Napoleon Empire Realism 7 - preview

[JaM]

What was originally planned as just small update, ended up being the largest gameplay update i did for this mod so far. NER v 7.0 will bring significant changes to gameplay. In next few days I will post teasers with more details about planned changes.



Battles will never be the same again!

[JaM]

Preview 1 - FATIGUE SYSTEM OVERHAUL

In the past, NER used unique Cohesion system, which replaced vanilla fatigue system. While Cohesion worked relatively ok, it was a bit problematic to balance out with infantry only firing from single rank, as other ranks automatically got "IDLE" status which decreased the "fatigue" and made cohesion not apply properly. Because of all these issues, and because i want to use new unit deployment system (as can be seen on pictures in first post) I have decided to come with slightly different system, which will combine both Fatigue, Cohesion and Morale.

New Fatigue system will not represent just physical fatigue from moving and running, but also Psychical fatigue, which makes units refuse to fight when toll is too high. Fatigue will apply to all units as before, walking, running, loading, firing or fighting in melee will all increase amount of fatigue unit has. Main difference will be that this fatigue will be impossible to remove during battle. Once unit is completely exhausted, it will become prone to routing due to large morale penalties. Unit quality will therefore define how well units can resist such battlefield strain, as Elite units usually have much higher morale than standard or militia units.

Fatigue stages wont impact unit fighting capabilities, so units will hit targets, reload or fight the same way, except for their morale.

How will that impact battles? Simply put, keeping reserves will be a lot more important than ever before. As fresh troops will be able to break exhausted units a lot quicker. Withdrawing such exhausted units from battle will be beneficial in situation when you have another army to reinforce, as reinforcements will come fresh. Overall, player will have to manage his units in order to win battles, especially against more numerous AI Armies.

[JaM]

Preview 2 - Combat Overhaul


Infantry changes: This will be the most significant change of NER 7.0. Practically every aspect of combat was changed. Infantry units fight in historical column formation, which was formed by 2 companies per line. Historically, such formation allowed Infantry to effectively move on the battlefield, as it allowed to concentrate infantry into decisive point on battlefield. Infantry could either attack while in column, or deploy into line, or quickly form square. Infantry in NER 7.0 will be able to move faster than before, will be able to maneuver on the battlefield a lot better. Musketry accuracy was completely overhauled, with unit stats a lot better representing unit quality. New deployment will also allow quite historical infantry vulnerability to artillery fire, as roundshots will hit all three lines instead of one. Player will be able to lessen it by deploying infantry in single line, but it will make unit to get tired from combat a lot faster than in 3 lines column formation. And combat fatigue is permanent, for the duration of battle, so quickly spent units will be much easier to break.

Artillery: batteries will be formed of 3 guns now, as well as howitzers or horse artillery units. Artillery will use similar stats change as Infantry - accuracy and reload stat will depends on type of artillery. heavy 12pdr guns will have highest accuracy, but lowest reloading, while light 4pdr guns will be least accurate (howitzers are exception) but with high reload. Howitzer shells were reworked to make them more effective, while British Shrapnel shot will be introduced with British howitzers, which will make them extremely dangerous pieces of artillery. Ability to increase rate of fire which every artillery unit has, will be slightly longer, but will stay single use only. Overall, artillery will be able to move on battlefield a bit faster than before, while horse artillery mobility will shine over everything else making it extremely effective flanking unit, that can follow cavalry.


Cavalry: Combat stats were again, reworked, with melee attack values dropping down. Main stats for cavalry is the Charge, and Charge value will define cavalry type. Lancers will have the best charge, followed by Heavy cavalry, Dragoons, Hussars with Chasseurs Cheval/Light Dragoons having the lowest charge. Goal is to make cavalry effective at initial contact, but lose that effectiveness in prolonged melee, so once charge bonus is gone, cavalry will have issues fighting in protracred melee and will be better off withdrawn to prepare for another charge. Of course, new combat fatigue means cavalry will get tired, and lose morale, so they will be somewhat "one use" weapon they were historically. Of course, they could be used even if tired, but will suffer morale penalties. Yet, thanks to their high anti-infantry bonus, they will still be very effective at breaking infantry formations, but will suffer heavy losses if used in frontal charges agaisnt well trained infantry.

