Second Post Release Patch

[Baris]

It was not a mercenary army who pick sides about who bribes. Previous Grand Vizier didn't favour war with Russia. But with Mehmed Pasha*, Giray Khan and Charles convinced sultan to go to war. For Crimean Tatars reason is obvious, Russian expansion. For Ottomans it was to take control of Azak fort again.

About peace treaty bribe, rumours for Austria to be pulled in to war same side as Russia, loyalty about princes in Balkans could be also a factor. Remember Ottoman had Treaty of Karlowitz few years back.

*It is rather mistake III. Ahmed gave title Vezîr-i Âzam 2nd time to Baltacı Mehmed Pasha. Ottoman sources tell he gained titles so quickly with good relations.

From my pbem plays Sweden with Charles was strong enough even a bit much strong.

[GenGrant21]

Yes, Karl XII is a general with very good stats. However, I don't believe to beat the Swedes you need to have him locked away 5 years in Turkey. Remember, Sweden is just one nation versus the Anti-Swedish coalition made up of several countries. The Anti-Swedish coalition, though inferior in initial troop quality and leaders, will slowly rise up to be a powerhouse if not kept in check. Sweden is spread thin. It's armies can only fight offensively on a few select fronts. The Swedish navy is primarily used in the game (at least by me) as transportation around the Baltic, not blockading or fighting enemy fleets. A Russian or Danish fleet if properly given time to be built up, can launch a lightning fast seaborne assault on mainland Sweden or cut off Swedish troops somewhere in Finland or another territory. I know this because I have played as Sweden primarily and have suffered from these issues plaguing the Swedes. Yes, I can take territory, but as soon as I move out of it with my Swedish army, I lose it to enemies in the vicinity. Also attrition is very costly to the Swedes.

Karl XII is beating you if you believe he is too overpowered and want to lock him away five years. He is getting in your head like he did to the Danes, the Russians at Narva, and the Saxons. You just need to turn his strengths into a weakness by not fighting him in conventional ways. He'll win if you try to conventionally fight him. However, if you innovate or get his army to suffer great attrition, you can beat him.

Remember, stop trying to go into pitched battles and defeat him by attrition. That's what the czar of Russia did. When the Swedes were weak by attrition and Karl was wounded, he attacked. Thus Poltava happened. That's how you beat the Swedes.

[GenGrant21]

P.S.



PLEASE DONT LOCK KARL XII FOR 5 YEARS.

[Liberty Bell]

Another possibility would be to have Karl removed from the game for five years by event if he does not capture and hold Moscow or Kiev by the winter of 1709. This would certainly motivate the Swedish player to invade Russain. Perhaps the Ai could be scripted to have Karl try for these cites no later than January,1709.

Thanks Vaalen for the good summary and suggestion. I agree, this would be historically correct and a very good event for the game. This turned the tide and was the most dramatic event. It is also a diplomatic effort for the Swedes.

Maybe there is a third option. To make it simple, just make an option to exile Charles, to start the effort of bringing the Turks into the war. Sweden will use the exile if it fails to beat the Russians and are outnumbered. Another event is to bring the King back later on.

But, I like the second suggestion by Valen best as it will motivate Sweden to attack Russia and Ukraine in a time limit.

[vaalen]

Karl XII is beating you if you believe he is too overpowered and want to lock him away five years. He is getting in your head like he did to the Danes, the Russians at Narva, and the Saxons.

Actually, I have only played the Swedes so far, and have never lost to Karl. I do not think he is overpowered since the changes in the patches.

And, I have no desire to lock him hp for five years. He was free to return to Sweden for most of that period , and the Turks offered him the use of an army to escort him back to Swedish territory if he would just leave, on a number of occasions. he refused, even when his own government begged him to return on repeated occasions.

The five year stay in Turkey actually happened, and had a devastating effect on the Swedish conduct of the war. I am suggesting a way to put this in the game, and to provide a challenge to the Swedish player that is based on this most important event.

I am very impressed by your excellent advice on how to fight the Swedes, which is pretty much what Peter the Great did after Narva. In fact, When Karl launched his invasion of Russia, Peter sent armies to get in his way, devastate the land, and slow him down, but ordered them to avoid fighting a decisive battle. Until Poltava.

