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The 1861 Blue & Gray campaign, the scenario most people play, has developed into a boring sitzkrieg in which the Union is overwhelmingly favored to win. This is coming from someone who really likes ACW. The game provides wonderful gameplay and creative innovations. Like cavalry sweeps. Wow, what a great idea. And an exciting research tree. And a beautiful map. And I could go on.

The developers provided a really cool, fun game. However, interest in the game is quickly waning. I noticed that the multiplayer section of the game currently provides only two challenges. That's down from over twenty just a few months ago. And activity in the ACW forum has also dropped considerably in the past couple months.

I think the Blue & Gray campaign has got to be fixed and soon. Here's my ideas.

Union
The Union must have more incentive to attack earlier in the game. Right now, the Union's best strategy is to sit back until the end of 1862, peck at the coast to keep the Europeans out of the war, build six to eight corps, then attack with overwhelming force. In real life, with that strategy, the Union would have lost the war. Starting in 1861, Lincoln was beset from all sides with demands to end the rebellion, now. The victories at Fort Henry and Fort Donelson were a godsend to his administration.

I think the Union must win victories by mid 1862 or be penalized by the game. Battle victories can be tough to measure in ACW, so perhaps victories can be measured with land and forts. For example, the Union must capture 40 FS worth of CSA towns/cities/forts by June 1862 or be penalized 300 FS a turn. 40 FS would add up to about 6 towns (5 FS per town) and a couple forts. The Union could decide how to accomplish the captures, coastal invasions or attacks in the west or east. But the captures would have to be CSA towns not recaptured Missouri or Kentucky locations.

Then Union would have to meet another hurdle at the end of 1862 and perhaps another at mid 1863.

South
The South incurs a huge penalty for crossing the Potomac by providing the Union with a bunch of free units. Did that really happen? Did the North really get free units when Lee crossed the Potomac in 1862?

Anyway, the result of the penalty is that the South advances to the Potomac and stops. And the game settles into boring sitzkrieg. Besides Washington, the South has no incentive to cross the Potomac. Why should the South provide the North with free units in exchange for a couple 5 point towns?

In real life, Lee's crossing of the Potomac in 1862 and 1863 was huge. Panic gripped the North. Headlines screamed that the North was losing the war. I'm sure Union fighting spirit suffered.

First, the North should not receive free units when the South crosses the Potomac. Second, the South should be rewarded for invading the North. Hagerstown and Gettysburg should be FS objectives worth 25 to 50 points. Doing so would open Virginia and Maryland to some major exciting battles and be a lot more historically accurate.

By making these changes the game would become a lot more active in early 1862 and maybe even in 1861 as the South crosses the Potomac in force and the North is pushed into risky invasions of the South.

Not really sure how to overhaul, but I'll add some comments:

1) Victory Conditions: this seems the easiest to change. fighting spirit surrender is going to happen, but doesn't reflect a measurement of good/bad play by either side for completive playability, mirrored game. points given for holding/capturing cities, destroying units. Bonus points for doing cool stuff. South capturing Northern cities, being adjacent to Washington. point system

2) FOW/Cavalry: mechanics are silly. North doesn't need to bother. Just send in a pigeon unit if your lazy. Obviously 1-Cav in any focal pt, moving behind your own line is done. need to know what leader is battling what leader. surprise combat or maintaining (clicking the cavalry first) isn't best for fun playability.Expand visibility. Create "mode" of defensive that allows for retreat or soft retreat. General Lee screened all the time. Could also, not expose units exact strength.

3) Too many units on the board. Parking lot ping-pong battles, units create great wall of China, until the dam breaks. need true Army counters. Less Naval pieces. Overrun attacks & keep moving. Retreat and ability to program unit to soft retreat.

4) Railroads/Supply in enemy territory. North should have to be close to a rail to reinforce in the South. Maybe no forced march double-click unless on rail. South needs some way to cut rails or have hidden methods of flank, retreat (maybe like subs hide?) Don't know how, but rails and cutting rails need some priority & adjustment.

5) Leaders shouldn't be influencing those outside the hex. need army counters.

6) Tech --- North doesn't need much. Just put basic ground and MMPs and slam pieces. For that matter, just slam units in Virginia. Really don't need navy landings.

7) South MMPs --- too much from overseas.

Summary: Need shakeup on fun-ness and playability. North just waits, then ground and pound.

