Napoleonic Wargame Club (NWC)

It is important to note that all parameters are closely correlated and FMM should be evaluated in a context of the game and its applications on the battle flow and the outcome. The PDF does NOT call FMM "unhistorical" (page 30) but it says that along with all other factors it gives unhistorical results.

Is FMM historical? Yes. But FMM does not exist in a vacuum. How is it impacting the game? It boosts the morale. Considering that in the original game electronic units show inhuman bravery, take ridiculous losses but do not get routed, this leads to unhistorical flow of battles an unhistorical casualties.

“…to defeat the enemy each arm should work in such a way as to:
1) establish morale ascendancy over the enemy and cause him to collapse;
2) hold him in place and punish him until he collapses; or
3) manoeuvre him into such a position that he has no chance of success and collapses.”
(Nafziger, “Imperial Bayonets”, page 277)

Historically, in most cases units pushed into the above situations did not wait until they suffered massive casualties. They pulled back BEFORE being decimated by the enemy fire:

“To understand the effect of moral of the attacker vs that of the defender you have to understand the moral effects that would happen between two forces about to fight. In battle ... The victor has often lost by fire more than the vanquished ... (but) Moral effect does not come entirely from destructive power, real and effective as it may be. It comes, above all, from its presumed, threatening power, present in the form of reserves threatening to renew the battle, of troops that appear on the flank, even of a determined frontal attack." (Colonel Ardant du Picq, “Battle Studies”)

This is the same reason why Napoleonic battles hardly ever had bayonet clashes and the same reason there was rarelyan impact between two bodies of the charging cavalry.This is the same reason why Napoleonic battles casualties were usually around 20-25%.

By using, a more fragile morale approach, H&R aims to simulate the morale aspects of Napoleonic warfare which, from tactical perspective, was the most important of all.

As already noted twice in this thread, the morale reduction is slightly offset by:

1. Regimental leaders (practically there is always a leader in each stack)
2. Melee is a rare event in H&R as it was in reality. Hence there are less morale checks.
3. Lower density per 100m hex (900 infantry, 300 cavalry) but the same frontage - less units take morale chekcs.

Furthermore, this approach encourages the historical positioning of the troops. The attached file is the Prussian regulations published in 1812, which provide a standardised combined arms attack by their 'brigades' (which were in fact combined-arms forces on a divisional scale). Note the 150 paces (~100 meters) in between attacking echelons. Another file shows how this formation would roughly look like in H&R.
There are gaps in between units and echelons. With this formation there is no way “THE ENTIRE CORPS will be running away”. While on defence, the defender will have to keep two hexes (200 meters = ~300 paces) in between his first and second lines, which is a common historical distance between echelons.

Most importantly, to avoid that “the entire enchilada heads for the rear in two turns ” both the defender and the attacker will have to slow down and make sure that, instead marching the entire army on turn one and engaging the enemy along the whole front, they will have to keep reserves all around the line.

Players will have to adjust their mentality when playing H&R. You might get a few routed units but this is not the end of the world. As long as they use historical in-depth tactics, use skirmishes to cover themselves (-20% to enemy fire), keep reserves and rotate the disordered units - this will give a completely different feel on the flow of the battles.

Finally, the reduction of morale along with more fragile will result in much more historical timing in terms rallying the troops. In the original game it usually does not take more than 20-30 minutes. In reality it took HOURS. At Waterloo, D’Erlons corps charged by the British heavy cavalry was “hors de combat” (knocked out) until the end of the day, so was the French infantry storming the fletches at Borodino.

All this factors will result in a more historical flow of battles in terms of time, casualties, and tactical situations. Surely, you won’t see 30,000 casualties at Borodino within 11 turns (even without marching the entire army and without FMM, with rout liming OFF and with Reduced morale from the New Setting project!).

Possibly, considering the morale reduction, FMM can be turned on But this has to be tested first to see how it is going to impact the game considering all other H&R settings. We did test is without FMM and it worked fine resulting in more historical results. FMM should be tested first so its implications can be analysed.

_________________
General-Leytenant Alexey Tartyshev
Leib-Guard Preobrazhensky Regiment (Grenadier Drum)
1st Brigade
Guard Infantry Division
5th Guard Corps


(I don't play with with ZOC kills and Rout limiting ON)

We can only “pretend” it’s a “close quarter firefight”. Obviously, the intention was to design it as melee and that’s exactly how it is described in the manual, in game phases, PDT and not surprisingly this “event”, no matter how it’s called, has all the features and carries all the implications of melee [especially referring to the cavalry, the term “close quarter firefight” is a very questionable explanation as in game the “melee=close quarter firefight” logic is applied to cavalry and infantry in the same manner].



