So...erm, how does it work?
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| Frederick after the battle of Kolin (Carl Röchling retouched by kabinettskriege.blogspot.com) |
So we have the map set for our campaign, and the armies are being marshalled. The scenario determines the starting positions of the Prussian and Austrian commands (call them armies, corps, or columns--terminology was a bit loose at this point). But while the approximate size of each force is known, and the starting position of most of the general officers, some details are still unknown, to be determined by the commanders in chief (CINCs) on each side.
While we wait for them to make these decisions, let's review the rules by which the campaign is governed. I won't post the whole ruleset here (they are part of the Might & Reason battle rules, which can be found for sale at the author's website), but let's go over some of the basics.
Victory
The most important question of any military campaign, and of any game--how do you win? As I mentioned in the first post, each army is seeking to occupy each other's supply sources (Dresden, Goerlitz, and Breslau for the Prussians; Pilsen and Bruenn for the Austrians). The Prussians also want to capture and hold Prague, the capital of Bohemia. And each seeks to defeat the other's armies in battle. If the Prussians manage to accumulate at least two more victory points than the Austrians do by then end of the campaign, they win. If the Austrians get more, or even if the Prussians are a head by only a single point, Austria has defeated the invader.
The Seat of War
The area of campaign constitutes most of the northern portion of the Austrian-controlled Kingdom of Bohemia, as well as parts of Saxony (conquered by Prussia the year before our campaign, in 1756) and Silesia (a part of the Lands of the Bohemian Crown lost by Austria to Prussia in 1742 in the treaty ending the First Silesian War). From these two conquered territories, emboldened Prussian armies make ready to plunge their knives into Austria, front and flank.
Each of the points on the map represents a town, a city, or a fortress. The points marked with a circle represent towns and cities without substantial or well maintained fortifications, while the diamonds represent fortified locations, whether a city or town or simply a fortress located at a strategic site. Three Prussian fortresses and two Austrian-controlled towns are marked as supply centers. Armies in the field will depend on those places to keep their men from starving and running out of munitions.
The lines connecting points follow the roads available for movement and mostly represent distances of 15 to 25 miles. Paths through more difficult terrain--especially the routes marked with small triangles, corresponding to mountain passes--represent shorter distances, as these defiles will take more time to negotiate. For the sake of simplicity, no other terrain is represented; assume that river crossings, dense forests, and poorer than normal roads are factored into the frequency of routes. The mountain passes will cause more attrition (explained later) to troops crossing them than other routes.
The campaign will last for five months of game time; it begins at the beginning of April and ends at the end of August. Each turn represents two weeks of activity.
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| Prussian grenadiers advancing at the battle of Leuthen (Carl Röchling) |
Armies
Each army in the campaign, Prussian and Austrian, is represented in the game by several commands. Each consists of one or more general officers and a number of units. Each unit is roughly the size of an 18th century brigade, something like four battalions of infantry (perhaps with attendant light artillery), ten squadrons of cavalry, or several batteries of medium or heavy artillery.
Units possess varying numbers of strength points (SP), which represent the combat power of the formation--a combination of manpower, training and discipline, experience, and morale. A unit with solid esprit de corps but fewer men might still have a higher SP total than a larger unit of untrained recruits or militia of limited experience and training.
Units cannot move operationally by themselves. To move, they must be under the direction of an army commander. Each side has a number of these individuals, of varying skill and ability.Several commands may be present at a point. Troops may be left at a point by a departing general if he wishes to garrison it, but they will have to remain there until another commander arrives to take charge of them.
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| Frederick the Great addressing his generals before the battle of Leuthen (Drawing by Menzel) |
Officers
These commanders mentioned above are rated for command ability, for personality (how aggressive they were), and whether they typically showed exceptional signs of valor in battle. Not all generals are cut out to be commanders, however. A general in charge of an army will need subordinates to command elements of his army in battle, and some of these subordinates were remarkable enough to be called out as individuals; other subordinates may appear at battle time but are generic enough they fade in the background at the level of the campaign. Each commander has a seniority level (the lower the number, the more senior), and whoever is most senior in a force if and when it comes to a battle must command.
Tomorrow:
Raids and Reconnaissance, Movement and Supply, and Battle and Siege
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