CoG and historical outcomes (Full Version)

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David Fisher -> CoG and historical outcomes (7/13/2005 3:06:04 PM)

hi,

I downloaded CoG recently and have had a quick go at playing -- nothing serious, just trying things out. One of the messages that popped up caught my eye -- something about "Russians fighting Tunisians in English Channel." It got me wondering about the historicity of CoG. What kind of outcomes have players had that seem to mirror the history of those times? What have been some of the "crazier" outcomes? (like Russians gaining control of the English Channel from the Tunisians...)

Just to clarify: I'm talking more about historical "flavour" than exactly reproducing what happened. History within broad parameters.

My other query has to do with POWs. This is the first game of its type I've come across that "models" this. Kind of took me by surprise. Just seemed -- odd. I'm no expert on the period, but I had never thought of POWs as contributors to their captors' national economy. Didn't French prisoners at the Nore spend their time whittling whalebone or something ("scrimshaw")? Can anyone enlighten me here? Is there a historical basis for this, or is it included solely for gameplay reasons?

cheers

David Fisher



ezjax -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/13/2005 4:21:45 PM)

POW’s,[:@]
You will find they are more of a liability then an asset. Stick them all behind your lines in a Province with a low forage rate and let them die off works best for me. They are to easily liberated by drunken Cossacks roaming your Provinces or by Defeated Army’s that jump over you and get behind you after you defeat them in battle.
I believe for game play they should just be a statistic you see after you win a battle, or a hidden asset that you can use until that Nation surrenders. Not some 5th element Unit waiting to be liberated and rearmed by Cossacks.



ericbabe -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/13/2005 5:03:05 PM)

Having a parole-system rule was on the list of features I wanted to implement, as POW's were often paroled in the period. It wouldn't be a simple thing to do though -- have to find some way to take them off the map till the war is over.

For the time being, I'll consider some ways of weakening them when they are liberated -- dropping their morale, reducing their strength, shunting them home to the capital (if it's not occupied), etc.

On the historicity, there's a whole fistful of things we could do to try to force the game to be more historical (rules like: Turkish privateers can't leave the Mediterranean, and similar). If there's enough demand for something like this we might offer it in a sequel or expansion, but it'd be a lot of work to do just for a patch, and I'm not sure that the demand for this feature would quite justify the work necessary to implement it, or rather, I think we might better spend our time on other features. Though I could be quite wrong in this evaluation, and I welcome any input you all might have on this matter. I haven't got a good sense yet of whether having Tunisian pirates in the English Channel really ruins the game for people, or no.

By way of example, we can't just have the rule "Turkish privateers can't leave the Mediterreanean", this would also require some user interface when human players tried to move their Turkish privateers into the Atlantic. It would also require informing the AI of every new rule as well.


Eric



ahauschild -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/13/2005 6:13:41 PM)

The game gives you a flavor of Nap times, but does not in many ways promote a "Historical" outcome. Nations to often commit to horrible attrition wars across the map with no hope of making any progress, Nations will often be complete decimated, just having surrendered to somebody and the next turn declare war on another nation with no hope of winning.

The austrians are famous for that in my campaigns, I clobber them, decimate their armys and once they surrender they will without any armys ready declare war on the french that have a billion troops at the ready. 2 turns later they surrender to the french, only to declare now war on the russians that have 2 billion troops just waiting to party in Austria, again, they surrender to them only to repeat this again and again.

Navys stray way out of their logical areas, and such. The AI for the stra part of the game gives you initialy a good fealing, but once you played a few games you will spot the need for refinement in it. I am sure though they will refine it as it goes on, as it does have the makings of a classic.



Ralegh -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/14/2005 2:01:13 AM)

The main reason the game doesn't more closely mimic historical outcomes is that the AI in COG is reasonably intelligent and doesn't do amazingly stupid things the way the generals (and kings) of the time did.

