit of a long post, but I have many ideas and the build on each other, some would be a lot easier then others to implement so I will try to start there.
I am also aware that this is a Space Empire building game, and that ground combat is secondary but Organizational charts for Military units is somewhat of a personal obsession, and there is great storytelling possibility in planet side wars or Deep space boarding actions so here are my Ideas to improve the systems that are currently in place.
#1 when you create a unit the number it gets should be sequential with that unit type, not with the total units ever produced so when I get around to making my first Mech unit its not numbered 347th but instead 1st and so on. to add to this, if a numbed unit is destroyed then the number should be assigned to the next unit of its type to be built thereby replacing losses with out having to reorganize the whole army.
#2 When you create a formation in the Formation planner, the new formation should be added to the unit list on the left so that you can use it as a component of a larger unit lead by a higher ranking officer.
At the moment you require a HQ unit to attach sub units to and the HQ unit is pretty high level, you can also not nest them, so you can only have one subdivision of a large force, this means that you are creating small Captain lead forces that are independent of large structure that you can place aboard ships, or Gigantic homogeneous Army's that have at best one subdivision level below the General. if you could make Companies (or equivalent) led by captains, then use those as building blocks for Battalions lead by Majors, which in turn get formed into Regiments lead by Colonel's who form Brigades lead by Generals, that form Divisions by 2 star Generals, forming Corps lead by 3 stars, then Army's lead by 4 stars and Army Groups lead by Field Marshals and so on. (Of course what you call each level is up to you) but now all your officers are in a single command chain but each level of it has an officer who you can assign a task to and therefore you can send or appropriate sized elements to deal with individual missions in either attack or defense. and because you can design multiple types of Company and then mix and match them to create multiple types of Battalion and so on your army can be as varied as you care to make it, but quickly scalable. you could also say stack two infantry Battalions with one Artillery Battalion a then add an Engineering Company and a Scout company all to form a Regiment, as the smaller units can be attached to any superior Officer, so a Captain fits directly under a Colonel as easily as a Major.
#3 Command size. this is now a slightly more novel concept that would enhance the Ideas above: Each unit has a Certain Administrative cost and each command officer has a certain Command capacity, therefor a formation that is below the commanders command capacity gains a benefit to its performance as the officer has more time and energy to deal with individual issues, but a large unit that exceeds its Commanders capacity gets a debuff as the commander struggles to address the basic needs of operation, In the real world this is why Military units are often between 3-5 in size, or mad up of that many sub units, as this means each Rank only has to pay attention to that many subordinates. I would say that the Basic units represent Platoon/Squadron/Battery/Troop sized about 30-50 men or about 3-6 Vehicles or Guns l by a Lieutenant so a Captain should comfortably command 3-5 of them and uncomfortably manage up to say 10. then a Major should be able to deal with about 3-5 Captains and so on up the chain. This could be modified by troop quality with more Elite forces requiring more Administration because of their Training and Equipment, where barely armed Conscripts could be fielded in massed units, as the Debuff has little to no effect on forces that have no buffs to begin with.
#4 Training, At present you have to design each formation, and then train as many as you want one after another, then you can attach smaller ones to HQ formations to make bigger units. I propose splitting the Ground Unit Training Facilities into Training Camps and Material Factories, These work similar to Maintenance facilities producing a generic Personal or Material stockpile and each unit has a required number of Personal and Material Required to build them, as well as a per month upkeep cost. As you design Formations, the required Build and upkeep stats are presented, and if you Click the mobilize button, the formation will be moved to your order of battle, drawing in the appropriate number of officers and creating promotion opportunities, as well as absorbing the Personal and Material from your stockpile. If you have insufficient stockpiles Unfinished unites will be marked as understrength as if they had taken casualties and suffer as appropriate reducing their fighting strength. Understrength units will draw down reinforcements as a priority though this could lead to other units missing out on resupply and suffering depletion that way so it would be important not to construct too much army in one go or you will quickly run into Logistical problems.
#5 Unit Designing. at present you design a unit by selecting a Type, Armour and Component. and these 3 options designate the capabilities of the unit (I am still assuming that each Unit is Platoon size or equivalent) I would suggest that you add more categories and allow some of them to be multiple selections, Example: Type [Infantry/Mounted Infantry/ Light Vehicle/ Medium Vehicle etc] choose one. Armour [Light/Medium/Heavy/Powered etc] Choose zero to one. Primary Weapons [Light Personal/Personal/Improved Personal/Crew-served Antipersonnel etc] Choose one. Training [Basic/Advanced/Commando/Desert warfare/Mountain Warfare etc] Choose zero to as many as you wish. Equipment [Long Ranged Comms/Entrenching tools/Active Cammo/Sensor grid/Amphibious gear/ Night vision goggles etc] Choose zero to as many as you wish.
Each additional training regime increases the personal cost of the unit as members mus spend longer in training, the choice of weapon and Armour sets the base Material cost for the unit and each additional piece of equipment increases it. The Administrative cost of the unit is based on the combined Personal and Material Cost as more needs to be managed to keep the unit in fighting condition. you might also have a Size modifier so that you could make smaller but more Elite units with less manpower but more training/equipment without overwhelming the commander of the formations ability to manage, For infantry this would be reducing the squad size with in the Platoon son instead of 3 squads of 12 men with Rifles and Steel helmets. you might have 3 squads of 6 Powered Armour boarding troops trained for zero G and equipped for Vacuum and breaching, The Powered Armour troops would still probably be more expensive, but by reducing the manpower you could keep the expense manageable, with Vehicles the Size would be the number in the squadron, so 6 light buggies, or 3 Main battle tanks or 1 Supper heavy mobile fortress, Likewise you could always increase the base unit size if the troops were cheep enough or you were willing to suffer the penalties of logistics and administration to field huge forces of heavy well equipped troops. To this end I would make the Penalties or Buffs from Command apply more to Assaults and relocation then to Defense, as it is many times easier to manage units that are not going anywhere.
Any way these are some of my Crazy Ideas, I am open to comments and suggestions. I would love to see such concepts implemented, though I am under no illusions that the Devs will have either the Time or inclination to do so, this is pretty much Blue sky thinking
With Regards Edbanger
-Edit, I just noticed that I posted this in the wrong section, I should have placed it in C# Mechanics Suggestions not C#Suggestions, my apologizes
