mod J & P Rebalance Mod by JonnyH13 and Pandakraut 05/06/2023 1.28.4

[killjoy1941]

16 hours ago, BCH said:

So...

If I only need 14 brigades for a battle; it makes little to no sense to fill all the brigade slots past that number of brigades. The same conclusion might be made about even filling a third corp with a commander until absolutely needed.

Yes. It's really only an issue through Malvern Hill or so because after that you generally have the experience and weapons to counteract any sudden jumps in scaling, but I rarely try to have more than the exact number of required brigades for any given battle. That's true at least through Shiloh, and often I'll forgo reinforcement brigades through Malvern Hill to increase the impact of artillery.

I discovered scaling by accident in vanilla when I tried to maximize the efficiency of my resources in Legendary by not buying veterans early. I'd just combine the hard veterans with blooded troops and let the large, rookie brigades get whittled down from a standard 1,800-2,100 at recruitment. That was the campaign where I saw the smallest CSA armies I'd ever encountered, and I came here to the forums looking answers. That's when I learned that your average brigade size determines the size of the brigades you face.

Keeping your average brigade size to 1,200 or less and equal to or less in total than the number of allowed brigades per battle pays huge dividends at Shiloh and eventually at Malvern Hill.

Leaders with no brigades to command don't seem to do anything though, so you should be safe to manipulate division structures in empty corps.

[pandakraut]

12 minutes ago, killjoy1941 said:

Leaders with no brigades to command don't seem to do anything though, so you should be safe to manipulate division structures in empty corps.

Using Malvern Hill as an example, even if you don't really bother with a 2nd corps it's always worth putting at least one unit in it. Free xp for the general, extra supply wagon, and generals apply their morale regen bonus to units in other corps at half the normal rate. Past that I agree, at least in the mod no real need for a 2nd corps at Malvern. Front load the first corps and annihilate the csa before the 2nd corps would even arrive. I usually just dump my cavalry into the 2nd corps for the cleanup.

[killjoy1941]

Just now, pandakraut said:

Using Malvern Hill as an example, even if you don't really bother with a 2nd corps it's always worth putting at least one unit in it. Free xp for the general, extra supply wagon, and generals apply their morale regen bonus to units in other corps at half the normal rate. Past that I agree, at least in the mod no real need for a 2nd corps at Malvern. Front load the first corps and annihilate the csa before the 2nd corps would even arrive. I usually just dump my cavalry into the 2nd corps for the cleanup.

Precisely, though I'll usually have at least half a division of infantry in the 2nd corps as well since I'll front-load all the skirmishers to wreck the AI assault staging.

[pandakraut]

4 minutes ago, killjoy1941 said:

Precisely, though I'll usually have at least half a division of infantry in the 2nd corps as well since I'll front-load all the skirmishers to wreck the AI assault staging.

That'd be interesting to see in action. I've never been successful with trying to fit in snipers in the initial deployment. The cover options aren't great and I find that I need at least 6 infantry brigade with the rest being Artillery to try and deter charges on Legendary. I usually try to bring the snipers in once the map opens up a bit, but artillery still does most of the work for me.

[killjoy1941]

7 minutes ago, pandakraut said:

That'd be interesting to see in action. I've never been successful with trying to fit in snipers in the initial deployment. The cover options aren't great and I find that I need at least 6 infantry brigade with the rest being Artillery to try and deter charges on Legendary. I usually try to bring the snipers in once the map opens up a bit, but artillery still does most of the work for me.

You have to deploy them all the way forward, then immediately send them headlong at an oblique toward the advancing CSA brigades. It's even more delicate than Shiloh, but if you do it right, you should end up with reasonably intact skirmishers behind the CSA advance. It's more about harassing the artillery and disrupting the timing of charges by getting the infantry to wheel at inopportune moments than causing any real damage. Once they're down to about half strength have them retire out of the way into the woods to the northeast and northwest.

Edit: Best results generally delay any heavy assaults until the rest of your 1st corps is almost up to the woods and fields which likely constitute your first line of defense. That's really the point of it.

Edited September 5, 2018 by killjoy1941

[BCH]

4 hours ago, pandakraut said:

Did the AI artillery target the boats at all?

They were sort of occupied with other issues.  I had sneaked a skirmisher unit along the far north edge into the NE woods; CSA cavalry and the artillery in the general area kept swinging around to keep it in check.

The rest of the CSA artillery were occupied in trying to repulse the Union attacking coming from the South side of the map. Every time a CSA battery appeared in that area the 20pdr Parrots opened up on them. CSA artillery that re-positioned south of the VP were also hit by the gunboats.

[BCH]

5 hours ago, pandakraut said:

your thinly defended batteries

I usually have a unit or two armed with high melee value weapons to protect the guns..

