This coming August will mark the third anniversary of Death Valley’s publication. During the GMT Seminar at CSW-Expo 2019, six weeks or so before the game shipped to customers, I announced that designer Greg Laubach was working on a follow-up battle, Piedmont.
As time went on, those listening that evening might have wondered what had become of this mini-game on a single rather smallish Civil War battle. The answer is that, just as Death Valley’s initial concept grew to encompass the Shenandoah’s big-name 1864 battles in addition to the 1862 battles, so the expansion pack grew to include McDowell, Second Winchester, and Cool Spring, yielding a total of nine scenarios or variants.
The expansion pack battles are not exactly household words, but interested readers can easily find accounts of them online. Thus, this article will focus on the challenges each posed to the design and development process, detouring into history only as necessary for an understanding of those challenges.
McDowell, May 8th, 1862
We hesitated before taking on this one. Anyone who’s been out to the field (not overly far from Staunton, VA) can probably guess why. The hills here present the same problem for terrain depiction as South Mountain did for Richard Berg’s like-named game in the Twin Peaks package. My wife and I visited the field in October, 2016, and I recall how we toiled up the trail to the top of Sitlington’s Hill, retracing the steps of Jackson’s Confederate troops, only to find the hill’s northwestern slope even steeper than the one we’d just climbed. It was up that northwestern slope that Union brigadier Robert Milroy launched his unanticipated assault. It had to be work for the Union troops, burdened as they were with rifles, ammunition, canteens, and whatever they had in their haversacks.
The Alleghenies as seen from Fort Johnson
(developer’s photo)
Another nagging problem was the mismatched small-arms carried by the opposing forces. Most of the Union troops carried rifled muskets, while the majority of Confederates at this early stage of the war were still equipped with smoothbores, particularly in Edward “Allegheny” Johnson’s division. GBACW players know what the Union player might do: stop two hexes away from the enemy and fire away, scoffing at Return Fire, dogged as it would be with a -2 DRM for smoothbore fire at that range.
Greg solved the terrain problem by doubling the 25-foot per elevation change found in the rest of Death Valley and the expansion pack. He then devised a new set of terrain effects reflecting the more difficult slopes. Those terrain effects set the stage for solving the problem of mismatched armaments. It’s hard to get up that hill, and it’s not a long battle. The Union cannot afford to depend on Fire Table results to drive the Rebs off, especially as Jackson’s division is meanwhile making its way up the back of the hill to reinforce Johnson’s troops.
Edward “Allegheny” Johnson
Historically, Milroy launched what could be called a spoiling attack, catching Jackson in the middle of preparing a flanking march and thus relatively flatfooted. A special Efficiency mechanic simulates Jackson’s sluggish response, and a judicious selection of victory point hexes compels the Union player not only to replicate Milroy’s attack but to close with the enemy, as will likely be necessary to take the ground. All this is not to say that the Yankee advantage in small-arms doesn’t count, because it does. Jackson suffered painful losses at McDowell, and playtesting indicated that he would in the game, as well. In this game, infantry strength points lost to Fire Table results generate victory points for the enemy.
Speaking of playtesting, I thank Andrea Pagni for his inestimable contribution to this scenario. His ability to analyze a situation not only makes him a formidable GBACW player, but a wonderful counselor for lost developers.
The Battle of McDowell
(from: Steven Stanley, American Battlefield Trust)
2nd Winchester, June 13th-15th, 1863
In retrospect, McDowell’s teething problems pale before those of 2nd Winchester. GBACW does just fine with three-day battles like 2nd Manassas, Stone’s River, Gettysburg, and Chickamauga. But in each of those, large, relatively balanced armies contend with each other. At 2nd Winchester, on the other hand, 14,000 Confederates confronted about 8000 Federals. How were we to keep players from routing or eliminating every unit on the field before even a fraction of the actual battle’s 46 hours elapsed?
Had we solved this problem, we’d have faced another. It’s hard to imagine GBACW fans embracing a long battle involving relatively small forces, an extensive set of maps depicting the course of the Valley Pike from south of Kernstown to north of Stephenson’s Depot, and restrictions designed to slow the action to the battle’s historical pace. To gain an idea of that pace requires a brief account of how the battle unfolded.
