questions???
Posted: Mon Aug 06, 2007 2:19 am
First I'd like to say, great game. Very addictive. All aspects of the game are handled very well.
Now having said that, when I was play as the union in version 1.5 something(pick your letter patch) ,April '61 campaign, I thought the battles were simulated fairly accurately, casualties to casualties afflicted.
But then patch 1.6 came along touting better AI and such. Seeing as I would push the rebs aside within weeks to a couple months to obtain Harpers Ferry and Manasssas and posed to make a good strike at Richmond (still 1.5), I decided it was time to try the rebs with the new patch...
As the rebs, I quickly obtained Harpers Ferry, lost and took it back for good within a couple of months from those pesky union idealists. In the process I managed to hold Manassas junction (lost a couple of of thousand (if i recollect correctly <2000) while the union lost over 10,000 ) I quickly booted the Unionists out of Alexandria and sent them packing to Washington. Odd battle statistics for the Manassas fight but tolerable (I'm picturing old Ab yelling at his generals to march, they give in, and the result is a Union "Pickets Charge" x 2.
Army is organized under the Bearugaurd guy(I know i prob butchered the spelling) 1st corps under Bonham, 2nd under Johnson (which brings me to an army organization question, but I'll get to that later), and I recently formed a third corps under Holms to station at Winchester. Johnson is stationed at Harpers Ferry, Bonham at Alexandria, Bearugaurd at Manassas. This way I have the River protecting the front and a corps/army to support one another to take advantage of the marching of the guns.
The Union army is in disarray, and seeing as it was fall, I decided to stay tight, and left a gap between the Harpers Ferry and Alexandria. I'm not sure if this was completely wise, but with winter coming ,being as the union was unorganized, and being '61 (strength only marginally higher than South), I couldn't see how they could exploit the gap without putting themselves at risk of being cut off. In the good weather months I would fill the gap with the strengthened 3rd corps. Anyhow now to my question, bothersome tidbit that occured...
Forgive me, my history may be a little hazzy, but when did the Union lose 20,000 to the south only losing 2,000 (15,000 plus union casualties and 4,000 prisoners of war
)? Yes, a couple of months later in December, the Union decides to march on Alexandria. They do have 102 units/elements to my fifty or so, but...they are disorganized/low cohesion (or so my cavalry relayed to me earlier). According to the after battle message (if I'm reading it correctly) and my recon, the units were not organized correctly/not under a leader. The after battle message said something about 102 units not having a commander/under command control.
I could shrug and say Pickets Charge across a river, or pat myself on the back and say I'm a tactical guru for taking the river into consideration for my planned defenses, Picket's Charge was one conflict across several days of hard fighting (by the way, does anyone have figures on the union losses during picket's charge? I know they say Picket lost a division, but from my understanding, it was an understrengthed division, which I'm guessing meant he only had 3-4k who were on their after noon stroll towards death. Accompanied with the two other divisions Trimble? and that Harry potter character Petigrew??? So, 8-10K on the low end to 12-15k on the high end??) It could just be me, but I am discouraged that I can take out an entire union corps and a division (corps being to me 15k) and only lose half a division.
Even Picket's Charge if I remember my history.. was only one firefight amongst several actions that occured that day. Even if this was a Pickets charge, a division is only like 5k right. Picket lost his division. So that's 5k. Say the other two division took 50% casualties/losses. So that's 10k. So I can live with the first fight I had at Manassas Junction. But this second ....a bit too unrealistic for me. Maybe if I had the union surrounded in 64 or something...and I understand rivers make things hard to retreat from... and there was something mentioned about failed retreats... but still one has to cross the river. If the army can get across, more than likely they are able to deploy right.But if one was crossing and met sizable resistance, they might just lose a corps and a division. But then why isn't the pc smart enough to realize it shouldn't cross, in addition to attacking with low coehesion. (I hope they were at low cohesion, cause I hate to imagine what the results would have been if they weren't). I would think it would take only a simple to moderate if else statement for the AI to realize this really isn't a good idea to try crossing. Maybe for rivers instead of a major combat type penalty(not sure what effect crossing river currently has/does other than bad things for attacker, good things if you're defending) is have a "repulsed" affect, meaning if a firefight ensues after crossing a percantage of brigades/elements don't participate, but those that do, fight at normal strength. Thus, instead of 102 elements fighting with a big combat modifier, only a percentage of the 102 elements fight with a minor cohesion/combat modifier hit to simulate disorganization/fatigue. I don't know, maybe the statements/code already does this.
