Promotions - good or bad?

[Caffran]

hey guys, sorry if this has been covered before but, should you always promote your generals when you get the opportunity?

sometimes after a big battle i can promote all involved which is good early on but seems rather silly in mid '63.

i've got four armies, all led by 3-star generals, and now i've got the chance to promote another three up to 3-star. is it worth it? considering some generals have their stats change with promotion, not neccesarily for the good.

it seems strange to have seven 3-star generals, half of whom are kicking their heels up because there's no army for them to command.

is there a consensus, good or bad?

[GraniteStater]

I hate to say it, but it depends.

As the Union, more often than not, somebody's gonna be angered. My advice is read the tooltip to see if it involves an NM hit or not and consider where you are in the game - can you afford the NM hit or not, maybe even the VP hit?

Thomas and Meade are 'free' promotions when they appear and are both well worth it, to bump them to **. I would say have Grant win something as early as you can, to get him to *** and an Army command. I always give Grant an Army, I think I'd do it for a 15 NM hit, if that were so. Grant is a beautiful person - put four of five Corps under him and he spreads the Grantness all around, Grantizing everybody. I've had McClellan under Grant as a Corps, and he shoots up to 3-2-2 or something similar. Rosecrans and Pope do well, too.

Buell is a decent Army commander, best used in command of a small Army to co-ordinate with Grant out West, IMO. I'd rather have McDowell than McClellan in the East; I've never had Meade as an Army commander, but he would probably be a good one.

I've had very little experience as CSA, but am the Rebs in a PBEM right now against Longshanks. We just got to Mar62 and IMHO, the South is, to a very large degree, self evident. You definitely want Longstreet and Jackson as Corps commanders, would say; perhaps J Johnston as a separate Army commander; AS Johnston with an Army out West. All I can say is, as the CSA, take every advantage you can of Leadership - it's your strong suit.

[Ol' Choctaw]

That takes a lot of thought and I am a bit selective at times as who to promote.

There are a couple of guides on Union and CSA generals and how they change their stats. They are downloadable pdfs. But I don’t remember exactly where they are located.

I wouldn’t worry about having too many three stars. It is not such a bad thing.

[Longshanks]

You do have to watch the VP and NM penalties sometimes tho. As GraniteStater indicated, this is harder for the Union and easier for the Confederates, both because the Confederates have better generals and more NM usually. For the Union, there's not much point taking a NM hit for a 3-1-1 guy, since you're broke out with them. But if you get a chance to promote even a 3-1-2 it's probably worth it.

As for Grant, yes, whatever it takes. Probably Thomas and Meade too. Sherman as well, although it always seems to take longer for him.

[Pat "Stonewall" Cleburne]

If they get better - yes
If they don't - only if you need a higher ranked general and the NM hit isn't too bad
If they get worse - no

[Caffran]

thx guys, that's cleared everything up . . . .

I'm playing as Confederacy and that's pretty much how i've been going.

It just seemed wrong to have 2-star generals with Divisions, and 3-star's controlling Corps.

I got the opportunity to promote John Magruder to 3-star. yay or nay?

Stonewall, Edmund K. Smith, and Theophilus Holmes are no brainers, but Magruder???

I probably won't bother to avoid angering Longstreet, but i had option for promotions so i thought i'd ask.

[Longshanks]

The data I can find doesn't show Magruder promotable to 3 star, so if he is chances are that he's the same stats and ability, so, yes you'd want to if there's no NM or VP hit, or even if there is and he serves a purpose.

In my games vs the AI (unless I set AI on "insane"), I usually find a lot of overpromoted generals. They do no more harm than usual.

[Ethan]

That takes a lot of thought and I am a bit selective at times as who to promote.

There are a couple of guides on Union and CSA generals and how they change their stats. They are downloadable pdfs. But I don’t remember exactly where they are located.

I wouldn’t worry about having too many three stars. It is not such a bad thing.

Ol' Choctaw, here you have the .pdf files with the lists of the USA and CSA generals. I hope it will be useful.

Greetings!

[Longshanks]

Thanks for the updated general files: I had the 1.13 version!

[Ethan]

You're welcome, Longshanks!