Army of Liberty: a Fantasy Revolutionary Warfare Quest

IroniChristian · May 2, 2024

[x] Plan Fortress Kinzberg

Chimeraguard · May 2, 2024

I feel like if we want to send cavalry around the enemy's rear, it should be our cavalry. We can only give relatively loose orders to Guillory's cavalry, and actions in the enemy's rear sound like they'd be rather micro-intensive if we want to avoid them getting routed (and if they rout, they'll flee until they find a safe location, which will be very scarce in the enemy rear lines.

EagerListener · May 2, 2024

Chimeraguard said:
I feel like if we want to send cavalry around the enemy's rear, it should be our cavalry. We can only give relatively loose orders to Guillory's cavalry, and actions in the enemy's rear sound like they'd be rather micro-intensive if we want to avoid them getting routed (and if they rout, they'll flee until they find a safe location, which will be very scarce in the enemy rear lines.

What if we pretend to send Guillory to the forest in the upper left side and then turn around and hide somewhere in the bottom left corner.

Chimeraguard · May 2, 2024

I feel like if we want to play sneaky games, it ought to be more along the lines of concealing how many cavalry we have.

Since while Von Trotha might have done whatever his equivalent of our Influence Action about gathering information on an enemy army is, he probably isn't going to be aware that we have two extra Hussar units from the VI Army.

But I'm also reluctant to try for anything particularly "clever" and would prefer the "Keep It Simple, Stupid" principle be followed.

EagerListener · May 2, 2024

Chimeraguard said:
I feel like if we want to play sneaky games, it ought to be more along the lines of concealing how many cavalry we have.

Since while Von Trotha might have done whatever his equivalent of our Influence Action about gathering information on an enemy army is, he probably isn't going to be aware that we have two extra Hussar units from the VI Army.

But I'm also reluctant to try for anything particularly "clever" and would prefer the "Keep It Simple, Stupid" principle be followed.

I wouldn't say that it would be particularly complex, but I agree that there would be value in keeping the extra cavalry we have hidden. I was thinking that if we did this then Trotha would keep some units to guard against an imaginary cavalry charge by Guillory, and Guillory could be used as a surprise against any frontal attack at Kinzberg.

Nerdorama · May 2, 2024

Okay, here's my edit of Fortress Kinsberg to deploy a detached force to the south end of the valley. I can't log in to imgur right now so just look at this map in the next 24 hours before Discord baleets it.

[X] Plan: Valley Outpost
-[X] Hotlinked Deployment Map
-[X] 16th Half Pfd: Northeasternmost Sohnsholz Forest
-[X] 19th Half Pfd: Forest 1W of 16th Half Pfd
-[X] Guillory's Hsr 1: Forest 1SW of 19th Half Pfd
-[X] Guillory's Hsr 2: Forest 1W of Guillory's Hsr 1
-[X] 200th Hob: Woods 1W of the road
-[X] 251st Hob: Woods on the road 1E of 200th Hob
-[X] 72nd Hum: Farm 1E of the road
-[X] 148th Hum: Farm 1E of 72nd Hum
-[X] 45th Elv: 1NE of 148th Hum
-[X] 108th Elv Hsr: 1E of 45th Elv
-[X] 5th Hob HArt: 1E of 108th Elv Hsr
-[X] 42nd Elv: 1E of 5th Hob HArt
-[X] 84th Elv Art: Eastern tile of Hochschloss Kinzberg
-[X] 10th Hum Art: Western tile of Hochschloss Kinzberg
-[X] 31st Elv Art: Woods on the road 1W of 10th Hum Art
-[X] 28th Half Pfd: 1W of 31st Elv Art
-[X] 13th Hob Lan: Woods on the road 1 SE of 28th Half Pfd
-[X] 55th Elv Hsr: 1SE of 84th Elv Art
-[X] HQ: 1SW of 84th Elv Art
-[X] Breastworks: on 200th Hob
-[X] Breastworks: on 251st Hob
-[X] Breastworks: on 72nd Hum
-[X] Breastworks: on 148th Hum
-[X] Wolf Holes: in the 1 Space Gap in the easternmost hills range

I'll fill in the actual orders in a sec.

It's mostly based on Fortress Kinzburg but with the 5th HArt and two elven infantry pushed forward to cover the approach through the eastern valley and bombard anyone approaching down that path, similar to how the Pathfinders and borrowed Hussars are covering the western approach. I moved the 28th Halflings to the left flank of the line rather than the right, and made some adjustments to the artillery that probably don't matter other than putting the 10th in the middle where it will have the most possible shots, and tweaked our reserve cav out a little so they have less distance to travel to attack the enemy. Since I made the main line shorter, I also took one breastwork and replaced it with wolf holes to block off the only flatland exit to the eastern valley and give us an extra turn to shoot anything coming through there. Green lines and empty icons are suggested turn 1-2 movement - we should have plenty of time to settle in before anything comes knocking, and we can react to whatever Trotha's preferred approach is once we see it.

