Flying to the sound of the guns?

[Heldenkaiser]

Marching to the sound of the guns is a great concept I think. But sometimes when I see it in action I tend to think whether it doesn't work way too well. In the last turn my current PBEM campaign, ASJ personally commanded a battle in Rome, GA, on day 6 through 10 (!) and at the same time one in Chattanooga, TN, on days 9 and 10. These regions are not even adjacent (they're separated by Floyd, GA), all three are in hill or mountain / mud terrain, and I guess one would march 10 days between them. That ASJ manages to not only command, but fight with his army stack in both of them at the same time seems nothing short of a miracle to me!

I see how the Rebs need all the help they can get to win the war, but troops that are present at two widely separated battle at the same time is stretching it a bit ...

[MrT]

come on admit it you fell for the old uniform on the stick routine and retreated did'nt you!

[soundoff]

<snip>

Marching to the sound of the guns is a great concept I think. But sometimes when I see it in action I tend to think whether it doesn't work way too well.

It is a lovely concept but its very poorly implemented in the game.....IMHO

[Gray_Lensman]

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[soundoff]

Gray I'd also like the conditions to be tighter in respect of penalties for troops MTSG that cross rivers. Coding to prevent Corps and Armies that are besieged inside structures from MTSG without having to engage the besiegers then popping back into their structures once the battle is over......I could go on but that would be boring

[Hobbes]

This reminds me of a similar discussion (a few posts down in this old thread).

I would be surprised to see any change from the abstracted MTSG's for AACW now unless there is some sort of future backport.

http://www.ageod-forum.com/showthread.php?t=8397&highlight=marching

Cheers, Chris

[cobraII]

Marching to the sound of the guns is a great concept I think. But sometimes when I see it in action I tend to think whether it doesn't work way too well. In the last turn my current PBEM campaign, ASJ personally commanded a battle in Rome, GA, on day 6 through 10 (!) and at the same time one in Chattanooga, TN, on days 9 and 10. These regions are not even adjacent (they're separated by Floyd, GA), all three are in hill or mountain / mud terrain, and I guess one would march 10 days between them. That ASJ manages to not only command, but fight with his army stack in both of them at the same time seems nothing short of a miracle to me!

I see how the Rebs need all the help they can get to win the war, but troops that are present at two widely separated battle at the same time is stretching it a bit ...

Rome is in Floyd, GA so they are connected, also they have the railroad, but yeah still strange. were there battle reports each day between 6 through 10, or just one on the 6 and the 10. also were the railroads in working order.

[Gray_Lensman]

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[soundoff]

What? They didn't have teleporters back then?

Now I'm not a Yank .....so I'll bow to your superior knowledge if 'Beam me up Scottie' was one of Lincolns favourite sayings

[Heldenkaiser]

Rome is in Floyd, GA so they are connected, also they have the railroad, but yeah still strange. were there battle reports each day between 6 through 10, or just one on the 6 and the 10. also were the railroads in working order.

Oops. I just closed the game, but I guess you're right about Rome. The graphics sits on the region border and looks like the town's one further south. That confused me, sorry.

Alright, then it isn't quite as impressive as I first thought, but still.

As I said, the battle in Rome was on days 6 thru 10 (five days) and the one in Chattanooga on days 9 and 10 (two days). So ASJ was definitely in two different regions in days 9 and 10 fighting battles in both regions on both days. He must have marched back and forth ... fighting in Rome on the morning of each day and in Chattanooga on the afternoon.

The RR in both regions shows as destroyed this turn. I didn't destroy it, and I doubt ASJ had time to do THAT too while flying from Chattanooga to Rome and vice versa.

[Gray_Lensman]

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[Gray_Lensman]

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[Gray_Lensman]

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[enf91]

Oops. I just closed the game, but I guess you're right about Rome. The graphics sits on the region border and looks like the town's one further south. That confused me, sorry.

Alright, then it isn't quite as impressive as I first thought, but still.

As I said, the battle in Rome was on days 6 thru 10 (five days) and the one in Chattanooga on days 9 and 10 (two days). So ASJ was definitely in two different regions in days 9 and 10 fighting battles in both regions on both days. He must have marched back and forth ... fighting in Rome on the morning of each day and in Chattanooga on the afternoon.

