Fog of War

[John Neal]

I'm more familiar with the War between the States.
Googled: The Secret War for the Union

(McClellan estimated enemy strength at 170,000 when it was actually 40,000 to 45,000)

The confederates marched troops around with the specific intent of making their numbers appear larger.

A slightly different case would be, for example, a corps in Gibraltar, is it 1,000, or 15,000? The Spanish would probably have a better idea as to its actual strength than that.

[Soapy Frog]

Fog of war is quite appropriate for EiA.
 
Although detecting troops did become easier with technology, so too did deception operations; however that is neither here nor there, it is quite plain that cavalry scouts would not be as reliable as aerial reconaissance, for example.
 
There are many examples of cavalry scouts completely missing or wildly under/overestimating their opposition.

[anarchyintheuk]

McClellan used the figure of 200k for the ANV because:

1. He used a private detective agency (Pinkertons) for information gathering, not purely military channels.
2. The Pinkertons tended to use full strength to&e not effective strength in their calculations.
3. It gave him a valid reason to continue ask for reinforcements.
4. It made him seem like he accomplishing something against great odds.
5. It gave him an excuse in case he had to retreat.
6. He was an idiot.
7. All of the above.

I personally believe in 7.

IMO the difficulties involved in reconnaissance have not changed much from then (EIA era) to now, only the pace of information gathering and distribution.

[fvianello]

He was using pinkerton to gather military intelligence ? That surely confirm point 6

Interesting piece of information anyway!

[John Neal]

From the same book i linked, Pinkerton estimated 94,800, twice the actual, but much closer than McClellan.

"Such was the obscurity with which he surrounded his estimating of enemy numbers that we are led to assume that some of his figures were inventions, made by guessing..."

[John Neal]

If the programmer(s) want to deal with it, there are other possibilities for a FOW rule than complete ignorance.
For example, a commander could designate his force as trying to increase its visibility, or decrease his visibility, resulting in a estimate presented to other forces that is erroneous, either greater than its actual size in the former, and less in the later.

Maybe the 1,000 troops in Gibraltar from my previous example could be mistaken for 5,000, at an extreme, but not 15,000.

I'd put this very low on the priority list, if at all.
Currently, i'd still vote to use the FOW rule as it stands.

[zaquex]

I think intel of corp strenghts often was quoted in regiments, squadrons and guns rather than men, the number of regiments was probably alot easier to figure out and could be reported as full-strenght half-strenght etc. The commander could also make an assessment and estimate at which strenght these regiments where based on different factors. Also take in to account that which regiments belong to a certain corp often was known as was there commanders etc.
 
Its not likely to ever be totaly accurate but i have no doubt that this way to make an assessment was both easier and more accurate than counting men and also alot easier to add together especially as each regiment usually had a banner and sometimes even different uniforms that was clearly identifiable.
 

[yammahoper]

Wow.  I played my first session of EiA in 86, and this debate is STILL going on.
 
Thanks for making me feel old.
 
[:-]
 
yamma

[AresMars]

Yamma,
 
You are not old!.....Gamers just NEVER change!  [;)]
 
And the time has passed for all of us.....  [:D]

[isandlwana]

Two arguments for and against FOW with Fleets---One in Napoleons time the english would scout blockaded harbors and generally knew disposition of forces and their preparedness well in advance--limiting the issue of FOW for blockaded fleets--on the other side of the coin fleets that escaped blockade were often reinforced by additional ships limiting the enemy intelligence and thus not allowing for a knowledge of ship disposition, numbers and strengths until fleets were sited.  On the whole I would agree that FOW for fleets is not an important issue.  In realistic terms in the Napoleonic era you can be sure that GB at least knew the relative strengths and dispositions of enemy or potential enemys prior to the advent of war.  Based on historical realism I suggest FOW is irrelevent and the game plays well without FOW employed in naval engagements--there is enough chance with wind guage  determinations etc to make it as realsitic as possible.

[Soapy Frog]

Nevermind that the naval war is not realistically depicted AT ALL in EiANW (or really in base EiA).
 
The Light Ship fleets are just ridiculous, as such masses of frigates never operated together, moreover it does not reflect the true role of frigates and other light ships. A COMPLETE waste of time.
 
