Cannot use Land Mine here, why?

[johnnycai1]

Hi,
Playing '61 April campaign against AI and have had siege on at Reel, MO for about 5months. For some reason, cannot get a breach, even with multiple siege mortars. Also, Land mine decision is not applicable here. Any clues? Is there a bug with this region?

Msg in screenshot show msg about land mine decision.

CWII_ReelSiege.png (1.25 MiB) Viewed 7460 times

[Captain_Orso]

I'd have to guess here about the RGD, but I think it can only be successful against fortifications, Forts (both pre-war and in-war), Stockades, and Redoubts, and I'm not too sure about the latter two, I think but probably.

Success in a siege has to do with two things, Artillery advantage, and the defender's lack of supplies.

To get breaches, you need to have an artillery advantage, your artillery's Offensive strength vs. the defending artillery's Defensive strength. Siege Artillery has a high Offensive strength, but does not automatically cause breaches.

To be sure you would have to load the CS side and actually count up the defender's defensive artillery strength and compare it to your offensive strength.

I also suspect that the defenders are getting supplies in. At any rate, the harbor is not blockaded (you need 8 combat elements to blockade an harbor exit point (tool-tip of the harbor icon will tell you the exit point(s)), but also, the river region below the exit point in Reelfoot Lake, where your Ironclads are, is open and supplies might get through there. Having a single unopposed combat unit in that river region will block all possible supplies through that region, but it would be exposed to attack.

Also the two land regions to the west might allow supplies through. Again, any single combat unit there, like a cavalry, would close any chance of supplies coming through.

But to first get a breach, you will need an artillery advantage, so I would check that first. The South may have a whole lot of 12lber's which have great defensive strength.

[johnnycai1]

Hi,
After reviewing the CSA position, the arty advantage didnt explain my inability to gain breaches. I had 3 field guns and 2 siege mortars while they had 2 field guns. There were some recent CSA attempts to escape via the Mississippi (which ended very badly for them) so they could have shipped some arty out of Reel earlier that may have prevented the arty advantage needed.
Thanks for the info on the land mine usage.

[principes romanes]

I think the escape attempts explain why the Land Mine card failed. I suspect that at the beginning of the turn, Athena ordered her forces out of the town. That would have meant, at the beginning of the turn, that there was an opposing enemy force in the region, and hence not a siege. Therefore, when the AI tested for the Land Mine card it was invalid.

I think that process also explains why you haven't advanced the siege after so many months - every time Athena attempts to escape, I think she broke the siege and therefore reset any breaches to zero.

[Captain_Orso]

Hi,
After reviewing the CSA position, the arty advantage didnt explain my inability to gain breaches. I had 3 field guns and 2 siege mortars while they had 2 field guns. There were some recent CSA attempts to escape via the Mississippi (which ended very badly for them) so they could have shipped some arty out of Reel earlier that may have prevented the arty advantage needed.
Thanks for the info on the land mine usage.

Breaching has ONLY to do with artillery advantage and nothing else. I stated previously that you had to count defensive and offensive power of artillery from the defender and besieger. Naming "3 field guns" etc means nothing.

I doubt very much that attempting to leave the region will break a siege. As far as I know, the game only looks at the status at the start of each turn, after suply redistribution, and not during it every hour of every day.

If that were the case, think about what it would mean. Hypothetical situation as an example: Grant and 2 additional Union Corps are besieging Vicksburg, in which a force under Pemberton in the form of a division of various units, is being besieged. The CS player breaks a decimated militia unit out of Pemberton's division and moves it into "the open field" location of the region (ie dragging it from inside the citing into the non-city part of the region), causing a battle between the militia unit and Grant's forces. Although the militia unit is eliminated in the first round of battle, since Grant's force is NOT unopposed in the region, the siege is broken, all breaches are repaired, and everything returns to their pre-siege status. No, that's not how it works. Unless the hypothetical militia unit is still alive in "the open field" location of the region at the end of the turn, the siege is not affected.

I have a question, or two; though: do you have any units in the besieged region in OP?

When the CS units attempted to leave the region, what happened? Why weren't they successful and returned to "inside"? The reason I ask is this, the illustration you posted show that the South has 5% MC in "the open field" location of the region. This should preclude any CS entering the region from auto-changing to OP, including exiting from within a region's "inside the structure" location.

[principes romanes]

I agree with you, Captain Orso, that my interpretation allows the sort of exploit you described and that it can be problematic. I come to my interpretation based on my recollection of what I've seen in games, although I would need to test it to verify it more conclusively.

