Plan XVII

[Bossy57322]

Thoroughly enjoying the game. A question however.

Trying to execute a "pure" Schlieffen Plan but the French (AI) reaction is ahistorical from what I'm seeing. Plan XVII called for a strong push in the center/right and, to encourage this, I pulled the German left back to entice them forward, "into the bag" as it were. A French cavalry unit duly took Metz and I fell back to a line behind it, weakend the German left a bit more and sent an open invitation to the French to attack, as they would have done under plan XVII. Instead, they reacted as they did during the war, abandoning their "gains" but without pressing any offensive at all. Joffre would have pushed forward under such circumstances.......

I'm guessing this is an issue of play balance as it is clear (in this game at least) that had the original Schlieffen Plan met Plan XVII, the result would have been the destruction of the French forces from 3 sides somewhere in Eastern France. Is it just impossible to execute Plan XVII as an AI routine because it was doomed to fail?

*Edit* Russians pressing hard in the east - beating up Austria-Hungary and starting to press on East Prussia. Nice!

[Hubert Cater]

This is one of those tough calls on my part when implementing the AI because on the one hand if I have the AI play historically in this case and it is too easy to defeat then this can come across as a criticism of the game or even worse a weak AI opponent.

Usually, and this is just from a design point of view, I will take the safest route and do my best to not have the AI make the same mistakes as happened historically or play the safer strategies so as to at least avoid potential criticism.

I realize that this might not be the answer you were looking for but I just wanted to give you an idea regarding what the AI has been scripted to do here.

Hope this helps,

Hubert

[wlape3]

I'm assuming it would be possible to script in more historical behavior for the French AI if a true test of plan 17 meeting the original Schlieffen plan was set up in a mod?

[Bossy57322]

This is one of those tough calls on my part when implementing the AI because on the one hand if I have the AI play historically in this case and it is too easy to defeat then this can come across as a criticism of the game or even worse a weak AI opponent.

Usually, and this is just from a design point of view, I will take the safest route and do my best to not have the AI make the same mistakes as happened historically or play the safer strategies so as to at least avoid potential criticism.

I realize that this might not be the answer you were looking for but I just wanted to give you an idea regarding what the AI has been scripted to do here.

Hope this helps,

Hubert

Kinda figured that. So far, it makes it REALLY difficult to come anywhere close to defeating the French in a war of movement in 1914. I actually had some success going the other way, through Mulhouse on the German left/ French right which dislocated the French a bit.

At some point in a future it would be fun to explore this, also maybe an add-on pack based on the various crisis (Adagir, etc).

The Russians really take it to A-H in the East. Great stuff there.

Still haven't explored but a fraction of this game.

[Bill101]

Attacking via Mulhouse is a very good way of keeping French forces pinned in this sector, and the effort should help out your forces advancing through northern France.

Making the French AI attack all out in Alsace-Lorraine is a bit tricky because we all have the benefit of hindsight and can see that it was a daft idea unless the circumstances were right, i.e. that the German right wing had been sufficiently beaten and their left was also very weak. This doesn't mean that we won't consider it further of course.

Yet the fact that the French AI was able to take Metz is quite extraordinary, or had you left it empty?

[Bossy57322]

Attacking via Mulhouse is a very good way of keeping French forces pinned in this sector, and the effort should help out your forces advancing through northern France.

Making the French AI attack all out in Alsace-Lorraine is a bit tricky because we all have the benefit of hindsight and can see that it was a daft idea unless the circumstances were right, i.e. that the German right wing had been sufficiently beaten and their left was also very weak. This doesn't mean that we won't consider it further of course.

Yet the fact that the French AI was able to take Metz is quite extraordinary, or had you left it empty?

Left it empty. I've done this twice but the AI will not bring units up to support this move so I can pretty much take it back at my leisure.

The Mulhouse move has allowed me to throw cavalry deep into the heart of France which, I would think, should have an effect on French dispositions and morale. Also, when Cavalry is out of supply, it seems their movement is restricted. Should this be the case?

The thing with Plan XVII and this game is that is simulates the results of its failure without it actually failing. The main French effort at the beginning of the war was into Alsace-Lorraine and the French were slaughtered precisely because the modified Schlieffen Plan deviated from the original in that the German left was far too strong from what was intended. This, more than anything, convinced Joffre to break it off and to start to meet the threat coming from Belgium. Had Moltke left the plan alone, Joffre would have played right into his hands and the war in France would have been over in 1914. As it is, relatively fresh French units are on the move instead of battered ones.

Another question - Is English intervention inevitable if Germany bypasses Belgium and tries to ram its way through the center? Haven't tried that yet but just wondering.....

