American Civil War Game Club (ACWGC)

Sirs,
Most of my gaming experience with HPS games has been with individual battles. I have started a couple of campaign games and the first battles are getting ready to draw to a close. As they are getting ready to end, questions are coming to my mind and if anybody has answers to them I would appreciate it. I've searched the game documentation for these answers, but haven't seen much on the subject.

1. Do inf. or cav. regiments replenish any of their losses between battles? i.e. with draftees, shirkers, stragglers, soldiers that took "French leave" after returning to Virginia from campaigning up north as happened with the Confederates after Antietam.
2. What happens to fatigue? Does fatigue return to zero at the next battle?
3. What happens to officer casulties? If you lose a divisional leader is one of the existing brigade promoted leaving an anonymous brigader leader in his place?
4. What about "uncrewed" artillery? If there is a uncrewed unit on the board does the winning army get to keep it even if it originally belonged to the enemy? Or does it go back to its owner or is it eliminated from the game for good?
5. Can captured artillery units be used in the next battle as the Confederates historically did after many of their battles?

That's all I can think of for now. If someone can help me with these questions and even pass on other campaign game issues that I'm not thinking of I would appreciate it.

Thanks,


Lt. Boyd "Bama" Denner
"Alabama Brigade"
1/3/III
ANV

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by Boyd</i>
1. Do inf. or cav. regiments replenish any of their losses between battles? i.e. with draftees, shirkers, stragglers, soldiers that took "French leave" after returning to Virginia from campaigning up north as happened with the Confederates after Antietam.
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If the same units are in the next battle, to a certain degree, yes. If they aren't, but return in a later battle, you may even see them return at full strength.

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">
2. What happens to fatigue? Does fatigue return to zero at the next battle?
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Yes, to zero, or whatever the scenario says. Sometimes that makes for strange occurrences.

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">
3. What happens to officer casulties? If you lose a divisional leader is one of the existing brigade promoted leaving an anonymous brigader leader in his place?
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That happens in the next movement phase/turn within the battle, campaign or no campaign.
Now, theoretically, officer casualties should carry over from one campaign battle to the next, but it appears at least in Gettysburg they sometimes don't. In Franklin, I've seen a leader wounded in the second battle return in the third. Must have been not too serious a wound.

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">
4. What about "uncrewed" artillery? If there is a uncrewed unit on the board does the winning army get to keep it even if it originally belonged to the enemy? Or does it go back to its owner or is it eliminated from the game for good?
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If it's captured during the battle, it's gone. If it isn't, it will return at full strength and crewed.

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">
5. Can captured artillery units be used in the next battle as the Confederates historically did after many of their battles?
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Captured artillery is simply eliminated. There is no way of actually "capturing" guns in the literal sense in these games.



Gen. Walter, USA
AoS / War College

Thank you sir, you have been most helpful.

I think one nice feature to consider for future games would be that an army could use captured artillery pieces in follow up battles. From what I've read this happened somewhat often during the war (see Jackson's seige at Harpers Ferry).

If this feature did exist, it might encourage some interesting game play. Confederate commanders might become more courageous charging artillery units in order to supplement their artillery arm for future battles and Union commanders might be more reserved about exposing their artillery units to needless risk.

Cheers,

Lt. Boyd "Bama" Denner
"Alabama Brigade"
1/3/III
ANV

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by Boyd</i>
<br />Thank you sir, you have been most helpful.

I think one nice feature to consider for future games would be that an army could use captured artillery pieces in follow up battles. From what I've read this happened somewhat often during the war (see Jackson's seige at Harpers Ferry).

If this feature did exist, it might encourage some interesting game play. Confederate commanders might become more courageous charging artillery units in order to supplement their artillery arm for future battles and Union commanders might be more reserved about exposing their artillery units to needless risk.

Cheers,

Lt. Boyd "Bama" Denner
"Alabama Brigade"
1/3/III
ANV
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I would have to agree with you on this point

My name is Gary G. Jones II.

Stand Watie

Commander of the 1st Cherokee Mounted Rifles

Lt. Boyd,

Good questions. I believe General Walter has answered them very well, with the exception of #2 (What happens to fatigue? Does fatigue return to zero at the next battle?). My experience has been, "It depends". I won a hard-fought battle at Corinth, but all those units started the next scenario at high fatigue levels. In another campaign, I won much more handily at Corinth and my units were all back to zero fatigue at the next battle.

It may have to do, then, with just how fatigued your units are during the battle. It may however, simply be as General Walter stated: It is scenario-dependent. I selected the same tactical options both times, but I don't know what options my opponents selected. It may be that the first one chose an option that didn't allow either army to rest, whereas the second one selected an option that brought us to the same map but more rested.

I also thought leader casualties carried over from one campaign battle to the next, but I can't say for sure about this. Supply wagons are entirely replenished in each battle, though. Since they don't count toward victory points you may want to avoid going after supply wagons unless you are really desperate for more ammo in that battle. Likewise, artillery ammo is reset.


Your humble servant,
LGen 'Dee Dubya' Mallory

David W. Mallory
ACW - Lieutenant General, Chief of the Armies, Confederate States of America
CCC - Corporal, Georgia Volunteers, Southern Regional Deaprtment, Colonial American Army

The amount of fatigue you get back depends in part on how long it is between battles. I won a round at Corinth and the next morning began a pursuit to Davis Bridge. My men recovered some fatigue, but not all.

As far as reusing captured batteries, it would increase the OOB complexity a great deal - you'd have to create hypothetical units and insert them according to very specific outcomes from previous battles. Hard to program, I'd think. Also, all you've captured is guns, you'd have to manufacture your own trained crews. I wonder how long the ANV typically took to put Union pieces back into service (as new batteries, not as replacements for individual guns).

Lt. Gen. Matt Perrenod
<i>The Blue Ghost</i>
VIII Corps, Army of the Shenandoah

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by mperrenod</i>
<br />The amount of fatigue you get back depends in part on how long it is between battles. I won a round at Corinth and the next morning began a pursuit to Davis Bridge. My men recovered some fatigue, but not all.

As far as reusing captured batteries, it would increase the OOB complexity a great deal - you'd have to create hypothetical units and insert them according to very specific outcomes from previous battles. Hard to program, I'd think. Also, all you've captured is guns, you'd have to manufacture your own trained crews. I wonder how long the ANV typically took to put Union pieces back into service (as new batteries, not as replacements for individual guns).

Lt. Gen. Matt Perrenod
<i>The Blue Ghost</i>
VIII Corps, Army of the Shenandoah

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I imagine outfitting an entirely new battery from scratch using the captured guns would take at least a month bare minimum, more for a good job. But I believe that most captured guns were used as replacements in existing batteries – take that old 6 pounder there and replace it with this shiny new 3â€

"take that old 6 pounder there and replace it with this shiny new 3â€