The Trade Window under the main Econ Window . . . probably not very important in the short Bavaria Scenario . . .

Looks like you can trade: money, labor, horses, food, iron, timber, wool, cotton, textiles, wine, spice, and luxuries, and you can adjust the nature and level of trade with all your different prospects.

I looks like, as in FoF the territory you control is broken into Provinces, each of which provide a certain set of resources. So for example, it looks like Picardy is providing me with 21 Money, 12 Food, 3 Wool, and 2 Cotton.

Will start a new one and do a proper AAR  . . . not tonight though, too tired

Interesting discussion over here.

And some quotes

That one spoke to my heart!

Have not had much time to play, despite wishing to the contrary. This ia s FABULOUS game! Pretty similar to FoF, but with enough differences that I have in fact had a few glances at the manual. There is actually a very handy in-game manual reached by hitting F1

Obviously the graphics are not nearly those of Civ. I see some people referring to them as “1990s” graphics.

To that sort of thinking I will ask: Do you have such a powerful and up-to-date rig that a game with advanced graphics like Civ can work on maximum settings with largest map at late game (most units) with zero noticeable effect on performance?

If someone cannot answer yes to that question then they are making a childish and silly complaint to point out that a game like COGEE uses more austere graphics. As you will see in this AAR, what COGEE lacks in fancy real-time-strategy graphics, it more than makes up for in in-game options, strategic gaming options, and excellent design which actually requires a player to analyze a wide range of factors, and make strategic decisions of an almost infinite variety.

This is a true strategy game, with enough visual appeal to be engrossing. It is not a game that is primarily visually engrossing and manages to achieve a childish imitation of a strategy game like Civ4.

Now as to Options.

Never Rally Garrison will turn On/Off whether or not Garrisons in cities join combats in their provinces or not.

Always Quick Combat will allow you to switch On/Off the two main modes of combat in the game. Actually though (as in FoF) there are three modes of combat: There are a number of subsidiary options here, including the option to show more of the various inter-turn movements or not.

The date is now Aug 1792. The scenario started at June 1792 so I’ve actually played through a few turns where I went through all my provinces to adjust their development and production, and I built a couple of new military units (militia and infantry). I will show the various windows for managing the national economy etc., as I progress. I am presently at war with Austria and Prussia, the scenario starts that way.

During the preceding turns, I moved my best units to the Champagne Province on the Luxembourg border where I have consolidated them into the Armee du Centre, under the overall command of 3-Star General Dumourriez. My final action during this August 1792 turns is to leave Armee du Centre waiting in Champagne for an Austrian attack. I have the neighboring provinces Picardy and Lorraine lightly garrisoned, but hopefully enough for them hold and and get my main force in Armee du Centre over to help as reinforcements.

In Champagne in addition to my Armee du Centre I have left a small garrison of 16,000 troops to guard the Supply Depot that I’m running to supply friendly units in adjacent provinces. The supply depot is the little symbol under the soldier symbol in Champagne.

At the level of the international map, the least divisible units are Division sized Infantry, Artillery, Cavalry, Ships, and Militia (basically less trained Infantry). Here for example is the small info window for the 22 Militia which is in Champagne Province

Here is the more detailed “View Infantry” window for Champagne Province.

As you can see, there are two smaller Militia “inside” the Champagne “container,” meaning that those two militia are actually set up as a garrison in the capitol town of Champagne. The 22^nd Militia is not inside the town, and you can also see a “unit” bar for the Supply Depot I have running in Champagne. I am leaving the 22^nd outside Champagne in hopes that if any Austrian cavalry or other fast units seek to dash into my rear area and pillage my baggage train (my Depot) the 22^nd will be able to defend it.

Units like Inf Div or Militia, or Arty, etc., can operate independently under the command of the implicitly attached command staff, or they can be “attached” to a larger military command like a Corps, and Army or even a town/garrison by ordering putting them “inside” the “container.” Armies, Corps, Ships, Towns, etc., are all containers. So above there are two Militias assigned to garrison duty over the town of Champagne by being put “inside” the container for Champagne. This is all achieved through some fairly straight forward left and right mouse clicks.

Here is the Overview map which shows the presence and location of large military concentrations for all the powers.  In it you can see that I have left the Armee du Midi in the south guarding against the Genoans. The relative size of the squares represents the troops strength, so as you can see the Armee du Centre has a much higher concentration of troops in it than the other containers.

There are other functions that are visible in the Overview Window as well including Diplomacy with Major Powers

And Statistics (basically change in various national level statistics over time), battle history, battle animations, etc.

