Inaugural Challenge FoF AAR

[Kingmaker]

HiHi

Since the bulbs are associated with research, maybe they are the "eureka" type bulbs one would associate with ideas, discovery, etc. Like a cartoon bulb over the head when the Epiphany moment hits you!

Good call Paul as anyone that 'woz brung up proper like' will remember, the tradition goes back to the Stone age ie through 'the Flintstones'

All the Best
Peter

[Kingmaker]

HiHi

Anthropoid, fraid as I understand it Detailed battle isn't an option with PBEM, it's just Quick battles.

Got a lot on just at the moment, but if your challenge isn't accepted come the end of the Week give me a nudge and we'll sort something out.

All the Best
Peter

[Kingmaker]

HiHi

Well I have fallen well behind, fraid the other ‘Life’ has occupied my time somewhat, anyhow will try and catch up a bit today if battle files don’t come in too fast.

Turn 6

OK some questions answered for me this turn, the invasion of Maryland by ANV didn’t lead to the automatic capture of the unoccupied Ft Hill, so as there is a Fed fort in Cumberland albeit unoccupied that province stays Fed Blue, however there was a small battle there (Reb victory) and from the Quick Battle (QB) screen I could see feds only had a +2 terrain defensive bonus, so that answers another question, ie unoccupied forts will not give a defensive bonus.

The screenshot below shows the position in Maryland.



On the screenshot you can see that there are 2 Stonewall Bgds, this is an oddity the game produces, at set up both sides get some ‘Legendary units’ (mine I give the small Confederate battle flag) and sometimes the same one appears in different containers, in the case of the Stonewall Bgd this game I had one with ANV & 1 with 1st Corps Shenandoah, so I have now given one of them the larger Reb Battle flag (I normally use that one for the Emancipation Bgds). On the shot you can also see that 8th & 9th divs have a + next to their header, this indicates they are rolled up so to speak, to see whats actually inside their respective div containers I would click on the + which would turn into a – and a drop down would appear showing the Bgds inside (see 7th div), this is a useful feature when reorganising within an Army/Corps as it cuts the clutter down and you can see only what you need to. In the ANV stats box you can see I have decided to stay in Cumberland and attack the Fort and so have issued the ‘Begin Siege’ order.



The clever Dicks amongst you will spot that this screenshot was taken before the one above as the 2nd Stonewall Bgd hasn’t been reflagged :)

OK still not being quite sure what will happen with the siege of an unoccupied Ft, and as time is important to me here (I’m casting a nervous eye over my shoulder at Fredericksburg and Richmond) I opt for the aggressive siege; against occupied forts this is extremely costly to the besieger, but with time constraints etc that’s what I go for, I can’t afford to be tied down with a long siege, eg encircle, which Bragg used against Ft Pickens in Pensacola.

Now as Feds have a lot of troops around Cumberland if they decide to attack, with their +2 terrain bonus ANV may take a bit of a pummelling; of course with movement being somewhat uncertain in this game it may be that any attacking forces don’t synchronise and ANV could therefore have far superior numbers for each unit coming in individually which would be great, but this early in the game I can’t afford a major defeat so I stick with the cautious approach, and set ANV to ‘Avoid battle’ (this is where a high Initiative comes in handy, Beauregards is superb), as Cumberland province has a fairly high Forage factor of 9 (clicking on a province shows this info + how many troops you have there and an approximate of Enemy numbers), I hope my boys can do a bit of Chicken stealing and set ANV to Low priority.

Finally for ANV I detach 1 Bgd and send it back to Fredericksburg, in the hope that any incursion into Virginia will be stopped by it in Fredericksburg due to the Feds having to fight a battle there (be warned, this ploy doesn’t always work, and can be catastrophic when it doesn’t!).

Whilst in the Eastern theatre, Lee stays in Norfolk, I need that province back up and supplying produce etc and don’t wish a repeat of Baton Rouge, I am surprised that Lee & 11th div hasn’t actually helped lower the unrest, but at least it is contained and in 2 turns Norfolk should be OK.

The Abingdon Gap, (screenshot below is after movements)



It's all very well ANV charging off after glory in Maryland, but with Lee tied up in Norfolk and Johnston still forming up 2nd Corps around Chattanooga it leaves Southern Virginia & North Carolina somewhat vulnerable to any rapid advance by Feds through the Abingdon gap from for eg, Appalachia KTY to Lynchburg, or the forces in Grafton swinging through Kenawha and into Abingdon, thereby cutting my Rail links.

Johnsons small 2nd Corps (just Lorings Franklin div @ 13,000) can reach Abingdon, but Prices MSG @ 17,000 will only get to Knoxville. Here therefore I go looksee what the Feds have, by clicking on the Union flag in Appalachia I see it is 9 independent bgds with no div or corps container + no commanders present (yellow dot beneath units) this means that while he could move them into Reb territory they could not turn a province Blue.

