Matrix Games Forums

Hello,
Been playing War in the East. Got me to thinking... Is there a good grognard Civil,War game as operationally complex as those Grigsby megatitles. I have played AGEOD CW games and it looks like Grigsbys own CW game is a abstracted title. Any recommendations on PC?

Delaware,

I'm a relatively bad player at the Gary Grigsby games, but I got into Matrix games while searching for really fun and detailed Civil War games. I'm a fan of the period, and I spent a while searching for games that would allow me to conduct campaigns and the entirety of the war.

Unfortunately, due to the logistical differences between the periods, most Civil War games are heavily abstracted to simulate supply difficulties and command challenges. The pace of the conflict dictates the pace of most historical simulations, so it becomes harder to say how production and supply should be handled, especially since the Union's overwhelming economic and logistical advantages were not wholly utilized until the war began to draw to a close, which is part of the reason why the Overland Campaign, with its grueling weeks of battle, is so different from previous campaigns. But I'm sure you know all this, so I won't waste your time repeating why games choose to abstract such details.

Most grognard games on the ACW deal with tactical battles. You can get some highly detailed Civil War turn based games based on specific battles, and even a rare few on specific campaigns, which I believe come the closest to an operational style game, though they are again ultimately played at the tactical level.

I'd suggest looking at John Tiller's Civil War Campaign series (or his previous games under the Talonsoft brand, though they do not track losses between battles, or allow for operational decisions in between battles). They allow you to make certain operational choices during historical campaigns- like what if the Confederates were able to lure Grant into battle at their entrenchments at Mine Run in '64, or what if the Union decided to go a slightly different route to Richmond in the Overland Campaign.

Once those choices are made, though, you switch to hex based control over the battles. The Campaign Overland release features a mega-scenario that spans roughly the entire campaign with all units available historically at the player's disposal and an impressively large hex map of the relevant parts of Virginia, and probably comes closest to allowing full operational control. But for that to work requires the use of additional non-coded rules provided by the scenario designer, and it requires a very large degree of micromanagement as you shuffle different regiments, batteries, and supply wagons around.

Of course, people who are better than me at the John Tiller games swear the AI is useless, so I wouldn't necessarily recommend the game if you don't have someone to play with. And again, the player's operational control is limited. Still, as far as grognard games go it simulates most aspects of both armies in '64, and comes with optional rules to enhance realism (like limited routing rules, adjusted combat rules to favor defensive fire, and penalties for mixing brigades) and it keeps track of cannon ammunition, supply, and fatigue levels through set limitations for artillery and the consumption of supply provided by mobile supply wagons.

In one game I played I had to end a scenario early against the AI (and it was still treated as my victory because of the match termination bidding rules) because I had fired all of my cannon ammunition and was faced with a grueling close combat battle because the AI will continue to throw units at you even after suffering 24k casualties in a single engagement to my loss of 5k or so. (And the Campaign series tracks losses between battles, so it'd be like Grant losing near what he did at the Wilderness and Spotsylvania in about a day and a half of fighting and deciding to continue attacking a line of breastworks he'd failed to shift. I even used my cavalry scouts to capture Meade, and somehow the game didn't end immediately after the battle with Grant losing his job).

Still, since you'll be fighting on mostly established battlegrounds there's a lot people with knowledge of troop dispositions can do to exploit initial layouts. If you know where the enemy is, you no longer have to spend the harrowing few turns wondering if you're throwing your men senselessly at a position to find another layer of defensive works behind them. Fog of war rules make you wonder, but since the Confederates are on the defensive it's not too hard to guess where they'll be, and things have to be going pretty badly for the Union to really suffer from a Confederate counterattack.

But the game has its moments, like when the Union threatened to turn my flank at Mine Run until Longstreet arrived on the scene with his First Corps and rolled up the Union attack. I was reminded of the line from the Ken Burns documentary, "Like a fine lady at a party, Longstreet was often late in his arrival at the ball. But he always made a sensation and that of delight, when he got in, with the grand old First Corps sweeping behind him as his train."

Long story short, lots of tactical games. Even some highly detailed ones that would please just about any stickler for realism. But to my knowledge, no mega-title quite like War in the East.

ORIGINAL: Delaware

Hello,
Been playing War in the East. Got me to thinking... Is there a good grognard Civil,War game as operationally complex as those Grigsby megatitles. I have played AGEOD CW games and it looks like Grigsbys own CW game is a abstracted title. Any recommendations on PC?

You might want to check out Frank Hunter's Road From Sumter to Appomattox. It has It's old, but I recall it having a fair amount of detail. though I don't know if it's still available.

Thanks
Rick

Frank Hunter's Road From Sumter to Appomattox

Frank I read released the game to freeware,

Here's a link to download .... Haven't played it.

http://www.thurb.com/games/acw/intro.htm

First of all, thank you Monniker for the incredibly thoughtful post. Ironically, i HAVE Campaign Overland and forgot about it. I will fire it up again. The Frank Hunter game looks like an early version of the AGEOD CIvil War game. Thanks again to all who offered. I wondered if anyone can recommend the Brother Against Brother game here as a good hardcore CW tactical game?

