How do you win shiloh as CSA?

[Dark Brandon]

you're outnumbered, and when you get to Pittsburg Landing, Union reinforcements man the barricades and your troops are tired by then cant charge. Shiloh is the last battle i need to beat all the historical battles. (brig. gen)

[Didz]

Is this the historical battle or the campaign?

The reason I ask is that I've played this battle in the campaign and don't recognise the problem you describe.

In the campaign battle I was able to pretty much follow the initial CSA plan for the battle, by turning the Union left and pushing the Union Army westwards away from the river and their gunboats support and away from the Objective marker at Pittsburgh Landing.

I don't actually remember there being a garrison force manning the barricades, but if there was it must have been trivial and easily brushed aside. The end of the battle basically involved me defending the Pittsburgh VP against repeatedly desperate assaults by tired Union units that had been completely cut-off form the river and pretty much surrounded by my army to the east and south.

Quite honestly the exhausted unit issue is your fault. One of the biggest mistakes you can make in this game is rush your unit back and forth like a bunch of headless chickens. There are very, very, very rare occassions when you should click on the 'Double' button, but it should only be used for short periods of time and you should always remember to unclick it once your done and give your brigade time to recover afterwards. These guys are mostly underfed clerks in uniform carrying 60lbs of kit on their backs, not marathon runners. It much more important that they arrive at their objectives together and fresh.

[Dark Brandon]

historical

[Caramirdan]

In the historical and campaign, for the CSA, effectively I break their middle (their left for the Phase 1 west side of the battle, and their right for the Phase 2 east), which ends up nicely enabling a march straight into the landing on the east side of the battle from my middle (when the west side and east side combine), rolling them up from the Hornet's Nest to the river, flanking the trenches from the west.

[Didz]

Originally posted by Fudgelology:

historical

Interesting I haven't bothered with the historical battles yet, I'm still working through the campaigns. Might have a look and see whats different. What difficultly were you playing on?

[Caramirdan]

Originally posted by Didz:

Originally posted by Fudgelology:

historical

Interesting I haven't bothered with the historical battles yet, I'm still working through the campaigns. Might have a look and see whats different. What difficultly were you playing on?

Man o man, you're in for a treat. The historical battles are fun, not only for the fact that you get to see the actual challenges the generals faced. The devs have mentioned they might be putting in the minor battles as historicals as well; hope this happens soon.

[Aluminum Elite Master]

The historical mode for Shiloh is indeed very different from the campaign. On the campaign, I can win pretty easily as either side... but the historical version is, yeah, a little different.

[Tom]

for the campaign your main goal for i the missions and im saying all the missions counting the historical battles is to inflict as many losses on the enemy as you can this is not conventional warfare its a war of attrition kill as many enemies as you humanly can. what i do is if its the battles before a historical 1 is even if the timer runs out i continue untill every enemy unit is killed routed or captured that way that number of enemy strength is reduced you can do it for historical battles too you can kill the whole enemy army and the strength will be heavliy reduced for the next campaign in the war

[Didz]

Well I thought I'd give the Historical Battle of Shiloh a try, and see if its any different from what i remember from the campaign version, which I've already completed as both the Union and the CSA.

So, far the only real difference I've noticed is that in the historical version I have slighly more troops. In the CSA campaign game my army was not quite as large as the historical version, so I have slightly more troops to play with, but slightly less cavalry, As in my campaign army the 2nd Corps has a full cavalry division of four brigades, but thats no real biggy as most of the map is heavily wooded so cavalry would have been hampered anyway.

I'll post my progress to date, although things are looking pretty good so far, and unless something unexpected happens I should be poised for a victory.

I won't bore you with all the detail, but basically Johnson's I Corps arrived first and drove north to take Shiloh Church, whilst Bragg's II Corps pushed north-east to sweep round to their right and head for Larkin field.

In the next phase Johnson's Corps kept pushing north to capture Spain field and Bragg continued north-east to capture Larkin Field. When Brechinbridge's Reserve Corps finally arrived it was pushed directly North through Larkin field, and relieved Bragg's Corps which began moving north-west towards The Hornets Nest.

The following screenshot shows the final stages of the battle for The Hornets Nest, with Bragg's II Corps having driven the defenders out and off to the north-west and Breckenridges Reserve Corps just beginning to pass behind them and form on their right to extend the line and preven the Union troops making their way back towards Pittsburg Landing.
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1100136850

The following shot shows the overall situation as I left it last night, with the CSA poised to begin their final assault on Pittsburg Landing.
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1100164088
The plan is to push Breckenridge's Reserve Corps north screened by Bragg's II Corps which will extend its front northwards to keep the Union troops pinned on the west side of the road.

Hardy's III Corps and Johnson's I Corps will gradually push north to maintain the continuity of the front and prevent the Union from disengaging and moving north. The overall intention being to keep the Union army bottled up on the west side of the pike whilst Breckenridge takes the final objective.

