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I was curious, is there any benefit in the game to attacking on more than one front at a time? If you are attacking the same region and bring forces on the opponent from 2 or more other regions that border it, do you get a bonus for turning their flank, or a chance to rout, or some other benefit?
Or are they simply added to the force from the other region?

Sadly there is no benefit for attacking from more than one region at a time....no flank attacks....no rear attacks etc Forces are, as you put it, 'simply added to the force from the other region'

Well........shucks.....might be a good feature for AACW 2 then.

I should think this would figure into frontage rules. If a stack already can only engage a single division against the enemy why would bring additional divisions to the region help.

And in addition to the advantages of flanking, consider the potential risks. An enemy backed against the river would be devastating for a failed attempt at a coordinated flanking maneuver, if the timing was off and the enemy was able to fight off the attacks separately. Just a few things to consider.

Benihana wrote:I should think this would figure into frontage rules. If a stack already can only engage a single division against the enemy why would bring additional divisions to the region help.

And in addition to the advantages of flanking, consider the potential risks. An enemy backed against the river would be devastating for a failed attempt at a coordinated flanking maneuver, if the timing was off and the enemy was able to fight off the attacks separately. Just a few things to consider.

Antietam "cough cough". While not really a flanking attack. An excellent example for the fighting off the attacks separately

Tell you guys what: I put a thread in the "help improve" forum called "AACW2 wishlist". You guys can put your ideas for AACW2 there so the AGE people don't have to comb through the entire forum to find these ideas. I also inserted something there for the developers, that these are only suggestions, not demands, and that they reserve the right to ignore any/everything there. Of course, someone stickied it, so it may have some merit.

Disagree that it would be good to add a flanking bonus. That's a tactical thing; this is not a tactical game.

Chaplain Lovejoy wrote:Disagree that it would be good to add a flanking bonus. That's a tactical thing; this is not a tactical game.

+1

I believe that if the 2 forces arrive at seperate times, then it should be handled as 2 seperate engagements with no bonus for flanking. But if a force is forced to fight on 2 seperate fronts it is only basic logic that they should have to do so at a disadvantage. Also if a force is engaged and it becomes realized that another force is engaging from a flank or rear, is it also logical to assume this would cause some disorder, panic, and possibly an increased chance of withdrawl even if by a small force. With respect, I believe this is a tactical game on a very basic level, otherwise there would be no movement of the forces, or postures/rules of engagement. Of course tactics play a part, as they should, IMHO.

Chaplain Lovejoy wrote:Disagree that it would be good to add a flanking bonus. That's a tactical thing; this is not a tactical game.

Well, World War One isn't a tactical game either, but it has parameters for flank attacks. And while AACW is grand strategy, the battles themselves take place on the operational/tactical level, where flanking matters.

Mortar wrote:I believe that if the 2 forces arrive at seperate times, then it should be handled as 2 seperate engagements with no bonus for flanking. But if a force is forced to fight on 2 seperate fronts it is only basic logic that they should have to do so at a disadvantage. Also if a force is engaged and it becomes realized that another force is engaging from a flank or rear, is it also logical to assume this would cause some disorder, panic, and possibly an increased chance of withdrawl even if by a small force. With respect, I believe this is a tactical game on a very basic level, otherwise there would be no movement of the forces, or postures/rules of engagement. Of course tactics play a part, as they should, IMHO.

That still doesn't argue the case with regards to current force and frontage rules. The frontage rules mean no matter how many divisions you throw at them, only some will be able to engage.

As it stands, each region is very large and forces don't fight together unless they are in a command structure together. I may be wrong but that is my understanding (and perhaps when defending a structure?). I think it does a lot to reduce "heroic" gameplay you find in most other games, where every battle is decisive and includes tactics that were difficult to employ in real warfare at best.

I think that the lack of things like flanking attacks really hurts this game. To me, without flank attacks and other situations like it, I feel like I lose strategy and instead only have to worry about dropping some big stack of guys here or there.

