Chevalier Plays AGEOD Let's Play/AAR

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

August 1, 1805: The Battle of Salzburg

A major battle is fought at Salzburg, and as you'd expect the Grande Armee gains a complete victory over the Austrians. Just in time, too, as the full Russian army appears to be gathered at Vienna. Elsewhere, Francis somehow slips the net, the Prussians invade Denmark, and our first glimpse of British army units in Spain. 

Danube Front
A running series of battles is fought in the hills around Salzburg over 6 days, culminating in the near total destruction of the main Austrian army by 1 August.

First, on 23 July Bernadotte storms Linz on the Danube against token resistance, securing us a depot and base on the road to Vienna:



The same day, Charles' army of 65,000 men fights a rearguard action against Lannes' V Corps pursuers near Hallein, a small Alpine hamlet a few miles south of Salzberg. He slips away with light losses:


However, the next morning, 24 July, he finds Soult's IV Corps drawn up around Salzberg, and the Marshal immediately attacks. Later in the day Marmont's II Corps joins from the east, and Charles once again attempts to retreat before becoming seriously engaged:



However, it's becoming clear that the Austrian army is in serious trouble - Charles is now bent only on retreat and escape, but finds the passes at Hallein blocked to his south. 3,000 Austrians are killed or captured on 25 July - note Charles' green (passive) stance, indicating he's only attempting to retreat now.



So the next morning, 26 July, Charles attempts to make his stand around Salzburg. He has Soult & Napoleon closing in from the north, Marmont driving from the east, and now Lannes and Ney closing on his rear. The Austrian divisions fight stubbornly all through the morning, and IV Corps takes significant losses storming their defensive positions, but when the rest of the Grande Armee closes in in the afternoon, Charles collapses:


He loses over a third of his remaining army, pulling the survivors into a tight ring around Salzburg itself. At first light, Napoleon renews the battle - again, Soult's IV leads the way. The Austrians are driven out of each defensive position, though they fight hard, as Napoleon's army suffers over 12,000 casualties across these two days. But to no avail, as the Austrians lose 10,000 more today, 27 July - and from reports from Emperor True Evil, Charles himself, attempting to rally a routing brigade, is struck by a French cannonball and mortally wounded.


Charles leading the troops at Salzberg. This moment would be the one chosen to immortalize the fallen Habsburg Archduke after the wars.* 



On July 28, General Mack, now in command, attempts to take over - but Mack himself is wounded from earlier fighting and not able to provide effective leadership (Mack is in a stack by himself in Salzburg after the battle, indicating his wounding). Half of the Austrians are killed or captured as Napoleon continues to pursue the remnants of the army. By the end of the day, only about 10,000 survivors remain with the colors of the army that stood 75,000 strong a week earlier:



So, here is the resulting weekly situation map for Bavaria on 1 August, 1805:


Our goal of destroying the Austrian army before it can rendezvous with the Russians is largely achieved. 10,000 survivors are cut off at Salzburg and will either be captured with the fortress or will retreat into the mountains - either way they are only a division in strength and basically irrelevant. More significantly, Kutusov has concentrated his army at Vienna - 4 columns of Russians, estimated at 20,000 men each, giving him a total of 80,000 men guarding the Austrian capital. I, II, and III Corps are comparatively fresh, as is Murat, while the Guard, IV, V, and VI Corps lost about 15,000 men over the week of fighting. Soult in particular needs a bit of a pause in his operations. 



My new goal is now the destruction of the Russians first and foremost, to make the rest of the game easier, and secondarily the capture of Vienna, which will enable the peace of Pressburg (I need Vienna & Austrian National Morale to be below 75 - it's at 76 at present after the defeats in Bavaria). But with Austria mostly out of the picture, Prussia charging north into Denmark, and the British playing around in Iberia, there's no more time pressure. We have a solid 2-3 months of good campaigning weather, 8-12 turns, to make something here. We only needed 5 weeks to dispose of Austria. 

So, let's try to maximize our blow, and minimize our losses. No headlong charge at Vienna is ordered - instead, I order a concentration to happen around Melk & St. Polten, while Soult and Lefebvre (brought down from Hanover when I feared Prussian invasion) will mop up the Austrians.