EDIT: we can move Guillory's Hussars further north into the forest turn 1 if we want to play funny games with concealment, feel free to ignore the lines there.

Interesting · May 2, 2024

[x] Plan Fortress Kinzberg

Chimeraguard · May 2, 2024

Nerdorama said:
Okay, here's my edit of Fortress Kinsberg to deploy a detached force to the south end of the valley. I can't log in to imgur right now so just look at this map in the next 24 hours before Discord baleets it.

[X] Plan: Valley Outpost

I object to the placement of the 45th Elven in an advance position. They're the Maverick Regiment, and if we need to pull back from their position, I'm worried their CO will decide he has a better idea.

natruska · May 2, 2024

NSchwerte said:
To visualise, this is how i currently imagine the formation we would assume: If there is nothing in the Rotholz or the center gets threathened the 5th moves back into the Hochschloss to be secure and blast off the enemy assault, while the cavalry is ready to flank from the east.

if there is stuff in the rotholz but the center is threathened we decide tactically

This is a pretty small thing but I'd rather have some other unit than the 19th screening for the horse arty. There's so much rough terrain on the left flank that Tasse's Rapid trait would really shine over there. It still makes sense for it to be halflings if we think they'll come under fire, but maybe the Falke halflings would be better suited for it.

I think it makes sense to use all 3 halfling regiments for skirmishing outside of the Kinzberg position. Tasse's halflings in the western forest, Falke halflings on the right flank, and the other Canard Rifle halflings waiting in ambush in the northeastern tile of the Sohnsholz. That does leave us short on reserves in the center, even though the Falke regiment would probably be pulled there eventually, but i think it'd be worthwhile.

Nerdorama · May 2, 2024

Chimeraguard said:
I object to the placement of the 45th Elven in an advance position. They're the Maverick Regiment, and if we need to pull back from their position, I'm worried their CO will decide he has a better idea.

Them being Maverick is exactly why I'm putting them forward and not on the core line. I don't want him to get bored and open up a path to the arty.

Simon. Andersen · May 3, 2024

[X] Plan: Valley Outpost

Pinniped · May 3, 2024

[X] Plan: Valley Outpost

Red Rationalist · May 3, 2024

So, since I've woken up I would like to make my critique of the new plan Valley Outpost.

Nerdorama said:
[X] Plan: Valley Outpost

So, while I appreciate the effort to do something other than let Trotha slowly advance towards us, the cornerstone of this plan revolves around controlling the eastern basin with the horse artillery. This a decent enough goal. The problem comes in the execution. Valley outpost leaves the Fortress Rotholz completely uncontested, meaning the enemy horse artillery will likely occupy it and be given a fire position into the basin. Rotholz provides further cover for screening Infantry of Trotha, so we are unlikely to win that exchange. This makes control over the eastern basin tough, but still possible. The problem comes with the lack of forces committed to this flank. With nothing contesting control over the central corridor, Trotha just needs to place one artillery position on the northern hill range and bombard our forces until they retreat.

This leaves in a worse position, with our forces damaged and driven out from our eastern flank.

Red Rationalist · May 3, 2024

So, to respond to the critique made of my plan yesterday:

Pinniped said:
Hmm. I think my only real objection for @Red Rationalist plan, is that we are sending half our army into a forward position on the Eastern flank, while leaving the other half in a passive position in the center. I think this is kind of the risk @NSchwerte is also worried about here

A criticism had been made of my plan: What happens if Trotha attempts to forgo control over Rotholz and sends a force trough the woods to set up firing positions on the eastern hills?

So, I will point out that taking artillery trough the forest takes a considerable amount of time. Every forest tile crossed takes 5 movement, meaning the crossing of the forest alone means 10 turns using the shortest position inside the forest. Add to that the effort of getting them on the hill and trough the plains, you have something 7 more turns, plus 1 turns of set-up. Let's make it a nice round number and say the enemy needs 15 turns, cutting his effort somewhat short. During this time half of his artillery is disabled, since they are tracking trough the forest. They are committed to moving for 5 turns and can't abort movement.

I think reasonable people would agree that 15 turns is enough to relocate our own firing position slightly, considering I'm not planning on staying in the same position for the entire match. If I just want to attrition any infantry tries to move onto the hills, I can do that in 2 turns by moving the central battery one NE and one turn of set-up. So the enemy now has the issue of preventing our own forces from seizing the hills before he does, and constant attrition over 10 turns if he tries to hold them. Not terribly desireable, if you ask me.

