AGEOD Forums

I don't understand when and why a Capitain or General or any grade sometimes it is ready and avalable to attack, and sudenly the following turn it is not.. or viceversa.
I have for instance the Corps of Franklin full in strrength and rest, and it was available to attack. I cross a river to prepare an attack and now it is not available to attack even if it is always full strenght and rest.
The same for other commandements without crossing any river or moving... some of them pass on available to attack whent there were not the turn before, and others the opposite...? Why? How can we know how they will be or if they will change the availability?

The only leaders in AACW are generals; both names are synonymous.

Each turn a d6 die role is made for each leader/general to determine if it is active. If the dr is <= the leader's strategic rating it will be active. So a typical 3-1-1 leader will be active about 50% of the time. This dr is modified by whether the leader was active in the previous turn or not. If it was there is a greater chance that it will remain active; if not there is a greater chance that it will remain inactive. I'm not sure if the dr modifier is +1/-1, but it probably is.

Success in AACW will depend very greatly on leadership specifically because of the activation rules, but also because of the advantages of the rank and offensive and defensive values of leaders. Good leaders (high strategic, offensive and defensive ratings) will nearly always win over and equal force lead by a mediocre or poor leader. This is what poses the Union the greatest problem during the first two years of the war. The decent to good leaders can be counted on one hand.

Although it will be difficult as the Union to attack with poor leadership, even the mediocre leaders will defend almost normally when inactive if they are defending in a region they control. The 35% power penalty does not apply in this case.

Starting in '63 the Union will start receiving its other good leaders. The Union player must be ready for this and put them in charge of divisions and corps ASAP. Once these generals start fighting and winning battles they will not only gain experience and quality, but also be offered promotions. A good corp commander can lead a number of mediocre division commanders pretty well.

Once one of these new, good leaders (Grant, Sherman, Meade, Reynolds to the greatest extent, but also Kearny and Lyon get promoted to Lt.Gen. you can put them in charge of an army and pass their good rating not only to the units in their own stack, but also to their subordinate corps. At this point the face of the game will change greatly.

For the South the problem is that you already start the game with almost all of your good leaders and need to rack up your victories quickly to keep Union morale low or break it altogether and increase your victory points. VPs affect your income and recruiting. The higher the better, of course.

Two more points.

1) Before you ever promote a leader, look them up in bburns9's List of Commanders Union and Confederate to be found here Updated Generals Lists 1.15 Legacy Patch. This is a must, because many leaders when promoted LOSE some very good parameters.

2) Protect your army commanders. Every leader active in a battle has about a 2% chance of being killed, be it a division commander or the commander of your army. Let your corps do your fighting if at all practicable.

Off you go now and have at 'em.

Really nothing more could be added to that excellent post except that you can always just turn the activation rule off in the options menu. Then all your generals will be active all the time. I will usually play with all the other rules in place except activation just because it can be really annoying.

And then of course there are those of us here who play on the Hard Activation setting (non-activated leaders will have high chance of not being able to move AT ALL). There are arguments for all three settings depending upon personal taste. I tend to see it as increasing historicity clicking further to the right. In spite of dire warnings about armies getting pinned & surrounded á la Stalingrad, it all works out very well and adds a great dimension of uncertainty to everything: e.g. is that large force of rebs moving up into W. Virginia halted south of Grafton because it's a feint? or is the army pinned because some CSA general dropped the ball (as happened historically). I don't play with any other setting at this point.

Captain_Orso wrote:2) Protect your army commanders. Every leader active in a battle has about a 2% chance of being killed, be it a division commander or the commander of your army. Let your corps do your fighting if at all practicable.

Isn't that wrong? I'm under the impression that anyone LG and higher is immune to death on the battlefield. I mean, in my current PBEM with Jerzul, Polk (as a MG) was killed in the defense of Pensacola, and in charge of a corps. Kinda put me into a tailspin as I had no one to take over his corps.

Wraith wrote:Isn't that wrong? I'm under the impression that anyone LG and higher is immune to death on the battlefield. I mean, in my current PBEM with Jerzul, Polk (as a MG) was killed in the defense of Pensacola, and in charge of a corps. Kinda put me into a tailspin as I had no one to take over his corps.

Immunity was revoked several patches ago.
2 star and 3 srar have lower probability, but no longer 0

hehe, try playing Americans in WIA with Washington dead....

lodilefty wrote:hehe, try playing Americans in WIA with Washington dead....

leure: leure:

lodilefty wrote:Immunity was revoked several patches ago.
2 star and 3 srar have lower probability, but no longer 0

hehe, try playing Americans in WIA with Washington dead....

I've never played WIA . Is losing Washington as bad as losing Grant and then not having Sherman appear?

Captain_Orso wrote:I've never played WIA . Is losing Washington as bad as losing Grant and then not having Sherman appear?

If you lost Washington in the early months of 1775 76 the white house will become the holiday mansion of the queen
the end !

Well, if Aphrodite Mae wishes to use it, I'm sure she has her reasons

King George II on the other hand..

Speaking of Aphrodite Mae, where has she and Dixicrat gone to? I hope they are well.

vonRocko wrote:Speaking of Aphrodite Mae, where has she and Dixicrat gone to? I hope they are well.

Thanks, vonRocko!

I'm a cop now, and so I don't have much time for fun stuff. Suspicious; grim; stern; that's me, nowadays. I wouldn't be much fun to read, even if I had the time. As for my wife, AM has transcended the confines of being merely mortal. She's become a high power executive. (No joke!) I started a thread on the topic in the General Discussions forum, so maybe anyone's responses to this post would be better posted, there. (Or else possibly Mae's "800" thread.)

All, please forgive the digression from the thread topic. We now resume our regularly scheduled thread discussion.

Dixi

PS And for those of you who find it an irresistible temptation to point out that everybody should do as I recommend since I'm a gun-totin' cop who's also a twitching nervous wreck from all of the sugary doughnuts and highly-caffeinated coffee I've doubtless consumed...

Well. We don't do "coffee and doughnuts" anymore. How 20th century! How stereotypical!
No, it's Lattes and Biscotti, which make us twitchy and edgy and a bit more suspicious than we might otherwise be.
Get it straight, men.

Speaking of which...
Is there a reason that your topic was swerving, all over this thread?
Please step out of the post, keeping your typing fingers visible at all times.
May I see your user log in, please?