So, far all I can see on the objective is a single artillery battery so, fingers crossed, that Breckenridge has the manpower to take it.

Breckenridge takes the objective.
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1100238431
Bit messier than I would have liked, but the objective has been taken.

Most of the Reserve Corps got delayed. One brigade had to stop to deal with a stray Union brigade that had survived Larkin Field and was trying to make its way north to join the defence of the landing. Another was caught up in a firefight along the road, and couldn't disengage until Braggs Corps moved up to relieve it.

The net result was that two skirmish units had to rush the Union batteries defending the objective, which they did successfully, and then Breckenridges remaining brigade moved up to secure it.

Bragg is gradually shuffling his Corps northwards along the eastern side of the road, whilst Hardy is distracting the enemy by attacking their rear. However, he is deliberately not putting too much pressure on as he doesn't want to drive the enemy towards the objective and make life harder for Breckenridge.

Johnson's Corps is simply holding the line to the south to prevent the enemy breaking out of the pocket. But again there is no need to push any harder.

Victory
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1100247054
The Victory screen just suddenly popped up. i was so absorbed in shuffling units north that I didn't even notice if the time had run out, or whther it just gives you victory as soon as the objective is secured. So, it took me a bit by surprise,

But basically that's how you win Shiloh as CSA.

[The Cunning Fox (raZoleg)]

Originally posted by Didz:

Well I thought I'd give the Historical Battle of Shiloh a try, and see if its any different from what i remember from the campaign version, which I've already completed as both the Union and the CSA.

So, far the only reall difference I've noticed is that in the hisotrical version I have slighly more troops. In the CSA campaign game my army was quite as large as the historical version, so I have slightly more troops to play with, but slightly less cavalry, As in my campaign army the 2nd Corps has a full cavalry division of four brigades, but thats no real biggy as most of the map is heavily wooded so cavalry would have been hampered anyway.

I'll post my progress to date, although things are looking pretty good so far, and unless something unexpected happens I should be poised for a victory.

I won't bore you with all the detail, but basically Johnson's I Corps arrived first and drove north to take Shiloh Church, whilst Bragg's II Corps pushed north-east to sweep round to their right and head for Larkin field.

In the next phase Johnson's Corps kept pushing north to capture Spain field and Bragg continued north-east to capture Larkin Field. When Brechinbridge's Reserve Corps finally arrived it was pushed directly North through Larkin field, and relieved Bragg's Corps to begin moving north-west towards The Hornets Nest.

The following screenshot shows the final stages of the battle for The Hornets Nest, with Bragg's II Corps having driven the defenders out and off to the north-west and Breckenridges Reserve Corps just beginning to pass behind them anf form on their right to extend the line and preven the Union troops making their way back towards Pittsburg Landing.
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1100136850

The following shot shows the overall situation as I left it last night, with the CSA poised to begin their final assault on Pittsburg Landing.
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1100164088
The plan is to push Breckenridge's Reserve Corps north screened by Bragg's II Corps which will extend its front northwards to keep the Union troops pinned on the west side of the road.

Hardy's III Corps and Johnson's I Corps will gradually push north to maintain the continuity of the front and prevent the Union from disengaging and moving north. The overall intention being to keep the Union army bottled up on the west side of the pike whilst Breckenridge takes the final objective.

So, far all I can see on the objective is a single artillery battery so, fingers crossed, that Brecken ridge has the manpower to take it.

Breckenridge takes the objective.
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1100238431
Bit messier than I would have liked, but the objective has been taken.

Most of the Reserve Corps got delayed. One brigade had to stop to deal with a stray Union brigade that had survived Larkin Field and was trying to make its way north to join the defence of the landing. Another was caught up in a firefight along the pike, and couldn't disengage until Braggs Corps moved up to relieve it.

The net result was that two skirmish units had to rush the Union batteries defending the objective, which they did successfully, and then Breckenridges remaining brigade moved up to secure the objective.

Bragg's is gradually shuffling his Corps northwards along the eastern side of the pike, whilst Hardy is distracting the enemy from the far side. However, he is deliberately not putting too much pressure on as he doesn;t want to drive the enemy towards the objective and make life harder for Breckenridge.

Johnson's Corps is simply holding the line to the south to prevent the enemy breaking out of the pocket. But again there is no need to push any harder.

Victory
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1100247054
The Victory screen just suddenly popped up. i was so absorbed in shuffling units north Ii didn;t even notice if the time had run out, or whther it just gives you victory as soon as the objective is secured. So, it took me a bit by suprise,

But basically that how you win Shiloh as CSA.

All this, but in short edible chunks for TL;DR

[Dark Brandon]

did it!

[Dark Brandon]

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1100683637

[Caramirdan]

Originally posted by Fudgelology:

did it!

Grats!

[Didz]

Originally posted by Fudgelology:

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1100683637

Well done!

Though looking at the mini-map it doesn;t look like you followed my advice, or Johnsons plan.