What good and bad things you can find in SOWG, which can be useful in Napoloenic Wars mod.

[Nowy]

Why are you so into Napoleon Nowy, just out of curiosity? Are you from Europe? Are you terribly short and have a penchant for thrusting your hand inside your unbuttoned frock coat? I realize Napoleon was an emperor and all but you should really give the American civil war a chance. In terms of an intense combat experience, you will not be disappointed - I can promise you - and actually the combat is quite similar. The only thing that is really lacking is mass cavalry charges at infantry in square formation.

Yes, I am from Europe and I am interested in NW.
It sad, but I didn't find any interested game which can be pretty made and properly handle warfare in that musket, sword and horse style, and was based on that period.

ACW was, as Jack said, last in that style or first modern war and it could be interesting, but I prefer NW.

Therefore I seek for game or mod which can be more realistic, historicaly accurate, give more immersion in period which had so intensive combats, where many things changed.

[Davinci]

The American Civil War was, depending on who you ask, either the last Napoleonic style war OR the first modern war. (Trains, telegraph, repeating rifles, etc.)

OK, True!

The SOWGB engine can be used easily to represent the vast majority of Napoleonic combat. Similarities include, but are not limited to -
Troops still march on foot or ride on horseback.
Artillery is still horse drawn.
Muzzle loading weapons are prevalent.
Generals still must ride around to find out why stuff is not happening according to their magnificent plans...(You get my point.)

OK, True!

Infantry ranges need to be drastically shortened. The average smoothbore musket had an EFFECTIVE range of roughly 50-75 yards. The term "whites of their eyes..." was real.

This might cause some serious issues with the units no-longer standing and firing, but charging towards each other.

This is very close to the melee charge radius. I would think that this distance would have to be slightly increased, and the movement speed of the troops slightly decreased.

Basically, by slowing down their movements, you would slow-down their reaction time on charging each other. (Debatable)!

Most Major nations fought in three ranks. The British and their KGL Allies fought in two ranks, since the American Revolution, I might add.

This shouldn’t be a problem – the drills file is extremely moddable.

Infantry Bayonet charges should result in the CHARGED side falling back BEFORE the assaulting side reaches them. The threat of the impact was greater then the actual damage. This is verifiable - look it up.

This is already \ somewhat in the game; there is a setting in the drills file that will cause the units to retreat if they are near each other.

Bayonet charges were quite often stopped by concentrated firing from well-drilled, steady Infantry.
(I give you the British in Spain. Time and again stopped the French columns with close-range volleys and, if necessary, a bayonet charge of their own.)

I don’t know how the game will react to this one!

Cavalry - 3 types. Heavy, Medium and Light. Heavy Cav were big men on big horses.

You can make the heavy cavalry slightly larger [/b] by the gfx file.

There job was to charge and crash thru the enemy ranks and (hopefully) sweep them away. Medium, (Dragoons mostly), had a dual role - Fight on horseback and sometimes dismount and fight on foot. (Note - American Cavalry has always been a species of Dragoon, no matter what they are called.) Light Cavalry - Scouts that can shoot and if necessary, skirmish.

This is going to require some redefining of the cavalry units to have three different tactics, and probably three different toolbars, and formations.

So, Medium and light Cav shoot, Heavies don't. Yes, there are exceptions always, but these are the main topics.

Again, different toolbars, and different formations!

Artillery - ranges possibly shortened, but maybe not by much. 3 basic gun sizes in the field - light, medium and heavy. Light - 3-4 pounders, Medium - 6-8 pounders, Heavy - 12 pounders.

Two distinct types -Foot guns and Horse guns. For gaming purposes leave them alone. Have designated Foot Batteries just move slower to simulate the gunners walking beside their pieces, as opposed to the Horse Batteries where everybody rode.

I’m not sure about this one, early testing by myself noticed that the mapname.csv file has more to do with the movement speed than the unitglobal.csv file.

Now, this might have changed over the course of the updates, but I don’t think that it is possible to have different speeds for the artillery units.

Organization - fairly easy. A Battalion is a Battalion, where-ever you find it. The difference between American Regiments (Volunteers) was we used the British style - a Regiment consisted of 1 battalion of 10 companies.

OK! – but the farther the units are separated from each other, their commanding officer, the more problems this will cause the AI.

The European Armies used several battalions of varying sizes to create their regiments. Don't get me started on Guards and Grenadier Regiments. I'll be here all day.

OK!

That is the super easy version so we can get started marching brightly colored units around and turning them into messy, bloody corpses.

OK!