Italian Front
Uh, Francis somehow escaped, avoiding battle entirely with the Army of Italy. Francis cleverly rode up to General Partenoux of XI Corps, barring the way over the Piave, and announced that a truce had been declared, and brashly ordering Partenoux to stand his men down at once. Partenoux, uncertain, sent to Massena for instructions, but also ordered his men not to attack for at least the morning. Then he just watched as Francis marched his men straight past him and up the road.**

Massena was furious when he heard of Partenoux's actions. He wrote him a scathing letter:

I cannot find words to express my displeasure. You only command my vanguard and have no right to agree to an armistice without my orders. You will cost me the fruits of a campaign. End the armistice at once, and attack the enemy. Inform him that the general who has signed this has no power to make it, that only the Russian Emperor has the right, and that when the Russian Emperor ratifies this agreement, I will also ratify it. But it is only a ruse. March, destroy the Austrian army. You are in a position to take his baggage and artillery.

Nevertheless, what's done is done. Francis escaped the noose, and now we must pursue him at once. Massena gets the army of Italy marching for the Isonzo:


He has about 100,000 men against what I estimate to be half that amount of Austrians. Francis should be somewhere behind the Tagliamento by this point, though it's just possible he fled north into the Alps past Trent. If he did, that's a cul-de-sac and Soult will deal with him in a few weeks. I'll march hard for Trieste, and then take the bulk of the army through Istria & Carinthia via Laibach and Graz to Vienna. If ljubljana is still around, this is his home stomping grounds.  

By the end of August, I should be close to joining my two armies and Vienna should be ours. 

Other developments
The British fleet is blockading the northern coast of Spain, but seems to have missed my own Rochefort squadron's escape. There's also a British formation of uncertain strength in Portugal:




Note that there are two militia in the British stack! What to make of that? ultradave! didn't want to send his best troops to defend Portugal? He's got lots of commitments and sent whatever he could scrape up? He just wasn't paying attention? Given the fact that the Spanish slipped the blockade and he's missed (seemingly) the escape of the fleet in Rochefort, ultradave! might just be sloppy. Worth keeping an eye on.

Other metrics of note I find paging around for information - you can see on this graph the total drubbing the Austrians received. It shows the last 10 turns of the game in terms of total men fielded. Remember, the war was declared five weeks ago, when I began to record what was happening in the game. So see the decline from turn -5 to now:


So, from a high of 278,000 soldiers in the field on 22 June, by 1 August Austria is down to 179,000 - he's lost almost exactly 100,000 men over the month of July. Francis has 50,000 of those, I think, there's 10,000 more at Salzburg, and the rest are mostly garrison troops, I think. My total number of men has increased - in fact I've recruited two entire new corps (VIII Corps and XIII Corps) since the start of the game, as well as beefing up some of my weaker starting corps like Bernadotte and Marmont. So we're in very good shape. Victory screen backs that impression up:



Power ratios are very much in our favor, as is national morale. Austria's losses dwarf everyone else's, though I do wonder how King Piroman has managed to lose 20,000 men fighting the Portuguese. 

Overall, I'm very pleased with how the Austrian phase of the war has gone, obviously. Now, the deck is stacked in our favor - qualitatively and quantitatively, no Coalition army is a match for the Grande Armee (I'll write more about this later, with some good reading recommendations). We have 250,000 with Napoleon alone and 100,000 more in Italy to call on, against about 150,000 mobile Austrian troops and - perhaps - 80 - 100,000 Russians who can realistically march there. And man for man, each one of our grognards is better. So we should win this war.

That said, the last two multiplayer games haven't reached this point. In one, Napoleon won on the Danube, but my own British armies overran Brittany. I basically landed two corps under Moore & the Duke of York with the intention to take Brest, burn the French fleet there, and draw French reserves my direction to support the Coalition, but that French player apparently dismissed the possibility of my doing anything and left only militia & garrison troops to hold me back - so the British took Paris and held it against a desperate attempt to reclaim it, and on 1 January 1806 if Napoleon doesn't hold Paris he is deposed. In the second, I played as Prussia and joined the Third Coalition, invading Hanover and reaching the Low Countries when that France lost several battles to the combined Austro-Russian armies deep in Moravia and threw in the towel. So it IS possible for France to lose this war, if you're not careful. The Allies have the Prussian army to call upon, which gives them a numerical edge. They have the Royal Navy and the British can land pretty much anywhere in western Europe at will, if the British player has the gumption. 

The correct Coalition strategy, in my view, is to obviously play for time. Don't fight at the frontiers, and join up with the Russians as quickly as you can if you intend to fight at all - probably in Moravia or Hungary, NOT anywhere in Austria, Italy, or Bohemia. The Austrian player has admitted that he was caught totally off-guard by how quickly the Grande Armee arrived, and thought he'd be able to take Munich and hold the line until the fast-moving Russians & Charles arrived to reinforce Bavaria. 

