American Civil War Game Club (ACWGC)

ACWGC Forums

* ACWGC    * Dpt. of Records (DoR)    *Club Recruiting Office     ACWGC Memorial

* CSA HQ    * VMI   * Join CSA    

* Union HQ   * UMA   * Join Union    

CSA Armies:   ANV   AoT

Union Armies:   AotP    AotT

Link Express

Club Forums:     NWC    CCC     Home Pages:     NWC    CCC    ACWGC
It is currently Thu Mar 28, 2024 6:44 pm

All times are UTC - 5 hours




Post new topic Reply to topic  [ 36 posts ]  Go to page 1, 2, 3  Next
Author Message
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Thu May 24, 2007 8:02 am 
Offline

Joined: Fri Aug 01, 2003 12:44 pm
Posts: 1200
Location: USA
I'd love to hear from folks "on the ground" in KC!

Image
General Jeff Laub
Union Chief of the Army
ACWGC Cabinet Member
http://www.geocities.com/laubster22/UnionHQ/


Top
 Profile Send private message  
Reply with quote  
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Fri May 25, 2007 5:16 pm 
Offline

Joined: Fri Aug 01, 2003 12:44 pm
Posts: 1200
Location: USA
Anyone with a summary of tonights activities??? Anyone get a look at Chickamauga yet???

Jealous I'm not there...

Image
General Jeff Laub
Union Chief of the Army
ACWGC Cabinet Member
http://www.geocities.com/laubster22/UnionHQ/


Top
 Profile Send private message  
Reply with quote  
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Mon May 28, 2007 4:00 pm 
Offline

Joined: Sat Jul 14, 2001 12:13 am
Posts: 335
Location: USA
I just got home from the grand gala. I didn't play ACW personally. The main ACW event was a large 3 on 3 scenario that had a plethora of players rotating through it, I'll let the participants fill you in on the details though.

I will say that the ACW discussion was extremely interesting, and some very good ideas were batted about. I am confident this great game will continue to get better.

Major General Gary McClellan
1st Division, XXIII Corps
AoO,USA


Top
 Profile Send private message  
Reply with quote  
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Mon May 28, 2007 4:45 pm 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Tue May 22, 2001 4:51 pm
Posts: 3524
Location: Massachusetts, USA
I think you will find that Chickamauga will fit in very well with the other games.

<b><font color="gold">Ernie Sands
General, Commanding, Army of Ohio
Image
ACWGC Cabinet member
</b></font id="gold">


Top
 Profile Send private message  
Reply with quote  
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Mon May 28, 2007 5:22 pm 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Wed Sep 25, 2002 5:51 pm
Posts: 749
Location: USA
<font color="beige"><b>Just got back home from TillerCon II a few hours ago....a bit of a delay on our flight back, all worked out in the end.

Great time was had.....

Got together with some old friends and met some new ones.

Picked up a copy of Chickamauga...haven't had a chance to get it out of the cellophane.

It was a really good ACW games group discussion with Rich Walker and John Tiller, The Tiller ACW team has been responsive to players input, the discussions at the last TillerCon and since on the forums have been instrumental in bringing improvements to the series, Full defense fire during melee, artillery capture, artillery fire by prolonge and mounted cavalry skirmishers to name but a few.

Several ideas were discussed;
Artillery losing guns and or fire effectiveness due to small arms fire rather than just 'crew killed / no effect'.
A melee phase at the end of the "turn play" mode so no offensive movement could occur after melee. Many players dislike the turn play mode due to the attackers ability to advance other units after melee and doing blitz style attacks. The melee phase as the last part of movement & fire maybe a way to bring together the best of turn play and phase play.
The possibility of having multiple entry points for reinforcements in a given scenario, thus creating more variations in entry time and location bringing greater "fog of war" to scenarios each time they are played, making them more "replayable".
More changes/fine tuning were discussed.....which I cannot recall at this late and tired hour.

The music was wonderful again this time, around 8 o'clock on Saturday evening Tom Hook on vocals & piano along with his daughter on vocals & guitar and brother Lee Hook on vocals & spoons dressed in ACW attire preformed fourteen songs.


Mike Mihalik put on a great ACW multi-player using Vicksburg with a custom scenario he designed. Myself, DeeDubya Mallory and Punic Wars designer Paul Buffell and a few other folks from time to time handled the Rebels, Ken Miller, Dave Klebbe, George Denny and Jim Gleason again with others from time to time ran the Yanks. (please excuse me if I missed anyone) The game was still on going when I left Monday morning....DeeDubya assured me Reb victory was in the bag.