So being reasonably confident that Ft Donelson can at this stage in the game (ie little or no Fed arty) hold for a turn or 2, I opt for partially covering the gap and building 2nd Corps into a stronger unit. To this end I opt to Move Johnson only as far as Knoxville and have Price join him there, by adding Price to 2nd corps I now have a fairly strong 2nd corps of 33,000 ready to respond to any threats in the Abingdon area while still being close enough to return and help out in the Cumberland Gap area.

While here I buy a Scout attribute for 2nd cav in Prices MSG this will help the scouting check before battle or help ‘Avoid battle’ if that’s been set.

Out West

Twiggs Louisiana div stays put in Baton Rouge, while there I buy a 2nd Artillery brigade attribute for 47th Inf, this costs me 20 Money & 40 Iron



Next turn 47th will turn into an arty bgd armed with 6pds, while it means I lose the Richmond Muskets the bgd is armed with (they came at game setup along with the 1st arty bgd attribute), it will at least gives me some arty out West, I’ll upgrade to 24 pds at the 1st opportunity, one disadvantage of get arty like this on the cheap is that the experience level is reduced by 1/2and needs a good commander or battle experience to build it back up.

I again upgrade Island No 10s guns, this time to 42 pdr rifle.

At Sea

Carolina Pride sent to Virginia Atlantic were I am hoping that she can pick up 50 weapons @ 70/20 from right under the nose of the blockading fleet, Georgia Peach has a less risky venture to Apalache Bay for 70 Iron @ 70/30

Builds/Political

In Richmond I order an army container which will become the Army of Tennessee and a Corps also for out West, at the moment Richmond is the only place I can build Corps & Army containers.

As Florida’s gov is supporting money production I make a gesture and order a Mint built in Tallahassee, and finally, I increase spending on British diplomacy by 8gp to hopefully keep the momentum of support from across the Pond going.

End of turn financial/resource City is the above mentioned Tallahassee.



Thats it for this turn, think I may have missed something out but am in a hurry trying to catch up so sod it :)

All the Best
Peter

[Kingmaker]

HiHi
Turn 7

The Events report below fills in the missing answers



Ft Hill was successfully besieged with no casualties on either side, fairly obvious for feds as no one was home! But at least we now know that besieging an ungarrisoned fort causes no loss to the besieger, the screenshot also shows that battle was avoided in Cumberland, I don’t know what the Feds sent in but it hit air anyhow.
Now if the troops suffered no damage the same cannot be said of the fort itself.



The stats box for Ft Hill shows its defence rating is down to 53% (it was 100% when ANV arrived in Cumberland) so it would appear that the besieging process, even though an automatic capture, does cause damage to the structure, as I used ‘Aggressive siege’ to gain the fort that may have made the damage% higher; in the unlikely event of get another opportunity with an unoccupied fort I will use the ‘Encircle’ siege option and hopefully less damage will be done to the structure.

The reason the damage ratio is so important to me is that I have decided to hold onto Cumberland, at least for a while. The high damage to the fort means I will have to keep ANV in Cumberland and set it, via the Engineering orders, to ‘Repair Fort’, with around 70,000 able bodied men it should not take long. For the defence of Ft Hill I put in 2 garrison Bgds, 1 NC & 1 Mississippi, I buy 42 pdr rifled guns for its armaments and buy Breastworks & Abatis to reduce damage from besiegers.

ANV I leave on Avoid battle while the repairs are underway but restore supply to Normal, there is bound to be a major battle soon and I don’t want my boys short on Ammo. To better enable ANV to avoid battle I buy the Scouts attribute for one of its Independent bgds, Ft Hatteras grs, and disband 2 divisional bgds that only have improvised weapons (as long as a disbanded bgd is in a container, div, corps or fort it will spread its troops around to the other bgds in that container).

It is worth noting that even if ANV should fail to avoid battle, because Cumberland is now Reb Red, ANV will now get the terrain defensive advantage + a fort defence bonus from the now garrisoned Ft Hill, and with that we can leave ANV building castles in Maryland.

Not much however is happening elsewhere, Lee & 11th div stay in Norfolk while the unrest peters out this turn and Braggs 5th Div moves to Rome.

At sea, due to redused target only Carolina Pride goes hunting for moving to the Carolina Atlantic to try and secure 70 Iron @ 70/40

Builds

The newly converted 47th art is given a Baggage train so it never stats a battle without ammo even through march attrition, although this does slow up its movement rate. Medical attribute and muskets are given to St Philips garrison on the Mississippi delta. Another RR is built in Augusta GA.

As not much is going on I will enliven the atmosphere with a screenshot showing what the Confederacy has by way of production at this moment in time, (Sheeee is the boredom setting in or what?!)



And that wraps up this turn except to note that Feds are now probably spending quite a bit on diplomacy, I notice this by the way Cargoes for my Runners are getting harder to find and are less likely to have above a 50% success rate +, for what I have allocated for bribes etc via the proper diplomatic channels (see screenshot below), I am getting very little return for the Confederacy by way of International recognition/trade/training expertise.



Note the 78% & 30% ‘chance to improve’ for Britain & France respectively, feds must be shovelling in the money for me to be out bid for favours, but they can afford it. On the same screenshot under ‘Income and expenses’ you will see the 15gp benefit accrued by Floridas Gov. Supporting Money production.