COG does have a system of Political Goals that direct the territorial ambitions of the countries along historical lines. Note that sometimes countries will achieve things that historically they weren't able to do...



Naomi -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/14/2005 2:18:14 AM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: Ralegh

The main reason the game doesn't more closely mimic historical outcomes is that the AI in COG is reasonably intelligent and doesn't do amazingly stupid things the way the generals (and kings) of the time did.

COG does have a system of Political Goals that direct the territorial ambitions of the countries along historical lines. Note that sometimes countries will achieve things that historically they weren't able to do...


AI is compared to Economics, which sums up what "rational" persons would opt for (or out of) in making decisions, though sometimes I came across very weird AI-made arrangements, like keeping "only" a stack of leaders idle in Paris staring at my troops threating their capital.



Mr. Z -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/14/2005 4:53:55 AM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: Ralegh

The main reason the game doesn't more closely mimic historical outcomes is that the AI in COG is reasonably intelligent and doesn't do amazingly stupid things the way the generals (and kings) of the time did.

Haha! That's funny [:D]

quote:

COG does have a system of Political Goals that direct the territorial ambitions of the countries along historical lines.

Which we might like to revise somewhat...



Ralegh -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/14/2005 6:13:43 AM)

Hah! Wait until you see my latest great abuse of this system! Then you will really want to modify these!



malcolm_mccallum -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/14/2005 5:47:16 PM)

quote:

The main reason the game doesn't more closely mimic historical outcomes is that the AI in COG is reasonably intelligent and doesn't do amazingly stupid things the way the generals (and kings) of the time did.


Buh? So Napoleon, Tallyrand, Metternich, Kutusov, Pitt, Charles, Suvarov, Blucher, and Wellington were all just stupid people who didn't understand the game mechanics of their world better than you? That, for you, is a more reasonable explanation for the wildly ahistorical results than suggesting that the underlying game mechanics are simply making for a very poor sim?

England should have invaded BRest in 1805 and marched on Paris like the game keeps having them do? A Ballsy Britain could have pulled it off?

Austria's best tactic would have been to crowd 150, 000 men into the Tyrol, throw them at Switzerland in in a lightning move drive on Paris while ignoring Napoleon's forces on the Danube?

Spain and Russia are natural enemies with much to gain from one another and smart leaders of those countries would have bent all their political and economic will to finding ways to conquer one another?




ericbabe -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/14/2005 6:00:54 PM)

quote:

you? That, for you, is a more reasonable explanation for the wildly ahistorical results than suggesting that the underlying game mechanics are simply making for a very poor sim?


What are some very good campaign level historical sims on the market today?






malcolm_mccallum -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/14/2005 6:14:57 PM)

There aren't alot of them available currently.

Campaigns on the Danube springs to mind.
Victoria and Europa Universalis II as well, IMO, though they are more strategy resource games than campaign simulators.

Empire in Arms is the next Great White Hope.



Erik Rutins -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/14/2005 6:30:23 PM)


In my experience, the results in CoG are not "wildly ahistorical", any more so than Napoleon ending up in Egypt as happened historically. There are definitely a few areas where things can be tightened up but the results overall seem to work out well and within historically reasonable outcomes in the vast majority of my games.

quote:

ORIGINAL: malcolm_mccallum
Campaigns on the Danube springs to mind.


Have you played this? It's a completely different scale than the other games, including CoG. It's an operational simulation rather than a strategic game.

quote:

Victoria and Europa Universalis II as well, IMO, though they are more strategy resource games than campaign simulators.Empire in Arms is the next Great White Hope.


There's really nothing out there that's quite like CoG. When you say that you've seen outcomes that are very ahistorical in your opinion, what are some examples from your experience?

Regards,

- Erik



Reiryc -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/14/2005 6:45:46 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: malcolm_mccallum

There aren't alot of them available currently.

Campaigns on the Danube springs to mind.
Victoria and Europa Universalis II as well, IMO, though they are more strategy resource games than campaign simulators.

