Legions have three key states: formation, facing and approach. These define your legion's ability and speed when it needs to move, to engage, to carry out activities on the battlefield or deployed to use its trained skills.
Facing direction is key to combat against legions and laying siege to targets efficiently - see HELP FACING.
Formation determines how much of a legion is available for attack as its front line, how much is able to factor when working its defence, numbers on the front line, the rear line and men available to carry out whatever deployed activity is commanded - see HELP FORMATION.
Approach defines how a legion moves itself within a location and around the land. It is critical when time is a factor and where terrain demands particular navigation like crossing deep water or digging tunnels or scaling mountain passes. Most times a legion will carry out movement and maneouvre no matter what approach but it will be slow as a snail if mismatches occur, e..g. your legion is moving between locations on the flat and you have its approach CLIMBING instead of MARCH or RUN - end result will be a 90 second time to finish the move instead of 6 if marching or 3 is running.
Syntax: COMMAND <legion> APPROACH <deployed approach>
It is crucial to choose the correct approach for the actions your legion is to carry out and bad selection will make the legion slow and at worst lead to the confused state or inability to carry out a deployment. Many deployments, like minehunting, are incompatible with CAVALRY and/or SWIMMING and/or TRANSPORTING approaches. Your legion will move and maneouvre much quicker if you ensure the approach is well selected for the task at hand.
Example: you want a legion to navigate a body of water so you will have it either swim or take transports. This demands the "swimming" or "transporting" approach before you give the MOVE order else the legion will try to ford the water without knowing how best to do so - reducing its speed severely.
Movement and deployment manoeuvre APPROACH list:
MARCHING Reasonably quick movement but ready in case of attack
RUNNING Fastest possible movement without readiness for sudden attack
BATTLEREADY Slow'n'steady movement but always 100% formation combat-ready
CLIMBING Ascending or descending (rope/ladders) UP, DOWN and trenches
SWIMMING Necessary for navigating river/lake locations without transport
TRANSPORTING Deep water navigated with "transports" also ready for attack
RIDING Legion to use "cavalry" for fast movement and deadly melee
DIGGING Needed for trench and tunnel orders; slow but watchful
RETREATING Reverse the front and rear line to maximise defence on retreat
LEVITATING Floating legion best attempt at keeping formation else confused
DIVERSE Multi-approach with legion defined by its deployment spread
CONFUSED Legion chaos, all movement and deployment slower/less effective
The "CONFUSED" approach should be avoided or reversed whenever it occurs. Confused legions deploy slowly, attack badly (if at all) and defend without organisation - front line is small, defenceless numbers large, minimum benefit gained by formation and facing. Avoid the "CONFUSED" state by using DIVERSE approach if your legion is going to be deployed across multiple activities but keep in mind DIVERSE is not as effective as BATTLEREADY for engagements nor as fast as MARCHING or RUNNING for legion movement.
Have a look at HELP COMMANDING for abbreviations and short-cuts for legion commanding including two letter aliases for quickly ordering your legion to arrange certain approaches most suitable for whatever tasks lie ahead.
