Win day One in Gettysburg

[Ikmuzun]

I played Gettysburg for the first time.

The victory day one is very easy ( too easy?)

I engage my best corps of vets ( 6 3* units) and a small corps of green units.

I played on normal difficutlies without save

How it's possible to not win in the first day?

[GeneralPITA]

39k men isn't a lot, most people will enter the battle with closer to 60-70k. I played with 100k men on hard as CSA. Your small army changes the battle tactically. 

It's easier to win if you play with a smaller army because the enemy scales accordingly and must hold the same amount of ground that the historically larger army had to hold. 

If you play the historical battle you'll see a day one victory is much easier than on campaign mode with a large force. I had iron brigade regiments of 1400 oppose me on campaign mode, but they were only 400 men strong in the historical battle. 

 

[Ikmuzun]

I have 39k man who enter in the battlefield.

This is my battle plan.

[Col_Kelly]

I imagine it's because you deployed your weakest corps in the North then, therefore triggering a small Union army for day 1. Another answer is that you seem to be a decent player since you manage to have 6 elite units + a large army at this stage of the campaign .

The confederates have to be given the opportunity to win on day 1 since the following days are much tougher and it wouldn't make sense to force the player to go through it if he's driven the Union off the field to begin with. If you play on hard I assure you you'll find it much more challenging to take Cemetary Hill. 

[A. P. Hill]

And thus the age old discussion of "If Jackson were still alive at G'burg, would the Yankees have lost on day 1 as indicated here."  No doubt coming to the field from the north, would he have recognized the importance of Culp's and have pressed harder to take it, instead of sitting back for an hour or more like Ewell did because he didn't think he had enough men to press the advantage. 

[Slobodan]

Also won on first day in my first Gettysburg battle. Similar strategy (not intentionally), best corps attacking from west, weakest corps for north (I was saving my 2nd good corps for 2nd day actually). Overrun Union easily, routing almost all their units with several units captured.

I had significant losses tough (16k to Union 28k), but since I'm restarting campaign anyway I thought to give it a push on 1st day and see what happens   Captures were a bit odd, 15 20pdrs Parrots among other exotics ?!

[vren55]

I actually deployed my best two corps from the north, aiming to deploy 59 thousand men (not incluidng art) in total and still beat it on Day 1, with VERY insignificant losses on medium difficulty. Granted, due to low manpower, my army was... small but mostly 2 star vets with about 3x2000 3 stars in them. I think it's mainly b/c the smaller enemy brigades kept getting annihilated by my larger ones. 

Moreover, when I played union, I realized there was a bit of a weakness in my defenses along the western part of cemetery. This was where I targeted with my confederates, swinging 3 x3 star brigades and 1 2-star brigade to smash into it and seize the hill. I proceeded to leave a couple of good brigades to fortify the reinforcement approach of the hill... and then basically massacred their men as they came to reinfoce. Got a lot of captures from that.

 

 

[Ikmuzun]

I play with my Hard campaign.

50K in my army

Union outnumbered me this time but it played aggressively against my first corps who take many losses, but the counter-attack of my second corps totally annihilate them

[Andre Bolkonsky]

22 hours ago, A. P. Hill said:

And thus the age old discussion of "If Jackson were still alive at G'burg, would the Yankees have lost on day 1 as indicated here."  No doubt coming to the field from the north, would he have recognized the importance of Culp's and have pressed harder to take it, instead of sitting back for an hour or more like Ewell did because he didn't think he had enough men to press the advantage. 

If Stonewall hadn't died by friendly fire, it would have been a vastly different battle. Because Jackson did what God told him to do rather than what men expected him to, no one knows how the battle would have been different, but it would have been different. And Jackson had the stones to temper some of Lee's more audacious commands. 

[Squadron HQ]

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.)

Edited February 15, 2017 by Squadron HQ

[Wandering1]

Small note for all involved; you will notice supply carts, even though they practically speaking do not have soldiers that shoot, are equipped with M1842s. You can actually see this if you bring up the corps menu in the battlefield.

Similarly, all generals have Sharps carbines even if the guys in the general squads don't shoot. 

[Squadron HQ]

15 minutes ago, Wandering1 said:

Small note for all involved; you will notice supply carts, even though they practically speaking do not have soldiers that shoot, are equipped with M1842s. You can actually see this if you bring up the corps menu in the battlefield.

Similarly, all generals have Sharps carbines even if the guys in the general squads don't shoot. 

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? 

 

Edited February 15, 2017 by Squadron HQ

[Jake4228]

I also beat Gettysburg day 1 as CSA. I play on Brigadier, not hard, but I just completely steamrolled the Union in this battle. I forgot to screencap the victory screen but I suffered ~6k losses to the Union's ~22k. The battle wasn't even close. It was a complete rout from the first volley.

