Nope Tommy, you're mostly wrong here. In, most of my games, at the end of the scenario, the statistics for losses have always (or nearly always) been higher (and much higher) due to attrition than due to combats.
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Nope Tommy, you're mostly wrong here. In, most of my games, at the end of the scenario, the statistics for losses have always (or nearly always) been higher (and much higher) due to attrition than due to combats.
yes, but regarding Gibraltar it would not be historical correct. Not even during the Napoleonic wars did they have guns strong enough to span the Straits of Gibraltar.
I would be proper for Constantniopel and
probably Öresund (the passage out from the Baltic Sea.
This is a situation where even if you can find historical justification for wars being decided by attrition, why would you want that in a game? What would be the point of playing? In a game like this you want the chance to move your armies and engage in battles. You want to win or lose on your merit, not attack and have 1/2 your army destroyed by some magical attrition programmed into the game.
Yea, why should the game be more historically correct, I mean attrition isnt fun so on that point the game shouldnt be correct. If i wanna play correct games i play north and south on the Nintendo 8-bit.
[This message has been edited by Threviel (edited 17-10-2000).]
I think it is possible to close the Straits of Gibraltar with ships. 400 years ago there was a fleet of galleys, faster than other ships in order to engage the enemy fleets. The seal of Gibraltar is a key over a castle.
1) Dealing with attrition is a key part of warfare during this period. It has nothing to do with magic. Large armies cannot be expected to remain intact in hostile territory without food or medicine in the middle of winter or in the middle of a desert. Otherwise, the combat system would resemble Risk. Risk is a good game but it is not EU.
2) From what I have read from the AARs and the beta testers' posts, severe attrition that wipes out half your army only occurs in severe conditions. Under better conditions, attrition is modest, slight or nonexistant. If the player is reasonable, the army will remain intact for battle. If the player is unreasonable, then it serves him right to have 90% of his army freeze to death during a winter siege of Muscovy. That's merit in my mind. Attrition is something to work around, just like manpower limitations, naval transport capacity and diplomatic considerations.
I think you're right. I also think I'm right. As I said, it all has to do with the degree to which it is implemented. I didn't say I was against attrition being part of the game, I said I thought that Paradox might have gone a tad overboard with it.
yea attrition does add a whole lot of realism to the game even if they did go overboard with it a bit. cant wait im getting the german version next week!
Because EU want to be historically accurate and realistic. If you don't like to play game like that play Shogun or Colonial Conquest...
Personally I think that attrition considerations can be made both fun and strategically challenging if done correctly. There should be no 'magic' involved although perhaps a random chance of plague.
I don't really know how EU solves this, but my scheme would be something like this:
All provinces slowly stock up supplies (especially in the summer), the level of which depends on population size, terrain type and climate. In the winter, these supplies are depleted by the population itself. Armies and garrisons naturally also consume supplies.
Normally, a province produces a surplus and the population grows. If the supplies are completely consumed by armies the population starts to decrease and the armies experience terrible attrition. However, surplus from neighboring friendly provinces can alleviate the effect. Also, provinces with ports can import supplies from other port provinces.
Thus you get a kind of supply 'bleed-through' in your own realm, even if it is not efficient enough to keep huge armies supplied if they stay in one place too long.
Hostile armies would consume more supplies, due to the inefficiency of their foraging.
In key provinces where you plan to gather large armies you could build 'supply depot' improvements that would stock up surplus supplies from all of your provinces.
Realistic and interesting effects of this scheme:
1) Armies deep within enemy territory would have to keep moving or succomb to attrition.
2) Winter campaigns would be foolhardy (in cold climates).
3) In peace-time you could not have a huge army standing still in one of your provinces forever.
4) You could pursue campaigns of destruction in enemy lands, denying food to the population and to the enemy armies.
5) Impossibly huge armies would dissolve quickly.
/Doomie
Hrm, in a historic game it seems like a rather good idea to keep to historic facts, does it not? And the fact of the matter is, that battles were quite rare even in times of intense conflict. Wars were decided mostly by manouvering and actual battle losses were very low compared to losses by attrition. You might not like - that's fine. But that's the way wars were fought in Europe during those times, so that is the way a game covering conflict in those days should work as well.