Fear of losses is the human nature and the basic instinct. In the game, it does not exist as we all feel very safe in our armchairs in front our desktops. We throw units into the carnage without any feelings and the execution is guaranteed as long it is within the engine mechanics (movement’s points etc). So of course in H&R players will also throw units into the Great Redoubt without hesitation. H&R deals with the process how is it done and whats the otucome of such action.

In reality, men would not necessarily follow the orders as robots and occasionally infantry would break up the formation and pull back to the rear, while cavalry would refuse to charge at all:
• In 1813 at Dennewitz the 2nd Uhlan Regiment (Poles) threw itself against squares of II, III and IV Battalion of 3rd East Prussian Landwehr Regiment and squares of 4th Reserve Infantry Regiment. The Prussians delivered volleys and the uhlans passed on and engaged the cavalry behind them. The uhlans were outnumbered, lost 102 men in this action and were fleeing. Marshal Ney sent orders to Westphalian Cavalry Brigade to support the Poles but the Westphalians refused. Furious Ney sent their colonel to Napoleon after "ripping off his epaulettes."
• The British 7th Hussar Regiment Queen's Own was the "embodiment of dash and panache". On June 17th at Genappe (in Belgium) Lord Uxbridge wanted to give them a "taste of glory" - the hussars charged but each charge "was not in the favour of the 7th Hussars. Finally the 7th Hussars refused to charge the French lancers." At Waterloo the hussars also didn't charge the lancers and seem that they refused to charge into the flank of cuirassiers.
• At Waterloo the Cumberland Hussars were showing very visible signs of wavering and Lord Uxbridge sent an officer to see what was going on. "The regiment began withdrawing but a number of officers and privates outraged by the cowardice of their comrades, left their ranks and attached themselves to other regiments. The rest of the regiment left the battlefield and galloped all the way to Brussels without participating in one single action. Their colonel was court-martialled and expelled from the army." (Barbero - "The Battle")

H&R changes will simulate the situation where, attacks can be beaten back by defensive fire as it happened in reality. Translating this into HPS language, this situation would occur when the attacking unit’s morale is shattered and they get routed. This was a very common situation in Napoleonic battles but unfortunately hardly happens in the original game but we were really glad to see this happening in H&R during our tests. This creates much more realistic flow of battles over time. Once the attacking force is routed, they pull back to reorganise or relived by another formation. Battles last longer without being decided half way through their historical conclusions.

The “heroic deeds” will still be happening but it will be truly heroic because it would not be consistency but an exception. For example, in one of our tests, one Austrian line infantry battalion (“D” quality) held in square for 30 minutes while being pounded by canister from French Grand battery and being fired and meleed by French infantry columns. The battalion lost about 50-60% of its strength but held its ground. This however, was not a consistent performance in Napoleonic wars, neither it is a consistency in H&R. After all its all numbers game – morale check die rolling can result in unpredictable results outside the normal distributions. Hence heroic deeds are not absent in H&R.



I would ask you to refrain from personal comments. I hope you will find it reasonable. A few members already noted that you are taking the discussion personally and getting too sensitive, which on a few occasions, translated in a few of your comments about our team being not issue-specific, completely ignore explanations received earlier, accusatory, mocking, personal and simply rude not to mention subjective, due the apparent conflict of interests. I hope we do not have to come back to personal issues anymore. This is not how NWC disscusions are usually done.



Let’s look at the facts.
H&R average battalion is 430 men. As per engine formula: R < L / (L + B)
25 losses would trigger the morale check in 37%.

Considering that there is always a leader in H&R stack, unit morale would be 4 out of 6(“D” +1 for the leader). Giving the benefit of the doubt to “C” unit from the original game and also assuming that there is always a leader around, the morale of such unit is 5 out of 6 (“C” +1 for the leader)

- for “D” unit, the rout probability would be equal to 0.37*(2/6)= 12.3%
- for “C” unit, the rout probability would be equal to 0.37*(1/6)= 6.61%

As can be seen the 6% difference is all the difference you get between “C” and “D” when taking 25 casualty. “would bolt the first time” – perhaps is not the most accurate expression.

Considering that, there is a lot less melee in H&R, less density and not always there is a leader in the original game - this 6% difference is even less tangible. Furthermore, regimental evaluation in H&R in fact raised the base morale of some about 20-25% units by 1, giving them in fact original quality of “C”.



The entire French line will not go as long as players use historical tactics. Refer to the above posts on in-depth–positioning.



