I played through 1745 today. It started well for the Austrians, beating a Prussian field army away from Olmütz, allowing a siege to go ahead. Before the city could be taken the Prussians had concentrated a larger force and beat the Austrians, drove them off and beat them decisively on the plains north of Vienna. Despite Saxony swapping sides (bribed with the promise of compensation at the expense of Bavaria), the odds were too great.
In Italy the Bourbons besieged Florence but still hadn't taken it when Austria sued for peace.
Over in France, an invigorated Cumberland struck down to Strassburg, putting it under siege. The French field army attacked and broke the siege.
One piece of good news for the supporters of the Pragmatic Sanction was that the Jacobite incursion was unsuccessful (needed a 3-6 on a D6), meaning that the Pragmatic Army didn't need to send troops to Britain.
In the peace negotiations the following year the following trades were made:
- Maximilian Joseph and Charles Emanuelle are returned to their thrones in Munich and Turin respectively.
- Prussia retains Silesia (including Breslau), but under Russian pressure are forced to relinquish Prague and Olmütz.*
- France agrees to the Dutch having garrisons in the border fortresses of the Austrian Netherlands.
- Britain, France and Spain conduct some horse trading in their colonies.
*Russia are not in the game but historically they marched through Europe (paid by the British) to threaten the French towards the end of the war. In my rationale the Russians don't want a too powerful enemy challenging their attempt to dominate Poland. The Prussian King, ever watchful of the cost, decides to cash in his winnings and consolidate his hold over Silesia.
Post Game Thoughts
The biggest criticism I will make is that the Prussians are too powerful vis a vis Austria. I have a few ideas on how to temper this, one of which is to introduce some kind of kleinekrieg that interdicts Prussia's supply lines. The boardgames Maria has a fairly simple mechanism for this. I'll see if it is easy to adapt.
The battle rules need a revision as too many battles are foregone conclusions, and once one side gets a clear advantage the other side can end up losing more and more in successive combats. This bit will take a lot of thought.
I will make the campaign season shorter. The sides can achieve too much in any given year. Campaigns rarely started as early as April as the grass wasn't long enough, so I'll trim that end. I might also impose attrition on any forces who are not in Winter Quarters in November.
Overall, however, I'm pleased it worked as well as it did. The obvious thing with this is that it doesn't need to be played on a table. I need to work out how I can play it on the computer. This then opens up the possibility that it could be a multi-player play by e-mail game if there's enough interest.
This was an interesting experiment to follow. One thing, for sure, is that the campaign did linger long on your table long. You fought the entire war in only hours. One thought is to investigate hex-and-counter wargames that cover this period to glean ideas from them for your next WAS exploratory. I think even Avalon Hill's venerable Frederick the Great had a WAS/First Silesian War variant that might be useful.
ReplyDeleteYes. 6-8 hours total. The whole idea was light on ‘research’, especially on the game mechanism front. Food for thought.
DeleteChris
Damn, I suspected that might happen! Looks like it all worked pretty well and from the (very) little I know of this period, the game outcomes sound quite accurate/realistic?
ReplyDeleteSorry about the result Keith. From a historicity point of view, it ended too soon and too decisively. I didn’t quite achieve that long-drawn out war that delivered little (beyond Fred’s initial land grab).
DeleteSteve’s comment below is right in my opinion.
Chris
Well that concluded nice and quickly Chris! Good to read your post campaign thoughts too. Reading Duffy recently I was struck by how the battles during the SYW fell away quite sharply after the first year or two, as all sides had taken enough losses to render almost hors de combat for forth coming years, even after being in Winter quarters. Maybe something to consider for this?
ReplyDeleteYes, you’re right. I didn’t model the long-term attrition in war-fighting capacity very well. You could argue that that’s relative - all powers suffered it as well-trained veterans died off and money ran out. But something that makes them all wary of battle might be needed. More fortified camps?
DeleteI don’t get the sense that Austria ran out of steam in the 1740s in the same way it did in the early 1760s. I think that’s because they were much better prepared for the SYW and that ironically used up more of the state’s resources ‘efficiently’ and therefore spent them quicker.
I have to check out your other posts about that campaign. The emperors return to Munic is something so typical! I love it.
ReplyDeleteThanks for your comment. I know that the War(s) of the Austrian Succession is of particular interest to you, so your view is very welcome.
DeleteI thought that peace with France could not be gained if their Wittelsbach clients were not restored. And that Austria would not tolerate a French client in northern Italy. I forgot to add in my ‘peace treaty’ summary that France and Spain wanted to reduce their European expenditure because of the threat to their colonies by the British.
Chris/Nundanket
I've enjoyed lurking my way through these posts. Very interesting to follow. If you have Age Of Reason rules their campaign system Sport of Kings is quite good and their map is nicely arranged by dividing Europe into areas (not hex). Works by dividing the year into 4 campaign turns.
ReplyDeleteThanks Richard. I haven’t got the Age of Reason rules. I might look them up. Thanks for the tip.
ReplyDeleteChris/Nundanket