Forming Army?

[Frosty_MooseHead]

in AACW you needed a 3 star general and the army HQ unit to form a army, it seems you do not need that here, even though there is an HQ support unit in the build menu. I am playing GC as Union and can form armies without any HQ unit, is this the way it is supposed to be? or is it a bug?

[Ace]

Yes, this is wad. It has been implemented to simplify things. HQ units bring additional CP, cohesion and training points to the Army though.

[Joe Wheeler]

These are the kinds of things that would be nice to have in the manual. I know a complete manual is almost impossible these days but perhaps someone will publish a guide explaining all the detail common only to CWII for people new to AGEOD. I for one could ask a ton of questions. Most people here are AGEOD veterans and my questions probably seem trivial, redundant and irritating to them. So, I feel more comfortable on the Matrix site, which unfortunately doesn't have all the answers.

[Ace]

You are welcome to this site, be free to ask anything, here you will find most helpful community I've ever seen. I can promise I'll do all I can to help. Manual is fine read material, but it is a start only. And some things describe the way it used to be in cw1, not in cw2. I know, I've learned ACW1 from the forums posts, I try to as helpful to new players as older players were to me.

[Mickey3D]

You are welcome to this site, be free to ask anything, here you will find most helpful community I've ever seen.

+1

I can promise I'll do all I can to help

Ace is the one of the most gallant member of this community. He definitively deserve the service medal.

[Joe Wheeler]

You are welcome to this site, be free to ask anything, here you will find most helpful community I've ever seen. I can promise I'll do all I can to help. Manual is fine read material, but it is a start only. And some things describe the way it used to be in cw1, not in cw2. I know, I've learned ACW1 from the forums posts, I try to as helpful to new players as older players were to me.

OK Ace, I'm going to take you up on that. I see some odd thing with the Battle Planner. For example I get an opportunity to plan a battle with Beauregard. I chose a deployment and then a battle plan. Sometime there is only one choice of battle plan. If I allow the AI to do this sometime a completely different deployment and battle plan are use that were not offered to me as an option. I hope this is clear. Is it WAD or is there a bug?

[Ace]

Sometimes inside one deployment, certain battle plans cannot be chosen if terrain is unsuitable, or your leader does not have sufficient strategic or off/def ratings.

[Joe Wheeler]

Got it. Thanks. Sounds like a work in progress.

[Ace]

+1

Ace is the one of the most gallant member of this community. He definitively deserve the service medal.

Thanks, the same can be said for you. I still remember when we played in PBEM, how you agreed to replay a turn because I accidentally drag&dropped on a unit instead on a region.

[Rafiki]

These are the kinds of things that would be nice to have in the manual. I know a complete manual is almost impossible these days but perhaps someone will publish a guide explaining all the detail common only to CWII for people new to AGEOD. I for one could ask a ton of questions. Most people here are AGEOD veterans and my questions probably seem trivial, redundant and irritating to them. So, I feel more comfortable on the Matrix site, which unfortunately doesn't have all the answers.

I'm sorry if you feel intimidated by the awesomeness of our forumites ( ), but I can assure you that they put their pants on one leg at a time and drink their Klatchian coffee followed by a Gargle Blaster, just like the rest of us

Kidding aside; having people somewhat unfamiliar with the game (if you'll allow me to label you in such a way) come along and ask questions is helpful in many ways:

• It makes it easier for others asking the same things to find the answers they are looking for. All experience so far indicates that if one person asks the question, there are at least 10 others wondering about the same, either already or in the future.
• It helps pinpoint things that may be less clear in the game than they ought to be, which in turn helps AGEOD decide if something should be better documented, get some nifty tooltips, get a trip to the Room of Redesign and/or be addressed in some other way.
• We get to ease new people into the community, and today's "newbies" become tomorrow's veterans. Every single "veteran" around here has at some point been a newbie, yours truly included.
• People asking questions gives us a chance to show off our awesome knowledge of the game, which in turn gives the next guy a chance to contradict what we said which in turn sparks a whole discussion that ends up with everyone involved learning something they didn't know before. Gaining knowledge through friendly, respectful discussions (the type we strive to have here) is cool (much like fezes and bowties, BTW)

So in short, there should be no reason for you to not feel welcome and/or discouraged from posting whatever you are wondering about or wish to say. If you come across such reasons, make sure to let me know and I'll address them appropriately.

[Canon]

Has any one run into problems with this new Army system? It seems like an incredibly easy way to circumvent the Union seniority problems. Just create 5 new Armies in order to ensure Grant gets his without any penalties. Is there a limit on the amount you can build? Otherwise whats to stop Union players (particularly in PBEMs) from exploiting this strategy....

[Joe Wheeler]

I'm sorry if you feel intimidated by the awesomeness of our forumites ( ), but I can assure you that they put their pants on one leg at a time and drink their Klatchian coffee followed by a Gargle Blaster, just like the rest of us

Kidding aside; having people somewhat unfamiliar with the game (if you'll allow me to label you in such a way) come along and ask questions is helpful in many ways:

• It makes it easier for others asking the same things to find the answers they are looking for. All experience so far indicates that if one person asks the question, there are at least 10 others wondering about the same, either already or in the future.
• It helps pinpoint things that may be less clear in the game than they ought to be, which in turn helps AGEOD decide if something should be better documented, get some nifty tooltips, get a trip to the Room of Redesign and/or be addressed in some other way.
• We get to ease new people into the community, and today's "newbies" become tomorrow's veterans. Every single "veteran" around here has at some point been a newbie, yours truly included.
• People asking questions gives us a chance to show off our awesome knowledge of the game, which in turn gives the next guy a chance to contradict what we said which in turn sparks a whole discussion that ends up with everyone involved learning something they didn't know before. Gaining knowledge through friendly, respectful discussions (the type we strive to have here) is cool (much like fezes and bowties, BTW)

So in short, there should be no reason for you to not feel welcome and/or discouraged from posting whatever you are wondering about or wish to say. If you come across such reasons, make sure to let me know and I'll address them appropriately.

