Artillery Attachments

[hazelbark]

What is not to love here?

I am rapidly moving to thinking these are tremendously efficicent. Short of a point limit, why not max out on them?

The only debate is are they better enlarging a battery or adding to a unit?

[panda2]

I would agree that they're generally good value and for armies with a limit of 1 per division taking the maximum is a good idea. Where more are available taking the maximum can sometimes be guilding the lily and the points may be better spent on an an additional unit.

On whether it is best to add them to artillery or other units, I've generally been adding them to infantry. This, however, may have more to do with the fact I've been using an unreformed army and so have found having some extra medium range dice for infantry more useful and because I've often found myself bringing my artillery batteries up to medium range to increase their effectiveness at disrupting enemy formations in the absence of of many skirmishers to do that job.

On the later point I think the pros and cons of adding an attachment to a small battery against spending the extra points on a large battery are not straightforward. At first glance the +1 dice at medium range and +2 dice for short range for 10 pts of the attachment seems like good value compared to 20pts for +2 dice at medium and close range to make a small unit large. However, at medium range there is a much higher chance that the artillery unit will become a target itself (or find itself assualted) and a small unit with an attachment is still a small unit and doesn't get the benefit ignoring the first hit (or the extra 2 dice in close close combat), but still occupies the same frontage as a large unit. For example, a medium range firefight with a large unit of reformed infantry is actually a quite close call for a small artillery unit with an attachment. The extra 3 dice of the artillery is to a large extent negated by the fact the large infantry unit can ignore a hit (although for a true comparison you'd need to compare the odds of getting 3+ hits on 7 dice vs 2+ hits on 4 dice). However, for a large unit of medium artillery against a large unit of reformed infantry there is only one winner.

Andy D

[hazelbark]

That is an excellent analysis thank you.
I sort of thought similar things but hadn't gotten my head around them.

The unreformed is particularly a good point.

[deadtorius]

I get all I can for my Austrians, they are the closest thing I can get to skirmishers in my army, and even if the Frenchies bring up cavalry they still shoot at full dice Pretty awesome when the Austrians can out skirmish shoot their French counterparts simply by spreading that mixed division cavalry out to cover 2 divisions worth of troops

I think I would still rather keep them in with the infantry as artillery is somewhat delicate if its threatened and can be forced to bugger off, as happened in our last game where a unit of poor Dragoons chased my artillery around for about 3 turns till the French army surrendered. My attachments were put to much better use in the infantry units that game.

I suppose it is still up to personal choice and game play style.

[plato]

I am not a fan or placing them with artillery because they expand your frontage as well. For targeting purposes this expands your arc of fire and means you might have to allocate dice to additional targets because every target directly to your front arc of fire in the same range band has to be allocated dice. For this same reason I am not a fan of large artillery units too.

Jeremy

[deadtorius]

I like having one large battery in the corps, never had an issue with splitting fire so far.

[plato]

Not sure how you would not have an issue with splitting fire. If a large unit fires at a small unit that has units to either side of it your arc of fire has to encompass more than one unit thus mandating you allocate dice to another unit. Now if you line up and fire on another large unit then there would be no problem. But not every army will have large units for you to pick on. This problem becomes especially problematic for large units with attachments. However there are still times when you might want to take a large battery. Like when you are allowed an odd number for maximum bases for a particular type of artillery. Pound for pound artillery seem some of the better units in the game in my experience so far. I just usually prefer to maximize the number of batteries and attachments by spreading the guns to infantry units.

Jeremy

[gibby]

That's the beauty, different things work for different people. I can see a point in both. You might want to split fire and hope to cause a stutter in an advance by just making multiple brigades take cmt to advance. They soon run out and are so easy to fail and you find an attack along a wide front is problematic.

cheers
Jim

[deadtorius]

One thing I have found interesting is that with the Austrians is now I can only have 5 guns of foot artillery max in T of N instead of the 7 foot guns guns max from the original lists. Looks like one of the mixed divisions will now be only getting artillery attached to a unit or I have to spend the extra points on that single horse battery. Have yet to actually play one of the new lists, perhaps next weekend...

[panda2]

I assume you're looking at 1809, since in 1813 you can have 6 (and add a division from the reserve corps with 3 heavies if you want). In 1809 you are right though its only 5 foot artillery plus attachments. However, in all the Austrian lists it is now possible to add a skirmisher attachment to any infantry division, which makes the need for artillery a little less pressing. On the downside in most of the lists the mixed divisions can't field any artillery other than 1 or sometimes two attachments and generally can only have 1 or 2 cavalry units (although in some cases infantry divisions can have cavalry attachments). Having got used to the 1813 list in the book and found a balance I like, I'm finding it difficult to get to grips with these changes to produce something that "feels" right.

Andy D

[Blathergut]

Mwhahaha! The French, on l'autre main, have even snazzier artillery now.