War isn't over yet, though, and I've only dealt with one of the four major powers ranged against me. I need to punish Kutusov and Tsar Durk is a wily old veteran of the club playing these games, so he's not to be underestimated. Prussia will be fresh and have veteran troops after beating up Denmark, and the British are always a major threat. So, eyes on the prize for now - concentrate the army for a second major battle at Vienna, and get out of this war with my army as intact as I can manage. 

*This incident is historical, though it of course happened at the Battle of Wagram in 1809, and Charles survived the battle. I've appropriated it to this point for our timeline.

**Also a historical incident. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_...B6ngrabern Napoleon wrote the letter quoted above, not Massena. Murat screwed up at least 3 major times in the war of the Third Coalition - when he hung Dupont's division out to dry just before the battle of Haslach-Juningen, when he let Kutusov escape after Durnstein and instead went for Vienna, and then this last one which crowned them all, letting Kutusov slip away once and for all to join up with the rest of the Russian & Austrian armies. Napoleon had to redeem this screwup with the Battle of Austerlitz.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

August 8, 1805

Quick update, again. No significant battles this week.

Situation map of the Danube front, 8 August 1805:


You'll immediately notice a fresh Austrian corps has come up and reinforced the defenders of Vienna. Highlighting it, though, shows it's an Insurrection Corps - these were bodies of mostly militia and irregulars, light infantry called out only after the invasion began. They have no heavy equipment, poor discipline, and low morale. They're not to be underestimated, but they're more useful for raiding and mountain warfare than they are for standing up to a French assault column in open terrain. Still, two divisions, plus the 4 Russian columns, probably give the enemy ~100,000 men here at Vienna. I have approximately twice that concentrated outside. I only issue a few orders - I, II, III, and V Corps hold in place, VI Corps will join the left flank, while Napoleon, Bessieres, and Murat will shift towards the center. I'll probably order the assault to begin on 15 August. 

I thought about sending Murat or Bernadotte across the river to seize Wagram and cut the line of retreat over the river, but any corps that goes off alone can get seriously roughed up by that force. I'd need to send two or really three to make sure they can take care of themselves, and then I've given up a lot of my margin of superiority for the attack. Throw in the river crossing and my army would be dangerously divided. So, no, I have the strength for a straightforward frontal assault, so that's what we'll get.

Italian front:


We catch up to the Austrian royal army behind the Isonzo river, hot on their heels - notice that Francis hasn't dug in at all (no sandbags around his portrait), indicating he hasn't paused there for any length of time. Massena's reserve and XI Corps (a day behind the rest of the army) will demonstrate along the river, while St. Cyr and Molitor's X & XII Corps will cross the Isonzo, a no-doubt insignificant river trivially forced in any invasion of Austria from Italy, and turn Francis's flank (again). Then I may try once again to encircle him by throwing St. Cyr to Postoina, which would cut him off in Trieste. I expect him to keep retreating, though. If he does, XI Corps will take over a siege of Trieste and the other 3 units will continue the pursuit towards Graz. 

Other fronts:
A combined British-Portuguese force attacks the Spanish army at Beja, near the Portuguese border:


The British are operating using only brigades, no divisions. 6 regular brigades and 3 of militia, plus 3 batteries in support, could be nearly 20,000 men in that army, but probably more like 10,000 judging by their 200ish total power - a weak division, essentially. The Porties provide 400 more power, against 900 total Spanish power, so King Roman should beat ultradave! here. There is, however, another Portuguese body of 350ish power just to the southwest who could march to join the fight, so it's not surefire thing. 

My own VII Corps reached Bayonne on the Franco-Spanish border today, cohesion was good, so I ordered them to continue into Spain, Burgos ETA September 1. VIII Corps finished its training, which along with XIII Corps still gives me a good army of nearly 70,000 for home defense if ultradave! gets frisky. Soult's victories at Salzburg have catapulted him to 2nd in seniority over Berthier, too, which is great - Soult will give up IV Corps and become my newest army commander once the situation calls for a third army.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

August 15, 1805

I'm surprised by a major battle in Gorizia, on the right bank of the Isonzo:



No one shows any river crossing penalty, so Francis must have still been on this side of the river. I also find my cavalry brigades with the Army of Italy are decimated, with most of them badly shot up while the infantry are barely scratched. So, best guess is Massena's cavalry came upon the Austrian Army of Italy attempting to continue its retreat over the river, and immediately launched an attack to pin them down. Unsupported cavalry can't really hurt infantry, so the Austrians formed square and blasted them away with musketry and canister - but in so doing were held in place long enough that my other corps came up in support of the horsemen, and the ensuing French infantry assault swept the Austrians away and into the river.

