The developers have given us some broad stroked of how war worked in the game. However, now it's time to see the sequence of events leading up to the clash of arms.
in order for a battle to happen one side must have at least one General with an Advance order. Once this happens an advancement meter will slowly start to fill up and once it’s full a new battle will be launched. Various factors can increase or decrease the time it takes.
When the battle is created, a sequence of actions unfolds before the fighting begins. All of these are in the script and can be tweaked by mods as desired. With the following sequence of events being the default:
- The attacker picks their leading General
- The defender picks their leading General
- The battle province is determined along the frontline
- The attacker determines the number of units they can bring\
- The defender determines the number of units they can bring
- Both sides select their units
While there can be several Generals on the Front, only one is selected for each side in a Battle. They are not limited to selecting their own units and so may borrow additional ones from other Generals or the local Garrisons.
Paradox Interactive
In addition, each side randomizes a Battle Condition which provides bonuses, or penalties to their units similar to Combat Tactics in Hearts of Iron 4. Unlike HOI4 though these are fixed for the duration of the battle. For example, a General with the Engineer trait has a higher chance of selecting the “Dug In” Battle Condition which provides defensive modifiers.