[deadtorius]

Panada I agree, its like starting all over again from day 1 with the new army lists. I am trying to put a couple of lists together myself, 1813 and 1809. One thing is that you can get more infantry, but a real lack of cavalry now with the restrictions of only 2 units per mixed division. Having jaeger attachments is going to be interesting and the debate over Grenzers seems to be over as in most lists they have to be skirmishers only, no light infantry option.

With the new mixed division restrictions seems like you have to take Grenzers since "1/2 of infantry in a mixed division has to be Jaegers or Grenzers" so you need two mandatory infantry to get 1 line infantry in there. You can still only have 1 Jager unit, even though you can make 2 mixed divisions (historically from what I have seen so far it was usually 1 jaeger and "border" troops in each mixed divisions), and only artillery attachments so less guns on the table.

Oh well see how version 1 works, infantry heavy force but at least you can go all large units and the infantry is still cheap With any luck I can still field more troops than the Froggies and give their flanks a nice big Austrian Grenadier hug

[Blathergut]

I can have light infantry jaegers.

[deadtorius]

probably scurvy lads from the your Confederation allies, our own Jagers will teach them how real Jagers fight

[hazelbark]

I assume you're looking at 1809.... Having got used to the 1813 list in the book and found a balance I like, I'm finding it difficult to get to grips with these changes to produce something that "feels" right.

I find the 1809 list produces a very proper looking historical Austrian Corps at just over 700 points.
Nice to see history being viable in the lists.

[panda2]

Deadtorius,

I intend to reply to your wider points on the new Austrian lists when I have a moment, but will probably start another thread to do so to avoid highjacking this thread on the awesomeness of artillery attachments and filling with lots of stuff on the awesomeness (or not) of Austrians (Arny excepted). However, you did raise on point about artillery attachments in the Austrian lists that I wanted to reply to.

You seem to be suggesting that artillery attachments can only be added to artillery units. I think from the context that you are refering primarily to the in the 1809 Army of the Danube list. I'm not sure I agree. The notes on restrictions in the attachments section of that list state that they may be added to artillery units, but they don't say they may only be added to artillery units (although that would be of course be true for the heavy artillery attachments anyway). To interpret the note the way you have wouldn't be constistent with the special instructions that allow mixed divisions to have an attachment, but no artillery unit, and if one interpreted the same wording the same way for the Reserve Corps list then it wouldn't be compatible with the requirement that large units of Cuirassiers must have an artillery attachment.

However, probably more importantly it wouldn't be a good represenation of the structure of Austrian army corps in 1809. In most Austrian corps throughout the period most of the medium artillery was in brigade batteries of 8 6pdrs, with 2 or sometimes 3 batteries per division. The position artillery was generally held in the corp reserve and might only consist of a few batteries. Whilst there's no real reason why in practice a commander might concentrate all or some of his brigade batteries to provide additional position artillery, I've no reason to believe that doing so was so widespread or universal that a player shouldn't have the option of leaving all or some of the brigade batteries with the infantry units. If, in deed, that is what the authors intended then I think that the minima and maxima for aritllery units would need to be substantially increased.

Andy D

ps: Don't let Blathergut try to convince you otherwise. It'll be another dastardly French ruse.

[panda2]

Hazelbark,

how did you handle the advanced guard? In 1809 for a corp advance guard this would generally only be a brigade and might often only constist of 1 unit of Grenzers and 1 unit of light cavalry in game terms. I'm finding it difficult to find away to legally field this without creating a one or more of fantasy units or transfering units from other divisions to bulk it out.

Andy D

[panda2]

Deadtorius,

ignore my earlier post. I just realised that I must have misread you post!? Oops!!

Andy D

[deadtorius]

Darn and I was so looking forward to talk Austrian. The new lists are going to be somewhat of a challenge, but after looking again, if you throw in the horse battery we can still get a full 7 guns like I had before. Still now we can skirmish with our Jagers, Grenz have to be only skirmishers later on and we can even attach cavalry to our mixed divisions. Who would have ever thought after looking at the starter lists??

[panda2]

Deadtorius,

I'm happy to talk Austrians, its just I didn't see any need for you to read a lengthy post that was responding to something you didn't actually say! As I did say though I may start an other thread for Austrian chat, since a thread on artillery attachments isn't the natural place that others would look. I've actually sorted a few 1809 Army of Danube lists that I'm willing to give a go a some point that are a bit of a departure from what I've been using to date and an 1813 Army of Bohemia list thats quite similar, but IMO not as good as what I could achieve using the list in the rule book (both in terms of effectiveness and being close to an historical organisation). In terms of effectiveness I think some of the Austrian lists for the minor theatres look promissing (as long as you don't want loads of cuirassiers). Also, if someone wanted a good, easy to use, unreformed army, with a bit of potential to scare people the 1809 Saxon army could be a good start.

Andy D