Now on to my short army organization question. I have the army of virginia under bearugard and purchased the 2 new armies available. One is obviously going out west to Johnston for the army of Tennessee. What do CSA players do with the 3rd army? I could make Johnson the Army of the Shenadoah but then I lose the march to guns affect right. Because an army won't support an army, right? I was think of sending it out west as well, perhaps under brag (which I think is how it was in reality), but right now I don't need two armies out west roaming the tennessee and kentucky area, especially when Johnston's command range allows Bragg or someone to just be a corps. I could use it for the Arkansas and Missouri area, but that seems a waste of an army unit at this point. I feel that I purchased something (army unit) that I have no use for. At least for a year or so anyhow.
Current April '61 game after early december (late december)
Current Morale CSA (ME) 113 to 87
Foreign Entry 15
Prisoners of War 5400
Accumulated Victory Points 780 to 494 (this doesn't seem quite right, though the timing of when the AI purchases bonds/conscripts might explain)
Points Accumulated each turn 51 to 40
Things are looking more than alright on the east front, out west, McClellan jumped the gun and booted me out of Lexington apparently as soon as he was activated with a sizable force which made me a little peeved because I wanted to use the rail lines against the Union but dilly dallied about moving some of my build up of troops to Lexington..so I said fine, be that way, and tore up the state of Kentucky, and left, which makes me wonder why 3 to 4 months later all the rail lines are still torn up. The Unions response seems to be that it doesn't care about Ft. Donelson right now, but is prepping for an attack on Island 10. Which I hadn't been reinforcing yet, but being winter, that might buy me a couple of weeks to correct that mistake.
How many troops/guns does it take to take over a fort? When I played as the Union, I watched the South endlessly try to take pensocola, but they seemed to never be close to taking it. And I've never played a game past February of '62 as the union so I don't know what it takes to take Ft. Donalson or Island 10. I would would always stop in feb of '62 because it seemed I would have a firm grip on things out east and was primed for the inevitable collapse for the South out west.
Now having said that, when I was play as the union in version 1.5 something(pick your letter patch) ,April '61 campaign, I thought the battles were simulated fairly accurately, casualties to casualties afflicted.
But then patch 1.6 came along touting better AI and such. Seeing as I would push the rebs aside within weeks to a couple months to obtain Harpers Ferry and Manasssas and posed to make a good strike at Richmond (still 1.5), I decided it was time to try the rebs with the new patch...
As the rebs, I quickly obtained Harpers Ferry, lost and took it back for good within a couple of months from those pesky union idealists. In the process I managed to hold Manassas junction (lost a couple of of thousand (if i recollect correctly <2000) while the union lost over 10,000 ) I quickly booted the Unionists out of Alexandria and sent them packing to Washington. Odd battle statistics for the Manassas fight but tolerable (I'm picturing old Ab yelling at his generals to march, they give in, and the result is a Union "Pickets Charge" x 2.
Army is organized under the Bearugaurd guy(I know i prob butchered the spelling) 1st corps under Bonham, 2nd under Johnson (which brings me to an army organization question, but I'll get to that later), and I recently formed a third corps under Holms to station at Winchester. Johnson is stationed at Harpers Ferry, Bonham at Alexandria, Bearugaurd at Manassas. This way I have the River protecting the front and a corps/army to support one another to take advantage of the marching of the guns.
The Union army is in disarray, and seeing as it was fall, I decided to stay tight, and left a gap between the Harpers Ferry and Alexandria. I'm not sure if this was completely wise, but with winter coming ,being as the union was unorganized, and being '61 (strength only marginally higher than South), I couldn't see how they could exploit the gap without putting themselves at risk of being cut off. In the good weather months I would fill the gap with the strengthened 3rd corps. Anyhow now to my question, bothersome tidbit that occured...
Forgive me, my history may be a little hazzy, but when did the Union lose 20,000 to the south only losing 2,000 (15,000 plus union casualties and 4,000 prisoners of war
)? Yes, a couple of months later in December, the Union decides to march on Alexandria. They do have 102 units/elements to my fifty or so, but...they are disorganized/low cohesion (or so my cavalry relayed to me earlier). According to the after battle message (if I'm reading it correctly) and my recon, the units were not organized correctly/not under a leader. The after battle message said something about 102 units not having a commander/under command control.