Furthermore, the sheer commitment of forces requires Trotha to strip out most of his army (6/9), leaving his remaining artillery in peril. But lets ignore that for the moment. I would withdraw some of the forces from the Rotholz garrison, since an assault is clearly not comming and march towards the hills of Sarnscheid, or towards the hills themselves. Plus reposition our own horse artillery one tile eastword. This makes the treck even more problematic, since the positions for the shortest path is now in medium range of 3 artillery positions vs. the enemy "none". Slowly, slowy, the enemy infantry can be driven out of the hill position via superior fire, long before they have any chance of placing their own artillery. This bypass simply takes too long and requires infantry screening without adequate fire support. It would be a problem if the army was fixed into one position though.

Red Rationalist · May 3, 2024

So, onto my critique of the slightly modified version of Kinzberg:

NSchwerte said:
[X] Plan Fortress Kinzberg
-[X] place the troops like in this map:

This plan insists again on tying all of our firepower in one position, a position with a deadzone across the eastern hill basaian. This plan makes our main position very tough to overcome, but also highly static. If the enemy doesn't put their forces into range of our artillery, we have no way of dealing damage. Maybe the battle would end after we run out the clock for night, but it requires the enemy to cooperate well.

Nschwerte has essentially presented a fairly simple rock, scissor paper concept: . It's simple, straightforward and looks quite good. Fine, let us grant that. If the enemy does nothing, we win If he tries to put artillery into range, he needs screening forces. Screening forces that suffer more damage than we would. The issue with this concept of the long range duel is that multiple of our infantry are placed coverless on the sides, the 28th and 42nd. With Trotha having 8 artillery pieces to bring against our 4, we are utterly reliant on the breastwork to protect us. I'm also critizing the rear line here: If an unit is slowly ground down, there is no backline for them to rest in. This could be solved by putting the cavalry someplace else, but this makes the cavalry now vulnerable to long-ranged fire.

But let's ignore those problems for a moment and ask: What happens if the enemy tries to position superior artillery firepower without screening infantry? Nschwerte gives us the response that the cavalry will take care of it. This seems plausible at first, but the cavalry needs to take care of the entirety of the enemy artillery force. Reliably, until the entire enemy is slowly eliminated via long-ranged fire. This inherently requires the cavalry to act separately.

So, in this scenario the artillery commences long range fire without an infantry screen and without additional cover, just to assume the most optimistic case, and the cavalry has to be sent out against that battery. Our own front forces will not take much in the way of damage due to the breastwork (-90); at least the ones in cover rather than standing in open field (-50, easily overcome after a long enough bombardment), but an artillery-> artillery fire shoots at -100, meaning we loose the exchange over a long enough time, especially with vulnerable infantry at the side. You wouldn't even necessarily need to expose your own artillery to counterbattery fire, considering the infantry screen is one tile before the artillery, meaning you can shoot 12, while the Klinzberg position is 13 tiles away. Since, long range is 12 tiles long, with the cavalry only being able to charge 9. Any such assault would take 2 turns over open terrain, even if forgo to place the artillery in cover. The infantry and cavalry screens could be placed 13 tiles away from our forces, swooping in one the following turn, where the cavalry is 3 tiles away and the infantry only needs to to move 2 tiles to cover.

It gets even worse. Their own cavalry can move out and charge our own cavalry. This further adds damage. Our own cavalry needs to be faster than enemy cavalry one tiles behind, who could simply be ordered to ready charge at 500m and interrupt the charge. This might seem achievable since we have 5 cavalry vs. the enemy 4. The lancers 7 movement points mean they are behind the other but fine. Then it needs to overcome potential infantry position if it doesn't break trough the cavalry screen (15 ish cohesion, from at most 3 positions). Then comes the deathblow to this plan, the enemy artillery reacting. This cavalry on cavalry fight necessarily takes place in medium-short range, while our own artillery fires at long ranges. It would still deal some damage, but likely not enough to premantly break the enemy. This means for a cavalry charge against an enemy long range position, our cavalry force has to run into their guns and survive the encounter. Not just once, not just twice, until the entire enemy artillery has been caught. If our cvalary routs, it lacks a much of a safe backline to rest and has to recover for at least 5 turns before attempting it again. Time to enemy can use to freely bombard the exposed infantry.

