Allied armies

One rather poignant concern about the Napoleonic period is the Allies often tried to combine field armies to confront Nappy, and in turn he was often trying to defeat them in detail.
The French struggled and lost against over whelming numbers at Leipzieg and Waterloo, but prevailed brilliantly against a much larger combined Russian/Austrian army at Austerlitz. There are probably quite a few battle/campaigns in this period where different countries combined forces in an attempt to overwhelm the Frogs.

My point is, I sincerely hope the AI/engine can duplicate/arrange in some way to give us a definate chance of seeing these combined/acting mutually, multinational(at least 2)armies in game. After all it's an important part, both polictically and militarily of the period. There were several coalitions against France, and we should see them on the battlefield in epic struggles, either playing as France, or any one of the Allies, perphaps if they hav'n't, CA should have some sort of attachment system where more than one Nations armies can move around the Campaign map together, rather like a crusade. Either locked directly together, or in close mutual support. I will be dissapointed if CA hav'n't thought about this in some way, because this is a key ingrediant in this era!

Yeah, I kinda agree with you. One thing I never liked about Empire was that I would never, ever get a decent ally battle. It would always be me against them and maybe a random Allied "Provincial Cavalry" unit every 10 battles. Proper allied battles would be appreciated.

Regards,
The Gallant Forty-Twa

Yeah we definitely need AI reinforcement during battles like RTW and M2TW had. This could represent the Corp system and Coalition cooperation quite well.

Originally Posted by Sol Invictus

Yeah we definitely need AI reinforcement during battles like RTW and M2TW had. This could represent the Corp system and Coalition cooperation quite well.

A better idea for the corps system in my opinion would be to limit the number of units in an army to 10. This would force smaller armies to march in support of one another and all converge upon a single battle, instead of the traditional "here's my line here's yours now let's flank each other" that got pretty boring in ETW. Having only 10 units would force the player to keep his corps closer together and to reinforce each other in battle, much as battles actually happened in the real Napoleonic Wars. The only question would be could the AI be programmed to actually try to have armies support each other. I think the range that armies could reinforce should be increased drastically, ecompassing as much as that army can march in a turn in my opinion (since a turn is only two weeks).

It would require a new diplomatic level of agreeing to go to war together (such as paying a rival to attack a country in M2TW).

But more importantly it would require the ability to prepare battlefield plans for your allies to follow. That kind of strategising, which has appeared in a few video games over the years, i'd be bloody surprised if it made it into a TW game. For one thing, it's "too complicated" for average gamers who actually buy these games (remember that we here are probably a fraction of a percentage of the total sales).

And for that matter, a level of strategy maps for the AI to follow would compound the difficulties for CA just too much. CA still hasn't managed to produce actual battlefield tactics with the AI; sure they respond like a computer game, but they don't manage to represent real tactical formations and their uses. How are they going to manage to create an AI that can both think and behave properly and deal with and adapt to a plan put together by a player?

Not every battle turned into a Marathon pincer or Waterloo's centre. and at the campaign level, you can always win using the Schlieffen plan, no matter how badly implemented. But OMG i'd be horrified to find out that i could suggest reinforcements do something, only to find out that the BAI interprets my orders to mean "rush into the middle of the field and do melee!"

Originally Posted by foszae

It would require a new diplomatic level of agreeing to go to war together (such as paying a rival to attack a country in M2TW).

But more importantly it would require the ability to prepare battlefield plans for your allies to follow. That kind of strategising, which has appeared in a few video games over the years, i'd be bloody surprised if it made it into a TW game. For one thing, it's "too complicated" for average gamers who actually buy these games (remember that we here are probably a fraction of a percentage of the total sales).

And for that matter, a level of strategy maps for the AI to follow would compound the difficulties for CA just too much. CA still hasn't managed to produce actual battlefield tactics with the AI; sure they respond like a computer game, but they don't manage to represent real tactical formations and their uses. How are they going to manage to create an AI that can both think and behave properly and deal with and adapt to a plan put together by a player?

Not every battle turned into a Marathon pincer or Waterloo's centre. and at the campaign level, you can always win using the Schlieffen plan, no matter how badly implemented. But OMG i'd be horrified to find out that i could suggest reinforcements do something, only to find out that the BAI interprets my orders to mean "rush into the middle of the field and do melee!"