So to bring this not very exciting turn to a close, this turns closing tourist hot spot is Augusta GA



Hopefully next turn will be a bit more exciting ... it cant fail to be really! :rolleyes:
All the Best
Peter

[Kingmaker]

HiHi

To facilitate the catch up programme I’m going to run several turns into 1 report, hopefully by now viewers will, from the screenshots, have picked up enough about the minutia of the game (I will stick bits in where appropriate) and what is necessary to run a Nation, therefore I will try and open the focus as it were to give more info re the military side, so lets start

Out West

I thought last turn was a bit weak in the West, I had in fact, in line with my ‘Confuse, even if you can’t conquer’ policy, done more movement than reported for last turn.

With regard to the far West my intention is to hold the line along the Arkansas river (Little Rock), using Twiggs div as the holding force, as there was a fair bit of Fed movement west of the Mississippi river and Freemont in Cape Girardeau was in striking distance of White River I had Van Dorns Texans move to support Twiggs around Little Rock.
Polks slimed down Army of the West I had leave Memphis and faint toward the Cumberland Gap via Hatchie and the Upper Tennessee River (while there are exceptions most of the time div, corps or army containers can only move 2 provinces a turn) this was a diversionary move to hopefully either fix Freemont in the Cairo area, or draw him away from the far west. That roughly sets the scene out West for turn 8.

Well, I succeeded in drawing Fremont, a bit too much in fact as he bounced AoW in Hatchie on Polks move back to Memphis. Fremont brought c42,000 to the field to face Polks c13,000 in the ensuing Battle of Hatchie Polk lost over 2,000 men mainly in the rearguard which held long enough for the main army to get into Memphis, the Bgd then considered its job done and surrenders to the feds. Despite this embarrassing defeat AoW remained in good spirits (ie Normal disposition).

However having draw Freemont away from any immediate involvement in the far west, ie east of the Mississippi river; this did present me with another problem.



As previously with Abingdon, I now had a vulnerable gap between Confederate forces. Fremont however is in much better position to do some serious mischief as he is on the Railway network. By quickly striking at Selma (ungarrisoned, industrial city, Iron & Labour) and Alabama he could do a fair amount of damage to the Reb economy, or he could choose to drive south along the Mississippi river and create mayhem in Mississippi & Louisiana making me pull AoW and Twigg after him, thus leaving the Union forces in the far west an open gateway to the south-western Confederacy.

Well by now my assessment of Fed strategy was that they would try and contain Rebs without forcing too much confrontation while they build up their naval power (by clicking on Fed cities I can see they have built 2 naval collages and at least 1 new shipyard + on the replays I have seen at least 1 Ironclad, ie they have a fairly well developed naval development underway), and on land nibble away it Reb provinces where they can.

So I judge that Fremont will not strike out in some bold raid into the Confederate heartlands, + another factor that affects us both; time wise we are now in early Nov, come December the winter weather sets in and movement becomes really difficult (even rail movement sometimes gets affected), so Fremont could find himself stuck down south and eventually surrounded. Nevertheless I move 2 Georgia garrisons to Selma as a holding force should he prove me wrong, the Mississippi cities & forts around Jackson/Natchez are already garrisoned.

Now looking at the map I notice that on and North of the Mississippi river feds have a lot of ungarrisoned cities, including State capitals (capture of cities reduces National will by -1, state capitals by -2).

As it is relevant I will step back here to explain part of my overall strategy for the game. I don’t build camps before the 1st April population boost (from AARs etc over at FoF Matrix this would be seen as heresy by most Reb players!). The April population boost is affected by National will (NW) so a big + NW will give a better return for population and help replace population Mustered or used by the camps, conversely a –NW will reduce the population boost, and this is very important to note, + or – NW also affects the standard of new Musters/conscripts and the ‘Will to fight’ in battle (it also has a knock-on effect to diplomacy I think). So an important part of my early game strategy is to reduce Fed NW while at the same time building up my own.

So with the above in mind and a state capital (Jefferson City,Missouri) and St Louis within reasonable striking distance before winter sets in, I decide to leave Fremont alone and drive for the undefended Cities. To this end I detach Hardees Tennessee div from AoW and use him as the spearhead by thrusting deep into fed occupied Missouri to Herculaneum, Polk with the remainder of AoW is more circumspect and in order to keep in touch with Memphis till I see how Fremont reacts, moves to Cape Girardeau (a side effect of this operation is that if both provinces turn Reb Red then unrest is likely to ensue which will hinder any fed movement and also effect supply to the fed forces in the far west).



Next turn Hardee moves on Jefferson city and will capture it next turn as there are no fed forces near enough or strong enough to intervene.

But as Fremont still sits in Hatchie and next turn brings winter I don’t want Polk stuck off the Railways and so pull him back to Memphis, also from the map I see feds mustering in St Louis which would mean when Polk arrived at St Louis it would have a garrison and I would have to lay siege to the city.

Again looking at the map I see the threat in the far west is reduced somewhat as his forces out there are hit by attrition (lack of supply?) so I pull Van Dorn out from Little Rock and reunite him with AoW in Memphis. Cape Girardeau goes into unrest Herculaneum doesn’t.

