Scourge of War Boards

Oh I agree LP. Wouldn't want to change the AI at all in this regard, just encourage players to approach things in the same way.

I'm not clear about the less fatigue bit. My earlier test seems to indicate there is no fatigue for going cross-country, even on the most rugged map.

Do troops move faster on roads in the game? I agree they should. I'll try running a test on that and report back.

Martin

I believe we have modified fatigue for MP, but there definitely is an increase in fatigue based on roads vs cross-country (and particular terrain types). If you are only travelling short distances cross-country, then the added fatigue will be minimal, especially over open ground, save of course for fences. I'm sure any advocate of road marching will become fast friends with our resident road warrior, Willard.

It is usually not worth using roads. The speed bonus is usually too small to make up for the extra distance you have to cover. I only use roads when I have individual regiments who would otherwise be marching right next to the road. Another thing we can change when map modding is allowed; I would like for roads to be worthwhile.

Agree on all counts Garnier.

Have run another test on the alpine map. This time I oredered 2 infantry brigades to the same point, one going cross country and one using roads. I tried picking a route where roads should give some benefit, although, as you say, units using them have to cover extra distance.

Another 6 miles as the crow flies, but again more in reality. The brigade going cross-country (including a climb up Aps Knob) took 70 minutes. The brigade using roads actually arrived 5 minutes later. Granted the latter brigade will have had a greater distance to march following the roads, so it was probably marching faster. But the net result is that it still took longer. In both cases I think the speed is too fast.

Neither brigade appeared at all fatigued, which again does not seem right to me. 6-8 miles represents a good half day's march over tough country. Also Aps Knob appears to be the highest point on the map, but the troops were 'rested' when they reached the top.

Going cross-country will get you where you need to be faster than using roads 99% of the time. And since I only play multiplayer, I certainly don't want to see cross-country speeds slowed, but would instead prefer the speed of road marching increased.

Yes I do see the problem. It will take ages to get anywhere, especially in MP where you cannot speed up the game.

OTOH at the current rate, you can complete a full days march for Jackson's foot cavalry in little more than 2 hours. Even the road speed looks to be too high, by a factor of at least 2. Historically I think you could march faster if you double-timed, but troops could only keep that up for a short while I think. And my tests have been at normal speed anyway.

Yeah since MP can't be sped up (and if it could, how could we decide when to), it's better that troops can march unrealistically fast and not get tired. We can't have 10 people spend an hour marching before the battle begins.

Yes, something's has to give in this situation. I find the current pace of the MP game good, and am not suggesting a major change.

My vote would be to leave road movement as is, but further slow cross-country a little, and also give troops some fatigue when they do it for any length of time. Overall just do enough to make it better to use roads on the approach, as the AI does, rather than the reverse. How does that sound?

For GCM I won't make marching any slower. I've always intended to make road marching faster when that becomes possible. For singleplayer it's a completely different game, one that I don't play.

I play both, but do have a preference for MP.

For me, generalship is partly about trade-offs, such as between speed of approach, fatigue and security (eg vulnerability of road columns). At the moment it's a no-brainer. As long as we end up with something that introduces some real decisions here, I'll be happy.

I see the march mph thing as less of an issue. One could take the view that this part of the game is illustrative, rather than strictly historical. And I suspect the game would probably be less fun if a scenario took 6 hours rather than 3 to get the same result.

I wonder whether a neat alternative wouldn't be to just speed up the game screen clock. It would have no effect on play, just on your little clock dispay at the bottom of the screen. This might help in other areas. I've seen comment that combats are over too quickly and casualties pile-up too quickly. Maybe this is just a function of the same distortions, and they are actually just right if you speed up the clock display?

All comments intended to be constructive folks. It's still my favorite game at the moment