American Civil War Game Club (ACWGC)

During a recent game the following situation occurred:
The Confederates had two routed/isolated units and one disrupted/isolated unit in the hex north-west of the hex marked 'O' and were facing the 'O' hex;
One Union infantry united meleed those units from the hex marked 'O';
The Union won the melee; and
All Confederate units 'retreated forward' into a ZoC as shown by the arrow.


The game 'rule' (which makes no logical sense to me) appears to be that:
The disrupted/isolated unit was then allowed to 'retreat forward' because it was stacked with routed units (if it wasn't then it would have been eliminated because it couldn't retreat to the rear): the routed/isolated units were able to retreat forward because they were stacked with an unrouted unit (or they would have been eliminated in an automatic victory).

That's crazy! Why is it so?

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Paul Swanson
Lieutenant-General
First Division
First Corps
Army of Northern Virginia

To me, it appears they could retreat forward because there is no indication in the diagram that the Confederate frontal hexes were in the Union units' zone of control.

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MG Mike Mihalik
Forrest's Cavalry Corps
AoWest/CSA

The hex that the CSA 'retreated' to was in Union ZoC from their unlimbered artillery and the unit in the hex marked 'O'. The only other vacant hex at the time of melee was to the south-east of the 'O' hex and again that was in the ZoC of the Union unit in that hex.
Also, in normal circumstances (no isolated/routed units), a unit retreating following a melee can only retreat to the three rearward hexes (not the three forward facing hexes). If such a unit cannot retreat into a rearward hex (e.g. they are occupied by enemy units) that retreating unit is eliminated.

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Paul Swanson
Lieutenant-General
First Division
First Corps
Army of Northern Virginia

The zone of control of a unit only extends into its three frontal hexes, so the hex the Confederate unit retreated forward into could not be in the zone of control of the unit marked '0' or the pictured artillery. My extensive experience has been that units can and often do retreat into one of their three frontal hexes even sometimes when all the rear hexes aren't blocked. But I play phase almost exclusively.

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MG Mike Mihalik
Forrest's Cavalry Corps
AoWest/CSA

"The zone of control of a unit only extends into its three frontal hexes"

Yes, exactly. The three frontal hexes for the unit in 'O' are north, north-west and south-west of it. The CSA units' retreated into their left forward hex which was in the ZoC of both the unit at 'O' and the artillery units.

"so the hex the Confederate unit retreated forward into could not be in the zone of control of the unit marked '0' or the pictured artillery"

But it was clearly in ZoC as shown in the screenshot.

"My extensive experience has been that units can and often do retreat into one of their three frontal hexes even sometimes when all the rear hexes aren't blocked."

That should never happen. If all retreat hexes (the three rearward ones) are blocked the defending unit should be eliminated if required to retreat.

The odd thing about the situation I described was that this normal rule was somehow nullified because routed/isolated units were stacked with a disrupted/isolated unit. Had they all been routed/isolated, or all disrupted/isolated, they would have been eliminated because the only two vacant hexes available to the CSA units were two of its 'forward hexes'. Also, both vacant hexes were also in enemy ZoC, although even if they weren't [say the 'O' and artillery units were facing the other way] it should not have mattered as they were forward hexes for the CSA units.

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Paul Swanson
Lieutenant-General
First Division
First Corps
Army of Northern Virginia

I would have expected total elimination of the Confederate units. Since they weren't, obviously, they had been drinking very heavily.

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Gen Ned Simms
2/XVI Corps/AotT
Blood 'n Guts hisself, a land lovin' pirate. Show me some arty tubes and we'll charge 'em.
VMI Class of '00

LOL, I don't doubt that for a minute.

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Paul Swanson
Lieutenant-General
First Division
First Corps
Army of Northern Virginia

Well, I'm done arguing. Why don't you submit this to WDS and see what they tell you.

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MG Mike Mihalik
Forrest's Cavalry Corps
AoWest/CSA

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Gen. Blake Strickler
Confederate General-in-Chief
El Presidente 2010 - 2012

"The old system of three in the rear and one in the front is no longer in place."

Yes it is, that still works.

The Manual diagrams posted remain correct. In the second diagram [Optional Rule Weak ZoC checked which is the norm] the Union unit has a rearward hex (north-west of it) in which to retreat which it uses. Had that hex been occupied and one of the forward hexes (south-west, south, south-east) been vacant it would have been eliminated.

It is only in the situation I described was that this normal rule was somehow nullified because routed/isolated units were stacked with a disrupted/isolated unit. Had they all been routed/isolated, or all disrupted/isolated, they would have been eliminated because the only two vacant hexes available to the CSA units were two of its 'forward hexes'. This situation is an unwritten rule that makes no sense to me as degraded units stacking together are somehow able to utilise a loophole unavailable to other units.

_________________
Paul Swanson
Lieutenant-General
First Division
First Corps
Army of Northern Virginia

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Gen. Blake Strickler
Confederate General-in-Chief
El Presidente 2010 - 2012

I only raised it 'unofficially', it's a 'byproduct' of other things.
In other instances 'blocking the rearward hexes' still works just fine. I just eliminated a couple of hundred enemy cavalry doing just that (even though they had a forward hex to 'retreat' into).

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Paul Swanson
Lieutenant-General
First Division
First Corps
Army of Northern Virginia

Seems like routed units can rout in any direction but unrouted units can only go rearward. When they share a hex and lose a melee it creates a situation where the game has to choose which rule to follow for the entire stack. The stack can only do one of two things: surrender or retreat. The stack can't do different things because the hex is overrun and the units must leave together or surrender together. No matter which they do someone will say they should have done the other instead.

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Gen. Mitch Johnson
GENERAL IN CHIEF