I you want another kind of game, I can recommend Red Alert 2. Lots of battles. No attrition.
Regards,
The E.
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Uhm... nice province. I
think I'll take it.
Attrition is part of every (or should) game of this type.
Realism = fun for me. This is not to say I wasn't agreeable with the amount of attrition suffered at before I became a beta tester. I remember on several occasions being surprised by figures quoted to me by Marcus J. Sadly, I didn't have the first clue about how bad attrition was during this era, but I grew to understand it and appreciate it as part of everyday warfare during this 300 year era.
Sapura
[This message has been edited by Sapura (edited 18-10-2000).]
Realism = fun for me. This is not to say I wasn't agreeable with the amount of attrition suffered at before I became a beta tester. I remember on several occasions being surprised by figures quoted to me by Marcus J. Sadly, I didn't have the first clue about how bad attrition was during this era, but I grew to understand it and appreciate it as part of everyday warfare during this 300 year era.
Sapura
[This message has been edited by Sapura (edited 18-10-2000).]
Historically, all armies have lost more soldiers from attrition than from the enemy's blades or bullets.
Napoleon's great innovation which allowed him to wield huge armies with devastating effect was to split the army into Corps (in effect) which allowed the army to advance over a huge front and thus help reduce attrition from supply shortage (among other things).
Napoleon's great innovation which allowed him to wield huge armies with devastating effect was to split the army into Corps (in effect) which allowed the army to advance over a huge front and thus help reduce attrition from supply shortage (among other things).
No, you can never be totally true to history in a game. I could cite a thousand examples of how EU isn't realistic and never could be because it's a game. It has to be fun and balanced as well as realistic. Perhaps you didn't read the thread where the designers admitted to using historically inaccurate information in the starting stats for the countries because they were concerned with game balance.
There obviously has to be something to make a game out of it. We wouldn't make a game about lightning striking, even though it is realistic, would we? No, because lightning striking is a random event that a player can't have any control over. He would just stare at his screen for hours waiting for the lightning to strike.
If attrition is reasonable, I like it. But if you lose 1/2 of your army in your own country, as I think I recall someone saying in another thread, then that is kind of like watching the lightning strike. Do you understand now?
There obviously has to be something to make a game out of it. We wouldn't make a game about lightning striking, even though it is realistic, would we? No, because lightning striking is a random event that a player can't have any control over. He would just stare at his screen for hours waiting for the lightning to strike.
If attrition is reasonable, I like it. But if you lose 1/2 of your army in your own country, as I think I recall someone saying in another thread, then that is kind of like watching the lightning strike. Do you understand now?
If you gather a huge amount of soldiers to one place you should lose heavy to attritaion even in your own country.
Originally posted by Vurbil:
Perhaps you didn't read the thread where the designers admitted to using historically inaccurate information in the starting stats for the countries because they were concerned with game balance.
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No where did they write that ?
/Greven
Perhaps you didn't read the thread where the designers admitted to using historically inaccurate information in the starting stats for the countries because they were concerned with game balance.
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No where did they write that ?
/Greven
Well vurbil, i agree with ya 100%. This attrition is not a big fun factor for these kind of games. When we play the Europa boardgame we changed the attrition rules slightly, u can role again if u wish for land attrition but after that the number is set. Worked like a charm, didnt affect the game balance any and this attrition bug factor was reduced but not taken out of the game.
Now i know most of u guys want the game to be as historic as possible but at the expensive of playability is not an option for me, like u guys said to vurbil if he likes no attrition play RedAlert2, well guys if u like attrition and totally accurate history just read some history books. This is an GAME, dont forget that.
[This message has been edited by Grettir (edited 20-10-2000).]
Now i know most of u guys want the game to be as historic as possible but at the expensive of playability is not an option for me, like u guys said to vurbil if he likes no attrition play RedAlert2, well guys if u like attrition and totally accurate history just read some history books. This is an GAME, dont forget that.
