Wish List

[R.E.LEE]

Gil im dumb all the fort info was in da manual,thanks for a great game,and ill be buying whatever you guys make next.[&o][&o][&o]

[Gil R.]

Thanks, guys.

R.E. Lee, we might put you to the test by doing a game on the Pig War. (For those who don't know about this historical gem, go here for the basics: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pig_War )

[R.E.LEE]

I have to say i would fail that test sir.

ORIGINAL: Gil R.

Thanks, guys.

R.E. Lee, we might put you to the test by doing a game on the Pig War. (For those who don't know about this historical gem, go here for the basics: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pig_War )

[Conny D]

Could it be possible to add an option for detailed combat regarding the near start - far start unit setup? I usually prefer near start because the maneuvering is very time-consuming but when two giant armies collide, i've often regretted not to possess the option to choose whether having near or far starting positions, since it is impossible to arrange, fan out, dig in and prepare for a superiour enemy with near start on. Historically there were several occasions when the smaller force lay an ambush or awaited the larger force in blocking positions but with near start this tactics are ruled out.

[GShock]

Conny the near-start option is in the settings when you start the game and the ambushes are possible and depend on leaders' ratings. The pre-battle screen with all options lists this opportunity as "Surprise Attack". There's a % of success and of fatigue and the side making it through will start very close to the enemy. 

[Conny D]

GShock, that is all known to me. What i have in mind is to decide at the onset of a battle whether i want near start or far start and not like it currently is, i have to decide once for the entire game. Would be better if one could chose according to scale of the battle:
Only a handfull of brigades engaged? Ok lets have near start. Armies of the James, Potomac and Shenandoah combined against my Valley District? Argh lets make far start i need to entrench first.

And the surprise attack option is a different issue imo. I have virtually no advantage when my smaller force makes a surprise attack on a larger force, since most of my troops are fatigued, stacked together and have no prepared defenses when Surpr Att, and the enemy will recover within the first round. I always make cavalry reserve because performance is better when the troops are fresh, and i need time to form the battlelines.

[GShock]

I know Conny i already pointed that out. Even when i am surprised, i still can resupply all units before contact while the surpriser is all fatigued.

The game is truly a potential masterpiece left incomplete according to me. Whether by patches or expansions, the potential of improvement is colossal. It's truly a pity that, following most of the matrix publishing dev companies, WCS has moved to other projects as i really don't see why moving on when this game could reach the rank of legend if wcs wanted.

Maybe in the future.

[moose1999]

I also like the idea of being able to choose near - medium - far start at the onset of every detailed battle.
Would be very convenient - although also a little bit unfair tactically.
But then the surprise attack would have to be changed so it is more of an advantage for the attacker. For example by adding a movement point bonus to the attacker or a penalty to the defender.
In the beginning, surprise attacks could be devastating as the AI would charge every brigade into one of mine in the first turn while they were both in column formation. Not always with success (he would often take just as many casualties as I would) but it sure messed up my plans and gave me a healthy respect for the enemy's scouting value.
'R. E. Lee's surprise attack is a success...!' could send shivers down my spine...

[39battalion]

One of the features I really like in the game is the "unit history" which records the units participation in battles.

I would very much like to see this feature added for Generals also to provide a battle history of each General throughout the war. This would certainly enhance immersion in the game.

[Conny D]

One more comment regarding detailed combat unit setup. Near start does make sense at the start of a game when unit containers for the most part haven't any good logistical staff ratings & unit morale is comparably low in relation to morale values in latter part of the war, so the units' movement rates are very limited as well. That means by now there is plenty of time for maneuvering before any shots are fired, and since none of the brigades are ready for action at the start of a fight this maneuvering time is indespensable in detailed combat.
Later in the war near start does make absolutely no sense any more imo, at least it then can become a reason for constant nuisance. The units' movement ratings are so high now that during the first round of combat the AI leads its marsh columns into the opponent before any forming of battle lines can be conducted. You end up with your artillery, supply caissons, sort of everything of value beeing overrun before any orders can be given. Well, you'd say: welcome to the horrors of war, but please, Two massive armies would have their troops prepared and deployed into formation prescribed in the order of march and battle, not disarranged and in column formation at this close range, for a game with such a focus on deep gameplay it's just historical inaccurate.

Would the divisions automatically be arranged whether ready for battle, that means brigade next to brigade in line formation (along certain terrain features in ideal case) and not vertically placed in marsh columns huddled together, or like a historical army on the marsh (one or more long thin columns marching to battle following the form of the road network), near start could still be fine.
Moreover meeting engagements in the 2nd half of ACW were increasingly replaced by deadlocked struggles over heavily fortified positions, and iirc the defensive works at Atlanta and Petersburg for example had nothing to do with "hasty" entrenchments.
But since these concepts are not possible at this stage there should at least be a feature allowing the player to change near start to far start or in any case to disable near start in a running game. Choosing between near and far start at the beginning of a game once and for all with no possibility to adjust settings later on is just irritating. Adjustable settings with a future patch would be great.

[BruceAZ]

Two simple requests --

1. I would like to see more roads and towns in detailed combat to make the battles somewhat historically correct. Maybe option buttons?

