June DevBlog - Officers Pt. 1

Mon Général!

Managing your military is one of the key tasks in a campaign game. Let’s start with officers. When describing how the officers work in GT2: Napoleonic Wars, let’s compare the changes to how officers work in GT1: The Civil War. While the big picture remains similar, we’ve added a bit more player involvement in how the officers’ careers will progress and what they can become.

Steam post image Image (ASSETS ARE NOT FINAL!): commander info, career honours, attribute progression and seniority.

Attribute Improvements

Officers command your most important units, both on land and on sea. In addition to field command positions, there are also staff positions, a bit like in the Whiskey & Lemons DLC. We’ll take a look at the staff in a later blog. The main difference to GT1 is scale. In the Italian campaign single units are battalions, squadrons and batteries. Officers command brigades and divisions, not single units like in GT1, where single units are brigades.

What we wanted to improve in GT2 is the players’ attachment to their commanders. Here, another sip of Whiskey & Lemons is served. In GT1, the officers have their attributes according to (a person’s opinion on) their historical performance. This “score” is the maximum the officer can have, and how much of it he can utilize depends on experience. So, a commander with low initiative will remain so, whatever you do.

This has now changed. Instead, when a commander gains experience in battles, he will generate “attribute points.” When enough points are available, the commander may be assigned one additional star in one of his attributes. So, while in the starting attributes the officer in question may have low leadership skills, you can improve this as he gains experience. Or you can strengthen the already stronger attributes, it’s up to you!

Decorations

The tracked commander attributes are, like in GT1:

• experience: gained through battles, required for promotions, increases attributes

• fame: increases morale and chances of promotion

• leadership: how good the commander is leading people, improves morale and training

• initiative: aggressiveness and decision making speed, reduces order delays and improves speed of operations

• administration: management skills within an organization, increases supply efficiency and training

• cunning: improves scouting and adaptation of tactics, reduces upkeep cost.

There is one further attribute the commanders have compared to GT1: loyalty. Loyal officers will fight harder for their nation. On the other hand, officers who feel unappreciated will have lower morale and may feud with fellow officers more often.

To improve officers’ attributes, there are also decorations. These are accumulated via what we call “honour points” during battles. After a successful battle, you may be able to decorate your officers with medals and grant them titles. For example, after that hard fought battle, award your Austrian General-major a Ritterkreuz and a title of Ritter (knight), which will increase his fame and loyalty substantially.

Playing the French in 1796, there are no medals or titles to award – that would make citizens un-equal! But before the prospect of colored ribbon, there were other things men fought long and hard for. Such as a mention in the Order of the Day, where one’s name and deed are read aloud to the entire army and formally printed in the official newspapers in Paris!

Seniority and Senility

So, you can award your officers with bling of many kinds to make them happy. But you can also make them unhappy. Few things are as fascinating as the system of seniority within military, even today. Even if an official seniority system is not in place, officers believe and especially expect promotions to happen according to time spent in uniform. Bypassing others is always due to merit, being bypassed by a "child-lieutenant" is a direct attack against one’s loyal, meritorious and selfless service! This is especially true in 18-19th century Europe if compared to the Civil War, where captains were made major generals (of volunteers) overnight.

Seniority is calculated from the date of the most recent promotion within the current rank. A Général de division is automatically senior to Général de brigade. But within the rank of Général de brigade, the one obtaining the rank in 1792 is senior to one promoted to this rank in 1795. So, in case of promotion to Général de division, the former expects to get the promotion before the latter. If you as the player decide to disregard seniority and promote the younger officer, this can be done, but not without upsetting the older brigadier.

In the later, longer campaigns, old age will also play its part, unlike in GT1, where officers could only die in battle. During this era, officers did not have a fixed retirement age or pension system, they served until they were no longer capable or politically removed. This means the old dogs will hang around and expect senior command positions even as their age takes its toll, randomly decreasing attributes. And yes, they will also die of old age.

In combination with all the above, officers are no longer available in numbers like in GT1. Even if every soldier is carrying a marshal’s baton in his knapsack, only a limited number at a time are available for promotion. The limited reserve of officers will always be replenished, but players can no longer simply cherry-pick Desaix and make him the next Napoleon, as there are many others, senior to him, waiting in line.

All this combined means players will have more tools for managing their officer corps, but at the same time the pool of replacements is limited. While sacking uncompetitive or failed commanders is still possible (no, guillotine is not an option) it makes much more sense to move up the ladder one step at a time and pay more attention to individual officers than before.

Cheers,

Grand Engineer Corps