About 3/4 of Francis's army is lost, including the vast majority of his infantry. He retreats into Trieste and I send St. Cyr sweeping around to cut his retreat (again), as discussed.

Up at Vienna, I tick one of the special order buttons, Synchronize Movement:


This allows two formations in the same army to march at the same pace, thus arriving at their destination, well, in sync. No one gets there too quickly and gets drubbed by a waiting enemy. Useful if you have, say, a handful of corps opposed to a handful of enemy corps and want to make sure your army attacks en masse...like exactly what we're facing at Vienna. I tick the box for Napoleon, who will automatically now bring II & III Corps along with Murat and the Guard as he marches into Vienna. That alone is about 100,000 men vs 80,000 defending Russians, but throw in the Austrian insurrectionists and it's more even. So on Day 2 I, V, and VI Corps will arrive from the west and that should break any remaining resistance. Napoleon alone would win an even odds battle thanks to his excellent stats and his special abilities (for example, he has one that grants his units smaller frontage on the attack, meaning he literally uses more units than should be possible to attack in constricted terrain - so he always has a numbers advantage unless it's a wide open plain), but take no chances. 

And that's it! Easy-peasy. The siege of Salzburg continues, most of my units begin to recover losses, but I still empty my reserves of conscripts now trying to fill the gaping holes in Massena's ranks, Spain and Britain fight in Portugal, and on we go.

[thestick]

I have little idea what's going on (haven't studied the Napoleonic Wars), but I really appreciate your reporting!

Out of curiosity, what kind of objectives do the Spanish, Prussian, and Ottoman players have (the ones who aren't at war with you), and how do they help/hinder/interact with your own victory conditions?

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

I have little idea what's going on (haven't studied the Napoleonic Wars), but I really appreciate your reporting!

Out of curiosity, what kind of objectives do the Spanish, Prussian, and Ottoman players have (the ones who aren't at war with you), and how do they help/hinder/interact with your own victory conditions?

Every country has to take some objective cities, and most of them have to take a handful from each of their neighbors. So, for example, I know the Prussians have to take Copenhagen, because I've played as Prussia before. From my Austrian game (page 2 of this thread) I know I need Belgrade, Sarajevo, and Bucharest from the Ottoman Empire. So, it shouldn't be a war to the death against France from the get-go. The War of the Third Coalition is probably unwinnable for the Allies as long as the French player doesn't blunder, but you can save your armies and prepare them for future rounds against other players and against the French. 

August 22, 1805 - The Battle of Vienna

The Grande Armee (minus IV Corps) storms Vienna as planned. The fighting is vicious and 10,000 Frenchmen are killed or wounded fighting their way into the city, but 20,000 Russians also fall, while the last Austrian corps fights to the death in defense of the capital. Total Allied casualties are 40,000 out of the 100,000 defenders (nailed that strength estimate, which I don't do often):



I highlighted the two Austrian insurrectionary divisions and their losses at the bottom of the report. The little heart on a unit shows its total strength in terms of hits - basically, HP. Hits represent a handful of soldiers, varying depending on if it's an infantry battalion, cavalry squadron, artillery battery, warship, etc. Really all the numbers are pure fluff and the game engine only processes hits. Anyway, you can see that the two divisions were at 93 HP and 109 HP respectively, and in the battle report I see that they suffered 92 and 108 hits each. That's a little quirk of the engine - the last hit in any unit is always the commander, who has an RNG chance to die in any battle (General Junot, of the French staff, died in this fight as it turns out). So basically, these two divisions were wipe out. All told, you can see at the top that my army inflicted 431 hits on the entire enemy army, so these two divisions represent about half of Allied losses. 

One final note on this screen - you can see the composition of each division or brigade on the screen. The two insurrection units consist of 4 battalions of conscripts (the brown-coated infantry, each man represents 1 battalion) and 5 battalions of militia light infantry (the blue coats). Those battalions all have individual stats like firepower, morale, experience (tracked individually), etc, which all play into the strength of the division. That's why even a big beefy insurrection division can be comparatively weak, because despite its high numbers all the men in it kind of suck, while the comparably sized division of the Old Guard visible on the French side is a monster. 

