Thank you for your explanation BNC. You are right, forts performed terribly during the Civil War. However, forts were not obsolete. Forts fell quickly because at the beginning of the war the South used forts incorrectly. They depended on forts to withstand Union attacks without support. When forts were properly supported, they did well.BiteNibbleChomp wrote: Wed Jul 06, 2022 2:51 pm If we look at the record of forts during the war, particularly with the game's scale in mind, underwhelming is the term I would say suits them best. With a few exceptions (the forts protecting Charleston come to mind), most times when the Union made a serious effort to capture a location primarily guarded by a fort, that location fell within a couple of days. Between one Union turn, and the next Union turn, in the game is anywhere from two weeks to two months - more than enough time for your attacking unit to determine the fort's weaknesses, attack and overwhelm it.
Often a fort's garrison was regimental strength (obviously considerable variation here). Most land units in the game are divisions - anywhere from 6 times as many men to 20 times as many men as the defenders. Given the general rule for successfully storming a prepared defence is to have a 3:1 advantage, a division shouldn't have too much trouble.
Forts being a burden to defend is really a consequence of hindsight more than anything. We know, through reading history books or discussions on the internet, or from playing the game once or twice, that forts aren't great at defending things. The commanders on the field, during the 1860s, did not know this. They did know that forts had been heavily promoted in the decades leading up to the war as a cheap and effective way to defend key positions, and their record in previous wars had shown there to be enough truth in this. But the forts that were built (and a lot of them were a decade or two old at this point, if not older) weren't equipped for this war. Had they been attacked by a brigade-strength force (as was typical in the Mexican War), using 1840s equipment and tactics, they would have done splendidly. But they were largely powerless against ironclads and overwhelmed by the sizes of armies in the ACW.
The complication is, if you had told the men commanding those forts at the time this, they would have ignored you or sent you somewhere else. Every time a new technology is introduced to the battlefield, it takes a lot of bitter and bloody experience before it becomes accepted. Even in the early parts of WW2, people were still seriously promoting the cavalry as an integral part of armies - despite being proven obsolete a quarter-century earlier. In the case of forts, that quarter-century of experience hadn't even been demonstrated yet.
In game, that bitter experience is assumed to be learned once a fort unit is destroyed, and the local commanders finally decide to adopt a more modern view of the situation (provided the position in question is still able to be salvaged - too often this wasn't the case). Before then? They're just not going to be convinced - look at how much trouble Lincoln had getting McClellan to simply move his army.
- BNC
Fort Donelson is a good example. Yes, the battle was a major defeat for the South. But, the South came close to winning the battle and with better commanders would have won. The reason the South almost won is that the fort was supported with a division sized force.
Later in the civil war and in WWI forts performed very well because commanders learned that forts were not stand alone fixtures. They needed to be properly supported. Forts didn't become obsolete until WWII and even then some forts performed well.
Part of the fun of ACW is the opportunity to try different strategies. What if the South encouraged Europe to join the war? What if Lee marched west?
However with forts players are forced to use a strategy that everyone knows doesn't work. Why not provide historical options where a player can improve upon history and allow players to occupy forts.
In many places, one brigade placed on the coast make taking the city with fort more difficult. If you can put that division and other brigade adjacent to the fort on the right hexes, I think it takes great effort to conquer the city. So not like there is nothing you can do, but you can't shut the port hex with a unit, yeah.
