Conscript income too low?

[ussdefiant]

As some may recall, back around 1.02 every unit avaliable in the game got massive hikes to their recruitment costs, particularly when it came to conscripts. I have read elsewhere around the forums that this was done because all the hits and such were calculated for individual elements based on them being compared sized, and the number of men in a "hit" of an element was supposed to be around 10 instead of 100, and the cost was adjusted to reflect that. If that is so, however, i have to question the amount of replacement manpower that both sides receive on a turnly basis, since they do not seem to have changed from 1.00.

As it is right now, the Prussia+allies starting positions in the 1757 has them getting 48 conscript "companies" every two weeks, which seems extremely low. I have severe doubts that the recruitment situation in the actual war was such that Prussia & Hannover + whatever the British could scrape up could barely get 240 men a week to the colors. As it is, the Prussians can't even raise a single replacement battalion (51 conscript companies) out of their weekly income, let alone consider adding anything to their OOB. Even their Militia battalions, extremly cheap in other regards, still cost an incredible 68 companies of conscripts to go with their 8 thaler/4 war supply cost. As such, i seriously think either the cost of infantry in the game needs to be reevaluated or conscript income needs to be boosted. Even the Coalition can only get 102 conscript companies a week, equivalent to 1020 men, which i'd think was FAR below what even Austria could throw up, let alone France and Mother Russia as well.

[OneArmedMexican]

I would love to see higher conscripts allocations, too. It might just make it affordable to play aggressively as Prussian.

But there has been a long debate about that point during the past weeks. And I for one have to admit, there were some good arguments made for keeping things as they are. Recruits were scarce and that should be felt.

As concerns the Austrian side, I am not sure an increase in conscripts would do them much good. I am usually running short of money, not conscripts when playing as Austrian.

But in general I have to agree: higher allocations of all three ressources might be a good idea. I miss the possibility of actively building armies like in ACW.
In RoP on the other hand, ressources are so scarce that at least the Prussian side is practically forced to spend everything on replacements (i.e. depot units). Thereby the construction menu becomes virtually superflous!

[Soderini]

The current manpower allocation is more or less historic, at least for the Prussian side. If I recall correctly, the Austrians reformed their army twice or so. Not from scratch, but they seemed to have a decent access to new recruits.
Playing as the Prussians, you can act aggressively the first two years, but then you have to go on the defensive, just as it happend in reality. Remember that this is the age of manouevre warfare. Marching is more important than fighting battles, and destroying the enemy in a pitched battle is entirely out of the question. ROP does a good job of portraying this.
As for building new armies from scratch as in AACW, it wasn't done during the 7YW, so do really want this?

[OneArmedMexican]

Playing as the Prussians, you can act aggressively the first two years, but then you have to go on the defensive, just as it happend in reality.

I beg to disagree: Frederic lost more than 25.000 men in May and June 1757 in the battles of Prague and Kolin alone. If one were to play equally agressive in the game, your army would never recuperate during the rest of the game due to the shortage of replacements.

Remember that this is the age of manouevre warfare. Marching is more important than fighting battles, and destroying the enemy in a pitched battle is entirely out of the question. ROP does a good job of portraying this.

In general, I completely agree. However, King Frederic wasn't a typical general of his time. The king seems to have diced on battles rather often to change his luck. In fact, his "battle-happiness" was a point of disagreement between the king and his brother Heinrich.
As concerns the destruction of the enemy in pitched battles: it is possible in the game (although not common). And I believe, this agrees with the historical facts: Three battles come to mind where armies were at least temporarily removed from the war: Roßbach, Kunersdorf and Maxen.
After Roßbach the imperial troops never again acted as an independent force and the French limited their war effort to Western Germany. And yes half the Reichsarmee was taken prisoner, wounded or killed.
As for Kunersdorf Frederic lost 19.000 out of 50.000 men; after the battle the Prussian army completely desintegrated, Frederic retreated with no more than 3.000 men. It took Frederic two weeks to rebuild an army of 33.000 men.
Maxen led to the capture of a whole Prussian Corps when General Finck surrendered.

As for building new armies from scratch as in AACW, it wasn't done during the 7YW, so do really want this?

True. I never heared about new regiments being raised in large numbers. However, Frederic managed to compensate enough of his losses, to keep his army in the field (at Torgau in 1760 he once again led almost 60.000 men). If one takes an estimate of perhaps 25.000 killed or wounded Prussians per year (not to think about disease and desertion), Frederic must have recruited at a much higher rate than depicted by the game.

Sorry, about this rather lengthy rant. I tried to underline my points with some historical facts.

Even if this may get repetetive, in my opinion:
1) the allocation of ressources per turn is too low
2) depot cavalry units would be a welcome addition to the construction options.
3) it might be a good idea to think about a new political option for Prussia: recruit foreign mercenaries in order to add to the conscript pool (it seems Prussia relied increasingly on foreign hires to make up for it losses).

[Anazagar]

I beg to disagree: Frederic lost more than 25.000 men in May and June 1757 in the battles of Prague and Kolin alone. If one were to play equally agressive in the game, your army would never recuperate during the rest of the game due to the shortage of replacements.

Not rly. Early on the losses to line inf are quite easy to replace at least in my experience.

In my last PBEM game by 58 I had +100k battle losses as Prusians (my opponent double that) and my armies were still fully battle ready - 70k in germany 80k in saxony and about 40k pommerania.

[OneArmedMexican]

Not rly. Early on the losses to line inf are quite easy to replace at least in my experience.

In my last PBEM game by 58 I had +100k battle losses as Prusians (my opponent double that) and my armies were still fully battle ready - 70k in germany 80k in saxony and about 40k pommerania.

Which patch are you using? While playing with 1.02: I try to stay well below of 50.000 Prussian losses during the first two years (meaning until late in 1757). If I fail to do that, I am usually unable to keep all my troops at full strength in spite of putting at least 75% of my conscripts into replacements.

But perhaps, I was not specific enough: line infantry replacements aren't the real problem: it is elite infantry and cavalry replacements that run out first. That's why I would love to see depot cavalry units.

With 1.03 beta, I haven't played enough Prussians to be specific about the replacements and conscripts. But I didn't get the feeling that things changed dramatically.

Or perhaps I am just wrong and a lausy manager of replacements. Who knows?

[Anazagar]

Which patch are you using? While playing with 1.02: I try to stay well below of 50.000 Prussian losses during the first two years (meaning until late in 1757). If I fail to do that, I am usually unable to keep all my troops at full strength in spite of putting at least 75% of my conscripts into replacements.

Remember that forces can recover hits in depots (tho this ability is limited by a hidden stat if I understand it correctly) you don't always need wole chits to recover strength. That's why building some new ones is a good idea when you have the wagons to spare.

Oh and the number of casualties is not that important. It's the ratio between you losses that plays the key part. If you play the Prussians you should aim for something between 2:1 to 1,5:1.

But perhaps, I was not specific enough: line infantry replacements aren't the real problem: it is elite infantry and cavalry replacements that run out first. That's why I would love to see depot cavalry units.

Those can be a problem especially with the prussian grenadier units that burn your elite replacements fast. I think that it's a good idea to combine the Elbe army with Kurt von Schwerin in 1756 and spread the gigantic number of grenadier units that he has amongst the whole forces (also don't make gren only corps)

As for cav I do agree that there isn't usually enough replacements but I think that is good. It forces you to be catious in their usage instead of organising deep rides into bavaria.

[ai90o78]

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