Wars in America: A 'how-to' AAR

Things are not good-looking to the French right now. That loss down South was severe, IMO.

So, what are the goals for each one of you? Survive for the French and completely wipe them out for the British?

ANO1453 said:

Things are not good-looking to the French right now. That loss down South was severe, IMO.

So, what are the goals for each one of you? Survive for the French and completely wipe them out for the British?

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I suppose both protagonists in this top-notch AAR could hope for no more fitting fate than for their General avatar to perish gloriously at the moment of victory in a final battle on the Plains of Abraham.

After the South, so goes the North? Louisburg is on its last legs... But at least you have some time to reorganize your defenses of Canada proper. Not to sound backhanded, but I do think you play a losing hand well. It's hard to see you win now, but it promises to be a slog for the English (and I guess not winning and losing aren't quite the same - perhaps you can manage a stalemate?)

Does Narwhal ever provide any information on what all those hits on the Royal Navy meant for his ships? Anything sunk, or anything badly damaged? I'm curious...

loki100 said:

You can rest assured that Narwhal carries on trying to kill my officers on a regular basis (I even have the emails to prove it) ... and reaching for victory does not make him any kinder to any passing Indians either. I'm not actually sure that in game Montcalm and Wolff clash ... I'll keep an eye out for it though.

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They never did - nor was Wolff ever the leader of any of my force - I needed my head-of-stacks to have "good logistician" traits and Wolff does not have that.

I'd be interested as both at Louisbourg and off Quebec those messages imply I've done a lot of damage. Ships are like land units with losses within elements and then the potential for lost elements so it should have some effect.

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That's why I made an Excel file - to follow that sort of stuff. But as Loki's know, I have lost one of my two laptops (a 8 years-old artifact) - the one on which I had the Excel file, so the following will be more informal thant expected. [The loss of computer also explains why I am late on the AAR]


In any case, in any AAR a good tough backs to the wall defense is always fun (both to play and read about).

I'll say this again repeatedly but this was/is a brilliant game and I'm really grateful to Narwhal for the chance. Its a fun game against the AI, but its engrossing against a human player.

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I can only concur - but I did not play brilliantely in my opinion. I just exploited the mistakes you made because you did not know the game.

You also tricked him into playing the French...

Let's hope you can loose with dignity then...

This is great AAR, in some ways more interesting read than actually playing the game itself.

Great AAR, guys! I'm enjoying reading it as well as learning from your insightful analysis of your gameplay as well as your opponent's gameplay.

September 1758 – French successes








I am a bit late due to various issues, but I will try to do as if you never read Loki100’s AAR.

September is an horrible, horrible month for me. French gets a major victory by ambushing my forces just in Front of Niagara :



12 elements destroyed and 1400 dead people is an extremely bad news… The two national morale points lost is bad news as well. Note that the forces outside the Fort were destroyed first, and then the French tried to assault the Fort and were stopped by Lord Howe.

Lord Howe managed to turn this into a victory when reporting to his superiors – and get a promotion (next turn).



Having a two-star leader with the fast mover trait is outstanding. He will command whole stacks and make them move fast !

Along the Champlain, I finally meet Montcalm… for the worst :



Luckily enough, I kind of expected this and gave cautious orders. Still my situation is extremely bad. Lawrence retreated, but he is now unactivated, and can be catch again and forced into battle by Montcalm again. This calls for an urgent retreat to Saint Frederick.

I lost 1 National Morale Point. This ain’t good either. But what exactly is National Morale ?

Beginner’s Corner : National Morale

National Morale is an indicator on how confident your troops are in the victory.
It can increase the following ways :
- If you win a battle
- If you destroy enemy elements
- If you kill enemy leaders
- If you take a city

In this case, the enemy national morale is lowered symmetrically

You can also win (or lose) national morale by event (very rare in WiA) and you can lose National Morale if you promote someone “over the head” or another leader, if that leader has an high politics rating.

National Morale has major effects :

- It increases (decreases) the maximum cohesion of ALL your elements by 1% per 2 points of difference between your NM ansd 100. This can be very significant. See my Rise of Prussia AAR
- It increases (decreases) the supply production by 1% in all structures per 2 points of difference between your NM and 100. Mostly insignificant.

In some cases, a very low / high National Morale (I think it is “as low as 0” or “as high as 200” means an automatic defeat / victory in the game. I never saw that happens in WiA, though, but it is possible.

Here is a chart of Loki’s and my NM since the beginning of the game :



As you can see, NM does not move much. I closed the gap quickly at the beginning by taking Duquesne and Fort Beauséjour, and then on it became quite stable. This tends to be the case in WiA – it is VERY different in the other AGEOD games.

End of the corner

Now to Louisbourg :
My fleet is still bombarding the enemy defenses. Not much effect for either side.



My fleet is still on good health, so I will carry on :



I carry on my strategy with the supply wagons, but I am a bit worried :



As you can see, there is a weak point, between Halifax and Louisbourg. If a French fleet sneaks in, it can intercept and sink my transports – and I need most of my fleet to blockade, as I don’t want to run the risk of a blockade runner bringing fresh supplies.

This is a new worry, because I just noticed a new French fleet way South :



We will see what direction it takes next turn.

