AAR II

[Viking67]

I played Sweden at Normal difficulty.

[Hard Sarge]

ORIGINAL: spruce

hello, I really like this game and look forward to get it ...

but isn't the casualty ratio CSA/Union a bit too high if you take into account that Confederate victories in this AAR are a ratio 4 to 5 times lower then the Union casualty figure ?

one thing, I think some are missing in the AAR, look at the number of battles this unit has been in, I have only wrote of a couple of battles that it fought in, there are also other Divs out there and been fighting

[Hard Sarge]

Okay I starting up a new game with the Union AI at +2

but I holding off on talking about it until Gil has a chance to show the screen shots he wants to show

[Grotius]

I'm also curious about Hard Sarge's success in maintaining a favorable casualty ratio. Is the AI overmatched, or is it simply that Sarge is a master tactician?

[Hard Sarge]

ORIGINAL: Grotius

I'm also curious about Hard Sarge's success in maintaining a favorable casualty ratio. Is the AI overmatched, or is it simply that Sarge is a master tactician?

depends on who you talk to

but over all, I still think we got to give me the edge on some of these battles and types, I also know when to push and when not to, plus some of my battle have been very nice traps, where I have been able to funnel the enemy into my lines with out being able to flank me

but I still think the CSA is pretty strong compared to the early Union troops, on defence, they are Pretty tuff to beat, but not strong enough to on the off

[Hard Sarge]

okay I was given the okay to show what I think is good to show

here is the map now

[Hard Sarge]

pretty much the same start as the other ones, but this time with the AI at +2

first battle was in Grafton, 18000 of me vs 6000 of them, not much of a battle, take one POW, the retreating Bde, runs into 2 Corps coming up from the south, 75000 vs 11500, this one was a little HARDer, but in the end 2 Bdes and 1 Garrison are POWed

the follow up turn, the Union had moved into Wheeling and I am on the side coming to the rescue (or so I hope)

pain and dismay, only one Div made it to the battle, call for Robert E and his Corps to come help, but it is still a 57500 of them to 11000 for me, and the Union gets a Surprise attack in

my Div and Garrisons are almost all armed with IWs, and out in the open, they do well, but take a pounding, but a good part of the Union forces rush and reach the 2 Victory hexes before Lee can come in (only 3 Bdes made it on the map)

I lose this battle, but more to the Victory hexes and the surprise attack then to my combat skills

but...

afterward, my other Div makes to Wheeling and another battle starts, and in a rush, Early is called for help

this one is a more normal battle and the Union is pretty worn out already

some heavy battle and the Union breaks and is force to retreat

[Hard Sarge]

I lose a Runner, and as you see, I lost some of my Arty, too early in the game to be wasteing resouces, but I need the Arty and buy more 12 pounders

the next battle is in Tenn-Miss-River, Stonewall with some good firepower begins the battle, and Johnson is called in for help

battle map has 3 Victory hexes, 2 to the northwest, and one to the southwest, but the Union gets another suprised attack, but I was able to pick the battle field, and had picked swamps, so, the Union has the drop on me, but I am to the side and in the swamp/river line

I set up a nice defence line and hope that Johnson can get to the city in time

[Hard Sarge]

of course, the Union loses siight of Jackson and marches right past him, and is massing for the attack on Johnson, I got to break my line and pull Jackson south

at least, part of Johnsons forces are shielded by the hills, so he can not use his numbers (and a good thing as Johnson is getting pounded, but is giveing back as good as he gets, and the Jackson is able to nail some for the Union forces in the flank and they have had enough

(again, the surprise attack almost give the Union the battle)

going to have to do something about that

[Hard Sarge]

trying to get my Wheeling forces bedded down for the winter

[jchastain]

Just to touch on AI for a moment since it has gotten a good deal of attention, an experienced player can beat the detailed battle AI far more often than he will be beaten by it.  The game just has too many levels of complexity for the AI to be able to evaluate the situation as broadly as a human can.  It does reasonably well, but it is McClellan to the experienced player's Lee as should be expected.  That's not to say it isn't fun - it is.  That isn't to say it is a cakewalk - it isn't.  But the bottom line is the AI is not and cannot be as good as a player on a level playing field.
 
Complexity is the enemy of an AI.  AI can play tic-tac-toe pretty well.  There are very few options or alternatives and no surprises.  Raise the bar up to playing chess and the programming is far more difficult, but AI has gotten pretty darn good at that game - though it took literally tens of millions of dollars in investment to accomplish that task.  Wargames in general are complex and it is difficult to build an effective AI for any wargame.  FoF is complex even in wargame terms.  Anyone who saw the screenshot of all the different brigade and attachment types understands the complexity in just the tactical game.  Beyond that there are different terrain types, different weapon types for each unit, different generals, supply, morale and a whole host of other factors that makes this particular game seriously complex and especially difficult for the AI to manage.  And yet, it actually does a decent job.
 