Anyway, the Russians made a good fight, but I managed to knock out their Austrian allies, storm the capital, and take out about 1/4 of Kutusov's army in exchange for 5% casualties of my own. Not bad at all for a frontal attack on an entrenched enemy - Napoleon really shines in these situations!

There's a second battle a few days later, around August 20:


General Wittgenstein leads a column late to the battle, attempting to join the main Russian army and apparently not realizing Vienna is under new management? Note the red river crossing penalty, which I've highlighted, plus a few notes on what the other icons mean in a battle report. So I know he crossed the river, despite having a defensive stance. Wittgenstein's column is wiped out entirely, apart from a few commanders escaping. Tuchkov, I note, must be wounded in the battle as he spawns without his stack in besieged Salzburg, of all places (the game takes injured commanders to random nearby cities to recuperate, but sometimes you get screwy results like this). 

Anyway, that's 15,000 more Russian casualties on top of their 20,000 already lost, ouch. 

Situation on 22 August:


Kutusov escaped across the Danube to Wagram with his 60,000 survivors. Another Russian column - I make that six, after the 4 with Kutusov and then Wittgenstein - turns up just east of Vienna, too late to join the battle but lucky enough to halt before plunging to its death like Wittgenstein did. I estimate Doctorov has about 20,000 more Russians with him. Had the Allies managed to concentrate everything, they'd've had 120,000 Russians join more than 150,000 Austrians (John's 30,000, Charles' 70,000, Francis's 50,000, and possibly Mack or the Insurrection Corps) to really put up a serious fight against the Grande Armee. That's why we move quickly, people. 

In Italy, Francis marches out of Trieste just ahead of the closing noose again:


He must be at Leobach.

So, orders. The main problem I'm now facing is supply. Namely, my supplies are stuck on the Rhine and not flowing through Bavaria as they should. That's...pretty serious, actually:


Supply view shows massive depots on the Rhine. There are depots in Wurtemburg and Bavaria, with whom I have supply rights, and more depots at Linz and Vienna. Now, rule of thumb says supplies should flow to depots within 3-5 spaces, which I've met (except maybe between Regensburg and Vienna, need Salzburg perhaps to complete that). But even if I have a gap between, say, Stuttgart and Regensburg, or Regensburg and Linz, I should be seeing stuff pile up in Stuttgart at least! But it's not. That's a problem, as the Grande Armee is about at the end of its own supplies and will start to get hungry soon.

Best guess is either a glitch or obscure rule is interfering with supply through the German minor states. I have two potential solutions: Manually walk my supply wagons back to the Rhine and refill them, then ship them back to Vienna. I have captured the small Austrian river transports and could do some of that. Other solution is to try and bypass the German states via an alternate path - ide, via Italy. 



So, the Army of Italy (less St. Cyr's exhausted X Corps, which will besiege Trieste) will pursue Francis towards Graz. Davout's fresh III Corps will come down to meet them at Graz and open an alternate supply line back to Italy, hoping that depots at Trieste, Laibach, and Graz will enable me to get up supplies to the Danube. V and VI Corps, who did most of the marching and fighting against Austria, will hold Vienna. I and II Corps and the Guard/Cavalry will begin to spread along the Danube, moving towards Budapest as my next major target. We will NOT pursue the Russians over the Danube, don't need the river crossing hits. Goal now is to end the war as rapidly as possible and minimize losses.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

September 1, 1805

Quick update. 

Davout, hero that he is, reaches and storms Graz quickly and efficiently, while Bernadotte takes Pressburg on the north bank of the Danube. The Russian army slips away without fighting, not certain where - either north towards Olmutz or east towards Estergom. I'm hopeful he just continues retreating and I can wrap up the war here. Francis is coming north from Italy towards Vienna and finds himself blocked by Davout at Graz.






Austrian National Morale is rock bottom (41 to my over 180!), so he fights only 40% as long and has only 40% cohesion, meaning I can pretty quickly rip through hsi remaining troops. Given the supply crisis, I go ahead and order Soult to storm Salzburg at last, while the rest of the Grande Armee & Army of Italy spread out in Austria south of the Danube. Goal is to re-open supply lines and in the meantime spread out to ease my foraging and hopefully minimize the hits I take.

more interestingly, Spain has kicked the Royal Navy around so much in the bay of Biscay that the British player has weakened the Brest blockade:


Only 500 power in that fleet, where it's normally ~900. I order a sorty from the 800 power Brest fleet and the 500 power Rochefurt squadron in support. Let's try and win a cheap victory here and then scuttle back into port.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

September 8, 1805 - Mop up

Battles all around the front as the Grande Armee storms various Austrian cities. Remember, the strategic goal for this phase of the campaign is to spread out and secure as many supplies as possible, and wait for the Peace of Pressburg to fire so I can end the war and return to France. Our goal of smashing up the Austrian army has been achieved, now let's get out without too many losses of our own.

