Report on Rifles from Quartermaster Assignment

[Dr Meat]

Fellow Generals, between battles I was ordered by our President Lincoln to report to Washington for a special assignment of rifle analysis. He wants all his Generals to read and interpret and use the results in this topic. Long live the Union.

[Dr Meat]

Generals, my report is confidential, do not let the reb traitors get a hold of it.

I analysed the available infantry weapons by putting all the data on Damage, Range, Fire Rate, Accuracy, Melee and $ cost into a table. Then I took each weapon and applied the following analysis: Damage X Rate = Potential Lethality; Then that X  accuracy (divided by 100) to generate Effective Lethality; then that divided by cost $ to produce Efficiency. You should do this too the Quartermaster general recommends. Some things become obvious.

   In melee it is obvious that the 69 cal muskets, especially the Farmer, are superior to the longer range 50 cal rifles. Don't sell off those Farmers, rebored Farmers or Springfield 69's late in the war. They can be reissued to crack 3* troops to replace some 58 cal for storm trooper capacity when charging a fort around Richmond. The 50's can provide supporting fire (peel off skirmishers to confuse the rebs with a plethora of targets but keep your 69ers intact for a melee charge. The advantage of an average 69 musket in melee is 32% ofve all 58's and 54% more than Springfields of '61 and '63 vintage. whileFarmers themselves carry an advantage of 69%. Versus the '53 Enfield their advantage is 46%, and against the CS Richmond it is still 17% and the rebs are sure to have plenty of each.

As far as costs $ go, our Quartermaster General looks at $ Efficiency. that is explained above. For all 60 caliber weapons it is about 8, while for all 58's it averages 11. For the special Lorenz from Austria design, it is almost 16. They are expensive at face value but apparently worth it due to high accuracy. Work the numbers out for yourself and see. Now the Rapid Fires (Cold, Henry and Spencer) are amoung the lowest at $ efficiency at 7 average. I doubt they are worth what our manufacturers want for them.

Make a table of 58's from 300 yards range to 400 yard range, interesting.the sweet spot of cost efficiency seems to be the '53 Enfield, the '55 Harpers Ferry and the '55 Springfield, all lethal out to the mid 300 yards. This is not to say the longer range rifles ought to be ignored, for each type of rifle has its purpose. With a 400 yard lethality you can defend well from an entrenched position that has a clear field ahead. It will be hard for the enemy to get close and if they do make a breech in a charge, send in that reserve of 60 cal to charge and melee the breech.

Clearly keep a 69 cal in each division of your army, along with an artillery and every two have a cavalry for scouting and raiding for a supply wagon.

Don't be afraid as entrenched defenses are increasingly encountered later in the war to reissue the 69's for storming forts and trenches. DO NOT sell them off. Support them with the long range 58's.

Onward to Richmond Generals, I return now to the front. Let's end this uprising and restore our Union under Lincoln.

---General Meat

[Dr Meat]

Generals, our brave Irish Brigade was issued buck & ball 69ers, preferred specifically by Brig Gen Thomas F Meagher their leader. They did excellent close in work enfilading the rebs at the Sunken Road at Antietam. Remember each weapon has a specific purpose, there is no perfect rifle.

[Dr Meat]

Generals, After the battle of  Chickamauga I came up with a different labeling system for my units. Gone is the Trefoil, the Crescent moon and others with the red, white and blue representing divisions. Gone also is my system of numbering a unit such as 2-2-3  58 S 55 to designate a second corp, second division and third brigade armed with 58 cal Springfields made in 1855. Better and easier to use on the battlefield is simply the caliber, 69 ; this can be further defined by F, RBF or 69 S or 69 P for the various high melee units. (F = Farmer).  Then label the 58 calibers as 58 S, 58 M or 58 L for their range from 300-400 yards. 

Then at a glance you can decide which unit goes where in a battle quickly and which to use in a charge and which for defense.

Onwards Generals, Godspeed to you in driving the rebels into oblivion and freeing the enslaved Americans.

[Dr Meat]

General Hannibalbarca, here is an example of my math for two rifles.

