American Civil War Game Club (ACWGC)

That sounds more reasonable to me. I would have thought 200 but you would know better than me what works.

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

Thanks for this, it helps clarify the evolution of the scenarios for a newbie.

Just one last Q on this remaining from my original post, and no worries if I need to take to main WDS forum- to clarify for scenarios beginning with "W Graphics" does it refer to Winter Graphics and how does this work? Taking 2 scenarios as an example:

050 FH_Battle in the pits at Ft Henry.scn
W Graphics_FH_Battle in the pits at Ft Henry.scn

If .map and .oob and .pdt files contain the info to play each scenario, they both use 'Ft Henry to Ft Donelson.map' and 'Ft Henry.oob' and 'winter 1861-2.pdt', so what's the difference between them, and is the W Graphics version a relic from a previous age (of ownership) that's no longer needed? Or do I need to switch to an alternative set of graphics in some way, or do something else, to get the W Graphics version to work? Or do i need to consider the W Graphics versions at all as a recent purchaser of the newer WDS version of the game? The scenario descriptions are identical, there's no clue anywhere of the difference(s) between them other than the names.

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Lieutenant Chris Horn
II Corps, 2nd Division, 6th Brigade
Army of the Potomac, USA

When the game was released, there was a winter graphics folder for winter scenarios. I'm looking to see why that is gone. IDK atm.

As for the differences in the OOBs and Maps, etc., Working through that would take too long. Sorry! In some cases, the scenario description might shed some light.

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Brigadier General Richard Walker
II Corps, 4th Division, 6th Brigade
Army of Tennessee
(JTS/WDS Scenario Designer)

Hi Rich,

Was always curious why a Siege of Vicksburg scenario was never created for the Vicksburg Campaign? I know it's a long battle but similar to Peterburg or Gettysburg, those have made for some interesting large multiplayer battles.

Regarding your point about the naval units, have always wished there was separate unit types for sea and river boats with deep and shallow water hexes. This makes me think of the battle at Fort Sumter, Mobil, N.O. vs the river fleets of the Mississippi and Ohio rivers and the transporting of the troops on transport ships at Belmont, Shiloh, Ft. Henry/Donelson, etc..

I know this is for scenario fixes/tweaks, so I'll keep my final CWB "wish list" to myself.

I would have liked to of seen a master list of Leaders (names/images/campaign), a master weapons file (that could be used on all CWB series) and a master .pdt to use as a default for designing scenarios or tournament for any version of the series.

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Union War Dog!
MG. Derek Hampel
Cmdr. Second Div., XV Corps
Army of the Tennessee

Regarding you Vicksburg question, I cannot answer as that was not a title I was involved in.

As for the naval actions. All I can say is that in the early days of HPS/JTS, naval actions had a low priority due to its cost in programing time. The focus was on land battles. Forgotten Campaigns did make an attempt to provide a greater naval presence with stronger programing.

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Brigadier General Richard Walker
II Corps, 4th Division, 6th Brigade
Army of Tennessee
(JTS/WDS Scenario Designer)

D. Hampel wrote:

"I would have liked to of seen a master list of Leaders (names/images/campaign), a master weapons file (that could be used on all CWB series) and a master .pdt to use as a default for designing scenarios or tournament for any version of the series."


I'll second that request. The games are terrific and deserve a lot of applause, but ----. I get weary of having to check the PDT each game turn that I'm playing so as to remind myself of how many movement points are expended in this scenario for movement in woods, etc. A forest is a forest, I don't care where it was located. That analogy applies to several other game situations where the game designer was allowed to alter the PDT to suit their individual tastes. Some standardization needs to be applied and when something does not comply with the standard, it should be pointed out in the scenario description so that the game opponents will know that before they start play.

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Gen Ned Simms
2/XVI Corps/AotT
Blood 'n Guts hisself, a land lovin' pirate. Show me some arty tubes and we'll charge 'em.
VMI Class of '00

I believe that the vast majority are the same. I know John Ferry liked to experiment with 30 min turns and that could cause a few different entries. Also, with weather impacted scenarios, the PDT values are the same, but in rain or snow or mud, the cost is increased as a percentage of the norm.

Just curious, do you know some that are in fact different? I'd like to examine them to see why.

For leaders, yes, a master file would be cool. But you have to understand that many of these earlier titles were created with little to no interaction between the programmer (John Tiller) and the several designers (Myself and a few others). The was no message board we could all use to pass notes and questions. We have that now. All updates were snail mailed using standard CDs. It was a crazy time when compared to now. Back then we didn't know any better. So, for this series, a very old series, WDS is doing the best it can to keep things as UTD as possible. If and when new ACW content is released, that will be a different story if the newer titles are any indication.

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Brigadier General Richard Walker
II Corps, 4th Division, 6th Brigade
Army of Tennessee
(JTS/WDS Scenario Designer)

Without checking every scenario (checked 2 or 3 scattered throughout the lists) for each game, here is what I found. The numbers indicate the movement costs for infantry (first number is cost in line, and the second number is cost in column) in forests.