[This message has been edited by Grettir (edited 20-10-2000).]
I would like to give some precisions about the way attrition is working to explain that is REALLY a FUN aspect of the game and not 'an historical cheat' made for game balance.
First of all, attrition is the ONLY factors that can explained that some HUGE armies have been destroyed by smaller one. I will give some exemples about EU period: the invicible armada has been defeated by english navy BUT has been DESTROYED by attrition because they have nee to make turn of UK during storm season. Napoleon (just a bit after EU) has nearly lost 500K due to attrition in Russia in 1812 which has directly made him lost all his power.
United States have become independant because England has been cut from his supply sources at the end of the war.
What does it means in FUN for EU.
It simply means that this is NOT a game where 'I have more guns than you, so I am the winner' like Imperialism can be. Of course it could be fun to play sometimes wich such games but I never play on it as much as I haved play EU during beta test. In term of game, attrition will signify that you will have to think twice before decide wich strategy you will use.
I can said to you: attrition is probably one of your best weapons as a human player, for 2 reasons.
The first one is that it will probably damage much more your opponent than your army, especially if you use a scorched earth tactic. I promise you, it is REALLY possible to play such a tactic with EU, that was impossible in Imperialism. I think that when you will have played one or two times Russia in EU, you will really appreciate such a thing.
The second one is that attrition cost you nothing when it destroyed some parts of the ennemy. As money is extremely important when making war, everything that cost nothing to you is good to take.
The other thing that we probably have not good explain, is that attrition depend greatly from WHERE you are and WHEN.
For exemple, Paris can contains a massive army even during winter. On the other side, some territories around Hudson bay, are simply a hell for army (If some canadians are present here, they will probably confirm that North Canada is not a really pleasant place to live in during winter without a good fuel heater
)
What does that means in term of FUN for EU:
It said that most of battles will occurs on plains during summer. But nothing prevent you, if you have a good maneuvring leader, to make a strategical surprise by walking through a less 'adequate' province. This means that you will arrive on the back of your ennemy with only some loses due to attrition. Here you will be able to looted and pillage most of his provinces greatly reducing him money.
The last point is that attrition is the most important weapons for some countries: England, Russia, Turkey, Sweden.
For this countries, attrition will signify that they ennemies will loose time and men just to arrive to the contact of their own troops.
Can you really imagine that England would have remain an independant country during this period, if the Channel was not here, to stop and slow french army?
In game play, that will signify that the English player will be able to see French concentrating force and loose time and men to cross. This delay is sufficient for England to send troops to the menace.
About tech level at start of scenario, I have seen people claims that it was a scandal that a country has one point more than another. Everybody should be aware that speculate of the effect of one point difference in tech, is like pretending that 50 cents is the sum that will made a 100$ note worth nothing.
I hope that I have been to explained in which sense attrition is really a fun aspect of war in EU, and that give really more strategical and tactical wealth to EU.
First of all, attrition is the ONLY factors that can explained that some HUGE armies have been destroyed by smaller one. I will give some exemples about EU period: the invicible armada has been defeated by english navy BUT has been DESTROYED by attrition because they have nee to make turn of UK during storm season. Napoleon (just a bit after EU) has nearly lost 500K due to attrition in Russia in 1812 which has directly made him lost all his power.
United States have become independant because England has been cut from his supply sources at the end of the war.
What does it means in FUN for EU.
It simply means that this is NOT a game where 'I have more guns than you, so I am the winner' like Imperialism can be. Of course it could be fun to play sometimes wich such games but I never play on it as much as I haved play EU during beta test. In term of game, attrition will signify that you will have to think twice before decide wich strategy you will use.
I can said to you: attrition is probably one of your best weapons as a human player, for 2 reasons.
The first one is that it will probably damage much more your opponent than your army, especially if you use a scorched earth tactic. I promise you, it is REALLY possible to play such a tactic with EU, that was impossible in Imperialism. I think that when you will have played one or two times Russia in EU, you will really appreciate such a thing.
The second one is that attrition cost you nothing when it destroyed some parts of the ennemy. As money is extremely important when making war, everything that cost nothing to you is good to take.
