MikeC

Hi guys Here are a list of things that some of us in the steam forum wish to hear some developer feedback on. Whether it is a known issue, or you are working on it, or whether it is just plain Working As Intended. I really hope you guys don't push release without first taking a look and at least giving us feedback on this list. http://steamcommunity.com/app/502520/discussions/0/1456202492181064612/

You can destroy Sickles if you want. Just push McLaws and Hood's brigades in a frontal assault. You will end up winning especially against some very weak Union brigades. Its just that you will exhaust your men and you won't have enough combat power to push past II and V corps and you will have no actual shot at beating the scenario.

The Day 2 Union left flank map is among the most difficult maps as a CS player. The AI has a big advantage over you in terms of micromanagement of artillery as it seems to be able to always know which spots can cover the ground it wants to cover and you as the player can't do the same thing without time consuming trial and error. This is compounded by the fact the Wheatfield map has multitudes of LoS obstructions that are not obvious to the player. I have played 7-8 CSA campaigns and that map still is difficult for me to get Epic or Major victories on. The most success I have found is to not begin the attack until Hood's brigades are formed up on the south side and accompanying artillery is set up to fire on devils den and Little Round Top. The 3rd corp divisions of Anderson and Pender that you get usually start the battle alone and that start of the battle need to be pulled back to good defensive locations in case III Corps moves forward. You will have to accept the fact that you will eat some artillery casualties while Longstreet gets his act together. Push all of Hood's men to Little round top using Big Round Top to shield you from Union artillery and have McLaws ready to move forward if the AI ties to attack Hood's left while moving. If you move quickly Hood should be able to overwhelm Union defenses on Big Round Top before V Corps gets enough brigades into position. From there you have a good position to fight defensively protecting Big Round Top while you grind down Little Round Top that is on lower elevation. Some patience is required here. Use McLaws's spare brigades to reinforce Hood on Big Round Top. I recommend against pushing McLaws in a frontal attack on Devils Den and the Wheatfield unless the Union troops guarding it are already breaking. A stand up fight will result in a very bloody mess for both sides. Attacking from the south side and hitting them in reverse seems to be the best possible approach. Good luck.

You probably should. I have played the campaign 15+ times now and still have not unlocked all maps. I suspect that I might have to actively sabotage my games to see some scenarios since some of them appear to branch out from poor performance by the player.

If you look under custom games menu, it lists all the historical maps there. If you do any reading up on the battle, even if just just the wikipedia page, you will know which actions lead to the historic scenarios. Keep in mind though your performance will effect whether or not you get the option of even selecting it. If you demolish the Union on the first day and take both Cemetary and Culps hill, there won't be a need to attack the Wheatfield as the Union wouldn't even be there.

The game is a chain of branching scenarios. While there are a large number of scenarios present, they can't account for every possibility I think. The game will try to place he brigades in approximate locations of where they were in the last scenario and retain most of the characteristics. However, sometimes the game doesn't have a scenario scripted exactly as a battle ended.

I would not add 90% of the stuff in this poll. Currently playing the .86 build on steam. I have said it in the ammo poll thread but I'll say it again. Your game is currently really good and it is really good at testing players at what matters most in a game of this level: skill at maneuvering brigade level units to form a coherent plan/strategy while under time pressure. Most of the stuff on your list is just feature creep that will ruin the game. Things on this poll that would legitimately ruin your product: - limited ammo - mount dismount cav - Non-stop 3 day - Divisional Generals w/ Lee /Meade - Detach regiments (god no) - Wounded/Killed Generals - Limber Artillery - Dress Line - brigade formations Why would you add any of this? It exceeds the scope of the game you have made. Right now its great. You select your army strategy and the map you play on and your relevant units of each army duke it out. Things like single line, double line, skirmish, those are things determined by your brigade commanders, your subordinates. There is no need to bog the game down with micro management that real commanders that you are simulating would ever worry excessively about or even be able to affect once battle was joined. Do you think Pickett had the ability to tell Armistead to detach a regiment here or there and have Kemper switch to single line halfway through his charge? No! So why would you have it in this game? Legitimate items that would make sense in a game of your scale and also not bog down the pace of the game. -building of fortifications etc. Civil war units did this on their own. Anytime soldiers had a reasonable amount of time without fear imminent attack, they used whatever was at hand to quickly build breast works. You already have a cover meter in place. Have units that have been stationary for x amount of time slowly build up cover to a certain level which would have to be determined by testing. It adds a very real strategy element that Corps commanders would have to deal with. Letting enemy units sit too long on objectives or important terrain objectives could be hazardous or require a different approach. See the failure of Ewell to capture Culps hill before the routed union troops rallied and fortified it. -ability for artillery to target infantry or artillery -brigades targeting more than 1 unit in its arc If both of these could be done intelligibly and the player retained the ability to override that easily without the AI rewriting the player command, I would put this in. It is definitely not close to a make or break issue with this game. -historic battle I would rather have an unhistorical campaign with dynamic unit entry onto the battlefield. Remember that both Gettysburg was a meeting engagement. Neither side had a clear idea where each other was or what they were facing until the final day. It would be nice if each time we played the game, we wouldn't know exactly what is going on with the other side. Adding something like this would bring a welcome dynamic although it would probably tax the AI even further in terms of what it should be doing. Also you would need to find a way to work out VPs accordingly.

Already mentioned a lot but just to toss my 2 cents to the devs. Why are you even considering this feature? Everything about your game indicates that you are testing a player's knowledge and understanding of ACW army level tactics ie cover, use of artillery, when to concentrate troops and when to keep them dispersed, timing of attacks and not unduly committing units in combat to keep them fresh. Ammo does nothing except test a player's ability to be a bean counter. If this was Ultimate Quartermaster Gettysburg, I would understand. The player, in the game, occupies the position of someone like a Longstreet or AP Hill on the map while the branching scenario options has the player occupying the role of a General Lee or Meade with respect to overall Army strategy. These people did not typically concern himself with a brigade's ammo supply. He drew up plans, issued orders and if a unit commander told him he couldn't go for whatever reason, the orders changed or he was told to make do. Your game actually does this very well, the AI's shortcomings notwithstanding. Don't ruin a good game with 'feature creep' like ammo just because its 'more realistic' in someone's eyes. Adding ammo would actually make it less realistic as the people who's position you occupied didn't worry about such things, they had subordinates to do that.

Views from Early Access build 0.86 There needs to be some sort of indicator in terms of blocked LOS when asking an artillery unit to fire. 10 hours spent in game and quickly learned that cannons are amazing but difficult and annoying to place. Any small clipping with infantry brigades in front or beside and the artillery can't fire. Consider easing the LoS restrictions with respect to clipping of friendly troops that are not meleeing another brigade. Your interface neither offers the appropriate feedback, nor does your control scheme allow for the precise control needed to avoid such issues in its current state. In a brigade level combat game, I would assume that your subordinates would be able to work out how to push the cannons that extra pixel up needed to gain LoS.