TLDR: In short, fortifying and countering the long-range bombardment relies solely on a 2 turn cavalry charge, a charge we need to do again and again, until the threat is gone. A moderatley cunning general, like one that tried to make us attack outside of our defences, could use isolated artillery to bait a 12 tiles cavalry charge, with the approaching cavalry taking one turn of medium range fire, followed by one of short-range fire as they charge. An approach that the cavalry is unlikely to survive, with them taking at least 5 turns after the first charge fails. This is difficult enough, but also causes substantial long term attrition in our cavalry arm. We might even kill some of the enemy artillery, but permanently injure our cavalry arm. This plans has an achilles heel, being solely reliant on one fixed position we can't deviate from. To quote a certain american general: "Fixed fortifications are momunemts to man's stupidity".

NSchwerte · May 3, 2024

Chimeraguard said:
I feel like if we want to send cavalry around the enemy's rear, it should be our cavalry. We can only give relatively loose orders to Guillory's cavalry, and actions in the enemy's rear sound like they'd be rather micro-intensive if we want to avoid them getting routed (and if they rout, they'll flee until they find a safe location, which will be very scarce in the enemy rear lines.

So my thought was that cavalry has three jobs here:

Screen, threaten artillery and be a nuisance in their backline.

Screening is of utmost importance, is the absolutely most micro intensive part of the battle and any mistake can have devastating effects losing is cavalry and artillery regiments, which certainly cannot be left to the unreliable allied troops.

My worry about placing them as threats against enemy artillery is that Guillory would have fallen for von Trothas Trap or at least wanted to charge last update. If Von Trotha places another trap I am scared that they will run right into enemy screening because he is overconfident.

On the other hand, if he just acts as "cavalry in being", tying up disproportionate enemy enemy resources to try binding him, he just needs to make sure to avoid damage, which I hope he can manage independently.

It also feels the most fitting mechanically, that the independently commanded hussars are independently detached to harass the enemy

EagerListener said:
What if we pretend to send Guillory to the forest in the upper left side and then turn around and hide somewhere in the bottom left corner.

What's the goal of hiding his forces?

Nerdorama said:
Okay, here's my edit of Fortress Kinsberg to deploy a detached force to the south end of the valley. I can't log in to imgur right now so just look at this map in the next 24 hours before Discord baleets it.

[X] Plan: Valley Outpost
-[X] Hotlinked Deployment Map
-[X] 16th Half Pfd: Northeasternmost Sohnsholz Forest
-[X] 19th Half Pfd: Forest 1W of 16th Half Pfd
-[X] Guillory's Hsr 1: Forest 1SW of 19th Half Pfd
-[X] Guillory's Hsr 2: Forest 1W of Guillory's Hsr 1
-[X] 200th Hob: Woods 1W of the road
-[X] 251st Hob: Woods on the road 1E of 200th Hob
-[X] 72nd Hum: Farm 1E of the road
-[X] 148th Hum: Farm 1E of 72nd Hum
-[X] 45th Elv: 1NE of 148th Hum
-[X] 108th Elv Hsr: 1E of 45th Elv
-[X] 5th Hob HArt: 1E of 108th Elv Hsr
-[X] 42nd Elv: 1E of 5th Hob HArt
-[X] 84th Elv Art: Eastern tile of Hochschloss Kinzberg
-[X] 10th Hum Art: Western tile of Hochschloss Kinzberg
-[X] 31st Elv Art: Woods on the road 1W of 10th Hum Art
-[X] 28th Half Pfd: 1W of 31st Elv Art
-[X] 13th Hob Lan: Woods on the road 1 SE of 28th Half Pfd
-[X] 55th Elv Hsr: 1SE of 84th Elv Art
-[X] HQ: 1SW of 84th Elv Art
-[X] Breastworks: on 200th Hob
-[X] Breastworks: on 251st Hob
-[X] Breastworks: on 72nd Hum
-[X] Breastworks: on 148th Hum
-[X] Wolf Holes: in the 1 Space Gap in the easternmost hills range

I'll fill in the actual orders in a sec.

It's mostly based on Fortress Kinzburg but with the 5th HArt and two elven infantry pushed forward to cover the approach through the eastern valley and bombard anyone approaching down that path, similar to how the Pathfinders and borrowed Hussars are covering the western approach. I moved the 28th Halflings to the left flank of the line rather than the right, and made some adjustments to the artillery that probably don't matter other than putting the 10th in the middle where it will have the most possible shots, and tweaked our reserve cav out a little so they have less distance to travel to attack the enemy. Since I made the main line shorter, I also took one breastwork and replaced it with wolf holes to block off the only flatland exit to the eastern valley and give us an extra turn to shoot anything coming through there. Green lines and empty icons are suggested turn 1-2 movement - we should have plenty of time to settle in before anything comes knocking, and we can react to whatever Trotha's preferred approach is once we see it.

