Having finished the scenarios and now playing Open Play, I decided to 
take a shot at putting together a competitive OOB as mentioned in the 
Developers Guide. I'm shooting for a Corp v Corp OOB basically consisting 
of 3 Divisions each with 4 brigades + Arty in each Division. This is in 
keeping with my belief that, even at roughly 2 1/2 miles square the maps 
are too crowded with 2 full Army's fighting out a meeting engagement. 
Being a comp OOB it's also going to be ahistoric as hell, but..........

I do have a comment and a some questions to go along with my efforts. 
First and foremost the comment. I am VERY grateful for the OB_and Unitscsv 
File tool. Combined with the 2nd Manassass Master OOB for reference, it's 
made putting this OOB together much easier than it would have otherwise been. 
10 minutes with the 2M Master makes the file structure for creating a new OOB 
readily apparant.

My first question is regarding the level of interest others may have in 
this OOB. My original intent was, and still is to do this for myself. If 
there's any interest in this I'll be more than happy to submit it to Brett 
for hosting over at Harper's Ferry in order to give back to the community 
some of what I've gotten from the game. So let me know. Any interest in 
seeing this out there?

A related question is (and this is geared more towards the ACW grognards 
out there), at what point does it become so ahistorical that you lose your 
suspension of disbelief? I've been considering using unit and leader names 
that have absolutely nothing to do with the actual ACW, or using them in 
an ahistorical context (ie Hood as a brigade commander with non-historic 
regiments under his command such as the 123rd Denver Militia for intsance). 
Point being, I havent' begun naming any of the units in the OOB yet and 
wanted to get some input from the community.

Last question is about an issue that I'm currently working on. The easiest 
way to set up a comp OOB is to make each side a mirror of the other. I want 
to differentiate the Union and Confederates while retaining overall balance 
and historical "flavor" in the OOB. A perfect example of what I'm talking 
about it with the artillery. Union batteries (as I've learned in the game) 
usually were made up of 6 of the same guns while Confederate batteries were 
made up of 4 sometimes very different guns.

I've given each Division two artillery batteries giving the Union a 
substantial edge in artillery. The Union also has a 150-man Sharpshooter 
"Brigade" in one of it's Divisions. To balance this a bit I've given the 
Rebels a separate Cavalry Division while the Union Cavalry have a couple 
of regiments attached to a couple of Divisions (in the style of Shurz's 
Division). This gives the Rebel's a greater Cavalry force and more flexibility. 
I've also bumped a few of the rebel brigades up by a regiment (5 as opposed to 4) 
to compensate.

My question is... what additional suggestions does the community have to 
increase the differentiation between the Union and Confederate forces while 
still maintaining the balance needed for a competitive OOB?

Thanks in advance for your input guys! I hope to finish this off over the 
weekend and test it out.