Napoleonic Wargame Club (NWC)

I agree with Colin with respect to the cavalry. And as a side benefit, this will help tilt the odds back a bit more for the Allies since they have more and better cavalry.

Maréchal Theron Lambert
Grande Duc de Montereau et Duc d'Angers
Cavalerie du VI Corps
Armee du Rhin
Commandant Grenadiers a Pied "les Grognards"

Re: cavalry charge - John Tiller recently made an update to one of my projects and its due to get into the next updates for the games.

Apparently the column fire percentage was affecting cavalry.

I also agree that lowering the cavalry multiplier was wrong and want to talk to Rich H. about putting it back to 5.

Paco and I had a series of discussions about cavalry charging over the last few months. He is of the mind that cavalry in the BG series was more powerful. I personally feel that its due to the fact that the Charge Phase came after the Defensive Fire Phase and you could hide your cavalry prior to the charge, taking no DF as a result. Then when you charged you werent fired on at all. You also were not fired on while you followed up.

This may have alot to do with why we are seeing cavalry have less ability in this series. The Charge Multiplier is only one factor.

Another thing to ponder with Jena is that the Allied cavalry generally have better morale and they have a TON of heavy cavalry. This should make any Allied charge that much better.



Colonel Bill Peters
Armee du Rhin - V Corps, Cavalerie du V Corps, 20ème légère Brigade de Cavalerie, 13ème Hussar Regiment
HPS Napoleonic Scenario Designer (Eckmuhl, Wagram, Jena-Auerstaedt and ... more to come)

Bill,

Please do not overestimate the numbers of Prussian cavalry! Of course nominally they are much superior compared to the french. But because of:
1. Ridiculous command structure. (Historical)
2. Reduced radia. (Artificial)
3. Low leaders quality. (Both historical and somewhat artificially exaggerated)
most of the cavalry can charge only once. After that it's really hard to:
1. Disengage properly hence huge loses.
2. Reorder

<center></center>
<center><b>Eyo Imperatorskogo Velichestva Leib-Kirassirskogo polku
General-Lieutenant Anton Valeryevich Kosyanenko
Commander of the Second Army of the West </b></center>

Hi All
Anton I am playing Prussians in the twin battles vs Jeff Bardon I am sure you will agree he is a worthy opponent. (patch 1.02)

I have been using the mighty Prussian cavalry to some considerable effect. I agree they are imperfect but used in mass and in waves that have cut the French to bits at times.

Also Tomasz and I are fighting a manuever at Karlsburg with him as Prussians he also uses the awesome Prussian cavalry to good effect as well.

Just my opinion but I don't think its that bad for the allieds. I am doing quite well in the twin battles scenario vs Jeff and the Prussian cavalry is fun to use.

Good to see the MOE battle went well for you.
Salute!


General de Brigade Knox
Baron de l'Empire
2e Regiment Gardes d'Honneur (the regaled pheasants)
La Jeune Garde
CO. 1er Brigade, III Division Cavalerie Legere, III Corps Armee du Nord
http://www.aspire.co.nz/colinknoxnwc.htm

Hi all,

Has anyone given thought to not having cavalry suffer reduced movement when disordered?

It seems to me as soon as a cav unit is disordered it is penalised in movement when in reality its movement was better as there was less control in keeping formation and more individual motivation to either catch up and reform or bugger off due to a poor situation.
Units therefore tended to charge controlled and once engaged that control was "lost" until the formation reformed.

From my readings the individuals and smaller groups would tend to gallop away to reform, pursue, retreat, rout or rally etc.
I feel in reality their movement was not in fact reduced but actually enhanced!

If we did not have reduced movement for disordered unitsit would better allow for the multiple charges and extraction of cavalry from melee/contact more easily and this I feel is more in keeping with what we read.

To often the cavalry tend to be a one shot weapon. I realise the combined arms preocess of reducing that hapening and the issue of blown horses etc, but still my comments I feel may hold an aspect that could be closer to reality.

My 5c this time [:D]

Col Mike Ellwood
Konig Regt
1 Bde, 22 Div
VII Saxon Corps, ADR

Hi Mike

Yes I'd like to see increased movement for disordered cavalry. Having them chased around by infantry isn't much fun. They are indeed a one shot weapon unless you can charge in several waves and leave an escape route open. Problem is like most changes to games, one has to consider the changes from all angles. Gamey opponents will simply move disordered cavalry forwards rather than backwards, if opportunity arises.

Zoc entrapment is part of the problem. Not as bad as it is in the old Bg games but still an issue for me......I've had 5-man units simply stop dead retreating cavalry. Retreating units simply would pay no heed to zoc, rather an abstract concept at the best of times. They would take losses as they pass enemy units but that's fair enough. But getting stopped dead? I don't think so. But eliminate zoc, and again you get gamey opponents who would simply advance unchecked and run riot given half a chance.

Generaal
2de Brigade
2de Nederlandsche Div
I Corps
Anglo Allied Army

"I feel in reality their movement was not in fact reduced but actually enhanced!"
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Good point, especially with regard to getting out of contact. There is no question in my mind that formed infantry shouldn't be able to run down retreating cavalry and mow them down -- I just don't see it happening. And in this regard it applies to infantry as well -- when falling back from an overwhelming assault I'm sure they were more concerned about "getting out of Dodge" than keeping their lines dressed. Fear can give wings to people's feet and I really don't see the average advancing line outrunning a retreating foe, but that is what happens currently. In Desert Storm we actually had the better part of an Iraqi "leg" infantry battalion flee on foot faster than we were advancing with our armor(against negligible resistance)so that our sister brigade that had circled around them captured the bulk of them rather than we who were assaulting across the objective.

So, should the movement penalty only apply to advancing units?? And how difficult would that be to code? Given that code already exists to prevent routed units from advancing, a modification of the code to apply to this situation should be relatively easy. I have to admit that, over all, this would put a big crimp in my usual attack pattern where the goal is to break up the line and then run down and destroy the disordered fragments. Of course, there was a point at which the general disorder was so great that control was lost and roads were clogged with retreating units getting in the way of one another so that everyone's progress was impeded and pursuit could overtake them. But it seems that this shouldn't apply to a handful of battalions or squadrons spread out across the terrain. We see some of the added movement I'm talking about when units rout, but not until that point. Which brings up another point -- should a player be able to "order" a unit to rout ("Run! Every man for himself!!")?

Maréchal Theron Lambert
Grande Duc de Montereau et Duc d'Angers
Cavalerie du VI Corps
Armee du Rhin
Commandant Grenadiers a Pied "les Grognards"

Monsieur one of the most gamey tactics is ZOC I had heavy cheval regment 250 men destroyed by one unit blocking there retreat of less then 50 men.

Col de Art 6/3 II Corps AN Marbot CS

Hiya,

Yep definitely think the ZOC for cav could be removed from infantry and arty as they did not prevent cav moving around them unless blocking a defile. It would be difficult to put in though due to the variations I feel, but unsure of the technicalities. The idea is definitely sound though.

Col Mike Ellwood
Konig Regt
1 Bde, 22 Div
VII Saxon Corps, ADR

If disorder means that they are in a process of getting the unit back to a fighting formation why couldn't a enemy unit go though them that is larger? How would they be able to stop a retreat?

Col de Art 6/3 II Corps AN Marbot CS