I haven't done one of these for the longest time. I'm going by the knowledge that I think Reconquista planners should be able to work from.
The Republican War of XXXX: Operation Frostfall - Gaining a Foothold in Tristain
Assuming that indeed, the three targets for Reconquista remain the three faerie cities of Sylvain, Freelia and Cadenza, I would hope that we know how to prioritise our targets correctly, because
one of these cities is not like the other cities.
Overall Objectives
- We should keep our troops morale high after our previous losses.
- We must set up a staging area for the Invasion of Tristain in Spring.
- We must take a defensible area to protect our forces over the winter.
- We must secure a stable supply line from Albion to the continent.
- We must survive the winter.
General Conditions on the Ground
With Reconquista recently currently suffering from a bad infestation of faerie assassins and some truly embarrassing military blunders (looking at you admirals in the corner,) over the past few months, morale is sure to be somewhat low, a double whammy considering our force composition.
- Mercenaries, whose loyalty is primary to their pay. Considering the conditions in Albion are deteriorating and the 'easy battles' are running out, they may feel inclined to either indulge themselves in violence and looting to make up for lost profits or to seek new employers on landfall...
- The army and navy, whose loyalty remains suspect due to the presence of in-fighting, repeated failures and the annoying legitimacy of the Prince-in-Exile. Considering that they may switch sides again, if given sufficiently good motivation, we can't quite rely on them for everything any more...
- Orkz iz made fer fightin an winnin! WAAAAAAAGH! (But they sure ain't made for getting in the good books of the locals. And they aren't as nice as the faeries, so people might be inclined to spread rumours about our choice of allies...)
- Zealots who truly believe in our cause. Guaranteed to go down fighting, but not always guaranteed to be of much use, and they may be a liability in the field if they cannot control their impulses...
Tristain itself is mostly easy to penetrate, as we have the ultimate high ground from which to launch attacks from, but we have to be cautious with our gains, due to the extended supply line, our precarious diplomatic position, the unreliability of our beneficiaries and our own shortcomings with morale at the moment. At any moment during our invasion, something could occur that will render our forces overextended, unable to react and quickly destroyed or captured in short order, leaving our isles unguarded.
The land of Tristain is no longer a safe place in general to winter; the presence of mobs of varied strength, the increased mobility and striking power of enemy forces due to all faeries being air-mobile mages, and the potential for the Tristainians to summon massive creatures of impressive strength means that we will either need to conduct a lightning campaign to take over the country in one fell swoop either this fall (stupid) or next spring (much safer), or to take a stronghold and survive the winter (risky in general).
We can expect the Tristainian army and navy to be at full/near-full strength for the duration of the campaign, enjoying a shorter supply line and increased morale due to their need to defend their positions stubbornly, as well as their belief in a righteous war against a heretical enemy. (Which is ridiculous, because they are the heretics. Clearly)
Freelia
The home city of the cait syth, Freelia is a tough nut to crack. As stated before, the presence of massive fortifications, the lack of safe ground directly besides the city (assuming the depiction of Freelia as a fortified island holds true, of course,) the cait syth beast tamers and their mounts pose a major problem for our forces.
We should hope that our improved weaponry will provide us the stand-off range to engage their defences safely whilst our own landing parties try to breach a hole in those defences, from which we can attempt to take the city, quarter by quarter. That said, the faeries will likely dig in hard and prove to be hard to shift. If their intervention at Newcastle is any indication of their overall combat ability, we will likely be pinned down in place through ranged attacks, then incinerated by their fire. Thus, should the fighting continue within the city itself, our losses are likely to be high, especially if the area is as fortified as we fear.
Their own dragons are much different than ours, being of hardier stock and with amazingly potent breath attacks. They will likely not deploy against our own dragon knights, but our numbers are thin on the ground since the start of the revolution. We should reserve our dragons for attacking their dragons, which will undoubtedly be used to terrorise our landing parties and provide support to their own ground forces.
If we seek this battle, we must commit at least a moderate portion of our fleet to Freelia; the Tristainian naval presence will be significant and the lack of terrain to land our forces and stage a multi-pronged assault upon the city will be severe limitations in our ability to engage them, and we do not have the time to carry out a siege. Again, our improved weaponry and the skill of our navy should give us some measure of an advantage over the Tristainian navy and their faerie compatriots, but our numbers should be carefully managed.
Overall, I would highly recommend reworking any plans to invade Freelia. Though the city is an excellent place to winter in Tristain, being fortified, easily defensible and close to the borders of the country, whilst also shortening our supply line, it is also a deliberate death trap and a sure way to lose many experienced men to faerie-fire and attrition.
Sylvain
The so-called racial capital of the sylphs is a major prize in this war, being the home city of the faerie leader, Sakuya. The city is given to the style of massive towers and exposed air-bridges, accommodating to the sylph's own natural tastes. Fortifications on the ground are likely to be light, as it appears that the sylph are inclined to use their superior flight and speed to pre-empt any incoming enemies, rather than fighting in place.
Naturally, due to the symbolic importance and relatively central position of this city, the faeries and the Tristainians will likely defend it to the death. Expect a significant Tristainian naval and army presence, as well as determined and dedicated defenders. Thus, we should require a moderate-to-high number of assets to mount an assault here.
