American Civil War Game Club (ACWGC)

<b>December 1861 – Turn 17 & 18</b>

Winter is in full swing so fighting isn’t. In this game winter is rather harsh. Rivers will freeze stopping River Fleets from moving and cutting off supplies to troops in Western Kentucky and West Virginia. If a player isn’t careful they can lose significant forces to starvation. This is a time for limited offensives and cleaning up rear areas in preparation for spring offensives. I get a new call for Mobilization. Unfortunately I had a game crash and when I reran the turn I selected Partial instead of Full Mobilization. Athena doesn’t make that mistake calling for Full Mobilization, 5% War Bonds, and Volunteers. The Union advantage is they have the War Materials and Money to use their mobilizations.

I now have a number of Army HQ’s available so I will be reorganizing my forces around armies but I can’t take full advantage of this until Corps becomes available in early 1862. I sent McClellan to replace McDowell, mostly to see what the costs would be(3 MP and 48 VP) and to get him out of the way of other promotions.

The severe pounding McDowell has received in Winchester forced me to finally withdraw him to Harpers Ferry so his army can be regrouped. Athena jumps on the chance to get Beauregard’s army out of danger moving him down the valley. In late December I advance a few divisions to take Winchester and start moving what is now McClellan’s army back to Alexandria. In the West Grant moves to besiege Clarksville, KY and manages to bottle Polk’s little army up in it without a fight.

This sets the stage for a lot of small successful battles for the Union in late December. They have victories in Humbolt in the west and Winchester in the East leading to its capture. But the larges battle is when Grant assaults Clarksville destroying Polk’s army in a two day battle. While only 15,000 Union and 4300 Rebels are involved the battle leads to the complete elimination of the 4300 Rebels and gets Grant a promotion so he will be available now for army command.

While a small battle, the Battle of Clarksville will make a good example for a utility I got from Mark van der Hagen (who I am playing a PBEM game now). It give a more detail list of what happen in the battles so I will partially reproduce it’s output below. Partially because it gives to much information so I will only show examples of some of it’s output.

<font color="green">*** Battle Report for Montgomery, TN at day 5 ***</font id="green">
(it uses the region name rather than the city name of Clarksville)
<font color="green">
<b>Confederate Forces</b>

Corps/Force Commander: Leonidas Polk
This force of 3 firing elements with 33 initial strength points killed 0 enemy strength points with 0 hits on 16 shots with an average base chance of 3% and an average final chance of 7%. It lost 2 elements killed and 32 strength points from 10 enemy hits on 83 shots with an average base chance of 16% and an average final chance of 10%.

---> Brewer Cavalry Bn (Cavalry) Starting Strength:12 Starting Cohesion:1

This element killed 0 enemy strength points with 0 hits on 9 shots with an average base chance of 0% and an average final chance of 7%. It was destroyed losing 12 strength points from 3 enemy hits on 33 shots with an average base chance of 18% and an average final chance of 11%.

Shots by this element:
Rd:0 Rg:0 %HitChance:0/7 Roll:86 (Act#40)
Rd:0 Rg:0 %HitChance:0/7 Roll:71 (Act#41)
Rd:0 Rg:0 %HitChance:0/7 Roll:12 (Act#43)
Rd:0 Rg:0 %HitChance:0/7 Roll:63 (Act#44)
Rd:0 Rg:0 %HitChance:0/7 Roll:110 (Act#46)
Rd:0 Rg:0 %HitChance:0/7 Roll:105 (Act#48)
Rd:0 Rg:0 %HitChance:0/7 Roll:81 (Act#49)
Rd:0 Rg:0 %HitChance:0/7 Roll:14 (Act#50)
Rd:0 Rg:0 %HitChance:0/7 Roll:23 (Act#54)</font id="green">

<font color="red">Each line consists of “Rd:â€

<b>January 1862 – Turn 19 & 20</b>

The first month of the new year brings little change. I try to correct my mistake of calling for a Partial instead of a Full Mobilization by issuing 5% War Bonds to raise money to pay for a Volunteer with $1000 bounty to get another 276 conscript companies. The CSA for their part started printing money.

I send a small force to take Humbolt and a larger one under Grant to besiege Nashville. The Rebels for their part send a force under Gen. Floyd to besiege Ft. Pickens in Pensacola harbor. I may lose the fort. I have been putting together a relief force but it will take it a month to get there and may not be strong enough once it arrives. Floyd’s force has a Power of 260. A very rough estimate is to multiply the Power by 15 to get the approximate number of men in the force which would be about 4,000. So I will have to come up with more than that. If I can I will probably also try to take Pensacola and build up a force to threaten Montgomery but that will have to wait until I see if Ft. Pickens survives.