This turn (9) I have quite a few builds

Mint in Charleston

Engineering school in Raleigh

RR in Natchez

Hospital in Columbus SC; this is to extend my Hospital coverage to the Reb heartlands and the Atlantic seaports in case of Amphibious landings in the region.

44th SC Inf with the ANV I buy 2 Bgd cavalry attributes for to give ANV some cav next turn and take advantage of the cavs scouting bonus.

Musters are ordered at Selma & New Orleans.

Jefferson City falls and even though most of Missouri is under fed occupation Missouri will on the appointment next turn of a Governor be returned to the Confederacy, this means Feds will get no economic benefits from there conquered provinces.

Now it is my assessment that I would not be able to hold Jefferson City should feds make a determined attempt to retake it, so with that in mind I intend to get what I can out of it while the going is good, I therefore order a conscription, which will use up 2 of its 3 population and also try to impress 30 horses at 60/30 the combination here I hope will spark unrest which if I am lucky will spread north of the river, part of my actions over the coming turns will be a scorched earth one in Union lands hopefully causing lots of unrest and thereby hitting the fed economy & limiting movement.

I now have a string of Reb Red provinces west of the Mississippi from Memphis to Jefferson city the later is particularly important as it means I can spread the Red North of the Mississippi- Missouri river. Now I could push Hardee north of the river to start the scorched earth policy.

Instead with the idea of closing off Fed forces in the far west from their supply I send him by rail (now in Winter months) south of the river to Rolla I will then try force marching the div to Westport and then Topeka the undefended state capital of Kansas

Quickly back to Memphis where AoW goes into Winter quarters in the city, leaving McCulloch 15,000 strong Arkansas div to try regaining Hatchie (Fremont has retraced his steps and reconquered Cape Girardeau , I don’t force march him at the moment (extra march attrition + fatigue on entering Battle) if he goes he goes, if not ...
Well the new gov is in place in Missouri and the city is now defended by its own conscripts, the impressments failed twice (even down to 40/30!) and didn’t cause any unrest.

Hardees successful invasion of Rolla & Westport however do and also spread it to Herculaneum, so fed forces in Arkansas & Osage are now blocked from supply from the Mississippi and have Hardee about to pounce on Topeka, they respond by starting to move north which means if I can force march Hardee into Kansas I may have to fight for the city in a weakened state and outnumbered on his own ground.

Time to be sneaky and disappear so I backtrack Hardee through Jefferson City and finally move Reb forces north of the Miss-Misouri river and onto the Railway in Little Dixie.

Thats me caught up for Out West the screenshot below shows the forces there at the end of turn 13 (the Confederate div shown in Springfield [if it got there, I’m awaiting the file to see] is a stripped down MSG consisting of 2 cav Bgds under Hodge & Stuart)



To be continued.

In the next exciting episode folks we shall see what’s happening in the Central & Eastern theatres, which will include major battles and a surprising siege.

All the Best
Peter

[Kingmaker]

HiHi

Turn 8 onwards cont.

Meant to mention re ‘Out west’, that although I had captured a state capital (Jefferson City) I received no NW points, don’t know for sure but I would hazard a guess it’s because the game see Missouri as a Reb state.

Right on to the Eastern & central theatres. I am going to try and capture fed forces in Franklin, it’s a long shot and with winter fast approaching I need to be careful, and if pos not leave my forces trapped away from a Railway line. To capture enemy div/corps/armies entire you must defeat them in battle and not let them have anywhere to retreat to so for eg they cannot retreat into a province with an occupied fort or into Reb Red provinces that contain a military unit.

So, "The Plan", to try and trap Fed 13th div & Dept of Ohio in Franklin.



In Cumberland FT Hill has a garrison so I detach Magruders Peninsular div from ANV, then march the rest of the 50,000 strong ANV to Grafton to close the gate to the west. Prices 2nd Corps leaves a Bgd in Shenandoah and moves to Abingdon, I bring up a Garrison Bgd form Lynchburg to Abingdon to act as the military unit in Reb territory there and detach 1st Bgd Cherokee from Prices corps, these then play Kamikaze by advancing into Kenawha. The idea here is that as Kenawha is Reb Red if the 4 Fed independent Bgds there move out then 1st Bgd becomes the Military unit there, if they don’t shift 1st Bgd gets thumped, hence the Kamikaze bit. If all goes as hoped for, the fed units in Franklin will be surrounded (Grafton will go Reb through ANV capturing it). The final moves in the operation are for 2nd corps to attack into Franklin, Magruder in Cumberland I Shift S so he won’t move into Franklin before 2nd Corps arrives, that will give me c42,000 v Feds c17,000 that should be enough (Franklin as Fed Blue will have a high Terrain defensive bonus coz of the mountains). Well there it is a “Plan”, but as we all know plans can go wrong.

True to form it did go wrong, the key element in fact, 2nd Corps failed to advance into Franklin!

But we did have a battle, in Grafton, unfortunately from my point of view not a major one, battles with over 10,000 casualties for one side are normally considered major and they affect National Will (NE) and can have an effect on Diplomacy.

