Napoleonic Wargame Club (NWC)

Gentlemen,
A group of officers from the Russian army are pleased to announce HPS Austerlitz add-on: Historicity & Realism project 1.01 (H&R 1.01).

This project is a result of 5 month of brainstorming, hundreds of emails, ideas and hours of testing involving numerous PBEM scenario tests totaling around 200+ turns. Surely, it is not perfect, but it was decided that it was better to release something, than to wait for perfection, which, considering the engine limitations, will never come.

As of now, considering the amount of PBEM testing done, the current settings represent the optimal balance between playability, realism and engine limitations. However, as practice is gained from future PBEM battles, depending on the feedback some changes are likely to follow. In such a way H&R is likely to remain an open project where players can influence the settings by providing feedback and After Action Reports.

As of now there is only one scenario converted into H&R and it will be available within a next couple of days. The plan is convert many more eventually expanding to other titles covering Campaigns of 1809, 1812 and 1815. The aim is to have the next H&R scenario ready in mid-January 2011.

To learn about the mod follow this link:
http://www.nwc.albom55.ru/hrp/
where you can download:
-the Main H&R file with methodology, reasoning and explanations (PDF)
-the new Firepower chart
-H&R Tactics Guide.

PS The scenario should be available for download in a few days

_________________
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)

Referring to:

http://www.nwc.albom55.ru/hrp/pic/H&R%2 ... 201.01.pdf

You guys call your fire table historical? I had to laugh. Ok, so the Austrians, who never used as much powder as a French or Russian gun, now have equal footing with the rest of the nations?

Then I took one look at the range of the 12lb guns: this was obviously NOT well thought out. It is well described in many texts and historical sources that not all nations' 12lb guns had the same range or as you call it "ricochet" effect. How can that be for the Austrians when they did not use the same amount of powder.

No, what you just did for the 1809 game is wipe out any chance of the French having any kind of even fight with the more numerous Austrian batteries. Now they will be able to obliterate any troops that advance on them.

Your musket values are too high if you are striving for LESS losses. You use the same values as what we used in the HPS games.

Sorry, I cannot buy into this. You are saying you are "historical" but use the same values across the board. For instance: we all know that a British shell would cause more losses at medium range than a French round of similar caliber.

How is this historical?

Historical losses maybe but not values. I would take the term "historical" off of your project title and quit bashing HPS/John Tiller/our team and consider that your values are plain vanilla.

I for one would never play them.

Note: the big reason why you see so many losses is found in the MELEE routine. Not the fire tables. If all you were looking for was a reduction in losses just add in a simple rule that you cannot melee when Disordered. That will slow down the attacker real quick. And do the same for High Fatigue units too.

The commands were committed by brigade. The main reason why we so see many losses is that very few players keep any kind of reserve. The entire army packs up and marches on the first turn of the game. They meet in a crush in the middle of the map for something like 20 turns and after that the game is usually decided. I am usually avoiding such players these days. And in my playtest group I am stressing the use of historical usage and not those kind of tactics.

What is lacking in the engine (which of course has been noted) is a command control system that would not allow all formations to pack up and move on turn 1. Each side would have an amount of command points to use.

If I were you and your team I would spend less time screwing around with what you did and just assign each side in a scenario a certain amount of points for command to use each turn. THAT would go a long way to solve the problem of max losses much more than making the fire values into vanilla ice cream.

_________________


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)

Mssrs.,

I agree that a leading factor in the horrendous losses typical in individual, single scenario battles is the lack of a "tomorrow" and the need to preserve an army that can fight another day. A much simpler solution, however, is to utilize the "Campaign" game engine.

From its introduction in the Campaign Eckmuhl game, this has always been my preferred format for serious gaming. Once players realize that the casualties in one battle carry over to the next, their whole approach to the game is immediately, and radically, changed. Moreover, I found that it speeds up the play of individual scenarios within a campaign because, once the tide of battle has been irreversibly set, the losing player is more willing to abbreviate the scenario by using the "Termination Bid" process.

