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The Mastery of the Globe: A Seven Years' War Quest

Reader mode
[X]Foundations
-[X]To Build
-[X]The Artillery
-[X]The Ways of the Court
-[X]Company Organization
-[X]Justice
 
[X]Foundations
-[X]To Build
-[X]The Artillery
-[X]The Ways of the Court
-[X]Company Organization
-[X]Justice
 
[x] Duty
-[x]To Build
-[x]The Artillery
-[x]The Infantry
-[x]Justice
-[x]Company Organization
 
Nice chapter! You can almost be there, see and feel what's happening...

[X]Foundations
-[X]To Build
-[X]The Artillery
-[X]The Ways of the Court
-[X]Company Organization
-[X]Justice

I like this one.
 
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To Riga and the West
  • Threadmarks
    • To Riga and the West

    [X] Plan Ambition
    -[X]Glory: You want to be remembered not for the slow march of advancement or for your rank and titles, but for the actions you take on the battlefield. You want to win, to lead armies to victories that will etch your name in blood upon the pages of history. That will require advancing in the ranks, but you're not one to wait until the right moment to seek action on the field.
    -[X]The Artillery: You have a number of new light artillery pieces, 'horse guns' as the parlance goes. They're manned by the artillerymen of the military and not by the Imperial Cavalry, and to make full use of the guns you'd best be advised to talk to their junior officers and see about getting some information. Of course, that assumes you'd be assigned horse guns.
    -[X]The Ways of the Court: The ways of the court are tightly bound up in older ritual Peter attempted to erase before it came back like a northern mist. There are a few books about this, diaries and the like from the time of Peter the Great with General Apraksin's annotations in the margins. The annotations themselves are the fruit of a lifetime's experience, and equal to any manual of manners.
    -[X]Company Organization: You command a company as a senior lieutenant, and that means you have more paperwork to do with no valet and staff to handle it with. You have to acquire supplies for the men and fodder for the horses, make sure that the lieutenants under you have their order sets, ensure that the horses are in shape and the men are mustered. And that is before starting on order of march.
    -[X]Drills: While a week before departing is not the time for extensive drills, it allows for the usual round of activities that constitute light drill. Marching, shooting drill, and basic sword-practice. Teaching the more backward of the troopers to handle their pistols properly. All of it is not the equal of proper horseback drill or actual picket duty, but it is valuable nonetheless.

    ​
    March 19th​, 1757
    The Baltic Campaign

    A Russian army on the move is a terrible, awe-inspiring sight from afar, massive columns of green-clad infantry marching regiment by regiment to the shouts of officers with banners flying at the fore. Trumpets and drums sound out the cadence as the troops move, and the darting forms of Cossacks move in and out to the little clusters of mounted officers as the picket commanders send their messengers inwards to the main body. The army marches to the Baltic, a mailed fist more than seventy thousand strong aimed straight down the coast to Prussia. The roads along the coast are barely paved, mud churned to a gelatinous soup by the marching boots of thousands upon thousands of soldiers. Artillery wagons move through it as if wading, the boatlike forms of panje wagons coping far better with the terrain than the guns themselves.

    You watch this from atop a hill as the main body passes you by, as your picket troop of dragoons keeps an eye out for Prussians in Russian lands north of Riga. The Baltic's haze is visible in the distance, mists rolling inland every morning and at every chill dusk like this one, the tang of salt air reminding you of where you are. It's a long way home, from here.

    The army itself marches to relieve the Austrians and take the eastern lands of Prussia, as you're constantly reminded by the dispatches and general orders. At perhaps twenty versts a day, it's a long way just to get to the Prussian fortresses marking their borders – let alone seize Berlin. You turn to the officer next to you, and say the same to him even as the banners marking the command group raise and lower in choreographed signals ordering the pickets to prepare for camp. "You tell me, Mikhail, what odds of taking Berlin?"

    Ensign Mikhail Obolensky, one of the few other real nobles in your regiment, nods pensively as if thinking. You'd be more taken in by the thoughtful air if you didn't know that the lanky ensign had drunk more than you had last night, the night the column set off. He eyes the column marching below with a bleary eye, dragoon's jacket stained with mud and horse shifting restlessly under him. Obolensky answers you in a scratchy voice that belies his rashness, "Bad ones, sir. We have the troops to take the fortresses, but there are rumors out of Prussia."

