(1648 AAR] Baden campaign

[Geoffrey of Villehardouin]

Baden campaign

Campaign difficulty: very hard
Batlle difficulty: very hard
Patched up to patch 4 (latest patch) and with the more aggressive campaign AI. There was also a slower assimilation of captured settlements and some small changes to make siege battles more difficult for the human player.

Margrave Georg-Friedrich of Baden-Durlach was one of the main Protestant leaders in the early part of the Thirty Years War and, because of its position and small size, Baden is one of the more interesting German Protestant factions, very much used in tests of the campaign AI.

This will not be a proper AAR, just a couple of videos with considerations of overall strategy. Baden starts with two provinces. With the more aggressive AI, the diplomat needs to use the first four turns fully, because after that diplomacy will become increasingly difficult. Diplomatic relations are usually very strong and can be long-lasting if diplomats actively engage with allies during the campaign. For a faction like Baden, alliance priorities would be with the Protestant Union, Rhineland Palatinate, Wuerttemberg, Hessen, Braunschweig and Bohemia. The quicker these alliances are sealed, the smaller the chance that the Protestant axis will become split via some accidental alliances of some of its members with Catholic factions. Saxony is a faction often making alliances with Catholic factions, and is best avoided. It is the black sheep in the Protestant camp. If an ally makes also an alliance with Saxony, there is trouble in the horizon.

In this campaign, despite my best efforts, the Protestants were eventually split because of the aggressiveness of the campaign AI. Baden was indeed invaded at some point by Wuerttemberg and the Palatinate, when the Protestant alliance was fractured because of some random treaty with a Catholic faction.

Baden was also invaded by less friendly neutrals, especially the Old Swiss Confederation and Mainz. These two factions mostly engaged in piratical attacks. For a while ceasefires were possible. Eventually, through their repeated attacks, relations worsened so much that it became impossible to call a ceasefire. For most of the campaign, therefore, Baden was at war with several factions, including the occasional Protestant faction, maintaining secure alliances only with Hessen, Braunschweig and Bohemia.

There were close to 500 battles in the 270 turns the campaign lasted (until 1640). About a quarter were sieges, with the remainder being open battles, the largest part of which involved at least one full enemy stack. The majority of the battles took place in the first 100 turns, when the campaign AI was at its most aggressive. The AI factions mellow out, once the player faction has become one of the strongest factions in the game. This is a general feature of the M2 engine, which naturally seeks to prevent AI factions from attacking the human player without sufficient strength.

The Imperialists invaded Bohemia early in the war and overran most of the country, causing a rebellion in Prague. Bethlen Gabor with his emergent Transylvanian army then appeared and took Prague. Following that, he parked his armies around Prague and stayed there until near the end of the campaign.

The Ottomans, the second emergent faction, invaded with their armies the southeast corner of the map, taking a couple of provinces and causing rebellions in several others. The Bavarians took Amberg from the Palatinate. In the meantime, the Baden armies had gone to war with the Catholic Leage over Bruchsal, following which they had also captured Strassburg and Rottweil. Then came the first major showdown between the Catholic League and Baden, when Count Tilly besieged Rottweil with a full stack. Rottweil was defended succesfully, but the Austrians and Catholic League became increasingly more aggressive, sending large armies to besiege the Baden towns. These attacks were constant and needed a flexible defense, with armies kept in reserve in the smaller towns and sent to wherever an attack came, as the defenders sallied out. This aggressive defense worked well, because dragoons and musketeers can fire from the walls while the melee units slug it out in the open. Pretend-sallies worked even better in enticing the besieging AI armies to battle where the human player has a clear advantage.

In the course of the campaign, one faction, the Old Swiss Confederation, went rebel when its family members died in a battle near Altkirch. Bremen was also destroyed by Braunschweig. Most other factions lived to the end of the campaign. Merchants were initially helpful, but their usefulness dimished until they became completely useless, when the economy script zeroed out all resources for the human player. That happened when a total of about 15 settlements had been captured. From then on, maintaining production had to do with building mines, breweries, farms and the like, and keeping taxes in order. This is an art, involving training good governors who are able to keep also good public order. This can be helped by two tricks: 1. Getting the governor out of the settlement once per turn, otherwise they have a high chance of getting drunk traits that decrease public order and movement points. Before taking them out, public order must ideally be at 150-175 or more, otherwise there may be a knock on order that makes this strategy pointless. 2. Therefore, it is useful to keep the public order high, ideally over 150, especially when building new buildings, but increasing taxes on the turn before a building is completed, to improve the tax traits of the governor.