Regards,

Paco

_________________
Maréchal M. Francisco Palomo
Prince d'Essling et Duc d'Abrantes
Commandant en Chef du 1er Corps d'Armée

Bill may be right but there is some interesting stuff here. The reduction in reliance on the infantry melee is a very good idea. The musket and firepower was the principle technique in the period and the way these rules are arranged (from what I can see) would imply the melee and all it's numerous current advantages may well no longer exist.

Interesting, I don't know if I agree with it all but I won't dismiss it as clearly a lot of work has gone into it. For example I like the cavalry multiplier that is much better I think.

I might try this at some point.

_________________
Marechal Knox

Prince d'Austerlitz et Comte d'Argentan
Ordre national de la Légion d'honneur

"What is history but a fable agreed upon"

I make no claims to be anything like an expert on any of thsi but I like the
idea of relying less on melee and nore on moving and firing.

As Colin noted, a lot of work went into it, so it is best to remain open mined until we hear more details. I owld lie to see some of teh concerns raised by Bill addressed, perhaps it is a simple misunderstanding?

_________________

Bill,
Clearly, you had not read the main PDF. You “took one look” at the fire table and “had a laugh”. Had you be reading page 42 of the Main PDF, this would answer your question on why FP was arranged in this way.



- We did try reducing musket FP at first. Did not work out that well.




It has nothing to do with “bashing HPS/John Tiller/our team“. About a few month ago I asked you about possible engine improvements. The answer was: “What did YOU do to make the game better?”

In fact we actually promote HPS games and it has already hit your pocket, although you might not know it. For a fact there is already one person who bought HPS Austerlitz just because of this Mod. Perhaps “bashing HPS/John Tiller/our team“ is not the most appropriate expression.




Exactly as you say one of the main reasons is in melee. FP table is probably the least significant change with the main effort went into getting rid of melee routine. The Melee routine you mentioned is the main area of improvement not the fire tables. A “simple rule” does not work unfortunately – the solution is not that simple.




This is ONE of the main reasons but not the MAIN reason. But good point - that’s why we revised the command structures described on the page 23.



Absolutely….. This is all good stuff. But we are tyring to be realistic here and obviously not in a position to fix this. It will either require a massive engine recoding or some sort of mad house rule which will never work.

Perhaps, reading the main PDF would answer most of your questions. Anyhow thanks for your, although premature, but feedback anyway.

_________________
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)

Gentlemen,

First of all, thanks for your interest! I shall try to answer some of your questions.

Bill,

I see four points in your post. In order of appearance:

1. Arty. It was me who insisted on this very approach. After a long debate the guys were convicted that the reasoning is solid enough. Briefly it's included in the document - as long as we do not know the amount of powder used any judgement of what muzzle velocity (and hence fire range) was is impossible. The amout of powder is unknown. It's what was written in textbooks on artillery equipment for artillery officers in late XIX century. Hence we decided to stick to "presumption of equality". After all it's the French tactical use of artillery what made it so effective. We tried it. I assure you that properly led French artillery will certainly defeat uproperly led Austrian. That's historical. All the other combinations are up to discussion.

2. Musket fire effectiveness. It should be considered in terms of possible casualties that could be caused by a stack of infantry per turn. In these terms, due to strict stacking limitations, the infantry fire effectiveness was almost halved. On the other hand, we needed to encourage players to use infantry fire rather than melee. So melee effectiveness must have been decreased even further. We did this as well.

3. Melee by disordered units. Due to the settings we applied Disordered units have bizzare chances of winning a melee. Much more probably they would be defeated, will suffer high casualties and acquire a lot of fatigue. Still players may use Disordered units in melee. Actually high loses in melee are not caused by attacking Disordered units. They are caused by huge stacks of 2000 infantry or 1000 cavalry attacking lonely units. Such stacks are absolutely unhistorical. For example in case of cavalry 1000 cavalrymen would be either a 300+ meter long (=3hexes) line or a column of divisions with 1 hex long front and 3 squadrons (6 ranks) deep. Since the times of Frederick the Great it was known that ranks counting from third do not contribute to cavalry melee effectiveness. And hence since that time typical formation for cavalry was two ranks deep. What we were doing was implementing exactly these limitations. And this is one of the most important features of the setting.

