American Civil War Strategy Game

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aurelian2
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American Civil War Strategy Game

Post by aurelian2 »

Dear Iain,

Have you and your team at Slitherine ever considered moving a little bit away from ancient times in future releases :?: In my opinion it would be quite interesting to see a good brand new ACW strategy game hitting the market. There is really a gap now for some time considering that most games dealing with these period have been relased long time ago.(e.g. Sierra Civil War Generals or Cid Meiers Gettysburg).

I can imagine that a game similar to the Legion Arena format but with Federal and Rebel armies to command instead of Romans and Gauls could be a Topseller.

How does the Forum community think about that :?:

Greetings to all at Slitherine,

Aurelian
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Post by efthimios »

That sounds like a good idea. I too would like such a game from Slitherine. In the future. Perhaps right after or at the same time they release their new space 4X game. :lol:
Seriously though, I think the american civil war is a great theme for a Slitherine game.
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Post by anguille »

I would love that too....that would be awesome.
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Post by IainMcNeil »

We are looking at other periods & settings, but the ACW is not that popular outside of the US, so could be a limited market.
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Post by bodidley »

In the U.S. it is a super-popular theme, and I suppose it would be "exotic" to people who aren't familiar with it.
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Post by malthaussen »

Although I am American, and have played a zillion ACW games since Avalon Hill released Gettysburg back in the Dark Ages, I think a totally new, "niche" theme would be more in keeping with Slitherine's line. I'd love to see something strategic about the 30 Years War (with sidelites to the English Civil War), The Great Northern War and War of Spanish Succession, etc. A 30 Years War game could be limited to land combat, but other periods would necessitate a good naval module.

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Post by dhanegan »

I am an American Southerner through and through. I have deep respect for Robert E. Lee, arguably the greatest general America has ever produced, the only man to EVER graduate West Point with a perfect record.

Nevertheless, I am sick to death of American Civil War games. They may seem "exotic" to Europeans, but in the States you can't visit a game store of any type, computer or face-to-face, without finding shelf after shelf of the things.

There is much that is quixotically poetic about the civil war, but to me, little that is tactically interesting. The North had a huge advantage in every militarily important resource, The South only survived for four years because of a nearly incredible series of blunders on the part of the Northern generals. It was fought at the beginning of the "age of rifles", an era when combined arms tactics became meaningless because infantry utterly dominated the battlefield. Rifle muskets could and did pick off artillery crews from beyond the effective range of cannon, and cavalry made such good targets they had to dismount and hide their horses as an essential prelude to entering combat.

The civil war was a traumatic event that deeply touches the soul of every American, our society was uttery changed by it. As such it makes a great subject for songs, poems, and movies. But it's a lousy subject to base a game around, please don't waste your time with this.
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Post by Redpossum »

dhanegan wrote:The civil war was a traumatic event that deeply touches the soul of every American, our society was uttery changed by it. As such it makes a great subject for songs, poems, and movies. But it's a lousy subject to base a game around, please don't waste your time with this.
I have to agree here. The War Between the States was a horror, a nightmare, a tragedy of incomprehensible proportions. And on top of this, it is still a very controversial issue. The version of events that American schoolchildren are taught bears little or no resemblance to what really happened. And yet one cannot say this without being reviled and called a racist, among other things.

We can't talk about the fact that the Peace Party probably won the election of 1864, and Lincoln apparently falsified the results to keep himself in power, so he could continue to prosecute the war.

We can't talk about the fact that Lincoln had civilians arrested by military police, tried by military courts martial, and executed by military firing squads, without ever declaring martial law, and that this is a gross violation of the Constitution.

We can't point out that Abraham Lincoln is on record as having said that if he could have found a way to preserve the union without freeing the slaves, he would have done so.

Although I have studied the rest of military history, from Bubastis (~3000 B.C.) to the Yom Kippur War (1973), I have always avoided the War Between the States, just because it is such a painful topic.

I understand that europeans are never going to really grasp this. No condescension intended here, just a fact.