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

<b>February 1862 – Turn 21 & 22</b>

It still winter but the Union seems to be on a run of good luck. I sent Grant to take Nashville and he achieves it with little effort. This give me a big boost in Morale Points bringing me up to 98 and pulling the Rebel down to 98. For the first time we are equal on National Morale and I am only slightly behind on Victory Points (838 vs 918).

Athena is still assaulting Ft. Pickens and seems to be reinforcing the effort with the arrival of A. Johnston and a force now of about 300 Power (probably 5,000 men). I have sent a Task Force with fresh troops to reinforce the fort but I am not sure they will arrive in time or be strong enough to drive off Johnston.

In the East McClellan actually get initiative so I take advantage of it by having him advance from Manassas on Fredericksburg where the Army of Northern Virginia with Joe Johnston in command is. I don’t have much hope for him arriving on time or being successful. I did manage to add one division to his command for the fight. During Late February the Battle of Fredericksburg takes place with Little Mac losing of course. But the stage is set for me to increase the pressure on Virginia with McDowell moving with a force of about 13,000 down the valley and behind the ANV with a supporting movement from Manassas. The question will be whether I will ever get McClellan to move again to support it. Here is a picture of the situation in Virginia at the end of February:



Meanwhile Athena for some reason takes the SouthWest. Except for some cactus I am not sure what value this far off area has. It is very difficult to supply a major force there but they usually don’t script in a strategy without a reason.

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

Kennon
In your 4/26 3:43 PM posting who said

"and thier emphasis is on Historical Accuracy not balance. If you want balance, play chess."- was this Ageod? If so, does this more than imply that the game is certainly unbalanced?

General Tony Best
Army of Georgia

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by tony best</i>
<br />Kennon
In your 4/26 3:43 PM posting who said

"and thier emphasis is on Historical Accuracy not balance. If you want balance, play chess."- was this Ageod? If so, does this more than imply that the game is certainly unbalanced?

General Tony Best
Army of Georgia
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

That was an AGEOD representative's post but may not fully reflect the designer's intent. But they are emphasizing Accuracy over balance. But what that balance should be is depends on your view (or theirs) of how close the Civil War was which usually means how close did Lincoln come to losing reelection.

Also the game is designed to be moded. It is apparently, I haven't tried, easy to design your own scenario with different parameters for many events. Ease of Foreign intervention is one of those that can swing balance over to the CSA's favor.

From the posting on their site I get the impression the Union has an easier time of it. I know their side is more forgiving of errors as long as you don't lose Washington. But I don't know if any one has kept any statistics on win/loss. But I have found almost all the Strategic games favoring the Union so far.

Also the game is continuously changing. The 1.14 version which is still beta has significant changes, about 60 all together.

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

<b>March 1862 – Turns 23 & 24</b>

The month was punctuated with a lot of small fights that I for the most part won. Athena expander her attempt to take Ft. Pickens but my reinforcements struck at adjacent Pensacola to distract her. Surprisingly the small (2,000 men and some cannon) fought off A. Johnston’s force making it eventually retreat and give up the siege. This will be something we will revisit because Island 10, like Ft. Pickens, is a level 1 Fort. I have never been able to take Island 10 and the Rebels have reinforced it with Van Dorn’s command. The fight for Pensacola ended up a series of battles most Union victories but by the end of the month I still didn’t have it in my possession. But the battles did attract away Rebel forces from Johnston.

In the West I am preparing for the advance on Memphis and taking Island 10. Grant has formed the Army of Tennessee and the Union is now reorganizing around an Army/Corps structure. Grant is also shifting has main army from Nashville to Hombolt for the advance.

In the East the Rebels briefly retook Winchester. This one of those partisan problems the Union has. While shifting troops in the valley I briefly left Winchester unoccupied so a CSA Militia unit took it back. The next turn I easily retook it but it side tracked one of my divisions to do it. Further east Athena decided to make a major push to take Ft. Monroe. Jackson attacked destroying Butler’s force outside the Fort, wounding Butler but unfortunately not killing him. The game represents this by redeploying Butler to some home state city and locking him for the number of turns he need to recuperate.

What looked like the great and possibly decisive battle for this month was McClellan’s attack on Fredericksburg and Joe Johnston’s Army of Northern Virginia. When I saw the battle report I thought a major victory had been achieved. McClellan won and captured Fredericksburg. His seniority was increased making him the highest ranking 3 star general. Then I took a closer look at the Battle Report shown below:



It shows McClellan with some 36,000 men attacking Joe Johnston with 18,000. But it reports casualties of 0 for the Union side and only 1044 for the Rebel. What I found out was the Battle Report is extremely misleading and other than telling you what forces were in the Region at the time of the battle and the casualties for the battle it is worthless. What actually happened is Johnston retreated from the region leaving nothing but a militia unit in Fredericksburg. The great battle was 36,000 men attacking 1044 Militia men. I don’t know whether the seniority promotion was due to the battle or just one of the many automatic events in the game.