4. Command control stuff. I wonder how could a group of users deal with that? As we all know deassembling of the software code is a direct violation of copyright. No one except JT can change the engine. We were working with what we could change - parameters in pdt and oob files. Does it mean that Command control issues are unimportant? Of course not! But we can do nothing about them. At the same time we could change settings in pdt and oob and achieve some interesting results. Well, Command control issues could be addressed via some house rules. We in principle wanted to achieve a setting that would work correct without any house rules. In fact it started from a set of house rules almost 10 pages long. I played with them once. It felt great from historical accuracy point of view. But it was a complete disaster in playability terms. With all the zeal to follow the rules on both sides every turn both of us violated them quite a few times. After 5 month of work we managed to find a setting that is just as good in terms of realism, but uses no house rules at all! Well, it's better with convenient embedded melee set. But it's good enough without any rules.

A few words about our plans. The scenario we extensively tested will be published within a couple of days. Right now we asemble a new oob with some eye candy added. During the test we didn't bother how our leaders are named, units within regiment numbered etc. Now all this stuff is to be included. For sure everyone will be able to try it by the New Year.

Paco,

You are right! But unfortunately these campaigns are not always available. And unfortunately they will not decide all the problems. For example at Austerlitz "Napoleon" will go "all-in" simply because the campaign literally has no tomorrow.

I agree that large operational level scenarios are much more interesting. But it does not mean that smallish or "regular" historical scenarios are not interesting at all. And regardless how big the scenario is the settings ought to encourage historical gameplay, and ensure historical course and outcome of engagements. And of course for a huge game the less house rules the better. We struggled to have as little house rules as possible.

Colin, John, at first it may feel very strange. For me, with deep knowledge of the document we used, it took almost 10 truns to understand how troops should be handled to achieve any success. I'm sure you will not regret about the time spent!

_________________

Bill was planning to arrange Napoleonic Campaign Site which I hope will solve this problem.

_________________
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)

Two more points.

First, most of the points we are discussing here are explicitly explained in the document. I understand it countains A LOT of letters, but it will probably answer many of possible questions.

Second, it may be a good idea to try the new settings in a "demo" game. Earlier I wrote about a tournament we wanted to organise based on these settings. I recall there were several members who wanted to take part in it. We will try to start by the end of January 2011. Until then there are at least three officers with enough experience to give everyone willing a try.

_________________

I will be happy to give it a play. I for one always appreciate it when time and work are given to improve the play of the games.

Thank you to Anton and team.

Bill we always thank you as the developer of so many fine games.

_________________
Field Marshal Sir Edward Blackburn, 1st Duke of Aberdeen K.G.
85th (Buck's Light Volunteers) Regiment of Foot
16th British Brigade
7th Division
III (Peninsular) Corps
2nd Battalion, Coldstream Regiment of Foot Guards

I DON'T PLAY WITH ROUT LIMITING OR NME OFF

Nice to see a group work within the game engine to redress some of its weaknesses, instead of demanding engine changes or inforcing house rules.

Although I've not played with these changes they echo many of my thoughts throughout the years concerning the "flaws" of the game, and how to "correct" them. I can see this breathing new life into an old engine without any reprogramming dollars spent.

Well done.

I just may have to reinstall my Nap games and start building scenaros again.

BTW, it appears this set of changes will allow a wider variety of tactical encounters to be modeled, and enjoyed. I suspect constructing campaigns using these guidelines to alter armies in subsequent battles within the campaign will greatly enhance that feature, and can lead players to appreciate the benefits of taking care of thier troops each and every battle.

al

I have read through most of the PDF - I have yet to find a PDT file I can look at and its tedious to look through all of the "historical" discussions. Maybe I missed the PDT file. Send it to me if you want.

All I can say is that the assumption that a battalion of over 500 men could attack in an area of 100 meters is odd. And splitting the battalions up into two units has issues too. I thought about doing that for the Austrians for Eckmuhl/Wagram and it all came down to the issue of there being a unhistorical usage of the Austrians. That was discussed in our group too as Paco could attest.

I know where you want to go with this but it has the same issues that were found in the ACW/BG concept that was similar to this. In the end the map didn't offer enough room for the units to get involved in the battle. I tried out the BGG game with the reduced stacking and in the end it just drove me up the wall.