Ditch light fleets, return to the standard fleet setup, and then incorporate the (at least better than basic and better than EiANW) Advanced Naval rules that were published in general magazine. 

[zaquex]

Heard alot of complaints about the advanced rules not being much better, a bit more fun maybe. Havent played with them in any of our games so I have no real oppinion yet.

[Soapy Frog]

They are a) more fun b) more realistic (especially hulks)
 
Only problems are balance problems, but at the face they are a million times better than the base rules.

[Murat]

We could ask to make advanced naval an option. It involves 3 chits with the best tables and a die modifier going to the British so long as they choose 2 out of the 3 (melee and offensive line) with Nelson adding another modifier in melee arrival (it's like Outflank).  If you use the EiA ships Britain gets a bigger advantage using these tables, if you use the EiH ships you may as well keep your fleets in port when at war with Britain.

[Soapy Frog]

Yes that is correct, the biggest complaint of the Advanced naval rules is the advantage it conferred Britian who would (generally) win all the battles (of course it was possible to lose anyway with bad luck, and indeed I have seen it happen, but the tables and morale differences massively favoured the Brits).
 
However the stratgey for beating Britian in the ANW was much the same, attrition. It was just a much less certain strategy than it is in the base rules. In the base rules, a combination of Span, France and Russia typically results in the destruction of the British fleet (if the British player is so foolish as to fight), a result absolutely carved in stone, barring incompetance. With the ANW Britain could fight it out and have some chance of success, although again the attrition and the probable loss of Nelson would result in defeat.
 
The problem was that, since Britain would win 80% of the battles they would get most of the hulks and the result was that they could rebuild their navy stronger for the next war at their enemies expense.
 
The most common solution I saw for this was to drop the British morale to 3.5 from 4 (or conversely, raise Spanish, Russian and French morale to 3.5 from 3, thus lowering the proportion of British victories... but still allowing britian a chance for survival against the Spanish-French-Russian coalition (roughly equivalent in my estimation to Frances' chances against a Prussian-Austrian-Russian-British coalition).
 
In any case that' s a very simple solution which actually pretty much fixes the central imbalance of the ANW (even though the rules themselves were more historically accurate; Britian could not reasonably be challenged on the seas after Trafalgar, that's not exactly FUN!).
 
IMHO a more complex solution would be adding chits to the mix as I have seen with other variants, that return the rock-paper-scissors challenge that makes land battles so interesting to fight.

[zaquex]

The problem with chits or anything that adds more mail exchanges is that it makes the game even slower and even longer.
 
I would be very careful to use the advanced rules together with the possibility of economic manipulation as it makes GB a next to sure winner.

[Soapy Frog]

ORIGINAL: zaquex

The problem with chits or anything that adds more mail exchanges is that it makes the game even slower and even longer.

Don't much care about this, the fault actually lies with the PBEM implementation in any case. I'd rather just have better naval rules available.

I would be very careful to use the advanced rules together with the possibility of economic manipulation as it makes GB a next to sure winner.

This is not true anyway, GB did not suddenly start winning every game when our FTF groups started using the ANW (even before we added any balancing modifications).

The one thing that DID happen when we started using the ANW; the game got a LOT more fun for naval powers.

[zaquex]

This is not true anyway, GB did not suddenly start winning every game when our FTF groups started using the ANW (even before we added any balancing modifications).

 
Anyone in your group tried "wooden walls"?

[Soapy Frog]

Not sure I catch the reference.

[zaquex]

The woodenwall is a potentially game breaking tactics that can be used by GB.

In short, at anytime GB reaches 10 vp on the political standings table, he starts to use +2pp economic manipulation, builds a "wooden wall" of ships to protect himself, and then basicly, by diplomacy, by using GB's ability to deduct VP and if needed as final measure by force, make sure that no other power meet its victory conditions.

If GB goes for this strategy early or early-midgame it takes a massive naval coalition to stop GB from winning. GB is somewhat more vulnerable at the start of the game. Without any provision for combined naval movement it might be impossible to stop GB from winning. This is probably the most important reasons why many/some game groups choose to play without economic manipulation.

Its utterly boring especially as GB in this case plays for status que, but seems to be effective. Unless you decide to stop GB by ganging up on him early, something you make it sound like you tend to do in your group.