Unfortunately, this does not happen always. Cavalry and light infantry hardly ever rout due to “B” and above morale ratings. “C” units are also quite steady. Even if they get routed after 20-30% casualties- they are usually back in combat within 20-30 minutes and ready to suffer further.

The result is wrong because the troops handling is wrong because that’s how the original settings encourage players to use their troops –e.g. high morale, melee, tight command and control, incorrect density.

Players cannot be blamed for unhistorical results. Players mostly act rationally, utilising the settings to their advantage - this is the fundamental element of competition when players strive to achieve a Major Victory. Hence the underlying reasons for such unhistorical behaviour are the game settings. What we believe is that H&R settings will force the players to use the troops in a more historical manner which will result in the historical outcome.



Incorrect. What H&R believes is that this should not be a consistency (it also depence on casualties, a dozen of other varibles and the definition of "great fire"). This is one of the basic reasons why Napoleonic battles casualties were not what we see in the original game.

_________________
General-Leytenant Alexey Tartyshev
Leib-Guard Preobrazhensky Regiment (Grenadier Drum)
1st Brigade
Guard Infantry Division
5th Guard Corps


(I don't play with with ZOC kills and Rout limiting ON)

I love these games and dream about the simulation of napoleonic battles,
so I do really appreciate this teamwork and all the efforts in order to
give the most accurate historical simulation

Lieutenant Rossi

Ve Corps d'Armee
1ere Division d'Infanterie

3e Brigade
61eme Regiment d’Infanterie deLigne

Let's all stop a moment and thank JT aka John Tiller, who made such a flexible and robust engine that can be tweaked to the user's tastes!

If this H&R effort and resulting discussions doesn't show us anything else, it does show how beneficial computer games are. With them each of us can have OOB, PDT and SCN files that we like setting on our computer next to files someone else prefers. With board games and miniatures this would be virtually impossible to achieve, or at least very, very expensive to field so many variations of scale, rules, basing, etc, etc.

Three cheers for JT. (now if a map editor were available. hehehe....)

Well and let me say that John is a great guy to work for. And yes, it is nice to see the efforts of you guys in trying to do things with the engine. Just because I disagree here does not mean that I am not appreciative of your efforts. Sheesh, you could have just moved along to playing something else.

Tweaking the PDT file settings, OBs and scenarios for BG and HPS/JTS games has been a fav. past time of Al's and mine for ... well over 13 years now! And thanks to you Al for your contributions in the past. I call you the Master Tweaker. Everyone else is just following in your footsteps.

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Generalfeldmarschall Wilhelm Prinz Peters von Dennewitz

3. Husaren-Regiment, Reserve-Kavallerie, Preußischen Armee-Korps

Honarary CO of Garde-Ulanen Regiment, Garde-Grenadier Kavallerie

NWC Founding Member

For Club Games: I prefer the Single Phase mode of play. I prefer to play with the following options OFF:

MDF, VP4LC, NRO, MTD, CMR, PR, MIM, NDM, OMR (ver 4.07)

There is nowhere to move Bill.

As Anton mentioned earlier , HPS is the only engine which can be taken seriously. What JT is created is amazing and when I read about Napoleonics it always comes across how resourceful HPS engine is in simulating Napoleonic warfare on a tactical level. For example this one below this from Nafziger on combined arms application is exactly what we see in HPS as rock-paper-scissors game:

“On a smaller scale, the combined operation worked like this. The attacking infantry would engage the opposing infantry force. In order to meet an infantry threat the general process was to extend into line so as to bring as many muskets to bear as possible. The appearance of attacking cavalry would oblige the defending infantry to change formation to defend against the greater threat - a strike in the flank or rear by the cavalry - which in turn reduced the number of muskets he could bring to bear on the attacking infantry. The change from line to square also provided a much denser target for artillery, ideal for having the maximum number of casualties inflicted on it, but provided the only protection against cavalry. The presence of the cavalry would oblige the defending infantry to keep in square, thereby allowing the artillery or attacking infantry to fire on the square until it was a shambles, at which point the cavalry or attacking infantry could bring it into close combat and crush it.

The square was not a good formation for defending against artillery or infantry attack, but the trick of a combined-arms attack was to force the enemy to choose between two equally bad alternatives. Having obliged him to assume a hopeless situation, the action was won before the first shot was fired. In situations where just cavalry and artillery operated together the square would be pounded until it broke and the cavalry rode down the survivors. This is not very different to the scenario described above.

In the case of infantry and artillery operating together, the process became very prolonged, the lack of cavalry giving the defending infantry no reason to go into square. Instead he would remain in line, which is the best formation for receiving frontal artillery fire. This would result in the battle becoming a fire-fight and no swift solution was likely if both forces were of equal morale. Only if a huge mass of artillery could be brought to bear, or could move up very close to the infantry fire-fight where it could add canister to the exchange of musketry, could it influence the battle. This latter effort would be limited by the amount of defending artillery and its willingness to engage in counter-battery fire.