Jack "big into research..." O'Neill B)

If we were Indians – Your name would be He whom name changes with the wind !

davinci

[Davinci]

I think that the dispute resulted from you criticizing the game and a mod, but let us put that behind us.

Yes, but when we think positive than criticizing isn't bad. It can help to understand what people like or don't like and what they see or want to see in the game or mod.

Can I just say, OK and we move on to debating about how you feel about playing and moving the units around in the demo to simulate the Napoleon War!

What likes, and dislikes that you have found!

davinci

[Nowy]

Yes, Jack post # 6 is excellent. He cast fine short remarks about differences between ACW and NW.

However there are some disputable things.

I could say that NW were more complex, involved much more belligerents, engaged more units, formations and inflicted more casualties in total. There were many political, diplomatic questions, many coalitions, many minor allies and some other wars were fought in back side. It could be taken into account, because it engaged few participants which at that the some time were engaged in NW.

Weather condition, seasons of the year, topography also were very important and sometime even decided about campaigns and battles results.

There were important navy role, however British navy dominated at see at that period, there were many navy engagements which participate even in few land engagements too.

In ACW generally were two opposite sides blue and grey, while during NW were more belligerents as well as some other problems and engagements on back side in Ottoman Empire, Egypt, Persia, India, both Americas, Africa and even in Europe.

What is more there were many thing which were changed during that period. Many participants changed sides sometime, armies changed their organization, strategy and even tactics.

Such big variability, changeability and numerous inconstancy get many problems and therefore it is not so easy implement NW into game. Even battle simulation could be hard, because there were engaged numerous armies, even in one battle.

Nevertheless there were many what if questions, and variety of conflicts which could be interesting for many people in the world.

[Marching Thru Georgia]

XNS wrote:

I realize Napoleon was an emperor and all but you should really give the American civil war a chance. In terms of an intense combat experience, you will not be disappointed - I can promise you - and actually the combat is quite similar. The only thing that is really lacking is mass cavalry charges at infantry in square formation.

Yet von Moltke is reported to have said, "I have no time to waste in studying the struggles of two armed mobs."

[Jack ONeill]

Born,

Yes about Sharpes. I own all of them, on DVD. Historical accuracy is sometimes questionable, but they are great stories.

DaV,

Yes. Some of this stuff may not be able to be changed. No need to have larger sprites for Heavy cav.
Cav Shooting - Just take away the Heavies ability to shoot. No formation changes needed really, nor extra tool bars.
Artillery - the difference in speeds is not necessary between Foot and Horse guns. The game engine can only do so much.
Infantry - Charge range can be reset if I am not mistaken. If it can be, reset it to about 10 yards.
Command and Control - will always be an issue, no matter what the organization is.

Nowy - This is not a game about Geo-Political bullshit. This is NOT a game of Stratigic manuvering. It just barely come under the heading of Grand Tactical operations. (No offense to Norb/Team.)

IF you have done any study of the actual Combat tactics used, they roughly remained the same.

The British fought in line Defensively at first, absorbing the attack, then going over to the attack themselves.

The French GENERALLY were attack oriented, advancing in columns, screened by clouds of Skirmishers (Chandler). They would also fight in line firing.

The German countries fought in firing lines in the early stages of the Wars, then moved over to columns of attack like the French after they got tired of getting thier butts kicked by them.

The Russians fought in deep lines formations, backed up by their awesome numbers of guns placed at intervals between Battalions/Regiments in line.

There were ALWAYS local variations, but GENERALLY they remained the same. For purposes of GAMING, the above written might work.

Also, this is a LAND-BASED COMBAT GAME. The HMS Victory would be a bit out of place here. Also, minor countries tended to emulate their larger cousins, so no great changes there.

Jack "of some trades..." O'Neill B)

[Nowy]

In majority I agree with Jack’s remarks and proposed changes required in the game. (post # 6)
Davinci also gives interesting remarks in post #12.

However there should be taken into account more things.

Belligerents
There were so many belligerents in NW. They had their own armies, different uniformed units and sometime quite different organization. They sometime used different or specific strategies and tactics.

Therefore question is, what and how many belligerents could/should be implemented in the game?
There could be next major problems in numbers and large variety of units in the game.
How many formations and soldiers could be placed per player and in total in the game?