    "Such as?" A quiet nod at the sergeant when he asks about setting up for camp, and the dragoons of your duty picket move off at a trot to see it done while you and Obolensky follow more sedately. There's a column of your soldiers at your back, but you ignore the muffled cursing and the sergeant's shouting behind you – it ill befits an officer to be that minutely involved. You instead turn back to Mikhail, "I had heard that the Austrians were suffering in Saxony, but nothing about Frederick. Nothing about the English either for that matter."

    "It was all Frederick, not the Austrians. The Austrians did well, but the Prussians did better." Mikhail Obolensky sounds half in awe as he speaks, as if narrating a legend that has trickled from the far reaches of Germany to the wild lands east of Riga, "I have an uncle in Vienna, as a diplomat. He told me what happened, that the Austrian guards and their finest commanders marched out to Berlin last year to punish the Prussian for his insolence. They thought it would be fast. They thought he had bled himself dry last war."

    "But it was not."

    "It wasn't." Obolensky nods jerkily, turning back to glare at one of the troopers and get him back in column. "It wasn't as if they were incompetent, this isn't the last war. But they still lost Saxony, and they lost the field at a place called Lobositz. The Ausrians still holds Bohemia, but things are not that good."

    "And so the empress sends us, after the Austrians sent for aid." You smile for a moment, "One needs the Russians to do a proper job of fighting, not Habsburgs. Just look at what the Swedes got."

    "Maybe, sir." He nods once as if to convince himself, Adam's apple bobbing up and down. "Maybe."

    As if to underscore the words of Mikhail Obolensky, a cold wind blows in from the west. The war is coming.

    -[X]The Artillery: You have a number of new light artillery pieces, 'horse guns' as the parlance goes. They're manned by the artillerymen of the military and not by the Imperial Cavalry, and to make full use of the guns you'd best be advised to talk to their junior officers and see about getting some information. Of course, that assumes you'd be assigned horse guns.

    Background roll, Contacts: 1d20+2 (Charisma 5-10)+1 (Trained Cavalry Command)→17+2+1=20.

    Needed: 15

    Background roll, grasping the tactics: 1d20+2 (Intellect 5-10)+1→ 1+2+1=4

    Needed: 10

    The gun itself is a cast-iron tube with decorative scrollwork along the barrel, a number etched into it at the top of the muzzle informing you that this is Gun Number 3 in the unit. It's cold and damp to the touch, the carriage's wooden wheels stained with mud and crushed vegetation. You look up at the artillery captain in your regiment, his epaulettes marking him as a member of the Artillery Branch and therefore answering to a cavalryman like you out of courtesy and the empress' order. Captain Iosef Cunningham is the son of a Scottish mercenary with the same upper-class Russian accent as you, and he eyes you almost assessingly when you ask him about how to use his guns.

    "Horse guns are an in between, fast and mobile but not really built for artillery duels. We're supposed to aid you by darting in behind the horse, letting off a volley or two to break a line, and then backing off as the horsemen charge." The craggy face of the captain watches you as he raps on the gun's barrel as he speaks, "The wheels are iron-shod, the horse teams are six or eight per gun, and I have enough guns for a full battery."

    "It's a pity that the battalion that will screen you is still understrength, then." You're more blunt with the captain than you would be with most, his rank and his status as an artilleryman meaning that the usual status games that the troopers play is something to avoid. You get a slow nod at the mention of the cavalry's shortcomings, and you plough on ahead without waiting for a reply. "I'm in command of the first company of the 3rd​, and I'll probably be the one to work with the guns when it comes down to it. Not enough heavy horse to mount the charge behind the guns."

    The captain snorts at that, derision mixed with something else as he thinks for a moment before coming to a decision. He turns as if to head off to his camp and calls back to you to follow, and follow him you do. The guns are parked wheel to wheel as if in salute, and you walk between the lines of them on the way to Captain Cunningham's tent. The captain himself murmurs something inaudible before he talks to you over his shoulder, "There's just one cuirassier regiment with the army, and they're Guards. They'll not be used to break a line to start with, but you will be, boy. And I'll wager that I will be as well." He pauses, grudgingly adding, "You have a point."

    You nod, unsure of what the captain means and acutely aware that you didn't expect this. You expected a boozy conversation with some lieutenant, not being caught near the artillery park by a captain and then being walked to the captain's quarters. Captain Cunningham's tent is a spartan one, with a great wooden seachest under his cot and a folding table that holds a thick book atop it. He gestures at that, "That, boy, is the manual of the artillery. You'll not be reading that in the weeks we have before reaching the Prussian border. Sit, and I'll tell you what to do instead." Cunningham gestures at a cheap camp-stool before rummaging in his chest for something, "Drink?"