There were frequent religious rebellions. If these get out of hand, they can cause a significant decrease in public order which can be difficult to remedy. The only advantage would be that budding generals can gain experience by fighting these rebels and a free priest is generated that way. However, the new buildings one has to build to restore public order tend to cost more than the 4000 Gulden one needs to pay to stop the rebellions from getting out of hand.

The main difficulty in the victory conditions is eliminating the Catholic League in the long campaign. This is a requirement for all German Protestant factions. Similarly German Catholic factions have to eliminate the Protestant Union. These two factions are spread all over the map, which means that the human player will probably need to capture more than the minimum 35-60 provinces required by the victory conditions. Achieving control over most of the large map in 360 turns is no simple task.

The Protestant factions also have the option of establishing a German Empire and having their faction leader named Kaiser. It is not required by the victory conditions but can be just as challenging, if not more challenging. This actually does not happen for the Baden campaign. Margrave Friedrich-Georg did not become a Kaiser, although Baden did eventually get the flag with the imperial double-headed eagle, which is about as good. Only the leaders of the Palatinate, Prussia-Brandenburg, Brunswick, Wuerttemberg, Hessen and Saxony have a chance of becoming a Protestant Kaiser. To achieve that, 7 out of 8 key cities need to be captured. Most of the cities are already Protestant, which could pose certain diplomatic difficulties. Seven are in modern Germany and the eighth is Prague. When the first one is captured there is an event that your faction leader has obtained the sceptre and crown of Charlemagne. It might be better at present to leave the identity of these cities clouded into a little bit of mystery.

There were occasional mishaps, rat infestations, poor harvests, bad wine, floods, bandits, diseases and the like all of which tend to affect tax income. Income losses can also be caused by enemy ships blockading ports and land desolation caused by rebels or invading armies. There were also outbreaks of the plague, fortunately never in an important city. No generals were lost. Plague can be managed by building hospitals and the like.

One important event in the campaign is the reform event. At that point the barracks that were producing the old units will stop functioning and the human player needs to start building new barracks. Moreover, the old-style musketeers, pikemen and cavalry will no longer get free upkeep and have to be moved to the smaller towns. The reform event happens sometime around 1628-1630. This is a difficult time for the human player, if he was relying on free upkeep in cities, which the AI factions do not rely much on. The new units will induce a shift in tactics to armies involving increasingly more musketeers and, therefore, require a different approach to fighting battles. Battle tactics evolve throughout the campaign, through the building of new types of barracks and the Reform event, in an attempt to simulate the historical changes in tactics during the war.

[Geoffrey of Villehardouin]

After extensively overhauling the campaign AI, the computer now behaves more as the AI logs say. Previously, the logs claimed one thing and the AI factions did another, in fact they mostly did very little, sometimes not even spending their money. That was especially noticeable in the first German version of the mod and was one of the reasons Gigantus introduced the money script.

The computer was mostly aggressive towards Baden, the human player, and less aggressive towards the other AI factions. So although there was supposed to be a Danish phase, a Swedish phase and a French phase in the campaign, there was little relevant observable AI behaviour. The problem is hard to circumvent since AI aggressiveness requires a good stretch of border between two factions and aggressiveness is enhanced by one of the factions being a human player. So unless there is a decent stretch of border between Austria and Denmark, there is not going to be an actual Danish phase, especially if Denmark is an AI-controlled faction, similarly with Sweden and so on. Even if the Imperialists go to war with Sweden over a port blockade or a scripted invasion, there may be no further pursuit of that war unless there are significant common borders. The M2 engine calculates invasion priorities apparently in a way that removing this limitation of attacking only neighbours increases the chances of calculation failure. It seems a part of the map issues the AI can have problems with.

Other than that, the revised AI took its chances when it thought it had a chance. So the Duchy of Bavaria, having lost some of its provinces to Baden or to rebellions, and left only with Amberg in Oberpfalz, went to war over Eichstatt when it saw its chance. The city of Eichstatt, the small town of Ingolstadt and the small town of Dietfurt near it, all three of which had decent garrisons, were simultaneously besieged. The Bavarians failed to attack Rennertshofen, however, whose garisson, led by the appropriately titled Franz von Sachsen-Weimar, relieved Ingolstadt. The Ingolstadt garrison, then relieved Dietfurt. And a combination of units from the towns’ garrisons next relieved Eichstatt itself, which had been the main target of the Bavarian assault. Subsequently, an army put together in the region of Nueremberg, took Amberg in retaliation – and that was the end of the Bavarian faction. But they had lasted for most of the campaign and their demise came only in the mid 1630s, along with the near simultaneous demise of Mainz.