Under the Units Tab on the lower left of the main screen, I can view ALL my units, grouped by their assignments/attachments, and I can select or de-select different types of units. Here is everything selected, so that all types of units are displayed (Naval, Leaders/Diplomats, Army/Corps, City/Garrisons, infantry, Cavalry, and Artillery) and with two of the Cities contents shown

Here is the units window with only Army/Corps shown (note the “contents” of these containers are not visible because I do not have Inf, Arty, and Cav selected).

I have at present three Armies, and 1 Corps (Swiss Guard) which is assigned to one of the Armies (Armee du Centre).  Armies can hold Corps or Div-sized units, but can only hold a limited number of each. By putting the Corps inside the Army, I increase the maximum number of troops that can be “contained inside” Armee du Centre.  In the following image I have Inf, Cav and Arty view turned on, and I’ll look at the actual Divisions that are assigned to the Armee du Nord and Armee du Midi of these “containers.”

I do not have the View contents (the little PLUS symbol) activated for Armee du Centre (the one that is about to attack Luxembourg), but as you can see Armee du Midi and Centre are very lightly manned at this point. This is because I stripped them of units and sent those units to attach them to Armee du Centre. Now here is Armee du Centre., and this time I’ll turn on Generals so that they show up too.

You can see there are lot more Divisions “inside” these containers, meaning assigned to these HQs. Also there are some Generals “inside” these containers. Inside the main Armee du Centre are Buernonville (a 1 star who will have direct command over one Division) and Dumourriez (overall commander of the entire army). By having the 3-Star Gen inside the main Army, his bonuses will have some effect on ALL the Divisions in the entire army (including those inside the attached Swiss Guard Corps. The 1-star Burnonville will only benefit the Div that is directly under his command (assuming that all this works the same as in FoF). Duc de Orleans is a 2-star in command of the Swiss Guard Corps, so I am guessing he will benefit that entire Corps by virtue of being a 2-star general.

I have some Privateers positioned in key sea hexes where there is high trade activity by nations with whom I do not necessarily wish to appease.

I have also sent the lionshare of my navy up into Prussian waters to blockade Prussian ports.

Here is a closup of Bouvet’s Squadron, with the unit hierarchy window open showing the ships that are attached to Bouvet’s Squadron.  This “fleet” is presently blockading Stettin Pomerania, a territory under Prussian control.

Underneath the window for Bouvet’s squadron you can see the diplomat “Mssr. Saint Croixe” whom I have sent into Prussia immediately to the left of the word “Neumark” on the map. He is assigned to the mission “Pressure for Peace,” This forces the nation to spend 60 gold per turn to remain at war. Since the French Revolution is just about to happen, France is not exactly on a strong war footing right now, and my primary goal is not to pick fights with anyone but simply to effectively defend France from her enemies and grow stronger and more stable. As such, getting peace with the Prussian allies of Austria is my first objective.

Pressure for Peace is just one of at least 10 or 15 different missions that Diplomats can be sent to engage in while they are in foreign lands. You can build more diplomats in provinces that have a certain number of “Courts,” one of the structures that can be built in a Province/Town. Each diplomat has three scores: Espionage, Influence and Legal, and different missions depend on different scores.  Saint-Croixe (E 60; I 20; L 30) is not my strongest diplomat at this point, that would be Tallyrand (E 20; I 70; L 40 )who is on a Goodwill mission in the Navarre Province of Spain.

My third and final diplomat at this time is Doumouriez (E 30; I 50; L 40), who is on a Goodwill mission to England. Because France is in the throes of a Republican revolution, I am not well liked by most of the other nations of Europe at present. My only two friends are Sweden and Turkey, with whom I am engaged in some trade. However, I’m trying to keep Spain and England appeased to prevent them from joining in the Monarchist war against France being waged by the Austro-Prussian alliance.

(1)    Instant Combat—in this mode, the machine does a series of calculations based on troop numbers, troop quality (training morale, fatigue), weapons, special abilities, generals, terrain, etc., and in a matter of seconds an entire battle is decided. This is effectively what Civ offers (although in Civ one is led to believe that what is happening is a more sophisticated combat algorithm, at the end of the day, you get zero tactical control over your troops, and it all boils down to one stack against another). (Will show an Image Later)

(2)    Quick Combat—in this mode a box grid popsup and you deploy your forces. Here you have a bit more control over how your forces deploy (e.g., the sequence of units one next to the other has an influence) but this is really just a slightly more detailed version of Instant Combat. (Also will Show an Image Later)

(3)    Detailed Combat—In this mode, a detailed hex map of semi-random composition is generated, and all the units on both sides are represented on the map. You have to deploy and rally your forces, and either defend or attack successfully. For those who want to experience BOTH a strategic/theatre level challenge AND a tactical battle challenge this is definitely the way to go.

a.       Actually, (and this is a further development compared to FoF), COGEE offers an ADDITIONAL level of detailed battle: where units on the detailed map are broken into Brigades instead of whole Divisions.