Thanks for posting this! I'm in the midst of putting together 1.04 now, which is shaping up to be a massive update (Garibaldi and the research system are both getting very substantial changes, as well as lots of little things), so this is really perfect timing for a suggestions post

Re the Union, I do like the idea of adding some sort of "war weariness" effect to the game - indeed it was one of the first things I coded into the game. General idea of that initial system was that the Union had to capture one of (Memphis, Nashville, New Orleans, Fredericksburg) by 1/63 or get whacked by -500 FS per turn until they did so. Issue I ran into was that it is very easy for the CS player to just camp units around those objectives (except Fredericksburg, they're all spawn points), which they would be strong enough to do, and just run down the clock. Fundamentally, the CS has to be able to stop the Union's advance in some places in order to have a chance in lasting to late game, but if they do and there's some sort of timer on the Union, my observation is that the Union will just get stuck in a doom spiral more often than not. So I scrapped it.
The per-turn Richmond bonus the CS gets was my way around that issue - if we assume that if Richmond falls, the CS is probably done for anyway, then what it means in practise is that if the Union controls <500 FS worth of towns each turn (ie, about a state and a half), the CS FS is going up each turn by the difference between occupied and 500. Ergo, the longer the Union sitzkriegs, the bigger the FS gap they have to overcome in order to win, assuming losses &c are all equal. But that's all under the hood, and deliberately so: "500 FS if the CS holds Richmond" is easy to explain to a player, "conquer X towns and Y settlements to not go backwards, or different amounts if cities are added, and blah blah blah" makes for a messy popup.

This last point rules out your idea of "the Union must capture 40 FS worth of CSA towns/cities/forts by June 1862 or be penalized 300 FS a turn. 40 FS would add up to about 6 towns (5 FS per town) and a couple forts." at least as it is described there, which would also be a nightmare to code (indeed I'm not sure how feasible it is). But more on that later.

Re the CS, I don't know about 1862, but those volunteers did get raised in 1863 just before Gettysburg, which is what the event is based on. I'll think about upping the cost, maybe to 450, but the point of that event is really that the CS couldn't just cross the Potomac without seriously committing to an invasion. The CS does also get a hefty European mobilisation boost if they go north (and especially if they sustain the invasion for any length of time). Given the extra units is only a handful of brigades and one division, you might be overstating their importance? I tend to find Maryland's geography a bigger obstacle to invasion than a few weak Union units, but that's just me.

Re Hagerstown and Gettysburg... I'd prefer avoid having too many "if X is controlled, lose Y FS per turn" objectives if only because they're hard to keep track of, especially if there's a lot of them. 50 FS/turn isn't much of a motivator TBH in a game where you can lose 3000 in one turn just from casualties, and isn't worth complicating the game for a town that really isn't that important in the grand scheme of things.

Re 1861, I'm also not keen on making big changes here. Number one, new players will likely still be learning the mechanics of the game, in 1861, so I don't want to push them with "you have to knock out Fort Henry right now to not lose", and number two all the units in 1861 are useless at attacking... it's just too hard to push at that stage of the game. Requiring players do so is just frustrating.

With that in mind, here's where my head is at right now for fixing this.
Add a per-turn drop on the Union from the start (or perhaps 1/62). Maybe 200 points a turn or so. No conditions on this, it's just continual war weariness.
Union FS boosts from capturing key locations - Nashville, Memphis, Little Rock, Atlanta &c are increased.
Union gets additional FS boosts from capturing less important places like how Knoxville TN has in 1.03. Thinking Arkansas Post, Corinth MS, Decatur AL, Murfressboro TN, Chattanooga TN, Dresden TN, Culpeper VA and Meridian MS are candidates for these. Maybe a few others. Each will be maybe +2000 or so, with the values calculated that a roughly historical advance will leave the Union FS in roughly the same place it is in 1.03, after accounting for the per-turn drop added above (or notably, that a slow advance means they're in a worse spot).
Add Union penalty and/or CS FS boost on capture of Hagerstown, Gettysburg, Frederick. Probably 2000 each or so. Might also up the effects of capturing the FS spots north of the Ohio.

Simple, to the point, does what I'm trying to do with the Richmond bonus but with a bit more urgency, and should encourage different strategies to be attempted - I think there's a lot to like there, but I'm very interested to hear everyone's thoughts, so please share below

- BNC

Looking at the above post all I see is FS and timing changes. Is there any chance of changing the unit count or something else to keep the Eastern Front from turning int SC WWI?
Thanks.

I'm also of the opinion that unit count being toned down would be a godsend for the game forcing brigades to be used as garrisons for vital towns and divisions and corps would have to be grouped into armies as they were in reality instead of being spread out across a vast frontline. Both sides just have far too many troops, MPP income is too high and production technology too powerful.

In the only CSA game I've lost, I still had 90 land units Vs 110 at surrender in mid '65 even with spending 200 MPP per turn on consumer goods. I'd also researched amphib technology purely for more units showing just how bloated MPP's are. Also this was against a very good player who put a good blockade in place early. The Union situation is of course even more absurd with every possible unit bought out by '64 and probably floating 10,000 MPP+ through the rest of the year.