So, a series of siege battles such as Salzburg...





Soult loses 4,500 casualties wiping out the 17,500-man garrison, but more importantly he nabs the city supply depot and no less than 4 fully loaded wagon units. I can distribute those to my hungry corps!

Murat, joined by Marmont later in the week, quickly scatters the defenders of Pest on the right bank of the Danube; a powerful Austrian insurrection corps holds Buda on the left bank:







No wagons here, but another depot and we have a jumping off point to attack Buda. I'll see if the Austrians withdraw first rather than attempt a contested river crossing with only Marmont's corps present. 

Ney seizes Estergom on 6 September, a link on the road from Vienna to Budapest...



In the only field battle, on 2 September Davout meets Emperor Francis retreating up the road from Venice to Graz. Francis finds III Corps blocking the way, and a hard-fought engagement occurs as Davout, supported by Molitor's XII Corps in hard pursuit of the Austrians, crushes the last regular field army of the Habsburgs:

 
Francis loses most of his infantry, nearly all of his cavalry, and is forced to deflect his march west into the Alps, where he'll have to make his last stand. 

Finally, off Brest on 2 September the first Anglo-French naval battle of the campaign is fought. Two French fleets, one out of L'Orient and one out of Brest, rendezvous in an effort to attack Sir John Jervis's blockading squadron. They find that Jervis has been badly stripped of ships, I presume as the British are chasing the Spanish fleet around the Bay of Biscay - really stellar work by my ally there. We have 50 ships including dozens of ships of the line, against a British force of only 15 ships - 5 SOTL, 4 frigates, 3 sloops, and 3 brigs, ie, only 5 real combat vessels. 


The Battle of Point Du Raz sees 6 British ships destroyed, including all 3 sloops, at least. I hope the other 3 were ships of the line but it's impossible to tell in AGEOD's battle system unless you wipe out an entire unit, as we did to the Cardiff squadron. 



It's a morale-boosting victory, but there are plenty more British ships of the Royal Navy prowling the seas around France, so we immediately put about and head back to port. Repair any damages from this battle, reorganize, and we'll venture out again. My goal is get Admiral Linois promoted - at 4-2-2 he's by far my most talented admiral, but he's sadly pretty far down the captains' list and my senior admirals are a bunch of dispirited, defeatist old men like Villenueve. 

The resulting situation map for September 8, 1805:


Only two bodies of enemy movable troops in sight. Francis's survivors, less than 10,000 battered men, are holed up at Laibach on the lower shoulders of the Alps. Archduke Joseph, a royal cousin, is gathering a fresh army of mostly militia at Buda. Looking at the army comp, I see General Alvinczy is also present with 12 units but only 96 power in his stack - probably either a big bundle of supply and support units or fresh battalions still forming. Either way, I probably should have ordered Marmont over the river. Next turn I'll swing Ney down from Estergom, and perhaps move Napoleon & the Guard to join Murat at Pest, which should see off that force, while I, III, IV, and V Corps remain positioned around Vienna to watch for the Russians. 

The Army of Italy is now strung along the road from Graz to Trieste, carrying out its sieges. Its commanders aren't quite as talented as the main army marshals and so haven't assaulted their targets yet, but we'll get there and the crackers flowing up the road. Molitor and Davout share a handshake in Graz, then Davout is marching back to the Vienna area to form a reserve, while Molitor will continue to pursue Francis into the mountains. Soult also is rejoining the main body after storming Salzburg, and will take up a position on the left wing to cover our communications back towards Bavaria. 

Otherwise, it should be quiet, -knock on wood.- The Russians lost 1/3 of their army in the brief stand at Vienna and I don't think they'll quickly return. The strategic map has lost track of most of the FOW units I used to be able to see, so not a clue where the army is - best guess is the neighborhood of Olmutz a few days' march north of Vienna. The only offensive actions between now and October should be mopping up Francis and quickly smashing up Joseph's force if it doesn't skedaddle in the next week. 



