Remembering my first battle

[Hook]

Earlier today I was thinking about the first time I fought the Montebello battle in the demo and watching the video replay and was surprised at how well I did given my lack of experience with the game.  Some of this may be useful for other new players.

I had completed the tutorials and fought the larger battle there a few times, but I really knew nothing about the game yet other than how to send out cavalry recon patrols and give deployment orders to corps commanders.  I knew nothing about the data the game displays besides the number of troops, morale and fatigue in the unit card.  I didn't even know that you could play the demo at grognard difficulty without the game crashing until I'd finished the tutorials and was about to start the Montebello battle.

Before I started the battle for the first time, I set the difficulty to grognard, which meant order delays and full fog of war for the enemy troops.  I'd never played with either before in the demo.  At least I would know where my own troops were.

I selected to command the French forces and went to the battlefield.  I had never seen the map before, was unfamiliar with my own forces, and had no idea what enemy I'd be facing or where he might be.  I didn't even know for certain when the battle would end.  I made a quick plan of battle and arrayed my starting forces with most of the corps in the center of my deployment area.

My overall plan was simple.  I would send out cavalry patrols to find where the enemy was, and where he was strong and weak.  I would then send my corps to attack in successive waves at his weakest point with each wave timed, as best I could with the order delays, to arrive as the previous wave broke, in order to hit the weakened enemy with fresh troops.  My intent was to destroy as many enemy forces as I could and secure the enemy line of operations, while keeping as many of my forces in reserve for as long as possible.  The Imperial Guard would be sent in last.  I would keep Napoleon near the heaviest fighting but behind the lines.  I would not do any micromanagement, as I expected my corps commanders to know what they were doing.  Additional orders would be sent to corps commanders as necessary.

The battle went surprisingly well and my forces broke through the enemy center and one corps marched on the enemy line of operations.  My attack on the defensive lines to the north had bogged down, so after clearing enemy troops from the center of the battlefield I sent the remaining troops north to flank the enemy defensive line.  I did leave one cavalry unit at the enemy supply trains to hold the line of operations. At the end of the battle my southmost forces had begun fighting with Russian forces there and most of the defensive line in the north was defeated.  The Imperial Guard, the last of my reserves, was sent forward at 5 PM.

I ended up with decisive victories for both tactical and strategic.

All this was achieved with a simple battle plan, the idea of keeping reserves as long as possible, as little micromanagement as possible, and watching my troops reactions on the 2D map to monitor their ability to keep fighting.  I won several battles on each side this way, and it wasn't until later that I was trying more sophisticated battle plans and trying to keep track of the various statistics that I got my first loss.  And it always seemed that the more I tried to micromanage, either individual regiments or entire corps, the worse I did.

I'll report on my second battle playing as the Russians in another post.

Hook

[Darsh]

Thx for the sharing.

[Hook]

After getting overwhelming victories as the French, I played my second Montebello battle as the Russian forces.  I found out the battle plays quite differently from the other side.

I used the same conditions from the first battle.  Grognard difficulty, keep reserves as long as possible, deploy one corps on each flank and the rest of the forces in the center.  Send out cavalry patrols.  Deploy the center corps in wave attacks.  Save the Guard for last.  No micromanagement.

This time, instead of waiting for my cavalry patrol reports on the enemy locations, I gave orders to my flank corps and one center corps to advance at the beginning of the battle.  This didn't seem to affect the outcome, and may have bought me some time at the beginning of the game.

I discovered a French defensive line in the north, and what looked like the entire French army deployed in the center marching toward my lone corps in the south.  Frenchmen everywhere.  I panicked and sent all but two of my reserve corps to attack their flank. 

I didn't believe my single corps in the north was strong enough to take on the French defensive line, especially after my experience in the first battle, so I turned him south to help in the center.  This was a mistake, as he'd already advanced within about 1000 meters of the defensive line.  He ended up trying to march south with his units being attacked by French artillery and in some cases within range of infantry fire.  This corps never made it to the main battle, although he survived longer than I would have expected.  I should either have had him attack the northmost portion of the French line or pull back to a defensive line well out of range of the artillery.

My massed forces in the main attack soon swept the French from the field and turned to advance across the south part of the map.  I noticed that some attacking corps which had gotten bogged down had formed defensive lines, which seemed like correct behavior.  I could use them as secondary reserves.

A few French corps in the center had pulled back from battle to form defensive lines.  I wasn't worried about these guys, as I had overwhelming superiority in the area and I knew the French were weakened.  The didn't pose any problems when I advanced over them.

A few Austrian units that didn't run into opposition bypassed remaining French forces and marched all the way to the village near the French line of operation.  The rest of the Austrians formed a defensive line far back from the enemy.  The units that made it near the village didn't survive, but I was satisfied that they'd weaken any French forces there.

At 3 PM I sent my remaining two reserve corps forward to deal with the French defensive line in the north.  One corps was given a diversion order while the Guards were given a "march to" order to get them in position quickly.  Since there were no enemy forces in the area, this was safe enough, although it may have fatigued the Guards. 

When the Guards were in position in front of and to the right of the French line, I gave them a deployment order on the far end of the defending forces.  This put them in a good position to flank the line.  I changed the order for the other corps from diversion to deploy, and they were able to flank the line as well.

The only French forces left were the French line in the north, a corps in the south which didn't move and the forces defending the village. I gave everyone but the two corps handling the French line orders to deploy beyond the village.  I soon had a local superiority at the French line of operations and was controlling it.  Various forces attacked the village but were unable to dislodge the French defenders. 

When the battle ended, the French in the north had been swept from the field and my forces were attacking the village on three sides.  The only micromanagement I did was to order units into the village, which would cause them to attack whatever defending forces were there.

The final results were an overwhelming tactical victory, and a decisive strategic victory, with a ratio of 1.99... another few minutes and I'd have had an overwhelming strategic victory as well when the ratio hit 2.0.

Lessons learned:

If you have a corps without close support meet forces it cannot defeat, try to pull them back to form a defensive line out of enemy artillery range.  Because of the order delays, you might have to let them take their lumps, and sometimes these corps do better than you expect.  Try not to get into this situation by keeping reserves where they can get to the battle to help out.  I'd already sent most of my reserves forward, so none were readily available.  Don't try to march in front of an enemy line; you're allowing yourself to be flanked.

Trust your corps commanders.  They usually know what they're doing.  Give them orders to attack or defend, and let them do their jobs.  A corps commander without orders will often figure out what to do on his own if there are enemy forces nearby.  The corps commander mentioned above may have pulled back from the fighting on his own, which would have been better than the orders I gave him. 

If you have to attack a defensive line, do it from the flank.  If you have to do a frontal assault, send in overwhelming forces on part of the line.  Once they've broken a hole they'll attack the flanks of the units on either side.

If you're attacking a village or other built up area, do it from as many sides as possible.  If you only attack one side, you're facing most of his forces.

If you attack in waves, your first wave will disrupt the enemy corps formations and weaken his units.  The second wave will be fresh troops facing an already weakened enemy. 

You can learn a lot by watching the replay of the battle.  You can see where things went right and where they went wrong. 

I'll discuss other battles in another post.

Hook

[Doyley]

Thanks, Hook. I will follow your guidelines and see how it works out. Keep the battle reports coming.

[gazfun]

Good work Hook