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Grand_Armee -> Prussian Report (10/13/2005 12:11:42 PM)
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I spent this Thursday off work working my way through the 1796 scenario. ...I love working a four day week. Anyway on to the report.
I Played Prussia in the 1796 scenario. At this time it's April 1805.
After an aborted start last night, I started this morning by shaping the Prussian economy. My main emphasis was producing whatever a province produced best along with lots of food.
Using linens instead of luxuries to build culture is great! It meant that I was able to keep barracks levels rising continually. A hint, though: Import wool and or cotton if your linen production is slow. To illustrate my success, each of my 20 non-protectorate provinces is at barracks level 5 and culture level 5. Training level is 24.13. I think this is a major improvement over the previous version.
It also meant that I only had to use enough production on spice and luxuries to keep morale rising. Wine comes with farming of course and I didn't worry too much about that since my NML was almost continually ascending.
Diplomacy was the big failure in the game so far. No treaties were able to be passed no matter how beneficial they were to the country proposed.
The multi protectorate bug seems to be gone. I took one province of Bavaria by seige and it went Prussian Purple on takeover. AS a peace condition I made Austria liberate both Bavaria and Piedmont. Neither nation's provinces went solid Austrian gold. I did however ensure that I selected all of the provinces as conditions. Another thumbs up, guys!
Feudalism has gone wacky. Each April, no matter how low my readiness was set, feudal troops were created. Eventually I began dropping my feudalism level to see what would happen.
This had to be done gradually since it caused major fluctuations in morale every time I dropped it. EVen when the level was ZERO, the feudal troops kept coming. Thank goodness for the newly added disband button.
The disband button is a huge bonus! I was able to pick and choose which feudals to disband. This even included protectorate troops...some even in protectorate armies and corps! Another thumbs up!
I had one detailed battle today. It was by accident...I just clicked on the wrong button.
Anyway, 58K Austrians against 148K Prussians. My force was 4 divs infantry, one Arty, and 8 cav.
His force 7 inf divs of varying size and 2 cav. I decided to see what I could do since I rarely have cav superiority. The lion's share of this cavalry came from the feudal levy.
...btw, my cav was upgraded to the max.
Once in position for a massed charge, I launched my horsemen. I was a trifle upset when every Austrian division formed square stopping my charge.
However...comma... Once my turn came around again, every Austrian square had gone skirmisher and looked disordered. So, I charged. Every Austrian formation was displaced.
I'm assuming that the Austrians tried to change formation and disordered.
If that's not the case, I'm not certain I want to be on the receiving end of somebody else' cav superiority. I've always felt that the Austrians were the easiest to beat in detailed combat in this game.
Military production: With the heavy arrival of feudal troops, I didn't build a single infantry or cavalry. I eventually gave up producing artillery as well since my protectorates Bavaria and Saxony built enough.
You'd have thought with all of those linens going to upgrading that I wouldn't have much left for anything else. And it's true, for a while I was hard pressed to continue with upgrades and build enough containers to keep them in. Then the joys of the disband button came into play. At the end of 1804 I had built 4 armies and 9 corps.
Still, I had enough linens to build a navy, too. At this time (April 1805) I have 7 heavy SOL's, 1 SOL, and 3 frigates added to Prussia's diminutive navy.
I hadn't built any Guard or Cavalry units that required linens. I let the Saxons and Bavarians provide those.
POW's: That contentious issue that has driven us all to distraction. Enemy troops caught on your soil stay yours despite cossacks running to and fro. If they're in enemy territory, they can be released. I ensured that whenever I caught some Ivans in Western Russia, that I marched them into Prussia.
On one occasion I was about to cry foul when I saw Austrian POW's being released in France's Lorraine province. However, on the next turn the province was striped gold signifying a change in control.
Also, POW's left in neutral territory can also be released.
Irregular troops: Yes, they still are flung far and wide when you war with Russia. But, if you have one division guarding a depot in your home territory, they seem to pass through looking for something easier to do. They never freed any of their comrades on my soil.
I never delved too deep into Russia since I've made a practice of seiging my way in, taking city after city until Russian morale is low enough to cause a surrender. I never needed to go to Moscow, so the ability of cossacks to destroy depots in THEIR territory isn't known to me just yet.
I didn't war with Spain or Turkey, either.
The Interface: Some things were improved on the development screen. For instance areas you can't develop due to either the province being a protectorate, or a lack of resources is now a marbled red and black area...I think it much better than the gray.
One thing I didn't like about the development screen was that the countries were shrunk and there were no dividing lines between my provinces. This often made me work alphabetically, or to close the screen altogether and start at the beginning.
Linens is now in a reddish box. And, whatever you do to adjust linen production that turn won't change that red box. You have to wait until the next turn to see what's happening.
I noticed also that some artwork was added to the background of the advisor's picture. I thought it a pleasant surprise.
I rarely bother with the military advisor. The only time I use him is when a unit seems to disappear from the screen. I didn't have any of those occurrences today even though diminutive Magdeburg was the gathering place of units waiting for a container to hold them.
I didn't think to test the sound....at all. Had the house to myself and wanted to catch up on some loud King Crimson with some Pink Floyd, The Who, and some others thrown in.
...ok, that dates me a little.
I didn't do much with my new navy except take short cruises to see what was happening around Europe. I didn't try to dock in any ports but my own.
Just considering the things I did today, I think it's a massive improvement over earlier versions. With the ability to upgrade with linens instead of luxuries, it makes for a much quicker game. I could usually count on being able to have the materials to build a corps in 4 turns.
EB, it's just getting better and better[:)]
Oh, I almost forgot to tell you about new leaders. I got two of them today with Germanic names. Both came as results of quick battle...which surprised me a lot. One was Wobeser and the other was Oppenheimer (he didn't bring his bomb, though...and yes, I know he wasn't German). They had some great ratings, too. Junior Bluchers they were...except neither had the cavalry modifier.
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