I wonder if the reason the problem occurs is that orders such as creating a division or moving a unit from within a city out to the corresponding region (or vice versa) occurs before some of the other start of turn checks? When the siege check is run, it would find those units ordered outside to already be sitting outside but not yet defeated in the battle.

Intuitively I think you are right that the game doesn't check siege status every day during a turn. For one, that would require running a lot more checks. And secondly, I don't recall any gameplay cases where a relief force arrived on, say, day 5 and lifted a siege despite being completely destroyed or routed out of the region by the end of the turn (and I'm pretty sure Athena has attempted a few such attacks against me).

[Captain_Orso]

I'm saying that there is NO exploit, and used the example of how it would be if there were one, to demonstrate how illogical it would be.

I believe the siege check occurs at the end of the turn, after all movement etc. This is supported by the fact that at the start of the next turn, when you are looking at the results of the previous turn, a new siege status is can be observed, but IIRC no siege resolution occurs. I might be wrong about the very first turn of siege resolution, but I don't think so. I am however certain that if at the start of the turn and the end of the turn a siege exists is there a siege resolution, the results of which you can see at the beginning of the next turn, unless a surrender occurs.

I also believe that regardless of what fighting happens during the turn, if at the start, and at the end of the turn a siege exists, then the siege has not been broken, and no breaches will be repaired. Of course, you have to get a breach, before a breach can be repaired.

Also, there is nothing take the length of a siege into account per se. During a siege units can take hits, and of course the besieged units still do use supplies, and both of these can change the results of siege resolution from one turn to the next, but not because of the turn count of the siege, but because of the status of besieged units.

I have seen nothing, here nor elsewhere, to indicate that my understanding of siege and siege resolution is incorrect.

I stand by my view that the lack of breaches in this case is due to a lack of offensive artillery power compared to defensive artillery power, and nothing else.

[johnnycai1]

Hi,
After reviewing the CSA position, the arty advantage didnt explain my inability to gain breaches. I had 3 field guns and 2 siege mortars while they had 2 field guns. There were some recent CSA attempts to escape via the Mississippi (which ended very badly for them) so they could have shipped some arty out of Reel earlier that may have prevented the arty advantage needed.
Thanks for the info on the land mine usage.

Breaching has ONLY to do with artillery advantage and nothing else. I stated previously that you had to count defensive and offensive power of artillery from the defender and besieger. Naming "3 field guns" etc means nothing.

I doubt very much that attempting to leave the region will break a siege. As far as I know, the game only looks at the status at the start of each turn, after suply redistribution, and not during it every hour of every day.

"..."

I have a question, or two; though: do you have any units in the besieged region in OP?

When the CS units attempted to leave the region, what happened? Why weren't they successful and returned to "inside"? The reason I ask is this, the illustration you posted show that the South has 5% MC in "the open field" location of the region. This should preclude any CS entering the region from auto-changing to OP, including exiting from within a region's "inside the structure" location.

Hi,
I missed these responses earlier and have not kept a good record of the previous turns, its possible that the units 'escaping' Reel were passing thru the region and not sieged as I recall (with the 5% MC you mention they still had) at least 2 attempts of single element cav, while others escapees were unknown or I cant recall.

In a recent PBEM game, I had CSA division escape a siege(that region/town north of El Paso) the turn I assaulted. The escaping CSA div. took some retreat hits but got out intact without much cohesion loss. I am guessing it was sortie order with green/green posture that they used. I also had 95% MC in this case, town was breeched and hits had been made the last turn.

I agree that this is not any bug or exploit, but I will keep an eye for similar situations where I can better understand what is happening under-the-hood.

Thanks,

[Captain_Orso]

The thing with siege is, that most players forget that since the enemy (the besieged) have 5% MC, if they put a stack into the field, it won't go to OP, but sitting in OP for the besieger slows cohesion recovery, so many just go to DP and expect the defender to stay there and be good boy and wait for their surrender.

In such a case, you can put any unit at all into the field for one turn to break the siege.

The problem with this is, you never know if the besieger is in DP or OP, there's no way to see it.

I tested siege recently. I was correct in my assumption that any fighting during the turn makes no difference. If a siege exists at the start of one turn, and a siege exists at the start of the next turn, what happens in between is irrelevant.

Yes, if they want to simply escape, going to PP (Passive Posture) is the best way, plus if you have an active leader using the Evade Combat SO (Special Order). Being that it was open/desert, depending on how mobile they were, there is a good chance they might escape. It depends greatly on the units on both sides.