Antietam 5/4
Atlanta 5/5
Chancellorsville 5/4
Chickamauga 5/4
Corinth 5/5
Forgotten 5/4
Franklin 4/4
Gettysburg 4/4
Overland primarily 5/4 but some extreme variations
Ozark 5/5
Peninsula 6/6 and 5/5
Petersburg 5/4
Shenandoah 5/4
Shiloh 4/4
Vicksburg 5/5

If I am playing a scenario each from Gettysburg, Peninsula, and Chickamauga; my brain is too feeble to remember the different movement costs when I open the game turn.

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Gen Ned Simms
2/XVI Corps/AotT
Blood 'n Guts hisself, a land lovin' pirate. Show me some arty tubes and we'll charge 'em.
VMI Class of '00

It seems to me that 5/4 makes the most sense.
There might be a few scenario specific reasons for a different entry, but for the generic scenarios, I might could easily make a change to have all the movement cost be the same for all terrain types and formation types. Have a look at the Historic Antietam PDT (Antietam.pdt). With regards to the movement cost, would there be objections to trying to use these values for the majority of the pdts?

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Brigadier General Richard Walker
II Corps, 4th Division, 6th Brigade
Army of Tennessee
(JTS/WDS Scenario Designer)

Although I agree that things would be much easier with a standardised model I'm concerned that a mass change could have some bad outcomes. Here are some reasons why:
Command ranges can vary from scenario to scenario;
Stacking Parameters can vary from scenario to scenario;
Turn times can vary from scenario to scenario; and
The terrain in each scenario affects the ease with which units can move across the map.
Those aspects all work together with movement rates to achieve balance within a scenario. If the movement rates are suddenly increased, or decreased, then the balance is thrown out. Units may now take too long to get where they are needed. Conversely, they may be able to get there too quickly. Units that were in command range may not now be able to do so with the ease they did before, and vice versa.

One example would be Overland 417-640528 - Fourth Epoch. It is a great scenario, I remembered it for this post because it had very different Parameter Data. On the surface the scenario looks like a big loser for the CSA but it can be won. The CSA is outnumbered almost 2:1 and, although they have more guns they have less artillery ammunition. Some of the Parameter Data differences for it are:
Day Turns are 30 minutes;
Maximum stacking of 800 men (and five counters);
Command distances - Brigade: 3 hexes, Division: 6 hexes, Corps: 12 hexes, and Army: 28 hexes;
Night Attack Penalty - 300, Night Movement Penalty - 50;
Skirmisher cost - 3 MPs; and
Crew Kill - 120.
Together with a large map those things work together to bring some balance to what could be a very unbalanced scenario. Being able to move more men faster (more men per hex), keep them in command easier, and on a smaller map would mean a heavy and prompt CSA defeat would be almost certain. The Union would move easier across the map and could then deploy large stacks to smash through the Confederates.
My Confederate victory wasn't easy, and a couple of times my army was in peril to a degree where the battle may have been lost. However, I feel that the unique Parameter Data (which I found difficult to get used to at the time) gave me a chance to gain victory.

I worry that there are many scenarios that could be ruined by standardised Paramater Data.

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

As a personal preference, I would rather see the movement factors contained in Chickamauga 039 in lieu of Antietam. The reason being that I'm used to cavalry being able to move 24 hexes instead of just 20, but if that was the standard then I could live with it.

You are correct that there are some scenarios in Overland that have very odd movement rates that would require changes in other areas of the PDT to make it viable, which means that they couldn't be done with an en masse change. I've previously custom altered the Overland Cross the James scenario PDT to fit Overland standard movement and to correct an error in it. Bringing them back to normal doesn't impact their road and clear hex movement but it does impact movement in other terrain.

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Gen Ned Simms
2/XVI Corps/AotT
Blood 'n Guts hisself, a land lovin' pirate. Show me some arty tubes and we'll charge 'em.
VMI Class of '00

Campaign Shenandoah also has cavalry at 20MPs. There may be scenarios in other titles as well.

The main problem with standard movement (or other things) across all the titles is that the individual scenarios were designed in view of the movement rates (plus stacking and other factors) being used to balance the scenarios. This is especially so with historical scenarios in order to achieve arrival times close to the historical ones. In Shenandoah, the maps are generally smaller and increasing cavalry from 20 to 24 would have an effect on most of the scenarios.

"I've previously custom altered the Overland Cross the James scenario PDT to fit Overland standard movement and to correct an error in it."

I believe that is the only way things can be done. Identifying known anomalies/errors and altering them on a scenario basis. In doing so consideration can be given to the overall design of a scenario.

In altering Gettysburg 007 to create Gettysburg Supplied the alteration to supply wagons only increased their supply levels (not the number of wagons). The historical parity of artillery rounds fired was also changed but not to the extent where it reflected the true number of rounds fired (over 100 per gun, both sides) as that would have severely unbalanced the scenario. [I also removed Meade from the map. Having him 'on map' and fixed had the perverse effect of detaching all the Union Corps. He now arrives on the map in time to reach his previous position at the previous release time.]

If a standard .pdt is introduced across all scenarios the possible adverse effects could not be known. That is my concern.

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

Valid points

We'll hold off on making any sweeping changes.

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Brigadier General Richard Walker
II Corps, 4th Division, 6th Brigade
Army of Tennessee
(JTS/WDS Scenario Designer)