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Jordan -> RE: 1796 NA PBEM AAR (9/2/2005 7:15:40 PM)
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Turns two through five go a bit nutty in our game. The reason was that each of the human players - each wanting to control their own trade and diplomatic decisions - did not touch our settings in the policy screens. We assumed that if we did not have our experts turned on, then we could. You read the manual and tell me if it's clear about policy settings and PBEM. (Other PBEM games had the same issues).
Anyway it was a bad assumption to make. Prussia invaded Saxony which then became a protectorate of mine, Austria that is. Not something I wanted to see happen with the French rampaging through Northern Italy. Sweden attacked Denmark, which became a protectorate of mine, Austria that is. Not something...well you get the story. It took us a few turns to figure out what was going on and to remedy the situation.
The French were besieging Piedmont and Milan and throwing ever more forces into Northern Italy, apparently unconcerned about a possible British threat or that Prussia might join the war against them. After a couple of turns, it was also apparent that the French strategy was to conquer provinces and not to go after my armies. While they sieged Piedmont and Milan, my weak, immobile army in Genoa (see above post) sat unmolested. My other armies had complete freedom of movement although I could see that he was attempting to use his diplomats to find my forces.
My plan was to play keep away for a few turns, not lose too much national morale and preserve my inferior armies until the right possible moment. To obtain a right possible moment I wanted to use the Army of Observation, sitting deep within Austria proper, to swing through Bohemia, the minor German states and into Holland where it would join with the British. Hopefully that action would serve to draw some French forces from Northern Italy and I could use my 1st and 2nd armies, which were now out of his LOS, via the Tyrol in combination with the 3rd army to gang up on the French. To add to the manuever I moved the Army of Piedmont, a force of mine that was in his LOS - sitting in Switzerland - north.
That was the plan. Unfortunately the Army of Observation, brillantly sneaking through Saxony, ran headlong into a Prussian army, with whom I was at war (we thought a ceasefire would have solved our problems). Run awaaaay. National morale hit. Further, the Danish forces now under my unwilling control on both land and sea were no match for Sweden. Big national morale hits for the HRE. It took two turns for me just to find all the Danish ships. And instead of diplomatically finessing Russia, I was trying to resovle my wars with Prussia and Sweden.
The irony is that I as moved the 1st, 2nd and 3rd armies into threatening positions in the mountains of Switzerland and Tyrol, by turn 4 France had poured all of his armies into Northern Italy, even his Army of Batavia had moved into a supporting posistion along the Rhine. Britain began a siege of Friesland and my Armies of Observation and Piedmont had still not joined them (so the siege of Friesland was still not much of a threat to France).
Yet I still had relatively unscathed armies (Prussia returned my prisoners when we sorted out the policy screen) and France was totally committed to the Italian theatre, not behaving aggressively and seemingly unconcerned about Britain and a potential Prussian threat.
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