Richard Ewell’s first challenge as new commander of Lee’s III Corp was to clear the Union forces out of the lower Shenandoah. The problem was that those enemy forces were rather substantial – two brigades at Winchester, another at Berryville, and still another at Martinsburg; about 10,000 men in all. Ewell had to do his work quickly if the Pennsylvania-bound Army of Northern Virginia were to steal a march on Hooker’s Army of the Potomac. While Rodes’ division was assigned the capture of Berryville and Martinsburg, Johnson’s and Early’s divisions accompanied Ewell to Winchester, where none other than Robert Milroy commanded. The previous year Milroy had shown himself a worthy opponent not only at McDowell, but a month later at Cross Keys, where he led his troops forward despite the timidity of his commander, John C. Fremont. But now Milroy’s natural combativeness played him falsely. At first he discounted reports of enemy infantry headed his way. Then, when no doubt remained, he told his superior, Major General Robert Schenck in Baltimore, that he could hold for five days if relieved by that time.
Ewell approached Winchester cautiously, perhaps recalling the way he’d sent 21st North Carolina into a deadly ambush southeast of town a little over a year before. He planned to have most of Early’s division conduct a flank march west and then north, placing it in position to attack Milroy’s forts from the west. The rest of the Confederate forces on hand would limit themselves to skirmishing as a diversion.
June 13th witnessed only one truly sharp fight south of town, and John Brown Gordon’s losses in that fight could not have encouraged Old Baldhead to push the diversion any harder. On the 14th skirmishing continued, not only south of town but to the east, as Allegheny Johnson’s division worked its way north. Late that afternoon Jubal Early delivered the Confederate’s first real hammer blow with his attack on the West Fort. The attack succeeded, and that evening Milroy announced to his assembled brigade leaders that he lacked both the rations and ammunition needed to make good his boast of standing for five days. With Ewell’s artillery now perched on the West Fort ridge, dominating the remaining Union forts, Milroy evacuated Winchester overnight. Ewell anticipated the maneuver, sending Johnson’s troops on their own night march to block the Valley Pike just south of Stephenson’s Depot. At dawn on June 15th Milroy attempted to drive Johnson off. He failed with disastrous results, about half the Union troops surrendering while the rest made their way north as best they could.
Action at Winchester, June 14th, 1863
(from: Emerging Civil War)
The solution Greg adopted for the time/space problems the battle posed was to create scenarios depicting the highlights of the battle, one each for June 13th, June 14th, and the action near Stephenson’s Depot on the 15th, as well as a small scenario focusing solely on Jubal Early’s attack on the West Fort.
The first and last named were easy to playtest and develop. Stephenson’s depot was a bit tougher. In that one, Milroy’s objective is to bypass the Confederate blocking force, and Johnson’s division is not large enough to stop him. But, as we’ve seen, that’s not the way the battle went. Milroy pitched into the enemy so as to continue his retreat along the Valley Pike. So, although we permit Milroy to exit the north map edge anywhere west of the Valley Pike (as the survivors ultimately did), Milroy’s escape is dependent on a successful attack. Union units exiting the map do not count for victory unless Milroy currently occupies at least one of six Victory hexes along the Winchester & Potomac Railroad.
Stephenson’s Depot Battlefield
(from: Stone Sentinels)
The June 14th scenario proved to be the most challenging in the entire expansion pack. As the historical sketch above indicates, there simply wasn’t much fighting until Early launched his attack late in the day. How were we to simulate that and yet maintain player interest?
The most important mechanic Greg introduced was variable entry for Early’s flanking force, variable not only in terms of time, but in terms of location. In fact, the Confederate player is free to bring Early on from the south, behind Gordon, Herbert and Johnson. The CSA player makes his decision pre-game and keeps it secret from his opponent until the turn Early’s division enters.
Jubal Early
Unfortunately, this flexibility pretty much guaranteed the Confederates would bring Early on as soon as possible, giving them ten turns to use their full strength to grind Milroy’s division to pulp. That certainly wouldn’t do, but neither would a game in which both sides knew when and where Early was going to enter. After much playtesting, it became evident that Early’s division needed six turns to reach the front lines, deploy, and then gain the upper hand against Milroy. That led us to rule that the game ends after that turn. If the Confederates bring Early on at 1100, then 1600 is the last turn. If Early enters when he historically did, at 1500, then 2000 is the last turn.
Of course, 1900 is a Dusk turn, and 2000 a Night turn. Attacks during such turns are more difficult than during the day. However, the later Early enters, the more time the Confederate player has to gain whatever advantage he can with his on-map commands. I phrase it that way because we did not want to lose sight of Ewell’s actual orders to these formations. While Gordon’s crack all-Georgia brigade and the small Maryland Line brigade under Herbert are free to proceed as the player wants, Johnson’s division cannot adopt Attack Orders until artillery accompanying Early fires at the enemy, or a Union unit moves adjacent to any of the Confederates.
