Black Powder - on going effects in a battle-campaign?

[Last Hussar]

This thread is SPECIFICALLY about Black Powder rules.

As mentioned elsewhere we are fighting a large battle by breaking it down into lots of smaller actions. This allows us to have a battle with 7 CS divisions vs 8 Union, fought at Unit=Regiment.

At the moment we have agreed
1) A unit that ends Shaken has 1 hit for the next battle from the start.
2) Routed units roll at some point 7+ Unit reforms, 5-6 lose one size, 4 or less permanently lost. (Numbers to be confirmed.)

Question 1.

When should Routed units roll to reform. End of the day – ie overnight? or after 'x' hours?

Question 2
A brigade that has units rout. In the next battle, assuming it isn't continually pressed- i.e. the division has a chance to fall back – how should the 'Break' point be calculated? On original strength, or on reform strength. We us OVER half for break

Example
A Brigade of 6 regiments goes into action. Break point is 4 (over half of 6). 2 Regts Rout. The Division is pulled back and pauses for an hour or 2. Do we recalculate the break point on 4, or keep the original?

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

What ho!

When I ran my 1870 campaign I went with another option, which is to reduce morale, from 3 to 2, and then reduce shooting and melee dice too.
This meant units that had been hammered were less likely to want to fight again.

A further point you might want to consider is HOW the unit routed. If it was from shooting and/or artillery, a unit was more likely to come back in a better state, loss in close combat to infantry who didn't pursue will be nasty, pursuing foot nastier; routing pursued by cavalry very unlikely to come back at all.
This was how VIII Corps managed to escape on two occasions but were finally crushed by cavalry attacking from all sides.

[toxicpixie]

I'd recalculate on the lower breakpoint, unless the brigade has recovered the "lost" battalions.

To recover "lost" battalions - I'd go with an overnight period. Keeps it simple and rewards getting your hammered units out of the line before night fall and secured behind an intact front line (or sufficient distance away not to be disturbed!). Like Will suggests, losses due to situations where significant numbers of men are lost as actual casualties or PoW's as opposed to the more common injuries and shock should be harder to recover...

[Last Hussar]

How long do people think it would take a brigade to reform after a battle?  Is an hour not long enough

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

6-12 hours to reform, rearm and headcount, get some sleep and food!

[kipt]

Depends if they are pursued or not. Think Jena.

[Last Hussar]

By battle I don't mean entire battle. Division was engaged for about an hour then pulled back.

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

That helps.
If you are falling back in good order, in BP it's as long as it takes your generals to get round and rally everyone!
I would say to rally and recuperate in that situation, your troops would be physically okay to fight after about two hours, but their morale would be shot, especially after having retreated. Most of the big campaigns I have fought in (1854, 1866, 1870, 1944) we normally say that after any actions recovery would take a day at least; especially as they will need to find packs/possessions/extra ammo/water and recover losses and head count. A big rout would be even worse.

[Last Hussar]

I've been working on the idea that regiments were reckoned to have a couple of hours fight in them before they needed resupply etc. They would then be pulled back for a rest. Big battles in the ACW units seem to fight fall back then are recommitted

[toxicpixie]

I might let an afternoon or morning period suffice to "auto rally" from Shaken or any hits down to the last one (but always leave that on unless you get an overnight rally?).

So basically two "day periods" and a "night interval"?

[Lord Kermit of Birkenhead]

You could reduce the unit size for the next game, to reflect long term losses.

IanS

[Luddite]

Its a tough question to answer because there are so many variables.

That said, I think the great majority of historical accounts of ACW battles seem to show that recovery from a battle would typically be done 'overnight' (e.g. the Seven Days Battles).

Is it therefore worth assuming that both sides in an engagement will not be combat ready until the following day (and any further engagement before then would force their immediate withdrawal)?

So:

Question 1.  When should Routed units roll to reform. End of the day – ie overnight? or after 'x' hours?

I would say overnight (or all of the following day and night if engaged in a night battle).

Question 2.  A brigade that has units rout. In the next battle, assuming it isn't continually pressed- i.e. the division has a chance to fall back – how should the 'Break' point be calculated? On original strength, or on reform strength. We us OVER half for break

Definitely reform strength. 
Regiments and Brigades were only typically reinforced in 'administrative' time (over weeks), as these reinforcements would actually be quite disruptive to combat readiness.  The Union brigade, the 69th New York Infantry, or the "Fighting 69th", for example took weeks to raise fresh troops from New York, and even then couldn't replace all its losses.

That said of course, if you want you regiments to recover in hours for your campaign, who's to gainsay that?   

[Last Hussar]

For the first post I'm sticking with the reform overnight/based on new strength.

However for a Division that has been in combat for an hour, waiting that long to reform seems too long.  I'm thinking of 'fall back half a mile, now everybody form up again', especially when half the units are ok to keep on.

[toxicpixie]

"Short rest" recovers all hits except final hit but only on units still "alive"; overnight period allows routed units to reform as Small Units, and allows "intact" units to recover all their hits?