Economic options in RoP and AACW

[Nikel]

Everybody seems to agree in that AACW is the ultimate AGEod game, somebody cited a feature present in AACW that seems to be missing in RoP, the economic options?


I am not very familiar with AACW so not sure which options they are. But in Szabo's book some economic comments are cited. So would it be possible to add them to the game not only for the strategical value that perhaps is difficult to simulate but to add some salt and pepper or historical ambientation


Examples:

France

Henri-Léonard-Jean-Baptiste Bertin was named contrôleur général des finances late 1759 replacing Etienne de Silhouette, the former was more credit minded and the latter had increased taxation on luxury items and lasted less than a year, poor rich


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Prussia

Debasement of currency, one mark of silver produced 14 talers and now 20 in the firms of three jews who had the mint concession




Can somebody explain briefly the economic options in AACW?

[Grouchy]

Briefly? Let's try...

Despite the fact that you are 'King' in ROP. The player does have more absolute control & more options available controlling and expanding the economy in AACW.

1. You can invest in production ranging from non to heavy in each of your states. You don't know if your investment paysoff and if it succeeds where it happens nor the type of production that will increase.

2. Increase river and rail transport capacity (needed to transport supplies and faster troop transport)

3. Men: produced in few places. Optional; Raise men through: call for volunteers (depends on your NM, the player can also offer a bounty), or mobilization (once a year several options). Replacement and recruitment system is also slightly different. Way better then ROP (more flexible as long as you have the right resources you can 'buy' any type of replacement, where in ROP you may or have not a military option available and only can 'buy' infantry units in the form of depots...big step back imo)

4. Money: Produced in few places. Once a year you can issue war bonds (different interest rates available) and/or raise exceptional taxes and/or print paper money (both will cause inflation)

5. Blockade & raiding commerce.

[Carrington]

Although arguably the enlightenment kings didn't have all that many economic options, so limited choices are appropriate.

[caranorn]

Although arguably the enlightenment kings didn't have all that many economic options, so limited choices are appropriate.

Agreed...

I'd also like to note that replacement or even recruitment of cavalry was far from easy. It was hard enough to find the trained riders, but finding quality horses must have been a nightmare during wars. If Cavalry depots were included (not entirely unrealistic as most regiments had such companies or squadrons) they'd have to be prohitivly expensive...

[Nikel]

Briefly? Let's try...

Despite the fact that you are 'King' in ROP. The player does have more absolute control & more options available controlling and expanding the economy in AACW.

1. You can invest in production ranging from non to heavy in each of your states. You don't know if your investment paysoff and if it succeeds where it happens nor the type of production that will increase.

2. Increase river and rail transport capacity (needed to transport supplies and faster troop transport)

3. Men: produced in few places. Optional; Raise men through: call for volunteers (depends on your NM, the player can also offer a bounty), or mobilization (once a year several options). Replacement and recruitment system is also slightly different. Way better then ROP (more flexible as long as you have the right resources you can 'buy' any type of replacement, where in ROP you may or have not a military option available and only can 'buy' infantry units in the form of depots...big step back imo)

4. Money: Produced in few places. Once a year you can issue war bonds (different interest rates available) and/or raise exceptional taxes and/or print paper money (both will cause inflation)

5. Blockade & raiding commerce.

Thanks for the detailed explanation Grouchy I guess some of those could be included, adapted to the period of course.


They were absolute kings and so had a lot of power, in 1759 Frederick gave orders to get replacements using every means possible, even kidnapping them from occupied territories like Saxony or Mecklenburg

[Bertram]

They were kings, but had by no means absolute power. Don't forget the Dutch kicked out their Habsburg king when they didnt agree with the way he ran the country, the Americans were busy kicking out the English king, and the French were just a few years of using the guillotine on their nobility (after, in fact, the king tried to make changes to appease them, which he could not pull off because his nobles didnt agree). The kings in this time had very well to take the opinion of their nobles and their middle class in consideration. And besides they had to balance the recruiting of the soldiers against the economic upheaval it would cause: population expansion was only beginning to outrun the need for hands to produce food and other necesities.

Recruiting was further hampered by the fact that the nation state was in its infancy - most civilians didnt really consider them subjects of a state, but were more connected to the town or region they lived in. There was no system of state wide conscription, just militia on local level, (or garrisons that the towns were required to keep up by agreement with the king - usually in exchange for other considerations, like the right to hold a market or something like that) which each town send to their soevereign when asked (or not, if they didnt feel like it was a good idea and they thought they could get away with it).
The army of the states themself were paid volunteers, who might well be from an other region al to gether. And they disappeared en masse when they thought the fight was not going to be provitable or the pay was not coming. After which they might very well show up on the other side....

The first really national armies were made by the French, a 30 years later. And one of the major changes they made was the centralized administrative organisation needed to recruit their men. This coupled to the fact that French had at that time the quickest growing population, made it possible for Napoleon to use his armies as he did. He won quite a few of the early wars because he could call up a new army after a campaign, while his opponents (Pruissia and Austria in particular) needed a much longer time to get a new army together after the previous one was depleted.

[Carrington]

Yes, Bertram, arguably the press gangs and other trappings of absolute monarchy were as much a testament to the monarch's weakness as his strength.

The problem was not sweeping the gutters for new recruits... it was finding resources to give them uniforms and guns. John Law provides an excellent example of the sorts of shady characters an enlightenment monarch might be tempted to patronize in order to fund that latter.

Abe Lincoln had to contend with habeus corpus and other trappings of democracy... but he could be fairly certain that Chase and Seward would do what he wanted. Louis XV's regent could have far less confidence about John Law... not least because Law's financial manipulations were, in essence, wizardry for most of his contemporaries.