Empire in Arms is the next Great White Hope.


All of these games can produce wildly a-historic outcomes and when it comes to victoria and EU2 that is the norm. Unless you consider my polish colonization of the new world to be historic from EU2... [8|]




malcolm_mccallum -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/14/2005 6:50:08 PM)

My standard replies to the ahistorical results in CoG. I've played only as France in the 1805 scenario and get frustrated at how the same ahistorical results keep happening:

-Austria hunkering down in the Tyrol with 150, 000 men, laying out a supply line to Paris, blitzing through Switzerland and then sprinting up the underbelly of France despite Napoleon being astride their communication line.

-Britain launching a corps into Brest or Normandy, brushing aside any French corps placed to defend against them, and then marching on Paris without any concern for securing a port. I've seen them throw two such corps into France in the space of a year. Its like the designers thought the British historically had a competent land army at this time.

-Austrian armies running circles around France, keeping always one step ahead of French forces trying to chase them down, while Vienna burned.

-The entire army of Italy of 1805 moved into Switzerland in anticipation of an Austrian attack and it being unable to even slow them down. Do these designers have no concept of what mountain warfare consisted of at this time? That you really would have an entire army having to climb mountains or edge along dangerous ledges?

-Russia asking for access rights through France so that it can attack Spain?

-Spain taking Gibralter from the British consistently within the first few months of the war.

EDIT:

quote:


quote:


ORIGINAL: malcolm_mccallum
Campaigns on the Danube springs to mind.

Have you played this? It's a completely different scale than the other games, including CoG. It's an operational simulation rather than a strategic game.


The question was "What are some very good campaign level historical sims on the market today?" and I replied in the context of horse and Musket games of this type. I am not saying that Campaigns on the Danube is of the same scope as CoG.



malcolm_mccallum -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/14/2005 6:53:36 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Reiryc

quote:

ORIGINAL: malcolm_mccallum

There aren't alot of them available currently.

Campaigns on the Danube springs to mind.
Victoria and Europa Universalis II as well, IMO, though they are more strategy resource games than campaign simulators.

Empire in Arms is the next Great White Hope.


All of these games can produce wildly a-historic outcomes and when it comes to victoria and EU2 that is the norm. Unless you consider my polish colonization of the new world to be historic from EU2... [8|]


That's broken RI, not AI. Yes players can generate ahistorical results in these games and that's part of the fun. AI though should be fairly normalized and its pretty good in those games for that. and yes, certainly there are ahistorical results coming out of them which I wouldn't applaud.



Reiryc -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/14/2005 7:07:10 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: malcolm_mccallum

quote:

ORIGINAL: Reiryc

quote:

ORIGINAL: malcolm_mccallum

There aren't alot of them available currently.

Campaigns on the Danube springs to mind.
Victoria and Europa Universalis II as well, IMO, though they are more strategy resource games than campaign simulators.

Empire in Arms is the next Great White Hope.


All of these games can produce wildly a-historic outcomes and when it comes to victoria and EU2 that is the norm. Unless you consider my polish colonization of the new world to be historic from EU2... [8|]


That's broken RI, not AI. Yes players can generate ahistorical results in these games and that's part of the fun. AI though should be fairly normalized and its pretty good in those games for that. and yes, certainly there are ahistorical results coming out of them which I wouldn't applaud.


I've seen the AI all over the map as well... Unless you consider that russian set of colonies in new york to be pretty standard historically... [X(]




ericbabe -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/14/2005 7:15:16 PM)

I didn't mean to sound as though I was issuing a sort of challenge vis-a-vis other campaign level games... I was just genuinely curious as what a good benchmark might be. I haven't played EU2 a lot, but from what I've seen of it I was under the impression that COG compares fairly well in this area. I was really just wondering if there was some sort of "gold standard" of history-simulators to which people are comparing COG (and other games, for that matter).

