From: "angriff@flash.net" Subject: 3W - Fred. the Great stuff I thaught you might be interested in posting this. I've also attached it as a file, if you'd prefer to use that. Thanks, James Urban =) I recently aquired a coopy of 3W's The Campaigns of Frederick the Great, designed by Rob Markham. One reason I like to play these types of games is to learn something about history. Unfortunately, one thing noticably missing from this game are discriptions of the scenarios. So, here are my discriptions for each scenario: The Seven Years' War background: Austria, France, Russia, Sweden and Saxony, concerned about the power of Prussia, formed a coalition to curb Prussia's plans for further expansion. England, fighting on Prussia's side, was heavily committed in North America with the French and Indian War and couldn't contribute large numbers of troops to the European theater. Scenario 1: August - November 1756 Frederick, having learned about the coalition's intentions, struck first. He entered Saxony with 70,000 troops (leaving 80,000 to gurad the eastern and northern borders) and occupied Dresden on 10 September, 1756. The 14,000 Saxon troops could not hold against the 70,000 Prussians, so they fell back to Prina where they were subsequently besieged. Marshal von Browne was marching an Austrian relief force of 50,000 men towards Prina when Frederick attacked them in the Erzgebirge mountains. The Austrians fled and Saxony fell. The Saxon troops were absorbed into Prussia's army. Scenario 2: March - December 1757 During the winter, the Austrians had concentrated 70,000 men in Prague, under the command of Prince Charles. In April, Frederick advanced on this army with 65,000 men from Prina. They arrived on 6 May and defeated the Austrians in a brief but bloody battle. Frederick broke the Austrian forces and beseiged Prague. The Austrians then marched 60,000 troops under Marshal von Daun to releive the city. Frederick split his forces, taking about 32,000 men, and attacked the Austrians at Kolin an 18 June, 1757. The Austrians defeated Frederick's army and relieved Prague. Frederick was forced to abandon Bohemia. In July, 100,000 French troops invaded Hanover, meeting the 40,000 Prussian troops which had been stationed there since April under William Augustus. Another 24,000 French and 60,000 Austrians were advancing to join the main Austrian force pursuing the Prussians as they withdrew back to Prussia. A further 100,000 Russian troops began their advance into East Prussia, commanded by Marshal Apraksin. The Duke of Cumberland was defeated by the invading French army in the battle of Hastenbeck on 26 July, and was forced to withdraw from Hanover. Four days later, the 30,000 Prussian forces under General von Lehwald were defeated by Russian forces at the battle of Gross-Jaegersdorf. In October, the Austrians plundered Berlin. In November, Frederick soundly defeated the Austrio-French forces in the Battle of Rossbach, losing only 550 men, compared to 10,000 French losses. Having turned back the main attacking force, Frederick immediately rejoined his forces fighting Silesia. On 6 December, at the battle of Leuthen, Price Charles' Austrians (65,000) awaited the inevitible Prussian assult. In the battle which was to become the defining moment for Frederick the Great (and which Napoleon called a "masterpiece of maneuver and resolution."), the Prussian forces (33,000) defeated the Austrians, inflicting over 6,500 casualties and capturing over 12,000 Austrians, 51 colors, and 116 guns. Prussian losses were about 6,100. Five days later, Breslau's Austrian force of 17,000 troops surrendered. This year's campaign was over. Scenario 4: May - November 1758 With muddy roads hindering any Russian or Swedish invasions until summer, Frederick once again began the campaigning season by advancing on the Austrians in Moravia. While investing Olmuetz, he learned the Russians had advanced to the Oder (July). He lifted is seige and moved his forces to intercept the Russian troops, while Ferdinand of Brunswick pushed the French back over the Rhine. By the end of August, Frederick had arrived at the Oder river and attacked the Russian forces besieging Kustrin - the battle of Zorndorf was fought on 25 August, 1758. Frederick's 36,000 troops attacked General Fermor's 45,000 troops - a bloody butchering of men ensued. 18,500 Russians were killed, as were 12,800 Prussians. The remaining Russian troops retreated to Koenigsberg but the exhausted Prussians were in no shape to pursue. However, the Russian advance was halted. By September, the Prussian forces under Prince Henry were being threatened by Austrian forces under Daun. Frederick forced marched part of his army which had faught at Zorndorf nearly 22 miles per day. Upon his arrival in Saxony, the Austrian forces withdrew without fighting. But on 14 October, the Austrians surprised the Prussians in a dawn attack which forced the Prussians to withdraw, leaving over 100 guns and 9,000 dead behind. The fight had taken the lives of over 7,500 Austrians, and they were too exahusted to pursue and complete their victory - they settled for besieging Dresden. By November, Frederick had reinforced his army and was marching to relieve Dresden. Upon hearing this, the Austrians left Dreseden without a fight and withdrew to Pirna. Frederick was in frim possession of Saxony and Silesia. Scenario 4: April - December 1759 The Prussian forces had lost a large part of its core units after three years of hard fighting. Prussian combat capability was beginning to deteriorate despite being able