Artillery Delay and Supression - One Post - Two Can's of Worms

[narwan]

Just responding to the suppression issue here, not the arty.

I have little problem dealing with suppression I receive. I can can usually keep the vast majority of my troops in good fighting order. How? By using command units as command units and not as an 'additional' fighting units. This goes for platoon commanders as well as company commanders.
In a standard four unit platoon the three non command unit are your fighting force. The platoon commander has 2 tasks, to keep the other three fighting (ie rallying them) and act as a rearguard for the platoon. While the other three units are 'up front' the commander is deployed behind them. Place him within 5 hexes of the others and next to the fastest movement route (especially for infantry). If units rout they'll follow the route which costs the fewest movement points so try to position them so that they will rout towards the platoon leader.

Use the platoon leader to rally the other units in his platoon, NOT himself (unless you really, really need to). Use the company commander to rally the platoon leaders, NOT himself (again, unless you really, really need to).
Don't attach units to the company commander. Keep the company command group as small a possible. Put support units in a support platoon with their own platoon commander. Try to limit the number of platoons (incl support platoons) to 4 per company. Of these use two fighting platoons forward with the support platoon somewhat behind where they can give support to the other two. Place the third fighting platoon as a tactical reserve. This way your company commander isn't overworked.
It far more effective to have three companies each keep back one platoon as tactical reserve than it is to keep one of the three companies back completely and the other two fully committed.

Narwan