Naval Unit Arrival

[Wilhammer]

Was playing the Long Campaign as the Union, and bought myself a bunch of ships.

Imagine my horror as some of them are built on The Great Lakes!

The first River Ironclad I built was the USS Cairo (of course, when you order them, it is a generic), and the thing was being built way up North on the Great Lakes above Chicago.

So, what do you do with them?

Well, after the River Boats were built, I found you can plot them a move to a River hex, and they will go there! Sure is fascinating to see the game plot moves across LAND for those river naval units - and they will then follow non-navigable streams until they get to the river.

However, if you build an Ocean Going vessel, you might not want to do this in New York, for, you guessed it, I had a unit getting built on the Great Lakes - this time it was a Monitor (not really Ocean Going) However, it could NOT be moved off the Great Lakes like other River Naval Units.

Also, the Union gets a brig and a Steam Frigate on the Great Lakes from turn 1 - they are trapped there for the duration.

------------

I can see why you might want to build naval units on the Great Lakes - the British might be a problem up there - but a very slim problem.

Can the Naval build rules be made to IGNORE the Great Lakes ports as build points, or, better yet, can the ports be selected during the build process, with each port perhaps having a limit of how much it can build?

--------------

My first reaction to correct this was to modify the .HST file and the Union's .ORD file to place the USS Cairo in Cairo.

To do this, I had to figure out what the Region Code was for Cairo and the Port it was being built in.

So, I changed those values, loaded the game back up, and still found the Cairo up in the Great Lakes - but when I reloaded, the Cairo was still up there, not in Cairo. I was thinking; maybe the the current .HST file does not tell the game where things are on the map; it's used to compare to the .ORD file to calculate movement times. It must be some other file; but perhaps it will still work...or maybe it won't...

So, I went ahead and plotted the ship to Cairo, and was shocked I got a path!

When I executed the turn the Cairo was teleported to Cairo. Was that due to my 'hack'? I was pleasantly surprised by the teleportation. I wondered if all such builds got teleported...so;

So, I undid the hack (I did backup my files before I hacked them) and plotted the move. It took the USS Cairo two months to get to Cairo...and that's the way it was for the other River ships built on the Great Lakes (except Monitors).

[jimwinsor]

Ships get from the lakes to the Ohio River via the Erie Canal. It's on the map, very faint, but it's there. That's why you are able to plot courses between.

[Wilhammer]

Thanks, Jim.

I figured their must be a good reason - but it was a shocker to see! 'Twas thinking it was the Erie Canal, but its hardly noticeable on the map.

Did they actually build these things on the Great Lakes in the Real War? Was the Erie capable of transporting them?

------------

Here is part of my Answer...

http://www.missouricivilwarmuseum.org/1ironclads.htm

[Spharv2]

The ship placement location has been fixed for the next update I believe. I was worse off than you, as I spent some hard won CS money on a couple of frigates, only to have them appear in Arkansas.

[tc237]

Wil,
I had the same problem.
Pocus answered in another thread about using the Erie canal.
Also had sea going transports appear in Pittsburgh. They ran the "guns of the Mississippi" all the way to the Gulf!

[Le Ricain]

Was playing the Long Campaign as the Union, and bought myself a bunch of ships.



However, if you build an Ocean Going vessel, you might not want to do this in New York, for, you guessed it, I had a unit getting built on the Great Lakes - this time it was a Monitor (not really Ocean Going) However, it could NOT be moved off the Great Lakes like other River Naval Units.

Also, the Union gets a brig and a Steam Frigate on the Great Lakes from turn 1 - they are trapped there for the duration.
).

Ocean going units built on the Great lakes can be moved to the Atlantic. Just pick them up and drop them where you want them.