And although I honor Bobby Lee above all other military leaders, bar none, I have no desire to relive his long, sad agony.
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Post by grimsta »

I would propose something of a Cromwellian game, but it would be rubbish :wink:

Why dont you take a look at the Norman Invasion?
Factions playable could be:

Anglo Saxons
Vikings
Scottish
Normans
Bretons
Irish

Hours of fun!
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Post by IainMcNeil »

It's not a game built by us, but it is one that is already complete. We're working with Mad Minute to help them place their upcoming titles & protect them from the nasty clauses that can appear in contracts. We've built up a large database of contacts & have a lot of experience avoiding the pitfalls.
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Post by Redpossum »

Iain, good for you! Nice to see the Indies helping each other.

But I'm not clear on what game this is...an ACW game?
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Post by IainMcNeil »

Yes, Mad Minutes game is called Take Command - 2nd Manassas
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You know what would be nice

Post by kyle »

would be to actually be able to use the Monitor and or the Merrimack

I think it would be interesting to have a naval edge in a civil war-game. I don't want to a hole game devoted to Civil War Naval Combat, since that would suck, since everyone would want to duel it out with the moitor and Merrimack, thus there would be no in since neither ship won the battle.
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I like the idea

Post by kleinemann »

I like this idea, I'm European so I know almost nothing about the events except from a couple detailed American movies who tought me next to nothing. Maybe Slitherine might team up with the history channel to make a historically correct game about the civil war, might be set up similarly to that napoleonic era game they're making with the Lordz.
The America civil war is the one where the northerners in the blue clothes fought the southerners in grey clothes, right?
Excuse me if I dont spell everything right, I have limitied understanding of English :?
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Post by coldknight »

hmm really good ideas, i think it would be nice to have like a European and American type of civil war game starting in 1800-1900, which would also include the War of 1812, the European wars and the Civil War
i think this is a really good idea
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ACW

Post by honvedseg »

Er, actually, the American Civil War was fought by Northerners clad mostly in blue uniforms, with a few states in gray and a few more in a mix of blue and gray, and a couple of specific units wearing bright and flashy colors, against Southerners mostly in gray uniforms, some without uniforms, and many without even boots or shoes by the later stages of the war. Since each state set its own standards, and that was supplemented by privately raised and financed units, there were no concrete national standards of dress, and the southern states were often unable to provide or transport the needed items. Unpopular dress standards on either side were frequently ignored, or in at least one case blatantly refused when one regiment tossed its hated dress hats into the Potomac river while crossing.

The early stages of the war were fought in a linear battle line fashion, with horrendous casualties due to the increased lethality of improved firearms and the failure of the military leadership to adjust its tactics to compensate. Peer pressure, possibly due to the practice of placing recruits from the same town in the same units, resulted in those units suffering incredible losses before fleeing from indefensible positions. The Northern states took a while to organize and to sort through a series of command and leadership difficulties, while the Southern states capitalized on the chaos. Within a year or so, however, the North had begun to use its huge industrial advantage and manpower edge to simply overwhelm the southern armies by sheer mass of men and equipment. By the final stages, it had begun to turn into a WWI style trench war, as firepower had again increased dramatically due to magazine fed rifles and even early automatic weapons, but the outcome was a foregone conclusion long before that.

I don't see the ACW as an ideal topic for a tactical computer game, as the unimaginative tactics used would make for a boring game if done historically, and a one-sided slaughter if fought using modern mobile tactics and use of terrain and cover against an opponent following the historical "rules".

A naval game of the same period would be even more of a waste, as the Monitor vs Merrimack (or Virginia) represented the first attempt of the North at an ironclad (firing a half-strength powder charge with its main gun) against some of the last of the Confederacy's hoarded pre-war armor plate. It was merely the "trial run" of a new series of ships for the North, but a last desperate attempt for the South. While a draw tactically, it strategically doomed the Confederacy to a Union blockade.
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Re: ACW

Post by Redpossum »

