Gladius had the best tactical combat I have ever seen.  The only time I have seen a Rock-Paper-Scissor approach work well.  Probably would have been better without it, but in that game it did work.

Should play Ursula's path, get a fucking Yeti sooner then!  Fucking Yeti, man!

Here's an example of bad unit placement.  The defenders unit at the bottom was so far away that it was out of the battle.  The unit got only one turn and the battle was over before they could take another one.

But if you play Valens and play your cards right you can get a minotaur and then go to the barbarian lands and get a yeti.

I most certainly don't want FE's tactical battles to be a carbon copy of Gladius but Gladius does show just how fun turn based tactical battles can be if done right.

Back on topic though I would just like to reiterate that having the option to manually place your units, within limits, before combat will make for better tactical battles and will solve a lot of the problems mentioned in this thread. And if Brad can get the AI to learn from the player how to best deploy their units it could work well for the AI too.

This has been quite annoying with the beta. I am not quite sure why the battle fields had to be reduced. This wasn't such a huge problem with the larger battlefields as you had a round or two to get your units into a combat formation. If the battle field must be shorter, maybe split the difference the new and old ones.

Other option is a group formation screen. I don't think anyone has mentioned this yet, but you could set how you want your units to spawn in general in some menu, so every map they spawn in that relative position. I think that would be the best solution (although could be technically tricky).

Here's another example.  My whole army, with one exception, is in the lower left.  The one other unit is in the upper right, completely isolated.

I'm really starting to dislike the auto-placement of units. It seems half the time I am pissed that my units are formed up in a way that doesn't make sense to me. Why are my tanks behind my glass cannons? Why are my units spread thin when I would have marched them up in tight formation against this enemy force composition?

I would like either full control of unit deployment or at least tie in the fubar AI placement to some sort of explanation in a random tactical event. Sort of like, "You got ambushed and taken by surprise, your units are deployed arse-backward" or "One of your units breaks formation and finds itself isolated at the beginning of battle", something to that effect.

Since one of the greatest strengths of the game is unit customization, I don't see how taking away custom deployment enhances that feature, since those custom designed units are placed based upon a game designers assumption that "this unit type should start here in battle".

A tactical setup phase is the solution here. There is no need to reinvent the wheel Stardock. There is no need for clumsy pre made formations. Being able to setup your troops prior to combat is simple, logical and and practical. It represents a commander telling his troops where to line up and avoids the obvious AI placement flaws. The option for auto placement should be on each pre combat screen to speed things up if the fight is expected to be easy.

The armies overall initiative and level could have an effect on the size of the green zone in which you are allowed to place troops. Placing units in defensive mode would incur a first round initiative penalty to the unit. Ambushes could be implemented on the strategic map. During an ambush your units would be auto placed and incur a penalty to initiative. 

This is so obvious I find it hard to believe it isn't already in the game. This game is so close to being great I would really hate for tactical combat to be neglected without such a feature.

I think it would be nice to at least be able to arrange them in that unit grid at the bottom when you select an army to give the program a general idea of how you want the units placed.

This is my favoured solution. In addition to the idea that stave-wielding mages should be placed at the back where they belong, I like the notion of the "Battle" button giving you a quick prompt where you can choose between formations like:

"Aggressive" - Melee units start pushed up in a staggered tactical formation wherein every unit can squeeze through a gap to engage on the enemy immediately. Ranged units in a loose formation at the rear. Good for when you want to be able to go all out from the get-go and screw the counterattacks.

"Defensive" - Melee units start pushed back near your ranged formation, in a close-packed defensive cluster. Good for a cautious approach to massed enemy hordes.

"Disperse" - All your units are spread out in a loose formation (a lot like what happens already). Good for fighting AOE casters.

"Flanking" - Your units are spread more or less evenly between two columns, ready for a pincer-movement or a dual defense. This may only be available on some tactical maps due to space limitations.

These would add tactical depth to the combat, remove the frustration that the current, practically-random formations cause, while preventing tedious manual placement and player-AI imbalance, as the AI would be subject to the same choices. I don't know much about how coding works, so I don't know how difficult this would be to implement, but it's a very important issue to address as it is mine, and evidently several others', largest perpetual issue with the game as it stands.

