March of the Eagles (Preview)

[PanzersEast]

Regarding the Ping-Pong effect... from the devs

we've done changes regarding the problem for the patch.


Looks like a patch soon....


PE

[sandman2575]

I'd be interested in hearing what countries y'all have been playing, and what strategies you've been employing.

I've had several false starts now as Prussia, Russia, Britain... mostly starting a GC, tinkering with army arrangements, assigning generals, building stuff.  The 'dominance' keypoints are helpful, but to be honest, I don't have much sense of how to prepare for a campaign -- what to build, how much, and how to arrange your armies optimally.  I've been assuming you should concentrate force in the center flanks, but have no idea if that's really effective.

(Incidentally, can anyone explain exactly what the 'supply wagon' unit does? I know in original NC you could build depots with them... in MotE, it's not so clear.  Put them in the rear flank of your army, and they, what, cut down on attrition? carry supply?)

[PanzersEast]

(Incidentally, can anyone explain exactly what the 'supply wagon' unit does? I know in original NC you could build depots with them... in MotE, it's not so clear.  Put them in the rear flank of your army, and they, what, cut down on attrition? carry supply?)

a couple of items on Attrition and Supply.... really one I believe that happens and the other that gives a bonus.

Attrition:
Attrition effects can be further reduced by adopting the Expert Foraging idea, or it can be increased by having armies use the Scorched Earth operational order. The Forced March operational order increases attrition considerably when it is issued to an army stack. 

Supply:
I believe this helps increase you supply limit on provinces that you exceed, but will have to test.

Supply trains provide a certain amount of logistical support to the formation they are currently assigned to. If there are enough supply trains assigned to that army they receive a bonus to attack in any combat they take part in.



PE

[Nefaro]

Supply trains increase the amount of supplies your army has, and I believe being in supply dictates your rate of reinforcement (replacement of casualties) along with limiting the maximum attrition rate at any one time (if you are supplied for that day).  For some detailed numbers, open your army info screen and hover the mouse cursor over a green bar underneath the Attrition rate number (hopefully 0.0!) and a tooltip will pop up telling you your supply numbers situation and if/where the supply line runs to.

[sandman2575]

Appreciate the info -- thanks

One thing that's been bugging me and I've seen no explanation for:

A LOT of units seem to have completely redundant stats. Playing as Prussia, for ex, among your cavalry, Hussars, Uhlans, and Freikorps appear to have exactly the same stats.  Same price, same build-time, all combat numbers , everything.  Same holds true for many units: Line Infantry and Second Line infantry: exactly same numbers. 'Foot' Artillery, 'Guard' artillery, 'regular Arty, again, all the same thing -- and the list goes on.

What gives?  Surely these cant all be 'flavor' units?

[Nefaro]

Appreciate the info -- thanks

One thing that's been bugging me and I've seen no explanation for:

A LOT of units seem to have completely redundant stats. Playing as Prussia, for ex, among your cavalry, Hussars, Uhlans, and Freikorps appear to have exactly the same stats.  Same price, same build-time, all combat numbers , everything.  Same holds true for many units: Line Infantry and Second Line infantry: exactly same numbers. 'Foot' Artillery, 'Guard' artillery, 'regular Arty, again, all the same thing -- and the list goes on.

What gives?  Surely these cant all be 'flavor' units?

I'm thinking that, yes indeed, they are flavor.  I'm guessing there may have been other plans for more stuff back when the AGE team was working on it, and the artwork was already done so the Pdox guys probably just put them in there in case modders did something with them.  Since they obviously had the assets done, I would've rather they included them for just such modding purposes rather than not.

I'd be interested in hearing what countries y'all have been playing, and what strategies you've been employing.

I've been playing as Russia lately. 

I try to put the highest Maneuver rated generals in charge of armies, as I believe that gives a higher bonus to Evade and March to the Sound of the Guns, along with some kind of assistance with retreats.  Having the highest combat ratings helps too, as the one for the army commander is given to all flanks. 

I tend to leave a national reserve of a few armies arrayed somewhat close to the center of the nation so when war breaks out with someone, I can move most or all of them to that front.  Unless it's another equally-sized opponent, I still leave a few armies on other borders with neighbors who don't like me too much; the AI in these Clausewitz games probably factors in how far away your armies are from the mutual border, when pondering a DOW on you so I don't want to encourage an attack on my backside any more than needed. 

If you're hurting for generals in your armies that will be seeing action, just strip them from those guarding borders or even ones that have taken losses and need to sit awhile and reinforce.  I highly recommend appointing most or all of your flanks, in your active armies, so that you can mix & match unit types on each flank that will enable you to set special tactics.  I tend to leave mostly a cavalry unit or two in the reserve along with an infantry or two if the army's big enough.  I had tried placing horse artillery in the reserve but I realized that artillery's most effective use is in the initial stage of the battle and that's where it may not even be committed if it's in the reserve.  So I don't put artillery back there, as a rule, unless I just can't spare any other type.  If it's a smaller army with a large amount of cavalry, I try to put 1 or 2 cav on the L or R Flank and set it to that screen tactic in the hopes that I'll get the Cavalry Screen event and I can move the infantry & arty over to the center or opposite wing to use an Assault/Up The Guard for a more heavy engagement there.  If you have some Light Infantry, the Delay tactic is a good substitute for the Screen, too.  There's a Counter (?) attack tactic that requires a certain amount of cavalry on the flank and I tend to use that one with regular infantry and numerous cavalry for a more offensive purpose.  There's a number of different tactic combinations to allow you to take a defensive posture on some flank(s) and an offensive one in others but you gotta have a general in each that use one and you generally need a certain percentage of unit types (mostly cavalry and/or light infantry but arty and guards units for others). It's always good to have a decent mix of unit types in your armies so you have the flexibility to set some tactics like this (the bonuses are quite nice).

