American Civil War Game Club (ACWGC)

At Pickett's charge didn't many say that they were looking to the rear for reinforcemnts to follow...They hit the wall and attacked...If there were troops behind Armistead...Wouldn't they exploit the hole he made...If Rhodes would have followed...His troops would have entered the hole and did what...They wouldn't just sit there.....They would have attacked.....Wouldn't that be an early form of bitz-kreig.....

Lt. Gen. John Dragan III/AoA

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by draganfly</i>
<br />At Pickett's charge didn't many say that they were looking to the rear for reinforcemnts to follow...They hit the wall and attacked...If there were troops behind Armistead...Wouldn't they exploit the hole he made...If Rhodes would have followed...His troops would have entered the hole and did what...They wouldn't just sit there.....They would have attacked.....Wouldn't that be an early form of bitz-kreig.....
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">John, They might have tried to do what you describe, but it may have taken a little time and co-ordination to do it cleanly, assess the situation and order in the reserves. There would also be a risk of command and control breaking down completely when moving units around in a tight space under fire. This I believe explains why battlefield manoeuvres were generally slow and cumbersome and kept very simple. The other point to make is that if the attackers had the time and ability to send in a second wave then the defender would also have time to react to any danger. The game (without the new melee rule of embedded melee house rule) gives unrealistic abilities to the attacker while reducing the abilities of the defender.


[url="http://homepage.ntlworld.com/a.r.barlow/acwgc/acw.htm"]General Antony Barlow[/url]
[url="http://homepage.ntlworld.com/a.r.barlow/acwgc/western_theater.htm"]Commander, Western Theater, Union Army[/url]

"while reducing the abilities of the defender"

Tha engine captures 'the deer caught in the headlights' defense to perfection. The defenders stand amazed at the brilliance, and audacity of the oncoming assault.

Of course with the click of the END TURN button the roles are reversed, so all is fair. [:D]

MajGen Al 'Ambushed' Amos
3rd "Amos' Ambushers" Bde, Cavalry Division, XX Corps, AoC
The Union Forever! Huzzah!

Quote/
John, They might have tried to do what you describe, but it may have taken a little time and co-ordination to do it cleanly, assess the situation and order in the reserves. There would also be a risk of command and control breaking down completely when moving units around in a tight space under fire. This I believe explains why battlefield manoeuvres were generally slow and cumbersome and kept very simple. The other point to make is that if the attackers had the time and ability to send in a second wave then the defender would also have time to react to any danger. The game (without the new melee rule of embedded melee house rule) gives unrealistic abilities to the attacker while reducing the abilities of the defender.


[url="http://homepage.ntlworld.com/a.r.barlow/acwgc/acw.htm"]General Antony Barlow[/url]
[url="http://homepage.ntlworld.com/a.r.barlow/acwgc/western_theater.htm"]Commander, Western Theater, Union Army[/url]
_______________________________________________

General Barlow, I couldn't agree more.

Colonel John Sheffield,
1st Brigade <b><font color="red">[Fighting First]</font id="red"></b>
2nd Division,
XXIII Corps
<font color="orange">Army of the Ohio.</font id="orange">
<font color="red">U.</font id="red"><font color="white">S.</font id="white"><font color="blue">A.</font id="blue">

While both sides do play by the same rules they are not balanced rules. The Blitz tactic is primarially an offensive tactic. If one side in a scenario is primarially on the defensive due to relative army size the Blitz tactic of Turn play will quickly overwhelm him.

My recommendation for using Turn play in multiplayer games is to just implement a "house" rule. The player executing his part of the turn can no longer move or fire once he starts executing melees.

This will allow each player to finish his part of the turn before forwarding on the game file. It solves most of the exploit problem although overlap formations could cause a problem. If both sides agreed to keep this to a minimum things should work. Mostly it would avoid forcing the player to only make his move and fire and having to write down his melees for someone else to execute or having another pass through all the players to do melee.

LG. Kennon Whitehead
Chatham Grays
1/1/III AoM (CSA)

<font color="beige"><b>I've brought this up before and still say the problem is not with turn play or when melee is done, it's the ability of the offensive player to have total control over and full movement with all his units on the map without regard to command and control or fatigue.
I know it's probably beyond the scope of the game engine but a "movement check" much like the moral check that is done at the start of the turn could allocate movement points to each unit based on unit command status, quality, fatigue etc.</b></font id="beige">

<center> <font color="beige"><b>Maj.Gen. R.A.Weir </b></font id="beige">
<font color="blue"><font size="4">AoA Chief of Staff</font id="size4"></font id="blue">
<b>ACWGC Cabinet Member</b>

<font color="yellow">THE CALVERT LINE</font id="yellow">
<font color="beige"><b>4th ENGINEERS
2nd - II
<font size="5">AoA</font id="size5"></b></font id="beige"> </center>

So...I read all these posts...sounds like there is a new optional rule for melee? But a new patch hasn't yet been released...is that correct? I know Rich said that something was in the pipeline back month or so ago, so I presume that we will see this "non blitz" tweak for single phase play in the next patch for each game?

Thanks to all...HPS, the Rich's, et. al. This blitz thing has been a perrennial topic for discussion as long as I can remember.

