PBEM AAR - It Ain't a Lost Cause Yet!

[Gil R.]

To give an idea of what I'm up against moneywise, here's the Nation Screen. Last turn I even had to remove 10 Money from British diplomacy, and I'm still low in Money. (This is partly temporary -- I bumped up supply levels for several divisions that were possibly seeing combat this turn, and can bump them back down next turn.)

A small part of my money problems is caused by the fact that the Union army moving around out west converted several provinces to USA territory. Provinces without cities each give 2 Money per turn, so that's 6 Money/turn out in Tennessee, Mississippi and Alabama. In order to convert them back, I need to send a division, corps or army of my own into those provinces. Over in the Memphis area, one fort has two extra infantry brigades that are currently serving no purpose, since the city is not under any threat. Instead of waiting two more turns until I can afford to produce a new division in one of my western Barracks -- which would cost 50 Money, plus other resources -- I take a divisional container out of my Fredericksburg fort and send it by rail towards the west. Since empty containers that encounter the enemy get destroyed I send it the long way around, south to Atlanta and then west to Alabama. It will take at least another turn to reach Memphis, but then I should be able to flip those provinces back in my favor.

And the last thing I do this turn is use some of that extra Labor and Iron to build three more Mints. I really need to build Mints whenever possible, since if ever the Union emancipates it will cause my Plantations to stop producing income, and my estimate is that around 50% of my Money income comes from Plantations. I need to prepare for that eventuality by building Mints and more Mints.

[Gil R.]

After hitting "End Turn" I get to choose my first Weaponry upgrade. I am very tempted by "Light Recoil," which sharply reduces the chance of fatigue for infantry in fire combat, but boosting the performance of my 4-5 sharpshooter units is too appealing. Sharpshooters both have significant morale impacts on the enemy and a chance to kill generals -- both very good things. "Moisture Proof Cartridges" is nice to have, since it allows one to fire in the rain much more effectively, but I'd say that less than 20% of battles take place in the rain, so this isn't the best choice. The best of these upgrades, actually, is "Improved Springfield," but that upgrade allows me to purchase the guns, and I don't have that kind of money -- for the Union it's a great upgrade, but it's wasted on me.

No, improving my sharpshooters' performance is the way to go, and every time I have an extra 60 Money I'll purchase the sharpshooters attribute for another brigade.

[Gil R.]

Eighteenth Turn

Finally we get a major battle... and the South wins!

My 1st Corps under Albert S. Johnston made it into Cumberland River by rail and trounced the Union army there, breaking up the siege in the process. Union casualties were more than 16,000. Perhaps more important, USA National Will is in the negative, and the CSA's is up to 1. Also, whereas at the beginning of the turn -- as shown at the top of the Event Report -- the USA had 3 Victory Points and the CSA was at -3, by the end of the turn, as is visible in the lower-right corner of the screenshot, there had been a major swing, with the CSA at 6 and the USA at -7. This is the first significant event of the war, and the CSA clearly got the upper hand.

Whether it will be possible to capitalize on this is another matter.

[Gil R.]

It will take a turn for the effects of this battle to kick in, but it's very likely that my governors and the Europeans will be more generous -- everybody loves a winner. For now, there's nothing terribly exciting to see here, other than the arrival of George Pickett on the scene. However, Joseph Johnston died in this battle, so my ranks of generals gains and loses in the same turn.

And both blockade-runners struck out in the same turn, it would seem.

[Gil R.]

Funny I should mention blockade-runners -- my third runners fleet has finished being put together in New Orleans. It's maiden voyage is quite short, though.

[Gil R.]

Here's how things look in the aftermath of the battle. The Union forces that were besieging Fort Donelson have retreated to Bowling Green, while that Union army that was chasing around the CSA divisions entered Pulaski, but appears not to have participated in the battle -- had I not used rail movement, the 1st Corps might have gotten to Cumberland River after this army arrived in Pulaski, and it would have been able to reinforce the forces in Cumberland River.

Unfortunately, Fort Donelson has been seriously degraded -- as is evident by the way its walls have become just faint traces. But the flag still flies and the garrison's green squares are still there, so the fort held and can be repaired.

Note over near Memphis that my Raiders unit has been produced.

[Gil R.]

