First Playthrough

[devoncop]

Grand Campaign......General Setting

Result...........Minor Victory (By just 3 points ........201 to 197 I believe)......Decided not to attack Spain or Russia but hammered Austria and Prussia a few times whilst hitting the British expeditionary Force. Denmark changed hands a few times and Sweden was only in French control very briefly.

Real nail biting stuff and the British Navy is brutal !

An absolute blast.......Highlight was killing Wellington in 1805

Highly recommended

[storeylf]

1805 campaign, middle setting what ever that was called (no bonus to player AI or player).

Epic victory.

The game seems like a nice simple game, but I'm not totally sure whether I would want to play again as despite a lot of nice things it just felt it was lacking in terms of being a napoleonic strategy game.

A few of the things that I think don't work, admittedly from one single playthrough that went very well.

1. Russia just felt totally irrelevant. In 1805 I took Vienna and the attempted relief included a few Russian units. I never made any attempt to engage Russia afterwards (as they got shifted back to Russia), and was at war with them until late in the game with no real consequence. Even with 2 wars vs Prussia and another 2 or 3 wars with Austria I never had to fight any Russian units again until late 1813 or early 1814 (can't remember now), when the liberation card (or whatever it was) caused everyone to go to war with me. I only fought them then due to spending one turn taking out Austria then another couple of turns to get to Berlin next, which gave the Russians time to get across and make an attempt at retaking Berlin. At that point I was finally able to play Tilsit on them. So 8 or 9 years of war with Russia saw only 1 battle which they lost badly.

2. Spain was largely irrelevant. I ignored them. About 1812ish I thought I ought to actually check the manual for the victory conditions in case I was missing anything and that confused me. There is a section somewhere saying you have to play the Kingdom of Spain to win, but the Victory conditions make no reference to that, so I went with continuing to ignore them and crossed my fingers! It appears that you don't need to take them out in the end. They did go to war with me when the liberation card was played (sort of surprising?), and joined up with some Brits to advance on Paris as a 30 unit army where they were whopped on by an army made up of 8 * 0 point militia and 12 other units under a 7 point leader. They were I think at that point the only Army still with weak 1 point Inf.

3. The strategy that seemed to work to easily, and to some extent the game forced was to sit with a 20 point army + some reserves with Napoleon in Saxony or another state next to it, await Prussia or Austria going to war and then stomp on them. You will know which one is next as the UK will be take a few turns getting them to war, so you can be next to the capital ready. They will fall before Russia can arrive to help. Not having read the manual The liberation card caught me out, but again I was in the perfect place to immediately stomp on one and then move to the other. With Russia and Spain being irrelevant there was no need to do anything else, and at no point in the game did I go any further east then Berlin/Saxony/Vienna.

4. Movement is just too slow. This exacerbates the above issues. I never felt like I was playing a Napoleonic game, but rather the wars of the Sun King where armies spend a year in the same region sparring over fortifications. This really struck me mid game when a sizable British force landed in Denmark and my armies for dealing with it were around Saxony. That is not a huge distance in Napoleonic terms, but in game is some 6 months across mainly fully controlled territory. Getting replacements from Paris to Saxony would take 8 months. Whilst there are cards to boost movement they are rare and not always available. It is this lack of mobility that hugely encourages you to simply sit next to Berlin/Vienna as there was no way you could engage in a major operation against Russia/Spain and react to other stuff.

5. The battle AI seems way to predictable, I can't remember now whether I ever saw an exception, but it always seemed to be that if you attacked them then they never moved off their line, and if they attacked you they always advanced across all their line. It could do with being more adaptive to what they face in each section. Pursuit seemed very erratic, there were a few times the enemy retreated after heavy losses but not quite being broken and had way less cavalry, but then inflicted pursuit losses on me which seemed to fall heavily on my heavy cav.

Annoyingly I never got the Berthier card, so was stuck all game with Napoleon at 20 unit armies. That did make some of the later battles amusing and fraught, I understood that they would get 25 unit armies mid game, but I was a bit taken aback when they suddenly started forming 30 units armies later on and I was on 20 units still!


