I have discovered the Auto Garrison feature works for the defensive players huge advantage.
As the Union I discovered when we benifitted from Dallas Texas going Union, that I just kept the (2) Cavalry on the defense. The South attacked me and I got a free Garrison Unit so we stomped the attackers. Basically, let the South rampage the Deep West and the Union generates all the Defensive units we need. This is true throughout the whole West.
It works both ways however, if as the Union we are agressive and probe the South too much they generate all the defensive units they need, considering the South's limited manpower IRL this seems like a cheat they get so many "free" units.
As the Union I am willing to forgo the benifits of Auto Garrison; because as the South it skews the advantage way too much to their advantage as by nature the Union must be "Offensive".
This has been made to help the AI (and human player to some extent) guard its possessions. While it is not essential for the human player it is almost a must for the AI as otherwise some/many cities would be left undefended when the main garrison is destroyed and this would lead to deep raids. Something that we had in original Civil War....
As the South I'm suffering heavily from auto-garrisoning. Example
Mculloch orders Springfield MO evacuated. the Yankees are coming so blow up the depot and head south. The army does this but then a cheesy auto-garrison shows up to defend Springfield. The Yankees siege it, if falls in a turn, and I lose one NM. I've lost a bunch of NM in this fashion, so I'm now having my pre-existing militia stationed outside the town to save on the NM loss. I wish I could blow up the city's too so the auto garrison doesn't show up. I like the concept especially as it's important when defending against cavalry raids, but it hurts me when the 450-man garrison shows up to defend Springfield against a 20,000 strong army.
Mculloch orders Springfield MO evacuated. the Yankees are coming so blow up the depot and head south. The army does this but then a cheesy auto-garrison shows up to defend Springfield. The Yankees siege it, if falls in a turn, and I lose one NM. I've lost a bunch of NM in this fashion, so I'm now having my pre-existing militia stationed outside the town to save on the NM loss. I wish I could blow up the city's too so the auto garrison doesn't show up. I like the concept especially as it's important when defending against cavalry raids, but it hurts me when the 450-man garrison shows up to defend Springfield against a 20,000 strong army.
I'm going to have to agree with Carnium. Campaigns against Athena tend, at least in my experience, to result in much more methodical games which don't see anything like the wholesale destruction actual players tend to unleash on each other. I currently have two PBEMs going, both with very active Western theaters, and I'm simply not seeing the auto-garrisons creating this kind of problem. One has seen the total destruction of most of west Texas and the territories and there have been no major NM shifts. The other has nearly all of Kansas and Missouri on fire, some towns have changed hands every turn, and I should be seeing NM shifts of three to six points a turn. It's not happening. I suspect the real NM shifts are coming from places like Springfield and Fayetteville where there should be a total shift of two NM, or locations where players may have left a militia regiment on a depot. That gives a militia regiment, the town auto-garrison, and the depot garrison. That's just enough of a defense to trigger a one point loss in NM.
I think the auto-garrisons are great; they keep players from being tempted to send a flood of single regiment cavalry raids deep into enemy territory tearing up everything they encounter.
I think the auto-garrisons are great; they keep players from being tempted to send a flood of single regiment cavalry raids deep into enemy territory tearing up everything they encounter.
On the auto-garrisons generating NM for the other side through siege surrenders, I believe the defender can voluntarily avoid this by placing the auto-garrison outside the city during his turn. This will in effect "sortie" the auto-garrison, where it likely will be destroyed in the subsequent field battle but when the city falls there won't be a NM loss. Is this a correct approach? The idea here is where a defender knows they cannot relieve the siege but wants to avoid the NM impact of a surrender (there may still be a NM loss for the field battle if forces are large enough, but I don't think an auto-garrison destruction in a field battle would cause that).
The only fly here is whether the auto-garrison, instead of sortieing, retreats before battle back inside the city and then surrenders anyway. But I assume some chance of avoiding a NM loss is better than none.
The only fly here is whether the auto-garrison, instead of sortieing, retreats before battle back inside the city and then surrenders anyway. But I assume some chance of avoiding a NM loss is better than none.
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