First Impressions

[Adraeth]

Personal background: old miniatures wargamer; helped in many "napoleonic" games here (Matrix and Slitherine); worked in other pc wargames (other firms) based on napoleonic wars; board/card game designer ... so a damned grognard

My impressions after an average of 1 hour of game:

it sounds simple enough to be an excellent gate to napoleonic wars for newvbies; it has a lot, really a lot, of potential.

The potential might be the quick battles, or even an easy to build editor (maybe even on existing maps) just letting player change the objectives, the Order of battle and army deploy, and (for single player) to play coalition Vs Empire in single player.

Hotseat should be interesting, even for quick battle, or better edited ones.

I like it, i like it very much, with just some interesting update (as mentioned above) it might become one of the most played napoleonic games in multiplayer or singleplayer, because it is easy to grasp and to understand.

[Alan Sharif]

An Editor would be excellent. I already have some ideas for some small battles I should like to design scenarios for. It would have to be reasonably simple mind, as this is something I have never done before.

[kondi754]

Is it a game worth buying?

[Angiel]

The game is a lot of fun even though I only played for 2 hours. If there were an editor it would be even better or, more simply, the possibility to customize the quick battle.

[IainMcNeil]

Thanks for the feedback. We're looking in to what we can provide. An editor might be difficult but we're seeing if we can add a skirmish mode.

The problem is the scenarios were built in the Unity editor so there is no stand alone tool for it. If people are willing to use Unity we might be able to provide the assets to do it but its not a simple thing to pick up and play.

[Adraeth]

Thank you, i understand the difficulty for the editor; anyway a skirmish mode will be a great add on and it might improve the longevity of the game.

[OldBlighty]

So far I have played 2 battles against the A.I. , Austerlitz (twice), and Jena-Auerstedt. Each time I was victorious (as Napoleon) against the Austrian-Russian Coalition controlled by the A.I. which generally behaved competently i.e. infantry formed squares when threatened by cavalry, forming line to fire and column to assault (though not always historically accurate, for game purposes it was fine). Played Austerlitz twice as the first time I was behind on points but captured Austerlitz village which gave me the win. The second time, I handled my forces more competently, so despite not capturing Austerlitz, I was ahead on points at the end of turn 20 which the game classed as a victory. Jena-Auerstedt was a comfortable victory by points (i.e. 200 points ahead) after about 14 turns.

The graphics (with some variety in uniforms) and animations are quite pleasing, terrain displayed nicely (and some labelled for clarity, e.g. hills and swamps) which makes a difference in combat and movement. On the negative side, a couple of times the A.I. moved a unit out of a village (strong position) to face my units in front (weak position), it also made some suicide attacks instead of retiring battered units to recoup strength - neither maneuver tactically sound though possible I suppose under "battle conditions". Also there is no room for flanking maneuvers, the battlefields (so far) are quite concise. But there we are, it is what it is.

No game crashes or freezes, but in the 2nd Austerlitz battle, after a few turns one of my artillery units froze in marching mode so I was unable to move it further or fire it (and as you only get two artillery units in total, this was a bit of a disadvantage). I was doing a lot of unit swapping and stacking Napoleon with it etc at one time so that probably confused the programme.

So in conclusion, I would give this game a cautious thumbs up. Quite fun and a reasonable recreation of Napoleonic battles but should not be viewed as a detailed simulation of Napoleonic warfare.

[Angiel]

The problem is the scenarios were built in the Unity editor so there is no stand alone tool for it. If people are willing to use Unity we might be able to provide the assets to do it but its not a simple thing to pick up and play.

It would be a great idea !!

[Dino_SWE]

Ive spent a few hours with the game now and beat the first 6 Chapters.

When everything works, its great fun. It looks and sounds great. But its where it plays I am seeing some cracks in the facade.

I have already experienced quite a few terrain issues with Line of Sight, with units that should be in plain sight being obstucted by an invisible wall. Or modifiers, like getting an uphill attack penality when Im the on on the hill.

The modifier summary on attack mouse-over is kind of bare bones and often doesnt make sense when comparing with the actual numbers or stats of the units involved.

At several occasions the AI has made some terrible decisions, or tends to just sit idle with a unit that could otherwise do some serious damage.
For instance, here the enemy chose to target my infantry rather than the arty piece.
https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ ... 2450F038E/

And in this one for some reason the enemy cav sits idle during its turn, leaving my vulnerable cav (out of supply) alone.
https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ ... 031AEC8F0/


Otherwise the game is very much enoyable.


- Maps needs a second quality pass in terms of LoS and modifiers.
- AI need some slight fixing.
- Battle previews could be made more clear and consistent.

Please dont abandon this game. It really deserves a patch. And some future DLC

Best Regards

[davezissou]

I hope the dev doesn't move on to the next project and leave this one to run stale. I think all the other titles were pretty much made and left alone. This one has so much potential, at the very least would like to see the possibility for bigger maps!

[1annoyedgamer]

Im enjoying this game so far. Its cute. Its kind of like playing chess with Napoleonic pieces. Ive only just started. So far Ive beaten Austerlitz and Jena/Auerstedt by capturing all the objectives. I was pretty close to leading by 200 points in the Jena battle, but ended up capturing the 2nd town before I got 200 points ahead. Definitely entertaining with a certain charm to it. Eylau tomorrow night

[Matto]

Great game, thanks for it ...

I found one strange behaviour ... check my pictures. I surrounded Schloditten with enemy artillery inside, but I'm unable take it, for all I tried assault many turns ...
Check second picture, where is support +3 Defense for enemy. Because I have units around it looks like bug ... please check it

sit01.jpg (114.27 KiB) Viewed 10024 times

sit02.jpg (69.29 KiB) Viewed 10024 times

[IonutG]

Hi guys,

Thank you for the feedback,
We have a new parch in the works, we will keep updating and improving the game.

[Adebar]

The map of Europe in the background of the scenario selection screen is just a terrible mess. The sheer sight of it gives me a swift pain in the rear. All the German battlefields (and not only them) are placed geographically completely wrong. Not to mention the national borders.

Was Slitherine's quality control guy out on a foray through the local pubs that day?

[robertahyuk]

I actually like the game but this isn't really my forte', so I'm learning as I go.
Shenandoah Studios always comes back with patches and updates for their games. One reason I like their games so much. Unlike some others? They actually care.
I'm sure any problems will be looked into and if possible? They will fix it.
Have patience.

[teachgovt]

The Casualty screen at the end does not have any explanation of the numbers. Is that posted somewhere, and I just missed it?

I don't quite follow the bonus for columns attacking lines. Column formation is for movement. Line is for combat.

The hard ZOCs take a little getting used to.

On the whole, I like it.

[1annoyedgamer]

I don't quite follow the bonus for columns attacking lines. Column formation is for movement. Line is for combat.

A marching column is for movement, but the "column" the bonus is referring to is the assault column which is a combat formation best used for closing with the enemy in order to give them the bayonet. Line is best for fire combat because it brings all of a units muskets to bear at the front, but if an assault column is able to close with a line unit, its densely packed close order grouping of men can punch through the thin front of a line unit and break it up.