The First Day at Gettysburg

A Scenario for On to Richmond

by Mark Piper

GETTYSBURG AS A SIMULATION

Very few people would disagree that the Battle of Gettysburg is probably the best known of American Civil War battles. The number of books written about the battle and campaign could easily fill the shelves of a small library. Unfortunately this means that as a wargaming topic, the three day struggle in Pennsylvania in 1863, is quite overwhelming.

Perhaps the best wargaming medium to simulate the battle in its entirety would be as a board or computer game. As far as board games are concerned an army level game such as TERRIBLE SWIFT SWORD using regimental counters, while a comprehensive simulation, does takes some time to play (UP TO 40 HOURS), with much cursing as counter stacks collapse and continual calculating of combat factors. My biggest problem with this approach is that players, taking the roles of Generals Lee and Meade, control and direct individual regiments and artillery batteries. Mindful of the actual location of these two personalities during the battle, I question their ability to exercise this type of "all-seeing" control.

AVALON HILL's recent version of GETTYSBURG is a much more playable game, but less of a true simulation of the battle. Its Order of Battle and entry timetable include some anomalies, such as elements of Stuart's Cavalry appearing late on the first day. Still allowing for its apparent simplification, it is a better simulator of command than its more complex brothers. Meade and Lee now control corps and divisions of infantry, divisions and brigades of cavalry, and battalions of guns. Thus the army commanders directly control two levels down in the chain of command.

It is interesting to note is that a 40 hour playing of TERRIBLE SWIFT SWORD and a 1-2 hour playing of GETTYSBURG often produces similar results. For my money I would almost certainly reject the former for the latter. The key element seems to be the counter density in each game, but still perhaps the commanders exert too much direct control. Here a computer simulation works well to create the 'problems' of army control while allowing some direct intervention at divisional level.

An Australian company, STRATEGIC STUDIES GROUP (SSG), produce three 'games' of the American Civil War. Titled DECISIVE BATTLES OF THE AMERICAN CIVIL WAR VOLUMES I-III, these games are in fact a system using a database that can be modified and changed to create what-if situations or new scenarios. Volume 11 contains three scenarios for Gettysburg, i.e. Day one, Day two and a three day "campaign" variant. The first problem faced by the army commanders is that they do not control most of the first day's battle and cannot change corps orders until they move to a particular corps location, if they can find it I In fact this would seem to approach the 'ideal' simulation of Gettysburg. While it can be played by two players, it is best played against the computer opponent, which due to the artificial intelligence module in the computer code, plays reasonably well.

As a miniatures player, while I enjoy these games I prefer the face to face confrontation of the table top. So that a game does not become too unwieldy, table top simulations should be 'snapshots' of a battle. Pickett's charge and the fight for the Little Round Top spring to mind. The number of units should be limited and commanders should not be locked into the EXACTLY the same decisions as their historic counterparts. For example, Pickett's charge if executed as originally planned would in most cases arrive at a similar result. At a regimental level limited attacks such as that on MCPHERSON'S RIDGE or CULP'S HILL work well. At Brigade level the attacks on Cemetery Ridge or as this rambling preamble has led us the meeting engagement of Union and Confederate Forces west of Gettysburg on the First Day. On this day the Union and Confederate forces were finely balanced and progressively reinforced until the Confederates won the "numbers game" late on that afternoon.

The Scenario

The following scenario was designed to be used with On To Richmond brigade level rules and 15mm figures. The terrain surface was laid out with GEO-HEX © on a 8' X 5' surface. The map supplied is drawn on a hex pattern but players without GEO-HEX © can simply ignore this. The map approximates the hexes shown on the Avalon Hill Gettysburg board but has been simplified and modified to suit. The forces listed in the respective Order of Battles are taken from a variety of sources but primarily from the appendices of Scott Bowden's original STARS*N*BARS and adjusted as necessary. I haven't read Scott Bowden's Armies at GETTYSBURG, but I assume he has based it on these appendices. Only those units present at the battle are included. Another useful reference was a 72 page Souvenir Guide to the battlefield that I bought on my visit to the battlefield in 1983. The thumbnail sketches of the commanders are taken from an article in Avalon Hill's General magazine.

Units are as for ON TO RICHMOND, i.e. 6 stands for UNION and 8 stands for CONFEDERATE, although ESTIMATES OF NUMBERS are listed in brackets after the morale class of each brigade. If using actual numbers work on a conversion figure of approximately 250-300 men per stand. As earlier stated 15mm figures were used based with three figures per V 1" 3/4" stands for infantry. We chose to use 25mm ranges and moves and after play testing found no difficulty with this arrangement. Usually we halve ranges and moves to fit in with the half 25mm sized stands.

The scenario should take approximately 5-6 hours to play with 4-6 players. Both sides have forces on board initially, with reinforcements arriving throughout the day. Arrival times are listed next to the name of the brigade.

The scenario is presented in three parts:

    1. 1st Day at Gettysburg Scenario Brief;
    2. Union Order of Battle;
    3. Confederate Order of Battle.

I hope that others can enjoy this scenario which tries to simulate the problems of the First Day at GETTYSBURG.

More Gettysburg 1st Day

Back to The Zouave Vol V No. 3 Table of Contents
Back to The Zouave List of Issues
Back to Master Magazine List
© Copyright 1991 The American Civil War Society
This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web.
Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com