The Battle of Grafton

What happened with ‘the Plan’ was feds didn’t move out of Kenawha, so 1st Bgd duly got thumped. Feds pulled dept of Ohio out of Franklin to join up with Butlers US 1st corps coming down from Monongahela + some independent Bgd in Grafton giving Feds c41,000 to face up to the advancing c52,000 ANV. As Grafton was fed blue they had a terrain def bonus of +2 (from the Quick battle [QB] screen, unfortunately I haven’t managed a screenshot of QB as its animated and I haven’t caught it without movement yet) so the fact that it was a Confederate victory just goes to emphasis the superiority early in the war of both Reb troops and their commanders etc. will have to show the Battle details in 3 links





Note in the groups 9th Div Norfolk was the only Reb container to take more casualties than it inflicted.



In the Generals report we see Reb gens are better at rallying their men, Moral & Special abilities of gens will start to kick in as the war progresses.

Below is a screenshot of the Army report for turn 9



Well it was quite an eventful turn all round as there was also a small battle in the Cumberland Gap again a confederate victory with 2 fed Bgds surrendering. That battle highlights one of the things to be aware of, in that the battle was brought about because I had a garrison in Nashville which came out to fight when feds moved into the province and Ft Donelsons Garrison automatically joined in, it is sometimes better to not garrison cities that are protected by a Ft as the City grs will always cause a battle to ensue, not always what is wanted, if there had been no grs in Nashville then feds would have just had to settle down to a siege, of course if there is no army/corps nearby you run the risk of the Ft being destroyed and nothing to stop the enemy subsequently capturing the City! “Decisions, decisions”

To round off this turn as its November we have Elections



A rarity occurred here in that Gov Joseph E Brown of Georgia who is always very anti was defeated, normally the bugger stays the whole game refusing to let Georgia cities Muster and often demanding builds for Georgia that are better suited elsewhere.

To be continued, just had some battle files come in.

All the Best
Peter

[Kingmaker]

HiHi

Turn 8 onwards cont.

Following on in the Eastern theatre after the Battle of Grafton the idea was to reunite ANV & Magruder in Fredericksburg. Magruder is looking a bit vulnerable stuck in Cumberland following the failure of 2nd Corps to trigger its support into Shenandoah.

So I issue instructions to Peninsular div to force march out Cumberland and into Shenandoah where it may catch the small fed div in Franklin trying to attempt a cheeky occupation of an empty Reb province. ANV I swing (due to Mountain terrain factors in Franklin & Shenandoah) through Cumberland and down to Fredericksburg as Cumberland is Reb Red if feds try intercepting although only 50,000 ANV will have both the terrain & Fort Hill bonuses so should be OK. Prices 2nd Corps will move by Rail to Knoxville to boot out some overly adventurous feds and then return to Abingdon while awaiting the consolidation of the ‘Army of Tennessee’ (AoT).

This process is underway in Georgia where J E Johnstons tiny AoT consisting of the Augusta GA grs is trying to rendezvous with Lees 2nd Corps.

Well most of the above went reasonably well (as its now Dec and winter weather, hence Magruders forced march [still no guarantee of movement] I am using the railway network as much as pos), ANV returned to winter quarters in Fredericksburg where its on the Railway, 2nd corps duely shovelled feds back to Appalachia, but somehow despite ANV passing through Cumberland Magruder got caught in Cumberland and was ignominiously bundled out, he later rejoins ANV in Fredericksburg where the army is being reorganised, I disband some bgds to fill out the ranks of established Bgds and move the bulk of the Independent Bgds into div containers, one really pleasing thing about the invasion of Maryland is that during the course of the battles ANV has undertaken the Lincoln administration has virtually rearmed ANV with superior weapons namely Minie & Springfield rifles, I now only have 2 Bgds with Improvised weapons, and the 63,000 strong ANV now has its logistical staff trained up to excellent, so hopefully no supply problems this winter (i.e. very low attrition).

The heavy investment in railways is paying dividends now and with still more being built I can move a fair amount of small/medium units around. This is what I now do in the centre, Lees 3rd Corps Richmond in Athens I split, pushing Lee with just Jacksons div by rail to the Cumberland Gap where Feds 20th div under Lyons are still loitering, Braggs Pensacola div waits on AoT to move up by rail.

Meanwhile in Cumberland Fed forces lay siege to fort Hill, and it falls surprisingly quickly, with all the defensive attributes, the 42 pdr guns + 3 Inf Bgds I expected it to stand a turn a 2 (maybe even sending ANV back in to take advantage of the Defensive bonus etc), but it went down in 1 turn, I have never used the ‘Normal siege’ engineering order before Alasdair did and it paid off with a very quick resolution albeit a costly one, (see Screenshot), I on the other-hand lost 3 small poorly armed Bgds, and Cumberland province is once again under the thumb of the fed invaders.