[vaalen]

Another possibility would be to have Karl removed from the game for five years by event if he does not capture and hold Moscow or Kiev by the winter of 1709. This would certainly motivate the Swedish player to invade Russain. Perhaps the Ai could be scripted to have Karl try for these cites no later than January,1709.

Thanks Vaalen for the good summary and suggestion. I agree, this would be historically correct and a very good event for the game. This turned the tide and was the most dramatic event. It is also a diplomatic effort for the Swedes.

Maybe there is a third option. To make it simple, just make an option to exile Charles, to start the effort of bringing the Turks into the war. Sweden will use the exile if it fails to beat the Russians and are outnumbered. Another event is to bring the King back later on.

But, I like the second suggestion by Valen best as it will motivate Sweden to attack Russia and Ukraine in a time limit.

Thank you for the kind words. You have understood my intent.

I find your third option quite interesting. Perhaps there could be a scenario for the great Northern war that would be the same as the existing one, except that the player could choose between the three options at the beginning of the game, or maybe just the second and the third.

[GenGrant21]

Good idea. It would be good to have another scenario where you can play through the war with Karl XII gone for a few years and play another scenario where he is available the whole time unless he his killed. I like that idea. That way, I can still focus on the Polish and Danes before I even have to enter Russia!!

[GenGrant21]

Since we are now on a similar page Vaalen, do you think the war should be extended past 1716 in this new scenario/grand campaign? If it was, I would feel like I still could have some time to make a resurgence as Sweden after Karl XII has been in the Ottoman lands for several years.

[GenGrant21]

Oh, and Liberty Bell, I should be thanking you as well. Brilliant idea.

[vaalen]

Since we are now on a similar page Vaalen, do you think the war should be extended past 1716 in this new scenario/grand campaign? If it was, I would feel like I still could have some time to make a resurgence as Sweden after Karl XII has been in the Ottoman lands for several years.

I really like that idea. I think it should be extended to 1720 in the new scenario. It would be a real challenge, But very interesting. What if Karl had not been killed by that Norwegian sniper? He had managed to raise a sizable army.

[PhilThib]

REPLACEMENT ISSUE FIX

The team made extensive trials and Bohémond supplied us a potential fix to the replacement issue. Just copy paste the enclosed file in the Settings and see how it works.

The main reason for the problem (which is NOT a bug) was that players did not have/keep enough assets to ensure maintenance (and the AI was even worse), so we decided to alter the behavior like follows:

* Maintenance now takes place only every 3 turns, like production, not every turn
* the overall maintenance cost has been strongly divided

If this does not ease the issue, one extra solution will be to slightly increase the conscript production, as this was the main source of problems (which explains also why Sweden is not suffering much from it in GNW, due to its large supply of conscripts).

Thanks for all feedback

[vaalen]

PhilThib, thank you for the improvement to the patch. I very much appreciate your efforts and those of the team to support this game.

Regards,

Vaalen

[phoenix]

Do I just copy this new file into the settings folder? I mean is it meant to completely replace the existing file of the same name?

[PhilThib]

Do I just copy this new file into the settings folder? I mean is it meant to completely replace the existing file of the same name?

Yes do so, this is what the dev tested and they feel it gives more balanced results

[Person of Interest]

Any update on the release date for the official patch?

[PhilThib]

Not until sufficient feedback has been received on the beta patch

[Person of Interest]

Not until sufficient feedback has been received on the beta patch

I wait with bated breath!

[Nikel]

The problem is that nobody is feedbacking and the rest are waiting

[Baris]

I think it wasn't all about Karl's war. Remember Peter of Russia was successful about modernizing clergy and army while III. Selim wasn't successful in janissaries. Pruth Campaign could be important as an option although game campaign isn't about Ottoman&Russian wars.

[vaalen]

I have been testing the latest patch over the last several weeks. I cannot stop playing the Great Northern war, and my gaming time is limited, so I have not played the War of the Spanish Succession.

However, while playing the Swedes, I have reloaded the game as the anti Swedish coalition, and paid particular attention to the way in which the AI handles replacements and deals with its units melting away, and the results of battles.

I did see some AI stacks that were melting away, which seemed like the bug the newest addition to the patch was intended to fix. However, each of those stacks had very low general supply, and without supply units. I attribute this not to a bug, but to lack of supply.