OK then!

[dublish]

Has any one run into problems with this new Army system? It seems like an incredibly easy way to circumvent the Union seniority problems. Just create 5 new Armies in order to ensure Grant gets his without any penalties. Is there a limit on the amount you can build? Otherwise whats to stop Union players (particularly in PBEMs) from exploiting this strategy....

I'm concerned by this as well. Perhaps it wouldn't be an issue if fewer Union generals spawned at 2 or 3 stars?

[Ace]

There is a hard limit. You can have the same maximum number of armies as in acw1. The flaw is that you are not paying any cost for forming one - like you had to before. I am pro army and division administrative corps being payed. It will correct the flaw.

[Njordr]

There is a hard limit. You can have the same maximum number of armies as in acw1. The flaw is that you are not paying any cost for forming one - like you had to before. I am pro army and division administrative corps being payed. It will correct the flaw.

+1

[Pocus]

There was never an army cost, only a division cost...

[Ace]

Not directly. It was the cost of buying HQ unit. Since now HQ provides fewer benefits than before (obviously since it is not needed for an army), maybe its cost can be halved. With the introducing of cost for forming an army (similar as the cost for forming a division). This would be best put inside help to improve cw2 part of the forum

[Pocus]

Right, there was a cost for the buying of HQ
Ideally we would want a mechanism were the game surveys if generals have enough troops, and by enough, a senior general probably expects to command at least as much troops as a junior one. As you say, that's improvement...

[willgamer]

Right, there was a cost for the buying of HQ
Ideally we would want a mechanism were the game surveys if generals have enough troops, and by enough, a senior general probably expects to command at least as much troops as a junior one. As you say, that's improvement...

What I hear you saying is that the political cost for promoting out of seniority order is removed (if you understand to promote everyone, every time) and that is now WAD.

Please correct me if that is mistaken.

I have to admit, while I respect any rule changes that y'all devs come up with (goodness knows you've earned it!), I'm somewhat annoyed that the changes were implemented seemingly in half steps. As in this case, why leave a penalty in place that will only afflict tyros, while making it trivial to remove for those in the know (i.e. ACW1 vets).

[Ace]

Political cost still exist if you promote lower seniority generals over higher seniority generals. It also exist if you appoint a general to army head with more senior generals without army command.

[dpt24]

I don't see it being a problem that it is "easy" to make Grant an Army commander. After all Grant was in full control of what could be defined an army by 1862. I prefer not buying the HQ unit. The system works fine in Revolution Under Siege and Rise of Prussia.

[willgamer]

Political cost still exist if you promote lower seniority generals over higher seniority generals. It also exist if you appoint a general to army head with more senior generals without army command.

True that, but the point is that only beginners will ever pay the penalty. There doesn't seem to be any down side to simply promoting every 3-star to army command whenever you can do it respecting seniority order.

Actually, there is a down side, but it only affects the player, not the game... it's annoying to have a long line of army icons on the left side of the screen when only 3 or 4 are of actual interest.

What am I missing?

[Ace]

Have you tried giving every Union general an Army. There should be a hard cap how many armies you can have. I know CSA has it. When you look at history, many lousy generals still had their own armies even after Grant became CiC, they were just not the biggest ones. Butler and Banks were still leading troops in Louisiana, Halleck still had high place in the Washington, etc. What the Pocus said is it would be ideal if senior Army general would complain why my Army has less men than this lower seniority general. That is an improvement not so easily done. We 'll see if they can eventually program it.

[Pocus]

Yes there is a hard cap, and you'll hit it before you run out of 3 stars, particularly a bit in the game.

[Captain_Orso]

*Uuuuuuu* that would be a real bitch . Basically you could do it by making an army commander also a department commander.

The problem would be that we would need new grand regions to remain historical and they would have to be variable since they did change during the war. Banks was basically an army commander in the Shenandoah Valley, but the Valley is currently in the Old North-West grand region (West Virginia, Ohio, Michigan, Indiana) and historically West Virginia had it's own command and Ohio had it's own command.

Also McDowell, who starts the game as commander of the Army of Northeastern Virginia, the only army at the start of the 2 grand campaigns, is not the highest ranking Lt. Gen. at the time.

Anyway I don't think it is entirely realistic and would lead to massive micromanagement especially if you build new units in a district belonging to one leader and then send them into a district belonging to another.

I personally cannot remember ever having read that that army commanders complained specifically about that some other commander had more men than he had. That fell under strategic decision made over their heads in the War Department. Otherwise Butler (sen. 6) would have hissy-fits on the peninsula with very few troops while Banks (sen. 12) battles in the Valley, and when Freemont (sen. 5) arrives in August '61 in St Louis he would throw everything even further into a tizzy.

And if you try to force me to either give Frémont the largest force in the game or command over the Union's Virginia army I'll go on the warpath

[Njordr]

And if you try to force me to either give Frémont the largest force in the game or command over the Union's Virginia army I'll go on the warpath

Better to switch to CSA...

Anyway, even if departments would be nice, I agree with you they would add a lot of confusion.