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Valdemar -> Southern Strategy (7/11/2007 11:58:45 PM)
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What follows are suggestions for an opening southern strategy. The operative word here is strategy, meaning that the discussion will center on the grand situation and operational level concerns. The other disclaimer I need to add is that my strategic view is colored by the belief that economics and logistics are more vital to winning wars of attrition than purely military operations. So, if you come to this with a focus on the Confederate military as the means of victory, you might be disappointed with my emphasis on economic concerns. However, I recognize that economies need militaries as much as militaries need economies. The reason I will place emphasis on the economy is that the military situation will vary depending on what your northern opponent does, but the economic situation will vary much more by what you do and a little to luck.
The Economy
Initially, the South is producing adequate amounts of labor and horse, but is desperately short of money and metal. The South is also producing few weapons. Another concern is that many southern cities have little room for building more buildings and those that do have room are precariously close to likely paths of enemy movement. This a concern because you should try to build critical building upgrades in as dispersed a manner as possible so that if the enemy overruns part of the South it will not cripple you. All your eggs won't be in one basket, so to speak. Realistically though, you don't have the time or resources to build plantations in every city that needs expansion room, so you'll have to build where you can. While not a concern for the economy, the South is woefully short of rail transport points, but it will be up to the economy to fix that problem, so I list it here.
On the positive side, you have access to a nearly free and practically unlimited supply of resources through your blockade runners. Yes, there is some risk and luck is a big factor, but it is reasonable to say that you will average a haul of resource(s) per turn. Obviously, you should concentrate on the lowest risk items first, Regardless of what they are and within that low risk subset, seek out metal first, horses second, and money third. Do not risk losing your runners. Should they become damaged, repair them. It is better to miss a turn of resources than lose the BR.
In order of priority, the things which must be built to improve the southern economy are:
1) Mint.
2) Mine.
3) Plantation. (The best return on investment in the game.)
While there are certainly other buildings that are desperately needed, and I'll get to them, none are as important that these three shouldn't be built first. You should build one of each of these per turn, resources permitting, in the first year. Whatever your resource situation is each turn, for the first year, try to build one of each, or as many as you can. As space to build more Mints and Mines becomes tight, emphasis should switch to building Plantations. But you shouldn't wait until you are out of space to build more Plantations. Place them in cities that need room and are near the center of the Confederacy, away from enemy forces.
Doing this for a year is somewhat arbitrary, but you must redress the Confederacy's poor economy in a serious way. You cannot depend on gifts from the Europeans, particularly with my strategy, nor can you count on BRs to get by.
Military concerns for the economy:
As mentioned, you have a desperate need for more railroad points. "Why", you ask? Because the South must mount a mobile defense in order to gain local superiority against incursions and then move back to exposed areas. The time to build more RR stations is, as soon as possible. To be specific, you should build one as soon as you score a major iron haul from your BRs. Just remember to build a Mine or a Mint or a Plantation at the same time. It is absolutely critical that at least one of those gets built every turn for the first year or so. I'd build another with the next big iron haul, and so on. If you prioritize scooping up iron with your BRs where possible, you will be able to start construction on your first new RR Station after just a few turns.
Another critical concern, and one that cannot wait, is the construction of several Hospitals in the eastern theatre of operations. Thankfully, they only cost labor and that is one thing the South has in reasonable amounts (not that more wouldn't be better). I repeat this for emphasis, when building your hospitals, remember to build a Mint, Mine, or Plantation somewhere during that turn. In order to get the three you need built in time for the first winter, you may want to start construction of one a turn after turn 2. Thankfully, this is sort of a one time emergency and after you build several hospitals in/near Virginia, you can set them much lower on your priority list for awhile.
After the Hospital and RR Station crises have been met, your next priority is building Camps. Here a Camp, there a Camp, everywhere a Camp-camp. "Why", you ask? Because right from the outset, you start with your existing army depleted by slightly more than 200,000 men. 200,000! You'd have a seriously kickass cadre if you had 200,000 more men, wouldn't you? Yes, you would. You're replacing a paultry 2000 men per turn. Since you will suffer significant attrition from disease and just from moving, you need to jack this figure higher as quickly as possible. Your goal should be to get to 10,000 replacements per turn. That means that next to Mints, Mines, and Plantations, Camps will be your next highest priority (after the Hospital-RR Station crises are met). My plan to deal with this is to build them as soon as opportunity presents. Mints consume labor and metal to build. Mines only labor, while Plantations and Camps require labor and horse. Mines and Camps are in competition for labor resources, so it may be necessary to alternate building a Mine one turn and a Camp the next. This may also be necessary because Camps require 100 horses. Depending on how much space is available it may also be necessary to forego a Camp in favor of another Plantation. But remember that in order to get to 10,000 replacements per turn, you need to build 16 more camps. 16!