I could shrug and say Pickets Charge across a river, or pat myself on the back and say I'm a tactical guru for taking the river into consideration for my planned defenses, Picket's Charge was one conflict across several days of hard fighting (by the way, does anyone have figures on the union losses during picket's charge? I know they say Picket lost a division, but from my understanding, it was an understrengthed division, which I'm guessing meant he only had 3-4k who were on their after noon stroll towards death. Accompanied with the two other divisions Trimble? and that Harry potter character Petigrew??? So, 8-10K on the low end to 12-15k on the high end??) It could just be me, but I am discouraged that I can take out an entire union corps and a division (corps being to me 15k) and only lose half a division.
Even Picket's Charge if I remember my history.. was only one firefight amongst several actions that occured that day. Even if this was a Pickets charge, a division is only like 5k right. Picket lost his division. So that's 5k. Say the other two division took 50% casualties/losses. So that's 10k. So I can live with the first fight I had at Manassas Junction. But this second ....a bit too unrealistic for me. Maybe if I had the union surrounded in 64 or something...and I understand rivers make things hard to retreat from... and there was something mentioned about failed retreats... but still one has to cross the river. If the army can get across, more than likely they are able to deploy right.But if one was crossing and met sizable resistance, they might just lose a corps and a division. But then why isn't the pc smart enough to realize it shouldn't cross, in addition to attacking with low coehesion. (I hope they were at low cohesion, cause I hate to imagine what the results would have been if they weren't). I would think it would take only a simple to moderate if else statement for the AI to realize this really isn't a good idea to try crossing. Maybe for rivers instead of a major combat type penalty(not sure what effect crossing river currently has/does other than bad things for attacker, good things if you're defending) is have a "repulsed" affect, meaning if a firefight ensues after crossing a percantage of brigades/elements don't participate, but those that do, fight at normal strength. Thus, instead of 102 elements fighting with a big combat modifier, only a percentage of the 102 elements fight with a minor cohesion/combat modifier hit to simulate disorganization/fatigue. I don't know, maybe the statements/code already does this.
Now on to my short army organization question. I have the army of virginia under bearugard and purchased the 2 new armies available. One is obviously going out west to Johnston for the army of Tennessee. What do CSA players do with the 3rd army? I could make Johnson the Army of the Shenadoah but then I lose the march to guns affect right. Because an army won't support an army, right? I was think of sending it out west as well, perhaps under brag (which I think is how it was in reality), but right now I don't need two armies out west roaming the tennessee and kentucky area, especially when Johnston's command range allows Bragg or someone to just be a corps. I could use it for the Arkansas and Missouri area, but that seems a waste of an army unit at this point. I feel that I purchased something (army unit) that I have no use for. At least for a year or so anyhow.
Current April '61 game after early december (late december)
Current Morale CSA (ME) 113 to 87
Foreign Entry 15
Prisoners of War 5400
Accumulated Victory Points 780 to 494 (this doesn't seem quite right, though the timing of when the AI purchases bonds/conscripts might explain)
Points Accumulated each turn 51 to 40
Things are looking more than alright on the east front, out west, McClellan jumped the gun and booted me out of Lexington apparently as soon as he was activated with a sizable force which made me a little peeved because I wanted to use the rail lines against the Union but dilly dallied about moving some of my build up of troops to Lexington..so I said fine, be that way, and tore up the state of Kentucky, and left, which makes me wonder why 3 to 4 months later all the rail lines are still torn up. The Unions response seems to be that it doesn't care about Ft. Donelson right now, but is prepping for an attack on Island 10. Which I hadn't been reinforcing yet, but being winter, that might buy me a couple of weeks to correct that mistake.
How many troops/guns does it take to take over a fort? When I played as the Union, I watched the South endlessly try to take pensocola, but they seemed to never be close to taking it. And I've never played a game past February of '62 as the union so I don't know what it takes to take Ft. Donalson or Island 10. I would would always stop in feb of '62 because it seemed I would have a firm grip on things out east and was primed for the inevitable collapse for the South out west.