Developer Diary #2 – Recruiting units
Posted: Tue Feb 16, 2010 4:39 pm
Developer Diary #2 : Recruiting units
In Rise of Prussia, it is entirely possible to draft and recruit quite a hefty number of new units. This makes the game akin in this respect to AGEOD’s biggest success yet, American Civil War, which enable you to manage the Union or the Confederate nation during 4 years. But here, there is a twist: you don’t recruit units in the same way as in our previous title: the system is in fact very different.
In American Civil War, you would order units at the American State level (the Governor’s being very independent in nature from the central government), and units arrived in the cities and villages of the said State, without you knowing where exactly beforehand.
Here in Rise of Prussia, things are much more organized. You first activate the Construction Mode, which allow you to see what are the units available to your nations (remember, each side is a coalition, for example Austria fought alongside with France, Russia, Saxony – which changed side --, Sweden, etc.). Then, with the help of filters, you choose the exact type of unit you want: Austrian Line Infantry, Russian Grenadiers, French Cuirassiers? Finally, you drop the unit in a valid region. Valid regions are shown in green on the map, and the eligibility take into account quite a number of factors. First, to whom belongs the region. You simply can’t recruit Russians in Austrian land (or Cossacks in Moscow).
Then, the population of the region enforces a limit, as a given region can’t draft an unlimited number of troops per year. Spice that with special conditions (some units can only be recruited in some parts of a country, some units like guns can only be built in big cities, partisans need woods/mountainous regions, etc.) and you get something pretty realistic.
Overall, the system is simple while being vastly different from what we did in ACW.
But some core features remain, which are in the center of our design philosophy, let me share them with you, if you discover AGEOD with Rise of Prussia:
-Each unit type has a ‘force pool’, i.e. a maximum number of units which can be drafted of this type. You simply can’t flood the map with Russian Grenadiers. You’ll have to buy units (with some freedom though) in realistic ratio: Line regiments will always be more numerous than Grenadiers ones e.g.
-Units when drafted appear immediately on map, but totally unfit for battle, to the point that if the enemy manage to attack a recruiting center, the poor conscripts would be slaughtered. This is a feature which is dear to our hearts: Units just don’t appears magically when ready, they appears as cadres then get filled with conscripts troops over the course of time.
In Rise of Prussia, it is entirely possible to draft and recruit quite a hefty number of new units. This makes the game akin in this respect to AGEOD’s biggest success yet, American Civil War, which enable you to manage the Union or the Confederate nation during 4 years. But here, there is a twist: you don’t recruit units in the same way as in our previous title: the system is in fact very different.
In American Civil War, you would order units at the American State level (the Governor’s being very independent in nature from the central government), and units arrived in the cities and villages of the said State, without you knowing where exactly beforehand.
Here in Rise of Prussia, things are much more organized. You first activate the Construction Mode, which allow you to see what are the units available to your nations (remember, each side is a coalition, for example Austria fought alongside with France, Russia, Saxony – which changed side --, Sweden, etc.). Then, with the help of filters, you choose the exact type of unit you want: Austrian Line Infantry, Russian Grenadiers, French Cuirassiers? Finally, you drop the unit in a valid region. Valid regions are shown in green on the map, and the eligibility take into account quite a number of factors. First, to whom belongs the region. You simply can’t recruit Russians in Austrian land (or Cossacks in Moscow).
Then, the population of the region enforces a limit, as a given region can’t draft an unlimited number of troops per year. Spice that with special conditions (some units can only be recruited in some parts of a country, some units like guns can only be built in big cities, partisans need woods/mountainous regions, etc.) and you get something pretty realistic.
Overall, the system is simple while being vastly different from what we did in ACW.
But some core features remain, which are in the center of our design philosophy, let me share them with you, if you discover AGEOD with Rise of Prussia:
-Each unit type has a ‘force pool’, i.e. a maximum number of units which can be drafted of this type. You simply can’t flood the map with Russian Grenadiers. You’ll have to buy units (with some freedom though) in realistic ratio: Line regiments will always be more numerous than Grenadiers ones e.g.
-Units when drafted appear immediately on map, but totally unfit for battle, to the point that if the enemy manage to attack a recruiting center, the poor conscripts would be slaughtered. This is a feature which is dear to our hearts: Units just don’t appears magically when ready, they appears as cadres then get filled with conscripts troops over the course of time.
What's the deal with those "Depot battalions" ??? That "R" on its nato icons looks intriguing... 