Time to show off another one of the game's features: the Battle Report. Since it's a scrolling list one cannot look at it all at once, but this list shows all of the losses and gains that occurred because of the battle. Numerous USA units ran and left behind some supplies, but even more damaging is that many of them left their weapons on the battlefield, giving the CSA troops a chance to upgrade. Here, for example, we see that the Bloody Sixth, a Legendary Unit from North Carolina, was able to grab those Minie Rifles dropped by the USA 84th Infantry.

To my surprise, most of the Union brigades that lost weapons dropped muskets, which are a mediocre weapon. No Enfields or Springfields or anything desirable was dropped.

I guess I should let the Union build up it's armaments and trounce it again so that I can get a better class of weapons.

[Gil R.]

Now on to this turn's moves. First, I send those Raiders after the Union forces.

It good to have Raiders again. They can be useful in many ways, not least of which is grabbing Guns from the enemy.

[Gil R.]

And now it's time to start repairing the fort. Divisions are able to fix forts more quickly than ordinary garrisons, so here I set the division inside Fort Donelson to repair the fort by giving it an engineering order. So long as the Union doesn't reenter the province and begin a new siege in the next few turns the fort should soon be as strong as it ever was.

[Gil R.]

Now comes the dilemma of what to do next. I start the unit with my 1st Corps in Cumberland River -- right in between two Union forces that still outnumber it significantly. Even though I doubt that the Union will try to invade the province again this turn, I can't take the risk. If Sibley's Corps had been closer I might consider it, but Sibley is three provinces away, and even with rail movement there is a chance he'd get there too late. The worst-case scenario would be for the Union to defeat my 1st Corps and then, after it blunders in too late, the 4th Corps. So the prudent thing to do is to leave Cumberland River.

It is tempting to pursue the defeated Union forces northward, but I would be at a disadvantage fighting in Union territory, and don't want to risk a loss. Also, if the Union sends that army in Pulaski to Bowling Green I might be facing an enormous enemy force that has home-field advantage. So I'm going to stick to my original game plan, which is to avoid getting carried away by the urge to invade the Union, and instead focus on building up my forces and holding on to my territory. This victory in Cumberland River makes that possible.

So, I instead send the 1st Corps by rail into Murfreesboro, and then have the 4th Corps in Rome join it (as shown in the screenshot). My guess is that the Union expects me to move there, but that doesn't concern me much, since I'm confident that I can win a battle in my own territory.

And just in case one breaks out, I invest 20 Money and 40 Iron to give one of my better infantry brigades brigade artillery.

Also, taking the longer view, I build another Barracks in Mobile, where I had built one at the governor's request a few turns ago. I now have three there, which means that I can produce an army container now. (This is something I had planned to do in Richmond, but Richmond is maxed out on new buildings until I construct a Plantation or Mansion there.) I had always planned to send the corps I had borrowed from the Army of Northern Virginia back to it, but right now there seems no need, and with "Centralized Railways" I'm confident that I can send forces back east if needed. So, once this new Barracks is complete I'll purchase an army and will put the 1st and 4th Corps in it, making it an even more effective fighting force.

[Gil R.]

And as for Virginia, absolutely nothing happened there -- I guess I was wrong to expect an invasion. And what last turn was reported to be a force of 184,000 now is just supposed to be 44,000, which seems less threatening. I think I'll leave the Army of Northern Virginia where it is until I'm able to build a fort in Shenandoah, so that it can not easily be taken and my rail-lines will be secure. It's in a good position here, since it's more easily reinforced by rail than it would be in James River, and because I have a better chance of seeing an attack coming and can prepare. I'll start spending more resources to improve the quality of the units in this army in the coming turns.

[Gil R.]

Time to engage in some building, since I have lots of Iron and Labor, which are not enough to upgrade troops (which usually require Money or Guns in addition to Iron or Horses). So, I can only spend the Iron and Labor on buildings, and it occurs to me that this would be the perfect time to build a Manufacturing Center, since those take 12 turns to build. Once they're done, they enable one to finish producing an artillery unit one turn sooner -- which can be very valuable.

Since they are linked to artillery production, it only makes sense to build a Manufacturing Center where there is already a Foundry (or more than one). If one goes to the City List there are a bunch of buttons at the bottom of the screen that quickly let one get a list of provinces associated with creating particulra sorts of military units and containers. I press the button that shows me all of the places that have Foundries and therefore can produce artillery units.