I know that this is a game about the "grand strategy" instead of the smaller battles, but I feel that ACW2 could be improved by at least adding flanks and the like.

enf91 wrote:Well, World War One isn't a tactical game either, but it has parameters for flank attacks. And while AACW is grand strategy, the battles themselves take place on the operational/tactical level, where flanking matters.

I agree with chaplain and soloswolf.
The in game regions are huge and the ACW war was a "battle" war not a continous front with huge 100 km long "offensives" kind of war like WW1 or WW2 (exception, the Richmond/Petersburg siege).
In ACW a battle, even a huge one would happen only on a little part of a game region so in the ACW any flanking or even rear attack should happen inside a region, on a tactical level, with little or no relate to the which surrounding regions units comes.
At most, this flanking could be simulated with some roll inside the battle resolution to check is some stack manages to turn the flank of the enemy battle line.
But IMHO, its not needed. This kind of thing is already represented with the offensive/defensive stats or special abilities like surpriser.
Just my 2 cents.
Cheers!

Im no programmer and Im not sure what the limits of the frontage rules will allow, but I feel that this is a very basic and important strategic application, which does in fact increase the decisiveness, but it's also tricky to pull off and not always possible, often resulting in the units arriving at different times, and each fighting on it's own. But in the case that units join in from a flanking or rear region at the same time, or during the course of the battle, why not allow them a frontage "bonus", or a frontage "disadvantage" to the flanked force, due to having to fight on multiple fronts, simultaneously. Again, I dont know what the engine limits, but I believe it would add a dimension to the game that is strategically sound, and should not lead to an overwhelming unbalance.

Chaplain Lovejoy wrote:Disagree that it would be good to add a flanking bonus. That's a tactical thing; this is not a tactical game.

+1

I think you could reach the assumption that considering the size of each of the regions...each of the virtual generals would discover the position of enemy forces approaching them and turn to engage accordingly. The manner of flanking of which you speak isn't something you could effectively model in an operational game like AACW. Now...flanking on a strategic scale...i.e. interdicting an army's line of supply and communication...definitely fair game.

I agree with Arsan.

This is a strategic/operational level game : Flanking movement is a tactical concept that has no meaning when your troops are moving tens of kilometers.

There is a "surpriser" ability that could represent the capacity of an officer to make unanticipated move. Or AACW2 could add a new special ability.

It's not because AACW has not this tactical concepts that it should be seen just as a "push my big stack on your big stack and see who is the more lucky" game : when you play against a human player this game requires deep thinking and planning and some of my opponents made me learn the hard way that strategical surprise is possible (and I hope I did the same myself :neener .

Moreover, flanking and rear attacks have their counterpart at strategical level : landings are typical rear attack moves and I've already seen my opponent or executed myself flanking move around the south defences in front of Richmond (e.g. in a game I'm playing now my northern opponent is putting the pressure on my line from Charlottesville and has just landed with Meade between Richmond on Petersburg). This will not give you immediate bonus in the fight but cut the supply to your ennemy and you'll see him running back.

My two cents ...

Tactical flanking is already present in the game. Pocus wrote this down on Feb 6th:
how units/elements get picked. A thing to know is that the elements involved within an unit will all fire against the same unit. generally this enemy unit, if it has not chosen yet a target, will fire back. This can explain why some of your units get badly mauled while others don't have a scratch:
Your unit A1 fire against enemy B1, which is replying against A1. Your unit A2 (you have more units) can also attack B1, and will not get casualties (some simplification and abstraction here, you are flanking/attacking the rear, of the enemy).

Another side effect is that a small unit can be entirely destroyed by another powerful unit. This can be bad and good. Bad because you lose an entire unit, and the damages are not spread over many elements. Good because the big enemy unit will "waste" some of its firepower killing your unit, and will not redirect fire against another target for the whole round.

Look I found it.