It's a little more complicated than that. Forward commands must be supplied as the combat modifiers for unsupplied Combat Units in ACS (see pages 308-311) are brutal. You also need cash to rotate commands.
Here is turn 1 of Operation RAT
[Sincerest apologies for such a long post.]
Just to make sure I wasn’t crying wolf over the RP situation I dug out the old 4th SW Atlas set and sat down to figure out what turn 1 and the economic turn of turn 2 would look like using the two RP numbers (1630 and 2175). Here is the result.
Turn 1 – Fourth Succession War (Davion)Econ PhaseCalculate RPs – 1630 (IO)/2175 (Fix?)
Banked – 0/0
Total Available: 1630/2175
Econ Expenses
Infrastructure Purchases – 0
Research Tech – 0
Supply – (((77 House Commands x 10.5 = 809 RP) + ((38 Merc Commands x 11 RP)x 1.1 [+1 to retention Bonus] = 460 RP)) + ((5 Cap Fort x 8') + (7 Std Forts x 2)= 52))) = 1321 RP
Hire Merc Commands – 0
Retention DR - 7 +1 = 8
Creating new Commands – 0
Creating New Spec Ops Teams – 0
RP Balance – 309/854
OrdersEspionage and Spec Ops - 0
Ten House and thirteen Merc commands are given Move or Assault Move orders along with an Attack/Invasion order. It is assumed the Davion Guards and Deneb Light Cav have dropships as do the Blue Star Irr, ELH, and both regiments of the Screaming Eagles. No other commands are given orders that will require the expenditure of move RPs in turn 1 or combat supply in game turn 2 (raid, patrol, etc.)
Movement Order[NB: these 23 commands equal 20% of the total AFFS in 3028]
1st Guards RCT (js) – aslt mv from New Aragon to Shensi – 2RP
3rd Guards RCT (js) – aslt mv from Demeter to Algol – 2 RP
4th Guards RCT (js) – move 2 from Nopah to Aldebaran – 4 RP
Hvy Guards RCT (js) – aslt mv from New Aragon to Styk – 2 RP
Lt Guards RCT (js)– aslt mv from New ragon to St Andre – 2 RP
20th Av Hus RCT – aslt mv from New Aragon to Styk – 4 RP
33rd Av Huss RCT – move 2 from Nopah to Liao – 8 RP
4th Deneb Lt Cav RCT (js) – move 2 from Nopah to Aldebaran – 4 RP
1st New Ivar Chas RCT – aslt mv from Demeter to New Hessen – 4 RP
2nd New Ivar Chas RCT – aslt mv from Demeter to New Hessen – 4 RP
Blue Star Irr RCTs x 3 (js) – move 2 from Nopah to Liao – 12 RP
ELH RCTs x 3 (js) – aslt mv from Demeter to Algol – 6 RP
Redfield’s Ren RCT – move 2 from Nopah to Liao – 8 RP
Screaming Eacls RCTs x 2 (js) – aslt mv from ?? to Pleione – 4 RP
12th Vegan Rangers RCTs x 2 - aslt mv from New Aragon to St Andre – 8 RP
12th Vegan Rangers RCTs x 2 – aslt mv from New Aragon to Poznan – 8 RP
Movement costs = 80 RP
Econ Costs = 1321 RPs
Movement Costs = 80 RPs
Total Expense = 1401
Start RPs = 1630/2175
Unused RPs Turn 1: 1630 – 1401 =229/2175 - 1401 = 774
Combat ensues and the game proceeds to Turn 2 <<BOOM, Zzzzzort, Taca-taca-taca, PING, KA-BOOM>>
Turn 2 - Fourth Succession War (Davion)Econ PhaseCalculate RPs – 1630 (IO)/2175 (Fix?) – no captured planets are producing RPs for Davion yet.
Banked – 229/774; Multiply by 1.05 = 240/813
Total available: 1870/2998
Economic Expenses[NB: here the rules are very unclear if not quite contradictory. According to the ‘Sequence of Play’ money from all sources is collected at the start of each turn but during the upcoming supply steps the rules state that - “If insufficient RP was left over from the prior turn, a number of units must be designated as having “No Supply” in the subsequent turn”. For this example it will be assumed that supply expenditure should be listed as first action in the sequence of play for the economic phase to avoid confusion RP sources.]
Infrastructure Purchases – 0
Research Tech – 0
Supply 67 house commands expend 10.5 RPs for non-combat supply = 703.5 RP
10 house commands expend 32 RPs for combat supply = 320 RP
25 merc commands expend 11 RP for basic retention supply = 275 RP [5.5 RP x 2 for basic retention]
13 merc commands expend 22 RP for combat supply = 286 RP [5.5 x 4 for combat supply]
10% additional supply for a -1 retention TN for merc commands = 56 RP
Total supply RP required = 1641
Banked total is only 240 RP. This requirement to pay supply from the banked RPs before collecting new RPs means the AFFS is short 1401 RP with a 1630 base economy. The 4th Succession War ends there and then as only 11 merc or 7 house commands would not be considered “unsupplied”. This means more than 100 commands are out of action before the war has even begun or any commands are moved in Turn 2.
In the case of the larger 2175 RP economy and with 813 banked RPs the deficit is still 828 RPs. This would require that all 67 uncommitted house command and 13 more merc commands receive no supply on turn two (88 of 115 commands) in order to keep the 1st Wave forces fighting for with combat supply in turn 2. A total of 26 commands have supply (23 from turn 1 + 3 more with RPs for movement). However, this would leave 0 RPs for banking in turn 3 resulting 88 commands now suffering from prolonged neglect and the remaining 27 now becoming unsupplied.
All this with only 20% of the AFFS committed.
As a side note the 1st wave engaged 13 Capellan commands on Turn 1 so their combat supply would cost 299 RPs on turn two.
*****
Now here is where a rules clarification might change the entire flavour of above disaster into something more playable.
If all sequence of play is valid (RPs collected before supply expenditure) then the supply situation on turn two look like this:
1630 base RP plus 240 banked RP = 1870 RPs.
Subtract 1641 RP for supply requirements and the AFFS has 229 RP for movement and other costs in turn 2. Unless a lot of commands are left unsupplied on turn 2 Operation Rat would likely still grind to a halt for lack of cash but,…. Note that 229 RPs only goes so far if the DC attacks on the other front and drives combat supply costs up further..
With the 2175 RP base plus 813 banked RP the AFFS has 2988 RP.
Subtract the 1641 RP for supply and the FS can fight turn 2 with 1357 RP. In this case the AFFS could continue the battles on the 1st Wave planets that are not resolved, commit a few additional commands if required, reposition some units, perhaps repair a few others. Don't get too excited, Operation Rat could continue but the amount of forces engaged would decline each turn while an RP pool is built up for the 2nd Wave and beyond (to say nothing about building factories, conducting Tech research and espionage/Spec Ops.
This scenario is about the same as what a similar test for the DC and Lyrans (with 1738 base) looks like (initial 20% quickly dropping to ~10% active commands) The FWL is very close to this level as well (20-30% committed, then declining). The CC is the odd man out. If moves are kept short they can keep 50-60% of their forces engaged (30-35 commands) and in the fight initially, then dropping to about 40% as they rest/refit commands.
Cheers.