Last turn, I forget to mention my project for Plaisance, a French town and port North of Louisbourg. It is small, but I happened to have a lot more militias in boston than I can train with Washington – and since I know these militias will disappear in December, I decided to do something with them :



Take the town of Plaisance ! My transport just sneaked past Louisbourg (where they are probably more worried by the 10 or so ships-of-the-line with all those men to whom we promised free holydays in a place which name bring images or sea, sun and surf : Plaisance. I mean, Plaisance. How more French could that name be.
It is also the last French port in the North besides Quebec and Louisbourg

My other actions for the turn are about bringing troops to my fort :

In Fort Henri Bouquet :



In Depot Niagara – I am afraid of losing it AGAIN.

October 1758 – Busy end of the season

First, let’s see the situation in Louisbourg…

The siege carries on and…



This is me at this point :





They won't surrender - they will just die by starvation then !

Meanwhile, our little bombarding continue :



And, good news, the French fleet went away :



So my strategy carries on :



This picture has not changed much, eh ?

Note the enemy power. I expect it to go down soon, as the French supply will be low.

North of Louisbourg, my happy candidate for holydays on the beach arrived in Plaisance :



They are exhausted, so I will wait one more turn before assau… games ! Fun games ! Paintball !


In Depot Niagara, the French force that destroyed my elements last turn tried to assault, but this time they were stopped by the determined defense of Lord Howe :



I bring more troops to Niagara – there is a depot there after all and those will be useful for my 1759 campaign. My 1758 campaign was wasted by the resistance of Louisbourg and my fear of losing one of the Great Lake forts / depots.

As you can see, I will use the bateaux to carry most of my force. For some reason, Loki100 did not have his schooners patrol the lake.

I spot and destroy some spies at Fort Henri Bouquet :



Finally, probably slowed down by his own inactivation, Montcalm could not catch Lawrence along the Champlain :



I believe Fort Saint Fréderic cannot be saved, but the walls of Fort Carillon should stop the French – so I will hide there. I don’t see the French starting a siege in November anyway.

Narwhal, you got a bloody nose around the Great Lakes area there, but knowing what's to come, clearly nothing irreversible happened.

It is very interesting to compare both of your perspectives on the same events, and also to see where your points of interest diverge.

Oh, and this:

They are exhausted, so I will wait one more turn before assau… games ! Fun games ! Paintball !

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is quite funny.

Lord Howe is one sneaky bastard, turning losses in wins and getting promoted for it. He'd make an excellent politician once the war is won...

November 1758 – Preparing for winter

November 1758 was fairly calm, except for a couple skirmishes so limited I won’t even show them.

Along the Champlain, Montcalm did not carry on the pursuit and I reached Fort Carillon without troubles :



I will try to spend the winter in Albany to recover strength points, even if it means moving in winter.

In Depot Niagara, a large force is ready for next year :



I have a three-stars leader here (Abercromby), but I prefer Forbes to be in command because of his 25% reduction in supply consumption. Without that, I would not survive winter.

Similarly, I have quite a force in Fort Henry Bouquet :



Actually, I am consuming more supply than I produce there, but only by a little so I should survive winter. I won’t be able to siege Détroit, though. I will have to assault (which should be ok).

In Plaisance, my militias are ready to be useful before being sent to their home.



Yes, that’s assault posture.

Finally, in Louisbourg, a French fleet is getting close … and it carries supply.



I am not afraid of this fleet, but I want to be sure it does not get into the area with all my ships : sure it will be defeated but it could retreat in the Port. As I can only see 2 units of transport and 1 unit of warship (maximum : 4 ships), I believe sending 11 light ships should be enough to chase them before they enter my area. If it does not work … well too bad.

I used the opportunity to see how much damage the bombarding from Louisbourg did to my ships, and the answer is : minimal damages. Mostly because the damages were spread out between a large number of ships, but also because I sent the most damaged ships back to Halifax.

Not to say Fort Batteries are useless – there have been other games were I lost severals ships to them. But in this case, I was careful enough so that the damages were minimal.
I did not do much damage to his army either, due to the very high level of the fortress (level 2 fortress, but “star-design”, so it should count as level 3 or something.

A small point : Fort Batteries shoot
- When a fleet bombard them, as “counter-battery”
- When a fleet gets OUT of the sea area they control, provided the ship is spotted and that they are not occupied by another fleet, as was the case here – so I could move my transports in & out.

Finally, I receive massive naval reinforcements that makes me the complete leader of the seas from now on :



The fleet has
- A very good admiral (Sir Charles Saunders 7-3-3 with the “Seaman” (i.e. Fast Mover at sea) trait
- 2 ships-of-the-line with no less than 100 guns (The Neptune and the Royal William)
- 5 ships-of-the-line with 80 guns
- 5 ships-of-the-line with 74 guns
- 2 ships-of-the-line with 64 guns
- 3 Frigates
- 1 Brig
- 8 Transports
This should be enough.

That's quite the fleet... Once you've taken Louisburg though, how helpful will they be for your push into Canada? Can you sail up the St. Lawrence with them?

Stuyvesant said:

That's quite the fleet... Once you've taken Louisburg though, how helpful will they be for your push into Canada? Can you sail up the St. Lawrence with them?

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Yes I can, but really once I take Louisbourg I only need one third of that fleet...

Dear people,

Unfortunately (for the AAR), I am going on holydays for the next week, and the following week I will prepare a competitive entrance exam - which means that the AAR will be on hold from me for at least 2 weeks. I was already slowed down due to various preparations for said "holydays".

The game between I and Loki is over, and I am pretty sure he will carry on posting. I will catch back afterwards (and, note to self, finish the few turns remaining for the RoP AAR).

As a teaser, 1759 is I believe Loki's best year, with an higher bodycount in battle for me that year than any other year, and possible as any combination of two years.

I might still pop in in the coming two weeks, but I won't have any way to do the AAR