Scourge of War Boards

Nowy,

I believe most of us appreciate your information. Unfortunately you still don't get the concept of working within the game. The infantry squares we can achieve here are what the game engine can support. Posting more information is fine, but unfortunately it will tend to be superfluous. No offense, but don't take offense if we tend to ignore it. Many of us have game design experience in some fashion. We know what can be done and what has to wait. Thanks for understanding.

Jack B)

Jack there is no offence, but do you know who ignore knowledge?

I think that Gunship24 is more open on my remarks.

Do you remember that guy which ignored hussars, more different types of infantry, cavalry, artillery, uniforms facings and few other small things needed in this mod?

I did not agree with him. Then I put some remarks in that matter and postulated some improvements, and as you can see, Gunship implement these colourful hussars, Voltigeurs, Grenadiers, new smaller flags and stars for generals. He also try implement Napoleonic tactic and formations. He did these things quite good, however it was showed after my remarks. It looks that he did not ignored my questions in that matter. B)

That is why I cast some information which can help all to better understand Napoleonic armies and warfare. Then the most characteristic things could be implemented in the game.

Infantry squares were characteristic for that period, therefore it should looks and operate fine. It should gives more immersion on that type of warfare too. Gunship tried implement this formation, but it still needs some improvements, because even on your screenshot in post # 90 that infantry squares looks as too small and tight formations. In far view it even looks like packed columns. There are too big four rows/ranks/ walls and too small hollow, empty place inside.

General commanders should be placed inside squares, at last even Napoleon and Wellington saved themselves inside infantry squares sometimes. I know that game have limits and other programming problems, but don’t you see that these squares do not look like historical big hollow squares?

It should be little bit bigger, have more hollow place inside and allow place generals inside.

Can it be done and how? That is a question to programmers. But they need some information how it worked in reality. Therefore I cast some things to help them in historical research.

And one more remark.
Infantry squares were defended with properly and timely fired volley, and firmly stand ground in formation. Mele was rare case, because “hoses were unwilling to impale themselves on bayonets.” Therefore they passed around squares. But when infantry broke square formation then cavalry can cut them into pieces. Not formed in square infantrymen had little chance against big horses and well trained cavalrymen.

Jack O'Neill wrote:

Here is my first attempt to post a screenshot. If it works it is a shot of Austrian Infantry Squares repelling a French Light Cavalry charge. You can see the Horsemen retreating in the upper left of the picture. Squares DO work AND I was wrong, you do not have to TC them to keep them in square. They will stay there like any other formation after melee. Sweet again!

Is it the mutual fire support of all the squares that keeps the cavalry at bay? In other words, would the cavalry melee with a single square?

By the way that's a very nice picture. With all that French cavalry pouring out of the town it looks like you've brought in Murat for the wet work.

MTG,

Because it is a game, the Cav will make contact with the square and melee. There is no provision for Cavalry either bluffing a charge or the "riding on through and reforming later" aspect of a real charge. After having done some more testing, the conclusion is the firepower of the mutually supporting squares can do an admirable job of helping a lot to drive off the charging horsemen. The squares get to fire all their weapons, which is NOT historically accurate, but it is acceptable as a trade off for the horsemen actually reaching the square(s).
Since Gunship has made the Cav slightly more fragile in melee with Infantry, even when they do close, about four out of five times the Cav falls back. The square will eventually break if hit 3-4 times by charging cav. I find that acceptable for gaming purposes. Once Gunship puts together some Heavy Cavalry, (Cuirassiers, Carabiniers, etc. - pant, pant...), That may be a different story. They should be slightly tougher against both firepower and melee. These were "Big Men on Big Horses" and thier job was to ride down formed infantry, smashing the enemy battle line, forcing a breach and allowing the light Horse to harry the retreating enemy forever, a la the pursuit of the Prussian Army after Jena-Auerstadt in 1806.
Sorry to run on there, but I do dig this period.

Jack "digging the period " O'Neill B)

Gunship,

A funny thing just happened during a battle. My Austrian light horse were formed facing Seminary Ridge and unengaged. I came back to find them with some 25-30 casualties. I peered across the valley and found French 8-pdrs were banging away from the ridgeline some 600 yards away. They were unsupported so I sent 2 squadrons to take them. The Cav reached the Battery but were not allowed to take the guns. They literally stood in the gunline but nothing. The Battery continued to fire, no-one was limbering up trying to escape or anything. Is this a glitch or did you tell us that somewhere and I'm too dumb to find it?

Jack "not very bright" O'Neill B)

The Cav reached the Battery but were not allowed to take the guns. They literally stood in the gunline but nothing.

This was picked up by alessillo in his zulu mod he was doing and is a bug in the game. For whatever reason they stop and fire instead of charging unlimbered artillery. I think you can get them to charge manually but they wont autocharge.

G,

Sorry, wasen't clear - I WAS manually charging after they didn't go in on their own. They'll charge Foot or Horse no problem. The just stood there, maybe they were firing. Hard to say.

Jack B)

Jack O'Neill wrote:

They were unsupported so I sent 2 squadrons to take them. The Cav reached the Battery but were not allowed to take the guns. They literally stood in the gunline but nothing. The Battery continued to fire, no-one was limbering up trying to escape or anything. Is this a glitch or did you tell us that somewhere and I'm too dumb to find it?

Were they tired? When cavalry reach that state, they will not charge. If they are meleeing, they will break off and retreat towards their lines. They have to be winded or better to be of any use. And they do take a long time to recover. This simulates the time needed to reorganize and rest the horses.

MTG,

Yes, aware of the "Horses Blown" issue. No, they were fully rested even though they rode some 600 yards to the Battery. Good morale too. Will test this out again when it comes up again.

Jack B)

gunship24 wrote:

At the very least I would love to see the FireMod and MeleeMod in the drills working, these would act similar to the Melee and Fire modifiers in unitattributes that are set with the units expereince level. It's been placed but doesn't seem to do anything.

Norb wrote:

firemod - works for cav and inf, not art
melmod - works for cav and inf

They are in there, they increase the chance of a hit not the firepower, just the chance that a shot will make a hit. I believe this is out of 1000.

Hope this helps.

B

Thanks B. I gave this another go. There are two files with Fire and Melee modifers. Unitattributes has Fire Modifer, Load Modifer and Melee Modifer. The other file Drills has FireMod and MeleeMod. I assume these do the same thing, one affects the unit as assigned in the OOB and the other the formation used by all units. I tested each one seperately.

Unitattributes
I copied the rank "9" Marksmanship, renamed it "10" and assigned values 1000 to each of the modifiers. I then set the unit Marskmanship in the OOB to 10 and sure enough the unit was like a killing machine. It mowed down the enemy as if it has machine guns and annihilated them easily in hand to hand. I also repeated with the Load Modifer left blank with the same result. So these do work.

Drills
With the Marksmanship set back to normal I set the FireMod and MeleeMod in the unit Skirmish formation to 1000 each. Loaded up the game, put a unit in skirmish but it had no affect. They fired and fought normally.

Its like the ones in drills just arent used.

All,

How odd. Sure would think those files should operate at least together.

Jack B)