Samuel Morris Cooper

[marquo]

There is a fixed training officer who appears in Richmond for several turns and then disappears - Samuel Morris or Cooper. He is only able to train for a few turns. Why does he disappear so quickly or at all? How many training officers does the CSA eventually get?

Thanks

[Stauffenberg]

As Davis said: "The many who measure the value of an officer's service by the conspicuous part he played upon the fields of battle, may not properly estimate the worth of Cooper's services in the war between the States."

Cooper is pretty much the southern equivalent of Winfield Scott for the north in Washington, and both held the highest rank and seniority in their respective armies. Often under-emphasized, the trio of Davis, Cooper and Lee drew up the entire organization of the CSA from scratch at the very beginning of the conflict. While Cooper did command units in earlier US conflicts, his talents were more readily recognized and put to use in command organization.

I'm not sure how many training officers the CSA get--certainly far more than than there were in the original ACW. As well, you now have quite a few HQ Support units which function as training officers, signals and medical elements. They are not needed to form actual army HQs and can be used in any stack.

[marquo]

The HQ support units are trainers and give experience, not Officers or Drillers capable of upgrading conscripts...any idea how many training officers and drillers the CSA has?

Thanks

[Stauffenberg]

Yes quite right. I had thought Bragg would certainly qualifywith this if anyone does, but apparently not. As of Dec 1864 in a campaign game I have going, only Richard Taylor is on the map with the officer/driller talent.

[DrPostman]

Only one that I know of after Cooper, and that's Taylor, and you don't
get him until later in the war.

[Stauffenberg]

Only one that I know of after Cooper, and that's Taylor, and you don't
get him until later in the war.

Bragg didn't do well in my game and is still a 1-star Dec 1864--perhaps he gets this talent with promotions if anyone knows.

[marquo]

A huge disadvantage for the CSA...the Union has trainers from the onset....

[Stauffenberg]

A huge disadvantage for the CSA...the Union has trainers from the onset....

Agreed. And historically, Lee and Bragg were clearly doing this energetically from the get-go.

[ArmChairGeneral]

This is sort of a disadvantage for the South, but in many ways the Training Master (or HQ) is superior to the Training Officer when used correctly.

As experience increases, the chance per turn for an element to spontaneously upgrade (conscript to regular, for example) increases. Additional experience stars add directly to stats, so Regular elements benefit from Masters but are not affected by Officers (artillery get xp from Masters too). Having a Training Master (HQ) in a Corps or Army stack will, over a period of 6-8 months, result in passively upgrading almost all of the conscripts to regulars AND increasing the stats of quite a few of the regular elements. That is if everyone is just sitting around the whole time: combat increases experience even quicker. While a Training Officer could upgrade quite a few Volunteers to Regulars in that time, you would have to buy them, cycle them through an Officer's location (most likely in the rear) and then get them to where they are needed manually, which takes quite a bit of micro-managing for maximum effect. The Training Master just has to be present. The Training Officer is best used behind the lines to upgrade the otherwise weak Volunteers as they come off the assembly line. The Training Master can be on the front lines, giving extra experience directly to the largest fighting stacks.

The Union's best play is to build a lot of Volunteers and upgrade them with Training Officers at strategic locations around the map. The CSA relies on its HQs and Training Masters (who happen to be quality front-line generals in their own right) to quickly train Conscripts into Regulars over a period of months on the front lines, and avoids Volunteers altogether until Taylor becomes available.

Almost all conscripts will become regulars within a year of being built, even if they are not in a stack with a Training Master. Volunteers will take much more than a year to upgrade on their own. Using a Training Officer to upgrade a Conscript is sub-optimal compared to upgrading Volunteers, since Conscripts would have become regs pretty soon anyway.

Cooper is only on-map for three turns, so can upgrade a total of six elements. I always try to make sure that I have three of the light brigades (2 Vol, 1 Lt. Inf) in Richmond so I can get my money's worth out of him.

[Rod Smart]

The south (once again) is at a major disadvantage.

Their only training officer is Richard Taylor, and you don't get him until mid 62-ish.
The North has three

And Richard Taylor is a very good general that you want commanding troops in battle, unlike the craptastic trio of Sigel, McClellan and Halleck.



I disagree with Armchairgeneral. The north has a major advantage. With three build points, you can have every single recruitable unit trained to line infantry before being sent off to battle.

[FightingBuckeye]

You noted that the HQs can act like training masters and argued that those are superior to training officers. I disagree, but let's say that they are in fact superior. It still leaves the South at a pretty big disadvantage. At 105K & 8 WS a pop an HQ unit is an expensive proposition for the South. When I play the Union, I always recruit those as soon as a new one is added to my build pool. Putting those in all my army stacks and corps stacks really helps, not just in training but the other bonuses they provide as well.