I'm kinda disappointed that my army didn't get to fight day 2 or 3 (although low casualties is a plus). Sid Meier's Gettysburg had a scenario where if the Confederate General captured all the day 1 objectives (i.e. Cemetery and Culps hills) then the Union would attack in force the next day in a bid to regain them. Perhaps the devs could integrate something like this in order to keep the battle going with a crushing confederate victory on day 1?

[Squadron HQ]

12 minutes ago, Jake4228 said:

I also beat Gettysburg day 1 as CSA. I play on Brigadier, not hard, but I just completely steamrolled the Union in this battle. I forgot to screencap the victory screen but I suffered ~6k losses to the Union's ~22k. The battle wasn't even close. It was a complete rout from the first volley.

I'm kinda disappointed that my army didn't get to fight day 2 or 3 (although low casualties is a plus). Sid Meier's Gettysburg had a scenario where if the Confederate General captured all the day 1 objectives (i.e. Cemetery and Culps hills) then the Union would attack in force the next day in a bid to regain them. Perhaps the devs could integrate something like this in order to keep the battle going with a crushing confederate victory on day 1?

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. 

[Wandering1]

1 hour ago, Squadron HQ said:

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? 

 

I meant on the battlefield, not in the camp menu.

The supply trains I've seen are equipped with M1842s, but it may be different between CSA and Union supply trains.

[chillwolf]

17 hours ago, Squadron HQ said:

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. 

Great idea! I think they need to keep working to improve the day-to-day options available on these bigger battles.

[A. P. Hill]

Perhaps the dev team could incorporate a bit of speculation. Should the rebs win on day 1.

History records that Meade had drawn a tactical line to fight along a good defensive position on Pipe Creek along the PA/MD border. Maybe the AotP pulls back?

In fact Meade had made plans to withdraw on the eve of July 2nd, and said so at a staff meeting he called, but all his subordinates were intent to hanging on Gettysburg. Thus we have history. 

Edited February 17, 2017 by A. P. Hill

[clench]

22 hours ago, Andre Bolkonsky said:

If Stonewall hadn't died by friendly fire, it would have been a vastly different battle. Because Jackson did what God told him to do rather than what men expected him to, no one knows how the battle would have been different, but it would have been different. And Jackson had the stones to temper some of Lee's more audacious commands. 

IMO, Longstreet was the GOAT civil war commander and he couldn't get through to Lee I doubt Jackson would have made much difference. 

[Squadron HQ]

2 hours ago, clench said:

IMO, Longstreet was the GOAT civil war commander and he couldn't get through to Lee I doubt Jackson would have made much difference. 

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!!!

Edited February 16, 2017 by Squadron HQ

[Andre Bolkonsky]

4 hours ago, clench said:

IMO, Longstreet was the GOAT civil war commander and he couldn't get through to Lee I doubt Jackson would have made much difference. 

Lee's 'Old War Horse' was an admirable Corps commander, in the Mount Rushmore discussion, but I'm not sure he is 'the greatest' officer of the entire war as you imply. 

Certainly not the most popular of the retired Confederate generals, just ask his house on the anniversary of Appomattox Court House. 

[clench]

1 minute ago, Andre Bolkonsky said:

Lee's 'Old War Horse' was an admirable Corps commander, in the Mount Rushmore discussion, but I'm not sure he is 'the greatest' officer of the entire war as you imply. 

Certainly not the most popular of the retired Confederate generals, just ask his house on the anniversary of Appomattox Court House. 

The Southern states were just butthurt over Longstreet's support for the government's Reconstruction and putting down the White League revolt in Louisiana so they spent many decades slandering him.

They also tried to blame him for Lee's failure at Gettysburg for giving Lee good advice. 

[Squadron HQ]

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.

[Andre Bolkonsky]

Lee surrendered to prevent a low grade guerrilla war that would still be going on to this day. No father could berate his son for not giving his life for the Confederacy when the Iron Cadet sued for peace. When Lee put down his saber, the South put down theirs.

The North, of course, just reloaded and killed everything West of the Mississippi in the name of the Railroads, but that's another story for another day. 

[CaptainKanundrum]

I have only played the historical battle, but I also feel that this battle was too easy. I won on day 1 at Brigadier General difficulty.

On UGG if you captured Cemetery Hill on Day 1, the battle still continued. Perhaps that should happen here as well

[Hank]

That must have been before the hotfix, right? I took it, but battle didnt end. Moreover, I mysteriously gave it up during the night, making day 2 a whole lot harder. Dont know if its meant to be like this...