    You bristle at being called boy repeatedly, but you're not idiot enough to tell a senior artilleryman that. Still, he is offering a drink. You sit down gingerly, "A small one, please. I have to prepare for the night pickets today."

    He grunts, "Take the drinks when you can, boy." A tumbler of some amber liquid is set in front of you as the captain sits heavily on another camp chair at the opposite side of the table. "Whisky. If you haven't had it before."

    The captain caught your dubious look, then. You raise the tumbler to your lips experimentally, and the drink burns a fiery trail down to your sternum as it goes down. Not as much as vodka, though. You take a minute to recover from the unexpected potency, "So what should I do instead, sir?"

    Cunningham nods to himself and downs a good peg of the whisky, "You come to the artillery drills instead of trying to get your head around the theory and practice of horse artillery. You're a cavalry subaltern, not a captain. Not much use in you trying to do things too early."

    "I have a company command."

    He laughs at that, a deep belly laugh that one might give forth at being told an excellent joke. "You're a lieutenant in a new regiment that's short of officers and mostly townsmen. You're not expected to do the work of a full captain, not as a green boy. Take the time to learn about your own regiment, and I'll help you with the task of handling the guns."

    "Thank you." You hesitate, unsure of what to say to that, and settle for another "Thank you, but-"

    You're cut off by the captain's raised hand, Iosef Cunningham just smiling sourly. "Don't thank me. I'm doing this so that the horsemen backing me don't get me and mine killed. It's as much me as you, boy."

    You hesitate again, and just settle for "Yessir."

    -[X]The Ways of the Court: The ways of the court are tightly bound up in older ritual Peter attempted to erase before it came back like a northern mist. There are a few books about this, diaries and the like from the time of Peter the Great with General Apraksin's annotations in the margins. The annotations themselves are the fruit of a lifetime's experience, and equal to any manual of manners.
    Rolled: Intellect: (8+2(Intellect Bonus))*(10+10(Trainer))=200

    Current: 200/400

    Imperial court ceremonial is a complex thing, mainly because it's also something that keeps changing as the tsars come and go. When Peter became the Tsar, he changed everything – but even Peter's massive, sweeping changes did not make for a static new order. Reading the mood of the court and managing the uncertain terrain of the Imperial Russian nobility is something as much intuitive as it is formal.

    Or so Stepan Apraksin has noted repeatedly. It began with Peter's shift to St. Petersburg and the sharp break with the old nobility, the disregard for ancient rituals and traditions that centered around the Crown of Monomakh and the Orthodox Church. It continued with Peter's reign and the victories of the Northern War, the prominence of the new gentry in the army and the administration over the old boyars.

    It finally continues with Elizaveta Petrovna, who plays the boyars off against the gentry-dominated army and bureaucracy, whose glittering court and rigidly elaborate ceremonial are a product of the Tsaritsa's uncertain rule. Your uncle Stepan notes repeatedly in the margins that the empress' first priority is in remaining the center of the court, and the center of the life that surrounds it – the balls, promenades, reviews, and more that the nobility almost all attend in some shape or form.

    You're not sure you can manage those waters, and you're thankful that you don't have to. The other constant in the diaries is the danger of getting too close to the throne and too dependent on its goodwill – more than one great noble or aspirational magnate has been brought low by the whims of the empress.

    -[X]Company Organization: You command a company as a senior lieutenant, and that means you have more paperwork to do with no valet and staff to handle it with. You have to acquire supplies for the men and fodder for the horses, make sure that the lieutenants under you have their order sets, ensure that the horses are in shape and the men are mustered. And that is before starting on order of march.
    -[X]Drills: While a week before departing is not the time for extensive drills, it allows for the usual round of activities that constitute light drill. Marching, shooting drill, and basic sword-practice. Teaching the more backward of the troopers to handle their pistols properly. All of it is not the equal of proper horseback drill or actual picket duty, but it is valuable nonetheless.
    Rolled:
    1) Organization: 1d20-4(Abysmal Administration)+2(Martial)+1(Subterfuge Bonus)→ 6
    1d20-4(Abysmal Logistics)+2(Martial)+2(Intellect Bonus) → 10
    Needed: 10