Regardless of casualties, both sides reach the hard cap and then stay there for the rest of the game with the Union winning in the end due to having more units through marines and the extra level of corps org as well as being able to raid almost all the FS objectives with marines which is unstoppable.

I really appreciate your willingness to consider new ideas BNC. You are one of the major factors that make ACW a great game.

Here's some of my ideas in response to your comments:

Re the CS, I don't know about 1862, but those volunteers did get raised in 1863 just before Gettysburg, which is what the event is based on. I'll think about upping the cost, maybe to 450, but the point of that event is really that the CS couldn't just cross the Potomac without seriously committing to an invasion. The CS does also get a hefty European mobilisation boost if they go north (and especially if they sustain the invasion for any length of time). Given the extra units is only a handful of brigades and one division, you might be overstating their importance? I tend to find Maryland's geography a bigger obstacle to invasion than a few weak Union units, but that's just me.

Upping the cost of the extra units is an excellent idea. However, MPPs don't matter that much to the Union. By 1863 they are swimming in them.

Everyone I've played recently (including me) stops at the Potomac. Opponents don't even take advantage of a convenient hole in my line to encourage them to cross. When playing CSA I weigh the advantages/disadvantages of advancing across the Potomac. Currently, nothing of value is within reach of a moderate invasion of the north. And, yes, those handful of brigades and division are pretty significant in 1861 and early 1862.

The hefty European mobilization boost is of no importance to me because European diplomacy is pretty well broken. It's just too easy for the Union to squash any mobilization growth.

Besides, Europe entering the war is a game breaker. I hate to have the game decided based on a random number generator.

I think you could improve European diplomacy by providing halfway points. For example, if England reaches a certain level of mobilization, she doesn't get fully involved in the war but offers the South a few ships. Or prevents a Southern port from being blockaded.

I don't think any European nation would ever have thrown land units into the hell of the civil war. But they would willingly have stabbed the Union in the back. I think that's the direction you should go with diplomacy.


Add a per-turn drop on the Union from the start (or perhaps 1/62). Maybe 200 points a turn or so. No conditions on this, it's just continual war weariness.
Union FS boosts from capturing key locations - Nashville, Memphis, Little Rock, Atlanta &c are increased.
Union gets additional FS boosts from capturing less important places like how Knoxville TN has in 1.03. Thinking Arkansas Post, Corinth MS, Decatur AL, Murfressboro TN, Chattanooga TN, Dresden TN, Culpeper VA and Meridian MS are candidates for these. Maybe a few others. Each will be maybe +2000 or so, with the values calculated that a roughly historical advance will leave the Union FS in roughly the same place it is in 1.03, after accounting for the per-turn drop added above (or notably, that a slow advance means they're in a worse spot).
Add Union penalty and/or CS FS boost on capture of Hagerstown, Gettysburg, Frederick. Probably 2000 each or so. Might also up the effects of capturing the FS spots north of the Ohio.

Yes, all of those are great ideas. War weariness was a bigger threat than Southern armies. Lincoln was constantly cajoling a reluctant Union into continuing the war. Boosting FS in Hagerstown, Gettysburg, Frederick will encourage more Antietams and Gettysburgs. More exciting than sitting behind the Potomac.

I think the Union should be pushed into taking more risks early in the game. Launching attacks in early 1862 when the South has better leaders and better units is pretty scary but it would make for a much more fun and exciting game.

stormbringer3 wrote: Tue Oct 25, 2022 2:13 pm Looking at the above post all I see is FS and timing changes. Is there any chance of changing the unit count or something else to keep the Eastern Front from turning int SC WWI?
Thanks.

YueJin wrote: Tue Oct 25, 2022 3:03 pm I'm also of the opinion that unit count being toned down would be a godsend for the game forcing brigades to be used as garrisons for vital towns and divisions and corps would have to be grouped into armies as they were in reality instead of being spread out across a vast frontline. Both sides just have far too many troops, MPP income is too high and production technology too powerful.

In the only CSA game I've lost, I still had 90 land units Vs 110 at surrender in mid '65 even with spending 200 MPP per turn on consumer goods. I'd also researched amphib technology purely for more units showing just how bloated MPP's are. Also this was against a very good player who put a good blockade in place early. The Union situation is of course even more absurd with every possible unit bought out by '64 and probably floating 10,000 MPP+ through the rest of the year.

Regardless of casualties, both sides reach the hard cap and then stay there for the rest of the game with the Union winning in the end due to having more units through marines and the extra level of corps org as well as being able to raid almost all the FS objectives with marines which is unstoppable.

