Scourge of War Boards

I take huge casualties attacking arty in Sandbox battles. I however cant leave all the arty the Union army has blasting away at me. I have lost. A brigade or two attacking a corps arty. Any ideas

You really can only attack unsupported artillery units - single batteries, maybe sometimes 2 together if they are tired or exhausted. It is most definitely suicide to attack the massed corps reserve guns, all you can do is minimise their effect by trying to not have your troops in front of them. I know that may sound facetious but many players (and real commanders) seem to lose sight of the bigger picture in the heat of battle.

Don't stand your division on that hill to hold it, where its getting pummelled by the enemy guns, but pull them back into defilade behind it. If the hill is attacked by the enemy infantry they can return to the high ground to meet the assault.

Saddletank wrote:

Don't stand your division on that hill to hold it, where its getting pummelled by the enemy guns, but pull them back into defilade behind it. If the hill is attacked by the enemy infantry they can return to the high ground to meet the assault.

Excellent advice, S. There's an Antietam scenario, one of RebBugler's, where you have to do exactly that to win.

B

Great advice.

The reason why I put this question on here was because yesterday I played Sandbox South Mountain Army vs. Army. I was holding the main gap to Burkettsville and crushing corps after corps of Yankees. The only problem was after I destroyed the infantry there would be the entire corps arty sitting a few hundred yards away blasting away at me. Tired of getting pounded by all those guns I flanked them with three brigades down the mountain to the right of the gap so they saw me at the last second. I took all the guns (which were a lot) but lost almost 1,500 men in the process and I had somewhat surprise and cover coming down the mountain (because they were all in the road at the bottom of the mountain). Everytime I attack arty I just think what a waist of life and it really bums me out. Anyways that my story, I try to leave them alone for as long as I can but they are annoying when thehy are all bunched together.

Saddltank wrote:

Don't stand your division on that hill to hold it, where its getting pummelled by the enemy guns, but pull them back into defilade behind it. If the hill is attacked by the enemy infantry they can return to the high ground to meet the assault.

Figures a Brit would come up with this answer. Napoleon thought Wellington to be very unsportsmanlike. :laugh:

My response to your experience in that battle would be in the form of a question:

"Why did you stand there on the Gap getting pounded?"

Crampton's Gap is the perfect place to defend easily while not getting shelled by enemy long range guns. The crest is so steep you only have to retire a brigade about 50 yards and lie them down and they are invulnerable.

An alternative view is that by that stage, if you'd hurled back every corps the enemy could throw at you, I think you would be justified in calling the game your victory at that point. A hundred enemy guns can't stand there and win a battle without infantry to do it with them. If the AI were written so that it had a concept of when it had lost a battle (reached a certain %age of casualties for example, or had a certain %age of its regiments retreated) it should withdraw at that point. The AI in this game is very good but it doesn't know when its beaten (which is a pity - Norb?) so I see no problem in the player deciding when it is.

Our HITS MP games are often ended by us players in the co-op team deciding there's no reason to continue fighting - part of the AI army is out there and refusing to give up but killing every last man isn't what receating ACW battles is about.

I won shortly after the engagement started. They sent their cav corps and one inf corp which smashing into Jackson's corp trying to capture Burkettsville needless to say they were slaughtered although their charging cav actually hurt me pretty good and the losses were two to one them until I brought brigade after brigade at them. They were overwelmed and I won on points but I wanted to feel better about Picketts Charge so I stayed in the game and slaughtered them.

What difficulty do you play on? I play normal and they just send their men in like peice meal. I guess I should crank up the diff.

Ya'll need to learn how to Command Cavalry......and use it!

The Mad One

Bloody 8th, 90% of my gaming is MP and we frequently play a co-op player side vs the AI. We do adjust the aicount variable to about 55 which makes the AI more aggressive.

I'm not sure what you mean by aicount. Is the diff harder on veteran or historical?