Banks6060 wrote:Oh...i just remembered....there was one question I'd wanted to ask you Soundoff. I think some readers were curious about it as well.
Was there are reason why you left so many rails damaged across the map??
Quite an easy one to answer really but perhaps not a satisfactory reply.
I've always been somewhat 'bored' by the rail destruction/repair mechanism in the game. Now don't get me wrong. Its vital for gameplay and balance but its just so tedious to me to have to deal with constant repairing of rail tracks. I do hope, if there is ever a AACW2 that they can automate it in someway. Thats not to say it ought to be easy to achieve....just make it less of a micromanagement task to carry out (at least on the repairing side)
As I find it tedious I tend not to bother too much about repairing them (except when I really have to) when I'm playing as the Union. After all your opponent cannot do any further damage if the rails are already chewed up and if you pay enough attention to the supply part of the game you can normally avoid it seriously impacting on supply movement.
When I play the South though..... thats an entirely different kettle of fish. You just have to keep those rails intact so cannot avoid the constant drudgery of sending units out to repair rail. But as the North I never find it so vital particularly as I'm usually on the offensive and operating in areas where my MC is poor so that I'm unable to take advantage of the rail network even if it is complete.
Diverting resources to repair railways for me is not aided either (when I'm playing the North) by my own self imposed house rule to virtually buy no Militia at all throughout the game. Usually I do not have a large quantity of spare single element infantry units that I'm able to divert to the task. Its not aided either by the automatic destruction of rail without the corresponding automatic repair of rail (all IMHO of course). I do tend to get so hacked off when I make the effort of moving a unit to a location...put in the repair rail order....then find that the rails still busted the following turn.
Mind you I've never played against an opponent who deliberately conducted a campaign partly based on an assessment of my ability or otherwise to speedily respond. Now its happened and were I to find myself pitted against you again sometime in the future I'd have to concede that perhaps I'd need to seriously rethink my current modus operandi and devote more time to railroad repair even if I do find it.......boring.