Making the best possible use of the Railways during the winter months I am setting up for action come the 1st week of Feb when Winter Weather ceases and movement returns to its normal (chaotic) rates. To this end I slim down MSG to just its 2 Cav Bgds under Hodge & Stuart (there for his ‘fair’ Cavalry rating) and move them by rail out West. I give both Bgds a ‘Quality horses’ attribute which will increase their movement capabilities. The idea is to slip them across the Missouri or Ohio rivers to rampage behind the fed lines out West, in conjunction with Hardees small Div, already hopefully north of the Missouri in Little Dixie both divs will attempt to strike at any undefended Fed cities and cause as much economic chaos as possible + hopefully creating lots of Unrest in the process, and gaining me + National Will for captured cities (again aimed at the April population boost).

Johnstons AoT, now augmented with Bragg div I move by rail to Abingdon where 2nd corps will join it, Bragg moving into 2nd Corps under Prices direct command, AoT now stands at c34,000, and come spring stands ready to move northeast in support of ANV, west to the Cumberland gap/support AoW, or launch it’s own offensive into Kentucky via Appalachia, or towards the Ohio river region via Kenawha. This all just leaves me enough Rail movement points to push Lees 8,000 strong 3rd corps by rail into Bowling Green (Lyons fed 20th has I think moved north towards the Frankfort/Lexington region).

With the beginning of Feb I am able to move Lees 3rd Corps by foot back to the Cumberland gap to be reinforced from Ft Donelson &Nashville grs and in the same turn move back to the newly conquered Bowling Green, Hodges MSG cav div will move from fed owned West Ohio river where it was stopped last turn and move via Vandalia on Springfield the undefended state capital of Illinois. With 30 Rail movement points I have enough to move Johnstons AoT by rail via Shenandoah to join ANV in Fredericksburg, the combined forces there will be well over 90,000; Lincoln are you watching!?

To tidy up a few administrative Bits & bobs, I have spent a fair amount on upgrading various Coast/River forts ether with defensive attributes or improved armaments, below is a City list showing Reb builds underway.



On the diplomatic front the signs are from the Political report below show that I may just be edging ahead. It also shows that Bobbie Lee was successful in his invasion of Bowling Green and that the impressment in Jefferson City was also a success.



And finally tonights prospective Holiday destination is Sultry Savannah where the situation map in the top left hand corner shows the Reb Red enclaves along the Missouri out West, & Grafton in the East



And That I think pulls the Eastern & Central theatres into line with ‘Out West’.

All the Best
Peter

[Kingmaker]

HiHi

From turn 14 late Feb,

Out West.

Hardee failed to get on to the North bank in Little Dixie, retrospectively probably a good thing as the feds have responded with some vigour to the fall of Jefferson City and are converging from all sides, see the screenshot below.



Time for Hardee do a strategic withdrawal (i.e. run away), so hopefully slipping his Tennessee div through the closing net I move him via Upper Missouri river to Council Bluffs and then hopefully on to Cedar falls; going for the undefended Des Moines, a state capital, is tempting but he could be intercepted there and forced to fight on unfavourable ground + part of the behind enemy lines thing is to draw fed units away from my main areas of invasion/action, Des Moines is too close.

To hopefully get Hodges cav div safely across the Ohio-Missouri river area I push Polks AoW from Hatchie into the Lower Tennessee River adjacent to Bowling Green. Hodge in Bowling Green with Lees 16,000 strong 3rd Corps I set to support Polk in so he arrives after Polk while still having Lee protecting his back in Bowling Green, Lee is then set to support Hodge into Lower Tennessee River to ensure he arrives last. Hodge is now ordered to strike at the undefended state capital of Illinois at Springfield.

Confederate forces in the Lower Tennessee River province, minus Hodge now number c42,000 I am fast developing a sizable army that will be able to take on feds on their own ground, it is my intention now the threat in the far West has been alleviated by Hardees incursion into Missouri, to bring up Twiggs Louisiana div via Memphis to join with AoW around Cairo, I shall after a brief faint with Johnstons AoT joining ANV in Fredericksburg, rush him by Rail back to the Cumberland gap area to link with AoW.

Meanwhile I reorganize my Western forces, putting Massa Robert in command of AoW and shifting Polk to command 3rd Corps. AoW then will advance on the strategically important River/Rail connection at Cairo.

A quick aside from the military stuff turn 14 saw Gov H T Clark of North Carolina come out in support of French diplomacy this will give me a 15% boost to whatever I set moneywise towards French support. Also that turn, being reasonably up on Horses I decided to order ‘Raiders’ recruited in Nashville. While I have little faith in their lasting long given their PBEM handicap, I will see if they can cause some mischief for demonstration purposes, (just don’t hold your breath). Due to shortage of acceptable targets at sea I doubled up Georgia Peach & Carolina Pride to seek 50 money @ 60/10 in Apalache Bay (there are a lot of cargoes passing through those waters, and it’s been quite a good hunting ground). Rounding of the turn I carried out some more improvements to Coastal Forts and Mustered in Charleston @ 85%, while again Impressing in Jefferson City for 40 Iron @ 80/10.

