Game of the Week - Jan 6 - 12

Now that the store wide sale has wrapped up, it is time for us to resume our weekly Game of the Week promotions. We're leading off this new year with a title from our Napoleonic Battles series - Campaign 1814. This title will be on sale at 25% off until Sunday, January 12th.

After the decisive Battle of Leipzig, the French retreated to the Rhine and beyond into France. Following them were the victorious forces of the Sixth Coalition. Napoleon positioned his forces on the Rhine, in Holland and in Belgium, and then left for Paris to build new field commands. Eugene was in northern Italy facing an Austrian army under Bellegarde. And of course the war in Spain was winding down.

The Allies did not wait for Napoleon to bring up his new army and began to cross the Rhine at several points. The understrength French corps were no match for the Allied juggernaut and retired by stages closer to the west. By the end of January, the Allies had advanced to within one hundred miles of Paris!

What followed from that point until the end of the campaign was one of Napoleon's most remarkable campaigns. Fielding an army one third the size of the Allied forces, he won one stunning victory after another. Unfortunately, he was never able to achieve a decisive victory. The Allied armies gradually ground down the outnumbered French troops, and after the Battle of Paris he was forced to abdicate.

As either Napoleon, Emperor of the French and King of Italy, or as Schwarzenberg and Blücher, field commanders of the Allied legions, you can relive those exciting days! All of the major actions of the 1814 Campaign in northwest France are covered in detail. Units such as the Gendarmes d'Espagne and the Baden Guard Grenadiers have been added to the 1813-14 inventory for the players to command.

Come experience the drama of the campaign as your men shiver in the cold waiting for your next command. Will you, as Napoleon, keep your throne or, as the Allied commanders, march victoriously into Paris? The choice is yours as you ride off into destiny!

The battles covered by this title are:

Bar-sur-Aube
Brienne
La_Rothiere
Mincio
Champaubert
Montmirail
Chateau-Theirry
Vauchamps
Mormant-Montereau
Montereau
Craonne
Laon_Semilly
Reims
Arcis-sur-Aube
Fere-Champenoise
St-Dizier
Paris

This title was published originally with 10-minute turn scenarios only, but with recent updates 15-minute versions have also been added. Additionally, there are many actions that have both a version to play Solo against the AI or against another person (Head-to-Head). The stand alone scenarios, along with those included for the Campaigns, bring the count to a staggering 758 scenario total. That number will whittle down based on your play preferences, but regardless, there is a lot of variety included.

Along those lines there are 8 Campaigns included with the game, each having variants in 15-minute & 10-minute turns as well as for Solo or HTH play.

Campaigns covered in the game are (listed in chronological order):

Napoleon's First Lunge South

This campaign covers the period of time from 26 January to 2 February. The battles of Brienne and La Rothière are covered in this time period. A small action at St. Dizier also occurred at this time. Napoleon starts at Châlons-sur-Marne and the campaign ends further to the south.

Napoleon's First Lunge North

This campaign covers the period of time when Napoleon trailed Blücher to the Brie Plateau area when the latter was making his first move on Paris. The French army over the period from 10-14 February won four engagements and drove Blucher away from Paris. While Napoleon's overall goals of destroying the army were not achieved, he was able to decimate several of the Allied corps. Olsufiev's, for instance, would be a shell of its former self for the duration of the campaign. Yorck's 1st Corps suffered enormous losses as did the other Allied formations. It was truly the main event of the game to model and a must to have in the game.

Napoleon's Second Lunge South

This campaign covers the period of time from February 17 to 21. After Napoleon had dispatched Blücher, he used the better roads to move south and try and catch Schwarzenberg's formations before they could escape. He dealt Wittgentstein and Wurrtemberg a severe blow on the 17th and 18th, and almost caught the 3rd Armeekorps of Gylui as well. Schwarzenberg backed away to the southeast avoiding battle at Troyes, but that action is included to allow the players to explore the "what-if" of the situation.

The Tiger of France

This links the first three campaigns together. Napoleon's apogee was reached at Montereau. After that he would always be terribly outnumbered, and generally the course of the campaign would be one of misery. He would enjoy victories, but they would be empty. The campaign has some "what-if" appeal to it and allows the players to take a slightly divergent course of action.

Napoleon's Second Lunge North

This campaign covers the actions of Laon, Craonne, Reims and Soissons. The period during the long march up to the north is covered in narrative. Blücher's second attempt to move on Paris was foiled, but at great loss.

Napoleon's Last Gamble

This campaign covers the final battles of the campaign. It has little deviation from the historical choices, with the exception that the French player can choose to not make the flank march that left Napoleon far to the east while Paris was in peril.

The Last Dance

This campaign links the preceding two campaigns together to allow the players to fight out the twilight battles of the campaign: everything from Craonne to Paris.

La Patrie en Danger

This is entire campaign. All of the campaigns were linked together to create this campaign file. It is rather linear, but for those that want to fight the entire campaign here it is. In the future, provided I get some time, I plan on adding in more options which will allow the players to explore more avenues that were available to the commanders of each side.

As with every title in the Napoleonic Battles series, this title includes Scenario & Campaign Editors which will allow you to make your own changes and create your own custom scenarios if you wish. There are 23 maps included with the game, the largest of which is ~369,000 hexes!

Additionally, there are campaign maps covering the various segments of this campaign year, an "Armies 1813-1814" document detailing the troops included (which the screen shots above were taken from), Design Notes, charts and various other documents to reference while playing the game.

This video, while long, does a good job of covering the Napoleonic period from 1809 until 1814, which helps place things in context for the campaign this game covers. The last 30 minutes or so (from time 2:52 on) focus on the 1814 campaign.

And now for some books on the period. This first one is only available in French on Amazon.

And now here's some in-game images for you to view. Again, as with the entire Napoleonic Battles series (14 games + Demo) you have five different views to choose from. Three 2D and two 3D views, as well as three different sets of 2D icons.

(All images can be clicked for full size viewing.)

Finally, here's the Napoleonic Battles specific section on the Official WDS forums if you wish to discuss the game, or any games within that series.

And that brings us to the conclusion of today's post. There's literally hundreds if not thousands of hours of game play to be had in this title - so what are you waiting for? Head on over to the Campaign 1814 product page and pickup a copy for yourself! 

Vive l'Empereur!