What should be aimed at is a commitment level similar to what Wellington's Victory had but more in the concept that no one commander could "activate" all of his units at one time.

In the end guys this is just rehashed ACW/BG concept and I went there with that before.

Since I cannot see the PDT file and do not have the time (I am in the middle of moving - my office is barren - my PC goes down tomorrow and I may not be up for a few days) to look over the doc for the charge multiple could someone post what you used. Here was my issue: if you do not use something above 7x for the charge multiplier for cav then they cannot run over infantry like they historically did. I only need to cite the famous charge by Kellerman at Marengo where some 400 dragoons (or whatever it was - my books are all packed away) rode over MANY Austrians battalions.

With only 280 cavalry in a hex attacking say, 800 infantry, they do not have a chance of winning with the present melee calculation in the engine. Even with my 5x multiplier for Austerlitz you end up with less than 1500 as a value and it is not even a 2:1 attack. In the HPS/JTS Nap series or even BG that spells a loss. You cannot attack and win in the series unless you can get 2:1 unless you have mods galore. For instance Old Guard Grenadier a Cheval attacking militia ...

Anyway, call it what you want - it just doesn't interest me. I can also pull out my book on Jena that was translated by Bowden and show you where the French deployment at Auerstedt fits our stacking allowance.

But anyway, I remember this in the ACW BG series and I just never enjoyed it. Less losses? Yes. But not historical. Those large battalions were used as SINGLE entities. Not in groups like squadrons where companies were deployed 200 meters or more back from the rest of the parent battalion. Yes, I know that Lines could have a company in Column ready to deliver a quick counterattack but that was a rarity for most of the nations.

Anyway, you bought the game, do with it as you like and if this is what makes you happy go for it. I would prefer to continue my tack of asking John to reduce the casualties in the melee calculations and go with that.

This all seems like a never ending discussion anyway. And I know of too many guys who just use prudence in the amount of troops they deploy and HOW they use them in combat to really get too excited about spending a lot of time on going to this extreme to SIMULATE history. This to me is the Avalon Hill approach - you were looking for an EFFECT. And hey, AH put out great games. Again if you like that fine but your version is reaction to what is published. I would prefer to just keep asking John to mod. the engine in this area.

Ok - I will give out ONE new thing we have done. The Column no longer fires for FULL effect as of the next title. It will be reduced and I think it fires at 75 percent ... this in line with what you are talking about. So in fact we are looking into some of the oddities of the series. But for me to go with your version as a default in new titles .. no thanks. I prefer to fix what is wrong if I can. I would love to see a command system that is more accurate. Probably not going to happen. In that case I would prefer to use a simple die roll per turn to determine how many maneuver elements (brigades) can move per Corps. Or something like that. Or if a commander failed his command test to just have the units move ONE HEX max. Or something like that. House Rule? Yes. But hey, if you want to get down and dirty and do this up right that is what is needed.

I am sure that the EFFECT that you reached may be pleasing but frankly you cannot tell me that only a portion of the 1/Jordis IR attacked a given point and that the other part was to the rear. The ENTIRE battalian attacked. If we go with your format I have to use a House Rule that says that "You must keep BOTH components of the battalion when split side by side in adjacent hexes or back to front with one leading the other as in a road column."

Not going there ...

_________________


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)

Al,
Absolutely. What we believe is there are two components which lead to unhistorical tactics.

1. PDT OOB SCN settings (reliance on melee, high morale, too efficient command structures etc.)
2. The lack of grand-strategic perspective (e.g. one-off scenario with no tomorrow)

H&R deals with the first part and hopefully will kick start the discussion within clubs how can this be improved further. The short term goal , with the help of other club members, is to polish what we achieved so far. For example, Bill mentioned to me that next Austerlitz patch will fix the issue of “units with no bayonets” which cannot initiate melee now. This will require a further thinking and testing but maybe a significant improvement from what we have now in version 1.01. The long term is to arrive at the standard which will be universally accepted by the group of players who will choose to use H&R. Therefore, as we progress and more scenarios are converted to H&R standard, constructive feedback and ideas from club members would really help.

