Weather in A House Divided

A House Divided now includes event cards, one of which is drawn each turn, and there are unique decks for each of the years of the war after 1861. Every card is drawn and played once, and so every one of the historic events portrayed by the card occur, but players are unsure in what order within the year they will happen.

One of the functions of the cards is to add weather effects to the game. There are three weather cards in each full year of the game, and their main effect is to have that turn represent the passage of two months instead of one. This shortens each game year from 12 turns to 9, because game length, particularly when playing the historical campaign, was an issue in the original game.

But most of the weather cards also have an additional effect, and they are all tied to historical events. Here are the weather events represented in the game.

January/February 1862: STORMS (advance turn marker one additional month)

January of 1862 was particularly cold and snowy in the east and very wet further west.

August/September 1862: DROUGHT (advance turn marker one additional month, no cavalry jump moves allowed, Confederate player removes one unit to recruitment or promotion pool)

The heat and drought in the summer of 1862 severely restricted army movement. The widespread Southern crop failures also caused unrest and much desertion, as men went home to help their struggling families.

November/December 1862: STORMS (advance turn marker one additional month, no naval invasions of naval jump moves) 

Heavy rains and flooding in the last months of 1862 severely limited Union efforts to drive down the Mississippi. Offshore storms disrupted the Union fleet at Port Royal and sank the US ironclad Monitor on its return voyage north.

January/February 1863: STORMS (advance turn marker one additional month)

January of 1863 was particularly wet, and the Union attempt to launch an early campaign turned into a fiasco, Burnsides’s famous “Mud March.”

August/September 1863: DROUGHT (advance turn marker one additional month, no cavalry jump moves allowed)

The heat and drought in the summer of 1863 again caused widespread crop failures and restricted army movement.

October/November 1863: STORMS (advance turn marker one additional month, no naval invasions or jump moves, no unit can take more than one march)

Heavy rains, cold, and snow in the last months of 1862 limited army maneuvers.

January/February 1864: STORMS (advance turn marker one additional month, no naval jump moves) 

May/June 1864: INTENSE HEAT (advance turn marker one additional month, no cavalry jump moves, both players remove one active infantry unit to the recruiting or promotion pool) 

The early hot weather in May of 1864 during the Wilderness Campaign restricted movement and increased casualties from heat exhaustion and forest fires started by small arms fire.

November/December 1864: STORMS (advance turn marker one additional month, no naval jump moves) 

Fierce winter weather toward the end of 1864 effectively ended Hood’s campaign in Tennessee.

January/February 1865: STORMS (advance turn marker one additional month, no naval jump moves) 

Heavy rains in the spring of 1865 slowed most armies but did not keep Sherman from pushing on toward the sea.

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