Major General
Tom Ciampa

Commanding Officer
1st Cav Division
XIV Corps, AoC
Games: TS/BG: AN, BR, CH, GB, SH - HPS: AT, CTH, GB, OZK, SH, VK

Interesting...so the beef here is NOT just the basic simultaneous blitz exploitation tactic but<b> also</b> attacking ONLY in column. Of course Cavalry always can do that, but I hope this post and Lt. B's experience WAS NOT someone ALSO meleeing<b>in column</b> with INFANTRY...doing that has always been a buga-boo of mine because infantry in column is really a road movement device NOT a (intended) melee formation.

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by Col. B</i>
<br /><blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">I have also seen entire battles fought without the attacking force ever leaving column formation so they could get high exploitation movement (in this case a one corps attack caught a two corps army withdrawing using road movement to get behind them destroying the entire force).


<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

Whole Corps attacking in column formation? All I can say is:


YUM[^]!


Bring'em on. I'm hungry

2nd Lt. Beno
5/2/I AoP
USA
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

Major General
Tom Ciampa

Commanding Officer
1st Cav Division
XIV Corps, AoC
Games: TS/BG: AN, BR, CH, GB, SH - HPS: AT, CTH, GB, OZK, SH, VK

"Interesting...so the beef here is NOT just the basic simultaneous blitz exploitation tactic but also attacking ONLY in column. Of course Cavalry always can do that, but I hope this post and Lt. B's experience WAS NOT someone ALSO meleeingin column with INFANTRY...doing that has always been a buga-boo of mine because infantry in column is really a road movement device NOT a (intended) melee formation."


...true but the game does force your infantry to melee in column over bridges. Maybe the game engine should allow inf melee in line over a bridge as an exception and then forbid inf melee in column all thgether.

Major Bill Cirillo
3rd Brigade, 1st Div.
XX Corps, AoC, USA

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by Net Warrior</i>
<br />"Interesting...so the beef here is NOT just the basic simultaneous blitz exploitation tactic but also attacking ONLY in column. Of course Cavalry always can do that, but I hope this post and Lt. B's experience WAS NOT someone ALSO meleeingin column with INFANTRY...doing that has always been a buga-boo of mine because infantry in column is really a road movement device NOT a (intended) melee formation."


...true but the game does force your infantry to melee in column over bridges. Maybe the game engine should allow inf melee in line over a bridge as an exception and then forbid inf melee in column all thgether.

Major Bill Cirillo
3rd Brigade, 1st Div.
XX Corps, AoC, USA
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

It's hard to fix since any rule you come up with to allow the exceptions creates other problems. It would be nice to have a third formation, column of companies, to allow you the ability to attack in column but not have road movement capactiy. The board games handled it quite nicely with a little "chit" you placed on the front of the column to indicate it was using road rates and couldn't fight.

Column of attack was used quite often in the Civil War to allow the massing of more men for the assault. They gave up the ability to shoot for the greater depth of force needed for melee.

LG. Kennon Whitehead
Chatham Grays
1/1/III AoM (CSA)

Yes,of course, Ken and Bill...meleeing in column over bridges has always been accepted with or without help of "the engine"...however, when I take up with a new opponent I always go over all of those "house" rules and come to an understanding before beginning...and for that matter agreeing to NOT purposely place wagons, lone leaders, disrupted artillery, routed units and such on high points in a LOS to draw ADF fire and waste the opponent's artillery...it is far too cheap a trick or tactic to be abided.

However, all I was responding to was the comment about ALL ATTACKING IN COLUMN as I assumed ALL meant ALL and that included infantry in column. Doing that seems to me to be an even more aggregious use of meleeing in column with infantry than simply a melee here or there. In some circumstances being allowed to melee in column with BOTH cavalry AND infantry simply DOES allow them to pull off a WWII-like blitzkrieg tactic...moving with some mobile forces, pinning and disupting and then moving through their negated ZOCs, encircling them and finishing them off on the next move or attacking other units further in the rear after just busting through the line. That is far more "not in the spirit" of the tactical intent of the game designers (I think anyway). That takes the reason for the exception of meleeing in line over a bridge to an extreme interpretation...again, in my opinion. As someone said earlier...maybe Antony....the defender just sits and watches his forces become ravaged with no realistic opportunity to take any action...even running away.


<blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by KWhitehead</i>
<br /><blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by Net Warrior</i>
<br />"Interesting...so the beef here is NOT just the basic simultaneous blitz exploitation tactic but also attacking ONLY in column. Of course Cavalry always can do that, but I hope this post and Lt. B's experience WAS NOT someone ALSO meleeingin column with INFANTRY...doing that has always been a buga-boo of mine because infantry in column is really a road movement device NOT a (intended) melee formation."


...true but the game does force your infantry to melee in column over bridges. Maybe the game engine should allow inf melee in line over a bridge as an exception and then forbid inf melee in column all thgether.

Major Bill Cirillo
3rd Brigade, 1st Div.
XX Corps, AoC, USA
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

It's hard to fix since any rule you come up with to allow the exceptions creates other problems. It would be nice to have a third formation, column of companies, to allow you the ability to attack in column but not have road movement capactiy. The board games handled it quite nicely with a little "chit" you placed on the front of the column to indicate it was using road rates and couldn't fight.

Column of attack was used quite often in the Civil War to allow the massing of more men for the assault. They gave up the ability to shoot for the greater depth of force needed for melee.

LG. Kennon Whitehead
Chatham Grays
1/1/III AoM (CSA)
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

Major General
Tom Ciampa

Commanding Officer
1st Cav Division
XIV Corps, AoC
Games: TS/BG: AN, BR, CH, GB, SH - HPS: AT, CTH, GB, OZK, SH, VK