I of course also think it's important to maintain "ambush" situations or surprise attacks wherein your guys get taken by surprise and end up arse-backwards all over the place, but the rest of the time a degree of control would be really beneficial.

How could this possibly be better than having a setup phase prior to combat where you place your troops where you want them? A placement phase allows you to form your army however you want before combat.

With a setup phase you place your units where you want them within a zone. The size of your armies placement zone can be a simplistic number of tiles measured from the back of the map or more sophisticated by including factors such as total army level, total army initiative, talents etc. All you are asking for with pre-coded settings is more frustration when units aren't placed logically based on your desires for each unit and the specific tactical map. This is why this thread exists to begin with and having a setup phases solved it all in a very simple, time tested way. If you want to be aggressive place your units aggressively! If you want to avoid placement completely because it's an easy fight then click auto placement before the fight. 

No it won't. It will end in frustration and people complaining about how their troops lined up. There are too many maps and too many human variables to possibly code a preset solution.

The AI would use the same logic it uses now and needs to work with the pre defined units each faction has. I cannot see how 5-9 quick clicks is tedious. The auto placement option would be there for all the easy fights. However, I wouldn't be opposed to having an army line up in a tight player defined grouping as the auto placement option. In fact I think it would be good if it works with all the maps. It would essentially be a watered down setup phase as a quick option. Trying to get the AI to logically place units as the player intends is a waste of time and will always be flawed.

I am totally for anything done manually by the player. I would favor both a setup phase and the inclusion of a player defined army formation for each army used as the default auto placement. Anything else is second rate.

While I see your points, I still disagree with the idea that manual setup is the best alternative. Especially when I think about manually placing each and every defender in a city attack, where I can have up to 14 or 15 units, I still think it's unnecessary. Formations give the player some input to what algorithm the game uses to place your units without making you have to place everything one-by-one.

Once again, to reiterate, I don't want to manually place each and every unit. But I think there is a middle ground between manual placement and the random mess you get now, and formations are something close to that.

Manual placement is for purists like me. I've seen it all all over the last 25 years and I know what works and what doesn't. I don't want to deal with the inevitable flaws in the code logic that comes with auto setup. The option for auto setup would always be there to use of course.

It would only take 5-10 seconds for setup but, as I said, you wouldn't have to manually place them every fight. It seems you missed my conclusion that a player defined formation for each army would be that middle ground you spoke of. You define how you want each of your armies to line up and that becomes the auto placement default for that army. Leaving any of this to AI logic will always have flaws.

How any of this works with the anti tactical  'armies start closer for teh acthun' design lead philosophy at Stardock is beyond me. I keep jabbing whomever said that but having finally purchased this game with LH I appreciate the work so far. Another expansion or two after LH and this will likely be the definitive game of the genre.

after a 5 month hiatus from the FE beta....

1) I love swarm, great mechanic! Though I love an uber unit (especially heroes- please buff...hint hint) having to send some weaker support units to prevent dogpiling makes sense

2) totally agree with the map sizes larger.  Its ok if a charging cavalary unit can get across the map, but it cheapens the advantages of mounted and ranged units.  

3) Agree with a 'lineup' section- this could even be as simple as allowing us to change the order of portraits in the 'army selection screen'.  IE The first 3 units are the front line, the second 3 units are the back line, etc

4) Make 'advanced lineup' a commander trait: ie a high-level commander with a 'Brilliant Strategist' ability gets to place his army AFTER the opponent places his pieces in order to exploit weakness in the lineup.

BTW great for all the hard work Stardock.  This game is shaping up to be a life-ruiner.   

This. I think it's nearly there, actually. Just a few more fixes and it will be unstoppable!

why not add the feature to predefine your combat positions? i mean this should work if YOU are the attacking party or inside your city while being attacked. logically if you attack someone you would create a strategy and formation beforehand and if you're being attacked at your city you had also see time to order the formations. problem solved!