American Civil War Game Club (ACWGC)

Ashdoll Ren said: "I think it already makes the whole fatigue rules invalid and pointless in both day and night turns."

Wow, this is BIG (and horrible) news and, as you also point out, in direct conflict with the manual. It is far worse than the FoW issue because at least that can be avoided by selecting Extreme FoW.

In a recently completed WDS v4 game I checked 4 stacks of units (12 units in total) from the beginning of (say) Turn 25 to the beginning of (say) Turn 26. [I was unable to check the exact fatigue at the end of Turn 15 as that turn is completed and can only be opened with my opponent's encryption key.]

Stack 1 (4 units) - All were at low fatigue, all moved and fired, all recovered fatigue.
Stack 2 (3 units) - All units were at low fatigue, all moved and meleed, all start Turn 26 disrupted with fatigue increase ranging from 18-41 (so it appears 2/3 have probably recovered fatigue).
Stack 3 (3 units) - All units were at low fatigue, all moved and meleed, all start Turn 26 disrupted with fatigue increase ranging from 13-109 (it appears that 1, possibly 2, have probably recovered fatigue).
Stack 4 (2 Units) - All units were at the high end of low fatigue, all moved and meleed, all start Turn 26 disrupted with fatigue decrease ranging from 9-10.

It seems our soldiers have become supermen, able to march around for twenty minutes, fire away at the enemy and even engage in strenuous hand to hand combat yet emerge less fatigued than when they started!

WDS v4 is badly broken. It seems the programmers went for show (graphics that no-one seems to like) over substance and the end result is that we have games that do not even follow the rules set down in their own manual. Shame on you WDS, you should be working around the clock to rectify these problems and not make us wait the standard period of many months to rectify known problems.

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Paul Swanson
Lieutenant-General
First Division
First Corps
Army of Northern Virginia

Hit them where it hurts and stop buying the games! Allow us to download 3.1 from your site or fix 4.0. Otherwise I see no reason to give you another dime until that time.

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BG Thomas "Tex" McSwain
Kansas Raiders

Oh please, can we get it a little less dramatic?
Sure, there are points to fix but there is no doubt that they will be fixed.
No need to call out a Jihad against WDS.

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Lieutenant General Christian Hecht
Commander I Corps, Army of the Potomac

"Where to stop? I don't know. At Hell, I expect."

Well, but the rebels used extensive trenching during the Peninsula Campaign early war. I guess I would say it is part of the game and should be left alone even though I dread playing my esteemed opponent Thomas Marshall because he makes extensive use of trenches.

These bugs will be corrected. There is no reason to call a boycott of WDS, give them time I feel they are doing a fantastic job so far.

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Gen Lynn Newell
Army Of the Potomac
V Corp
Commander

But when will they be fixed? When will they be corrected?

This is not a case of mere quirks or niggardly points to fix. Some are major functional issues within all WDS Civil War games that are in stark contrast to how such things are described in the manuals.

FoW does not work properly to the point where President Dortch sends out a Club-wide email to say that FoW should should not be used and instead Extreme FoW should be selected. In responding to an enquiry about this matter a representative of WDS calmly responds "We'll adjust for the next update...for now you just have to toggle visible hex option. It works properly with EFOW selected however.". In other words FoW does not work and no indication of when it will be fixed.

The 'fatigue' situation in WDS v4 is ludicrous because as I said earlier "It seems our soldiers have become supermen, able to march around for twenty minutes, fire away at the enemy and even engage in strenuous hand to hand combat yet emerge less fatigued than when they started!"

To those two very significant issues there are other lesser ones being discovered on a regular basis.

There is no mention of these problems on the WDS website, no emails from them (although they send out others) and above all no indication that the problems are being treated as a priority with the urgency and dedication that should accompany it.

FoW and Fatigue need to be fixed now not months down the track with the casual attitude that accompanies most updates.

When will the major functional issues be fixed?

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Paul Swanson
Lieutenant-General
First Division
First Corps
Army of Northern Virginia

Im willing to wait for the updates and will do so for as long as takes to work it out right. I know the updates will be free to me and that WDS will indeed do the best they can for us, as I know they frequent these and other forums.

If you dont want to play the current version then your are welcome not to. Throwing lengthy fits doesnt seem productive.

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Lt. Colonel JJ Jansen
3rd Calvary Brigade, 4th Calvary Division
Army of Tennessee
CSA

Who's throwing a lengthy fit?

If you're referring to me, all I have stated is facts. Past experience is that any 'fixes/updates' do not appear for many months. I think they need to hurry up on the two main issues. At the very least, WDS can advise when these issues will be rectified.