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

<b>April 1862 – Turn 25 & 26</b>

I managed to reinforce Ft. Monroe so it is now besieged but not in much danger unless much larger forces are moved against it. Likewise Ft. Pickens and the Pensacola area are still in danger but I was able to land Rickett’s division which lead to a whole series of small battles between them and A. Johnston and Bragg. But still neither side strong enough to win out right.

I formed a Corps under Banks and sent it against Richmond which stirred up a hornet’s nest of Rebel activity. Up till then I thought I had turned the corner and gotten the upper hand but Rebel Armies are appearing out of the woodwork. I found Longstreet with a force almost equal to my largest Corps, Banks, in Richmond. Then the ANV moved against McClellan his support units left to hold Fredericksburg retaking it. In addition I found Magruder nearby with another 12,000+ force supporting either the ANV or Jackson and Forney who are attacking Ft. Monroe. Charlottesville also has a sizable force guarding it. I will have to draw back and consolidate my position in Virginia and probably will be on the defensive there for a while.

Assuming there is some limit to how may forces the Rebels can raise against me, I am trying to concentrate enough to take Memphis in the West. To understand the situation there I have reproduced the current situation map below:



Athena has placed her largest force, the Army of Tennessee under Van Dorn, in Island 10. There are smaller but still sizable forces scattered around covering the approaches to Memphis in the lower left. I have no way yet to determine how large the forces are defending Memphis. Island 10 is extremely difficult to take when even poorly defended. With a major force there its un-take able so I am going to bypass it. I am going to build up Grant’s AoT in Humbolt and advance down the railroads to take Memphis and Corinth. Lew Wallace has already moved down to Corinth on a Railroad destroying expedition to cut Memphis off from the rest of the Confederacy. The yellow lines coming to and from Humbolt highlight the major rail line coming in from Bowling Green which will allow me to use rail movement to build this army up for the final assault. As long as I can hold that rail line I don’t need to control the Mississippi below Island 10 to feed my armies. Now to see if Athena can reach again into her hat and pull out more armies.

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

<b>May 1862 – Turn 27 & 28</b>

The war goes on but the Union isn’t making much progress. I had to fall back from Richmond and try to consolidate my rear areas. Jackson made another attempt on Ft. Monroe which was beaten back. But I still have pretty firm control on the western parts of Virginia and Northern Virginia.

In the West Grant is side tracked by Polk moving up toward the critical rail line. He took his army and struck Polk at Decatur driving him back south. Buell takes a small force and moves south from Nashville to see if he can cut some of the east-west rail lines the South is using. In the Far West a small force advances and takes Springfield, MO.

Meanwhile way down south in Pensacola area another series of small fights between Union and Rebel forces takes place. I have reinforced the group down there but they badly need a rest. They may yet be destroyed if some of these troops aren’t drawn off to defend Tennessee soon.


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

<b>June 1862 – Turns 29 & 30</b>

In the East Jackson again attacks Ft. Monroe and is again sent packing with heavy losses. Forts are hard to crack in this game. Meanwhile Union forces besiege Charlottesville as I expand my hold on Central Virginia. Athena withdraws from Fredericksburg.

In the West Grant returns to Humbolt and then starts his advance on Memphis driving the garrison back into the city. The Rebels have a force nearby just north of Memphis but it isn’t large enough to defeat Grant’s. Grant’s problem is going to be supply since the Union doesn’t control the river and the Rebel force is on the railroad from Humbolt. We will see if I have sufficient forces to both take Memphis and open the rail line.

Meanwhile the endless battles for Pensacola continue with neither side getting the upper hand. Berry’s command is defeated again but still manages to recover some of its cohesion making them a formidable force again. Also some split off units rejoin the group.

Athena’s response to all this is to issue 6% War Bonds to raise money and Call for Volunteers. Next turn big things will happen if I get enough initiative.


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

<b>July 1862 – Turns 31 & 32</b>

I am still having a hard time getting Grant to assault Memphis and finish the thing. Only thing I can figure is he’s fallen off the wagon again. Luckily his support troops do move with Sherman driving Polk across the Mississippi and Wallace moving his Corps to help secure the railroads. But rail access is still broken and Grant’s supplies are falling fast.

But elsewhere mostly good news with my hold on Virginia expanding to include Charlottesville and Fredericksburg. And way down South in Pensacola area Berry defeats A. Johnston driving him out of Milton. This should leave Forest’s force besieging Ft. Pickens cut off so they will have to withdraw.

May, June and July have been very successful months for the North. Although no major battles were won I have steadily improved my position and won many small battles which add up. The net result is that for the first time I lead in Morale Points, 105 vs 101, and for the first time the CSA Foreign Intevention number fell going from 34 to 30. Another telling measure are total loses for each side which is now 41,000 to the South’s 48,000. Since the game doesn’t give you a measure of your own or your enemies force levels losses are the only good measure you have of the damage you are doing.

