AAR - Ralegh as Russia

[Ralegh]

Gee - I forgot to post one! I did Russia before Austria... [For anyone new to these reports, I am trying to post a report on beating the AI at Napoleon level as each nation. I have done it a few times during the beta, and now am trying with the released game - well, actually with different betas of the first patch, what will be version 1.1. The process is very useful for finding game bugs, since I tend to use different game features as different countries.]


Here's the military/political version:

As Russia I spent several games trying to find a way to save my ally Austria from the French - no matter where I put their rally point (even if I kept them out of battle until we got there in force), the French were easily able to hold Styria long enough for insurrectionists to force a surrender. We Russians just weren't good enough to beat them off.

So I started again, with a different tactic. I bypassed Styria, and ran 2 Russian armies all the way to France (yes, using Forced March)! These armies were the cream of Russia, brim full and with all of my leaders. 2 armies largely consisting of cossacks took up defensive forage zones, and suppressed the usual Russian revolutionaries. The running armies got supplied for a while out of Krackow on their way, but mainly took forage losses.

A British Army had already beseiged Paris by the time we got there, and we joined the siege. Relieving French forces would have overwhelmed the British if we hadn't arrived, but 2 armies of Russians bulked them out nicely. I set up a sea supply chain so reinforcements could flow all the way into France.

Austria surrendered to France, and insurrectionists forced France to surrender to me. Darn - I have to abandon my allies. Oh well, I'll try to help them:
- I took an army on loan (The largest, led by Lannes)
- I exiled Napolean
- I made them liberate Bavaria and Batavia
- I took Flanders (fab for textiles, and gives me a local supply source) and Languedoc (for a supply source near Spain - I didn't want to take Gascony since it is on Spain's goal list))
[Note1: if a country voluntarily surrenders, it can't leave out an ally with whom it is also at war: it is all or none. But insurrectionists cause surrender to one country at a time.]
[Note 2: I didn't take access - I just violated their territory whenever I wanted to - and I didn't take a longer period of enforced peace. I figured those armies were in Western Europe to stay!]

At this point a bug hit - I had taken the Bavarian Army on loan (since it was the largest), and the game didn't know what to make of that when combined with the liberation of Bavaria - and I hadn't even noticed the potential conflict [if Bavaria was freed, would the Bavarian army go neutral or continue to be on loan to the Russians? I hadn't even noticed that freeing Batavia would take the Batavian army away from the French - I was just being mean]. After a months lag for housekeeping code to kick in, I ended up with the French elements of that army (but not the Bavarian ones - they went neutral) as mine - permanently rather than for 12 months. Oh well - I reported the bug and moved on. [I used the forces aggressively for 12 months, and then the game ended, so it didn't invalidate the game too much.]

I marched the 2 armies in France, reinforced by the french divisions on loan (hehe), down to retake my province of Languedoc on the Spanish border - (yes, as soon as I owned it, the Spanish took it). This was overwhelming force, and we fought our way to their capital. The extra divisions (more than I could fit into the 2 armies) were useful: I defended my supply lines with them.

Meanwhile, a small Spanish expeditionary force in lower Germany was threatening Krackow - 2 corps marching down to Spain stopped off to obliterate the problem.

Troop strengths in Spain were dropping, and the supply lines kept getting interrupted unless I left significant forces with each depot - bloody guerrillas - even though supply was only coming from Languedoc. And defending the POWs was tricky too! I shuffled the 2 corps from Germany into Spain, and put a new army into Germany in case it was needed. The new corps arriving in Spain fleshed out my armies, to bolster the seige of Madrid, which fought off Spanish counter attacks until eventually Spain surrendered to me - giving me enough glory to end the game. (I play 1805, Napoleon level, default victory, which is 1000 glory)


Naval:
I sailed the Russian balkan fleet around to help Britain against Spain, ensuring the safety of my southern merchant. Similiarly, I send the northern fleet to Blockade duty, and put the northern merchants around England in the best trade areas in the world.

At the time of my invading Spain, I moved the Northern fleet down, and actually launched port raids to fully destroy the Spanish fleet. This was intended mainly to hurt their morale still further, getting them to surrender sooner.


Development/etc:
I designated Moscva and St Petersburg as artillery builders, and built up to level 5 barracks at Piltyn and Smolensk so they could be corps/guards builders. I built lots of artillery, and as many corps as I could manage the textiles for. by the end of the game I had built around 6 corps - two were in Spain, 2 in Germany, and 2 in Russia (adding to the 4 armies Russia starts with). I had just finished building my first guard. I had build about a dozen artillery - every corps and army had at least 2 (one fo the armies in spain had about 4).

I slowly reduced the feudal level as my national morale could manage, eventually to zero.

I established trading routes with my neighbours, and made treaties with them (just to help them love me). I sent the diplomats to Turkey to charm them. This seemed successful at keeping them friendly. I exchanged territory to maximize glory and also reduce how much I had that they wanted -
- I traded Vilna to Prussia for Krackow - that helped give me some supply as we moved forward - I did this in month 1.
- I traded Cherson to Turkey for Bessarabia and Wallachia.
- I traded Sevastapol to Britain for Malta.

I built mainly culture and barracks in my underdeveloped areas, getting me upgrades to the military - I usually got an upgrade every season.



Particularly notewothy:
- If you beat France, make them liberate Bavaria and Batavia - it is cheap in treaty terms, and deprives them of 2 of their 4 starting army counters. If you also take an army on loan, suddenly they are down to 1 army counter. Corps size forces are more easily faced by the allies, and this helps LOTS.
- Note the trading territory process. I swapped provinces that were not worth glory to me for provinces that were worth glory.
- Reinforcement management: as my expeditionary force shrank, I combined units, allowing inf and cav divisions to be obliterated. Why? So reinforcements would be focussed on the units with gaps - artillery, light infantry, heavy cav - rather than on my more common units (inf, cav). Basically I wasn't generating reinforcements fast enough to refill everyone, so I did the common units by hand through transfer of troops, and had the reinfrocements go into the scarcer, more important units.


As always, comments/questions/discussion welcome.