But here is where I must point out the overwhelming strength of this game design: the player can choose how much detail-managing he wants. He/she can choose his handicap (with difficulty broken into three components: Power Handicap; Strategy Game Difficulty; Combat Difficulty); he/she can choose to play with advanced or simple economies; very simple, fairly simple, or detailed battles, etc., etc.

Another nice feature about the detailed battles: depending on the factors involved (leader characteristics, terrain, unit morale, special abilities of the units involved (e.g., scouting) you get various alternative options at the outset of a Detailed Battle, i.e., you get some influence on the nature of the random hex map that gets generated

Here I’m about to start the Aug 1792 Battle of Luxembourg. I have a numerical advantage (although if the Austrians have units that are sufficiently rested in adjacent provinces they may be able to call in reinforcements during the battle, which will take anywhere up to 3 days, with turns in the battle taking a few hours).  Here I can choose between Father Start; Rendezvous; or Easy March. These are just three of probably 15 or 20 different starting battle “Dispositions.”

Since I have a numerical advantage and I am attacking Farther Start would not help me. That would place my units and the Austrian units farther apart on the hex map. Since I’m attacking I want to capture the Austrian objectives on the hex map as quickly as possible, so being closer to them is actually better for me.

Rendezvous is also of no us to me. Before this battle, I concentrated as many Divisions into my Armee du Centre as I possible could, it pretty much has the maximum possible number of troops “attached” (or assigned) to its command. As such, I do not have much of anything in the adjacent provinces back across the border in France. If I had split my force and had a sizeable contingent in an adjacent tile waiting, or If I had set another stack to reinforce this one, then Rendezvous could help me by allowing me to call in more reinforcements.

I’m not totally sure what Easy March will do, have never seen that one before, but I’m guessing it means that my General figured out a way to get his troops to the site of the battle quickly without a tiring forced march, thus my troops will arrive on the battle map fresh, and not fatigued. I’ll choose that.

Here I am now getting to place my units in their initial dispositions. Here I have all my supply caissons (non-fighting units that resupply actual combat brigades once per turn)

The buttons across the bottom are the various commands that can be given to a unit in the detailed battle window, down on the lower right a mini-map of the detailed battle map, and the hexes with the yellow borders and the numbers show where the first unit in the initiative queue can move and the remaining movement points left after it makes any given move.

Here are my combat troops

I need to have a look round the combat map to get a sense of the terrain. You’ll notice that I can see all the terrain and where the strategic objectives are, but I cannot see the Austrian units positions (fog of war)

Unfortunately cannot zoom out more in detailed map like in the main national level map

Basically the Austrians control three towns down on the lower left of the map. MY goal is to take those towns before my will to fight (in the upper bar listed as Attacker 25 versus the Defender 26) goes to zero and my troops rout.

In this case the terrain favors them (along with them having the advantage of defending) to a certain extent, but this is not ideal defensive terrain. The main problem will be that town in the upper left of the first image I posted, the one that is the most northwesterly (assuming up is north in these maps). The most vulnerable town in the one to the south, off by itself, but it is also the farthest away.

I’m thinking my best bet is to divide my forces about 1/3 by 2/3. Send the larger fraction straight south across the open terrain between the two lakes

While the other 1/3 puts light pressue on the center town by heading southwest down the main road. I’ll also need to send my supply caissons to position behind each force to provide supplies as they expend them during actual rounds of fighting.

One of the nice things in the detailed battles is that you can save game, or if you just want to get it over with and stop having to go through every single unit in order of their initiative in the queue, you can just have it resolved via instant battle. Sometimes you can get pretty favorable results if you just fight a few rounds in the Detailed map, spoil the enemy morale and the integrity of their postions, then hit finish by Instantly Resolve.

In short, the game offers me the option to micro-manage an entire nation, and to micro-manage my forces on the battlefield (where I can make smart tactical decisions, and employ actual reasonable tactical doctrine manifest in game mechanics) or if I get tired of micro-managing I can just hit the Resolve Instantly button most of the time. I can also save the game, close it down, and restart it with different difficulty/options etc.

So I moved my supply caissons (3 to north, 4 to south) and now I get to do my initial placement of forces for those that have a Leader attached.

You can see how all those hexes have turquoise borders, meaning they are options for the initial placement of the unit and its subsidiaries.

In the interest of my plan to isolate and take the southern town first, I place a significant chunk down south, so I didn’t have to march them between the lakes after all: Units that have a Leader attached can be placed on the map at start instead of having a randomly decided start position (except if the enemy somehow outsmarted you during initial dispositions or something).