Anyway, thank you for the constructive criticism. If you have any concrete suggestions for improving the AI, I'd like to hear about those too.



Malagant -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/14/2005 7:24:23 PM)

If I wanted a recreation of history, I'd read a book. This is not what I play games of this type for.

Yes, 'historically' Britain did not have much of a land army at the time...but who's to say they could not have concentrated more heavily on the development of an army that was able to invade the mainland?

It's a GAME. Gamey things happen. (Hence the name.) It's for fun and entertainment, not to recreate history perfectly everytime it's played.

Can the big picture strategic results that historically occurred be recreated in this game? Yes, absolutely! Are you constrained or confined or forced in to those same strategic results? No, not at all! And that's the whole point, imo.



Uncle_Joe -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/14/2005 7:25:50 PM)

quote:

-Britain launching a corps into Brest or Normandy, brushing aside any French corps placed to defend against them, and then marching on Paris without any concern for securing a port. I've seen them throw two such corps into France in the space of a year. Its like the designers thought the British historically had a competent land army at this time.


Yes, the lack of 'lines of communications' has been noted before. It is something I'm hoping for in a future update. From my readings, maintaining a secure line of communication was foremost in the thoughts of many of the combatants. In fact even as late as Waterloo, Wellington maneuvered AWAY from his Prussian allies just to make sure his LOC wasnt interupted. Archduke Charles continually fretted about his LOCs to ensure that he could always preserve the army.

What my proposal has been is to require not only a line of supply, but a line of communication. If no LOC exists, then the army should take a pretty big (and growing) morale hit and eventually surrender or disband. This would prevent a lot of the silly adventurism going on (like the constant Russian forays into Spain and the British attacks with abandon on the French).

As to some of your other gripes, many of them have been noted before, and in fact some had already been changed in previous (pre-release) versions. Its possible that movement through mountainous terrain needs to be restricted yet again. Perhaps supply can be harder to trace through poor terrain or something?



Reiryc -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/14/2005 7:28:46 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Malagant

If I wanted a recreation of history, I'd read a book. This is not what I play games of this type for.

Yes, 'historically' Britain did not have much of a land army at the time...but who's to say they could not have concentrated more heavily on the development of an army that was able to invade the mainland?

It's a GAME. Gamey things happen. (Hence the name.) It's for fun and entertainment, not to recreate history perfectly everytime it's played.

Can the big picture strategic results that historically occurred be recreated in this game? Yes, absolutely! Are you constrained or confined or forced in to those same strategic results? No, not at all! And that's the whole point, imo.


I think his argument isn't that he wants history recreated exactly but rather what could be historically plausible.





Uncle_Joe -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/14/2005 7:40:36 PM)

quote:

I think his argument isn't that he wants history recreated exactly but rather what could be historically plausible.


Yes, I made the same argument in beta, back when the total weight of the allies would come crashing down into Spain (after making peace with France). I had a game where there were over 750,000 troops attacking Madrid and the surrounding areas. [X(]

A lot has been changed since then. I'm confident that as more reports roll in and as the system evolves, that less and less of the 'flights of fancy' type of events will be occuring.




malcolm_mccallum -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/14/2005 8:13:01 PM)

I'm not saying CoG is a bad game. It may be a very fine game.

The problem that I have with it is that the solutions to the problems presented by the game have to be 'gamey' solutions not 'principles of war' solutions.

My natural bias is so strong that I refuse to send my Grand Armee into Tyrolia to confront the Austrians. It goes against all the principles of warfare to attack a strong foe in natural defences, especially when they have doomed themselves by setting up in a place that they cannot maneuver from or supply themselves into.

Possible Rules for mountains:
Max 4 units can fight on either side in mountains and retreats aren't required. Decisive actions did not happen in mountains.
Attrition is extremely high in mountains
No more than 2 corps can cross a mountain provincial border per turn.

Get the fights into the lowlands where they were historically.