In one example, the AI built a huge Polish army and sent it towards Stade, where I had a small Swedish army and the army of Holstein. The Polish force was far larger than the one I had, I quickly reinforce these armies, both with replacements and new units. By the time the Poles were in striking distance, my forces, well dug in, were a match for them. They retreated, had no local supply source, and started to melt away. The AI did march them towards a supply source.

I have seen the AI be constantly short of conscripts and replacements. However, the AI took a lot of actions to raise more conscripts, and build replacements constantly. And some of the melting stacks were rebuilt with replacements.

I think that the AI builds too many Polish units, creating a large Polish army, something that never happened during this war, and this depletes the supply of conscripts. At one point, the AI had no less than twenty five single unit stacks at Danzig, which later combined to form the large army described above.

At the same time, the AI does not build enough Russian units. In the real war, a number of Russian troops were sent ot help The Saxons, who did most of the pitched battle fighting in Poland. The Poles did a lot of small scale raiding , but did not field large armies, with the exception of the Polish Crown Army , about eleven thousand men, which fought in one battle, as I recall.

If there is some way to encourage the AI to build more Russian troops and less Polish infantry, that might help the situation.

I have, however, seen some Russian forces that I thought would simply disappear, because their elements were almost entirely red, be revived by replacements and become a viable force again. This led to a couple of small defeats for the Swedes.

I also had my main Swedish army run out of supply while recklessly chasing a defeated Russian army, when early snow struck. By the time I got back to Narva, Most Swedish units had most of their elements half red. That was not a bug, just reckless play on my part.

Decisive battles can now happen. Not all of the time, or most of the time, but they can happen. I have inflicted a few massive defeats on the Russians and the Saxons, and had the Saxons inflict a crushing defeat on one of my armies. In these battles, the losing side has lost between twenty and fifty percent of their men, wigh smaller forces losing a larger percentage. Small forces fighting a much larger force can get completely wiped out, which makes sense.

I am really enjoying this game, and finding it challenging. For example, i sent a large Swedish force under Rehnskold to take Kovno, which has a size four depot. I also sent a supporting force with four supply wagons. My plan was to take Kovno before winter struck and to spend the winter there. The Poles had no large force left that could possibly stop me, and Kovno was only a level one fort, which could be stormed without a breach, if needed.
However, the Poles sent several small stacks of cavalry into Kovno while Iwas about to assault it. My assault failed, because my troops became too tired to assault after fighting several successful battles against the small stacks. On top of that, the supply force was delayed by mud, and did not arrive when expected. On the turn I stormed Kovno, whichwas the turn my supply force reached it, My army was down to seven percent supply. Exciting stuff.

[Francescopgg]

I finished my first grand campaign as Grand Alliance VS AI (Lieutenant, more time on). I won in June 1707, the AI played a good game in Italy, Germany and Hungary, but it barely defend Spain (all the Spanish army was on the Rhine) and Flanders (in 1705 I had conquered all of the most important fortress, Ypres and Lille included). Overall, a good match, that keep me committed for several hours

The AI had some strange behavior: it keep Vendome in Cetua all of the game and it built 11 magazine depots in Paris.

The units depletion problems is fixed, and the replacement cost is well balanced. Money, conscripts and engagement points are very well balanced too, you have made a very good job with all of them. You never run out of supplies, I ended the game with over 9k supplies selling them whenever I could and I never bought them, you can maybe reduce them, but it's not a big problem.

I have found two minor bugs (I post the save and script in a different post):

1) when you activate the options Alliance with Savoy, all the Savoyard cities and forts but Turin remain in bourbons's hands, the Bourbons' Savoyard army still remain in game, and Victor Amedus is duplicated: one for the Grand Alliance, one for the Bourbons

2) The option More Concession to Prussia never unlock, so you can't activate it

It's really a good game, in my opinion one of the best you have made so far

[Khanti]

(...)
I think that the AI builds too many Polish units, creating a large Polish army, something that never happened during this war, and this depletes the supply of conscripts. At one point, the AI had no less than twenty five single unit stacks at Danzig, which later combined to form the large army described above.