When cavalry and artillery worked in conjunction against enemy cavalry the process was similar, but the goal of the artillery was to weaken and demoralize the enemy cavalry to such a point that the attacking cavalry was assured of victory. Figures 188 and 184 are drawn from the Austrian 1808 cavalry regulations. They clearly show the desired maneuvers, including the positioning of the artillery so as to enfilade the enemy line, thereby inflicting the maximum number of casualties. They also show the placing of small detachments of cavalry adjacent to the horse battery, to protect it from attack as well as to act against the flank of the enemy line. In the situation where infantry and cavalry worked together, one would find much the same situation as when infantry and artillery operated together. The victor in a battle between numerically equal forces would be decided as much by the chance breaking of a unit as a carefully orchestrated maneuver and superior tactics.” (Nafziger)

_________________
General-Leytenant Alexey Tartyshev
Leib-Guard Preobrazhensky Regiment (Grenadier Drum)
1st Brigade
Guard Infantry Division
5th Guard Corps


(I don't play with with ZOC kills and Rout limiting ON)

For quick reference is there a screenshot of the options you guys prefer so that gamers like me can quickly change our Options to match them? I found digging through the entire PDF to find them tiresome. Did I miss a list? If so kindly point me to it please.

_________________


Generalfeldmarschall Wilhelm Prinz Peters von Dennewitz

3. Husaren-Regiment, Reserve-Kavallerie, Preußischen Armee-Korps

Honarary CO of Garde-Ulanen Regiment, Garde-Grenadier Kavallerie

NWC Founding Member

For Club Games: I prefer the Single Phase mode of play. I prefer to play with the following options OFF:

MDF, VP4LC, NRO, MTD, CMR, PR, MIM, NDM, OMR (ver 4.07)

I just noted: good job in making the Staff units Cossacks. The entire concept of adding them to the game was to enable them to protect the leaders. Probably something I will consider doing for future updates to the games where they are present.

_________________


Generalfeldmarschall Wilhelm Prinz Peters von Dennewitz

3. Husaren-Regiment, Reserve-Kavallerie, Preußischen Armee-Korps

Honarary CO of Garde-Ulanen Regiment, Garde-Grenadier Kavallerie

NWC Founding Member

For Club Games: I prefer the Single Phase mode of play. I prefer to play with the following options OFF:

MDF, VP4LC, NRO, MTD, CMR, PR, MIM, NDM, OMR (ver 4.07)

Attached are the settings we used in the last test.

We purposedly didn't use any house rules. My own opinion is that MOEIV set of House rules makes it even better.

UPD Uploaded the file. Sorry!

_________________

Am I blind? I do not see an attachment.

_________________


Generalfeldmarschall Wilhelm Prinz Peters von Dennewitz

3. Husaren-Regiment, Reserve-Kavallerie, Preußischen Armee-Korps

Honarary CO of Garde-Ulanen Regiment, Garde-Grenadier Kavallerie

NWC Founding Member

For Club Games: I prefer the Single Phase mode of play. I prefer to play with the following options OFF:

MDF, VP4LC, NRO, MTD, CMR, PR, MIM, NDM, OMR (ver 4.07)

Bill,
as posted on Opponent finder – FMM ON can be tried to see what results its going to give.

_________________
General-Leytenant Alexey Tartyshev
Leib-Guard Preobrazhensky Regiment (Grenadier Drum)
1st Brigade
Guard Infantry Division
5th Guard Corps


(I don't play with with ZOC kills and Rout limiting ON)

I'm new to this system. Where does one find the "MOEIV set of House rules"?

Thanks

_________________
Mssr. Jim "Haven't even been issued a musket yet" Sexton
Ecole Militaire

Obviously on the MOEIV web page
http://www.wargame.ch/wc/nwc/MOE4/MOE4.htm

_________________

For the love of Pete! Would somebody get poor Lieutenant Sexton a musket. He is going to need something with which to defend himself with before FM Nelms charges and runs him off the field with his Salad Fork!

just one thing - "Multiple Cavalry Charges" to be turned OFF.
Also - "No Retreat Overuns" can be ON as well - thats how we tested it i am pretty sure.

_________________
General-Leytenant Alexey Tartyshev
Leib-Guard Preobrazhensky Regiment (Grenadier Drum)
1st Brigade
Guard Infantry Division
5th Guard Corps


(I don't play with with ZOC kills and Rout limiting ON)