Also, invaders should be forced to detach forces to maintain lines of communications. If you do not have forces controlling an enemy province it is simply not available as a retreat path and the entire force must be surrendered if forced to retreat.

PoWs should be releasable on parole.

Guerillas are not player controlled forces. They cannot join armies and their normal function is to drain the economy and raise the attrition rate for any armies in the area, allied or enemy. What the Spanish player can do though is convert guerillas to regular troops with time and money.

Remove the naval invasion option entirely. Allow a force to land at friendly or allied ports only. Allow forces to land at unoccupied neutral ports but this causes a declaration of war (or something).



munited18 -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/14/2005 8:15:16 PM)

I love the "no control the Guirrelas" idea!



sorry for the bad spelling!



Uncle_Joe -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/14/2005 8:18:52 PM)

I like many of these suggestions. Some are probably not going to be viable in the current engine though.

I very much would like to see having to detach units to guard the LOCs and in fact, it was something I lobbied for long and hard previously. Currently moving long distances does not sap your strength the way it historically did (and I dont mean attrition which is a whole different animal). This is why we get some of the 'interesting' situations that we see...armies arent constrained by their historical needs so they are capable of much more movement and momentum.

Good suggestions!



ericbabe -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/14/2005 8:36:32 PM)

quote:


Possible Rules for mountains:
Max 4 units can fight on either side in mountains and retreats aren't required. Decisive actions did not happen in mountains.
Attrition is extremely high in mountains
No more than 2 corps can cross a mountain provincial border per turn.


There are size limits in battles already, and mountains impose a hefty contribution to the limit.


quote:


Also, invaders should be forced to detach forces to maintain lines of communications. If you do not have forces controlling an enemy province it is simply not available as a retreat path and the entire force must be surrendered if forced to retreat.


We have a rule very close to this; retreating into an enemy province without one of your supply depots imposes a +35% chance that


quote:


PoWs should be releasable on parole.

Guerillas are not player controlled forces. They cannot join armies and their normal function is to drain the economy and raise the attrition rate for any armies in the area, allied or enemy. What the Spanish player can do though is convert guerillas to regular troops with time and money.

Remove the naval invasion option entirely. Allow a force to land at friendly or allied ports only. Allow forces to land at unoccupied neutral ports but this causes a declaration of war (or something).


Some of these make sense but seem to me to be much more effort to implement than they would contribute to game playability. Converting guerillas, for instance, would be 1000 lines of code, at least, but I'm not sure it would make the game that much more enjoyable to people.

If we forbade naval invasions, wouldn't people complain that they couldn't invade Egypt as France?


Eric



malcolm_mccallum -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/14/2005 9:04:07 PM)

The size limits in the mountains aren't severe enough for my tastes. :)

Napoleon would invade Egypt by going there when it was neutral and then going to war on it. There's alot of things about the Egyptian campaign that skew games of this scope just as you really can't model the british destruction of the Danish fleet without twisting the possibilities of the game out of whack.

The price of allowing naval invasions anywhere anytime is that the AI thinks of the oceans as all adjacent and trivial. That's what gets your Spanish/Russian wars, I expect. If the oceans were an opportunity for Britain to land at his liesure and sack Europe, why did they fight so hard to maintain a foothold in Portugal historically? Britain's continental allies become liabilities and offer no advantages if Britain can fight the land war without them. Britain's main focus in the game should be diplomatic, preservation of their tiny army, and preservation of naval dominance. Any system that turns them into Kamikazee Vikings, however much more fun that might be for the British players, is skewed beyond recognition.

Since Austrians can currently place supply depots in French territory at will, all you do by linking depots to Lines of Communication is to allow nations with gold to throw around to run rampant. I'm assuming the ability to drop depots in places where you do not have armies currently and where you do not have LoC to your supply sources is a bug.