Preservation of the artillery batteries was at the utmost in the American Civil War by both sides.

There is an interesting first hand account (actually several accounts) about the withdrawal of Stewarts guns on the first day at Gettysburg. One carriage was damaged to the point of being useless for moving the gun; elements of several Union brigades (mostly mixed up at the point of withdrawal in and through Gettysburg) left a position of relative safety to help the gunners try to save their piece. To make a long story short, the gun was removed from the carriage and carried to Cemetery Ridge were it was eventually remounted.

[RToy]

Hi.  I installed the rebalance mod and it seems to have installed OK as the new features are shown, but in the first Confederate battle I got all of the federal artillery units to surrender or destroyed them and it shows green check marks for both.  It goes on to the second day and I sink both of the ships, and hold the fort.  The victory conditions that display on the map only shows "Hold the fort" with a green check and I've even destroyed or captured every federal unit on the map, but when time runs out I keep getting "Defeat" and it shows a green check for the fort, but also shows the white circles for "Destroy Battery A" and "Destroy Battery B".  I've played it through twice without reloading but same result both times.  Any ideas?

[killjoy1941]

9 hours ago, RToy said:

Hi.  I installed the rebalance mod and it seems to have installed OK as the new features are shown, but in the first Confederate battle I got all of the federal artillery units to surrender or destroyed them and it shows green check marks for both.  It goes on to the second day and I sink both of the ships, and hold the fort.  The victory conditions that display on the map only shows "Hold the fort" with a green check and I've even destroyed or captured every federal unit on the map, but when time runs out I keep getting "Defeat" and it shows a green check for the fort, but also shows the white circles for "Destroy Battery A" and "Destroy Battery B".  I've played it through twice without reloading but same result both times.  Any ideas?

I'd guess the game doesn't register captured artillery as destroyed since artillery was never meant to be captured. Try gunning them down until they shatter instead.

[BCH]

Thoughts on Gaines Mill at MG level with ModV 1.23

Not really unbalanced.. more 3* CSA brigades than I would like to see; several 1,000 man skirmisher units (I was able to rout and then completely destroy one of the CSA skirmisher units with two Union cavalry brigades); and extremely large CSA batteries,  but otherwise just a tough battle.

I tried to defend all three VPs and was successful until the last CSA reinforcements arrived; the last Union reinforcements were not enough to hold the key VP point for a Union victory.

I brought in 17,368 inf. vs. 40,698 CSA inf.; giving them a 2.3 to 1 advantage on the infantry side.  Since the CSA brigades initially arrive piecemeal, Union batteries were able to greatly reduce their initial numbers.

On the next play through, I will pull back sooner from Boatswain's Woods and force the CSA to cross open ground to get to the other VPs. I am was still sitting on $178,655 and 30,000+ manpower after I started the battle. I will increase the Union manpower on the divisions coming in as reinforcements, particularly II Corp which comes in at the end for me. I am guessing that scaling will stay roughly at a 2+ to 1 advantage on infantry

 

[pandakraut]

11 hours ago, RToy said:

Hi.  I installed the rebalance mod and it seems to have installed OK as the new features are shown, but in the first Confederate battle I got all of the federal artillery units to surrender or destroyed them and it shows green check marks for both.  It goes on to the second day and I sink both of the ships, and hold the fort.  The victory conditions that display on the map only shows "Hold the fort" with a green check and I've even destroyed or captured every federal unit on the map, but when time runs out I keep getting "Defeat" and it shows a green check for the fort, but also shows the white circles for "Destroy Battery A" and "Destroy Battery B".  I've played it through twice without reloading but same result both times.  Any ideas?

Thanks for the report, I"ll look into it.

[BCH]

15 hours ago, RToy said:

in the first Confederate battle I got all of the federal artillery units to surrender or destroyed them

Did you use only your cavalry to attack the artillery or did you make use of other units?

[RToy]

3 hours ago, BCH said:

Did you use only your cavalry to attack the artillery or did you make use of other units?

I used cav on one side and a regular infantry on the other.  The second time I tried standing off a bit and just shooting at them but they still surrendered before I broke them.  Also I could swear the first time through there were 3 artillery units and the second time I played it there were just two.

[BCH]

3 minutes ago, RToy said:

I used cav on one side and a regular infantry on the other.  The second time I tried standing off a bit and just shooting at them but they still surrendered before I broke them.  Also I could swear the first time through there were 3 artillery units and the second time I played it there were just two.

I always try to race cavalry down the east side of the map and attack the CSA batteries east to west; not sure they will surrender to a single cavalry brigade.

Note: You will need to distract CSA brigades on the east side of the map to get your cavalry down to the east side of the fort in one piece.