This was my second Tiller Con and it was every bit as good.....heck it was better than the first, I highly recommend attending one.

No mention of Tiller Con I or II can be complete without a very...VERY BIG
<center><font size="5">Thank You</font id="size5"></center>
to Rich Hamilton, there are a number of folks that lend a hand and help out but it is Rich that makes these things happen. It truly amazes me how much he puts into pulling Tiller Con off.</b></font id="beige">

<center><font color="blue"><b>Maj.Gen. R.A.Weir</b></font id="blue">
<font color="yellow">THE CALVERT LINE</font id="yellow">
Image
<b>First--III--AoA CSA</b></center>


Top
 Profile Send private message  
Reply with quote  
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Mon May 28, 2007 5:47 pm 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Tue Nov 11, 2003 9:52 am
Posts: 870
Location: USA
I just want to echo MG Weir's remarks about TillerCon II and thanks to Rich Hamilton. Truly amazing, his accomplishments to put these events on. I hope to make TC III.

As for the ACW discussion. It was the one event I most was looking forward to. I will always trust the players to come up with good ideas, or to give input on others.

To add to what was already mentioned.

1) Fix bug for misdirected routed units.
2) One ammo point for each tube fired. John can create a program to fix previous scns on the fly.
3) 3/4 movement extended to routed units
4) Fix bug so every unit can move at least one hex.
5) No disruption to units that successfully melee units that are destroyed without retreating.
6) Tweaking 3D graphics

Laslty, I want to say thanks to all the players to showed up to give input.

I enjoyed meeting everyone and I hope lasting friendships.

Thanks!


Lt. Col. Richard Walker
I Corps
Army of the Mississippi
2nd Brigade, 3rd Division
"Defenders of Tennessee"


Top
 Profile Send private message  
Reply with quote  
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Mon May 28, 2007 11:04 pm 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Tue May 29, 2001 3:54 pm
Posts: 499
Location: United Kingdom
<blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by Robert</i>
<br />Several ideas were discussed;
Artillery losing guns and or fire effectiveness due to small arms fire rather than just 'crew killed / no effect'.
A melee phase at the end of the "turn play" mode so no offensive movement could occur after melee. Many players dislike the turn play mode due to the attackers ability to advance other units after melee and doing blitz style attacks. The melee phase as the last part of movement & fire maybe a way to bring together the best of turn play and phase play.<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">I really like this idea. I currently use the 'embedded melee phase' rule but it would be better to have something hard coded into the game.

Image
[url="http://homepage.ntlworld.com/a.r.barlow/acw/acw.htm"]General Antony Barlow[/url]
[url="http://homepage.ntlworld.com/a.r.barlow/aoc/XXAoC.htm"]XO, Army of the Cumberland[/url]


Top
 Profile Send private message  
Reply with quote  
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Tue May 29, 2007 1:23 am 
Offline

Joined: Thu Sep 11, 2003 4:32 am
Posts: 1737
Location: USA
"2) One ammo point for each tube fired. John can create a program to fix previous scns on the fly."

Glad to see this in list. I consider it to be fixing the single worse flaw in the game system.

LG. Kennon Whitehead
Chatham Grays
III Corps, AoM (CSA)


Top
 Profile Send private message  
Reply with quote  
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Tue May 29, 2007 4:27 am 
Offline

Joined: Fri Aug 01, 2003 12:44 pm
Posts: 1200
Location: USA
Good to hear the updates, thanks for sharing!

Not happy to hear about DW and a Reb victory, though![:D]

Image
General Jeff Laub
Union Chief of the Army
ACWGC Cabinet Member
http://www.geocities.com/laubster22/UnionHQ/


Top
 Profile Send private message  
Reply with quote  
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Tue May 29, 2007 4:41 am 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Tue Nov 11, 2003 9:52 am
Posts: 870
Location: USA
Aside from the bugs, the proposed updates will need to be prioritized. John is unlikely to impliment them all at once.


Lt. Col. Richard Walker
I Corps
Army of the Mississippi
2nd Brigade, 3rd Division
"Defenders of Tennessee"


Top
 Profile Send private message  
Reply with quote  
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Tue May 29, 2007 8:44 am 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Thu May 24, 2001 11:25 am
Posts: 1022
Location: USA
Gentlemen,

Alas, there was good news and bad news about the ACW battle. The Rebs did indeed reach a Rebel Major Victory by the time we had to end the game, but we were only at about turn 65 of 165.

