Squadron HQ

Cool of the devs to be responsive. I would like (and I think many others too) to see the fixed strength for all the game modes, including legendary. But naturally we'll have to test it first.

I have noticed that if the value of supplies you capture in one battle exceeds 25k, assuming what you spend in the battle is not more than what you capture, you will get a 2nd wagon. I.e. you start a battle with 25,000 supplies. you use 1000 supplies and capture a train worth 2000. in camp u will have 27000 supplies (which u can then push to 50,000) and 2 trains.

Never ever fight Hornets Nest. Send 2 brigades around it, either left or right, and camp the road. You will proceed to the next day and you can either rush the Landing or camp their army as it runs from the nest. But fighting it out in Hornets Nest is always a mistake.

Edit: just played the Shenandoah campaign on my new Mj-General playthrough. My old one had bad career choices. Port Republic: whoever suggested trapping the union reinforcements against the spawn, that was so cheesy but so good. They were just murdered. Then I could almost walk into the VP. Even better way of fighting the scenario than I am used to. CK: got a favourable conclusion that I'm happy with, for the firs time ever. I recovered the costs of the battle because of my high politics and I got two brigades up to 2* from that battle alone. Aetius' video was especially helpful (I got a slightly better % but on a lower difficulty. ). For some reason I was putting my infantry brigades at the head of the forest, rather than in the centre as you guys suggested. It makes a HUGE difference! Especially on this game I had a Fayetteville brigade on the flank that racked up 1000~ kills, so that helped a lot. On the other hand, what people said here about Winchester didn't help at all. By not making any kind of demonstration the Union just through 5000 troops at me once I was in the town and I lost men without any serious business fighting. Which I consider a waste - this battle can be won without fighting and it doesn't have a big reward so I consider it as free reputation & money, rather than free exp. Next time I will use my own personal strategy for Winchester as I find that demonstrating against them draws their attention totally from the town. So I rate the suggestions by the thread 2/3! Thanks guys!

High attrition rate makes it totally not worth it to fight even two days, let alone three.

I usually find Port Republic really easy - that's a novel approach that would let you capture loads of cannons though, I should try that next time.

Don't take supplies. You don't need them for 1st Winchester.

Multiple unsuccessful charges by a single Brigade - Law/Sheffield's Brigade at little round top? Didn't the Alabamans make two unsuccessful attacks (or were these simply separate Regimental attacks?)

That was the first thing I did on my 1st ever playthrough of 1st Winchester but the union actually moved to intercept me, so from then on I took my approach.

Give it a shot. I usually put 3 brigades across the road northeast of the town. They duke it out with a big union brigade there but I fall them back out of range and union doesn't pursue. At first there might be a battery there but I rush it w/ force march and volley it until it retreats. That line established, union won't attack it. Then you just go behind that line and into the town.

I don't get this screencap. CS victory 1st day but player control Union?

Winchester is easy to win with <500 casualties in very short period. Force march your forces to the forest just north of the town, engage the union troops there, then swing some brigades into the town and capture the objective, hugging the right hand side border of the map. The battle will end after the 20m objective timer has counted down. I always win this with v. low casualties. Cross Keys on the other hand I don't understand. I can beat Gettysburg or Chancellorsville with fewer casualties than CK. The Union will have more men and more Brigades and they simply throw them at you until you are destroyed or they are. It's mega dumb.

When Lee talked to Longstreet about surrender his reply was Not Yet! Even though it was basically over. Lee's staff came to Longstreet before Appomattox and told him that Lee would listen to him if he suggested Lee surrender. To which Longstreet replied that if the surrender was dependent on him advising Lee to do it, there would never be a surrender. He then told the man that he could have him shot for trying to persuade an officer to surrender. He was not a popular General because he wrote some stuff about Lee regarding Gettysburg and people, especially J. Early, wanted someone to blame. And because he was pals with Grant and because he supported reconstruction (which is an obviously forward-thinking position), a lot of people turned against him. But most soldiers who served under him believed in him and he was friends to the end with some of the Generals who served under him (like JB Hood). I guess the title of GOAT Officer is probably one people have and will continue to discuss for a long long time. Longstreet is for sure in the running though.

That's the point though. Ewell replaced Jackson. Lee told Ewell in the same terms he would have told Jackson to take Cemetary Hill - "if practicable." Ewell decided it wasn't practicable, but there's a good chance that Jackson would have decided it was (because Jackson just really liked attacking things.) If the Rebs had taken Cemetary Hill (and then reinforced it with Johnson's division when it arrived) the battle (and the three subsequent costly attacks on Round Top/Culps/Cemetary Ridge) wouldn't have happened. But I think you're right in one sense. Supposing Jackson did fail to take Cemetary Ridge, he wouldn't have been able to persuade Lee to not take the course of action he decided. Also agree about Longstreet!!!