Objectives look good. 70,000 Frenchmen vs. nearly 180,000 combined Coalition losses. Austrian power is down to 15% of ours, Russians are at about half of our own, Britain 3/4. The Royal Navy is now only 4.5x as strong as the French navy! We have the most victory points and are gaining them at the highest rate. Hanover and Venice aren't properly garrisoned but I'll fix that and our VP gain will go even higher. National Morale is 190 to Austria's, um, 11.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

September 15, 1805

All quiet, for the most part. My hope is that the Peace of Pressburg event will become available on October 1. For 10 Engagement Points (the little wreath at the top of the screen), I can fire a scripted peace with Austria - he'll pay me reparations, and more importantly transfer Venetia to the Kingdom of Italy and Tyrolia to the Kingdom of Bavaria, two of my vassal states. Scripted events like this are damn near the only way to transfer territory in AGEOD games (this one and Pride of Nations are the only two with real diplomacy anyway). The event is only available if I hold Vienna, have a certain number of troops in Austria, and Austrian morale is both below the French and below 75. 



So, there's a few minor battles at Trieste and Leoben - Francis once again escapes into the mountains with a handful of survivors; I let him go - but otherwise all is quiet. The Austrians pulled out of Budapest as I expected, so Marmont is ordered to cross the river and seize a bridgehead on the eastern bank, but not to push deeper. Ney remains at Estergom as a link and distant support, while Napoleon cautiously takes the rest of the army towards Olmutz north of Vienna. Supplies should start to flow soon and I may need to beat the Russians one more time. I'm content if time runs out and we sign peace instead, though. 

In Portugal, Augereau's VII Corps has arrived outside Lisbon in support of our Spanish allies:


The Spanish player has already thoroughly defeated the British expedition in the area, though - apparently the entire corps has been nearly wiped out. I'll rest and regain cohesion and then help him take Lisbon, incidentally one of my objective cities. I'd make Augereau an independent army, but Murat (ugh) presently has seniority and would throw a fit. I'd like Davout, Lannes, or Soult to gain seniority instead so I can make them head of an army. 

At Brest, a new British fleet shows up, but it's interestingly weaker than the fleet bottled up in the harbor:


I'll wait a few weeks to again regain cohesion, then if nothing changes I'll hit him again, to pick off more ships and give Linois a chance to promote.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

October 1, 1805

Missed a few turns because I was moving, but I'm at the new house and internet is up, so let's get caught up quickly.

16 September saw Marmont successfully cross the Danube at Budapest and storm the city of Buda, wiping out two Austrian divisions in the process. Each division was a hodge-podge mix of light infantry and cavalry, so not as impressive as the numbers seem. A huge number of Grenadier brigades were also training near the city - the half-trained recruits scattered for their homes as soon as French grognards showed up. Kaiser True Evil will have to start recruitment all over again.





Sunset brings an end to the fighting, but by 17 September Marmont finishes off the remaining garrison. Note how reduced the Mesko Division is on the second day of fighting, by the way - just its commander and a few artillery pieces.



From Vienna, the Emperor decrees that Hanover is to be annexed to the French Empire - I already occupy the German state, but now I can draw more conscripts and supplies from it, as well as setting up future event chains to create Westphalia and eventually the Grand Empire. 





I could have done this on turn 1, but I thought the event was bugged and wouldn't fire. Turns out I'd overlooked the requirement of having at least a division of troops occupying Hanover itself. I'm forming a new Army of Germany in the electorate so I had the troops available now. 

Meanwhile, I tentatively ordered the Grand Armee north of the Danube on a scouting trip. We cautiously cross the Marchfeld, a broad floodplain just across the river from Vienna where the Habsburg army holds its annual manuevers, and cross the heights around a small village called Wagram. No enemies are sighted, but a few days' march down the road we find the Russian army gathering at Brunn:


I count at least 5 Russian columns and 1 Austrian column. Kutusov has 900 power with him personally, of about 3 divisions each. That means Bennigsen has 2 more divisions, Barclay de Tolly probably 2 more, Tormasov another 2, and then Doktorov and the Austrians are probably a reinforced division each. All told that makes nearly 11 enemy divisions, probably nearly 120,000 men, gathered around Brunn. Across the river is another Russian column guarding their retreat:


Essen probably has the equivalent of another 2 divisions with him (1 formal division and 3 loose brigades), so call it another 20,000 men. Throw in Yermolov and we're probably looking at about 150,000 Coalition soldiers encamped at Brunn and Austerlitz. 