I realized that it would have to be a quite simple affair, I was thinking any countries that were in a coalition could on a restricted basis(rarely, perphaps just that armies are supposed to more precious in NTW would do?) could offer a stack to each other. So the perphaps their is some diplomatic agreement between the player and AI as to who leads the joint army(could be based on incentives offered, or perphaps the most troops, or best General?).
Anyway the player or the AI when an agreement is reached, click on their stack and attach it with another click(or whatever)to their Allies stack. It then travels to link up, and the multi-national stack moves around the campaign map together. During this time perphaps the player or AI could be informed of link ups, like Napolean was, so link ups could be contested by destruction in detail? Something Nappy was often trying to achieve.

I do see the problem of a BAI working together, it would be ok if it's the AI fighting the player, playing as Nappy, but could the AI fight well enough along side the player, perphaps it could, I have had battles(rarely) with AI Allies fighting along side, it's their Artillary that's the worry, if you want to advance, will it shoot you in the back?

yeah i wish i could remember the game i was thinking of. i think it might have been Empire Earth (which was otherwise a strange, regrettable game). but in multi-player games you could open a strategy map and draw arrows and control zones and all the goodies necessary for a true battle plan. so in my head i jumped to that one (and as something of a strategic analyst at heart).

i'd be okay with your suggestion of linkable armies. it's not a bad way to go about it, if you could tell someone at Creative Assembly. as it stands, you can practice defeat-in-detail already on the battle maps in ETW. maybe not exactly like they were done, but pretty close. and having reinforcements sort of time in a bit late is all it would take to enact an awful lot of major battles in history.

Yep, I want this very much

I wouldn`t get my hopes up too much. from the sounds of it, they want to make it easy for the player, so I doubt the real challenges napoleon faced will face the Player too. Especially since BAI seems a minor concern. Your only hope is that two random online players will drop in as allies and give you a challenge if you have that mode on.

If CA at some point managed to give us something along the lines of what I am suggesting, even in it's simplist form, then we would stand a much better chance of seeing something near the 10,000 troops they are always telling us about, although the re-inforcement system in MTWII gave me some 4 army battles that were tense and busy. Now that was Total War!

Humble Warrior, The online player setup you mention, the new campaign one I presume you mean? Does that actually allow 2 players to drop in, not just one and so the other army attacking you remaining the AI?

Originally Posted by Frost, colonel

Humble Warrior, The online player setup you mention, the new campaign one I presume you mean? Does that actually allow 2 players to drop in, not just one and so the other army attacking you remaining the AI?

Well as far as I know, they`ll be a mode in Nap to allow a Player to take place of AI armies to fight in your SOLO campaign. I don`t know if it will allow two players though, that was just speculation on my part.

Originally Posted by Frost, colonel

a much better chance of seeing something near the 10,000 troops they are always telling us about

if u have a 4v4 battle where the only armies are austrian line infantry, ottoman mobs or ghoorkas, then u get 10,000 troops, its nothing new

I hope battles are more focused on tactics and formations, instead of crap ai and ugly /boring battles.

I would almost favor a somewhat preformed battle in some instances, where troops are already marching to designated areas but controllable after a certain time period.

Say 25 - 60 + seconds..., or at least form battle areas to better fit army quarrels.

One thing that really pained me with ETW was that the AI would either flee extremely early and route = boring, and or use terrible formations and make a mess of things.

I surely hope formations and tactical planning can become a real piece of the battles in NTW, ETW was good but in many cases battles were pathetic in my view, unless you micromanage your units enough to entice opposing ai to form up properly.

Originally Posted by driecken

I hope battles are more focused on tactics and formations, instead of crap ai and ugly /boring battles.

I would almost favor a somewhat preformed battle in some instances, where troops are already marching to designated areas but controllable after a certain time period.

Say 25 - 60 + seconds..., or at least form battle areas to better fit army quarrels.

One thing that really pained me with ETW was that the AI would either flee extremely early and route = boring, and or use terrible formations and make a mess of things.

I surely hope formations and tactical planning can become a real piece of the battles in NTW, ETW was good but in many cases battles were pathetic in my view, unless you micromanage your units enough to entice opposing ai to form up properly.

We will see how much the BAI has come on from ETWv1.5, CA have said the BAI has now been instructed to multi task, and have a sense of prioities, so reacts better to the player.
NTW will get patched after release, one hopes, so things should keep improving, although if there are problems in what may prove to be a 'harried for time release', hopefully it won't take 6 months to get a semi-decent game like ETWv1.5, and yes that means I don't think ETW is too bad, in fact I think it's quite acceptable to the average gamer out there.

When you say the AI would rout to soon, which I also find borring, which difficulty were you on? Standard CA TW always seems to feature battles where the AI routs like there's no tomorrow, and has always been a let down, it's something many mods balance very well. NTW will feature excellent graphics, and yet I would like to have the time to watch the action close up before everyone starts running!