Final Report: Battle of Somewaresville

Last weekend we completed the Battle of Somewarsville. It was a Confederate victory with high casualties on the Union side. It was a 2:1 loss ration in favor of the Confederates.

As the game continued, the Confederate left flank had pretty much fought to a standstill. The Union center was demolished! When the game ended, the Union center was being basically held by 2 artillery batteries and a general. On the right, which was where I was commanding, I had managed to rout a couple of Union brigade's and was able to take up a defensive posture. I also had my final division arrive on board which was a relief for me. The Union lads also had a final division appear. They should have appeared sooner, but were mistakenly overlooked. Could they have made a difference? They had arrived in the center but were too late to be effective by games end. However, if they had arrived as scheduled, it could have changed my deployments. I may have not focused so much on my flank by moving more of my units to the center. I knew I had a reserve arriving that would have been more than a match for any Union units they would have faced.

In the end, it was roughly 100+ stands lost on the Union side to less than 50 stands for the Confederates. The artillery losses were 5 for the Confederates and 4 for the Union. Cavalry losses were in favor of the Union forces. Losses were in the form of actual kills and routed units.

Some rules changes are going to be made. I am thinking of making ammo allotments for the artillery. This could prevent some of the arguing over what is a good shot and what isn't. Less shots may be taken knowing that if the die roll doesn't go their way, the player losses that round of ammo. I am also looking at using the artillery arc from Fire and Fury. I am going to make the Corps commanders more important by designating points to them, that could be allotted to Division commanders. This would help more units to move along and be useful if a unit needs to do something important. As it was, I had the Corps commanders basically as figure heads that would replace a Division commander if they were knocked off.

All in all I was happy with the game. It was the largest game I had ever set up and I am looking forward to setting up another with the rules changes. The rules I have are simple and basic and I wish to keep them that way. This will allow me to continue to put on larger games and keep it relatively realistic.

More Re-enactment Pics

The Union and Confederate lines engaged.



To the right of the cannon, you can see Old Abe the eagle from the 8th Wisconsin Regiment on his standard.

Awaiting the order to fire.



Fire!



Got lucky enough to catch the smoke ring.

Re-enactment Pictures

We didn't game last night as we didn't have enough people show. So I thought I would take the time to post a few pictures from the re-enactment I went to the past September.These were taken at the Wade House here in Wisconsin. They have put on a show for quite sometime now and I have managed to make it to most of them.

ACW Pics: Day 1 Battle of Somewarsville

In these pictures, you can see the various stages of the troops moving onto the field. The first two pictures are of Union troops moving on board. The 3rd pic is of two columns of Rebels approaching. The 4th pic is of the Rebs that held off the yanks in the woods from the initial contact. The picture is of one of the Yankee brigades routing. The 5th pic is of more Yankees arriving and the 6th is an overall view.

ACW Game: Day 2

This report is from the 2nd day's fighting. Just one note, I haven't figured out how to set this blog up so the postings would be in order. Sorry for the confusion.

The fight at Somewarsville continued on. The fog and mist had lifted
and this revealed to each and every commander that they were in a
major engagement. Deployments changed along with strategy. Yanks and
Rebs were everywhere and units were forced to enegage with or
without support.

On the left flank, Union and Rebs tried to flank each other only to
check each others moves and fight it out. Rifles fired as the smoke
filled the field and once cleared, revealed that more units were
moving up to engage. Neither one tried to cross the bridge. They
just manuevered around to try and gain an advantage, only to see
that they were equally matched. Artillery seemed to play a large
roll, but the men kept coming.

In the center, a bold move by the Yankees was thwarted. A Union
brigade managed to flank a Reb brigade. The ineffective fire of the
Yanks allowed the boys in gray to hang around. Two CSA brigades went
on line along with a couple of batteries. This forced the Union
brigade to rout out once they realized the were outnumbered. The
Yanks had taken some high ground, only to realize that there were
plenty of Rebs willing to sacrifice themselves to keep the Yanks
from holding the key high ground. This allowed the CSA lads to move
forward and try to create a battle line. To the right of the CSA
lads, the boys in blue kept trying to make their way forward. In an
artillery duel, the CSA lost their battery and caused minimal
casualties amongst the Yanks. However, the Rebs were on the move at
last observation. They knocked out a Union battery before it could
unleash a hailstorm. One CSA barrage managed to rout a Union brigade
that was still in column and trying to move up.

In the center, a charge was initiated by the Yanks. Two infantry
columns met head on and faught it out. Though the Rebs lost more
men, their morale held and forced Billy Yank to retreat! A yell went
up at the victory and a clear advantage was gained by the CSA.