[Gil R.]

Since artillery units require one level of Men (= population) in addition to resources, it makes the most sense to build them in cities with higher levels of Men -- in the case of the CSA, that's Richmond or Memphis. Memphis strikes me as too risky, because even though well fortified it might be taken more easily than Richmond. And Richmond already has a Manufacturing Center, so building another there would speed up the time of production even more. Unfortunately, I cannot build any new buildings in Richmond until I've first build a Plantation or Mansion. So, I instead settle on Norfolk, which has just 3 Men and therefore cannot produce more than three artillery units per year (i.e., not until the April population refreshment restores it to its maximum level). Of course, artillery is expensive enough that I'd be unlikely to build more than three units there anyway, and I do have other cities in which I can build them.

There is a plus to putting the new building in Norfolk: there are three foundries there, and each foundry gives a new artillery unit +.2 quality, so the artillery brigades I produce in Norfolk will be of a high quality than those built elsewhere.

(I should note that manufacturing centers also speed up the process of producing new infantry brigades, but I don't really care about that -- those take only four turns to produce, which isn't bad. I'd much rather use the scarce Men resources for artillery. But still, if ever one is in a pinch, it might be very useful to have a seasoned infantry brigade appear after three turns instead of four. I just don't plan on being in such a pinch...)

[Gil R.]

After hitting "End Turn," get to promote another 2-star general who will command one of my divisions, and the decision is a very easy one to make.

This is the first chance I have had to promote Longstreet, and I'm using it.

[Gil R.]

And after that, I tell the Partisans to try to sabotage the railroad, in case the USA is trying any large troop movements.

[Gil R.]

And I tell my new Raiders to destroy supplies, just to be difficult. That army just lost a whole lot of supplies in the battle, so this will make it harder on them. Perhaps it will even lead to morale problems for the troops. But more importantly, I might be able to attack it before it's fully resupplied. (And resupplying it would involve turning supply levels to "high priority," which will sap a lot of the Union's money for a turn or two.

[marecone]

Very nice AAR. I wasn't sure about your plan but you did it and got yourself a major battle win.
Well done [&o]

[Gil R.]

Nineteenth Turn

On we go...

There's a weird bug that caused the siege to last an extra turn after the Union had been chased out of Cumberland River, which explains the siege report. But Eric is on the case. Also, it appears that the way of calculating Victory Points was a bit off, so I actually gained more and jchastain lost more than should have been the case -- but again, that has been fixed or is being fixed. (This is why we play the game a few times before releasing it...)

[Gil R.]

My Partisans and Raiders both had success with their railroad sabotage and supplies destruction, respectively. That's the good news.

The bad news is that I stupidly gambled that disease wouldn't strike the Army of Northern Virginia in Shenandoah, and it did. Mathematically, the odds were close to 50-50 that this would happen, since each turn disease strikes a single brigade and then spreads to all the other brigades in the province, and the number of brigades I have in Shenandoah is somewhere around 40% of all of the ones I have (another 25% or so are in those two western corps, and the rest are in garrisons). Since Shenandoah isn't a city I can't build a Hospital there, so anytime I send forces there they do not have the protection they do in a city. So, the ANV has just lost close to 20,000 men, not to mention that all of its brigades are not as gung-ho as they were (though their disposition levels will be improved again by the nearby Hospitals over the next few turns). Good thing the enemy has no way of knowing...

[Gil R.]

A bit more bad news is that the Union has made a bit of a gain in diplomacy with the "Other Europeans," and now that I'm down to one Level of diplomacy I can no longer purchase Lorenzs, which require a minimum two levels. For this reason, during this turn I invest 10 Money in diplomacy with the Other Europeans, and another 10 Money with the British. (I'm very glad that a turn or two ago I armed my highest-quality brigade with Lorenzs. But more on that unit later.)

Some good news is that for the first time in many turns my blockade-runners brought back some cash. And this turn, there are two shipments of Money out there, so if my runners succeed I'll be able to make some good purchases next turn.

Also, note that the Army of Northern Virginia has trained one of its two corps, the Valley District, with the result that its Command Staff rating is now "Great" -- meaning that it will fight more even effectively in battles.