All that said these are great areas to explore in a future patch/ release. For now, I am able to clear out Belgium in short order and meet with the French and British in northern France and get on with it.

Absolutely impressed with the map, design, the pace, the way events are handled - the whole package. This is a great game - it suits the SC engine best IMHO - and I'm having a ball playing it.

[Bill101]

Hi

Cavalry movement when out of supply is very low to prevent them from being able to raid indefinitely behind enemy lines. That might make more sense in an American Civil War campaign, but it was found in testing that a WWI Cavalry Corps being able to roam quite far when out of supply just didn't feel at all right.

British intervention is inevitable in the default campaigns because they were mobilizing for war when Belgium was invaded.

We'll never know for sure exactly what impact on their actual war entry date a German decision to not attack Belgium might have had, but it would probably have been minimal. Niall Ferguson in his The Pity of War estimates that even if the British government had fallen it would only have made a difference of a week.

[Bossy57322]

We'll never know for sure exactly what impact on their actual war entry date a German decision to not attack Belgium might have had, but it would probably have been minimal. Niall Ferguson in his The Pity of War estimates that even if the British government had fallen it would only have made a difference of a week.

Agreed. Most recent scholarship concurs British intervention was inevitable. Just wondering how you folks handled it.

Is Belgium open to the same type of diplomatic bidding as Holland if Germany avoids them or are they inevitably coming in with the Entente as well?

[Bill101]

Belgium will be open to bidding, or even an attack by the Entente if they are really feeling that way inclined.

[Bossy57322]

Belgium will be open to bidding, or even an attack by the Entente if they are really feeling that way inclined.

So Belgium could become an ally of the Central Powers?

[Bill101]

With a massive amount of diplomatic investment by the Central Powers, theoretically, yes.

But the cost would be huge as Belgium starts with a pro-Entente leaning, and the expense would almost certainly be much better spent elsewhere.

[Bertram]

The original question though, was if the British would enter the entente, if Belgium was left alone. Sadly I have to answer "yes". I tried a game in which I did not declare war on Belgium - I wanted to try to limit the war in the West, and go for Russia first. The British joined the Entente the next turn anyway, and immediatly started blocking German commerce. As the Germans have no points to spend the first turn, they can not try to influence British policy (not sure if that would make any difference at all).

This is a bit of a shame - I think the British involvement wasn't a given, if the Germans would not have invaded Belgium, and it makes for an interesting alternative strategy.

[Bossy57322]

This is a bit of a shame - I think the British involvement wasn't a given, if the Germans would not have invaded Belgium, and it makes for an interesting alternative strategy.

Perhaps a variable chance at entry with odds of involvement increasing as time goes on but giving the Germans a chance to delay the inevitable further by spending on diplomatic points?

I wish I knew how to mod these things because a Franco-Prussian War scenario with all the variables would be a really interesting exercise and fit this engine well......

[Bill101]

This is a bit of a shame - I think the British involvement wasn't a given, if the Germans would not have invaded Belgium, and it makes for an interesting alternative strategy.

Given what happened it's very hard to be 100% sure either way, but from reading about the build up to the war in the UK, it was the German threat to France that had the British wound up, because it was feared that with France beaten, Germany would be able to challenge the UK.

The attack on Belgium (which came after the UK started mobilizing for war) gave the British the ability to present the war as a defensive one, in aid of Belgium whose neutrality had been violated. Thus it was much easier to sell the war to the public than if the UK had just entered the war to go to the aid of France.

But maybe I've just read the historians who think this! Are there some who argue strongly that the British may have remained neutral, if only for a few months? If so I'd be interested to read their arguments.

[Jail Bird]

I'm not sure Britain would have jumped in right off if Belgium had not been invaded. I don't think they were spoiling for a war on the continent and were more concerned with increasing the empire outside the confines of Europe. I believe the Entente Cordiale was in place but was not a "war alliance" but was in place only to resolve colonial issues within the empires global aspirations That along with the Anglo-Russian Entente makes up the Triple Entente which was most defiantly not a military alliance. It seems to me that with all the interlocking alliances that caused the war Britain seems to have possibly purposely avoided such pacts. Additionally I think it is interesting to note that Britain was not involved in any of the four or five wars that proceeded WWI (I think). I do not believe they had a master plan such as the Schlieffen Plan or Plan XVII which would facilitate a place in a continental war. It is safe to say that Britain would have been drawn in at some point in 1914 due to the fact that the war would have created logistical issues with resources and the concerns they had over German aggression from a global view point. This is highlighted by the arms race they were engaged in with Germany on the high seas. It's all speculation of course and in the end it is fascinating how a political incident involving a petty autocrat dragged humanity into a blast furnace like frenzy of death and destruction.