At the same time, the AI does not build enough Russian units. In the real war, a number of Russian troops were sent ot help The Saxons, who did most of the pitched battle fighting in Poland. The Poles did a lot of small scale raiding , but did not field large armies, with the exception of the Polish Crown Army , about eleven thousand men, which fought in one battle, as I recall.

If there is some way to encourage the AI to build more Russian troops and less Polish infantry, that might help the situation.
(...)

Very detailed report and helpful.
But one thing wonders me: do you really want in sandbox game that AI (or player) to build exact historical armies (exact composition of troops)?
Does it really matter if in real timeline there were more Russian troops than Polish, or there were more cannons and less cavalry or things like that?
The game is played in alternate reality from turn 1 when AI armies marches to not-that-places-as-they-did in our reality.
The AI and player can recruit different troops than in reality (of different proportions).
Do you want to have forces set up like in Napoleon's Campaigns / Birth of America ?

[vaalen]

I see your point, and I pretty much agree with you.

I do not want the AI to only build historically, for the very reasons you mentioned.

But Poland did not have a modern standing army during this war, and most of the Poles saw it as a war of their Saxon King,, and wanted no part of it. The one army fielded by Poland in this war, against the Swedes, The Polish Crown Army, was tiny and did not do well. Many small Polish detachments were raised locally and fought an effective guerilla war against the Swedes, though they could not drive them out. But the kind of large, modern army raised by the Ai in the game was never raised in this war. The Poles refused to fund such an army. For Poland to raise large numbers of trained infantry does not reflect the reality of the situation. If it would been possible for Poland to raise such an army in this war, I would have no problem with it.

The other point is that the Russian troops were eventually trained to a point that they improved enormously, eventually winning most of the battles they fought against the Swedes.

My thought is that the AI, like a player, should build the most effective units available to it, which, in this war, assuming that Denmark is not active, would be Russian troops, then Saxons.

But despite this concern, I very much enjoy the game, which is brilliant, and provides a wonderful feel for the period. My gratitude to everyone who has taken part in this project.

[Khanti]

(...)
For Poland to raise large numbers of trained infantry does not reflect the reality of the situation. If it would been possible for Poland to raise such an army in this war, I would have no problem with it.

My thought is that the AI, like a player, should build the most effective units available to it, which, in this war, assuming that Denmark is not active, would be Russian troops, then Saxons.
(...)

So I assume your doubts could be solved by event chains. But, yes mass building Polish troops at the start of the war (with King Augustus II) was not possible historically.

***In 1715 in Tarnogród was formed Tarnogród Confederation by nobility angered by illegal taxation, levied for Saxon forces. Its marshal was Stanisław Ledóchowski. He gained widespread support for the nobility, so even the Russians believed that in the event of the Polish throne being emptied, Ledóchowski had a chance to become the king of Poland. In a short time he built a strong confederate army (36 thousand troops).

The confederate forces in February 1716 were 2,260 hussars, 7,500 armored cavalry, nearly 3,900 light cavalry, 3,100 arquebusiers, 5,900 dragoons, 13,170 infantry - in total nearly 36 thousand soldiers and 6,000 or more volunteer militia.

***Is it possible to increase cost of Polish troops IF Augustus II is king of Commonwealth? He really had minimal support, but with other leaders there were no problems with rising armies.

The rest of the post does not have any connections with technical side of game.

HISTORICAL background.

King Augustus II was not popular and had minimal support in Commonwealth. He was put on throne by Jewish money of the bank houses of Issachar Berend Lehmann and Samson Wertheimer and a corps of Russian troops of Prince Mikhail Grigorievich Romodanovsky, stationing over the Lithuanian borders.
He was not even crowned by Primate of Polish Church. (Michał Stefan Radziejowski refused to crown him, as he received less votes of the electors than his opponent).

[Primate of Poland - title granted to the archbishop Metropolitans of Gniezno from 1417, emphasizing their priority in the Polish episcopate and the historic role played by the primate as interrex and the first prince of the Senate.]

So Augustus II was proclaimed king by a minority of nobles bribed by the Russians and was weak. His allegiance with Russian Tsar was also seen as threat to Commonwealth. And he knew that. He led to the actual dissolution of the Polish army, as he meant that Saxon army was supposed to maintain order in Commonwealth.