The other thing that we probably have not good explain, is that attrition depend greatly from WHERE you are and WHEN.
For exemple, Paris can contains a massive army even during winter. On the other side, some territories around Hudson bay, are simply a hell for army (If some canadians are present here, they will probably confirm that North Canada is not a really pleasant place to live in during winter without a good fuel heater
)What does that means in term of FUN for EU:
It said that most of battles will occurs on plains during summer. But nothing prevent you, if you have a good maneuvring leader, to make a strategical surprise by walking through a less 'adequate' province. This means that you will arrive on the back of your ennemy with only some loses due to attrition. Here you will be able to looted and pillage most of his provinces greatly reducing him money.
The last point is that attrition is the most important weapons for some countries: England, Russia, Turkey, Sweden.
For this countries, attrition will signify that they ennemies will loose time and men just to arrive to the contact of their own troops.
Can you really imagine that England would have remain an independant country during this period, if the Channel was not here, to stop and slow french army?
In game play, that will signify that the English player will be able to see French concentrating force and loose time and men to cross. This delay is sufficient for England to send troops to the menace.
About tech level at start of scenario, I have seen people claims that it was a scandal that a country has one point more than another. Everybody should be aware that speculate of the effect of one point difference in tech, is like pretending that 50 cents is the sum that will made a 100$ note worth nothing.
I hope that I have been to explained in which sense attrition is really a fun aspect of war in EU, and that give really more strategical and tactical wealth to EU.
Well sarges u made some good pointers. But to make myself clear i was just talking about attrition when moving on land and after battles not when u are 'cut out of supply'.
Now my experence on this matter is only from the boardgame, and high attrition usually came from bad leaders and bad luck. I remember when i was defending france from the damm dutch, lost all my armies in moving my armies within france or should i say 60% of my total factors in 2moves. I was very unlucky but i lost the war because badluck on the attrition roll.
I do not know how it works with EU CG but i hope they will have a more fair system then in the boardgame.
Now my experence on this matter is only from the boardgame, and high attrition usually came from bad leaders and bad luck. I remember when i was defending france from the damm dutch, lost all my armies in moving my armies within france or should i say 60% of my total factors in 2moves. I was very unlucky but i lost the war because badluck on the attrition roll.
I do not know how it works with EU CG but i hope they will have a more fair system then in the boardgame.
Sarges,
You bring up some good points. Foremost among them is the fact that attrition brings an additional element of strategy and planning to the game. An element to be used or abused by the player. Military campaigns are often won or lost based on mutliple factors, not just the number of guns and troops, as you aptly point out. For instance: it appears that you can cause an enemy losses by outmanuvering him and perhaps causing him to march through unfriendly or scorched lands.
Winter should be a difficult time for armies of this time. Sickness would cause severe losses for an army on the move. As late as the U.S. revolution, the British and American armies went into winter quarters for the duration. They would come out if necessary or to gain a brief advantage, but wouldn't make a habit of it. (The U.S. Continental army was almost completely incapacitated during the Valley Forge winter but the British never came out of their winter barracks to finish it off.)
Obviously, I can't judge the affects in game terms (yet), but you 'betazoids' seem to feel that the attrition process works out fine.
You bring up some good points. Foremost among them is the fact that attrition brings an additional element of strategy and planning to the game. An element to be used or abused by the player. Military campaigns are often won or lost based on mutliple factors, not just the number of guns and troops, as you aptly point out. For instance: it appears that you can cause an enemy losses by outmanuvering him and perhaps causing him to march through unfriendly or scorched lands.
Winter should be a difficult time for armies of this time. Sickness would cause severe losses for an army on the move. As late as the U.S. revolution, the British and American armies went into winter quarters for the duration. They would come out if necessary or to gain a brief advantage, but wouldn't make a habit of it. (The U.S. Continental army was almost completely incapacitated during the Valley Forge winter but the British never came out of their winter barracks to finish it off.)
Obviously, I can't judge the affects in game terms (yet), but you 'betazoids' seem to feel that the attrition process works out fine.