This game is pretty complex, so lots of micromanaging is kind of expected. It's best to park the Union training officers in a spot where you usually build lots of troops. So say maybe Cincy, St Louis, Cairo, Indianapolis, Louisville, etc. You're going to be garrisoning those regions with troops anyway. So build them there and as new units come on line, swap them out with a garrison unit that's already been trained up. Now your units are serving a key function while your officers are turning them into real soldiers.

[ArmChairGeneral]

Yup, to both of you, it is definitely an advantage having TOs. I'm making the points that Masters are also quite effective when used properly, and that the advantage the three TOs give the Union isn't that great since the Union has a lot of even bigger advantages that they already struggle to bring to bear, and because overall troop quality isn't a big bottleneck for the Union (leadership is) after the first few months of the war. If the CSA could get their hands on an early TO, it would help a lot, since they have to penny-pinch and could squeeze a lot of vital resources out of Vol-spamming. The Union has plenty of money, and after the first year plenty of good quality troops in the pool as-is, so the relative advantage gained from microing up a bunch of volunteers to save cash isn't that big of a deal. The Union can't really do that much with those troops until the Blue Wave is fully complete and has appropriate commanders anyway. At that point, the Wave itself will overwhelm the South regardless of whether some of its elements are still conscripts or not. The reason to Vol spam is to save money, which is something the CSA needs desperately but isn't that important to the Union.

The disadvantage to the CSA comes not because the Union has three, but because the CSA only has half of one (Taylor, partway through the war) meaning they essentially cannot Volunteer-spam, which is what TOs are good for. Rather than build and train Vols like the Union can they must stick to building conscripts and put them in the field with Masters to get them trained up. This doesn't take as long as it sounds though, and overall TMs are pretty darn effective.

My (slight) preference for TMs mainly comes down to their multiple uses. The Union TOs are a one trick pony, whereas CSA TMs can affect a lot of units at the same time (including regulars and even artillery) while still being effective frontline generals rather than in the rear with the gear. Slower to directly see the training effects, yes, but I still think they are great and at least on par with the net-effects from a TO.

[Rod Smart]

Two questions:

1- can the training masters stack their benefits? If I have Bragg, Wheeler (or is it Hardee?), and a Headquarters unit in one stack, does everyone get 3 experience stars per turn?

2- can special abilities be modded? I would prefer Bragg to be a training officer, can I change him?

[ArmChairGeneral]

1- No. Abilities with the same icon never stack with each other. Abilities with similar effects but different icons DO stack. (It is Hardee, BTW).

2- Pretty sure the answer is yes, though someone else would have to chime in on exactly how to do it.

[ifailmore]

what turn or time does smauel cooper disapper? I just found out hes gone after i checked richmond after I won the game @.@

[DrPostman]

IIRC he is removed from the game on the 3rd turn.

[ifailmore]

does bragg or hardee train everyone onthe stack there in or just the division under them? if i put them in a the army hq stack will the crops on another province get trained? or just the one with the army hq?

[Captain_Orso]

does bragg or hardee train everyone onthe stack there in or just the division under them? if i put them in a the army hq stack will the crops on another province get trained? or just the one with the army hq?

Training Master: "This leader provides 1 experience point every turn to all the units in the stack he is in by drilling them."
Training Officer: "This leader will train up to two regiments of conscripts to regular soldiers every turn in the force under his command."

If the unit with the ability must command a stack for the ability to be used, it will say so.

--

In all the years I've been in forums on all sorts of subject manor, from serious to entertaining, I have rarely come across a post so sloppily and poorly written in which the poster was not obviously trying to demonstrate how kewl, edgy, 1337 and hipster he/she is. I came very close to not answering at all because of this. They way you present yourself in the forum reflects on the attitude you bring to the forum. Your attitude cries from, --you are all too unimportant to me, that I should make the least effort to make my post readable and understandable without the reader having to put in a special effort, by using proper grammar, spelling and punctuation. It's simply insulting. Grow up some.

[Scottus]

Didn't Lee's promotion to "General in Chief" in January, 1865 give him a higher rank than that of Cooper? I have always debated that Cooper, as Inspector General of the Army (thus Davis' representative) was still of higher rank than that of Lee even after his final promotion. Just trivia but what are your thoughts?

As Davis said: "The many who measure the value of an officer's service by the conspicuous part he played upon the fields of battle, may not properly estimate the worth of Cooper's services in the war between the States."

Cooper is pretty much the southern equivalent of Winfield Scott for the north in Washington, and both held the highest rank and seniority in their respective armies. Often under-emphasized, the trio of Davis, Cooper and Lee drew up the entire organization of the CSA from scratch at the very beginning of the conflict. While Cooper did command units in earlier US conflicts, his talents were more readily recognized and put to use in command organization.

I'm not sure how many training officers the CSA get--certainly far more than than there were in the original ACW. As well, you now have quite a few HQ Support units which function as training officers, signals and medical elements. They are not needed to form actual army HQs and can be used in any stack.