Tactical Exercise 4

[Kyrian]

I. This is a limited-width capture the flag battle with a twist. There are various obstacles between you and the enemy. This is similar to the setup at Octoberfest 2005 where the castle tables were laid on their sides and served as obstacles. Red force objective is to capture the blue force flag and return it to their starting point. The blue force objective is to defend the flag and eliminate all red forces. The grey lines on either side indicate the boundaries of the battlefield.

II. Red forces.
--a. Large unit of heavy line fighters with high experience (40)
--b. Medium unit of medium skirmishers with medium experience (30)
--c. Medium unit of medium skirmishers with medium experience (30)
--d. Small unit of light line fighters with medium experience (15)
--e. Small unit of light line fighters with medium experience (15)

III. Blue forces.
--a. Medium unit of heavy skirmishers with high experience (30)
--b. Medium unit of heavy skirmishers with high experience (30)
--c. Large unit of medium line fighters with medium experience (40)
--d. Small unit of medium line fighters with medium experience (15)
--e. Small unit of medium line fighters with medium experience (15)

IV. Organization (from blue force perspective)



Blue force commander, how would you set up your defense?

[Big King Jimmy]

Okay, using the 3 bottom obsticles, I would have d fill in between the wall and the left, c fill in the beween the 2 in the middle, and E hold between the right and the right wall.

If the obsticles are tall enough to hide behind, I'd have the skirmishers hide behind any obsticle not on a wall. If not I'd have them hang behind and inbetween C D and E, and give orders and fill gaps.

[Grim Warhawk AlRitte]

Using the walls to defend against archers and force them to decide a way to attack and commit to it. Any way they move in I can come from a different direction. And I still have a very nice reserve force.

[Kyrian]

Using Grim's defensive position:

While setting up your defense, red forces deploy:



and set themselves up near blue's defense:



Blue force commander, your orders?

[bo1]

I think i would send blue A to move right and forward quickly past red D and flank or back red A with blue D+E sliding right helping to distract red A's front, note that blue D+E fight defensively to give the flankers time. blue B would move to the right and take out red E as well, also flanking red A. Given the armor, experience and numbers Blue A+D should go quickly through red D+E with little losses. In this way you(blue commander) attack the enemy's strenth from both sides and the other of red's smaller groups are of little concern given the reenforcements that you have in blue C. Once blue A and is in motion red A must be eliminated or risk lossing the entire battle.


by the way how do you make the piucture of what you want to happen?

[Galant]

i would have blue c left and forward to occupy red d and b. have blue d and e move into the front of red a to keep their attention.blue a move behind blue c and hit red a on the left rear flank. then have blue b move into the gap just to the right and hold position and beat off red c and e. if either red c or e were to go help red a then blue b should hit the unit left there hard and fall into the right flank of red a.

[Kyrian]

Bo,

I've been using Powerpoint to generate the images. Basically, I move the objects around until I have it looking the way that I want. I select all of the objects I want contained in the image. Then I right-click on "Save as picture" and save the image as a gif. I upload the gif to Photobucket and paste the image link into the post.

If you have Powerpoint, I can email you the template.

[Kyrian]

Using Bo's response:



which achieves this positioning and handily wipes out red d and red e:



Realizing that they're about to get seriously crushed, red a decides to push through and go straight for blue c and the flag. Red a wipes out blue e and severely damages blue d. Meanwhile red b and red c decide to head for the flag and also to hit the flanks of blue c:



Which ends up looking like this:



Blue commander, your orders?

[Ohtar]

I Would have Blue C engage red A, With Blue A coming into sandwich red A. Blue D Flanks to the front of, and lightly engages Red B. This is just a hold off manuever not a major attack (Engage, and move, engang and move). Blue B directly attacks Red C going for the throat.

Hopefully Red A will be routed, Red C Greatly wounded or dead by the greater numbers, and experience of blue B, and Red B will be tied up but not majorly enganged with blue D, with the ramaing blue army comeing to finish her off.

[Grim Warhawk AlRitte]

1. Blue C stands over the flag in a shield-arc formation so they can't be flanked
2. Blue D holds position and readies the charge for after Red A engages Blue C
3. Blue A moves around behind Reb B and engages their rear as they attempt to take the Blue C and the flag
4. Blue B moves around behind Red C and does the same.

My skirmishers have more armor and are hardened vets, and they still have to return the flag AFTER prying it out of Blue C's cold-dead hands. The unit with the biggest posibility of taking the flag is a line unit, and a big one. I should have at least 2 skirmisher units left after the fight.

Also, sorry I didn't respond yesterday. I was at work (24 hour shifts).

[bo1]

i aggree with the above post, but Blue c should only fall back if pushed by red A. i think that given that blue a+b are full strength, have b eliminate the red flankers nearest them. the same for blue A then have blue c+d- engage red A from 2 sides. this does leave blue c+d- a little open but only for a moment until red A is delt a cruching blow by the rest of the blue units. plus bieng that a is a wall, the skirmishers will move much faster

BTW After the battle i would talk to blue A+B+D+E for not following orders. Blue D+E were to fight defensively, when Red charged they should have fallen back until in contact with blue C. That falling back while still slowing the red advance would have allowed the Blue flankers, which should have a major speed advantage, to engage the enemies rear instead of getting left behind.