1842 Palmetto 69 Cal: Damage(18) X  Rate of Fire (40) = Potential Lethality of 720. Multiply 720 by Accuracy of 0.135 to get Effective Lethality of 97.2 , I assume perfect accuracy is 100 (100% hits) or 1.0 , and then no accuracy at all is 0.0 , or 0%. So when you divide accuracy by 100 you are then converting accuracy to percentage of hits. Then you divide the Effective Lethality ( 97.2 here) by the $ cost of 13 for this smoothbore musket to get 7.5 for a Effective Lethality per $ dollar spent.

In the case of the 1853 Enfield 58 Cal rifle then we have Damage (12.5) X Rate (48) = 600 Potential Lethality. Then that 600 X 0.67 for Accuracy = 402 for Effective Lethality. Then divide Effective Lethality of 402 by $ cost of 29 to yield a Effective Lethality per $ spent of 13.9 and this weapon has the bonus of the 340 range opposed to the Palmetto at only 250. I did not factor range into my analysis quantitativly.

Now the Enfield has only a melee value of 65 opposed to the Palmetto at 91. You could do a dollar cost analysis on that as well. But we do not know how the algorithms used in Ultimate General factor in rate and accuracy in a melee. Remember the 58 will only shoot 1 minie ball at a time while the smoothbore 69 shoot 3 buck and 1 ball at a time. They are probably more lethal or damage causing at very short range hence their superior melee.

General H, I hope this explains and helps you defeat the cursed rebels trying to destroy our Union. God save President Lincoln and his Grand Armies.

[Albert Sidney Johnston]

Amazing! While it's rather terrifying that the Federals have such excellent tech analysts, I no less commend you on your work.

[Dr Meat]

General Hannibalbarca, I did not factor range into my rifle analysis. It is a puzzlement to do so. The 69ers will not hit anything at 400 yards, In reality any musket or rifle probably has declining accuracy at increasing range, from say 100% accuracy at 1 yard to low accuracy at 400+ yards. Each will tail off at its own rate. So it is difficult to value. In my analysis I ignore range letting the final Effective Lethality and $ Cost Lethality be at the assumed stated ranges. So as such it is a general prediction and better than nothing. 

General, Godspeed onward to your next victory. Long Live President Lincoln.

  ---Gen Meat

[Dr Meat]

Union Generals,  I am concerned that we have spies in our midst.  General Hannibalbarca may indeed be one and certainly General Albert Sidney Johnston is one. If you catch them or any of their employees around your camps, then hang them from a sour apple tree next to Jeff Davis.

Long live the Union and our beloved President Abraham Lincoln.

[Andre Bolkonsky]

On 7/18/2017 at 10:13 PM, Dr Meat said:

Generals, After the battle of  Chickamauga I came up with a different labeling system for my units. Gone is the Trefoil, the Crescent moon and others with the red, white and blue representing divisions. Gone also is my system of numbering a unit such as 2-2-3  58 S 55 to designate a second corp, second division and third brigade armed with 58 cal Springfields made in 1855. Better and easier to use on the battlefield is simply the caliber, 69 ; this can be further defined by F, RBF or 69 S or 69 P for the various high melee units. (F = Farmer).  Then label the 58 calibers as 58 S, 58 M or 58 L for their range from 300-400 yards. 

Then at a glance you can decide which unit goes where in a battle quickly and which to use in a charge and which for defense.

Onwards Generals, Godspeed to you in driving the rebels into oblivion and freeing the enslaved Americans.

Wait, what? You can actually insert Red/White/Blue iconography into your brigade name panel? Please elaborate

As far as placing the weapon into the title, I totally agree. I've been doing that for some time now; makes things much more simple. 

[Dr Meat]

General Bolkonsky, I did not intend to mislead you. In UG you CANNOT insert the color, symbol etc into your brigade name. That was only in what is called 'real life' back then.  But it would make for an interesting mod for our game. Remember, General, our mission from President Lincoln. Defeat the combinations of rebels in our southern States  and do it as quickly as possible. A simple naming system of brigades would be S, M and L for type of musket/rifle. Perrhaps Corps and Division numbers are irrelevant to us. S = the 69 cal, M = 58 cal but the 400 range which would be the L's. This Short, Medium and long contains all the basic info at a glance on the battlefield to make tactical decisions. Godspeed to you and onward to Richmond!

---Gen Meat