EDIT: we can move Guillory's Hussars further north into the forest turn 1 if we want to play funny games with concealment, feel free to ignore the lines there.

I am not sure about the Wolf hole, especially as it leaves the center exposed if Von Trotha does decide to attack through it. Could you explain what the thought behind it?

Red Rationalist said:
So, since I've woken up I would like to make my critique of the new plan Valley Outpost.

So, while I appreciate the effort to do something other than let Trotha slowly advance towards us, the cornerstone of this plan revolves around controlling the eastern basin with the horse artillery. This a decent enough goal. The problem comes in the execution. Valley outpost leaves the Fortress Rotholz completely uncontested, meaning the enemy horse artillery will likely occupy it and be given a fire position into the basin. Rotholz provides further cover for screening Infantry of Trotha, so we are unlikely to win that exchange. This makes control over the eastern basin tough, but still possible. The problem comes with the lack of forces committed to this flank. With nothing contesting control over the central corridor, Trotha just needs to place one artillery position on the northern hill range and bombard our forces until they retreat.

This leaves in a worse position, with our forces damaged and driven out from our eastern flank.

When the enemy takes control of Rotholz Turm, he is exposing his screens to medium range from Kinzberg, which is already a win for us.

And of course, we can just move our screening infantry a bit back to ensure they are are sheltered by the hills, where an artillery on Rotholz cannon hit them - the Rotholz forest means that the enemy is slow to reach us and the position is a forward position, if it comes under too much threat we will simply abandon it and move back.

So Rotholz Turm cannot actually project power to dislodge us, because there is a hill of where it wants to actually hit and we can shelter behind it.

If von Trotha puts artillery on the northern hills, he hits us with -70. We have generally ruled out such a deployment, both because von Trotha is unlikely to do a sustained long bombardment like this and because he is unlikely to move all his artillery there, (artilery on the northern mountains would hit at -50 into the Rotholz forest after all)

I am tbh not sure how a lack of control over the central corridor plays into this?

Red Rationalist said:
So, to respond to the critique made of my plan yesterday:

A criticism had been made of my plan: What happens if Trotha attempts to forgo control over Rotholz and sends a force trough the woods to set up firing positions on the eastern hills?

So, I will point out that taking artillery trough the forest takes a considerable amount of time. Every forest tile crossed takes 5 movement, meaning the crossing of the forest alone means 10 turns using the shortest position inside the forest. Add to that the effort of getting them on the hill and trough the plains, you have something 7 more turns, plus 1 turns of set-up. Let's make it a nice round number and say the enemy needs 15 turns, cutting his effort somewhat short. During this time half of his artillery is disabled, since they are tracking trough the forest. They are committed to moving for 5 turns and can't abort movement.

I think reasonable people would agree that 15 turns is enough to relocate our own firing position slightly, considering I'm not planning on staying in the same position for the entire match. If I just want to attrition any infantry tries to move onto the hills, I can do that in 2 turns by moving the central battery one NE and one turn of set-up. So the enemy now has the issue of preventing our own forces from seizing the hills before he does, and constant attrition over 10 turns if he tries to hold them. Not terribly desireable, if you ask me.

Furthermore, the sheer commitment of forces requires Trotha to strip out most of his army (6/9), leaving his remaining artillery in peril. But lets ignore that for the moment. I would withdraw some of the forces from the Rotholz garrison, since an assault is clearly not comming and march towards the hills of Sarnscheid, or towards the hills themselves. Plus reposition our own horse artillery one tile eastword. This makes the treck even more problematic, since the positions for the shortest path is now in medium range of 3 artillery positions vs. the enemy "none". Slowly, slowy, the enemy infantry can be driven out of the hill position via superior fire, long before they have any chance of placing their own artillery. This bypass simply takes too long and requires infantry screening without adequate fire support. It would be a problem if the army was fixed into one position though.

A small correction, but artillery moves at 3 through forest, its not cavalry. But I dont think the time to get into position matters for this plan and we can definitely do all of the movement we want to take in response.

I do think you are for some reason thinking that the Infantry would be moving into position before the artillery is ready to move, which i do not understand. The infantry would shelter in the Räuberholz, getting -80 cover until the artillery is through, at which point it takes 5 turns for the artillery to set up fully, with the quickest being done in 2 turns.

I will assume that you mean that you put the horse artillery one tile westward. Are you putting screening forces into the open plains to protect it and accept the -20 bombarement or do you just not screen it?

I am also not sure how the HArtillery is now in position to bombard the moving infantry, seeing as it is only 1 tile closer but the enemy would still have a corridor of 4 tiles left.