    2) Drills: Horsemanship and Commands: 1d20+1(Trained Cavalry Command)+2(Martial)+2(Charisma+Oratory Bonus)→ 13+1+2+2=18
    Firearms: 1d20+1+2→ 3+3=6
    Needed: 10, 10 → Epic Success, Failed

    Skill Gain: Administration: d20+2-2(Abysmal Admin) * 5 → 60, 30/200

    Skill Gain: Logistics: 14+2-2 * 5 → 140, 70/200

    Skill Gain: Cavalry Command: d20+2+1 * 5 → 60, 60/800

    Drilling the men does not go as well as the talks you have with the artillery-captain Iosef Cunningham. Your troop is a thing of contrasts, of urban Muscovites with the wealth and breeding to buy an officer's commission intermingled with the farm-boys, Kalmucks, and former Cossacks that make up most of the rankers. Every common trooper is enlisted for life, and the grizzled beards of most of the noncoms make it clear that this isn't their first posting. The regimental banner that flies above the troops is a young one, with no tradition or wealth of experienced enlistees to buoy the regiment's morale at war.

    When you approach Colonel Yegor Lebedev for permission to drill your company you're waved off from the half-insensate colonel by his batman as the stink of vodka fills the air. With the mumbled assent of your commanding officer in hand and the knowledge that your immediate superior – the commander of both battalions of horse – is currently an alcoholic, you decide that the best thing to do is make sure that the accounts are in order and up to date.
    That turns out to be less easy than anticipated.

    The pay sergeant and the other lieutenants give you a look that's more trepidation than anything else when you ask about the accounts, and simply getting your hands on the paybooks and supply manifests for your company of dragoons is more work that expected. The books themselves come with a sullen note from Major Vorontsov, the colonel's second in command, warning you to return them posthaste and in good condition – the implied order being what it is, you have little time to sweat through the regimental lists to make sure the muster is exactly as written.

    Instead of that, you decide to prioritize food and fodder over ensuring that your pay stubs are accurate. The family name is enough to shield you from accusations of embezzlement, and the colonel won't be stupid enough to try to use you as a scapegoat when your uncle is the general commanding. So with the knowledge that nepotism is on your side, you turn to supplies.

    One horse needs nine kilograms of forage per day, and less if one feeds them on grain. The horses that you have are not the great chargers of the heavy cavalry, and therefore need less fodder and water than the guidebook recommends for mainline horse. The troopers themselves ideally need two hot meals a day and enough dried meat, biscuit, and water. The troopers need vodka or wine, enough for a daily ration that they don't mutiny or sell their equipment for a drink. All of that and more takes a long, long time to painstakingly transcribe, the supply manifests made out in the same manner as the ones already stamped and countersigned in the regimental account books. It takes long enough that you give up on scrutinizing the accounts, and settle for the knowledge that you've secured enough silver and immediate fodder for the company to march to Riga. After that...you'll have to rely on Colonel Lebedev and Major Vorontsov.
    That makes you take a moment to pray.

    The nights are filled with the account books and supply manifests, meetings with your other lieutenants and Major Vorontsov to finish the marching orders. The days, though, are filled with drill as your company gets herded out on parade.

    The first day of parade, on the barracks-grounds of Narva, you take a look at the hundred cavalrymen astride their horses on parade. The banners of the 3rd​ Dragoons and the city of Moscow fly below the imperial eagle in the Estonian dawn, eight days before the army marches off to war. As you ride down the ranks of the company that you're tasked with commanding, you see nervous faces, pale with excitement and anxiety. You see the older troopers watching you with their expression carefully schooled to neutrality and their eyes warily eyeing you up as much as you inspect them. Bruises and marks on some of the younger troopers get no comment – you know enough about barracks hazing to know that the sergeants will make sure it won't get too bad. If the muster is understrength, you'll know. And at that point, you'll get involved.

    Since the unit seems to expect a speech, you ride back around to the front of the company with every cavalry troop drawn up behind a lieutenant. On the flanks are the file leaders, and at the head of the unit is the company banner. You take this in, painfully aware of the new unit and new soldiers all waiting for you to speak. So, you speak.

    You tell them of the regiment's youth, that nobody expects anything from the sons of Moscow. That the capital and the great regiments of St. Petersburg are the cream of the cavalry. You tell them that they will carve their names into history, that glory and wealth await at your back...or their names will be forgotten in the ashes of history if they flee or fail. You tell them that they will not fail or falter, and that they will make their city proud.

