American Civil War Game Club (ACWGC)

The ACWGC used to have many tournaments always underway at one time. Now they are few and far between. There are some great efforts out there including the Fight the War, Tessier, and First Historical but hardly none of the old army against army tournaments.

I think that none of us have figured out how to do these tournaments yet. Everyone doesn't have HPS yet but conversely some members own only HPS. It's easy to establish a BG tourny since we have years of experience with those scenarios and we know which ones are balanced. HPS is a different story. As other threads relate, it is difficult enough to just determine what scenario is being played in a HPS campaign and since people haven't been able to register the games with an adequate identification, the club does not have a record (a published one anyway) to show what HPS scenarios are balanced. I assume that campaign games couldn't be used anyway but it would have to be the standalone scenarios to be used for tournaments.

Can someone tell us how to do a HPS tourny without doubling the fun by fighting mirror matches? Can HPS name the scenarios so that the fans among us can do some adequate managing with them? How do the other HPS clubs handle the problem with scenario names and tournaments? Isn't there a very short supply of smaller standalone HPS scenarios that could be used for tournament play?

Dang, that was draining on the throat. Barkeeper, slide that emergency kit over here, please! Ahhhhh, Granny always could make some good medicine.

Brig Gen Ned Simms
2/VI/AoS/USA
Blood 'n Guts hisself, a land lovin' pirate. Show me some arty tubes and we'll charge 'em.

A way to resolve the problem of unbalanced scenarios is by establishing a system of handicap. You penalize the favorite side with points penalties.

Naturally, you need to play all the scenarios involved first.
More results = more precise handicap.



Lt. Col. Harold Lajoie 3/2/I/AoM, CSA.

Good post Ned. I was just wondering about all this myself. The AoC usually has a tournament against a reb army each year and we are contemplating another one in the near future - but until now they have all used the BG games.

General Antony Barlow
Army of the Cumberland

I've always enjoyed tournaments, and agree, not so many around these days. We're running an in-house tourney over at the AoP, called the Cross Town Rivalry (http://www.geocities.com/laubster22/tournament/)
to help us get to know our own army mates a bit better. I anticipate this Fall to go hunting for some ANV officer of repute to sign on and accept a challenge to duke it out![}:)]

I agree, the HPS games are tough to find good scenarios of reasonable length and scope to use for tournaments, although I must confess, I haven't spent much time looking...




General Jeff Laub
Army of the Potomac
http://www.geocities.com/laubster22/AoP/

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by laubster22</i>
<br />I've always enjoyed tournaments, and agree, not so many around these days. We're running an in-house tourney over at the AoP, called the Cross Town Rivalry (http://www.geocities.com/laubster22/tournament/)
to help us get to know our own army mates a bit better. I anticipate this Fall to go hunting for some ANV officer of repute to sign on and accept a challenge to duke it out![}:)]

I agree, the HPS games are tough to find good scenarios of reasonable length and scope to use for tournaments, although I must confess, I haven't spent much time looking...




General Jeff Laub
Army of the Potomac
http://www.geocities.com/laubster22/AoP/
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

The stock HPS Gettysburg scenarioes offer nothing in the way of balanced, shorter scenarios that don't involve overly large numbers of men that make tournament play impractical. All of the shorter scenarios are unbalanced, and the only one that isn't unbalanced is the depiction of Longstreets attack on Day 2, but instead of being small like the old BG Wheatfield to Roundtop scenario, this one is the entire map with all forces available on both sides, so it is just plain too big for tournament play. Anything coming from HPS GB will have to be a blind scenario - which I think are more exciting for tournament play anyway. I would also be willing to setup a few blind scenarios to help out the cause (I already have one nearly complete on the Fairfield map).

Regards,
Lt. Col. Alan Lynn
3rd Battery "Jacksonville Greys"
4th Div, II Corps, AoA
God bless <><

General Lynn,

I designed a couple of shorter GB scenarios for Tillercon that probably never got used. One is the Wagoner's Fight involving two divisions of Union cavalry against Stuart and a scratch force under Imboden. The other is a hypothetical rear guard action involving the Union VI Corps vs two battered Confederate divisions. Both are twenty turns and reflect a fair amount of historical research. I also modified the 2nd Day scenario with fixes and releases so that the only forces involved are those that historically fought in the Wheatfield-Roundtop areas. You are welcome to any and all of these if you want them. I found the ones I put together work well in multiphase, but I don't recommend them for single phase play.


MG Mike Mihalik
1/III/AoMiss/CSA

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by mihalik</i>
<br />General Lynn,

MG Mike Mihalik
1/III/AoMiss/CSA
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Woo hoo! A field promotion from Lt. Colonel to full General! I should post here more often! [:D]

I for one would prefer if we AVOID cavalry actions at all cost - the games just don't work well for cavalry, and if the only forces involved are cavalry, it can make for some very unhistorical game play, especially in single turn games. I don't mind some scouting cavalry forces, or battles where other units are also involved, but if we take a vote, count me against using any all cavalry scenarios.

Besides, I'm not good with cavalry. Right, Jeff Laub? (He should know, haha) [B)] [xx(]

Regards,
Lt. Col. Alan Lynn
3rd Battery "Jacksonville Greys"
4th Div, II Corps, AoA
God bless <><

As a West Point Instructor we've been getting more people joining with only the HPS titles. With HPS Getty this creates a problem as noted there are few good 10-20 turn scenarios to use for training and tournaments. With this in mind I recently converted the old BGG 06H to HPS Getty and tried it with a new cadet. Seemed to work okay, got the usual reb major victory when the reb is more experienced than the yank and the yank leaves his guns exposed. Total casualties were about even except for the guns. I'm doing some testing on it now to see how it plays with players of more equal ability. If it works out I'll post it.

Also I noticed a scenario for HPS Getty at the Strategy Zone Online where Rich Hamilton has moved all his website files recently, it's at

http://www.strategyzoneonline.com/forum ... o=cat&id=7

The file is Things Heat Up, currently playing it with one of my cadets, it seems a fairly balanced meeting engagement.

Lt.Gen.Ken Miller
Veteran's Divsion
VIII / AoS