Am I correct in assuming your response would look like this?

NSchwerte · May 3, 2024

This is what i am currently looking at when it comes to modifying my plan

Red Rationalist · May 3, 2024

Plan Village Outpost

NSchwerte said:
And of course, we can just move our screening infantry a bit back to ensure they are are sheltered by the hills, where an artillery on Rotholz cannon hit them - the Rotholz forest means that the enemy is slow to reach us and the position is a forward position, if it comes under too much threat we will simply abandon it and move back.

Yeah, that's precisely my criticism: Village outpust puts forces on the basain, but has to retreat after actual firepower gets there. And then we're back to a static position, which is undesireable.

NSchwerte said:
When the enemy takes control of Rotholz Turm, he is exposing his screens to medium range from Kinzberg, which is already a win for us.

That's nice and all, but it has nothing to do with my plan. I don't entrench in Fortress Kinzberg, and simply showed how my plan would deal with a 10 turn advancing army.

NSchwerte said:
A small correction, but artillery moves at 3 through forest, its not cavalry. But I dont think the time to get into position matters for this plan and we can definitely do all of the movement we want to take in response.

You're incorrect. Forest is 5 turns for "non-infantry". Artillery isn't infantry.

NSchwerte said:
Am I correct in assuming your response would look like this?

It would look like this if the enemy could teleport. This isn't the case. The enemy needs to secure the position over 15+ turns, turns with little fire support until the artillery is at the hill range. The response would be look like this if I fell asleep for 15 turns and woke up after 16 turns, but I don't forsee that happening.

Red Rationalist · May 3, 2024

NSchwerte said:
This is what i am currently looking at when it comes to modifying my plan

Ok, how does placing forces outside of cover improve things? The 45th, Hssr and Lancers are out in the open, with the enemy 7 artillery pieces being able to slowly grind them down. Your entire concept for winning the long-range duel requires our infantry to stay in cover, since we can't win the duel vs more and more experienced artillery. If you're planning on imitating village outpost, you make the same mistake of putting the artillery and forces in a position where Trotha can use superior fire to grind them down.

NSchwerte · May 3, 2024

Red Rationalist said:
Yeah, that's precisely my criticism: Village outpust puts forces on the basain, but has to retreat after actual firepower gets there. And then we're back to a static position, which is undesireable.

ok, so your criticism is just with the plan and has nothing to do with the actual modifications

Red Rationalist said:
That's nice and all, but it has nothing to do with my plan. I don't entrench in Fortress Kinzberg, and simply showed how my plan would deal with a 10 turn advancing army.

I didnt say it was about your plan? i am saying that in my plan, if the enemy goes into rotholz he needs to screen the artillery

Red Rationalist said:
It would look like this if the enemy could teleport. This isn't the case. The enemy needs to secure the position over 15+ turns, turns with little fire support until the artillery is at the hill range. The response would be look like this if I fell asleep for 15 turns and woke up after 16 turns, but I don't forsee that happening.

How does it look like then, because i changed it like you said your movement would be

Red Rationalist said:
Ok, how does placing forces outside of cover improve things? The 45th, Hssr and Lancers are out in the open, with the enemy 7 artillery pieces being able to slowly grind them down. Your entire concept for winning the long-range duel requires our infantry to stay in cover, since we can't win the duel vs more and more experienced artillery. If you're planning on imitating village outpost, you make the same mistake of putting the artillery and forces in a position where Trotha can use superior fire to grind them down.

yes, i am obviously moving the infantry into the hills, like was discussed extensively already?

And you didnt actually explain how he can use superior fire to grind them down beyond talking about how he will shoot at them with -70 until they are dead

NSchwerte · May 3, 2024

Red Rationalist said:
This plan insists again on tying all of our firepower in one position, a position with a deadzone across the eastern hill basaian. This plan makes our main position very tough to overcome, but also highly static. If the enemy doesn't put their forces into range of our artillery, we have no way of dealing damage. Maybe the battle would end after we run out the clock for night, but it requires the enemy to cooperate well.

I wish you would stop lying about how we are certainly going to have 30 turns of nothing if von Trotha decides not to attack instead of Photo just skipping to us getting the reinforcements.