I recently purchased two titles from WDS so I do not have JTS versions of them. Given the problems with the WDS v4 I would rather play JTS v3. Is that possible? I'm unsure how I can retrieve them. Current, and proposed Club Tournaments require that they be played using WDS v4. I want to play in the tournaments yet I must use WDS v4 in order to do so. I have purchased WDS v4 in good faith yet those games conflict with the very manuals for them.
What action do you suggest is productive to have this matter promptly resolved?

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Paul Swanson
Lieutenant-General
First Division
First Corps
Army of Northern Virginia

The issues gave been stickied in the forum and your stance is clear in the threads. Continuing with verbose and, as another mentioned, “dramatic” posts is indeed starting to look like a fit.

A solution may be to allow for backwards versions to be available going forward as you sort of mentioned. Im saying we know the issue, but instead on constant complaining we should all work to find a solution.

As for tournaments, solutions by the club were given. Use EFoW and play honestly, seems gentlemanly enough. If your looking for a fight, Im done sir. Just exhausting reading the same complaints over and over. Your entitled to continue though, so do as you please.

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Lt. Colonel JJ Jansen
3rd Calvary Brigade, 4th Calvary Division
Army of Tennessee
CSA

Hardly verbose, all my posts here are shorter than the new rule changes recently proposed.
I agree that we should find a solution, I want a solution but I don't want to wait for a lengthy period to get it. As 'silence is the stern reply' from WDS there is no way of knowing when the matter will be rectified.
If future tournaments are EFoW that's fine with me, not preferred but it is what it is and I guess I will have to adopt the same in other games. Not playing the current version is, as pointed out earlier, not a viable solution.
And what about fatigue? I see no way around that blunder until it is fixed. The other problems that are being identified are, to me, annoying but not game destroying and can possibly wait the standard period of many months before they are rectified.

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Paul Swanson
Lieutenant-General
First Division
First Corps
Army of Northern Virginia

We can talk all night and all day, the patches will come when they will come.
Of course it's understandable to let off some steam. WDS thought they make a great pre-X-Mas present with these new 4.0 versions but unfortunately it backfired with the CW series.
All we can do now is have patience and wait for the patches.

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Lieutenant General Christian Hecht
Commander I Corps, Army of the Potomac

"Where to stop? I don't know. At Hell, I expect."

I just did a test scenario in 4.0 Gettysburg and I am not replicating this. Fatigue is working normally for me with no perceptible increased rate of recovery.

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WDS: Antietam, Chickamauga, Gettysburg, Overland

Hi Ashdoll,

two things:

1. I tested fatigue recovery without the optional rule and I am not seeing increased fatigue recovery. I am also not seeing ineligible units recovering fatigue. In your example, did you have the optional fatigue rule on? I only see what you described as plausible with that rule on.

2. I don't think your fatigue formula reflects what is written in the manual or what I have seen by experience. Even units at maximum fatigue recover only about 5 fatigue per day turn. If I had to guess, the percentage is not actually a percentage as implemented but rather a a flat 5 or 20 fatigue points. We should open another thread to test this topic like we did with some other ones.

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WDS: Antietam, Chickamauga, Gettysburg, Overland

Last thing: writing as someone who has been on occasion disappointed by the JTS/WDS titles I have bought (looking at you, Naval Battles Midway), I really don't think these issues are a big deal.

1. LOS: Just play with extreme or don't cheat. Normal LOS in 4.0 works almost like extreme FOW anyway. This bug has such a minor impact. If people in this club claim they are too lazy to fire their units individually in order to maximize the effects of their offensive fire, then they are too lazy to hunt around the map with "Highlight LOS" on looking for units. People who would exploit that bug are penny wise and pound foolish.

2. Fatigue does seems to be working normally, at least for me. I think people are going off without knowing how the game mechanics are supposed to work. Even if fatigue doesn't work, then you have a civil war game that at the moment does not model the affects of battlefield fatigue. No biggie.

3. There is an LOS bug in the game with turn-based defensive fire is more significant than the current LOS bug. Yet I have not seen it mentioned on the forums even though it is fairly obvious when it pops up. I have great doubts that anybody's enjoyment of the game is being impacted by it or any other bug in the game. (I won't explain the bug. It's not something exploitable. I passed it on to JTS with a save file.)

WDS updated the game and introduced some minor bugs and changes that people are not a fan of. As the Germans say: Wo gehobelt wird, fallen Späne. Things will probably get fixed or changed based on the feedback.

4. If people are really annoyed by trenches, then the club should just produce a few standard pdts that can by used by agreement or in tournaments. For example, we could standardize the weapon values across all scenarios and create a pdt for scenarios with trenches and one without trenches. That would be a relatively easy fix that we can implement on our own.

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WDS: Antietam, Chickamauga, Gettysburg, Overland

Hi Logrus，

Ok, I will check it tomorrow and post in a new thread.

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BG Ashdoll Ren
3rd Division
II Corps / Army of Northern Virginia

"Days and weeks of sheer boredom, interspersed with times of stark terror!"