There's not much value in building some of the structures.  I generally only drop a Depot on occasion - some place near the border where I plan on building military units.  A port upgrade might be worth consideration if you're rolling in ducats but I don't think ship building is a high priority for most nations, and the extra income from it would probably be negligible.

[PanzersEast]

I'd be interested in hearing what countries y'all have been playing, and what strategies you've been employing.

Suicide Strategy for me..... I am playing as Prussia and have joined the French Coalition and am sandwiched between Russia and Austria.  The Brits are hammering Denmark and I have had a few small engagements with them.  Austria and I have skirmished at our borders, however no large scale battles have taken place.  Russia just made peace and maybe looking to attack me. 

I have not gotten a feel for how large my military should be etc.... Austria is fielding an Army size of 297K, Russia 394K, and I am about 225K.  I am also not sure of the best size or composition and at this point learning them in some major battles will cost me, but hey I'll have fun and have made it interesting!


PE

[sandman2575]

Great tips.  I've been doing exactly what you describe in terms of putting horse arty in reserve, thinking they could be rushed to front where needed. But i think you're probably right that arty should be deployed at start of battle for the 'bombard' phase.

Kind of sucks, in my opinion, that all these redundant units are in there with the expectation that 'the modders will take care of it.'  Not sure what other explanation there could be. But would it really have killed the dev's -- or unbalanced the game -- to have tweaked some stats in a logical way so as to give you at least some incentive to care whether you build "Hussars" as opposed to "Uhlans" as opposed to "Freikorps Kavallerie"??

There's a certain under-baked quality to MotE that is disappointing.  I'm all for a more 'streamlined' experience and the idea that you can finish a whole campaign with a couple of play sessions.  But right now my overall impression is this game may be too shallow to hold my interest for long.

I have no doubt that modders will seize this thing and run with it and soon produce some outstanding mods.  And to their credit, I'm sure Pdox will continue to patch and support it.  So for now, maybe it's 'play in order to learn the mechanics' and expect a more satisfying game months down the road.   

[PanzersEast]

Great tips.  I've been doing exactly what you describe in terms of putting horse arty in reserve, thinking they could be rushed to front where needed. But i think you're probably right that arty should be deployed at start of battle for the 'bombard' phase.

Kind of sucks, in my opinion, that all these redundant units are in there with the expectation that 'the modders will take care of it.'  Not sure what other explanation there could be. But would it really have killed the dev's -- or unbalanced the game -- to have tweaked some stats in a logical way so as to give you at least some incentive to care whether you build "Hussars" as opposed to "Uhlans" as opposed to "Freikorps Kavallerie"??

There's a certain under-baked quality to MotE that is disappointing.  I'm all for a more 'streamlined' experience and the idea that you can finish a whole campaign with a couple of play sessions.  But right now my overall impression is this game may be too shallow to hold my interest for long.

I have no doubt that modders will seize this thing and run with it and soon produce some outstanding mods.  And to their credit, I'm sure Pdox will continue to patch and support it.  So for now, maybe it's 'play in order to learn the mechanics' and expect a more satisfying game months down the road.   

I like the game, however it does feel like a frame work with other components to be added later.... either by mods or by a official add-on.  Either way, I believe in the end it will grow into an excellent game.  Already a lot of activity in the mod section.


PE

[sandman2575]

How much of a challenge are you guys finding it overall?  The corollary to its being "light" seems to be that it's also rather easy.

[Nefaro]

I like the game, however it does feel like a frame work with other components to be added later.... either by mods or by a official add-on.  Either way, I believe in the end it will grow into an excellent game.  Already a lot of activity in the mod section.


PE

Yeah.  If there is plenty of Modder activity, then it can only get better.

That's where Sengoku suffered - there were almost no big mods for it.  IIRC, one guy had did some work with different campaign dates, and filling out the historical figures, but that was about it.  Good to see more activity with this one.

[Nefaro]

Looks like there's a DEMO:

http://store.steampowered.com/app/227760/

[Johnnie]

Is there a way to play the game without having to log in to Steam each time you load it?  Just learning the game.  Looks like it will be fun.  How come everyone seems to be playing a power other than France? (the obvious choice for me)

[Tuna]

You don't have to log into Steam, you can make a shortcut from the exe and put it on your desktop and launch it from there.. Just go to your MoE folder

C:\Steam\steamapps\common\March of the Eagles

Your drive mapping might be slightly differnt

right click on MotE.exe and drag it to your desktop and choose Created Shortcut

[Nefaro]

Also.. until it's patched.. you'll have to copy the install folder to another location and run it from there if you use any of the mods currently out for it, and copy them directly over the files.

The Mod enabling software, that's built into the game, is bugged right now.  FYI.  CYA.  U-NO.


Speaking of mods, it's encouraging to see a slew of them looking to expand the gameplay.  I've seen a couple-three that I'd like to check out, given time to simmer.