Prinz Friedrich, the Baden heir and army marshal, was now engaged in consolidating his position in Bohemia. His right hand, Jan von Thurn “the Scarred”, was one of the main Baden generals who had taken many a German town for the Protestant cause and was accompanying him in his Bohemian venture. Together they intercepted a Bohemian army after Bohemia had demanded but had been refused the handover of Prague – and had gone to war over the issue. Margrave Georg-Friedrich had every intention in restoring Bohemia to the Bohemians, but only after the end of the campaign. It was hard to tell them that in the diplomacy scroll they had opened up. The garissoning of Prague, however, demanded most of the army Prinz Friedrich had brought with him, so he set out for Upper Saxony with little more that Jan the Scarred for company. A rebel army was threatening Teplitz Schoenau, so after gathering some mercenaries and the local town garrison, Prinz Friedrich attacked the rebels at night. They had an army of very fine quality but no real general to lead it and surprised by the night attack they were nearly encircled and never managed to put a good plan together. They attempted to re-deploy twice after becoming encircled and finally launched what seemed like a desperate attack that was slowed down by withering fire from the Baden musketeers, before being brought to a hault by counterattacks of the pikemen. It had been a pitiful show from the rebels. With the rebel army scattered, the road to Upper Saxony was open. The Bohemians controlled Dresden, that had become their new capital. They had repeatedly refused selling it to Baden. They confronted Prinz Friedrich outside the city in a massive and closely fought battle in which the Bohemians were evidently being led by some of their best generals. A night attack was not possible and victory was, therefore, costly. But Dresden fell and it was not long afterwards that the Protestant factions sent their representatives to elect a German Kaiser.

Who was he we may never know, because Baden is not one of the five Protestant factions whose leader can become a Kaiser. Suitably, Margrave Georg-Friedrich “the Watcher” had been languishing for most of the campaign in Siegmaringen, drinking bier, watching his collection of dread skulls grow, while training high quality units for the garrisons of Wuertemberg and for the campaigns in Franconia and Bavaria. But then, the other Protestant princes had not been doing much more - if they did anything as much. Hessen had been at war with Mainz and Cologne but had neither conquered nor lost any territories. Brunswick had conquered Bremen and then fought no further. Prussia-Brandenburg had lost some territories to rebellion and then to the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth expansionism but had made up for it by taking a province in Silesia from the Austrians. Saxony had succumbed to a Bohemian onlsaught, after Bohemia had been overrun by the Imperialists, and it had disappeared from the map. The Palatinate and Wuerttemberg had done nothing constructive, having gone to war with Baden over some trivial alliance issue. They had been allowed to live but had done nothing to further the Protestant cause. The Protestant Union itself, having taken the side of Wuerttemberg and the Rhineland Palatinate against Baden, had even made matters difficult for Baden. Perhaps the new Protestant leader was then a German intellectual, a Protestant ascetic, a poet or a peace-maker. But the war would not be over until the Catholic League would give up the fight.

The Catholic League strongholds in the north of Germany and in Poland and Prussia had been taken by one of the top Baden generals, Maximilien von Bingincourt, dubbed “the Unstoppable”. Jan von Thurn “the Scarred” set out in a campaign for the reconquest of the remainder of Bohemia from the Imperialists, succeeding in taking Iglau. Prinz Friedrich went himself as far as Bruenn, bringing reinforcements to the mercenary army that had stood there in an uneasy face-off against Wallenstein. The appearance of Prinz Friedrich finally made up Wallenstein’s mind to abandon Bruenn to the Protestants. Perceiving his control over his Bohemian Estates lost, he headed for the hills, preparing perhaps for a little bit of guerilla warfare. The campaign was now all but over, except for the Catholic League not being quite gone, with Graff von Pappenheim doggedly holed in in the city of Bisanz in Alsace, determined to fight for the Austrian Kaiser and the Catholic cause to the very end.

[YourStepDad]

This is beyond awesome, keep it up, give us more!

[YourStepDad]

By the way, is it just me, or do I see some new UI art, among other things?

[Geoffrey of Villehardouin]

The minor cosmetic changes on the UI were well spotted. Some of the new factions (Cologne, Hesse, Bayreuth, Siebenburgen) had been left with default black UI colours (0,0,0). Now their UI colours match their unit and flag colours. I also removed the yellow borders on the Baden provinces. It's hard to resist from tweaking things.

I have been mostly occupied with issues people raised in their feedback that are gameplay related.

Thanks for the kind words.

[YourStepDad]

Could you share this with the community, in form of a patch or a hotfix of sorts?

[tono4850]

Where can I download more aggressive campaign AI patch please ?

[Geoffrey of Villehardouin]

Where can I download more aggressive campaign AI patch please ?

It is attached in a previous post. We may release it in a more official way with a few more minor things, such as a fix for the missing UI faction colours, at some point. In the meantime, feedback on the more aggressive campaign AI would be useful.

