Grand Tactician: The Civil War (1861-1865) News

Gen'l,

December 24, and all quiet on the Potomac tonight. With the cessation of fighting, troops retire to their winter quarters. Unofficial cease-fires are agreed on, and along the picket lines the Billy Yanks and Johnny Rebs approach one another to trade coffee, tobacco, stories... and news. While still enemies, there are many things that the soldiers in blue and gray agree about:

...that the generals on both sides are getting the enlisted men killed in futile assaults against enemy works, that the newest weapons seem take too long to reach the frontline regiments, that there's never enough information about what is going on, that the food is not that great...

...and that while the Grand Tactician's Christmas patch 0.8307 does not yet bring the end to the war, it brings a lot of fixes, improvements and requested features on the table, that will keep the men fighting.

These include, among others:

• Map Pack #1 is finished, with 10 new historical battle maps added and available during the campaign
  
• Raiding option to fleets to launch surprise attacks against blockading fleets
  
• More aggressive battle AI, if it has the numerical superiority
  
• Rebalanced numbers of volunteers and drafts, with drafts being used to fill up volunteer units and draft units reducing support in recruiting state
  
• Fixed morale loss and gain for losing or capturing cities during the campaign
  
• Poor training and low support slowing down movement of armies
  
• Armies no longer besieging enemy forts on the opposite bank of a river
  
• Option to withdraw instead of retreating, with rear guard action and only pulling away from the immediate danger
  
• New rolling text information about campaign events, like autoresolved battles including rear guard action and naval battles
  
• Improved naming convention for new armies
  

And a lot more...

Read the full patch notes here:
https://steamcommunity.com/app/654890/discussions/0/2993170476553402018/

We, the Grand Tactician Team would like to wish you all a merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! Also we'd like to thank all the Early Access players, who have supported us in making of this game, from providing feedback, to playtesting & bughunting, to the many friendly words of encouragement we have received while working hard to improve the game and finalizing it for the full release.

Cheers - and onwards!

Since we started the Early Access in August, we have been releasing new patches in a steady flow. While following the Early Access Road-Map, we have also listened to player feedback, adding and reworking features, improving the game play experience.

The first mile-stone from the Road-Map has been reached, and the game now allows mid-battle saving during both the historic battles and campaign battles. Thanks to players' reports we've been able to quickly fix related bugs as well, and keep doing so as we move forward.

The next steps have also been under development simultaneously. Map Pack #1, introducing 10 new historical battle-fields, has already been partially implemented during patching, with maps of Winchester, Olustee, Mine Creek, Cumberland Gap, Honey Springs and Honey Hill already added in the game, available for campaign battles. After three more historical maps, the next step is to start adding the randomly chosen non-historical battle-fields to increase campaign battle diversity.

And while adding maps, new historic battles have also been added: Shiloh (1862), Olustee (1864), and Wilderness (1864) are now available as stand-alone scenarios. A few more historic battles are also coming with the 1864 campaign.

Also on the Road-Map are the tutorial videos. We're proud to announce that we have teamed up with the one and only History Guy Gaming, who has already produced the first tutorial video about the game's Information and Options, and continues to produce new ones as we speak.

One of the most requested features by Early Access players along with AI improvements has been the weapon upgrades. First we added a standardization feature, which limited number of available weapons, but this alone was not sufficient, as hinted by the players. In the latest patch we've reworked the standardization feature completely, and now newer and more advanced weapons will be available in smaller quantity at start, and will slowly become more common when equipping more units with them, increasing standardization. Re-arming the whole Army of the Potomac with repeating rifles is no longer possible, and as the Confederate player you may be stuck with heaps of obsolete weapons only available to your troops for some time - making capturing of Union weapons from the battle-fields after victories more important. At the same go we added improved tooltips for weapons and perks, which should help players when choosing weapons and specialization for their units.

And while the economic model has been improved in the background, we've added further information for player about the state of their economy. Credit rating is now shown on the main campaign view, and if the rating drops too low, further recruitment is no longer possible before taking steps to improve the rating via policies, taxation, government spending and so on. Also the economic hit of military operations such as blockading and raiding has been added to the strategy panel, along with information about weapon production efficiency.

Next steps will include, in addition to the items on the Road-Map, improved information about the policies and their effects, as well as possibility to choose the reinforcing units in campaign battles - both requested by the community.

The march continues. Thanks to our dedicated community, who are helping immensely with reports, suggestions and feedback, the work on the Early Access version has been progressing well. The work is not finished, but with each patch the game is getting more and more enjoyable. Public patches are to be expected, like before, approximately weekly or bi-weekly. We have also allowed Early Access players to opt for developer patches, which arrive at even steadier flow. Using the Steam betas, players can see the latest features and give feedback about them, before the public patches come out.

We are, sir, Your very ob't se'v'ts,

The Grand Tactician Team.

Since the Early Access release of Grand Tactician: The Civil War (1861-1865) the game has been patched regularly, improving the game play experience. In addition to bug fixes, AI and performance improvements, new campaign scenarios and battle maps have been added.

The players have also had their say. The latest patch released includes a highly requested feature, allowing unlimited save games per campaign scenario. Also included is a new historic battle of Olustee. Work on further maps, tutorial videos and mid-battle saves is already underway.

As Wargamer.com put it, the game is shaping up to be the definitive American Civil War strategy game!

https://steamcommunity.com/app/654890/discussions/0/3003297945129070197/

A new patch has dropped for Grand Tactician, the American Civil War strategy game we've been waiting for since it was announced last year. It's had a decent, if shaky start to its early access journey.

While we still think it will (probably) evolve into the definitive ACW wargame, at the time we previewed it there were still plenty of creases to iron out. The developers have been working hard since release though to fix as much as they can, as fast as they can. Today sees the release of a new patch which provides further quality of life changes.

The main patchnotes post is here, though it is a tad confusing to parse. Many of the entries seem to be tagged for previous patches. I believe it's in chronological order however, which would make everything at the bottom of each section the most recent changes. 0.7707 is the latest patch version, at least, so everything marked with that number is new. The only points we're really not sure about is the unmarked lines.

With that in mind, the following has just been patched in to the game:

Read the rest of the story...

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