The RR in both regions shows as destroyed this turn. I didn't destroy it, and I doubt ASJ had time to do THAT too while flying from Chattanooga to Rome and vice versa.

Maybe the battles were along the boundary between the two regions?

[Heldenkaiser]

How's this?

Definitely better. I had problems with these two regions during my entire last turn. Extremely confusing situation, as the stacks, too, were sitting right on the border.

[cobraII]

How's this?






Rome, GA After:

[ATTACH]8456[/ATTACH]


Note: The associated military stack location will move to the north along with the structure.

This is much better.

[Heldenkaiser]

Maybe the battles were along the boundary between the two regions?

At least that explanation serves to rationalize the behaviour.

Still, seeing how Chattanooga is on the Tennessee and Rome on the Coosa, and there is 60 miles of mountains in between, and the battles will have been for or around the cities, on the river plains, not up in the mountains, what with my armies attacking Chattanooga from the west and Rome from the south, too, not coming out of the mountains, personally I think it's more realistic to think these battles took in fact place at the opposite ends of both regions, not on the boundary.

In fact, with the terrain being what it is, IMHO it doesn't make sense that these two regions, centered on cities so widely separated by distance and terrain, have a common border. Maybe there ought to be a mountain region in between. Just a thought.

As Gray said, with the logic of MTSG being as it is, maybe the regions really ought to be smaller. Of course, this would mess up RR travel speed and such ...

[Gray_Lensman]

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[Meagher]

Rome, GA confused me too.

In order to devise a plausible narrative, I would imagine the battles took place on different days, or that the command was split but both Union forces thought that the whole force was upon them and reacted accordingly.

[Pocus]

Gray I'd also like the conditions to be tighter in respect of penalties for troops MTSG that cross rivers. Coding to prevent Corps and Armies that are besieged inside structures from MTSG without having to engage the besiegers then popping back into their structures once the battle is over......I could go on but that would be boring

You found a loophole it seems. A besieged stack should not be able to help.

[Heldenkaiser]

Thinking about it more, even disregarding my confusion over Rome, GA, and equally disregarding the fact that the two regions involved whose inhabitable areas that will allow warmaking are separated by 60 miles of mountains, I still harbor nagging doubts about the way MTSG seems to work.

- First, is it realistic to assume, simply given the size of regions, even obstructed terrain aside, that battles will just *always* miraculously take place at the border? For me that works poorly as a post facto rationalization of nearly instant reinforcement by major bodies of troops without consideration of distance and terrain, and worse, for such major bodies fighting in two different regions for several days on end. Because only the defender benefits from the mechanism. For the attacker, the battles in two different regions are never joined. Which leads me to

- secondly, the fact that, with the defensive already being extremely strong in this game, MTSG makes important operational concepts that in real life would have worked in favor of the attacker to help him overcome that defensive strength impossible in the game. For instance:

Faced with a strong defensive line of several corps, in real life the attacker would pin a part of that line with a diversionary attack, then fall on another part with overwhelming force. MTSG, as it presently seems to work, means that cannot be done in the game. Because the defenders at the point of the diversionary attack will receive that attack AND STILL FIGHT AT THE POINT OF THE REAL ATTACK ON THE SAME DAY. And do that again next day, if necessary. (See my original post.) In short, MTSG works as a permanent force multiplier for the defender out of all proportion to the benefits gained in real life by interior lines even under the best conditions.

Should it not be modified to
a) take into account terrain and distance to the battle that's being reinforced, forth AND BACK again?
b) definitely disallow a force to fight in two regions on one day?

BTW does a force that MTSG's even lose its entrenchment status?

Just some more thoughts.

[Jim-NC]

BTW does a force that MTSG's even lose its entrenchment status?

Usually no, however, I have seen when the battle was at the end of the turn (day 13 or 14) where the MTSG units did not get back into position after the battle, and so lost their entrenchments (they stayed in the battle region), and had move orders back to their old region. It is rare, but does happen.