[madmatg]

7 hours ago, pandakraut said:

Thanks for the report, I"ll look into it.

I had the same problem

[killjoy1941]

8 hours ago, RToy said:

I used cav on one side and a regular infantry on the other.  The second time I tried standing off a bit and just shooting at them but they still surrendered before I broke them.  Also I could swear the first time through there were 3 artillery units and the second time I played it there were just two.

There are three. Two in the fort and one in the counterattack.

[killjoy1941]

14 hours ago, pandakraut said:

Thanks for the report, I"ll look into it.

Oh, and that's a good reminder: it's likely to affect Nansemond River in the Union campaign as well since you have to destroy several batteries there.

[BCH]

14 hours ago, BCH said:

Thoughts on Gaines Mill at MG level with ModV 1.23 

2nd play through.

I pulled off a draw.

Lost a 3* through being foolish, but otherwise had about 4,000 less casualties and caused about 3,000 more CSA casualties.

I tried pulling four brigades of the initial Union deployment to the woods northeast of where they spawn and sent horse artillery to support them. They attacked CSA units going by, and the CSA attempted to counter-attack; very low Union losses with this group of brigades This created an interesting dynamic to the battle, with that group eventually attacking the rear of the original CSA deployment. I was able to get all of them and the battery back to the Union lines before the first CSA reinforcements arrived.

The first Union reinforcements can not hold the McGhee Hill VP on their own; I probably should have pulled back at least half my forces to the Hill to hold it and then counter-attack at the end when the final group comes in.

This grand battle may suffer from some of the issues found at Shiloh, but to a lesser degree. CSA batteries were exceptionally large; this allowed them to set up and take heavy losses without routing or withdrawing. They were actually more of a factor than the large CSA brigades. Again a couple of 1,000 man CSA skirmisher units were present; biggest issue is they seemed to out range the Union brigades ( I suspect they were armed with '56 Enfields) while being as large as most of my Union brigades. My only solution was to turn my batteries on them; this time they seemed to work in pairs which made getting at them with my cavalry rather risky.

I am not advocating any changes or tweaks at this time.

I intend to re-play this battle a dozen or so times to see what else might work in regards to the Union order of battle and tactics

 

[pandakraut]

10 minutes ago, BCH said:

This grand battle may suffer from some of the issues found at Shiloh, but to a lesser degree. CSA batteries were exceptionally large; this allowed them to set up and take heavy losses without routing or withdrawing. They were actually more of a factor than the large CSA brigades. Again a couple of 1,000 man CSA skirmisher units were present; biggest issue is they seemed to out range the Union brigades ( I suspect they were armed with '56 Enfields) while being as large as most of my Union brigades. My only solution was to turn my batteries on them; this time they seemed to work in pairs which made getting at them with my cavalry rather risky.

It sounds like you are forcing up scaling based on your army composition. Do you have a bunch of large skirmisher units leftover from Shiloh?

[pandakraut]

Have a new fix for the artillery capture bug. Will get Jonny to post it tomorrow.

[BCH]

9 hours ago, pandakraut said:

Do you have a bunch of large skirmisher units leftover from Shiloh?

My skirmishers are as follows:

I Corp
375 w/  '41 HF
150 w/ '56 En
375 w/ Rebored Muskets

II Corp
318 w/ Muskets
375 w/ Rebored Muskets
375 w/ Rebored Muskets

That is it.
 

[BCH]

dropped the 3 skirmishers from II Corp; that brought the CSA skirmisher size down to 700+

[JonnyH13]

Updated to fix the Potomac Arty Bug...

[lightningg]

Just a thought I want to throw out there and see what people think   I know there are perks that boost speed, cover, etc but my thought is a more basic across the board option

Artillery move as they should

Infantry have 3 movement options - walking (normal), running and charging

Cavalry & Skirmishers can do their 'normal' movement speed or can charge

 

Now I know that the default speed for Cav and Skirmishers is higher than infantry but it seems strange to me that the fastest/lightest troop types don't have a third movement speed button option

As light infantry, the skirmishers could have a slower option that allows faster condition/morale recovery or one that costs more conditioning by makes them harder to spot or is maybe just a different speed to normal/charge

Now I don't ride horses but I'm sure that in the movies there are various 'gaits' used by mounted troops/horses - walk, trot, canter, gallop

 

guess I am asking if it is possible and a popular idea to have an 3rd speed added in the mod?

Edited September 8, 2018 by lightningg

[BCH]

2 hours ago, lightningg said:

Now I know that the default speed for Cav and Skirmishers is higher than infantry

That depends upon  the perks.. I had a CSA 2* infantry brigade catch my 1* Cavalry brigade going up hill.