I'm a little scattered - Soult and Davout at are Vienna, Ney is at Estergom to the east. Only I and V Corps, the Guard, and Murat are actually on hand, perhaps 70,000 Frenchmen. So, I'm outnumbered 2 to 1, but I doubt they attack - they have to cross a river, they'll be uncoordinated since he can't form corps yet, and he doesn't know where the rest of the army is. So, I'm not overly concerned that I've mousetrapped myself here. Couriers fly down the road to Vienna and get Davout and Soult moving - they'll be here within 3 days. Ney is a further march away, but he can reach the army in 6 days (one turn's time). Marmont and II Corps are distant at Budapest, raiding over the Danube, and will need nearly a month to get here, but he's probably gone far enough and needs to start heading back. The concentration ordered, I have no further plans here. I COULD throw everything at Essen and hammer him - he's separate from the main army by the Morava river, they can't really MTSG because no corps yet, and even if they did I could count on Napoleon's special abilities to carry the day. But even if I won and cut their road back to Russia, I'd bleed in doing so, and I've already accomplished my wargoals of smashing the Austrian army and capturing Vienna. So, I stay defensive.

Meanwhile, the Army of Italy continues to open a supply route as Massena forces the surrender of Laibach:



And VII Corps, which I would name the Army of Spain if Murat wasn't demanding the next army command (absolutely not), has closed to Lisbon and seems able to place the city under siege as soon as Augereau activates:


Augereau isn't benefiting from Napoleon's leadership even though he's technically a corps of the Grande Armee, because he's much too distant. So he's inactive a lot, reliant solely on his own strategic skill. He does still get the boosted command points a corps gives, though. 

The British have gotten serious about the blockade and have fleets of over 1,000 power each opposite all my Brittany ports and Spain's northern coast (plus Gibraltar and Toulon):



And that's it! Next turn we hopefully will see peace with Austria, at which point I'll drop back to monthly or quarterly updates as we enter a period of peace. No idea if it'll be a year or what, since I don't know if Prussia's declaration of the War of the Fourth Coalition is scripted next summer or if it's up to the player. Anyway, a year will take about 2 months of real time so expect some quiet from here on out.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

1 December, 1805

Mes amis, it has been two weeks real time since I gave you a dispatch from the Empire, and two-months in AGEOD time as we move through the turns about 1 week every 2 days. Not much has happened since hte conclusion of the Austrian War. 

Austria, whose national morale literally hit zero, accepted the Peace of Pressburg and ended the ongoing slaughter of his armies. The Tyrol region is given to my puppet Bavaria, while the Venetia region (including the jewel of Venice itself) is gifted to the Kingdom of Italy, also my puppet (I'm the King of Italy in addition to Emperor of France, of course). He also pays an indemnity. Russia, a bit bloodied but not seriously damaged, accepts peace and pays me a minor indemnity, as well, nothing major. I order the Grande Armee back to the Rhine - the only excitement is juggling supply wagons to try and ensure everyone has enough to eat on the march back to France. A few units take hits but nothing major. 

At sea, the British blockade clamps down closer than ever as ultradave is rapidly learning. After a glorious summer of hit and run raids, it looks like most of my fleets and the Spaniards are once again bottled up by far superior British squadrons (see image in last post). King Furiosa of Prussia abdicates and is replaced by his heir, King Ministop, who is playing his first multiplayer game. 

My new ambitions are to attempt to drive the British from the Mediterranean and make it a rightful French lake, particularly the Western Med. 

In Spain, after a five-week siege, in mid-November Augereau and VII Corps lead a joint assault on Lisbon alongside our Bourbon Spanish allies:




Trivial losses, but alas, the Spanish firmly assert their control of the city, and Augereau, not having news of the Emperor on the far-distant Danube, sees no way to refuse. So I don't pick up that objective. I send the cannon and stores at least on the long march back to Bayonne. 

From here, Augereau will march on Gibraltar. It's a tough nut to crack but it's the only place I can pressure the English at the moment. At the same time, Massena is assembling the Army of Italy in Ancona. Once everyone's back from Istria, we will invade Britain's only remaining Continental ally: The Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, aiming for its capital at Naples. 

All in all, 1805 closes with the Empire victorious and the army preserved for future struggles. From here on out I"m not sure how scripted things are - is Prussia FORCED to fight the War of the Fourth Coalition? If not, I will need to kick things off myself. A lot of my best events - the Duchy of Warsaw, the formation of the Kingdom of Westphalia, the Treaty of Tilsit, etc - are locked behind occupying most of Prussia. 

What could possibly go wrong?