Our main problem will be that of sylph raiding parties. Their high mobility and all-around magical ability will play havoc on our forces if they cannot dig their heels in, and we can expect lone ships to be enveloped, boarded and captured in short order. Thus, we must keep our naval assets in close formation to support one another, and the ground assets in close cohesion to prevent them from being picked off.
We have to concentrate our forces and fight for the city itself, not the terrain surrounding it, though damaging the city is not recommended due to our need for a location to spend the winter. The structural integrity of the towers is not known, but should be of fairly solid build.
A possible option would be to rush a small flotilla to one of these towers, breach a hole in their upper levels and board the towers from there, fighting in confined spaces and moving downwards as we go along. This maximises our ability to bring manpower to bear in close quarters, negating the mobility advantage of the sylphs and forcing them to fight for the tower itself. In addition, successfully capturing the majority of the city in this manner will allow us to reduce the overall windstone cost of ascending and descending, using their towers as makeshift sky-ports.
The prize of winning Sylvain is being in possession of a pseudo-skyport, a major propaganda blow and morale boost for our men and the chance to strike closer to the heart of Tristain and the city of Arrun from our new staging point. However, our supply lines will be somewhat stretched and vulnerable to raiding from the Tristainian navy, and there is no guarantee that the sylphs will not simply retreat and continue to harass us well into the winter.
Cadenza
The tent city of the puca, Cadenza possesses little in the way of defensive fortifications, and the puca themselves, whilst hosts to a most unusual form of magic, are not apparently martial in nature, unlike the salamanders or the cait syth. The terrain itself seems quite hospitable and the location of the city is decent enough to stage further attacks from.
The puca are not a major political or military force within the faerie ranks, but even so, they still are faeries and they will defend their own. We can expect Tristainian military planners to either write off Cadenza as an indefensible position or to declare it the weakest link in their coastal defences. Thus, either the area will have a light or heavy naval and army presence, as well as ample faerie presence.
Frankly, this is our best opportunity to gain a foothold on Tristain. The present lack of stonework means that our ships will have no problems bombarding the outer defensive perimeter sufficiently to establish a beachhead for our troops, though we must not actually bombard the city proper; their low defensive strength also means that should be destroy it ourselves, we cannot use them for shelter later. Once we take the city, we must spend as little time as possible repairing it and more time adding proper fortifications to it.
Personally, I fear for our men on the ground. We have had little experience with the puca song magic, and as much as it is superstitious and illogical, looking to the old stories suggests that their songs can drive men mad, harming their souls and causing great pain, in addition to supporting their own forces and granting various beneficial effects. The notion of song magic is troubling, as we cannot guarantee that drowning out the music will prevent it's effects from taking place, nor do we know if the puca can combine their music into a congregation of sorts for greater effect.
Thus, we should likely send the expendable troops first, orcs and the more ill-tempered mercenary companies. This will allow us to gauge the efficacy of song magic and develop our own response.
Other than the song magic however, nothing else of major importance seems to be applicable. As long as we can bring our superior naval forces to bear against their own and come through victorious, taking Cadenza seems like a surety. In addition, Cadenza's distance from Albion is presently reasonable, though the need to ascend and descend is still a concern for our windstone consumption.
Should we take Cadenza though, our own hopes of defending it are very much dependent on the speed and skill of our own engineers and troops on the ground, as they too will then suffer from a lack of hard cover. Should our navy under-perform in the battle, there is little stopping Tristain from simply counterattacking the remnants with their own reserves and destroying our prime advantage in one swoop.
Finally, we also have to take into consideration, the various faerie-related mobs in the area. The faeries naturally know how to deal with these creatures, but with their withdrawal, whatever creatures they held in check for the city's protection may be let loose upon our ranks. Given enough men and time, we should develop our own strategies for dealing with these mobs, but there is no guarantee that we will emerge victorious.
Final Thoughts
It takes decades to build a tradition, but it only take a year to lose it all. Our professionals and ships are precious. We cannot afford to lose any more skilled men or ships unnecessarily in this campaign, or we will have to rebuild our reserves from scratch. Thus, we must keep our most precious troops in reserve and keep them safe and strong for the advance in the coming spring, or risk being unable to capitalise on our gains and being slowly bled dry by Tristain.
The faeries are the hated enemy, but we must respect their abilities. We paid the price for underestimating the faeries at Newcastle and York, had our plot in the capital ruined by their intervention and are currently dealing with unknown numbers of faerie infiltrators wreaking havoc across our island. They must be treated with respect as befitting their abilities, but we do not have to be polite to them.
We must make inroads with the local populace and the rest of the continent. We cannot fight this war by ourselves and expect to come out unbloodied. The people of Tristain are inclined to fight to the death for their own land, which we threaten to take from them. If they can be led to believe that we mean them no harm, as well as bringing the light of the Founder and God back to their lands, we will have a much easier time advancing through the countryside.
In addition, our position amongst the nations is tenuous, having stood apart from the Church and being led by the people's will.
Germania is ever-hungry for land and resources, and should they spy the chance, they have the ability to march upon either Tristain or Albion to take over whoever they wish. We should improve our standing with Germania, try to convince them to ally with us.
Romalia is likely to support Tristain in this war. The quality of the Romalian forces is high and they are very much motivated to fight against us for our 'heresy' and our liberation of Albion for the people and God. We should likely see Romalian intervention should the Tristainians come into a tight spot.
Gallia is as always, ever quiet on matters concerning the continent. We cannot guarantee who they will swing towards, but should it be our cause, we can expect substantial support from them.
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