And stop saying fortress Rotholz isn't a static fortification

Red Rationalist · May 3, 2024

NSchwerte said:
And you didnt actually explain how he can use superior fire to grind them down beyond talking about how he will shoot at them with -70 until they are dead

You mean how does artillery that gets +30 to attacks grind down infantry at the hill? You place one artillery regiment at the wooded hill (3*N from Rotholz), able to shoot at the hills in medium range. Maybe one at the northern hills, since that can cover a few more blind spots This position isn't easily chargeable by cavalry, since you need 10+5+3 movement from the hill positions, meaning the enemy has 2 turns to place screens in the way. Quite feasibly for them, plus the cavalry takes damage, then the infantry withdraws after the charge is over. Then they fire, and fire, until the superior artillery wins out, which Trotha has. The exchange is unfavourable, and we will eventually loose

NSchwerte said:
How does it look like then, because i changed it like you said your movement would be

You're free to draw a picture for 15 turns of movement. That would take some time, which I'm not willing to spend. Realistically, you would need to draw a picture of the first infantry just arriving, since that is the reaction point. There are 2 positions in total not exposed to the artillery fire, so I'm confident about taking the hill with infantry and mauling the enemy with fire, with melee and cavalry taking care of the blind spots.

NSchwerte said:
ok, so your criticism is just with the plan and has nothing to do with the actual modifications

If your modification is "take an inherently indefensible position and wait until we have to withdraw", I do actually have something to criticize about it. It would help if your plan had literally any description of what you're trying to accomplish. I'm not a mindreader.

Red Rationalist · May 3, 2024

NSchwerte said:
I wish you would stop lying about how we are certainly going to have 30 turns of nothing if von Trotha decides not to attack instead of Photo just skipping to us getting the reinforcements.

And stop saying fortress Rotholz isn't a static fortification

I'm not lying. You're making the claim we get an automatic skip button if the battle takes too long, which I haven't see evidence for. We certainly didn't skip forward as Brutet dragged on and the playerbase was done with it.

What do you think is a static fortifcation? A point of defense with no further defensive lines of withdraw is a text case of static defense. To put the cherry on top, it's a literal castle, the oldest form of static defence. If you're in a fixed position with nowhere to form a second line of defense if the first fails or gets eroded, you're betting a static defence.

NSchwerte · May 3, 2024

Red Rationalist said:
You mean how does artillery that gets +30 to attacks grind down infantry at the hill? You place one artillery regiment at the wooded hill (3*N from Rotholz), able to shoot at the hills in medium range. Maybe one at the northern hills, since that can cover a few more blind spots This position isn't easily chargeable by cavalry, since you need 10+5+3 movement from the hill positions, meaning the enemy has 2 turns to place screens in the way. Quite feasibly for them, plus the cavalry takes damage, then the infantry withdraws after the charge is over. Then they fire, and fire, until the superior artillery wins out, which Trotha has. The exchange is unfavourable, and we will eventually loose

Hmm, this is a good point. If von Trotha does put his troops on these hills, we will have to draw back our presence in the East. We can still do some
shooting in the gap between the hills on our side if we want, but the exact approach we are going to take depends on what exactly von Trotha chose to do besides moving the artillery in these positions.

Its still worth it, because it means that von Trotha needed to move his artillery into these positions, being delayed and harassed by artillery fire.

But ill include it in my plan info ill write

Red Rationalist said:
You're free to draw a picture for 15 turns of movement. That would take some time, which I'm not willing to spend. Realistically, you would need to draw a picture of the first infantry just arriving, since that is the reaction point. There are 2 positions in total not exposed to the artillery fire, so I'm confident about taking the hill with infantry and mauling the enemy with fire, with melee and cavalry taking care of the blind spots.

Yeah, I will call your bluff here, if you are correct that would serve as a great way to rethink my assumption too and if you are wrong thats important to know

Red Rationalist said:
If your modification is "take an inherently indefensible position and wait until we have to withdraw", I do actually have something to criticize about it. It would help if your plan had literally any description of what you're trying to accomplish. I'm not a mindreader.

We were talking about Nerdos plan, who does have a description of what she wants to do, but i will make an updated description for mine too

Red Rationalist said:
I'm not lying. You're making the claim we get an automatic skip button if the battle takes too long, which I haven't see evidence for. We certainly didn't skip forward as Brutet dragged on and the playerbase was done with it.

You claimed that we would be sitting here while von Trotha does nothing. We wont, we have actually even seen this at brutet where if both sides didnt attack we would have skipped forward.

You claimed that the enemy would put no forces in our artillery range, when everything he wants to do to actually attack places units in our artillery range and that the battle would end "after we run out the clock". If this is not implying that von Trotha would not attack us i dont understand what it is saying.

Red Rationalist said:
What do you think is a static fortifcation? A point of defense with no further defensive lines of withdraw is a text case of static defense. To put the cherry on top, it's a literal castle, the oldest form of static defence. If you're in a fixed position with nowhere to form a second line of defense if the first fails or gets eroded, you're betting a static defence.

ok I dont think that matters, but Kinzberg Hochschloss is not a castle, its a "High Palace", a Manor House on a hill or mountain while Rotholz Turm is a "Tower", so a small castle. Sarnscheid is a Schloss, a "Palace" and Ottenburg is a Ruine, a "ruin", Kloster Damenhof is a Monestary.

