Ageod's Upcoming Napoleonic Game

[Rayfer]

When I say "traditional front lines" what I mean are basically established boundaries for the conduct of the the war.  If I cross this line im moving into any territory and I'm invading that territory striking for a specific strategic city or envelopment. That in essence, the operation is planned in order to penetrate a specific boundary line and then either surround the enemy or move towards a strategic location behind that line.  In the American Civil War in 1862 that line is the Potomac River and the borders of Kentucky and Tennessee in the east and the junction of the Mississippi river with Kentucky Missouri and Illinois.  The AI  confederacy will send stonewall Jackson with the division up through the appalachian
Mountains over the Potomac and up into northern Pennsylvania to do something and I'm not sure what.

Compare that to "rise of Prussia "Frederick moved his army all over Prussia and Silesia and Austria and what is now the Czeck Republic shifting to meet threats wherever they are.  He was defending "Prussia proper" and Silesia from attack in four different directions so there really were no front lines.  Or compare to moors in Rome where I might be trying to subjugate Parthia which would require me to move armies throughout the region putting down rebellions and trying to trap and crush enemy armies.

Maybe a better way to separate it is to suggest that the ageod games do well when the goal is destroying strategic locations and destroying armies but does less well when the goal is more about keeping and holding territory.  The goal of the north was to take back the territory of the south until grant arrived in an essence change that to destroying the will to fight. In World War I it was all about attacking to simply grab territory. The game seems to have more of a problem with that and does better when you're just trying to destroy enemy armies

Thanks, makes more sense now. I was thinking more of a traditional front line along the lines of WW1 where each and every mile of the front had to have troops in position to defend and/or attack.  This wasn't the case in the ACW....but you're right, there was a front line as you described, they just didn't man every mile of it with troops. In the ACW I believe the raids into the north were to instill fear in the general population in hopes it would force Lincoln to seek out a negotiated end to the war.  Maybe that's what the game is simulating?

[mikeck]

I think your right in that it's trying to simulate raids but it has trouble. I often saw confederate AI  take a general like stonewall Jackson give him three brigades worth of infantry, not form into a division, and move it all the way up north of Pittsburgh to basically sit there and with her on the vine. In a non-linear war that force might destroy a city or catch an army unaware. Used as a "raid", it's just slow infantry starving in enemy territory.  It would send 4 corps to try to destroy an army on the Mississippi while it allowed me to waltz right into Richmond and take all of Virginia.  I love AGEOD games and An avid fanboy. I own all of them but I have a difficult time playing the Civil War games for this reason.  So maybe if the cities didn't mean as much as destroy the armies it would be OK

[MengJiao]

So the new Napoleonic one's progress is more heavily scripted than previous AGE games?


Hell.. I'm still playing AJE/BOR and haven't even put much time into CW2 and TEAW yet.  Not in a big hurry, especially since Napoleonics isn't the highest period on my favorites list (gonna catch hell for saying that?).

  No hell from me.  I think the revolutionary period is a lot more interesting...ie things up to 1805.  I guess I've just played things in the 1805 to 1815 time frame way too many times over the last 50 years.

  But now I'm doing it as the Ottoman Empire!  And no crashes yet.  Though not much is happening in Sept 1805.

Had a crash after running 3-4 big turns.  That seems like a memory leak.  Works fine after you restart the computer.

[chemkid]

hi all!

after 1 year of fine-tuning, bug fixing and playtesting by 'early buyers' ;) is this game ready to be played?
i'd like to play solitair/h2h on my own - cannot make heads nor tails from ageod ai... - anyone here still playing with latest paches?

TIA
chem!

[Tuna]

I was looking in the forums a few weeks ago, because I've always been interested in this one. The maps are beautiful, I enjoy Alea Jacta Est, enjoyed Civil War I.

But from most of the posts it looks like the game is still broken. If you hear otherwise, let me know, because I will jump on it. Playing Waterloo on Asid's server has peaked an renewed interest.

[chemkid]

WoN's release last year was very tempting but i was short of money -
matrix' sale didn't include the game but this year's sale + my anniversary coupon make it a walk to the movies...

will it be a good or bad movie - that's the question? haven't found out except the locals keep muttering about crashes...
few folks seem very happy, though...  ( http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/fb.asp?m=4195230 )

...very tempting... (again!)  :pullhair:

[Boggit]

WoN's release last was very tempting but i was short of money -
matrix' sale didn't include the game but this year's sale + my anniversary coupon make it a walk to the movies...

will it be a good or bad movie - that's the question? haven't found out except the locals keep muttering about crashes...
few folks seem very happy, though...  ( http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/fb.asp?m=4195230 )

...very tempting... (again!)  :pullhair:

It has some very odd things in the 100 Days scenario. Lancers are all dragoons, some iconic units like the Empress Dragoons and the Polish Lancers are presented as dragoons too. Lazy stuff that should have been picked up early. I don't know if that is the same in the GC game, but certainly the Waterloo campaign was disappointing.

[mikeck]

WoN's release last was very tempting but i was short of money -
matrix' sale didn't include the game but this year's sale + my anniversary coupon make it a walk to the movies...

will it be a good or bad movie - that's the question? haven't found out except the locals keep muttering about crashes...
few folks seem very happy, though...  ( http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/fb.asp?m=4195230 )

...very tempting... (again!)  :pullhair:

For me the game is very stable but it's a question of trying to do too much. AGEOD  got in a cycle of adding more and more "things to do "like cards to be placed on territories in the form of events. Things that the AI did not know how to use but the player did. just made it to one-sided.  With all of the event cards, diplomacy and alliances, I  think it was just too much for the AI.

They decided to go back to basics with wars of succession and have simplified a lot of things. There still diplomacy and such but the event cards are gone it is much more of a sharper focus....the AI is much better for it

[panzerde]

Agreed. What I'm seeing of Wars of Succession so far is a return to the successful AGEOD formula of games like Rise of Prussia, but with recent engine improvements.


I've avoided WoN for all the reasons listed above. That bums me out, because I really enjoyed their original Napoleon game.

[Sir Slash]

I was tempted too during the recent Steam sale where it was discounted to about $23. But I also think they've not got all the bugs out of the game yet and it will be on sale again sometime. Mikeck makes a good point. ACW 2 Was great but sometimes the AI was kind of overwhelmed with all the many options and would sometimes do something dumb or crazy that a human would not. So I think Napoleon's probably worse. But, damn it looks good.

[Cyrano]

All the details aside -- and I take those as important as well -- the scenario design is poor.

I've now played the Jena Campaign a half-dozen times and I'm not persuaded there's a way for the French to lose.  I get it, it was a bad deal for the Prussians historically.  There are ways of making the game at least interesting for either side without traducing history.

Same observation about the Hundred Days and Austerlitz, although I've played them fewer times.

Missed opportunity.

[Philippe]

I have a nagging suspicion that Ageod is jinxed when it comes to Napoleonic games, which is why I didn't buy this one.

[chemkid]

thanks for lots of your replies! great, keep 'em coming BUT my money's gone now for a different game...

cheers!

[W8taminute]

I picked up the game a few weeks ago on sale and have played now a total of about 9 hours.  I like the game.  It has not crashed on me during game play so far.  It did however crash twice during my 9 hours when you try to start up the game.  According to the forums this is going to happen so simply restarting the game will have to be the fix for now. 

[Tuna]

So you give it a thumbs up for gamelplay w8t?