Targeting recruitment centers in a continental campaign

Cities and regional buildings are treated as sources of military power rather than territory alone. The plan is to seize Philadelphia, Annapolis, and Virginia quickly because the game ties them to professional soldiers, line infantry, and yeomanry. Fighting the existing American field army away from those recruiting centers would also increase its distance from replacements and force it onto defended or indirect routes. These are Empire: Total War's campaign rules rather than a literal model of eighteenth-century geography. Within the scenario, force generation, reinforcement distance, and operational geography can make a recruiting center more important than a larger stretch of land.