Back to the ‘Guts & Glory’ stuff, Hodge only made it as far as Kaskaskia north of Cairo turning the province Reb Red and causing unrest, I am now a little uncertain about pushing him to Springfield due to the way fed forces are deploying, so I decide to entrain his Neddyboys and send them against the undefended Chicago. I also alter Hardees target from St Pauls the State capital of Minnesota (hey folks, you are also getting a geography lesson in these reports, and at no extra charge!), to Madison Wisconsin primarily to be able to effect support to Hodge if necessary but also to take out the Naval collage there and for supply purposes, to be near a Reb City ie Chicago. Supply behind enemy lines is fraught with problems and should it fail and brigades end up with no supply they will surrender enmass at the 1st whiff of gunpowder. I am hoping that by setting both Hodge & Hardees divs to ‘High priority’ supply and being in the vicinity of a Reb city (ideally with the province Reb Red as well), I will be able to keep them in supply.

With some moves still to come below is a screenshot of the Military Groups overview.



Lees AoW detaches 4th Arkansas Bgd which moves into Bowling Green to hopefully act as a block on any proposed fed advance through that province, 1st Mobile grs is also detached and sent to bolster the garrison at Ft Donelson. AoW is set to avoid battle and moves on Cairo where, as it’s defended, I will be able to set ‘Plunder’.

My aim for Cairo is total annihilation, I want it destroyed as a staging post for fed incursions, either into the Cumberland gap or down the Mississippi river towards Memphis, + as destruction of Mansions effect National Will (NW) and Cairo has 2 I look to gain some NW points with their destruction.

Late March sees the production of a 2nd Muster in Charleston & 1 in Galveston, there I take the risk of mustering at 75% with only 3 population in the hope the April population boost will give me back at least 1 to keep that cities production on line, I also conscript in newly acquired Chicago in order to have a garrison there and free up Hodge for mischief elsewhere, here hoping that as Chicago may not stay Reb for long that the population boost doesn’t produce there.
In the ongoing battle to win hearts and minds across the Pond I put another 8gp towards silk stockings and stuff to woe the ‘Other European nations’, this raises my chances with them to 56% (those poor Southern Belles doing the ‘Grand Tour’ over there must be quite exhausted).

Back at home I order a RR at Shreveport, a Mint at Wilmington and a Plantation at Jackson Mississippi, Jefferson City is again asked to provide resources this time by impressments of 30 Labour @ 85/30 (ironic really, at the start of the game 2 of my */10% impressments caused severe unrest yet Jefferson City I have bleed without mercy and it still refuses to go into unrest!).

This turn I had an important upgrade, that of Indian recruitment, this increases my chances by 50% to add Indian Bgds (50% chance of being cav) to Confederate Armies.



Well 4th Arkansas did themselves proud in Bowling Green although forced to retire into the Cumberland gap, they took on Banks’s entire US 3rd corps comprising 11 Bgds and came out on top in the casualties ratio.



AoWs siege operations against Cairo, didn’t destroy any Mansions but did gut the provinces Capitol, this means that nothing can be produced in Cairo till its rebuilt at a cost of 50 each money, labour, iron & horses, with its defences reduced to 4% and the province certain to go Reb next turn I again set AoW to plunder and set it to ‘Seek battle’ whereby I will gain the terrain defensive bonus should feds try to relieve Cairo.

A quick look at Cairo before it becomes (hopefully) a burnt out wreck, note the lack of a Capitol building and the blank spaces for produce, money, labour etc



And heres how it shows on the reports



Meanwhile Hodges cav have been gallivanting across fed territory to Vandalia where in the true spirit of that provinces name their destructive presence causes the province to go into unrest, unfortunately the newly commissioned Quantrill’s 1st Btl Raiders only got to Vandalia and so did nothing (as an aside Raiders have a % chance of stopping fed movement in any province they are in). Hardees Tennessee boys have completed the capture of Madison and that city, like Chicago & Jefferson City (now back under fed management) will now be conscripted & impressed into the ground before its likely recapture

A word here about National Will, I have discovered through a query on the Matrix FoF site, that there is a bug in the game that fails to let capture of undefended cities gain the attacker +NW, even worse, upon recapture by its original owner the city does grant +NW to them, this is something of a bummer for me as part of my game strategy was dependent on raising my NW through such captures by small fast moving divs behind fed lines, I will now have to have a ‘Scratch & think’ about the situation, the one thing in my favour is that fed recapture of these cities will be defended by home city conscripts and in the process of recapture the cities defences will be significantly if not completely reduced thereby giving me an easier chance to, in my turn, recapture the cities. After note Jefferson City has finally gone into unrest for 4 turns so the feds will still not gain any produce from the state of Missouri!

Before wrapping up Out West let’s see what happened with the April Population boost.



Well not bad at all 17 population to spread around my cities, Galveston is now back up to 3, but conversely Chicago also got 2 pop and is now nearly fully stocked again, hopefully I can hold onto it long enough to drive the population down again through conscription, only time will tell. On that screenshot you can also see how NW was affected by the recapture of Jefferson city.

Right to bring us up to date Out West, AoW should hopefully (I use that word a lot because to reiterate, Movement in this game is never a foregone conclusion) be up to its full operational strength of c73,000. That is if the final element ie Hodges 1st corps manages to join Lee around Cairo.