The biggest thing I would ask for is that the Strategic movement card is another card that you always have. The ability to move an army across your controlled regions at some pace each turn I think would go some way to making it feel less Sun King and more Napoleonic, and therefore make strategies based around Spain/Russia look more viable. They would still be tough calls as you don't have that many troops and there are large distances/attrition cards for those countries, but at least knowing that you might be able to have an army or 2 in France/Central Europe react to other stuff better would not make you feel that you should just sit next to each hot spot ready with an army.

[sage3]

I agree very much regarding movement. It's just too slow. It seems like armies should be able to move 2 to 4 areas per turn if they're not opposed. Perhaps slow if in enemy territory to represent having to siege important fortifications?

Additionally, Generals moving without armies should be faster still.

[Solaristics]

ORIGINAL: storeylf

The game seems like a nice simple game, but I'm not totally sure whether I would want to play again as despite a lot of nice things it just felt it was lacking in terms of being a napoleonic strategy game.

A few of the things that I think don't work, admittedly from one single playthrough that went very well.

1. Russia just felt totally irrelevant.

...


3. The strategy that seemed to work to easily, and to some extent the game forced was to sit with a 20 point army + some reserves with Napoleon in Saxony or another state next to it, await Prussia or Austria going to war and then stomp on them.

I pretty much agree on most of this. To your point about playing again, and your point 3, they seem related to me. See my post about repetitiveness. Defeating a major nation needs to be a hard won, a rare event, and somewhat lasting. Currently, your strategy described in 3 seems to make it too easy to defeat Austria and Prussia. They should be harder to beat, but also stay down longer, which is more historical.

I had a similar feeling about Hannibal after a while. I played it quite a bit until I "solved" it. I obviously enjoyed the ride (see my avatar ... I even unlocked the secret level ), but it felt too puzzle-like. Good wargames can't be solved as there are too many degrees of freedom, and every strategy has some weakness. Perhaps the simplicity of this game, which I initially liked, is its undoing here.

As to the Russians, I wouldn't say they are totally irrelevant, but they have little impact in the two games I've played so far.

I was going to play the game gain tonight, but have been having similar feelings to yours and wondering if I could be bothered with the rinse and repeat strategy.

[FroBodine]

Secret level in Hannibal? I wasn't aware of any secret level. Could you please give me a hint as to how to unlock this level, please?

[Solaristics]

ORIGINAL: jglazier

Secret level in Hannibal? I wasn't aware of any secret level. Could you please give me a hint as to how to unlock this level, please?

The secret Mago upgrade, unlocked with Photoshop.

[SteveD64]

I don't mind the slow movement, the allies were plodders, but I think the French side should get a couple more cards that increase movement.

I've never been able to camp in Saxony as the British are always landing a good amount of troops in France and I need to be near Paris.

[Lascar]

Perhaps additional forced march cards would be in order. The Grande Armee advanced from the Neman River to Moscow in 3 months, about 2 turns in game terms. Using a forced march card the three areas between the Duchy of Warsaw and Moscow can be crossed in that time.

Individual generals moving alone should certainly be able to move more than one area per turn. As it is now, it further delays the movement of armies due to the limited number of commanders. Getting reinforcements from Paris to far off armies is somewhat restricted now simply because there is often not enough generals in Paris to move them to where they are needed.

[FroBodine]

ORIGINAL: Hondo

ORIGINAL: jglazier

Secret level in Hannibal? I wasn't aware of any secret level. Could you please give me a hint as to how to unlock this level, please?

The secret Mago upgrade, unlocked with Photoshop.

Oh, I see now. Hahaha!

[prince_blucher]

I also agree about movement and not enough movement cards.

Also new cadres should be allowed to move without a general (but not contribute to a battle unless commanded by a general) this would speed up reinforcements.

I also never received the Berthier card, so I'm, fighting ever increasing sized allied armies...25+.

The Berthier card is random or supposed to be available? Which year does it trigger? Anyone know?

[SteveD64]

In Hannibal there were a ton of "Hannibal on the March" cards. I don't think there should be that many but maybe one more Strategic Movement card and one or two more Forced March cards, and have the possibility of attrition for the forced march play.

Overall, though, I do like the slow movement. It really makes you think about your next move and you have to commit to a strategy.

IIRC the Berthier card is completely random.