With the battle raging on, the Union boys have taken a good amount
of casuaties and have had a unit rout right off the field of honor.
The battle has see-sawed back and forth. But as it looks right now,
the men from the south are in control and plan to exploit their
advantage.

Only time will tell along with the die rolling:)

ACW Game

I finally put together a large battle using my ACW collection. We are currently still gaming after 2 nights with a 3rd night coming up to complete the game. I have the majority of my collection on the table and it is impressive.

The scenario I am using is loosely based off the Battle of Shiloh. I wanted to create some confusion in the game along with some unpredictibility. I managed this quite well! I had units set up to enter on various turns using their command rolls. Some came on right away and some didn't. So far it has worked to what I was hoping for.

I have 24 brigades, 2 cav brigades, and 15 batteries for the Union. For the Confederates, I have 17 infantry brigades, 2 cav brigades, and 15 batteries. The troops are arranged into divisions/corps. I did all the rolling for troop quality and command rolls ahead of time to speed up the game. My die rolling wasn't to hot for the command rolls. With my system, you need to roll a command roll in order to move units. This number is based on a d10. I had plenty of rolls for command at 6's and 7's. Needless to say, not too many units moved. You need to roll that number or less. This is something I am planning on changing for future games.

The scenario....I had an independant corps moving out in the early morning hours. Each side was probing looking to find each other after several days of miserable weather caused each army to loose each other. The weather began to break, but a heavy fog still lasted for quite sometime. About 4 a.m. the Cav from the independant corps met and commenced to engage.

The picture is of the 2 cav brigades engaged. They fought a couple of turns before the Confederates lost morale and broke. The Confederate infantry brigade and it's artillery made it into the nearby woods and proceeded to hold off the Union troops as the poured on the table. The defense by the Confederate brigade reminded me of the Hornet's Nest at Shiloh.

The remainder of the night dealt with more moving around trying to gain some advantage. Below is a battle report from the field. This is from the 1st day's fighting:

The forces of the CSA and USA were somewhere out in the countryside
plotting and probing their next moves. 3 Corps for the Yankees, and
2 Corps for the Rebels. Small reports from the locals had given
information that each was near, but weather had kept them apart.
Patrols were sent out on each side with no luck. That was until
early one morning when recon troops consisting of 2 cav brigades, 1
inf. bgd and a battery of artillery discovered each other in the
silent, moonless night. That silence was about to be broken.

At about 4am, Union forces had just crossed a bridge and stumbled
upon an equal sized force of Rebs heading in their direction.
Without any hesitation, the Union Cav mounted a charge that was
robustly accepted by the Rebel boys and both crashed into each
other. The scene was chaos! In the darkness, horses whined and men
screamed in agony as pistols went off with orange flashes and sabres
clanged in the night. The troopers from both sides at first refused
to budge. As suddenly as the clash began, it was over! The boys in
gray appeared to have lost heart and were routed from the melee.

With the melee in full force, a rebel brigade managed to move
themselves into the woods along the roadway attempting to re-enforce
the troopers. With the troopers in full flight, the infantry were
left to fend for themselves. Moving to take up a good fighting
position, the dawn began to break revealing more Federals moving
across the bridge. With the brigade appearing to be surrounded, they
dug in and defended the woods from a Union brigade trying to
dislodge them. The boys clad in butternut and gray held firm and
repulsed the blue brigade, forcing them to fall back out of sight.
A huge roar of joy could be heard, but it was short lived as more
and more Union troops began to appear. Another brigade of blue moved
into the woods with vigor but met with the same fate and was too
repulsed. With the Rebel commander hollaring out orders and praise,
the Johnnies were last seen holding firm, disrupting the Union plans.

Along the front, troops from both sides had recieved their orders
and have began to move to the sound of the guns. However, with the
poor visability, many units are unsure about where they are to move
to. Many units stalled in the congestion of the roads as units ahead
of them stalled. Units have engaged to the south, sparring with each
other trying to determine force strength. Another bridge seperates
them, but both sides are spreading out to bring up more fire power.

The middle for the Rebels has seen their units move up but as of
yet, have not engaged. Union lads are moving towards them, but the
misty, foggy day has limited their vision.

To the north, the leading units on both sides have managed to
engage, with a union brigade being routed back as it approached in
column. The Rebel unit was able to deploy faster and moved to line
and sending off a well directed volley. A Blue brigade has managed
to get into the woods, almost flanking the rebel line, but again,
vision has prevented them from seeing this. The rebel lads, spirits
high, anxiously await the next blue column to approach them not
knowing what may hit them.

Small pockets of muskets can be heard throughout the countryside as
both sides desperately try to engage each other. Orders could be
heard to move forward along with the obvious cursing. The fight has
only just begun! As the day progresses, more chaos is sure to ensue
as the armies of both sides are sure to clash in one final struggle.

Local Observer