John Brown Gordon leads his troops at Gettysburg
(Dan Troiani)
Johnson is free to maneuver, however. That might be an attractive proposition, due to a rule designed to reflect Milroy’s folly in having stayed too long at Winchester. If at the end of the game the Union artillery cannot trace a path to a road hex at the north, west, or east edge of the scenario’s playing area without that path coming adjacent to the enemy, the artillery is eliminated, evoking the way Milroy abandoned it the night he evacuated the town. And of course, the CSA player would earn a VP for each eliminated gun, as in Death Valley. The rule is easier on Milroy’s infantry and cavalry – if they can trace any sort of path east, north or west and off the map without it coming adjacent to the enemy, they avoid automatic rout. Thus, Johnson can choose to work Milroy’s flanks, forcing the Union player to bar the way by deploying strength ultimately needed elsewhere.
There was still another factor to consider in all this. Milroy has a big division. Somewhere out there in GBACW-land there was bound to be a Union player unable to resist the temptation to attack, despite not knowing when or where Early might show up. Even as fabled as Gordon’s brigade and Johnson’s division were, they’d be in for a tough fight, especially if Early wasn’t due to enter until 1500. Two considerations might give such a Union player pause. First, the on-map Confederates are veteran troops, and moving adjacent to them relieves the restriction on Johnson’s division. Second, If the Union moves adjacent to the enemy south of town, Johnson can call upon his reserves, an infantry brigade and an artillery battalion, which otherwise sit out the game, as they sat out the battle.
Yet even that might not dissuade an aggressive Union player. There’s an additional victory condition reflecting the fact that Ewell wasn’t simply fighting to recapture Winchester, but was leading the ANV’s march toward and beyond the Potomac. The Union earns a victory point for each infantry strength points Ewell loses. This rule is an important part of the toolkit used to balance the scenario.
Due to the variety of extreme cases possible, playtesting for the June 14th scenario was more extensive than that for any GBACW scenario I’ve developed thus far. For instance, what if Early entered during the 1100 or 1500 turn? What if Milroy attacked as soon as he could? What if Johnson did indeed work the flank? Fortunately, I had plenty of help, and will always be grateful to Alex Barney, Kevin Coombs, Nathan Mueller, Neil Randall, Alan Sawyer, and Dick Whitaker for rallying around the flag.
The Star Fort north of Winchester
(developer’s photo)
Piedmont, June 5th, 1864
How could a game pitting an infantry and a cavalry division against a similar force possibly cause design/development headaches? Once again, we must consider the actual event. Early in the morning of June 5th, 1864, General David Hunter sent Julius Stahel’s Union cavalry south toward the crossroads just south of the hamlet of Piedmont. Opposing them was John Imboden’s cavalry brigade. A swirling battle ensued for several hours before each side’s infantry was in a position to influence events. While cavalry losses weren’t heavy, Stahel bested Imboden, the latter able to do no more than slow the Yankee horse soldiers.
The main reason the infantry took so long to engage was the shape of the battlefield, stretching approximately six miles along the right bank of Middle River and at no point in the struggle extending eastward much more than a mile and a half. The opposing infantry entered from opposite sides of this elongated area.
The historic battlefield did more than anything else to shape design/development decisions. For starters, it required two 22×17 inch maps, with the 17 inch sides abutting, reminiscent of Avalon Hill’s Afrika Korps. Next, knowing how long it took Hunter’s infantry to reach the positions from which it launched its actual attack, we had to work out Orders, Efficiency and Fatigue in such a way that made the historical deployments possible. The scenario would not have worked well if Hunter’s infantry could have reached its jump-off positions too soon, or had to accept a degree of Fatigue to arrive on time. This was even more imperative, since a scenario depicting the infantry fight that started around 1300 is also included. Lastly, we had to ensure that neither side’s cavalry could get away with any of the “funny business” victory-hungry players like to conduct with fast troops, such as blocking reinforcement entry hexes or beating up enemy units made vulnerable simply due to the vagaries of activation by chit-draw.
A portion of the Piedmont battlefield
(from: National Park Service)
Funny business notwithstanding, we also sought to preserve the possibility of that swirling cavalry battle occurring, while minimizing the chance of it being decisive for the game’s outcome. Greg achieved this by maximizing the number of AMs each side’s cavalry receives during the first three turns. How best to use this wealth of opportunity is, of course, up to the players, but we believe it presents them with the same problems Stahel and Imboden actually faced that day, along with the capability of implementing just about any solution they’d like to try.