[JaM]

Preview 3 - NAVAL COMBAT

Naval combat in NER 7.0 will introduce some gameplay tweaks which main focus is to improve the battles and make them more historically authentic. Ship speed and maneuverability was altered, so ships will sail visibly slower, but will be able to "rotate" faster, which was something sailing ships were good at, as sailing ships did not predominantly rely on rudder for turning, sails played quite a big role. (and sails were distributed on all three masts). For this reason, deployment zones were shortened, so ships will start battles much closer than in previous NER iterations.

Another important change is to gun models, which received a boost in size. Entity was adjusted to be much thinner, so while they present small target when firing broadside, they are much easier to hit by raking fire which is now much more devastating. Crew numbers were adjusted, so now ships have appropriate number of men without crew dropping overboard at the start of battle.

Ship crew morale will be now more impacted by ship taking damage than anything else. Hull Hitpoints were decreased across the board, which means heavy guns will now deal a lot more damage to enemy, and therefore will be more likely to cause enemy to rout. At the same time, ship magazine armor was boosted so ships explosions will be not as often as before. Similarly, ship being on fire will now actually boost crew morale, so crew can put out the fire (previously it routed the crew which then did nothing, and ship burned down)

Naval gunnery was also improved, with gun dispersion values adjusted. Overall, ships will be more deadly at shorter ranges, so holding fire and sailing close to the enemy to deliver a broadside will be effective and valid tactics now, instead of blasting shots as fast as they could be reloaded without considering enemy position.
Chaser guns also seen some adjustments, with them being much more accurate than ordinary guns. Ships which used heavy carronade as chasers (British 1-rate ships), now have new "hybrid" gun type implemented, which allows them to fire accurate 12pdr solid shot for long range firing, but when grapeshot is selected, they will fire 64pdr carronade grapeshot with devastating effect, as these ships historically carried heavy carronades for short work, but also had long barrel 12pdr guns for long range chasing.

Campaign AI in NER 7.0 will focus more on securing the colonies (trade areas), but will also try to take out enemy fleets, so keeping oversea trade up will be slightly more challenging now. Yet, small nations will no longer focus too much on sea, so they wont waste resources they might need for defending their provinces. Britian AI was boosted for more active naval role. They will try to dominate seas and put player under pressure.

[JaM]

Preview 4 - Naval Game

To complement improved Naval combat, Naval campaign game play will see changes as well. Most importantly, Ships will take a lot of time to build. Historically it took at least 3 years to build Ship of the line, anyway because game uses 24 turns per year, such build times would be way too long. Instead, they are approximately reduced by scale of 3, so large Ships of the line will take 1 in game year (24 turns) to build, while 38-gun Frigate will take 6 months.

Ships will also cost more than before, repairing them when they take damage will be more costly as well. This will put player into dilemma if he wants keep the prizes or just sell them for extra income, as repairing badly damaged captured ship will be a lot costlier.

To compensate these longer build times, Shipyards will be now able to build multiple ships at once, and number of ships that can be build will increase with Shipyard upgrades, which will now be locked behind Technology research.

At the same time, Ship number limitations were increased, so technically, player should be able to have practically historical number of ships available for large naval factions. Britain for example will be able to build over 80 3-rate ships, while France will be able to get up to 40 such ships. Limits are still implemented though, to keep the naval strengths historical.

As before, Campaign movement for all ships is defined by their maximum speed, so fastest ship is, more movement points it has. Frigates therefore will be ideal scouting ships, able to evade enemy Ships of the line, and will be also ideal ships to use to transport troops or reinforcements.

Overall, Campaign AI was adjusted so it behaves more historically, especially with factions that actually had decent Navy during Napoleonic times, while land based factions will not invest too much into Navies anymore. AI will prioritize raiding trade routes and attacking enemies, but also will more often use fleet for invasions or to occupy oversea colonies (trade areas) to secure resources.