The scenario General Mihalik put together was a 'what-if': General Joseph Johnston rode to Vicksburg and personally ordered Pemberton to get his army out and meet with Johnston's army at Jackson, Mississippi. The map was a long east-west map, with Jackson about 1/4 from the eastern edge. In both eastern corners were exit hexes for the Rebs. Jackson had 12,000 points worth of geographic objectives.

Some of Johnston's Army of Relief (Walker's 2-brigade division and a handful of cavalry) started on the map, guarding the southwest corner. Pemberton's army entered via a road in the upper west. Grant's army was located somewhere (the Yanks will have to provide more detail) in the southwest.

Walker's division and the cav was beat up badly while trying to slow the Yanks down, but most of Pemberton's army was able to get past the Yanks. (We lost all of our supply wagons, but fortunately there were no points for supply in the scenario!)

Bob Weir, Paul Bruffell, and I basically rotated control of the two Rebel armies throughout the 3 days, depending on who was available. The biggest challenge with rotating through commanders was deciding on and carrying out a focused strategy. Some felt it would be an easy win to just force march across the map and out through the exit hexes. Others felt this wouldn't provide much 'fun'. It was interesting to spend several turns setting things up one way, then get pulled away to some other activity, only to return several hours later and see things going (strategically) in an entirely different direction. (This was also evident in command and control: Some weren't as confident as others about the importance of command ranges.)

The Rebs needed 15,000 for a Major Victory. Adding in the 12,000 objective points we would lose by abandoning Jackson we had to have 27,000 to guarantee a Major win.

Many of the Rebel forces made it entirely off the map, and more were safely on the other side of the creek running north & south through Jackson and would have been able to add to the score. Unfortunately, the Rebs left far too many stragglers (in my opinion) as rear guard units. These were quickly gobbled up, not only decreasing from the points available to us to get off the map but increasing the number of points we would have to have to guarantee the Major.

For me, the most exciting part of the battle were the last few turns, when Yanks began emerging from the woods southwest of Jackson. The Rebs had about a division or two worth of units (of mixed commands!) still on the road west of Jackson. I felt like Lee at Appomatox! [V] Some of the Reb infantry deployed to provide a screen so the remaining artillery could cross. The artillery was one turn away from the getting across when George Denney had to bow out. He was the last remaining Yank, so we called the battle.

The final score was just shy of 21,000 points, a Reb Major Victory. We still had about as many units already across the river who could have made it to the exits as we had on the west side, so even if we had lost ALL of the units on the west we MIGHT have still had enough for a Major Victory, but who knows.

Rotating command had its challenges, to be sure, but it was great fun. Not only did it allow those who wanted to to participate in other parts of the convention*, but it provided more of the fog of war I enjoy. ("You did WHAT while I was gone [:0] ?!?")

(* = I played -- and WON! -- my first Panzer Campaign game. Of course, I was given the Axis at Arnhem, so I definitely had the odds stacked in my favor. Still, for only having been provided 7 turns of 'tutoring', primarily by Mike Laabs, I was thrilled to be anything more than a speed bump to the Allies. My thanks to Gary Cobleigh for putting that tournament together, too. I even got a medal for being on the winning side!)

My thanks to Mike Mihalik for putting this blind scenario together. Based on what he saw, he might tweak it to make the Jackson objectives worth even more. (As Ken Miller, one of the Yank opponents, pointed out, the objectives points should be such that if the Rebs retreat their entire army and abandon Jackson, the best they could get would be a draw. That way, they would need to at least attempt to inflict some casualties in rear guard fighting to garner a victory.)

My thanks, too, to Bob Weir and Paul Bruffell, who had the brunt of the Rebel control in the game. I heard there was another Reb who filled in at times, but he and I never crossed paths at this battle. Also, I want to thank the many Yanks who led the overwhelming assault on Jackson: George Denney, Ken Miller, Jim Gleason, and Dave Klebbe (with Mike Mihalik himself stepping in at the end, when George was left by himself, to help move those throngs of Yanks along).

I'll make a separate entry on my overall thoughts on the convention later, but I knew many would want to know how the battle ended.