[arsan]

- First, is it realistic to assume, simply given the size of regions, even obstructed terrain aside, that battles will just *always* miraculously take place at the border? For me that works poorly as a post facto rationalization of nearly instant reinforcement by major bodies of troops without consideration of distance and terrain, and worse, for such major bodies fighting in two different regions for several days on end. Because only the defender benefits from the mechanism. For the attacker, the battles in two different regions are never joined. Which leads me to

- secondly, the fact that, with the defensive already being extremely strong in this game, MTSG makes important operational concepts that in real life would have worked in favor of the attacker to help him overcome that defensive strength impossible in the game. For instance:

Faced with a strong defensive line of several corps, in real life the attacker would pin a part of that line with a diversionary attack, then fall on another part with overwhelming force. MTSG, as it presently seems to work, means that cannot be done in the game. Because the defenders at the point of the diversionary attack will receive that attack AND STILL FIGHT AT THE POINT OF THE REAL ATTACK ON THE SAME DAY. And do that again next day, if necessary. (See my original post.) In short, MTSG works as a permanent force multiplier for the defender out of all proportion to the benefits gained in real life by interior lines even under the best conditions.

Should it not be modified to
a) take into account terrain and distance to the battle that's being reinforced, forth AND BACK again?
b) definitely disallow a force to fight in two regions on one day?

BTW does a force that MTSG's even lose its entrenchment status?

Just some more thoughts.

Hi!
MTSG works also for the attacker.
In fact i think it works better for the attacker that the defender, because defensive posture have some penalty for MTSG.
Regarding the defence being very strong in this game, yes it is, but i think it reflects quite well the historical reality.

I think the MTSG system works pretty well, but of course its an abstraction. Like 15 days turns and 50 miles regions are abstractions...
It's game, and all the rules are abstractions that try to convey the general flavour of the real ACW.
In some occasions MTSG will seem like "nonsense" (Like when one stack fights at two places the same day) but if you look past the details and on teh "big picture", i think it gives very good "flavor" results.

And the ACW "flavor" was: unless the defender had bad luck/bad intelligence/bad leadership (simulated by failing to MTSG), attacking was a pain in the ass once armies got experienced and properly organized in corps

Now, under siege corps MTSG looks definitely like a bug.
All abstractions have their limits
Regards!

[Heldenkaiser]

Hi Arsan,

I don't question it in principle, quite the contrary--I think it's one of the most beautiful concepts of the game.

But I do think it could be improved to eliminate some "nonsense" (your wording) results. And the example described in my original post is certainly beyond the imaginable (or rationalizable).

[MrT]

You found a loophole it seems. A besieged stack should not be able to help.

On the same vein as that, why when a stack is been besieged can a stack that has freshly moved into the area be merged with a currently besieged stack.. always seems a bit unlogical. Just for future reference .

[Heldenkaiser]

On the same vein as that, why when a stack is been besieged can a stack that has freshly moved into the area be merged with a currently besieged stack.. always seems a bit unlogical. Just for future reference .

Similarly: why can a corps of 60,000 use the entrenchments dug by 700 militia (i.e. merge and enjoy the same entrenchment level)? Seems like, if you take the trouble of entrenching a militia unit in every important hex, you'll never fight unentrenched.

[MrT]

Would be more logical when lvl1 entrenchment is means less than 1000 men say, level 2 less than 3000 level 3 less than 7000 level 4 less than 10,000 and level 5 unlimited, thus meaning than big stacks moving into single unit stacks trenches dont get the benift of level 4/5 straight away but they have to expand improve, that seems a simple way of improving that for future games.

[enf91]

While we're on the entrenchments tangent, why is it that depending on whether I merge stack A with stack B or stack B with stack A, the entrenchment changes? Like if stack A is entrenchment 3, merging stack B with it will result in the giant stack having entrenchment 3, but if stack B has only entrenchment 1, adding stack A to it will reduce those units' entrenchments to level 1.

[Gray_Lensman]

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[Benihana]

It may be the rare case, but I think Buford at Gettysburg is an example where a small force held vital ground while waiting for a larger force. Even if it wasn't entrenchment you still see that effect. Perhaps a small militia force would find and establish vital entrenchment points that would make it rather easy for a large force to join?