honvedseg wrote:Er, actually, the American Civil War was fought by Northerners clad mostly in blue uniforms, with a few states in gray and a few more in a mix of blue and gray, and a couple of specific units wearing bright and flashy colors, against Southerners mostly in gray uniforms, some without uniforms, and many without even boots or shoes by the later stages of the war. Since each state set its own standards, and that was supplemented by privately raised and financed units, there were no concrete national standards of dress, and the southern states were often unable to provide or transport the needed items. Unpopular dress standards on either side were frequently ignored, or in at least one case blatantly refused when one regiment tossed its hated dress hats into the Potomac river while crossing.
And in the later stages of the war, many confederate units wore home-made uniforms of "butternut", which is simply the natural color of unbleached, undyed cotton, similar to what we'd call khaki today.
honvedseg wrote:The early stages of the war were fought in a linear battle line fashion, with horrendous casualties due to the increased lethality of improved firearms and the failure of the military leadership to adjust its tactics to compensate. Peer pressure, possibly due to the practice of placing recruits from the same town in the same units, resulted in those units suffering incredible losses before fleeing from indefensible positions. The Northern states took a while to organize and to sort through a series of command and leadership difficulties, while the Southern states capitalized on the chaos.
Military traditions were still strong in the South, and many families sent their sons to military schools, which was a huge advantage to the Confederacy in trying to build an army from scratch. Furthermore, the South's largely rural population was intimately familiar with firearms, with boys traditionally learning to shoot a rifle before 10 years of age. In contrast, the North, in order to take advantage of its vastly superior population base, was forced to draw upon a large urban population, many of whom had never fired a rifle in their lives. The contrast in average standards of marksmanship would be felt throughout the war; even green confederate units could shoot.
honvedseg wrote: Within a year or so, however, the North had begun to use its huge industrial advantage and manpower edge to simply overwhelm the southern armies by sheer mass of men and equipment. By the final stages, it had begun to turn into a WWI style trench war, as firepower had again increased dramatically due to magazine fed rifles and even early automatic weapons, but the outcome was a foregone conclusion long before that.
Agreed, all true, but I expect some damn fool will be in here shortly to accuse you of "Lost Cause Romanticism". And, err, I didn't know about the automatic weapons. Are you referring to Gatling guns?
honvedseg wrote: I don't see the ACW as an ideal topic for a tactical computer game, as the unimaginative tactics used would make for a boring game if done historically, and a one-sided slaughter if fought using modern mobile tactics and use of terrain and cover against an opponent following the historical "rules".

A naval game of the same period would be even more of a waste, as the Monitor vs Merrimack (or Virginia) represented the first attempt of the North at an ironclad (firing a half-strength powder charge with its main gun) against some of the last of the Confederacy's hoarded pre-war armor plate. It was merely the "trial run" of a new series of ships for the North, but a last desperate attempt for the South. While a draw tactically, it strategically doomed the Confederacy to a Union blockade.
Well said, well said, well said! An accurate overall summary of the purely military aspects of the war
Last edited by Redpossum on Thu Dec 13, 2007 8:37 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Post by Redpossum »

coldknight wrote:hmm really good ideas, i think it would be nice to have like a European and American type of civil war game starting in 1800-1900, which would also include the War of 1812, the European wars and the Civil War
i think this is a really good idea
See, now this is a better idea. Do something a bit more generic, like SPI's Rifle & Saber, which covered the War Between the States, Sepoy Mutiny, and a few other period conflicts that escape me at the moment.

R&S had units to represent smoothbore muskets, rifles, both breech- and muzzle-loading, and as I recall the breech-loading rifles were divided into early and late.

Sorry if I'm vague here; I'm trying to recall details from the early-to-mid 70's ;)
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Post by lancerunolfsson »

like SPI's Rifle & Saber,
Huh ya know I never thought about it before, but one has to wonder if R&S had some part in inspiring Norm Kogers "Age of Rifles"?

When the topic of AOR comes up on General PC game forums there is always a pile of "Gee I wish they'd re do that one" replies.

OTH There are always a lot positive responses when someone suggests yet another WWII East Front game. And that is really done to death.
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Re: American Civil War Strategy Game

Post by operating »

If you liked Sids' games, go to MMG website for a game called Take Command 2 Manassas, very intense with alot of play. There is a new game coming out on NSD website www.war3d.net, pretty much the same people who developed TC2M, should be real good, also in their forum under Preview is a vidieo of the new game, but only enough to tease you.

Good luck, hoistingman4
aurelian wrote:Dear Iain,

Have you and your team at Slitherine ever considered moving a little bit away from ancient times in future releases :?: In my opinion it would be quite interesting to see a good brand new ACW strategy game hitting the market. There is really a gap now for some time considering that most games dealing with these period have been relased long time ago.(e.g. Sierra Civil War Generals or Cid Meiers Gettysburg).

I can imagine that a game similar to the Legion Arena format but with Federal and Rebel armies to command instead of Romans and Gauls could be a Topseller.

How does the Forum community think about that :?:

Greetings to all at Slitherine,

Aurelian
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