Strategy for CSA in the east

[fcam1387]

Hi there,


I always seem to run into the same problem when playing as the CSA. By late 1862-3 my Northern Virginia Army is severely depleted by repeated battles with the Union in Fredericksburg and Shenandoah. While I win most of them, you cannot afford many 10-20k losses given the minimal reinforcements that camps are capable of providing.

So the question is, how do you go about keeping the Union at bay in the crucial state of Virginia? The Confederacy was historically able to do it for 4 years - I can only manage 1 year before the situation becomes untenable and I have to completely pull out of Fredericksberg, thus exposing Richmond to an inevitable union assault....

[Jonah]

Well a few questions just to know your circumstance.
 
1. How big are your victories on averege? Do you get any 'Cannae' like battles with huge sucsess or are they hollow victories?
 
2. Have you launched any invasions of the north?
 
3. How big is your army at it's peak?
 
After knowing those, then i can give some advice. But I might also add you mentioned falling back to richmond, which in FoF isn't a big thing. When the USA loses at Fredricksburg they auto fall back to washington, but thats no big setback. The reason being that one of FoF (while still a game I love) has a major flaw that between Wahington and Richmond there is only one province, which causes effects that you describe.
 
I would loe to help with some advice but I will need a bit more info if thats ok.
Good luck!
 

[fcam1387]

Generally at its peak my Dept of Northern Virginia and Stonewall Jackson's group in the Shenandoah (which I keep seperate but coordinate) totals around 70,000

I did launch relatively bloodless invasion of the North in one of my games and captured Harrisburg. I quickly pulled out though. Several months later the Union is yet to capture it despite it being unoccuppied (this is a potential flaw that needs to be fixed IMHO).

Most of my battles against the North are Cannae or Pyrhic wins. My only qualm with pulling back to Richmond is that once the enemy gains a foothold in Shenandoah or Fredericksburg, it is extremely hard if not impossible to dislodge him.

[cesteman]

There are some quirks in FoF that I've noticed such as not taking back cities that I've captured. In one game, the AI keeps trying to push down the Mississippi while one sole division is running around in the west taking all of Missouri and Kansas with no reaction from the AI. Another one that's odd is the AI will start a seige and then leave for no reason (no battles nearby).

[fcam1387]

Common guys - no one has any suggestions?

[twitter]

I have had success with sending troops into southern Ohio which had the AI North send some troops from the D.C. area over to deal with me there.  The problem though is that my force was big enough to get noticed, but too small to do any real threat.  I've often thought about your question and really came up with two ways.  One, is to attack right away while you have "close" to equal numbers and a higher quality of troops and leaders.  I mean kind of a all or nothing strategy where you push forward on both fronts and save a few troops around Richmond/Memphis as a last defense.  The second is to hold in the east (which is usually not that hard for the first two or so years in the game) and attack in the west and ohio valley.  Of course this comes with the risk of the North just letting you go and moving down the MS river to take your cities.  I think a mix of both might work (attack early and then try and hold what you have gained).  The more chaos you can cause the North early in the game, the longer it will take them to correct the ship and that gives you valuable time to plan, build, and excute your strategies.  Hope this helps...

[Jonah]

My strong suggestion would be to
 
A. Launch an invasion of Pennsylvania. Capture Harrisburg and bring the state to your side, this will allow you to not only convince the world that the CSA has offensive power, but you can now produce troops in the union rear. This means that the US could do one of three things, attack your army in the field where you (judging by your record) can beat them, or they could attack Richmond, but do the size of the city they could not take it before you arrived, or they could remain in Washington which leaves you can attack cities at will. This would also cause a disruption of union reinforcements to the Army of the Potomac from every other states, causing thm to slowly shrink. It not only results with angry govoners from the north but it isolates Washington to the point where the powerful city no longer matters.
 
B. Build a fleet. Only on the water can the south have it's freedom. Build ironclads and sink those yankees! Let the blockade end, and possibly even send ships to New York or D.C., imagine ships flying the confederate flag off of Manhatten.
 
C. Win in the west. The west is a very important theatre, including the far west as well. What I do is I launch 'Blitzkrieg' tactics where i send my western armies to steam ahead across the Ohio river and capture the undefended cities, even Chicago. This would force the US to pull back or watch their cities be lost.
 
I wish you good luck in your war you are fighting, and hopefully you can bring Southern independence.

[terje439]

Don't let the Union keep on attacking [:D]

Get his brigades, capture them.
You do not state if you play DC/IC, but if you play DC you should be able to capture quite a few Union brigades every turn.
I love it when the Union attacks, I know that each attack will leave me a little weaker, but the Union will be weaker still.

Terje

[dolphinsfan9910]

When units get depleted I move them into the forts and use those garrison troops in their sted. They are inexperienced, but soon gain the experience. You will notice that Richmond has almost 18,000 men in garrison. Other major cities with forts have 9,000.

Otherwise, you can move these garrison troops into a depleted division and then disband them. The 3,000 men then get distributed to all the units in that division. This can be risky if you get hit with an amphibious assualt, but that only happens once in a blue moon.

If you don't want to use garrison troops, conscript or muster troops and move them into your units, disband them, and your units get re-enforced. The quality does go down some, but the Southerns usually get experience soon enough.

Like the other posts say, you must go on the offensive. St. Louis is a great target in the West!!

[hgilmer3]

I'd kind of like to know what difficulty setting and do you play DC, IC, QC.  Even if you only build 1 camp a turn, I'd do it.  Eventually those camps add up and when you get the Invalid Corps update (try to get it as fast as possible), your replacements start rolling in.

I never really play the CSA but I have found that when the CSA attacks Kansas, that just really screws up everything.  Especially if the AI leaves a division in the area below the city and just sits there.  I then feel I need to garrison with a few troops and it takes away from what I'm doing elsewhere.  And if he leaves it undefended, you can get Kansas easily and possibly start rolling up the west say Iowa and Minnesota.  This doesn't necessarily help you in the immediately in the east, but the extra money always helps.  If you can take Illinois and MO, you should start having enough money to build more camps and get more units.

Also, if you can go ahead and build just a couple of forts in Fredericksburg, and then pull back to the area just to the east, the AI sometimes (iirc) keep attacking Fredericksburg, then you can move back and lift the siege on your forts with a much better defensive advantage.