If reasonable guerillas are too hard to code then simply remove them from the game. Make spain attrition heavy and force invaders to garrison provinces and you've achieved the sum total effectiveness of the guerillas in any case. Sure you may want them for colour but really they were not the heroes of Spanish resistance that British legend makes them out to be.



pfhokie -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/14/2005 9:16:12 PM)

There should be some dipomatic option to arrange prisoner exchanges between nations. This would allow the countries to relieve their burden of the POWs but also would allow them to restock their own armies.

I understand that historically prisoner exchanges did quite often occur especially on the continent. The British and the French didn't do exchanges very often but that was mostly because they were in a constant state of war for about 20 years. The rest of the European nations often came to terms and were peacefully for a limited period of time.



ericbabe -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/14/2005 9:26:30 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: malcolm_mccallum
Since Austrians can currently place supply depots in French territory at will, all you do by linking depots to Lines of Communication is to allow nations with gold to throw around to run rampant. I'm assuming the ability to drop depots in places where you do not have armies currently and where you do not have LoC to your supply sources is a bug.


Depots must be able to trace a path back to a supply source that is free of ungarrisoned enemies or they are destroyed. When I play France I don't get the depot chains that other players are describing because I tend to keep some ungarrisoned units to prevent these supply chains.


Eric



malcolm_mccallum -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/14/2005 9:28:58 PM)

I recommend you swap it around. Put the onus on the supply depot creator to have troops there, not the one owning and controlling the territory.

Destroy depots if they are in a territory that does not have ungarrisoned (why ungarrisoned? Depots were in cities, not out in the middle of a field somewhere) friendly units.

What situation are you trying to model that discourages garrisons and encourages placing depots ahead of your army in enemy territory?



kerguelen -> RE: CoG and historical outcomes (7/14/2005 9:55:34 PM)

quote:

Anyway, thank you for the constructive criticism. If you have any concrete suggestions for improving the AI, I'd like to hear about those too.


I think one of the major problems now (which according to Mr. Z. is going to be addressed anyway) are the goal files.
I assume that the Provence +3 glory for Austria and the Tyrol +2 for France is only to keep them fighting each other (at least Provence, but even Tyrol was only given to Bavaria in 1805 but not annexed by France). However, I (playing 1792) usually end up with AI-France getting Tyrol and AI-Austria taking Provence in the next peace. Same with Britain and their goal-provinces in northern France: they usually get them pretty early. I think the option of keeping countries independent from enemies should be used much more often as a goal (that's what RL British did; furthermore if this is the goal than a country annexed by the enemy should be liberated in the peace agreement and not annexed by the victorious nation - which has keeping them independent as goal). May be Sea-Provinces could be given some attrition level ar something else, which can only be mastered reasonable with certain naval skills (like a total amount of docks or so, giving the British a huge advantage). The AI should maybe guard supply lines (depots) better. Maybe it's also possible to introduce feudal level as a goal: one goal for all nations should be giving France a higher feudal level modelling the return of the Bourbons. On the other hand revolutionary France should want to give other nations a lower feudal evel.
Such goals should rank higher on the agenda than getting provinces additional to your national core provinces (Prussia occupies Artois, although they have really no interests there).

@malcolm_mccallum
Concerning Eu and Victoria (which are my favourite games): They have their events to keep them somehow on track. And although I liked this idea in the beginning (EU2 was the first strategy game I really played, most others I couldn't even stand the demo), you realize the serious shortcomings after some time (insufficient triggers, advance knowledge). So from this point of view CoG is a completely different game.
AI not caring about their supply lines: Thats also very common in Victoria. Seems to be difficult to teach such things to AI.


So in total I really like CoG and I think those problems can be addressed. Especially games like this can show a lot of different weird outcomings and it might be difficult to find all those during Beta-testing. That's why there is usually a lot of feedback from players and lots of patches after the publishing of such games.

(Besides, what I liked better about Victoria were the more accurate province borders. It was possible to give my country a historical national shape. Bit i could be much worse I have seen screenshots from Cossacks2 and Imperial Glory campaign maps [:@])



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