[JiminyJickers]

Good stuff, I'm only around two years into the big campaign with the middle difficulty and getting destroyed. Loving it!

[SteveD64]

Oh wow, there are 6 Forced March cards and two Strategic movement cards in the game, I thought there were half that much. Forget I said anything [;)]

[MikeWat511]

Not sure what I am doing wrong but find even on Corporal I tend to have a hard time winning battles. Appears my 3 rated artillery and infantry are not strong enough for 1 rated Austrians. I feel the AI is a little too "lucky" with its attacks and it is very frustrating to watch so many of my units get eliminated on first attacks by inferior units. Quit in frustration tonight...will try again and reread manual but thought playing on easiest would help learn the game.....

[gdrover]

With regard to the movement rate:
It is a great challenge to make scale and time operate correctly in a 'game' (vs. a simulation).
Victory & Glory is much more a game with a Napoleonic theme than an attempt to accurately model the Napoleonic Wars.

That said, I very much wanted the game to 'work' in a historical way as much as possible to create the right feel.

The movement rate is a bit slower than would be true in a historical simulation.

The same is true of the limits on leaders. This was a nod to challenging gameplay (limited resources force the player to make better decisions).

[gdrover]

Red -
With regard to the Austrian '1's defeating your higher rated troops. This isn't necessarily luck.
There are a myriad of combat bonuses that accrue to each unit. A major one is 'support' from other units in the same battle area.
This is meant to model the fact that an unsupported attack against an enemy line would get heat from the entire line, not just the unit that was directly in front of the attacking unit.
Also, a combined arms group (Infantry, Cavalry and Artillery) is going to perform much better than three units of infantry.

I don't know for sure, but you may be suffering losses because your attack (or defense) is not optimized, thus giving your 'superior' units a much lower chance of success.
Check out the sections of the manual that discuss the combat bonuses (and hover over the target of an attack to see what bonuses you are getting and the total modifier). Also check out the end of the manual for hints.

[optimistical]

Great thoughts storeylf. Your experience mirrors mine. The game has great potential obviously but there seem to be some things that just aren't working well.

[prince_blucher]

The British Army (15 stack) has just sailed direct from London to Provence (south of France) in one turn and deposited its army there. Not bad for two months work. This army glided through six sea provinces, some with as many as two naval units. Bizarre.

[Lascar]

ORIGINAL: gdrover

With regard to the movement rate:
It is a great challenge to make scale and time operate correctly in a 'game' (vs. a simulation).
Victory & Glory is much more a game with a Napoleonic theme than an attempt to accurately model the Napoleonic Wars.

That said, I very much wanted the game to 'work' in a historical way as much as possible to create the right feel.

The movement rate is a bit slower than would be true in a historical simulation.

The same is true of the limits on leaders. This was a nod to challenging gameplay (limited resources force the player to make better decisions).

I can appreciate that design philosophy. However, as it is, the limit of one area movement for an army stack seems too restrictive, but the forced march cards and strategic movement card helps to take the edge off that limitation so it doesn't feel severely ahistorical. Perhaps a few more forced march cards added to the deck along with the possibility of losing a few units that engage in a forced march would help matters.

With lone commanders being limited to the same movement rate of one area per turn it begins to feel unnecessarily and annoyingly restrictive. Playing the 1805 campaign Napoleon is accompanied by at least half of the available commanders while there are leaderless army stacks many areas away and it takes many months and actions points to move those commanders to where they are needed. They are even affected by winter attrition which doesn't make sense when you are talking about an individual accompanied by a small number of men (staff and guard escort.) Certainly such a small group can find comfortable quarters and hot food, in a tavern or Chateau along the way.[;)]

I realize that Napoleon has a special card that allows him to reach Paris in one turn (after all he made the journey from Brezina to Paris in 13 days in winter) so there should be some mitigation for the other commanders to move about more freely and speedily then is currently allowed.

I think that overall this is a great playable game, that I have eagerly anticipated since I first learned of its development. It is very approachable with an intuitive user interface and yet it offers a lot of historical flavor for an enjoyable immersive experience. It just need a few minor tweaks to realize its full glory.[:)]

[Erik2]

At the start of the 1805-campaign: I think it would be better if most of the French leaders were in command of the various leader-less units around the map.