He had no support in the army, even among those whom he bribed. The example could be Hieronim Augustyn Lubomirski - Hetman (Grand Marshal) of Polish Crown Army.

During the interregnum of 1696 Lubomirski supported the French candidacy of Fr. Conti, being in opposition to the Augustus II. In 1702, Augustus II, desiring to acquire him, made him the field hetman of the Crown, and shortly after that hetman of the Crown (highest military position). Nevertheless, he belonged to the enemy of the king, and in the face of the invasion of Charles XII he took a vague attitude. Under the pressure of public opinion and supporters of August II, he united the Crown army with the Saxon army commanded by the king. In the August II defeat of the battle of Kliszow in 1702 he commanded the Crown forces. He admittedly personally ran a hussar charge, which, although it defeated the Swedish cavalry, was not able to break the infantry. After this failure, he unexpectedly withdrew the Crown troops from the battlefield, revealing the Saxon wing, which became the main cause of their defeat.

***So yes, there should be some event chains to make Augustus II real king (political fiction) or just to remove him from throne (that was the plan of Polish nobility) and then adding Polish army.

Two things to consider.

*After the occupation of Warsaw by the Swedish army in 1704, hostile to King Augustus II Polish nobility formed the Warsaw Confederation, deposed the king and allying Commonwealth with Swedish.

*In 1715 in Tarnogród was formed Tarnogród Confederation by nobility angered by illegal taxation, levied for Saxon forces. Its marshal was Stanisław Ledóchowski. He gained widespread support for the nobility, so that the Russians believed that in the event of the Polish throne being emptied, Ledóchowski had a chance to become the king of Poland. In a short time he built a strong confederate army (36 thousand troops).

I really do not know how all that political mess in Commonwealth during the reigns of Augustus II - Stanislaus I could be correctly recreated.

[vaalen]

Thank you for the historical background, it is fascinating, and I learned from it.

I do think event chains, as you have suggested, would be the best way to handle this.

Though, as you wrote, it would be hard to recreate the whole mess. It would still be a lot of fun to have the Confederation form at the proper time, and see what they could do. It looks like they had a strong force of impressive cavalry, but that most of their infantry were militia.

[vaalen]

This is odd. It is November,1703, and I have looked inside of Warsaw in the Great Northern War scenario. A Saxon Polish army of no less than thirty six units is inside the city, easily the biggest and strongest AI army in the game. Many of the units are cavalry, not exactly ideal for defending a city.

These units cannot move for four hundred and ninety eight turns, which amounts to a bit more than forty years.

Is this intentional, or a but, and if it is intentional, why?

It certainly does not resemble any event in the actual war.

any help will be appreciated.

[Elyeser66]

Latest Post Release Beta patch (N°01b, 30th March, dated 31/03/2018) can be downloaded here:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1vpobFj ... sp=sharing

It’s all inclusive of all previous patches (unless errors fixed by same, such as replacement bug) and can apply on either a previously patched version or a vanilla game. It’s NOT save compatible (although in theory no blocking changes made, behavior of previous saves may be broken and/or altered by changes and lead to weird results or CTDs).

LIST OF CHANGES

-------------- version 1.01b -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Major
* Replacement bug: should now revert to vanilla situation, and units maintenance cost have been reduced to ease the replacement situation
* Combat damages (in both hits and cohesion loss inflicted) has been increased, to reduce the number of ‘skirmish-like’ endless battles.

Other / Events / Options
* Arkhangelsk has now received a Russian shipyard and can be reached via Norwegian Sea
* rembourser crédit
* Number of Supply Wagons in Pool has been largely increased
* All British admirals can lead Dutch ships and vice versa.
* Swedish and Finnish region names changed in map (thanks to our volunteers)

* New option to “Sell War Supplies” has been added, converting 100 WSU to 1000 money
* Option to buy WSU has been beefed up a bit, you now get 50 WSU instead of 20 for the same cost.
* Altranstädt treaty beefed up, Sweden now receive large benefits in money, NM and conscripts

---------------- other changes as per previous patch ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Please report anything weird.

This can serve as a base for the first official patch when thoroughly played.

Hello everyone. Thank you for exposing this with us, However, a detail trots me a little, I would like to expose it if it is possible. Thank you for your return.  Good luck to all.