AoT after its brief sojourn with ANV came back West by rail via Abingdon to the Cumberland gap, there Johnston detached Holmes 1st corps and moved into Fort Donelson. Holmes has been set to Avoid battle and will try to join Lee at Cairo via the Lower Tennessee River. Hardees div I have set to garrison Madison while the new conscripts defend Chicago, Hodge moves onto Wabash in the hope of turning it Reb Red and causing more unrest, Quantrill will deploy to the north of him in Terre Haute, were as it is next to a Reb Red province ie Vandalia it should create some mischief.

That brings me completely upto date for Out West as I wait for the return file.

In passing I must say you are a quiet lot out there ... err Hello! ... Ah yes, someone is there I saw the curtains rustle, ... greetings.

Compared with the AARs over at Matrix it’s been positively funereal here, no criticisms, no compliments (we like them!), no freshly printed £5 notes (we like them even more!! See, 2 exclamation marks), nothing; please don’t be shy say something lest I think I’m boring the pants off you all! ... Mmmm, maybe I shouldn’t have suggested that ... exit Peter stage left with worried frown quietly muttering to self.

All the Best
Peter

[Kingmaker]

HiHi

T14 (recap), onwards,

East & Centre

The situation in Kentucky must appear a somewhat awkward for feds, Lees 3rd Corps in West Kentucky at Bowling Green and Johnstons Army of Tennessee (AoT) in the East in Appalachia which has also gone Reb, and is now in a state of unrest. With the Kentucky cities of Lexington & Louisville both undefended and not a lot of fed forces to be seen, I am hoping this is causing them some concern, enough to start pulling troops from the Eastern theatre towards the west. So with fed eyes fixed on their Mid West and Kentucky, it is again time for some ‘move to confuse’, so ...

Fresh from its conquest of Appalachia Johnstons AoT moves by foot to Knoxville Tennessee and there entrains to join ANV in Fredericksburg travelling via Shenandoah (Lee is also pulling out of Kentucky towards Cairo).

The combined Confederate forces in Fredericksburg now amount to c98,000



This is however only a temporary thing as Johnston will be heading back West, but whilst the armies are together I do some reorganisation, 1st off noticing that Magruders Cav rating is Excellent I move ANVs 2 cav Bgds into his 8th Peninsular div to take advantage of his rating.

Holmess 1st corps (Longstreet was originally in command there but Holmes is the senior officer (and thankfully has better stats) so he commands the corps, detaches Jeff Davis artillery Bgd which I want to stay with ANV, and transfers to AoT where Prices larger 3rd corps moves its flag the other way to join ANV.

The greatly reduced AoT (c19,000)now moves to Shenandoah by rail, and then on to Abingdon; I am having to juggle rail movement points between East & West and so don’t push AoT further + with Johnston now back in a position to move towards the Ohio river via Kenawha, this will cause more uncertainty about my intentions within the Lincoln administration. Federal forces have also reoccupied Appalachia so an advance there must also be considered by them. One unfortunate thing from my point I noticed on the replay, was that Johnstons move went in ahead of fed movement into Shenandoah, while fairly heavily outnumbered a battle there could well have been a Reb victory due to the terrain bonus and our better troops/commanders, however that opportunity was missed.

The net gain for Beauregards ANV now puts them at c80,000 strong, with 2 cav & 1 arty Bgd + with the rearmament program feds kindly set up, they look in pretty good shape to withstand any fed assault through Fredericksburg, they will however, with Johnston about to move west again to Cumberland gap, have to keep an eye over their shoulder towards Lynchburg



We are now upto date movement wise(turn 17,) early April 1862, so as Alasdair has just this minuet returned the battle file I will just add that I have now received 2 more upgrades, Indian training which brings any new Indian Bgds in as Regulars and Indirect fire for my arty.



Right that’s me done, I can now go looksee at what’s gone wrong with “the best laid plans of ...” this mouse, “Squeak, squeak”.

All the Best
Peter

[Kingmaker]

HiHi

Due to a series of escalating anomalies within our game Alasdair and I have decided to cut our losses as it were and pull the game and then start another one as soon as possible, it may well be that we ourselves have triggered these problems by shortcutting on the amount of files sent to each other (gonna check this out sometime over at FoF support).

However when things like feds gaining fortification bonuses for a Reb city in QC, not just once but x3 between the same armies in the same province start occurring it is obvious that something is seriously wrong. Other bits like x3 Reb upgrades not materialising even though I have the screenprints to show they were earned & offered, and the ‘Events’ & other reports showing blank on the main game (there on the replay) etc. etc. it is time to call it a day and start over.

It’s been good fun and I certainly have learned some bits I didn’t know before, and I just hope our viewers have got something out of our AAR reports as well.

I feel public acknowledgement should be paid to Alasdair who despite increasing time constrains, and the fact that his previous FoF experience consisted of a part played game v’s the AI at Basic level, nevertheless stepped up to the plate and contributed so well to getting this Inaugural game & AARs off the ground, sorry they are only Cyber ones but, Pints to you Alasdair.

All the Best
Peter