2. May not happen but it would be very cool if we had detailed combat in naval engagements.

Great game.

Recon
Semper Fi

[Scona]

Two areas that would be great to improve in the game:

1. Increased political costs for demoting some of the more politically well connected incompetents such as Butler, Banks or Polk. This would truly reflect some of the problems of dealing with political issues for both the USA and CSA.

2. A more detailed treatment of the "brown water" fleets on the major rivers; the ability to build different ship types like cotton clads, basic and improved types of gunboats, rams and mortar barges; each type designed for a special sort of use.

[terje439]

After yet another run in with the Union I started thinking (I know, always a bad idea, yeah yeah...). The brigade artillery is supposed to represent a few artillery pieces. So, when one of those units surrender, were do those cannons go? How about every 10 (??) brigade artillery you capture spawns a "captured" arty piece?
Just me thinking here, and too tired to see the downside here, so fire away please [:)]

[Randomizer]

Apologies if these are included already, I went through about half of this thread and didn't see them.
 
1.  The option to name a Detailed Combat battle would be nice.  The Seventh Battle of Fredericksburg sounds about as interesting as the Tenth Battle of the Izonso.  The representive DC maps usually have some place-names that could lend their names to the local action.
 
2.  Some command and/or combat bonus to fight container units as a formation.  This might take the form of divisional or corps integrity or a penalty for detaching brigades and sending them a given distance from their higher command.
 
3.  At the start of a DC, corps and armies should be seperate and distinct within the initial deployment area to facilitite 2 (above).

[marcbarker]

actually I would like to see river transport barges, better partisan units in a more organised format. Ie. Morgans Cavarly, Roddey's Cavalry.....these boys were hard hitting with some military disciplne, also an interesting thing quaker guns in detailed battle to allow the enemy to go for the fake while your sharpshooters and cavalry hit them from the flanks...just a bad idea

[terje439]

ORIGINAL: barker

actually I would like to see river transport barges

Would not this be implied in the extra movement along the rivers?

[marcbarker]

True, But I am a graphics hog is all....

[Kingmaker]

HiHi

This is personal as it's screwed up part of my basic stratergy.

Get the undefended cities capture not affecting the NW, but recaprture does bug fixed!

Reb raiders in PBEM not having choice of targets as do Runners is not merely handycaping Rebs, it is in effect a complete waste of space in the PBEM game.

All the Best
Peter

[moose1999]

Now that I hear a new patch is on its way, I have a few suggestions that I've thought about for a while.
(maybe I have even posted them before - can't really remember...)

1) You should do something about the way you gain/loose national will.
Playing as the north, I took the state capital of Tennessee in a daring raid and gave it up a few turns later (never meant to keep it). This operation ended up costing me 4 NW points (two for losing a city, two more for it being a state capital), which I never managed to get back afterwards as it seems very hard to gain NW points, as opposed to losing them.
My suggestion: Make it a bit easier to gain NW points - but only untill you reach 0. After this it should be as hard as it always was.

And/or: Referring to my example above, it should only be when losing core cities in core states (the states that start the game in your hands) that you get the full NW punishment. For example, losing cities that you have taken from the enemy only costs half the NW points - i.e. the same (I think) as the gain.
When a conquered state/city has been in your hands for a certain amount of time (for example a year) it would then become a core city/state and you would suffer the full NW penalty for losing it.

You could make the game a little more interesting in the long run by introducing random events that has a chance to raise/lower the NW when it has gotten very high/very low. For example, when NW gets above/below +/- 6 or 8, there will be a chance of a random event firing that would raise/lower it.

2) While we're at it, more random events in general (perhaps inspired by history, perhaps not) would be fun. I just love the way the Europa Universalis and other games use the historic/random events as a spice to their gameplay. You do have a few of them already (staff appointments (God, I love to hate them) and governor actions/demands), but more would be welcome...!

Lots of things could be done here (also things that aren't already done similarly in other (ACW) games...), so if you ever need ideas on this don't hesitate to ask...

3) I love all the reports and statistics in the game - they are a very big part of the immersion factor for me. I especially like the unit battle histories and the overall "kill-board" (found in the Overview menu). But please make the unit battle history report a bit easier to read - it's difficult to visually seperate the different battles on the report. A simple space between each item on the report would help a lot...!

And please make it possible to sort the "kill board" after unit names, unit types, kills, losses etc. This would make this report much more helpful and interesting. Buttons that added/removed units after type and the ability to arrange them in the military hierarchy (like in the military menu) would be very welcome too. As it is now, it can be quite a chore to find a particular unit as they seem to be arranged randomly on the list, and it would be very interesting to be able to sort the list to contain only units from a particular division or army, or, for example, to remove garrison units.

Well, thats all I can think of right now (thank God).
Looking forward to the patch!

EDIT: And some kind of pop-up function in detailed battles that will give information on terrain modifiers for specific hexes would be great too...!

[gunny3013]

Please untie the Union forces by allowing them to enter naval ships via a fortress (like Monroe) without converting the province. This allows buildup and attacks at a later time. Also please give Union forces a better supply system reguarding invasions.