David Fair

The map looks great but knowing the topography over the next hill is a huge advantage historical leaders seldom enjoyed. Military balloons were employed during the Civil War to help reduce this problem; but, at Gettysburg neither side deployed balloons during the battle. I'd almost like to see the LOS control how much of the map I can see. This puts recon at a premium. Additionally, it makes Jeb Stuart relevant/critical and why Lee needed him during the early days of the battle. See: "Why military balloons were not used at Gettysburg" http://www.yorkblog.com/cannonball/2011/12/31/military-ballooning-at-the-january-harrisburg-civil-war-round-table/

Concept #7 looks great; but, the relationship of the map to the troop scale and temporal aspects are critical to answer the question. Trading off topographical eye candy for playability is not a good alternative.

By the times the armies were assembling around Gettysburg Jeb's recon role was limited. The flanks were both known Culp's Hill and Little Round Top; and the Confederates were stretched thin due to Union interior lines. Jeb could have fought delaying actions on advancing Union columns; or more importantly delaying/disrupting/destroying Union supply columns. Threatening supplies could force troops to move at the speed of the supplies and force thousands of Union troops to be held in reserve.

Both sides used the US Army training manual at the start of the war. Thus their drum and bugle calls we the same. There are references to competitions (usually in the evenings) between the opposing bands at the end of a day when it was safer to play and instrument without getting shot. Night movements were usually conducted in stealth so no calls were conducted which would disclose intent. In some cases musicians were used to mask stealth movements of the trigger pullers. Then musicians would skedaddle at sunrise. We're not 100% certain of what musicians did during the war. Musicians definitely played the Camp Duty-calls to signal orders and regulate certain activities--in camp, this is a very old concept. Also this was the bulk of their duties as they spent at least 50 days in camp for every day of battle. On the march, drummers definitely kept cadence and the fife and drum corps played music. In battle, during the Civil War, drummers and fifers became less useful and therefore became stretcher bearers and helped in the field hospital, but how much time they actually spent in the field isn't known. Also this isn't always possible to portray at re-enactments, and therefore remaining with your unit makes sense. The musician's place is with the officers so they can relay orders. There's no proof that corps played tunes during battle, though many will at re-enactments any way. See: http://www.music.army.mil/music/ Call to Battle: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WChcIrQz8-E March: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cki6QJQr-DA US Army Band has an excellent list of music at: http://www.usarmyband.com/watch-listen/ceremonial-music-guide.html List of Drum Music:http://www.fifedrum.org/excelsior/tunes.shtml US Army Band is a good reference to calls and how they are used (today; which for the most part is a derivation of how they were used historically: http://www.usarmyband.com/pdf/FM_3_21_5.pdf

The Battleground series took a tremendous amount of micromanagement and thus time. You really never got the sense or satisfaction that you were commanding an army or making "big decisions". Everything was really tactical at a large scale.

Map looks great. Hopefully this will be a game with a little "fog" in the "fog of war". It's annoying when the Army Commander knows the precise strength, ammunition supply, and moral of every unit in the Army at all times. One key historical leadership metric was understanding what troops were capable of achieving given their current state. Smoke, confusion, exhaustion, and supply were critical leadership intuitions rather than data points for issuing orders. It would be refreshing to play a game where the outcome wasn't predetermined by how much minutia I have about my troop's state. Local commanders knew which troops were fresh and which had been on the line and rotated troop orders according to their fatigue, experience, and reputation. I'd like a leadership gut vs. algorithm gaming experience. In almost every Civil War memoir leaders, when pressed to hold or attack replied, "we'll try". Famously after Pickett's Charge Lee went out to greet his shredded regiments apologizing for believing they could do the impossible. Longstreet knew better, and on that day for that charge, Longstreet had a deeper understanding and perspective on the fog of war in that valley. Lee's inability to grasp the fog of war was masked by his desire to win the war, or at least win the support of England/France so the South could get out of the Civil War as an independent nation.

Ammo Tradeoffs In historical simulations it is important to consider, "what impact did ammunition supply have on the actual battle?" Small Arms Ammunition Ammo was a key issue for Buford's U.S. Cavalry at the start of the battle to delay Archer's Brigade. The rate of fire was slowed to preserve ammunition until Reynolds/Doubleday I Corps arrived. Once Corps level organizations arrived on the field the ammunition crisis was alleviated. Front line troops could draw ammo from regimental supply, reverse troops and their regimental supplies, and finally Corps supply trains. Every evening supplies were moved from the Army reserve to restock the Corps, division, regimental, and front line ammunition reserves. Note that the defense of Little Round Top was another case of isolated troops that were stationed to hold a position that had been detached from their Corps. They ran out of ammunition after 3 attacks. My suggestion is that troops operating within the zone of their Corps are supplied. Troops operating independently had finite supply. Artillery Armies were limited on how much ammunition could be carried on campaign. The level of artillery ammunition was a key logistic decision for every Civil War Campaign. Lee limited his artillery ammunition supply to fight one three-day battle during the Gettysburg Campaign because of his limited supply capacity; both wagons and draft animals were in short supply. Sherman also, for example, reduced his artillery park prior to the March to the Sea because he could not carry enough artillery ammunition for all of the artillery he had accumulated during the Atlanta Campaign. When he abandoned the railway supply line he also had to abandon about half of the artillery he had used in the siege of Atlanta. Artillery batteries and Corps organizations carried limited artillery ammunition; usually enough ammunition to fight for 1 day. They were then resupplied from the Army reserve supply train; which carried enough ammunition for the Army to fight for 3 days. July 2 was the major artillery duel at Gettysburg. The Confederates planned an artillery barrage that was to last more than two hours prior to Pickett's Charge. However, they had failed to bring forward enough ammunition from the Army reserve supply to support a rapid-fire barrage of two hours. Confederate rate of artillery fire was ordered to slacken to ensure ammunition would last up to the time ordered for Pickett's Charge. During the charge ammunition was brought up from the Army reverse to prevent a Union counter-attack. Note that during the preliminary barrage from the Confederates the Union batteries stopped firing after an hour of counter-battery fire to preserve ammunition. Once Pickett's Charge provided ample targets the Union batteries opened on the target rich infantry in the valley between Seminary and Cemetery Ridge. Lee's artillery ammunition situation was a key factor in forcing the Confederates to abandon the Gettysburg Campaign after the battle. His reverse supply of artillery ammunition was exhausted.