ORIGINAL: Delaware
Hello,
Been playing War in the East. Got me to thinking... Is there a good grognard Civil,War game as operationally complex as those Grigsby megatitles. I have played AGEOD CW games and it looks like Grigsbys own CW game is a abstracted title. Any recommendations on PC?

I wouldn't overlook the Grigsby game. A Civil War 'War in the East' it certainly isn't, but it remains my favorite of the strategic titles. It's not really any more 'abstracted' than the Ageod game, although it is simpler. The great plus that goes with that, of course, is that you can actually finish the 'full'campaign in a few evenings rather than WitP style months.

Monniker has it spot on with the Tiller titles. More expansive that you would expect, but you'll be needing a human opponent before long. The Tiller AI has perked up some of late judging from the way Battles of Kursk keeps kicking my butt, but the ACW titles are fairly ancient now.

On the tactical side, Brother Against Brother is competent and extremely well researched but somehow uninspiring - at least IMHO. Scourge of War remains THE tactical Civil War game.

I think there is not a Civil War game as complex as War in the East.

This may be close: Civil War Generals 2, Grant-Lee -Sherman.

Many agree this game is, after 17 years, still the best Civil War Strategy game ever made.
It is a very old game and I understand it does not work with Windows 7.
There are lots of reviews and game play videos online.

Seethe video review here:
http://www.wargamer.com/article/3499/pc ... tro-review
The reviewer mentions Matrix in the review.

http://www.gamespot.com/civil-war-gener ... 200-51207/

Matrix Games should do a sequel.
With just better graphics it would be a real winner.

An old dos game by SSI "No Greater Glory" comes to mind. More recent would be "Forge of Freedom" with both operational/strategy and tactical involved.

Tactical for realism Brother against Brother. Hopefully the series will continue to cover many more and larger battles.

Do take a look at Forge of Freedom for the whole war. Involved and time consuming but if you like War in the East or West that probably isn't a problem for you.

I disagree with those who suggest Scourge of War titles. They are beautiful but RTS games just aren't for me personally. This old Grognard has enough trouble reacting to what I can see happening slowly much less to all the things going on everywhere else I can't. But if you like RTS by all means give it a try.

ORIGINAL: Trugrit

I think there is not a Civil War game as complex as War in the East.

This may be close: Civil War Generals 2, Grant-Lee -Sherman.

Many agree this game is, after 17 years, still the best Civil War Strategy game ever made.

It's certainly remembered very fondly by many, including me, but it was/is a tactical battle game, not anything resembling WitE. While not exactly beer and pretzels, it's hardly complex or even realistic compared with Brother Against Brother or Scourge of War. That said, it did ooze the fun factor and I'd certainly play a remake. Somebody do Age of Rifles first, though [;)]

BTW, I did see an article somewhere on how to get CWG2 to run on modern systems, although it was pretty convoluted as I recall.

ORIGINAL: Delaware

First of all, thank you Monniker for the incredibly thoughtful post. Ironically, i HAVE Campaign Overland and forgot about it. I will fire it up again. The Frank Hunter game looks like an early version of the AGEOD CIvil War game. Thanks again to all who offered. I wondered if anyone can recommend the Brother Against Brother game here as a good hardcore CW tactical game?

I can certainly recommend it. I played it quite a bit earlier this year (I was also on beta test team so I might be considered biased). I'm just starting to get back into now in fact. The only reason I didn't mention it was that it is more higher level tactical-operational rather than strategic. It is oriented toward specific battles much like Tillers civil war games rather than covering the entire war.

I'd suggest visiting the forums and reading some of the AARs. BaB covers early Battles in the Civil War and lesser known battles. It's done at the Regt level and incorporates differences in weapons and ammo. The battles covered in the first game are lesser known battles, but they are working on the next game in the series and i'm looking forward to it.

Thanks
Rick

ORIGINAL: Yogi the Great

Tactical for realism Brother against Brother. Hopefully the series will continue to cover many more and larger battles.

Do take a look at Forge of Freedom for the whole war. Involved and time consuming but if you like War in the East or West that probably isn't a problem for you.

I disagree with those who suggest Scourge of War titles. They are beautiful but RTS games just aren't for me personally. This old Grognard has enough trouble reacting to what I can see happening slowly much less to all the things going on everywhere else I can't. But if you like RTS by all means give it a try.

You do know you can play all the way down to regiment level right? That's like one group of 5 and I just don't see how that could be that hard for you to control.

Scourge of War to me (and I hate rts games with a passion) is the best game I've come across in 10 years. I love it and it's almost all I'll play anymore. It's like a movie and a game at the same time. You give very few orders and take some from your commander and basically just stand and shoot with a little maneuvering. I usually hold my objective in the game. [:)]

Command Ops is another I enjoy and it's basically a real time game as well although they want to call it "pauseable real time" most rts games I've played are pauseable too. But, they make you play so much faster. Games like Scourge and Command play in real real time to me. Very slow an enjoyable pace.

I'm nearing 60 with arthritis among other things and I never have a problem with the speed of these two games.