The tactical AI is better than it was in CoG and it has actually been a ongoing discussion point and a point of emphasis during the development and testing of this game.  During the beta, there has been considerable discussion about the AI and whether or not it should be allowed to cheat in order to give it some extra capability.  The testers have come out generally against cheats and strongly against anything that players might be able to see or detect.  Without cheats or unless one is willing to reduce the complexity (and therefore the richness) of the gaming experience, the AI is at a disadvantage. 
 
So, what does that mean to the playing experience?  First, without cheats, as you raise the difficulty level of the game it applies more to the strategic game than to the tactical game.  But if you have far fewer resources to buy troops, research technology, upgrade weapons, promote generals, and conduct diplomacy, you will eventually lose on the battlefield simply because you don't have the firepower to compete.  That won't show itself in the early portion of the game but it tends to provide a bit of a snowball effect down the road.  So the first few battles might be fairly easy, but they will become progressively more difficult.  Remember Hard Sarge actually has better weapons in the battle above and can fire unmolested from long range.  On more difficult settings, that won't be true for very long.
 
So, when talking about the AI, I would caution that you have to consider the whole game and not just the tactical AI in isolation.  For those who still can't handle the fact that AI can't compete with a human in massively complex simulations, you can always turn off tactical battle entirely.  With Quick Combat, things are FAR less complex and the AI competes on an even par with a player.  As I have said before, the strategic game is entirely fun and playable by itself.  And, of course, you can always PBEM against another player.  But don't neglect to consider what happens on the battlefield as the war wears on if one side has a considerable resource advantage over the other.  In fact, isn't that a pretty accurate description of what happened historically?
 

[regularbird]

Hard Sarge, thanks for the AAR's I look forward to them every day.  I do have one question.  In your latest post it looked like you had 98,000 soldiers in your army around parkersburg in 1861.  Should the rebs be able to muster that kind of strengt in 1861?  I think the rebs never fielded more than 80,000 in an army the entire war, although I could be wrong.
 
From other ACW games brigades usuall consist of 400 to 1200 soldiers, is that the same for FOF? 

[USSLockwood]

IIRC, regiments usually numbered between 300 and 700 soldiers.  A brigade would consist of three to five regiments.

[Hard Sarge]

got to run to work in a short bit so have to answer shortly

in the game, a Bde can be 3000 men (upgrades can up this to around 4000)

but most Bdes do not start at full stength

one thing on the main map, when you mouse over, you also get the stength of the city and fort troops also, so that is not the numbers of the ANV

[Grotius]

Thanks for that sensible explanation of the AI, jchastain. It sounds like the devs have taken just the course I would hope -- no obvious AI cheating, but difficulty levels with which to handicap the human player. Also, I'm not one of those who demands (unreasonably) that the AI be as capable as a human. Besides, I stink. Everyone tells me how bad the WITP AI is, but I still find ways to lose to it, if I crank up the difficulty setting and play reasonably historically.

Also, by the time I do get a thwacking the AI, I'm usually up for a PBEM anyway. This game supports some sort of multiplayer, right? I've forgotten whether it also includes tactical battles in multiplayer.

[Gil R.]

ORIGINAL: Grotius
Also, by the time I do get a thwacking the AI, I'm usually up for a PBEM anyway. This game supports some sort of multiplayer, right? I've forgotten whether it also includes tactical battles in multiplayer.

Well, "multiplayer" is, of course, limited to two sides. We have PBEM, hot-seat, and TCP/IP. Tactical battles can't be fought in PBEM, but can be in the other two. (Tactical battles are simply too complex for PBEM, and a single battle would take months and months to finish. That said, I believe it is possible to play tactical battles by e-mail if one plays hot-seat and saves the game and e-mails the save files after each turn or so.)

[Joram]

As far as jchastains comments, I completely disagree with the last paragraph. While it's nice to have the option to turn off the tactical battles, it doesn't make sense to say "Don't worry about the AI, just turn off that part of the game". I absolutely hated the quick battles in CoG and if it's the same system here, I know I will hate the quick battles in FoF. Which at least to this potential buyer, it would be nice to be sure that the tactical AI issues have been addressed.

I am encouraged by your other comments and do appreciate the complexity of creating an AI believe it or not. While it might be more feasible to do PBEM here then in CoG, I usually get bored waiting for the days or even hours between turns so PBEM is not a viable option for me normally. Which is why I harp on the AI issue so much!



Anyway, back to the AAR, keep up the screenies Hard Sarge, without a demo this is the next best thing and you definitely do the game justice.

[Hard Sarge]

Gil had wanted me to show off the Wilderness if I had the chance so here is a shot of it

of course, the Union decided it didn't want to fight the ANV, so ran away

[Hard Sarge]

This may be a long one, or it could be a dud

but over all, this could be the war

Robert E's Corps and Early's Corps have moved to engage part of the AOP that slipped behind my lines, with the ANV (Gregg, pretty weak really, a weak Corps) and the 16th Div (Bragg) set up for reinforcements

(going to try one of the commands I have not used before, the support command)

[Hard Sarge]

Sorry skip this post, wrong fourm