Sun of Austerlitz

Update

by Marc Grad

1. Austro-Russian Unit Manifest, 27-28 Nov: Kolowrat is under Kolowrat (not Kutusov). 2. French Leader Manifest, 27-28 Nov: Maj. General 1 Cav, Bourcier, should be in 3238. 3. Example of Play: The example is not reliable regarding exact positions and exact strengths, so cannot be relied upon in every detail. However it still accurately reflects the flow of play.

I setup the Austerlitz scenario today and tried to run through the Example of Play. Thanks for allowing me to send you these questions about the example of play. I have 4 of them. The first is from the French Forced March Phase in the second column of page 29. The other three are from the Austro-Russian Combat Phase, all on the left hand column of page 30 of the SoA Exclusive rules folder.

1) In the French Forced March Phase section: After Murat moves into Legrand's hex, the example says that Murat is using 5 1/2 out of his 6 for command span. Counting the Cav. units on Murat's display and counting Legrand's Subordination rating, I only get 5.

    Kellermann sub value = 1
    Nansouty =.5
    D'Hautpoul =.5
    Walther =.5
    Milhaud =.5
    Maj. Gen. Legrand = 2

2) After the first round of battle between Murat and Buxhowden the Sps are recalculated for Murat's counterattack. The Russians lost 1sp, but now they go from 17Sps to 14Sps. How is this possible? Since arty isn't used in odds calculation, then you would have 17-1 =16 (and not 21-1=20) Not sure where the 14 comes from?

3 )There is another attack in the first round between Duroc's regiment and Kienmayer's advance guard. Kienmayer gets a 2-1 attack and rolls a 6, which on the NA chart gives you a 3/2 result, and the Attacker is designated the loser of the round. Kienmayer retreats 6 miles, which should be 3 hexes since the scale is 2 miles/hex (Paragraph 9 standard rules). That also agrees with the chart result of 3. Problem is, he starts in hex 2224, yet the Example says he headed for the rear, stopping 6 miles away in hex 2622, which is FOUR hexes away or 8 miles.

4) Near the end of the Austro-Russian combat phase, the example states that both Murat and Buxhowden's forces lost a total of 8 Sps. I counted the French as losing 9SPs.

    French lose 3K in first Russian Attack
    French lose 2K in first French Counterattack
    French lose 1K to arty before second Russian Attack
    French lose 3K after they retreated, because pursuit was no lose and Russians lost 3K

I think there were a couple of more things later in the turn, but per your note I will stop here. Please let me know what you think.

[Ed sez: Marc, I think you are right. You are certainly right about the first instance (5 -not 5.5- is correct). I have looked at my original notebook and do not find anything to add. I wonder whether anyone else reading this has noticed these descrepancies in the Example of Play. I haven't had a chance to set-up the Battle Scenario again to run it through. Hopefully someone else on the list will be able to confirm all you have found. Clearly we will need to warn folks that the example can't be relied on in terms of all these specifics of factors. The most likely explanantion is that things were moving too quickly during the play test session, what with making notes regarding rules changes etc., and other events transpired that I failed to get down on paper.]

Here are some proposed corrections

French Forced March Phase

1) The example says Murat uses 5.5 of his Command Span of 6. *Actually Murat only used 5 of his command span.

Austro-Russian Combat Phase

2) After the 1st round of battle between Murat and Buxhowden, the combat odds are listed as 8 French strength points vs 14 Austro-Russians strength points. **The A-R should have 16 strength points.

3) In the combat between Duroc's regiment and Kienmayer's advanced guard, Kienmayer is forced to retreat 3 hexes from hex 2224 to hex 2622. **2622 is 4 hexes away from 2224. The retreat should leave Kienmayer's troops 3 hexes away in hex 2523.

4) Near the end of the Austro-Russian Combat Phase a sentence reads, "The battle is now over, and Buxhowden has won it, but at a serious cost to both sides-- 8 SPs each... **The French lost 9 SPs. In addition see #5 below for change to Vienna Morale roll.

    French lose 3K in first Russian Attack
    French lose 2K in first French Counterattack
    French lose 1K to arty before second Russian Attack
    French lose 3K after they retreated, because pursuit was no lose and Russians lost 3K

5) Since his (French) losses were greater than 7,000, there is a chance that this battle will affect morale... **See #4 above, According to [197] in the standard series rules folder, there is no change to morale if the non-retreating Force lost the most SPs. Since the Russians were the non-retreating force and they lost 1 less Strength Point than the French they are eligible to roll on the Vienna Morale table. They would need to roll a 1 (9-8) to make the Vienna Morale factor move. (As the example was written, since both sides lost 8 SPs, I don't think there would be a roll on the chart because you would have to roll a zero. (8-8=0)

French Player Turn

6) The 1st sentence reads, "The French will react slowly, however, as they have only 1 Movement Command on the first turn. (This will increase to three thereafter.)" **[210] The Exclusive Rules (Battle Scenario #3 Austerlitz) says that the French have 4 Movement Commands available on the 1st turn of the scenario, and it says they also have 4 MCs for each turn thereafter. I assume here that the example is incorrect, since I would expect the French to have at least as many MCs as the Coalition player, even on turn #1.

Russian Forced March Segment

7) Bagration proceeds into Kobelnitz at a cost of 3.5 MPs. **According to the A-R unit manifest, On 1-2 Dec. Bagration starts the game in Posoritz PO (hex 2220). Assuming Bagration moved through hexes 2221 (primary rd .5mp), 2222 (hill 1.5mp), and 2123 (town/clear 1mp), then his total MP usage would be 3 not 3.5 movement points.

French Combat Segment

8) French 3-2 attack in affecting terrain. The die roll is a 5. Results are both sides lose 2 SPs. ** According to the Combat Results Table, A roll of 5 at 3-2 in affecting terrain is a 3/2, not 2/2.

Please let me know what you think.

Back to OSG News February 2004 Table of Contents
Back to OSG News List of Issues
Back to Master Magazine List
© Copyright 2004 by Operational Studies Group

This article appears in MagWeb.com (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other articles from military history and related magazines are available at http://www.magweb.com