The second issue is harder to deal with. Bill was planning to set up a Napoleonic Campaign Site- and my hope is that it is going to resolve this issue.
Meanwhile we can try something ourselves. Like setting up a series of engagements – for example from the French crossing of the Rhine in 1805 and redesign each scenario OOB carrying the losses to the next scenario. I bet that in that environment, combined with the settings from H&R 1.01, players would have experience they have never had before.

This could be a separate project and ideally the more people get involved the better.

_________________
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)

- Not sure where were you reading. At no point we said something similar to that. What we did say is that a battalion above 500 men deployed in line CANNOT fit into 100 meters.




- Yes – the issue is in less historical allocation of companies by tactical groups. However, taking into account the 100m by 100m hex this is the only way of representing the tactical aspect correctly. If you stick to “historical” size of battalions this blows the tactical component out of proportion as you project the different size battalions to the same area of 100 by 100, REGADLESS of their size. We deal with what we have – and what we have is 100 by 100 meter hex.





- Certainly did not have this issue in our main testing scenario where 35K strong French force assaults Austrian positions along the 3 km front. Certainly, this battle density will not be problem for Austerlitz where there is a plenty of space. It will get packed and busy at Waterloo and Borodino but this is exactly how it was in reality - so be it.





-Spot on. For all the reasons you listed above H&R uses *9 cavalry modifier. You said it was tedious to look through "historical" discussions of the PDF, hence you missed it but its there.




- The original stacking allowance does fit, when the troops are positioned in the rear eshelons and reserves – once they were deployed in battle order they needed A LOT more space. For example cavalry was usually deployed in regimental columns – which can easily fit up to 1000 horsemen into one hex. But once they were ordered to move forward they redeployed into battle order - which is two-rank line - wich cannot fit more than 250-300 cavalrymen. Seems like you skipped this part of the PDF as well.






- The overwhelming majority of battalions still operate as single units. It is rarely, when they had to be split in half. [Furthermore this is not going to be an issue in 1812 and 1815 at all.] Mostly, “a company” was detached from each one and a new one was “formed”. As I mentioned earlier this was driven by the desire to improve the tactical aspect, which occasionally went at the expense of the less accurate representation of tactical units. It is reasonable to assume that benefits outweigh the inaccuracy of having 5 units in one regiment rather than 4 units. So it’s a matter of priority – and quoting your self from here:
viewtopic.php?f=5&t=11129





- That would be really nice. But is this the only thing which needs to be fixed? A list might be a bit longer than that…. As you posted last month:
viewtopic.php?f=5&t=11129
By the reasonable interpretation of the paragraph – we are not going to get much.





Exactly. That’s why we try to fix what we can otherwise most of it is “not going to happen”.




- I guess no point sending the PDT then.

_________________
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)

"Not sure where were you reading. At no point we said something similar to that. What we did say is that a battalion above 500 men deployed in line CANNOT fit into 100 meters."

Odd here - first you say that the line cannot fit into 100 meters. Then you deny saying that it cannot attack in a 100 meter area - in line!

You should know your own doc. I found it under the infantry section. Go read it. You say that battalions of over 500 men does not work.

By splitting up the battalions you create an odd game. Battalions part a and b. I was never for this in Waterloo but that is where Rich and Charlie went and it was their own call. But try finding that kind of usage at Waterloo for that matter.

By increasing the size of the hex you would go outside the confines of the map. And anyway you slice it - go with company size battles like Rich White and I have done or just go with ANY scale you end up with oddities. Hey, that's life. People come in all sizes and do not all fit in the same automobile. A small guy in a large van is an oddity. A large person in a Volkswagen bug is too. Life is not perfect and neither was a battlefield.

We fix the issue of the amount of muskets able to fire from a 3 rank line in the next update of the game and in future titles. So that was addressed. It is the best we can do. To go with a larger hex (150 meters) would then make those small battalions look odd as well. And the fire from a hex by multiple lines still an oddity.

Yes, I would like to see the PDT file. I guess you are against criticism of your format by not sending it to me. I guess what is good for the goose is not good for the gander eh? But eventually I guess I will get a copy of it and get my chance to give it a critique. Just like you have for the series.

_________________


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)