Major General difficulty? More like "McClellan" difficulty

[James Cornelius]

Gentlemen,

 

I consider myself to be better than average at the game. On Brigadier General difficulty I have played through the Union campaign without losing a single battle. On the Confederate side, I've played as far as Chancellorsville (haven't had time to play further) and not lost a battle there.

 

So I decided I wanted to try Major General difficulty. Now, I cannot beat the very first mission! Despite inflicting considerably more casualties, I was not able to take Phillipi the first attempt and in the second attempt, while I got troops across the river I was annihilated shortly thereafter. Being outnumbered initially is bad enough, but there are reinforcements that show up (that I don't recall arriving on BG level), to say nothing of trying to withstand the counter attack in phase 2 if I ever made it that far.

 

What am I doing wrong? My normal strategy is to put a skirmisher on the heights as soon as the battle begins while taking my brigade and other skirmisher into the woods on the right to drive those rebels away. Once the reinforcements show up I would swing around to cut off the retreat of the rebel skirmishers on the heights, then swing north to surround and capture the rebel brigade holding the town closest to my troops. Then, with infantry and artillery wear down the enemy forces holding the bridges with my troops in cover and once they run rush across the bridges to drive the rebels out of Philippi proper.

 

None of that works now. The initial rebel skirmishers run as soon as my other troops show up, and once a volley or two is fired at the rebels in the closer town they too retreat. Once I was finally able to soften up the rebels holding the bridges, just as I cross (and with my brigades now at like 1/2 strength, despite using cover) I am immediately counter attacked by fresh rebel brigades.

 

 

Here is my final screenshot:

https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/854972554290936591/ED592132D233E229F6117CA798264FABDBD2B84A/

 

Any advice? Like I said, I thought I was pretty good, but I now know how McClellan felt when he thought he was up against 200,000 Confederates.

[Hjalfnar_Feuerwolf]

Ok, I just tried it on Major General too. No chance. I was able to destroy the rebel brigade on the western side of the river and a unit of skirmishers. Then I inflicted about 500 men losses on the enemy brigade holding the northern bridge, routing it twice. At this point I had 2 ingame hours left and taken only minor losses, less then 150 men in total. I crossed the bridge...and was assaulted by 3 units of 700-900 rebels and 280 skirmishers. I was simply overrun.

 

Edit: I have to admit it might be possible to force the enemy to move up his reinforcments for the northern bridge by only crossing it with skirmishers and getting him to follow you to the bridge, where on the other side your infantry and artillery is waiting. Will have to try that tomorrow.

Edited July 14, 2017 by Hjalfnar_Feuerwolf

[Albert Sidney Johnston]

I know, right? There's such a huge gap between BG difficulty, and MG difficulty. And to top it all off the tutorial missions are legitimately really tough.

It's the perfect storm for failing the initial mission, and I think even the most veteran strategists have faced defeat. The ironic part is, at least for the CSA campaign, 1st Manassas is actually EASIER then the tutorial! 

Anyways, I have very limited experience with the Union tutorial, but I always immediately rush the Rebels guarding the bridge, without "softening them up". I always try to sweep the city as quickly as possible, regardless of casualties. Because generally, just biting the bullet and charging immediatly will leave you with less losses then slow, careful strategy to "try and minimize casualties", especially when trying to clear a city like Philippi

 

Then again, maybe I'm wrong, but that's what's always worked for me. 

[Col_Kelly]

Personally, I take my time, placing artillery very close to the bridge and shelling the rebs guarding it until they rout. Then I rush into the breach with skirms,dismounted cav and the infantry brigades right behind. You'll probably take a canister shot or two but once you get ur troops into cover it should be smooth sailing.

This guy managed to beat it on a recent version, could also help

 

[Bigjku]

The missions can be beat.  The real question is why at least for the Union which I mostly the first two missions need to be as difficult as they are while also having basically nothing to do with gameplay in every battle that follows.

They are just very poorly designed missions.  They add nothing to the game and risk turning players off to the product before it starts to shine in later missions.

[Hjalfnar_Feuerwolf]

Interesting. It seems you have to rush Philippi, because I had at least one additional unit against me, other then the guy in the video.

[James Cornelius]

I managed to beat it last night. Final casualties were 2:1 in my favor, but I was also outnumbered about 2:1. I did not really alter my strategy, I think I just got luckier in the first phase. For the second phase, I retreated into the town and through a huge amount of micro managed to hold the rebels at bay just long enough to get my reinforcements in place. In the past  on BG level I also focused on the armored train immediately to get it out of there - this time I ignored it and focused my artillery on enemy infantry instead.

 

Then, I went to the Supply Depot mission.

 

Due to the fact that all my reinforcements went to simply restoring my decimated units from the first mission (I had about 100-200 in each brigade I carried over) I was unable to build a larger force for the Depot and was overrun there (I did save at one point when I could finish the mission with a draw - I might go back to that if I continue to be unable to beat it).

[Hjalfnar_Feuerwolf]

Did the mission yesterday, still have to do supply depot. The trick was to rush the city and afterwards, when defending, to not hold the trenches but instead stay in the city. THere you have much better cover and won't get hit too hard by the armoured train. The battlements in the north were hold only by my skirmishers and the cav, they repulsed three assaults before finally being overrun. At this point the reinforcements had arrived and I was able to destroy the enemy completely. One brigade carried over was reduced to 200 men, the other one to 600 (and did 1500 kills!). Now I have two brigades of 1500 men, two artillery batteries (one of 6, one of 8 guns) and a skirm cav brigade of 500 men. Looking forward to Supply Depot.

[Hjalfnar_Feuerwolf]

Ok, only managed a draw in Supply Depot. Need to play Phillipi again and try to conserve manpower. I need two additional units of infantry at Supply depot...