Mon Jun 29, 2015 3:54 am
The game was by no means lost to the South quite yet. Ok, so they just lost Savannah and were about to lose Nashville. But Arrow pretty much had me stopped from further shenanigans in the East when the game ended. He'd inflicted a large loss in Falmouth and was threatening DC from that position with Jackson. With him there, I'd be forced to leave at least a small corps in DC or attack him, either of which would serve his purposes. Like you said, the West and Far West aren't crucial to the South's chances of victory. Yeah, those theaters help. But what would the North have won even if I'd been able to parlay the Humphreys battle into taking Memphis, Corinth, and Nashville. No industry was laid down in Tennessee, so the net effect would have been marginal economically speaking. Yes losing a complete division is hard for the rebels to make good on, but it's hardly a death blow. As long as an opponent is trading space for time in Tennessee, it'll be a long time before the Union can take anything truly meaning out in that neck of the woods.
Savannah's economic impact is the biggest here as that city is one of the top 5 CSA cities in economic output. But the rebels have too many coastal cities to defend them all properly from a Union opponent committed to landing 2+ divisions down. So that loss is hardly surprising and probably not too unexpected.
Our game did last 39 rounds, so close enough! Unless you meant another 40 rounds, in which case I agree. I really thought it would go into '64 and that thought played a major role in my audacious little campaign. I figured either it'd work and go a long way towards victory or it wouldn't and I'd have a year to replace that lost corps.