Today we're bringing you another round of updates for the Napoleonic Battles series of games. It's been about a year since our last round of updates for this series. During that time a few bugs surfaced, and those have been squashed... and a few new features are being added in as well.
Republican Bayonets on the Rhine was the first title to receive this update this past Monday when it was announced as Game of the Week (running through this Sunday night). Now we are bringing you a large block of titles... seven in this round. The balance will be updated next Friday. Todays lineup includes:
Additionally, we are publishing the first of two blog posts today by Andrew Bamford, On the Plains of Spain, which details his recent battlefield tours in the Spanish Peninsula this summer. A second blog will be following next week, if all goes well.
As mentioned, this round includes various bug fixes. Nothing too major this round... most only occurred in very specific circumstances:
And of course we continue to update and polish the documentation. Most of the games in the series also had various scenario, map and OOB adjustments as well - for any problem reported to the
Help Desk since the last round of updates.
Next we will look at the new and adjusted features and rules for the game:
The Fire Range command (Shift + F) displays not only the firing range for the selected unit's weapon, but also the facing, so it's clear what hexes are considered in the Front and which are on the flanks and rear, and in turn not able to be fired upon. In the first image we see a French battalion in Line selected, while the second image has a Skirmisher unit selected - which has no set facing.
Then we have a change to Zones of Control. Now a unit with a strength below 25 men will not exert a ZOC. It can still participate in combat, but it will not stop a formed unit in its tracks.
A change has also been made to the AI in how it handles artillery. Now it will make an assessment and fire all of its artillery batteries (in Turn mode) prior to executing movement commands. This will cut down on unnecessary limbering of units that had good valid targets within range.
And finally, the last change we want to highlight for this post, which should have a pretty significant impact on game play is - Recovery from Disorder will be automatic for units on their following turn if they only became disordered due to a movement event. So, if a unit in Line crosses a hedgerow and becomes Disordered it is slowed with all the Disorder effects for the balance of the turn, but upon the start of the following turn it will be in good order with full mobility. This is regardless of whether it is Detached or not, as it is assumed the Regimental/Battalion level leadership would be able to dress ranks and return the unit to good order on their own. This new rule applies to all unit types.
Additionally, the unit does not have to move out of the terrain... so a Cavalry unit that moved into a wooded lot and Disordered will return to good order on the following turn. If they move through offending terrain again on that turn then they will of course Disorder again.
Ok, will that concludes our preview of todays changes. We do suggest that you complete ongoing games before migrating to the newest version.
This round is an Update - which can be obtained from the
Support Hub page - so you do not have to do a clean install if you don't wish. But, as always, new fully up-to-date installers are also located in your
Store Account.
We will close things out with a few screen shots. We hope you enjoy this new version of the game engine.
It is hard coded.
If you like Disorder, you can also use the Line Movement Disorder and Movement Threat Disorder Rules. ;-)
Is the automatic recovery going to be an Optional Rule or baked in?
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