What's next on the priority list? Research! Fortunately, the main resource consumed by research buildings is money. Since none of the buildings that we've listed previously as higher priorities require money for construction, the balancing act is a bit easier. The question becomes more about what research do you pursue first and when do you start building. Lets answer the second part first, the question of when to build. The answer is, well, as soon as possible. Now before you smack me, the "as soon as possible" part depends on just two easily managed factors, namely: how much iron and/or horses you have after you've attended to your other priorities, because you'll have plenty of money. With this in mind, you will not be able to begin regularly constructing research buildings until after the first year. You might have an opportunity here or there with big hauls of iron or horses from your BRs to build a research center in addition to your other builds, but you won't be able to construct research centers in numbers until the second year. By then, you'll have built a number of Mints, Mines, and Plantations, enough to get the South to the point where basic economic development is no longer your first all-consuming priority. Mints, Mines and Plantations will still be high priorities after the first year, but you will be able to focus on the material aspects of war first. In answering the question of what to research, I recommend training first (War College), logistics a close second (Laboratory), engineering (duh, Engineering), then weapons (Armory). While not a category of research, I'd prioritize Schools next, then naval technology (Naval College), and Universities only if you're winning the war and have nothing better to spend it on.
Now I know that you've raised an eyebrow a couple of times because I haven't urged the construction of Arsenals (+2 weapons), I haven't urged you to use your BRs to trade cotton for weapons, and I just said that weapons research is low on the priority of research needs. So you're thinking, "What gives? Doesn't this guy know that the Confederate Army needs better weapons?" Well of course I know that. The problem is that building all the aforementioned upgrades is far more important. Because the South starts with a qualitative superiority over the Union and because we have the advantage of defense, we have some breathing space. The other reason to set weapon construction and weapon research so low in priority is that weapon/fort upgrades require money and sometimes other critical resources to buy and build. We don't have the money to spend. It's just that simple. There's only so much money to go around and we need that scarce amount for other more important things. Having said that, your raider, partisan, and BRs might score weapons hauls from time to time. This will not be a reliable source of weapons and it will be small scale, but it's better than nothing. If you have some extra weapons and money, by all means, upgrade a brigade with better rifles. But emphasizing weapons research and getting Sharps rifles before the North does is absolutely useless if you haven't been able to build a single new Arsenal, much less afford the weapons upgrades for your Army. Weapon upgrades only benefit one unit in your army. By contrast, you will get Army-wide upgrades to firepower through tactics research. Logistics will allow more efficient use of your scarce resources, and engineering will again give you Army-wide bonuses to defense and siege attack. Training first, logistics second, engineering, then weapons. Naval technology is not worth researching until you have gained a parity with the North in the ground war. On the construction side, Arsenal builds begin after your able to turn your priorities to research and Camps. Arsenals are a near substitute in terms of resource cost for a Mint. So, when you feel you have enough Mints, start building Arsenals.
Methods:
What I've outlined here is very ambitious, somewhat risky, and extremely demanding on scarce resources. So you ask, "How am I supposed to build all this stuff with the southern economy?" I'm glad you asked. There are two tricks, if you will, to accomplish this. On the first turn of the game, in every region where you can impress resources with only a 10% chance of unrest, do it. Impress every low-risk region. I emphasize doing this on the first turn because if you get unrest, restart and do it again until you're able to impress without getting unrest. Some may call it cheating, I don't. I could explain my reasons, but just suffice for now that I think the chances of unrest are too high for the rewards to be gained. You may wish to continue to impress goods from time to time. Personally, I've never had to impress goods after the first turn, but I think this massive impressment effort is critical for the south to get on its feet quickly. Granted, you may not get many resources, or they may not be what you need most, but any amount is well worth the negative adjustments to Governor's attitudes towards you. The second trick is to not spend any money on diplomacy, not for awhile anyway. Now before you scoff and change threads, let me explain. There are several compelling reasons for the South to eschew diplomacy entirely in the early game.
1) The North can easily afford 100+ money per turn on diplomacy, which does nothing for him but torpedoes your efforts.
2) The rewards you can get from diplomacy are minimal until you can spend significant amounts of money to gain favor.
3) Considering the very low return on the investment in diplomacy during the first year, you can spend the money on other things guaranteed to produce needed resources.
4) For 150 cash, you can build another BR that will nearly always gain you a resource reward per turn. Most players will spend 150 cash on diplomacy in 4 or 5 turns. You could start construction of a BR on that same turn.
