General impressions / wishlist / bug fixes

[Davekhps]

Alright, I've played through a couple of full RC4 campaigns, one Union, one Confederate, and have a list of things to share.

First, so they're not lost in the shuffle: bug fixes.
1. Mosby's Rangers are spawned in Rockingham, NC. I'm guessing they are supposed to be spawned in Rockingham, VA?
2. CSS Wyvern (one of the Laird Rams) is misspelled "Wynern"
3. Misspellings across the map: saw a number of "Bay" regions with the lowercase "bay"-- Swamp bay, Tucker bay. Also, Cape Henry reads as "Cape henry", etc.
4. When you hover the cursor over a division in the stack, you will see the left-side box pop up with the leader and units in that division. The leader in that left-side box is always shown as 1 star, regardless of whether they are 2- or 3-star generals. If you click on the division, you'll get the *right* side box with the leader and see their real rank, but it would save a click if the left-side box accurately portrayed the leader's rank.
5. Light infantry in a stack is shown as militia in that left-side pop-up box.
6. Is horse artillery worthless in a siege? I'm assuming yes because they were useless in game.
7. My units rarely were able to capture leaders or supply wagons outside of enemy stacks, i.e. I'd have units in regions with both, for *dozens* of turns, and I'd never capture them. Seems like a bug.
8. The game crashes pretty frequently during turn resolution; I'd say 1 out of every 20-30 turns I'll get a
crash. I wasn't in the hunt to start sending error logs, but I may do so; surely I'm not alone.
9. Happy the "never enter Kentucky" bug is fixed in 1.01... that really put a damper on both my games.

General impressions:
Overall, a great game. Kudos to the AGEOD team for delivering something of this scope!

That said, from a historical standpoint, I think there are some odd balance choices when it comes to money/war supplies/conscripts:
10. Money is a limiting factor for both, but especially the Confederates. Definitely stings, and I never could get "whole" as the South in the cash flow department. Seems to work well.
11. Choosing either side, selecting even a smattering of industrial options in the early game results in essentially limitless war supplies in mid-war (forget about late war). Personally, I think the war supplies are probably too stingy in the early years, but by the mid to late game, they're absolutely meaningless.
12. Likewise, manpower isn't much of a limiting factor for either side in the mid/late game. The Union's supply is practically inexhaustible (historically WAD, perhaps-- but more on that in a moment), while the Confederate's manpower isn't a limiting factor (again, cash is-- at endgame I had well over 800+ conscripts in the bank without *once* ever paying a premium for volunteers, thousands of war supplies, but little cash to use them).

Bottom line: the mid-game, let alone late-game, balance is out of whack for some reason.

A special note about Union manpower: as a student of the Civil War, I'm well aware of the Union's historical ability to swamp the South in manpower, money, and industry. But playing as the South, the Union numbers were genuinely obscene. I wasn't just outnumbered in every theater-- I was outnumbered by 3, 4, even 5 times at every spot. And this was at the point of attack, mind you, i.e. we're not adding in all the 1000+ (even 2000+) PWR Union stacks that magically appear in the rear every turn. It's one thing, for instance, for the Army of Northern Virginia to face down a 100,000 man Army of the Potomac; it's another thing entirely for there to be *multiple* Armies of the Potomac bearing down on you in every theater.

It certainly makes for a challenging game as the South, but not a very realistic one, IMO.

13. Victory conditions: in my Union game I managed to defeat the South in April 1864 by capturing Richmond and Nashville. I *hadn't* captured, however: New Orleans, Atlanta, Little Rock, Vicksburg, nothing in the Carolinas, no El Paso, etc. I'm sure I won based on the NM hit to the South, but this wasn't capturing Richmond in 1861, when the shock of such a conquest might have forced peace; this was after three years of war. Again, ahistorical outcome, IMO.

Wishlist:
14. Cavalry should have an "auto destroy enemy rail" capability that works every turn without having to wait for it. Currently in the game, destroying rail takes two turns minimum-- one turn to enter a region, a second turn to destroy the rail, and additional turns if you fail to succeed the first turn. I think for certain units (again, cavalry) this should be quicker and/or automated (perhaps at the cost of cavalry's speed). One month to destroy rail in one region is ahistorical.
15. Washington, D.C. isn't blockaded by an army laying siege to it, i.e. you need to also blockade the port. To anyone familiar with the geography of Washington, this is pretty ridiculous-- you could "blockade" the Potomac with a battery of guns. I'd suggest that river (but not coastal) cities consider themselves blockaded, at least partially, if an enemy stack is besieging it.
16. Promotions: these come very infrequently; I'd suggest a bump to their frequency. Also, if you miss the notice in the bottom-right reports, you won't know a leader is promotable until you stumble across that leader in a stack (and only if you select that stack for special orders). When the info ledger eventually gets the ability to see all your leaders (it *will* get that, right??), it'd be welcome to see a notice of all your promotable leaders there.
17. Unit experience: units gain too little experience, too slowly. Even my best units, elite units, that had been victorious in battle many times, at most had 2 stars of experience. Given that enemy units probably had similar levels of experience, it's all relative, BUT given how the game tracks *10* stars' worth of experience, this is too slow (especially since you can train up unit experience to one star without ever entering battle).

Bottom line: Battles just aren't that frequent in Civil War II to justify slow promotions and experience gain.
18. Leaders are wounded rarely, and die VERY rarely, perhaps ahistorically so. Maybe a player-selectable option to increase the frequency a bit?

---

Anyway, thank you again for the great game, and continued technical support!

[loki100]

individual leaders are near impossible to catch - they have very high evade value (this is common in the AGE system)

Death rates is an issue in some other games. Rise of Prussia is one. Here's a link to the middle of a thread discussing the problem in that game - it contains info on which variables you can change to increase the lethality.