    You get a brief cheer, probably on the sergeants' prompting, and then the drills begin. This is repeated day after day, the unit moving through evolutions and formations at the call of the bugler and barked orders from each file leader. Formation tactics are something that you had some aptitude for, above and beyond the other lieutenants – and thus the unit learns.

    Firearms drill on the other hand is harder. Getting your hands on powder and shot is something harder than you thought, with the commissary service unable to store more than the combat loads for the regiment. Running dry-fire drills has marginal results, with the basics of firearms drill run through by every trooper reasonably smoothly – while you can say that the men know basic shooting drill, you don't get to run them through live fire drills.
    Hopefully that will be sufficient.

    Your company is now at High Morale: +2 to combat morale rolls.

    Votes:

    The Regiment:     The key thing while on the march is to connect with others in your regiment, which is conspicuously short on officers. You're one of the new officers, and a War College graduate at that – it is wise to know those under and above you before they make assumptions about you based on the name you bear. Pick one:

    []The Battalion Mess: Your own battalion mess is headed by a captain, and the battalion is apparently understrength. A two-company battalion like this one is a small place, and it pays to know one's comrades in that sort of place.

    []The General Mess: Major Vorontsov heard of your last name, and as a fellow noble invited you to the other battalion's mess instead of yours. A larger unit and the home of most of the regiment's experienced noncoms, the 1st​ Battalion is a place that you'd have preferred – the 2nd​ that you're stationed to is far less solid as a force. One might as well make some connections outside the battalion, just in case.

    Duties on the March: Your time is limited while on the march, but you have a mix of formal and informal commitments while the regiment makes its way past Riga to the Prussian border. You can take a mix of formal and informal duties, but remember that your formal duties come first. Pick one of the following:
    []Screening the Army: Your unit is assigned as a picket force ahead of the troops, with the Cossacks on the flanks. The vanguard is the most likely to engage the enemy, but it's also a place of glory and renown – why not take it?

    []Watching the Flanks: Your dragoons are on the flanks, heavier than the Cossacks and therefore intended to watch for a flank attack. More time can be bought by dragoons than Cossacks, and the army is geared more for a head-on engagement than in flank. Of course, this duty is less likely to find an enemy…

    Pick one of the below:
    []Artillery Drills: You've been invited to attend the firing drills and the informal meetings that the horse artillery are holding to shake down while on the march. It's a large concession, and made more understandable by the knowledge that your colonel is a drunk, your captain overwhelmed by the work he has and the major disinterested. This will probably help your understanding of commanding the guns, at the cost of time and association with the artillery.

    []Mingling with the Lieutenants: Under you are another two lieutenants and a few non-commissioned warrant officers who hold warrants from the general signed by the marshalate. Knowing your subordinates better can only help, although it comes at the cost being more directed towards your own regiment's affairs.

    []Handling the Supplies: You can spend more time attempting to secure fodder and food – the army's commissariat is notoriously sclerotic and securing supply will improve unit morale as well as combat effectiveness. Of course, this will take time and frustration, with a poor decision or loss of temper angering the commissariat.

    Votes are open. I will update charsheet later. Feedback welcome.
     
  • Threadmarks
    • [X] Responsibility
    -[X]The Battalion Mess
    -[X]Artillery Drills
    -[X]Watching the Flanks

    We should solidify our battalion before getting involved with others. Meet our people, learn to use our guns. I'm not satisfied with our ability to meet combat as the vanguard, and the Cossacks are better suited to it anyway.

    If we want glory, well enough, but we'll be sensible about. No making bad calls and callous mistakes for vainglorious nonsense.
     
    [X] For Glory and Mingling
    -[X]The General Mess
    -[X]Screening the Army
    -[X]Mingling with the Lieutenants
     
    mouli said:
    "It was all Frederick, not the Austrians. The Austrians did well, but the Prussians did better." Mikhail Obolensky sounds half in awe as he speaks, as if narrating a legend that has trickled from the far reaches of Germany to the wild lands east of Riga, "I have an uncle in Vienna, as a diplomat. He told me what happened, that the Austrian guards and their finest commanders marched out to Berlin last year to punish the Prussian for his insolence. They thought it would be fast. They thought he had bled himself dry last war."

    "But it was not."