5) The very worst your ratings with Europe can go is 0. That can and frequently does occur even while spending considerably on diplomacy because the North is outspending you. So what if relations go to zero? You can always repair it in the future when you have the money to match northern spending.
In short, BRs are a universally better return on investment that can continue to pay well after the initial cost, whereas diplomacy is not likely to have immediate returns and requires considerable cash before reasonable gains can occur. The key to diplomatic spending is to spend nothing on it until you can spend a lot on it. That is so for the South. The North must spend at least some money on diplomacy continually.
Thus, by not spending any money on diplomacy, your cash crunch is solved and you have it available for weapon upgrades, research buildings, and most importantly, more BRs. This is why I also recommended going for iron and horses before money with your BRs, because you will likely have enough money. The rest of the South's economic miracle just comes from being focused like a laser beam on building Mints, Mines, and Plantations.
Diplomacy:
Since we're sort of on the topic... The answer is, just say "no" to diplomacy. Build BRs with the money you would've spent on diplomacy in your first year and see which yields the most fruit first. As Arnold the Govenator says, "listen to me now, believe me later". When it is time for diplomacy, spend 50 money on one foreign power before you spend anything on the next. When you've spent 50 money on the second, then you can start on the third. It simply doesn't pay you a quick enough return to spend 1 here and 2 there and 1 over that-away. Concentrate your resources for the maximum possible effect. I recommend Britain first, then France, then the rest. The logic there is that even though the other Europeans seem better disposed to the South that Britain or France, they can't enter the war on your side. Now, some might argue for a different order to powers in your attempt to influence them, and I know that France first, Europe second, and Britain last has some real merit, but I just prefer to try to get war entry on the two possibles before I court Austro-Hungary and Prussia.
The Military:
As leader of the CSA, you are faced with two contradictory military needs. The first is the need to capitalize on the South's initial superiority in quality over the North. Opposing this is the need to conserve manpower and units. Notice that you need to conserve units as much as manpower, because it is much easier and less costly to replace manpower through Camps, than to pay the economic and political costs of creating a new one. I recommend being aggressive. Contest the North for possession of Kentucky. Look for opportunities to ambush the North with superior numbers early on. You should also try to tie down or contest northern forces in the Far West and for control of Wheeling, WV. If you are able to hand the North an early defeat in WV or KY, the northern player is likely to send his corps in the Far West to the Ohio area. Use this opportunity to take your AK division north and take territory. The other thing to do early on is strip those garrisons with more than one unit and send the extras to the nearest larger formation. The South has to wage a mobile defense and launch spoiling attacks. This requires your manpower to be in your armies and corps, not sitting in forts. The other reason to minimize garrisons, is that you should not spend any money and weapons on fort upgrades. You need those resources to upgrade your brigades to better rifles. Again, it is your armies that will hurt the North, not your garrisons. Later, when you're forced onto the defensive, then reoccupy and reinforce your forts with more garrison troops where appropriate. One thing to carefully pay attention to is the governors section of your turn reports. Whenever you see a governor supporting mustering or conscription, then recruit from every city in that state just before the next April. You will get some brigades without political cost and the replenishment in April will help minimize the hit to production of resources through the loss of population. This may not happen, but always keep an eye out for governor's aid.
It is now summer 1862 and you've started emphasizing building Camps, research facilities, and Arsenals, and this is the point to start focusing on quality upgrades to your troops. Use Weapons and whatever extra money is available to buy/build better weapons for your brigades. Do this before you spend anything on fort upgrades. It is much easier to defend a fort by driving off the attackers than it is to sacrifice the garrison in hopes of getting a better kill ratio. In the end, the fort will fall, your brigades will be annihilated (meaning you have to build expensive replacements), and you'll still have to force the Yanks off your land to preserve your economic base. There is rarely a benefit to letting your forts do the fighting, especially if your opponent is like me and simply bypasses strongpoints and aims right for a juicy city. Obviously, you've been busily promoting generals to vacant command positions over this past year and they may have taught your troops some valuable special abilities. All the better, because the name of the Confederate game from now on is quality over quantity. You cannot match the North's ability to create new units. He has the resources to buy what he needs and while loss of population is something he cannot ignore, it will hurt him much less than it will you. You have to try get a large army through replacement Camps. Remember, the goal is 10,000 per turn. Therefore, for you to have a chance to last through 1863, you need to start the quality upgrades and continue to engage in mobile defense in order to gain local superiority.
I know it is tempting to build partisans and raiders, but don't. You need those horses for Plantations and Camps far more than you need to destroy northern supply. Use the two you start with to full effect, but if they are destroyed, do not replace them.
Regards,
Valdemar
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