National Morale though is approaching a critical point. When it goes above 105 my conscription per turn rates will increase which will help build up my armies between Drafts.

I haven't found out all the internal affects of Morale levels but here is a table of the nominal levels their ranges:

110 115-120
105 106-114
100 95-105
.95 86-94
.90 75-85
.85 70-74

In the game if you mouse over the NM it will tell you your national morale co-efficient (this effectively is your modifier instead of your raw NM score). So if you have a NM of 105, your NM co-efficient is still only 100: so there is no improvements. But if you have NM 106 then your NMC changes to 105- so you will get a 5% bonus. Then if your NM is 114 your NMC is still 105. But with a NM of 115 your NMC goes up to 110.


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

Just wanted to say thanks for your work in making these posts Kennon. Have you considered any amphibious operations? How is the naval aspect of the game going?

General Mark Nelms
6/3/IX/AoO
"Blackhawk Brigade"
Union Military Academy Instructor
Union Cabinet Secretary

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by nelmsm</i>
<br />Just wanted to say thanks for your work in making these posts Kennon. Have you considered any amphibious operations? How is the naval aspect of the game going?

General Mark Nelms
6/3/IX/AoO
"Blackhawk Brigade"
Union Military Academy Instructor
Union Cabinet Secretary

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

I did use an amphibious landing to reinforce Ft. Pickens. Since it was besieged rather than try to reinforce the Fort I landed in nearby Pensacola which initiated this on going fight in the cities and regions around Pensacola bay. I also reinforced it once more by sea with mostly artillery with the intention of securing one of the ports and fortifying it (takes four artillery and two supply units to build a fort). I still haven't been able to get firm enough control down there to secure the regions but it has tied down three large Rebel forces.

In my PBEM game I did a better job of it since I landed before the CSA decided to try to take Fort Pickens and secured the area but because overall I am losing that game (Mark is much better at the game than I am) I haven't had enough spare troops to exploit the base.

The game has a very complex naval game and I have only figured out a few parts of it. The South's shore starts lined with fortifications which the Union navy can bombard and/or blockade. Blockade forces can be placed in general areas considered "blue water" blockades which aren't port specific or you can place them in "brown water" blockades (water regions adjacent to port entrances. You can build a wide range of ships from scout schooners to steam iron frigates as well as various ironclads. Some are better for chasing raiders, some make better blockaders, others are for taking on forts and ironclads.

I suspect the naval game picks up as the US player accumulates more money and War Supplies. Ships cost a lot but don't require many men so they make good "buys" later in the game when you have money but not men.

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

The Union player really needs to pay attention to the naval game as they will need to take Confederate ports to cut down on the amount of war supply and cash they get from overseas. They should also work on maintaining the ocean blockade and do some brown water blockading also. I just noticed you hadn't said much about it and was wondering where you were on it. Has the CSA built any raiders?

General Mark Nelms
6/3/IX/AoO
"Blackhawk Brigade"
Union Military Academy Instructor
Union Cabinet Secretary

<b>August 1862 – Turn 33 & 34</b>

Still can’t get Grant to attack. I am beginning to suspect there is some restriction on a group based around an Army HQ even though it contains two divisions. But so far no one has confirmed anything on the AGEOD forums. Sherman at least is doing his duty. His small force captures Covington and then moves on to take Hayward opening another rail line. I am continuing to push troops down the rail line to help garrison it. Grant does succeed in breaching the fortifications. Foote runs his gun boats past Island 10 and blockades the river next to Memphis. I should have Grant back in supply soon. Meanwhile I will try to find a free independent force to take Memphis with just in case Grant refuses to attack again.

Event wise I get two, Emancipation Proclamation and Sinking the CSS Alabama. Oddly I didn’t see any affect for the Emancipation Proclamation but the CSS Alabama caused a +5 bonus to my Morale. In the east Athena seems obsessed with Ft. Monroe sending Jackson against it again for heavy losses.


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

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by nelmsm</i>
<br />The Union player really needs to pay attention to the naval game as they will need to take Confederate ports to cut down on the amount of war supply and cash they get from overseas. They should also work on maintaining the ocean blockade and do some brown water blockading also. I just noticed you hadn't said much about it and was wondering where you were on it. Has the CSA built any raiders?

General Mark Nelms
6/3/IX/AoO
"Blackhawk Brigade"
Union Military Academy Instructor
Union Cabinet Secretary
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

I have had difficulty determining what the CSA is doing naval wise. I have seen some ship movement but they never engaged. They have some ships in the Atlantic boxes but not enough to indicate building programs. When I played as CSA it wasn't clear that there was enough return from building blockade runners and raider to justify their costs.

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