to maintain its numbers. In April, the Duke of Brunswick, having been reinforced with British troops, unsuccessfuly attempted to push the French out of Frankfurt and Wesel. In August, the battle of Minden saw 60,000 French troops under the Marquis de Contades and the Duke Victor de Broglie attacked by 45,000 Prussian, British and Hanoverian troops under Ferdinand. The French could have been soundly defeated, but when Ferdinand ordered 5 regiments of cavalry to attack the routing French, their commander, Lieutenant General George, Lord Sackville refused (three times!) to attack. (He was later courtmartialed and kicked out of the military. Subsequently, he become Lord Germain - the same Lord Germain who caused all sorts of problems with the British army during the American Revoluion.) While the French withdrew in the west, the Russians (now under Count Soltikov) were advancing in the east, defeating Prussian forces at Kay in July, and advancing on Frankfurt. They were joined by Austrian General con Loudon's forces - the combined forces numbering 80,000 - and dug in just east of Frankfurt. Frederick attacked with 50,000 men and took excessive losses (nearly 20,000 men in 6 hours) and were forced to withdraw. The Russo-Austrian forces failed to pursue. Ferdinand reinforced Frederick's depleated army and the Prussians concentrated on Daun's Austrian forces, as the Russians had eaten everything in their area and pulled back to Russia. Near the end of November, Frederick sent General von Fink and 13,000 Prussians to attack the Austrians. The Austrians countered with 42,000 troops - the surviving Prussians surrendered. Scenario 5: June - November 1760 Austria had 150,000 men in Saxony and Silesia - the Prussians had 75,000. Russia had 50,000 troops in East Prussia - the Prussians had 15,000. The French had 125,000 troops in Hanover - the Prussians (with British forces) numbered 70,000. Ferdinand's Prussian/British troops were initially able to push the French back to the Rhine, but were then forced to withdraw to Lippstadt, where they settled in for the winter. Similarly, Soltikov's Russian troops were unable to make much progress against Prince Henry's troops in East Prussia. The Austrians, however, were causing many problems for Frederick. Loudon destroyed a small Prussian force at Landeshut and then beseiged Glatz. Frederick, in return, put Dresden under seige. On July 29th, Daun was about to attack Frederick to lift the seige, but Frederick escaped without fighting. Glatz fell the same day. Prince Henry reinforced Frederick's forces and they force marched into Silesia with 30,000 men. The Austrians with 60,000 troops and the Russians with 30,000 troops pursued the Prussians. Frederick successfuly attacked Loudon's 24,000 troops at Liegnitz (8,500 Austrian losses - 3,400 Prussian losses) and escaped before Daun's forces could intervene. Frederick then tricked the Russians into thinking the entire Austrian army had been defeated and the Russians withdrew. This left only Daun's forces to deal with. However, the Austrians and Russians were once again looting Berlin, so Frederick turned to save his capital and attacked 53,000 Austrians at Torgau with 50,000 Prussians in November. The Austrians withdrew, but not before inflicting over 16,500 casualites on the Prussans while receiving only about 9,000 themselves. Scenario 6: June - November 1761 Once again, Ferdinand had some early success against the French, but by the end of the year had been pushed back - this time to Brunswick. George III had succeeded George II in England the previous year and had begun withdrawing English troops from the contintent. In the east, Frederick was facing odds of 3:1 and was cut off from Prussia by the Austrians (under Loudon) and Russians. In only 10 days, he entrenched is forces in the Eulengebirge hills at Bunzelwitz, near Glatz. Political infighting between Russia and Austria prevented any major offensives from being undertaken and both armies withdrew into winter quarters. Prince Henry spent the year sparring with Daun in Saxony, but no battles of any significance occurred. Scenario 7: June - December 1762 With the death of Elizableth of Russia, Peter III (a supporter of Frederick) was now ruling Russia and signed a peace treaty with Prussia. He also added a Russian army corps to the Prussian order of battle. Sweden, being somewhat of a puppet-state to Russia, signed a peace treaty when the Russians did. Thus, 1762 looked to be a good year for Frederick. With his eastern and northern flanks secure, he could concentrate on the French and Austrian forces and in June, Fredinand defeated the French in Westphalia. However, Peter III was overthown in July by Catherine II and the Russo-Prussian alliance was broken. The Russian troops under Frederick's command were ordered to return to Russia. Frederick convinced them to wait a few days until he could attack the Austrians (hoping to convince the Austrians that the Russians would fight.) The ploy worked and, at the battle of Burkersdorf, Frederick defeated Daun and Prussia then took firm control of Silesia. Later, in October, Prince Henry defeated the Austrians in the battle of Feriberg, thus securing Saxony. With these successes, Ferdinand was able to accumulate sufficient forces to finally push the French across the Rhine one and for all. By November, all countries were worn out from years of fighting and France and England were already in peace negotiations. On 16 February, 1763 the treaty of Hubertusburg saw an end to the fighting and Prussia in control of Silesia.