But like static defenses having multiple lines is super common? They are literally just fixed fortifications.

And if Plan rotholz retreats from Rotholz turm it needs to withdraw from the battle. Without the breastworks it is not possible to defend Kinzberg against 7 enemy artillery units. This is why it doesnt make sense that you disparage Fortress Kinzberg for not having a fallback position, because the fallback position of Fortress Rotholz is an illusion that would burn under enemy barrages on open plains defending it.

Uhh, random quote about patience - "If you wait by the river long enough, the bodies of your enemies will float by"

Red Rationalist · May 3, 2024

NSchwerte said:
Hmm, this is a good point. If von Trotha does put his troops on these hills, we will have to draw back our presence in the East. We can still do some
shooting in the gap between the hills on our side if we want, but the exact approach we are going to take depends on what exactly von Trotha chose to do besides moving the artillery in these positions.

Its still worth it, because it means that von Trotha needed to move his artillery into these positions, being delayed and harassed by artillery fire.

So we agree that the eastern hill range is untennable if we simply occupy the southern hills. Leaving the horse artillery on it's own also runs into the risk of insufficient screening, which means it will have to withdraw once the screens get to scarce. Ok, good. This does put a hole into the plan for village outpost and your modified plan-

I'm confused however at how the delay is worth it. Both of your plans rely on static defenses that need to be manned, so it's not like this time could be used to reposition forces.

NSchwerte said:
Yeah, I will call your bluff here, if you are correct that would serve as a great way to rethink my assumption too and if you are wrong thats important to know

You're free to make an illustration about issues with my plan. I don't forsee it failing if Trotha could use 15-20 turns to set up an eastern firing position if he wasn't interrupted. I don't think this is realistically possible without giving us the option to slowly grind screening forces into dust, but fine. We are talking about trying to secure a position with infantry and holding it for 15 turns without fire support, something that is rather challenging.

Regarding wait times

NSchwerte said:
You claimed that we would be sitting here while von Trotha does nothing. We wont, we have actually even seen this at brutet where if both sides didnt attack we would have skipped forward.

I'm sorry, we have "seen" a counterfactual? I don't remember any timeskips happening in Brutet due to both sides staying in place.

NSchwerte said:
And if Plan rotholz retreats from Rotholz turm it needs to withdraw from the battle. Without the breastworks it is not possible to defend Kinzberg against 7 enemy artillery units. This is why it doesnt make sense that you disparage Fortress Kinzberg for not having a fallback position, because the fallback position of Fortress Rotholz is an illusion that would burn under enemy barrages on open plains defending it.

No, my plan has multiple lines of defence. Even if the enemy takes Rotholz, we can now set up another line of artillery south of the hills, protected from enemy fire. This means the enemy bleeds multiple times while trying to take the next position, without having to solely rely on cavalry charges to disrupt long-term bombardment. The theoretical taking of Rotholz neatly leads into the issue of taking the central corridor, after the enemy infantry has heavily bleed and plenty of munitions have been exhausted. And my own cavalry didn't have to be deployed, enabling raids on the enemy if he is weak enough. After all this, the option of a counterattack still remains. The south of Rotholz isn't particularly protected against artillery fire.

See, you claim the second fallback position is an illusion, but that is false. The enemy needs to commit either large amounts of ammunition to storming Rotholz, or significant amounts of manpower. In either case, it weakens him. The second position might be in the open, but it is an artillery position that needs to be overcome with an already weakened force. The enemy artillery can't teleport in there and I don't leave half of the map to the enemy to freely reposition their forces.

NSchwerte said:
Uhh, random quote about patience - "If you wait by the river long enough, the bodies of your enemies will float by"

That's nice, but non applicable. I don't see a river here, and Wachenheim certainly needed a reason to charge us rather than wait out our charge.

NSchwerte said:
ok I dont think that matters, but Kinzberg Hochschloss is not a castle, its a "High Palace", a Manor House on a hill or mountain while Rotholz Turm is a "Tower", so a small castle. Sarnscheid is a Schloss, a "Palace" and Ottenburg is a Ruine, a "ruin", Kloster Damenhof is a Monestary.

While Schloss means palace in the strict sense, there are also conventional fortifcations that we would classify as a "Burg" and that were called "Schloss" by the people at the time.. Considering the tile is literally a fortified hill, I would classify the tile as a Burg, meaning a castle. It functions as one, regardless of the name.

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