    "It wasn't." Obolensky nods jerkily, turning back to glare at one of the troopers and get him back in column. "It wasn't as if they were incompetent, this isn't the last war. But they still lost Saxony, and they lost the field at a place called Lobositz. The Ausrians still holds Bohemia, but things are not that good."
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    It appears things are going much better for the Prussians than OTL. I'm under the impression that for them the actual Seven Years War was a total disaster that they escaped without major concessions purely through sheer luck, one particularly egregious example being the Russians flipping sides literally at the gates of Berlin due to a timely succession. Well, more glory for us!

    We've made a contact, if not quite friend, in the Artillery, although failed to learn more about the guns. I'll take it! It's pretty clear having the right connections means everything in Russia, so the sooner we start making them the better.
    mouli said:
    It takes long enough that you give up on scrutinizing the accounts, and settle for the knowledge that you've secured enough silver and immediate fodder for the company to march to Riga. After that...you'll have to rely on Colonel Lebedev and Major Vorontsov.
    That makes you take a moment to pray.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    So logistics is a complete clusterfuck, to nobody's surprise. This ain't helped by the fact our character has no idea what he's doing, so for now I think we're just gonna have to deal and hope we get help in the future.
    mouli said:
    You tell them of the regiment's youth, that nobody expects anything from the sons of Moscow. That the capital and the great regiments of St. Petersburg are the cream of the cavalry. You tell them that they will carve their names into history, that glory and wealth await at your back...or their names will be forgotten in the ashes of history if they flee or fail. You tell them that they will not fail or falter, and that they will make their city proud.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    A Russian Napoleon, indeed ...

    Plan wise, I'd prefer socializing outside the company due to the more useful contacts, but it's not critical. Otherwise, I agree with taking the flanks and following up the Artillery line.
     
    Last edited:
    [X] Covering the bases
    -[X]The General Mess
    -[X]Artillery Drills
    -[X]Watching the Flanks

    I think it is a good idea to get to know the leadership (the Major) first and foremost.
     
    LonelyWolf999 said:
    Well, it appears things are going much better for the Prussians than OTL. I'm under the impression that for them the actual Seven Years War was a total disaster that they escaped without major concessions purely through sheer luck, one particularly egregious example being the Russians flipping sides literally at the gates of Berlin due to a timely succession. Well, more glory for us!

    We've made a contact, if not quite friend, in the Artillery, although failed to learn more about the guns. I'll take it! It's pretty clear having the right connections means everything in Russia, so the sooner we start making them the better.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    Remember that this is 1757, the bare second year of the war. By this time historically, Frederick had taken Saxony but the Austrians had held Bohemia and Silesia. While the Austrians had been made to quit the field and fall back, they had massively bloodied the Prussian Army in the doing - not that they knew it. All they knew (due to the wonders of 18th century information channels) was that the Prussians had settled back into winter quarters in Saxony after bloodily pushing them back.
    ...as far as logistics is concerned, this is entirely on brand. The only thing that really held the Imperial Russian Army back at this point in time was the inefficiency of their commissariat leading to running out of ammunition periodically and thus pulling back beyond the Vistula for resupply.
     
    [X] Covering the bases
    -[X]The General Mess
    -[X]Artillery Drills
    -[X]Watching the Flanks
    mouli said:
    Remember that this is 1757, the bare second year of the war. By this time historically, Frederick had taken Saxony but the Austrians had held Bohemia and Silesia. While the Austrians had been made to quit the field and fall back, they had massively bloodied the Prussian Army in the doing - not that they knew it. All they knew (due to the wonders of 18th century information channels) was that the Prussians had settled back into winter quarters in Saxony after bloodily pushing them back.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    Ah, so it appears that things are still upon the rails of reality, at least for the moment. I ought to do more research into the time period in general, but the Seven Years War can honestly be better described as a kind of proto-World War.
    mouli said:
    ...as far as logistics is concerned, this is entirely on brand. The only thing that really held the Imperial Russian Army back at this point in time was the inefficiency of their commissariat leading to running out of ammunition periodically and thus pulling back beyond the Vistula for resupply.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    Admittedly speaking, stuff like our commanding officer being an insensate alcoholic hasn't been inspiring much confidence in our army's martial prowess, but perhaps that's specific to the Dragoons - the unit seems to be treated as something of an afterthought.
     
    Honestly, we, the Russians stand a decent chance. Historically the first battle between the Russians and the Prussians (Zorndorf) was a draw so inconclusive that each side ended up taking out a wing of the other's army.
     
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