While the 0600 scenario allows the Confederates a wide choice of defensive lines, the 1300 scenario presents the players with the historic positions at that point in the battle. Piedmont was a close-run affair, with Grumble Jones not only repulsing Hunter’s initial assaults, but even counterattacking before the Yankees finally found his weak spot. Extensive playtesting indicated that both scenarios allowed for the full range of historic possibilities and needed only minimally different victory conditions. I thank Pepe Moya, Allen Dickerson, Nathan Mueller and Charles Golightly for that playtesting.
The Battle of Piedmont
(from: Steven Stanley)
Cool Spring, July 18th, 1864
As the foregoing demonstrates, games on small battles are not necessarily the easiest to design or develop. That held true for Cool Spring, too. As in the case of Piedmont, the nature of the battle contributed to the problems, but so did the GBACW system.
Cool Spring Battlefield
(from: American Battlefield Trust)
During its pursuit of Jubal Early’s Valley Army after Monocacy, Union forces under Horatio Wright found themselves stymied trying to cross the Shenandoah versus John Brown Gordon’s Confederate division at Castleman’s Ferry. Wright thereupon directed George Crook to take Joseph Thoburn’s division downstream, cross at Island Ford, and then head back upstream to outflank and dislodge Gordon’s force. Unfortunately for Thoburn, Early had the divisions of Gabriel Wharton and Robert Rodes posted not too far from the Ford, and both responded to the emergency. Thoburn managed to get his troops across and into position before Rodes hit his right flank. Curiously, Wharton did not join in the attack, except to send his sharpshooters forward to harass the enemy and support Rodes.
Although Union artillery atop the high ground along the river’s right bank did good execution, Thoburn eventually had to evacuate his toehold on the left bank. Of his force of 5000, 1250 were “unreliable dismounted cavalry”, another 500 served in a “100-day regiment” (the 170th Ohio, akin to militia), and two more regiments consisted of “Maryland garrison troops”.* These were simply no match for Rodes’ veterans. Thoburn’s men were beginning to stream back across the ford when James Ricketts’ division arrived on the east bank of the river. Although Ricketts had been ordered to support Thoburn, it was probably too late to reverse the day’s decision.
Early playtesting revealed that Thoburn could not hope to stand versus Wharton and Rodes. Greg thereupon created a mechanic limiting Wharton’s participation in the battle, just as it was limited in the event. It’s never our intent to deny an alternative narrative in a GBACW game, and if the Confederate player is lucky, Wharton will pitch in before too much game time elapses. However, the earlier his intervention, the higher its cost in victory points awarded to the Union player.
While going far to balance the scenario, this mechanic does not guarantee Thoburn will do his best. His second- and third-class troops are not only more prone to Rout than his veterans, but they have little maneuvering room inside the bridgehead. If one unit routs, the results can be grim for the Union player, depending on other units’ status and proximity. Still, the victory conditions are pitched high enough for the CSA player that it would truly be a bad day for the Union if routed units ruined Wright’s hope of victory, or at least a Draw.
The Battle of Cool Spring
(from: Steven Stanley)
Yet the game provides an unlucky Union player a consolation prize—a “what-if” variant in which Ricketts crosses the river and joins in the fight. In the variant, the restrictions on Wharton are lifted right after the head of Ricketts’ column finishes its first move onto the map. In addition, a whole new set of victory conditions determines the winner.
Cool Spring required plenty of playtesting as we worked out Thoburn’s best options, found them all wanting, and then returned to the fray equipped with Wharton’s restrictions. Once again, Andrea Pagni contributed immensely. I thank Charles Golightly and Nathan Mueller, as well, for their playtesting.
Closing Remarks
GBACW has proven itself robust enough to successfully handle far more than the big-name Civil War battles. Indeed, Gringo!, Battles with the Gringos, and Churubusco proved that long ago. Even if some battles, like the Seven Days, Chancellorsville, or Spotsylvania, might defy attempts to cover them start to finish, they seem eminently suitable if approached the way we did 2nd Winchester, with scenarios for the separate fights comprising the overall battle.
Battles for the Shenandoah is done and perhaps already on its way to the printer. The series continues to be blessed with dedicated playtesters, without whom the games would not be what they are, or might not be at all. Do not be surprised if more than one of them graduate to designing their own games in the future. Given the number of potential themes for future installments in the series, I believe that would be a most welcome development for GBACW fans.
*See Scott Patchan, Shenandoah Summer: the 1864 Valley Campaign, p. 67. Univ. of Nebraska Press, 2007.
Author: William Byrne
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