It's kind of realistic - units often got lost due to poor maps or bad roads, didn't come in in proper march order, the commander couldn't organise properly etc. Unfortunately after one playthrough you can simply game by shifting stuff in the camp, so it's not a dynamic feature. I agree how disconcerting it is though.

I think day 1 attack on Chancellorsville is superior to playing out the full day battle. Victory with <15% casualties on hard.

I agree. Even UGG had this. If you seize Cemetary Ridge in Day 1 there should be a Day 2 where Meade attacks the hill. If Meade wins, it can go straight to the usual Day 3 as a counter-attack. If not, the CS player can win.

They go uphill. IMO this is not a fun battle. In any way. It involves superhigh micro and niche techniques and you suffer lots of casualties. I tend to skip it (whereas I will play Blackwater.)

I knew about the Sharps, but I thought the supply carts also have Sharps (if you look at the details section on the deployment screen, that is what you will see, I thought). My supply train has Sharps. It's only AI that has M1842s?

Brigadier-general Day One win. I bring 40k men and they bring only 27k men - I did not even fight Brandy Station. Union lost 18k men and I lost 6k (actually counting cavalry it was 8k, but I built the cavalry as disposable so I don't mind. Among some interesting captures: 256 JS Brown (TS). 14 James guns. 48 M1842s (WHY?) and over 15k worth of supplies All I did was start with cavalry, go south of McPherson's ridge and mop up other cavalry/skirmishers. IMO if you deploy infantry first, the AI will shred them with their snipers. Then my division of 5 3-star brigades arrived and I simply pushed hard and fast. Most of my casualties were from these brigades as they were 2250-2500 units and they were pushing 40% casualties. I think Kemper's 3-star brigade lost 1700 men !!! (and Kemper was wounded too.) When the 2nd division arrived i push north oak hill then swung two of my 3-star brigades around seminary ridge, semicircled all union army in oak hill and wiped it out. from that point I did not even require the 2nd corps to win but it did conserve some casualties in my expensive elite brigades. IMO on this battle you should not bring any artillery if you can help it because you'll be moving way too fast for them to keep up. what i notice about Gettysburg is that Iron Brigade and Cutler's Brigade. In other CW games (the ones I playeda nyway, UGG and CWG2), these weren't weak units. But because they're split up, if you concentrate fire on them with 2x2500 3 star brigades, you will shred them in a few volleys. These two Brigades must be concentrated imo, and very strong. Additionally it is silly for Gamble and Devin's units to have sniper rifles as IRL these were dismounted cavalry units. the AI also does not hold the field too well. If you play hyper-aggressive you can quickly force him off Seminary ridge and then he will withdraw his whole force to Oak. Visa versa also - if you are smart you can trap him on Seminary too. Then the whole field is simply yours. Howard's XI Corps is utterly useless and you can throw it off the field v. quickly. When he retreats, trap him with cavalry and wipe out his corps. between Gettysburg & Chancellorsville (inc Salem Church) I lost just about 10,000 men. Medicine will have reduced this to around 8,500. It's kind of insane because I lost twice that many at Stones River. These last two battles, some of the war's most epic, are really easy to get quick Day 1 wins on. I'll try on Major-General (but I have ont yet beaten Chancellorsville on my MG playthrough.) (top 5 brigades are my elites.)

I can now confirm that the Day 1 victory on Chancellorsville is possible. Actually, I have a comment here - the game ended as soon as the timer confirmed I had the farm: if I had known that, I would have taken maybe half the casualties. I seized the farm very quickly with 37 minutes left on the timer at victory - Howard and Sickles Corps had showed up just before, but they did not even get to attack me. If they had done so I would have held the position but lost maybe 1,000 more men. This was on Brigadier-General. IMO, the player should have to wait until the timer ticks down to 0, and control the farm, to win. At least allow Howard and Sickles to make one big attack on the farm. Otherwise it's just too easy.

My career points are -3 despite winning Chancellorsville?

I think MH on Legendary must be impossible! But in the other modes, the best way to take North MH is to flank it from the south, west, or east (or a combination). By that point you have got the other MH points easily. So I think it is a bit... unusual in setup. But this battle is designed to be challenging so that 2nd Manassas is not a total cakewalk, I think.

Fburg is probably the most ridiculous battle. The Union irl lost 12,000 men and broke off the attack when it became obvious they would just lose more - in this game it's possible to inflict in excess of 40,000 men at Fredericksburg. I can't decide if Fredericksburg or Sharpsburg is more ridiculous. In this game, dozens of brigades attack at once, moving up to Marye's Heights in march column, deploy into battle order, bayonet charge the wall and retreat. In real life the attacks were made one brigade at a time.

It's an absolute maximum - I'd be surprised if any players fight Malvern Hill with more than two corps. You want as few corps as possible (you will need two for 2nd Manassas and 3 for Sharpsburg and Fredericksburg, but only two for Chancellorsville. The available force deployments aren't recommended, it's just max available. You want fewer corps because the side missions only allow you to play one corps, but the AI will scale its forces for your whole army, not the one corps deployable.