Infantry
Battalion organization changed and were little bit different in some countries during NW
- British regiments included one or few battalions, each consisted of 10 companies,
- French battalion until 1808 reforms had 1 grenadier, 7 fusilier, 1 voltigeur companies, each 120 men.
- French battalion after 1808 had 6 companies, but each include more men c.a. 140
- French Imperial Guard battalions had only 4 companies, but each included more men, nominally c.a.200
- Austrian battalion had 6 companies
- Austrian Grenadiers comp. in war time were separated and formed grenadier battalions 4 or 6 companies each.
- many German and Italian minor states had battalions mainly modelled on Prussian, Austrian or French
- Polish units were modelled on French battalions, but had different number of men
- Prussian battalion were more monolithic and had 4 the same type companies
- Russian battalion changed their internal organization, however had similar number of companies

Almost every country changed their units organization and had their own specifics or such things like guerrilla, partisan, rebel, insurrection, volunteer, legionary, Landwehr, auxiliary and many other types of units and this matter needs more explanation, but it could be done in other time

Here is a question.
Is it possible implement so many different battalions organization for each faction in the game?
It is not necessary, but it could be interesting and sometime more accurate.

Cavalry
There were regular cavalry with specialised types, however all cavalry units can charged in battles.
Even medium and light cavalry support infantry and often used their cold steal arms. Their fire arms were not so common in use, because were not so effective. However it also play important role. There were many light cavalry units which did not use or very rare used fire arms e.g. hussars, uhlans, lancers, some cheavauleger etc.

Additionally there were many irregular, national or other cavalry e.g. Cossacks, Bashkirian, Tatars, Mamelukes, Insurrection, Landwehr etc.

Cavalry units organization had even more differences than mentioned above infantry basic units. Even in the same country, light and heavy cavalry can included different amount of squadrons and men and there were many differences between many countries too.

Therefore there are questions.
Could it be and how implemented into the game?
What with different organization for each type of cavalry and each nation?

Artillery
Some differences in artillery organization Jack mentioned, but there were some differences in equipment and tactical use of artillery too.

There were Horse and Foot artillery batteries of course, but there also exist regimental artillery organised in companies or section 2 light cannons. There were used siege artillery, heavy cannons, mortars and even rockets. What is more in the game it could be hard implement 1:1 ratio for artillery organization and equipment. Then here should be implemented some simplifications and reductions.

It worthy note few other things.
Russian exactly loved their artillery guns, but their batteries included cannons and specific unicorn guns which were used instead howitzers.

Prussian additionaly had batteries entirely formed with howitzers, but I don’t remember how they were used on real battlefield. It could be researched.

Soon I can add some more remarks about other things, troops, commanders, artillery organization and equipment which could be implemented in the game.

[Davinci]

Nowy – you have to keep in mind that there is a limit (i.e.….Memory, Computer Specs, Graphics, etc) that will greatly limit the amount of men, and uniforms that are in the game.

Every uniform that is in the game will impact your memory.

Basically, you have to draw a line between what is practical, and what is not!

A computer game can never do everything that the real-life-soldiers dealt with, or what they went through.

Translated - This is only a game that has limits; it’s a delicate balance between give and take.

davinci

[Jack ONeill]

Nowy,

Good Lord man. Where do I begin?

The number of British regiments which had more then one battalion IN THE FIELD I can count on one hand. Yes, like the French, they had more then 1 Battalion, the 2nd. one being a depot battalion back home to send replacements to the front.

The number of belligerents can be paied down to a handful. No-one will care what the army of the Province of Old-Scone did with their 32 men and one antiquated cannon.

Companie organizations within the Battalion are irrelevant. It is the BATTALION that counts, not the company. Yes, we all know Battalions had light companies to detach for skirmisher duties. Screw it. Use a light infantry battalion and screen the Brigade.

Numbers of men per company is irrelevant. It is the number of men in the BATTALION which counts.

I didn't say light and medium cavalry couldn't charge. Medium Cavalry, (French Dragoons), charged and broke a British square in Spain.

The numbers of irregular cavalry , (except for Cossacks), was relatively small. Prussian Landwher Cav could be rated as slightly better then Cossacks for GAMING purposes.

We are not, generally, talking about campaigns here. Nor sieges. Partisans and guerillas are irrelevant.

Russian batteries contained 8 guns and 4 unicorns. A unicorn is a type of howitzer. Treat it as such for gaming purposes.

Try to remember Gunships wonderful Mod upcoming is for a GAME, not a game unto itself.

Speaking of games, are you figuring SOWGB out, or still just blathering on to show off your knowledge? Talk is cheap. Come on into MP and see how easy it is to get your butt kicked.

Sic Semper Avantis

Jack "whites of their eyes..." O'Neill B)

[Marching Thru Georgia]

Jack O'Neill wrote:

No-one will care what the army of the Province of Old-Scone did with their 32 men and one antiquated cannon.

Yeah, but I bet they had really fancy dress. :laugh: