Austerlitz +204

Scenario set-up from Napoleon's Battles Module Two
copyright 1994, The Avalon Hill Game Co.

Despite the fact that a half-dozen or so of my favorite games are set in the Napoleonic era, I'm not really a Napoleonics fan. It's juts that the man is just about unavoidable if you're going to be an avid wargamer or serious student of history. He may have been a man of short stature, but he strides like a colossus through European History. Few individuals have had such an outsize influence in history that an entire era is named after them. His Maxims have been studied by aspiring generals since the 1820s and the attempt to understand and communicate his genius inspired two of the most influential treatises on military strategy ever written, The Art of War by Baron Antoine Henri de Jomini, and On War, by Carl von Clausewitz.

Napoleon personally commanded on at least 65 battlefields from Montenotte on Apr. 12, 1796 to Waterloo on June 18, 1815, but he reportedly considered the Battle of Austerlitz, fought on Dec. 2, 1805, as his masterpiece. It was definitely a battle won by superior generalship. Napoleon set a trap for his opponents and they walked right into it, allowing him to wreck a great army.

Yet it was not, despite its cleverness and lopsided casualty count, a decisive battle. As a matter of fact, Austerlitz merely inaugurated an intense period of fighting that lasted four more years and involved a dozen more battles including Jena, Eylau, Freidland, Aspern-Essling and Wagram.

And despite its lopsided outcome, that outcome was hardly a foregone conclusion. While the French Army was at its peak of effectiveness, having undergone intensive training for the planned invasion of Britain, was buoyed by a victory at Ulm and fresh from several years of peace, it was outnumbered by a substantial amount. And while the Allies were hobbled by antiquated organizations and a confused command structure, they had good troops on the field.

So the situation is perfect for a good wargame -- two evenly matched, but not identical, armies, facing each other on the field of battle.

Map detail from Austerlitz, Battle of Three Emperors
copyright 1973 Simulations Publications, Inc.

As I said, I'm not a big Napoleonics fan, despite appearances. There have been many good Austerlitz games published, but I only have a few. Austerlitz is a scenario in the Napoleon's Battles miniatures game system, but its not a scenario I've ever played. I have played the old SPI quad game Austerlitz -- Battle of Three Emperors, but that's merely because it's one of the games offered on Hexwar.com. The game is your typical quad game, which mean that it's not much of a simulation, really, but it is a pretty decent hex-and-counter wargame from that era. It's one of the more popular games offered on Hexwar and is reasonable well-balanced.

Map detail from Napoleon's Triumph
copyright 2006 Simmons Games

My third Austerlitz title is Napoleon's Triumph by Bowen Simmons, which I definitely bought based on the reputation of the designer. I was extremely impressed by his Bonaparte at Marengo game and I knew that the NT game system was inspired by the earlier game. It's not accurate to describe the two as being in the same system, as there are bigger differences between them than there are between, for example, the SPI quad games on Marengo and Austerlitz. It's an interesting bit of trivia that Marengo was the last battle Napoleon fought as General Bonaparte and Austerlitz was the first full-scale field battle he fought as Emperor-- and it was fought on the anniversary of his ascension to the throne.

Napoleon's Triumph is my current top wargame, even though I haven't played it anywhere near enough times to suit me. As important as I believe theme to be in wargames, I'm primarily a fan of NT for it's virtues as a game. A legitimate criticism of Bonaparte of Marengo is that it's a bit stereotyped in play and isn't good at replicating the historical battle. Napoleon's Triumph, on the other hand, manages to be much more free-wheeling while at the same time holding out the real possibility of replicating the general course of the battle.

It's also, of course, a handsomely produced game, but the best feature is the game play. Having the game has prompted me to look more closely at the Battle of Austerlitz, which I think is the hallmark of a good wargame -- it inspires a deeper appreciation of history.

More thoughts on Austerlitz strategy for the Allies

I've now got a few more plays under my belt and adjusted my thoughts on Allied strategy accordingly.

I still think the French side is easier to play. They have the better army, with a larger stacking limit, a finer degree of articulation in units strengths (making it easier to achieve efficient odds and exchanges) and faster units. All these things make that side easier to handle. The speedy units, especially, make it possible for the French player to react to whatever strategy the Austro-Russians pursue.

The Austro-Russian allies do start with the initiative, and if they fail to keep it the French will eat their lunch.

There are three general strategies available to the Allies. My initial preference was to give up on the idea of winning by exiting units and concentrate on winning the attrition race to demoralization and seek out a decisive battle in the center of the map. With more experience I conclude that my aim was sound, but my means was deficient. It's certainly possible for the Allies to win such a battle, but against a clever French player the odds are not good. The French stacking advantage and speed will tend to result in unfavorable matchups in a main force confrontation. It's true that whichever side gets demoralized first will promptly lose, but on average it will be the Allies who suffer that fate.

A second approach that shows some promise is to try to pull the Allied army back in good order and exit off the East edge. Against a cautious or slow French player this can work. The threat of exiting most of the army may panic the French into attacking too hastily. If they do the Allies may have a chance to destroy enough French to demoralize them. Even if they don't, the Allies may be able to get enough off to win. The best French counter is a strong attack to demoralise the Austrians quickly, cut off their escape route off map and then mop up the survivors. Because there is a good counter strategy, however, it may not be as effective as the third choice. It's also likely to result something less than a decisive win for the Allies, if they win at all.

That involves making a serious effort to follow the historical Austro-Russian plan and attack on the left. The right flank Allied units and the small reinforcement group should stand on the defense at first and try to lure the French into committing a sizable force to that sector. If the French ignore them, move up. If they send too few troops over, kill them. If they send too many to fight, exit the map. The points probably won't count, but they won't count for the French, either.

Meanwhile, the Allied main body moves at top speed against the French right and the high-value exit area. They're not fast enough to make it off before the French get there, but the threat may induce the French to approach in a piecemeal fashion. If they do, then the Allies have set the stage for a winning attrition battle against just a portion of the French army. It's no sure thing, but it provides a good chance to demoralize the French. If demoralized, the surviving French will not be able to stop the Austrians from exiting enough to win a decisive victory.

SPI's Austerlitz -- terrain issues

By 1973 Jim Dunnigan's wargame-producing system was cranking up into full gear. One technique that made this possible was creating game systems that could be ported to cover many different battles. One of these was the Napoleon at War system which started with Napoleon at Waterloo, but was soon expanded to cover many other Napoleonic-era battles and, with suitable modifications, formed the basis for the "quads" on many other eras from pike and shot through modern warfare (and even naval warfare in Sixth Fleet!).
The main advantage of this approach from a gamer's point of view was providing a large number of new game situations without requiring the player to learn a whole new set of rules. The underlying validity of this approach has been proven time and again and still powers game systems such as Borg's Commands and Colors, Advanced Squad Leader, Great Campaigns of the American Civil War, Great War at Sea, PanzerGrenadier and many others.
The disadvantage of this approach is that it can result in a game system that ends up ignoring the factors that made each battle unique or affected it in an unusual way. One might easily end up with a wargame on a battle that fails to bear much resemblance to the historical event. As much as SPI emphasized history in it designs, this flaw existed in many of their games.
Among them is the NAW-system game Austerlitz: Battle of Three Emperors.
The state of the art in game design in the 1970s advanced at a rapid clip, but unevenly. There were early strides with improved orders of battle and a lot of the really big mistakes that rendered early Avalon Hill efforts like Stalingrad and Afrika Korps fanciful were corrected with better research. Austerlitz includes a complete and reasonably accurate OB that makes some interesting distinctions in strength and movement capabilities between different units and between the two armies as a whole. Overall, the French have a significant edge in speed, generally moving 1 movement point faster than the equivalent Austro-Russian units. Fair enough.
Terrain analysis in 1970s era games, on the other hand, still tended to be simplistic and often missed the point. In Austerlitz the waterways are depicted appropriately, but the towns tend to be too small, which starts to distort the effect the battlefield had on the course of the fighting. The game also doesn't make any functional distinction between cavalry and infantry other than movement allowances, so cavalry units can benefit from fighting in towns, which is quite unhistorical. Artillery units can also benefit from occupying town sites, which is also contrary to historical practice and experience.
The game most misses the mark, however, in its treatment of elevation. One can't read an account of Austerlitz without soon hearing about the Pratzen Heights, which was the dominant terrain feature affecting the fighting. The mile-wide plateau is reduced to a single-hex knoll, which ends up being a position of minor local importance instead of the battlefield's key terrain.
Apparently the designer, John Young, was misled by the gently rolling terrain of the battlefield into thinking the elevations were not important because there were no high, steeply-sided hills. (Actually, there was one, the Santon, on the French left, but it doesn't appear in the game at all).
But a height advantage in military terms is extremely relative, not absolute. In otherwise flat terrain a very slight elevation advantage can take enormous importance, while in hilly ground a steep hill may be unimportant if it's overlooked by higher ground nearby.
On the Austerlitz battlefield the Pratzen Plateau was important, not because it was difficult ground, but because it was high enough to hide troop movements, provide a defensive advantage and when occupied by the French, completely dominate the Allied position.
Coping with this kind of effect was beyond the scope of a 1970s-era wargame, but it means that Austerlitz, the game, ends up bearing little resemblance to the actual battle.
Other aspects of the game working against its historical authenticity are the victory conditions, which seem to be designed to induce the Allied player into making an attempt to strike the French right as per the actual historical plan. This course of action stands little chance of success, however, and most allied players turn their attention to winning the slugfest in the center of the battlefield. Whichever army becomes demoralized first (by losing 70 combat factors worth of units) will almost certainly go on to lose the game, given the severe penalties of demoralization. (Demoralized units lose their zones of control and have their combat strengths cut in half.)
Another terrain oddity on the map is the "Abbey" near Sokolnitz Castle. The game makes this a very strong position, quadrupling the combat strength of any unit occupying it, but I don't see a reference to such a location in accounts of the battle. It doesn't appear in the game Napoleon's Triumph, which has a very detailed and sophisticated terrain analysis nor is there any reference to it in Osprey's campaign book Austerlitz 1805, which includes several detailed battlefield maps.
Austerlitz is an interesting and challenging game. As a matter of fact, it's one of the best-balanced wargames ever. According to Hexwar.com's statistics as of Jan. 16, 2008, the French side as won 793 times, and the Allies 783 times, a ratio of 50.3/49.7. It's just not very much like Austerlitz.