EDIT: Is diplomacy too aggressive? Are AI factions too aggressive? Are they, perhaps, not aggressive enough?

The campaign AI principally governs how diplomacy and alliances develop, the size of the computer player's alliance and the number of armies that invade the human player. It also makes decisions on when is the right time to invade. With more aggressive AIs, the AI has more opportunities to display different types of invasions, such as opportunistic invasions by the weaker factions, such as the Bavarian invasion in this campaign, vs full-scale invasions by the stronger factions, such as I faced from the Catholic League starting with Tilly's attack. Another aspect is piratical naval or land attacks, aimed at hurting your economy. Factions that are neutral and are caused by the AI to launch piratical attacks but are in relatively good standing with the human player will afterwards feel bad about it and ask for a ceasefire. If the human player fails to keep them into his sphere of influence, the random piratical attacks will eventually lead to a deterioration of faction standings and these neutral factions will be gradually pushed towards the computer player's alliance.

The computer will not feel secure in attacking the human player, if the human payer has a stronger alliance. Also for the computer player to attack the human player, the global and faction standings of the human player must fall to about poor or worse. Global standing will fall only if the human player has few friends and many enemies. Therefore, the human player is basically only permitted to make alliances in the first few turns. It is the same with some other aggressive AIs around, such as the Stainless Steel Gracul AI. This is part of the reason why diplomacy has been made quite difficult. After the first 10 turns or so, making alliances with new factions becomes nearly impossible. On the other hand, attacking a faction that is an ally of one of your allies has a reasonable chance in causing you to lose that ally - and of course the human player is game for all neutral factions, especially as faction standings deteriorate.

Back-stabbing, that is attacks from allies as opposed to from neutrals, is practically impossible, especially if standings are good or better. With the exception of port blockades, only neighbours will attack the human player. This is a general feature of the M2 AI. It is also a reason why it is difficult, but not impossible, to maintain good relations with neighbours. There are also some slight tendencies for factions to ally with factions of their own religion and to mistrust a faction or an alliance of a different religion. So Catholic factions will tend to have lower faction standings towards Protestant factions and also towards the human player, if he is allied to Protestant factions and vice-versa.

One aspect of diplomacy that I have been surprised to never see in let's plays of M2 campaigns is making gifts to your allies. It is occasionally brought up in the forums and it it is impossible to see how good standing with your own allies could be maintained at harder difficulty levels without giving them gifts. Just as one chats every morning with their colleagues, telling them perhaps also of the project one will be working on that day, with responses such as "how can we refuse such a wonderful idea" and "you truly have the best interests of our company at heart" consider making similar gifts to your allies to maintain standings at good or better.

On hard difficulty, the campaign AI will be more passive. It will only be truly aggressive on very hard difficulty.

[Geoffrey of Villehardouin]

With much of Germany united under the Baden banner, the campaign was nearing its end. In the west, the Baden armies had conquered Saarbruecken and parts of Alsace. Some of those conquests had been made by Sigrfrid von Nassau-Saarbruecken, another incidentally appropriately named general that, moreover, happened to have a character portrait of a historical member of the House of Nassau. He led the first Baden contigent to the Catholic League city of Bisanz (Besancon) and engaged two Catholic armies outside the city. The outcome of the battle was far from decisive but more Baden armies were marching from the lands of the Old Swiss Confederation and from the Rhineland, so that by the Spring of 1640 the fighting resumed.

Sigrfrid von Nassau-Saarbruecken attacked Pappenheim’s cavalry at night. Cleverly, perhaps, the Catholic League cavalry concentrated on an attack on the left wing, nearly over-running that side. But the right wing swung about and Pappenheim’s cavalry was caught in a crossfire. Some of the Catholic League generals fled but others charged the Baden centre and right. In that fighting the enemy commander and High Plenipotentiary of the League met a hero’s death. With that, the remnants of Pappenheim’s Horse fled and the battle was won.

Following that victory against Pappenheim’s cavalry, the balance turned in Baden’s favour. In its next battle, the Catholic Union placed its army between two hamlets, incidentally covering its flanks from attack. Catholic League pikemen marched to intercept the cavalry that Sigfrid von Nassau-Saarbruecken sent to outflank their positions. The success of the Catholic League counterattacks was limited and temporary. But it bought time, so that the remainder of the Catholic Union pikemen and halberdiers attacked the Baden tercios, under cover from their cannon and musketeers. Outnumbered, outgunned and outflanked, the Catholic League soldiers fought as best they could until discipline collapsed and the remainder of that army fled.

One last Cartholic League army remained outside Bisanz but they retreated shamefully when challenged to battle. Graf zu Pappenheim had been abandoned in Bisanz. Bisanz surrendered after a brief battle - and with that the campaign was successfully concluded.