Question: Want to buy... but question first...

[Marshal Villars]

I just heard this game is 1/6th scale. What does this mean?

Does it mean that there are 1/6th as many men on the battlefield and that because of this the scale of the battlefield is 1/6th of the size of the original? Meaning it will take a man 1/6th as long to march from one end to another?

Is it possible to play at actual unit density and battlefield size? That is with 70,000+ men on each side?

[RebBugler]

The game is scaled one to four but the default sprite ratio is one to six to accommodate the full army battles as they take quite a bit of CPU power. Depending on your rig sprite ratio can be scaled to your liking, I prefer one to four. However, troop units are limited to 200 sprites, so without breaking the battalions down to company level with a mod, real numbers won't be represented by sprites but will be indicated in the unit stats.

[Marshal Villars]

So there is a mod which breaks units down to company level -- theoretically letting you have battalions with about 800 men? With proper formation?

[RebBugler]

I built one mod to show and explain one to one sprite ratio, SR1, but I know of no others. Just so there are no misunderstandings, SR1 design is possible, just not practical from a historical/realistic viewpoint because overall the game is scaled and designed for SR4 to SR6 play using battalions and squadrons as the smallest troop units.

[Mr Digby]

As Reb says the game displays units at reduced numbers of men because no retail computer could handle a full Waterloo battle at full scale. With armies of around 70,000 men on each of the French and Allied side plus about 40,000 Prussians the full battle scenarios still have 45,000 sprites on the field and artillery batteries are depicted as 1 gun and crew sprite per actual gun so the visual spectacle is incredible.

The game easily blows Total War out of the water both visually and in terms of its AI.

Our group often plays MP co-op vs the AI and it has beaten us many times. On occasion it does not feel like you are fighting against lines of computer code but against a human mind, it is that good.