include g:\\winword\\crrspnd\\pbm\\au\\gmnews.doc \* MERGEFORMAT Hints'n'Tips
The following is a quick resumé of commonly made Austerlitz mistakes. Settle down in front of a roaring fire, mug of hot chocolate in hand, for a good long read...
SYMBOL 183 \f "Symbol" \s 10 \h In section -1- goods can only be transferred between national warehouses and barracks/shipyards. To transfer goods between a baggage train/ship and a national warehouse or barracks/shipyard then use sections -17- and -19-.
SYMBOL 183 \f "Symbol" \s 10 \h In section -1-, you also can't transfer goods directly to or from a Trade City. It would be good if you could, but you can't!
SYMBOL 183 \f "Symbol" \s 10 \h When Increasing Headcount in section -05-, the number of 'men' for the increase is actually the number of men that will be added to each battalion rather than the brigade as a whole!
SYMBOL 183 \f "Symbol" \s 10 \h The goods required to fortify a barracks/shipyard are actually taken from the National Warehouse. The precondition listed in the rulebook, which says that the goods are taken from the barracks itself is actually a typo.
SYMBOL 183 \f "Symbol" \s 10 \h Each production site requires 1,500 citizens as staff, and if there aren't enough in the national warehouse then an error is generated. This should have been in the rulebook, but was somehow lost in translation.
SYMBOL 183 \f "Symbol" \s 10 \h In sections -17- and -19-, Trade and Loading, you can't actually load goods into or out of a federation. Instead you have to individually load them directly onto the ships/baggage trains in the federation so that the program knows where everything goes!
SYMBOL 183 \f "Symbol" \s 10 \h In section -20-, Boarding, you can't load a federation directly onto a fleet. The rulebook does sort of hint that you can, but believe me, you can't! Instead brigades must be loaded individually onto a fleet, and commanders onto ships.
SYMBOL 183 \f "Symbol" \s 10 \h When disembarking troops in section -20- you do not have to specify the fleet, unless, of course, your brigades are on someone else's fleets.
SYMBOL 183 \f "Symbol" \s 10 \h When I said in the newsletter to write '10x' against each trade command in order to save writing out all the multiple trade orders, I should have also said that you're still limited to just the normal 18 trade commands! So writing '10x' against each and every order means that you rapidly run out of trade orders...
SYMBOL 183 \f "Symbol" \s 10 \h How do blockades work? Each blockading fleet protects the eight coordinates around it, plus the coordinate it is on:
Fleet
If any fleet of an enemy nation (relationship 1 or 2) enters any of the nine coordinates then the fleet will move to attack them.
SYMBOL 183 \f "Symbol" \s 10 \h And finally, the old Austerlitz cashflow problem! At the start of each month in Austertlitz, before any orders are processed, all the maintenance costs, wages, etc, for your empire are taken from the national warehouses. This means that the figure for Louisdore on the empire sheet for the previous month is quickly whittled away by the costs of running the empire! So you have to work out exactly how much money you have available before allocating any of it! You don't have to be an accountant to play Austerlitz, but it helps...