Short answer here is no, I'm afraid. I tested the game a lot with smaller unit counts, it didn't really work. (I think the CS division cap was 18, Union 22 or something like that?) There's just not enough reserves to make up for heavy losses on a particular turn - lose one key unit and goodbye Richmond, which isn't fun. Plus the AI struggles with it.

Longer answer, going from having no units whatsoever in 1861 to enough units in 1862 to launch something similar to the Union's historical offensives requires the Union to get a lot of MPPs (in short, roughly the amount they get now) in order to afford everything. For the Confederacy to have a chance to respond to those offensives, and not just guarantee Union victory, they also need to get a (smaller) lot of MPPs. Catch is, if they get a lot of MPPs in 1861, then they will get that same lot in 1862, and 1863, and 1864. If I don't have the build limits high enough, you end up with both sides sitting on a huge pile of MPPs and nothing to spend them on, which isn't ideal. At least in the Union's case, there's some truth to it, for the Confederacy it is just silly.
So why don't I just halve MPP output and spawn in the 1862 attackers? Easy: losses. Over time, the size of armies will tend towards whatever can be supported with a side's MPPs per turn, or the build limits, whichever is smaller. If an army has too many units for what it can support, the enemy will kill off those extras when they inevitably don't have the MPPs to reinforce them. So if I drastically reduce MPP, spawn some units for 1862, and stop there, then by 1863 the smaller unit count will be what happens on the map... and I've already tested that and found it doesn't really work. If I spawn in new units regularly but keep MPP low, then players will often be over their build cap and unable to build anything, which isn't any better.

In 1.04 I am increasing the cost of late-game upgrades, which I'm hoping will finally solve that "Union sitting on 10k" issue and should slow down unit builds in 63 onwards. This is already a massive change (you'll see what I mean when the update drops) and I'm wary of making too many changes and thus overcorrecting, so I'm cautious about adding more. But I won't rule out a small change (maybe a tweak to industrial modifiers or something) either.

- BNC

I am new to this game, played a little against the AI and have completed four server games - two from each side.
All four games were won by the Union, they were not close games, it was an easy win every time. And using different strategies: Eastern approach taking Richmond; Western approach attacking to New Orleans from both directions; some games using marines extensively, one not; sometimes doing extensive convey interdiction but not always.

It seems that the Union has all the advantages:
Research capacity.
Production, with the deficit for the Confederates increasing throughout the game.
More units.
Naval invasions.
Convoy interdiction.
The advantage that you might thing the Confederates would have from interior lines is if anything the opposite because of the unlimited distance of rail transfer and that sea movement is so much faster than land movement.
So the game is not so much a question of which side will win but how they want to go about it. Excepting that the Confederate player plays better by a very wide margin.

I am not knowledgeable about the ACW, maybe the Union were certain to win. Other games deal with this through the victory conditions, for example in WITE the Axis player gets a win if they can survive past 1945 even if the Soviet player is clearly winning the war.
A game is an activity in which people play to win, if the result is largely pre-determined then that takes some of the interest out of it.

So my question is, will the proposed changes resolve this fundamental issue ?
Or maybe I have it wrong and the game is not unbalanced or perhaps that is considered not to matter.

Suggestion:
To burn the Unions lategame MPP you could add some war weariness events that let you decide to either get a FS penalty per Turn or pay MPP.
A bit like the consumer goods for CSA but the other way round.

You were talking about the crossing the Potomac event. What I dislike more is the Ohio River event.
I recently had a CSA game where I went Indian and Cavalry heavy in Missouri. Routing him there and reaching the first traderoute / travel hex (then Gunboats blocked further advance).
Once he had sufficiently reinforced I conducted a fighting retreat but took 3 or 4 of the Riders and forcemarched them into Arkansas. Surprising, surrounding and annihilating his holding position there including an HQ.
Then I made the mistake of crossing the Ohio northwest of Cairo with 3 Cav, 1 Division and 1 Brigade. Major mistake. Gunboats cut me off, Ohio spawns blocked everything with ease.
I found this super frustrating. I had him beat on multiple occasions while Richmond was under immense pressure.
With his Missouri troops pursuing my units in country with no railroads, this incursion might have forced him to divert troops from Richmond.
In the end all the attackers got slaughtered which kinda nullified all my previous exploits.
I know, the reinforcements spawn without guns which already slows them down a bit. But with gunboats cutting my troops off, Union reinforcements do not need weapons to hold key positions.

Suggestion:
Maybe combine the decision to take the reinforcements with a hefty FS penalty to the North for having to "admit" that the South got this far? And only make the event trigger at all, when at least 3 units crossed? So to not make it easily exploitable or trigger by accident.

It will be still very bad and unrewarding for CSA but since it historically happened, you can not scrap it completely I guess.