The only AGE game where leaders die like flies is Revolution under Siege so if you have that, it may be worth comparing the relative values.

[Ace1_slith]

15. Washington, D.C. isn't blockaded by an army laying siege to it, i.e. you need to also blockade the port. To anyone familiar with the geography of Washington, this is pretty ridiculous-- you could "blockade" the Potomac with a battery of guns. I'd suggest that river (but not coastal) cities consider themselves blockaded, at least partially, if an enemy stack is besieging it.

You can siege Washington, and after gaining level 3 entrenchment, enable units to fire at passing ships. It should block supply going to DC. This is actually modeled quite right:)

[GBS]

About #7.

I have Gen. Wise (previous union fort commander) sitting in Ft. Sumter. I long ago took the fort, there are batteries and a CSA unit there and it is flying the Confederate flag with 100% military control. Never the less he sits there turn after turn. I can't move him and cant capture him. Is this a BUG or is he trying to defect?[;)]

[Davekhps]

ORIGINAL: Ace1

15. Washington, D.C. isn't blockaded by an army laying siege to it, i.e. you need to also blockade the port. To anyone familiar with the geography of Washington, this is pretty ridiculous-- you could "blockade" the Potomac with a battery of guns. I'd suggest that river (but not coastal) cities consider themselves blockaded, at least partially, if an enemy stack is besieging it.

You can siege Washington, and after gaining level 3 entrenchment, enable units to fire at passing ships. It should block supply going to DC. This is actually modeled quite right:)

Hmmm, okay. I know that I sat on D.C. for many, many turns and supply never seemed to be a problem for the enemy, so I chalked it up to be an open, unblockaded port.

[Davekhps]

ORIGINAL: GBS

About #7.

I have Gen. Wise (previous union fort commander) sitting in Ft. Sumter. I long ago took the fort, there are batteries and a CSA unit there and it is flying the Confederate flag with 100% military control. Never the less he sits there turn after turn. I can't move him and cant capture him. Is this a BUG or is he trying to defect?[;)]

As the CSA I had Union General Morrell in Leesburg from early 1862 through the end of 1864 and no CSA unit could ever capture him. He never moved, was never captured, no matter what unit/posture I used in that region.

[Emmeric]

I have had the same issues in Sumter where - depending on the combat result - I apparently had a victory but the Union general just floats there taunting me with French insults.

It might have to do with stalemates that cause a withdrawal of union forces, and thus a confederate victory, but the union general sits and wags his butt. [:D]

[The Red Baron]

Re: #7 - While playing the Shiloh scenario as the Union against the AI, the CSA left two wagon trains in a nearby region. I moved into the region with cavalry the next turn and instantly captured both of them. I then used them to build a depot in Humboldt.

Re: #18 - Again, while playing the Shiloh scenario, I killed Leonidas Polk and another general in a single engagement; however, Athena reincarnated him because when I later assaulted Memphis, he commanded the garrison; THAT definitely seems like a bug.

[Ace1_slith]

You have to toggle bombardment special order to cut riverine supply moving in. About naval supply, I am not so sure, the devs should answer that.

[Ace1_slith]

18. Are you sure Polk was not just wounded. Sometimes a general is wounded, and after that sent to nearest city and locked for few weeks(months) while he recuperates.

[The Red Baron]

Polk's name had a red slash through it in the battle report. It was the first time I had seen this, so I hovered my cursor over the graphic, and, IIRC, the tooltip said he was dead.

[bstarr]

16. I agree wholeheartedly. I'd like to see it reduced as much as allowing promotions after only two seniority bumps, at least for brigadier generals. And even then I'd like to see more scripted promotions, especially in the east for the union , as the army of the Potomac (and other Eastern union armies) went through many, many corps commanders.

[Davekhps]

ORIGINAL: bstarr

16. I agree wholeheartedly. I'd like to see it reduced as much as allowing promotions after only two seniority bumps, at least for brigadier generals. And even then I'd like to see more scripted promotions, especially in the east for the union , as the army of the Potomac (and other Eastern union armies) went through many, many corps commanders.

The current selection of 2 stars available at first are odd. For example, the Union... John Dix never held a field command, Amiel Whipple never starts as a 2 star when he never made 2 stars (except on his deathbed... in 1863, two years after he arrives in game), Hiram Berry was another late 2 star promote, Charles Gilbert didn't look like that (wrong portrait?), etc., etc.

If they can't speed up the battlefield promotions, then would at least prefer a starting selection a little more historically appropriate.

[bstarr]

I noticed that. I assumed they were semi-generic generals (real but lesser known) that were there for the ai to use to build corps' since genuine promotion is so uncommon.

[Pocus]

Lot of sound remarks. With time many will make into the game I'm sure.

As for war supplies balance, we reduce what some structures produce, but it seems that's not enough for you.

[Davekhps]

As for war supplies balance, we reduce what some structures produce, but it seems that's not enough for you.

I only started playing with the more recent patches, so I don't know how structure production was on release, but again, for either side, WSU does not appear to be a limiting factor after the first year if a few (or perhaps *any*) industrial options are chosen. Money, yes; conscripts, yes; WSU, no.

Maybe my experience is isolated, we'll see how others see it in time.

Anyway, thanks again for the great game, and the fantastic support!

[Ace1_slith]

Yes, ws is abundant as Union. As CSA, you 'll run short of it eventually.

[Davekhps]

ORIGINAL: Ace1

Yes, ws is abundant as Union. As CSA, you 'll run short of it eventually.

In 3 games I haven't yet... maybe if the Union AI ever beats me!

[Toro12]

Might be dependent on the types of units you're building? I'm playing CSA now, late '61, and am begging for war supplies. Lots of recruits and cash, just needing the WS.