Ammunition Wagons

[mcaryf]

Has anybody tried to understand how ammunition wagons work?

The OOB and scenario files typically show them as starting with 50,000 units of ammo. However, when you interrogate them in the game this number seems to have been multiplied by 10 so they have 500k units. I am deliberately using the word units as it appears to me that the cost to the wagon of replenishing both a cannon and infantry is counted in the same units.

the lowest holding I have ever seen after a battle was one Prussian Wagon which seemed to have used about 10 x as much as any other being about 166,000 units. The next closest had dispensed 32,500. I fact very few wagons had reduced by more than 1,000 units.

I have the impression that the multiplying by 10 in the game is probably an error in what was already an over generous allocation and for whatever reason that Prussian wagon is the only one working properly.

Historically some Prussian units at Ligny had to withdraw from the battle as they had run out of ammunition also of course the artillery fires all day long at Waterloo without a care in the world.

I know it is not the right era but when General Custer went on his final mission to Little Big Horn he had a mule train that included 12 mules each carrying 2,000 rounds of ammo one for each of his 12 companies. Thus the replenishment ammo in that case was about 30 rounds per man. At that rate of resupply the Allied and Prussian armies would only need about 8 wagons rather than the over 40 they have.

A British ammunition Wagon actually carried about 20 barrels holding 1,000 musket rounds each. Thus it might be reasonable to reduce the capacity of wagons available to human players to about 20,000 actual rounds so possibly 2,000 in the OOB.

I guess some players might not want to be bothered with this logistics issue but it would be another way to add realism and the artillery would not go short if a musket ball really is the same as a shell.

Regards

Mike

[Jean Lafitte]

I have been trying to figure out exactly how the Ammo Wagons work. They obviously follow the Division Commander around. When the player orders an artillery battery to Re Supply the battery will travel to the wagon, ignoring all danger.

I'm still trying to figure out whether a battery left to its own devices will pull itself out of the firing line to Re Supply when all ammo is expended.

With regard to the infantry battalions, I assume that they simply have unlimited ammo.

I agree with you that adding realistic ammo supply constraints would enhance the game.

[Hook]

I once saw a battery move to a supply wagon in the rear and resupply. The battery commander came with it. This was all under AI control. Then it moved back to the line.

Typically the supply wagons will automatically move to the battery line and resupply the guns, but not necessarily any that have been withdrawn behind the line because they are out of canister. I'm not sure why this particular gun had to go find ammo elsewhere; possible the wagon that would normally supply it had been captured.

A lot of things are different if you leave everyone under AI control.

Hook