Your humble servant,
Gen 'Dee Dubya' Mallory

Image
David W. Mallory
ACW - General, 3/2/I/AotM (Club President & Cabinet Member)
CCC - Lieutenant, Georgia Volunteers, Southern Regional Department, Colonial American Army


Top
 Profile Send private message  
Reply with quote  
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Tue May 29, 2007 8:53 am 
Offline

Joined: Fri Aug 01, 2003 12:44 pm
Posts: 1200
Location: USA
Great update, Mr. President! Sounds like a fun scenario, in fact!

Image
General Jeff Laub
Union Chief of the Army
ACWGC Cabinet Member
http://www.geocities.com/laubster22/UnionHQ/


Top
 Profile Send private message  
Reply with quote  
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Tue May 29, 2007 1:14 pm 
Offline

Joined: Tue Aug 07, 2001 11:39 pm
Posts: 28
As a spectator (I was often at one of open computers at their pod) I enjoyed watching the game develop. Really was a dedicated crew. They played 8-9 am until almost midnight most days (though it got thin during meal times). Enjoyed evesdropping on some of the banter too...

Bill P was of course missed. I might have been able to nab a victory had he made the trip.[;)]

Major M. Cox
2nd/1st/<i>VIII</i>
AoS
Image<i>'Once more unto the breach'</i>


Top
 Profile Send private message  
Reply with quote  
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Wed May 30, 2007 8:28 am 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Tue May 22, 2001 10:10 pm
Posts: 1035
Location: USA
Finally found some time to get online, had 4 days worth of emails and turns to catch up on.

My thanks to Rich Hamilton for all the effort he puts into Tiller Con.

I had a good time even though the allies lost the PzC tourney and the yanks lost the ACW game although they did have a 2-1 casualty rate advantage over the rebs and captured practically their entire supply train. Thanks to Mike for putting the scenario together. Had the rebs elected to fight it out it would have been interesting but after loosing all their wagons they decided the best thing they could do was save their army.



Gen. Ken Miller

Image

Army of the Shenandoah


Top
 Profile Send private message  
Reply with quote  
 Post subject:
PostPosted: Wed May 30, 2007 8:50 am 
Offline

Joined: Tue Nov 11, 2003 9:52 am
Posts: 1324
Some brief thoughts on the ACW game.

General Mallory gave an excellent account of the battle. It didn't unfold as I thought. Because of a scarcity of roads and a plethora of creeks, plus Ken Miller's bad luck in getting the XVII Corps released and Bob Weir's skill in using the terrain to delay them, Union troops were never able to intercept Pemberton's army and force it to fight as I envisioned. George Denny did catch and mall the rear guard and captured the supply train, but Paul Bruffels essentially marched the bulk of Pemberton's army to Meridian without interference. I was disappointed because the Jim Gleason and Ken Miller could only get a fraction of their men into play because of terrain restrictions, but I think the scenario did provide insight as to Pemberton's chances of escaping if he had tried.

The map I used was Bolton-Clinton-Jackson. Unfortunately, the road used historically by Sherman to move on Jackson is not all on the map, so it couldn't be utilized. Had Ken had the option to use that road, I think the outcome would have been different.

What Dave failed to mention is that casualties broke about 3:1 in favor of the union. It was hard to tell how many guns were captured as they don't show in the victory dialog, only the points for them. But in men the losses were about 12,000 rebs to about 4000 Yanks.

I really liked the multiplayer computer setup. Although it would occasionally kick a player out it was easy to set up and assign units, which could then be moved and fired simultaneously by that side's players.

I saw the cavalry skirmish option employed for the first time. It is a powerful tool, maybe too powerful. When selected, it allows the phasing player to see two hexes like skirmishers while using its full movement allowance without skirmisher penalty. It also can delay units approaching it just like skirmishers. I think it is a valuable option, but I would have preferred mounted cavalry having to deploy as skirmishers with the same penalties that infantry skirmishers suffer. I thought the artillery capture rule worked OK, but the players who participated in the battle ought to have more valid input about it than I.

My thanks to all the guys who particiated in the battle, and to the gals who allowed it. The players pretty much stood manfully to their guns through the three days and managed to fight their way through about 65 turns of a frustrating scenario. Skoal!

MG Mike Mihalik
1/III/AoMiss/CSA


Top
 Profile Send private message  
Reply with quote  
Display posts from previous:  Sort by  
Post new topic Reply to topic  [ 36 posts ]  Go to page 1, 2, 3  Next

All times are UTC - 5 hours


Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 108 guests


You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot post attachments in this forum

Search for:
Jump to:  
Powered by phpBB® Forum Software © phpBB Group