Archived template: Battle report

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/image...Rep_banner.jpg

I have constructed a template that you guys could copy and use for future “battle reports”. A final word about detail thou, the reason why a report has to be very detailed is that otherwise it is nearly impossible to draw any useful information and lessons from it. And any discussion regarding it will otherwise be constantly bogged down in various uncertainties, and that is not how things should be, so please bother to fill in all entries and thorough if possible. If you dont know, use an EST. (estimated) marking in the entry. Anyhow a decent battle report should include:

• Battletag. Proof of the fact that battle has actually happened, it is utterly pointless to study and discuss pure fiction. If you want to include additional pics, by all means do that but remember the restrictions of 800x600 as an absolute max. Otherwise use spoilers.
• Overview section. To provide a good overview of the battle and the ruling circumstances for that battle.
• Setup section. Specifying exactly (if possible, do try to get this right) what troops were involved and deployed in that battle etc.
• Results section. What was the results of the battle? Basically you put in the stats from the battletag and let the numbers do all the talking...
• Commentary section. Here the reporting “commander” can share his opinions, impressions and insights of that battle. This will of course be a very important part of the battle report.

Further suggestions on improvements and additions are of course welcomed, post 'em in the regular redux-thread and I will transfer relevant suggestions and stuff to this place. The current template is as follows...


-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
BATTLE REPORT-TEMPLATE 1: Battle 1A (Insert title, ex. “The Battle for Patay”)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/image...l/BatTag01.jpg


-----------------------------------------
BATTLETAG: “Battle 1A”
-----------------------------------------
The Battletag is proof of the fact that battle has actually happened, since it is utterly pointless to study and discuss pure fiction. We won’t learn anything from that! Don’t use any higher resolution than 800x600 for this. It must also be possible to read it as well, otherwise there is no point with it. That means that the smallest resoltion you should use is about 600 x 480 or there about (if you want put in a spoiler, by all means do that). You can upload the images/battletags at “ImageShack” and “Filefront”, places like that. JPEG is probably the best file-format. Battletags don't need any text attached to them, it's redundant, let the "tag" do all the talking here....


-----------------------------------------
OVERVIEW: “Battle 1A”
-----------------------------------------
Player: Axalon (Who played the battle?)
Version: - (Redux default is assumed, if altered version it should have been stated here)
Level: Expert (at which difficulty? Expert/hard/normal/easy....)
Troop setting: Default (Which unit-setting is it? Small/default/medium/large/max.)
Circumstance: Attack (attack/defence)
Weather: Fine & windy (what was the weather like? fine/windy/rainy/storm/snow)
Terrain: Lush – plains, some woods & hills. See mini-map. (Lush/temperate/arid/desert and some basic features woods, hills, moutains, bridge and stuff like that).
Turn: 000 (this was a custom battle, in campaign however the turn should be stated)
Odds: 4:1 disadvantage roughly (it was a bit more than that but there about in this case)
Outcome: Victory (victory/defeat does not matter really. Defeats are intresting as well)


-----------------------------------------
SETUP: “Battle 1A”
-----------------------------------------

Friendly:
-------------
Faction: England (insert faction you played)
Deployed: 306 men (How many men in total did you deploy in battle?)
Upgrades: 4xall - Att:1,Arm:3. (number of upgrades x units, if it varies, then like this: 2x3 unit A, 6x2 unit B, 4x4 unit C, etc.)
Commander: G.Champion, (0 stars, 0 val.)
Specs: 1 G.champion (0 val), F.Champions (0 val.), 3 H.Infantry (0 val), 3 F.Knights (0 val)

Opposition:
-------------
Faction: Italy (it could of course be more than one, then state all)
Deployed: 1310 men (How many men in total was deployed in battle by the enemy?)
Upgrades: 2xall - Att: 1, Arm:1.
Commander: R.Knight, (0 Stars, 0 val.)
Specs: 1 R.Knight (0 val.), 2 F.Knight (0 val.), 2 L.Cavalry (0 val.), 5 It.Infantry (0 val.), 2 R.Infantry (0 val.), 2 Pikemen (0 val.), 2 It.Crossbowmen (0 val.).


-----------------------------------------
RESULTS: “Battle 1A”
-----------------------------------------

Friendly kills: 808 men (what killratio did you have?)
Enemy kills: 173 men (what losses did you have?)
Friendly survivors: 133 men (how many of your men survived the battle?)
Enemy prisoners: 243 men (how prisoners did you take?)
Outcome: Victory (win/loss, does not matter really)


-----------------------------------------
COMMENTARY: “Battle 1A”
-----------------------------------------

Background: (Always provide a short background to set the context right, this of course is especially true for campaign-battles)

Insert your average concise and interesting background text here... In this case it should be all about Battle 1A of course. However, since it was a custom/solo battle, it might be a bit redundant but at least state that fact: “This was a custom battle I set up that I thought could be interesting.”

Battle Events: (In sweeping terms what happened, how did the battle develop? What happened?)

In this battle my foe tried to do a strategical outflanking positioning by dispatching 4 units to take control of a tactically important hill with woods as well. 2 royal infantry (especially these just had to be destroyed, or they would destroy me) and 2 pikemen formations it was. Now that mistake was too good to pass on since I knew that I had to destroy these units before I was forced to fight the bulk of the entire enemy army. This was a prospect that simply was not viable with the manpower I had available so I marched rapidly to fight these units before I had to deal with all other enemy units.

As usual my infantry tied up the enemy forces while I tried to flank and break them with my knights. However to give some additional power to the fight my various champions went in to support the infantry (including my general). While my knights just swooped in to break and finish these enemy units off, my general died in battle. Not good at all, and frankly I expected him to survive but he didn’t (enemy royal infantry is not to be toyed with obviously!). l was now really concerned that some infantry would panic and this envelopment would fail but they actually stand firm and the destruction of the units was completed.

By now other enemy formations was on their way to join the fight (it. infantry and feudal knights) but it was too late and I hurriedly moved my infantry to make a defensive line to meet these forces soon there after all hell broke loose and all my infantry was tied down in combat. The enemy had now almost full contact with my forces. I reinforced the line with one formation knights to keep the line intact were the enemy feudal knights were (they would have killed my infantry if it not were for that). Thus I have two knights-formations to do some manoeuvring to take out the 2 it. crossbow formations. I knew that I had to take out these or loose the entire battle, no matter the cost. I eventually did manage to do almost that while the battle at the foot of the hill raged on. But it sure took some several move orders and evading from the 2 it. infantry formations that tried to engage and perused my knights.

I just could not allow that to happen or I would surely loose. I had to break off once since one formation actually caught my knights formation. Anyway, the enemy general was now my primary target when the pressure and threat from the crossbows was gone. I ordered 1 knight formation to engage him but for some stupid reason they failed in doing a successful charge and were soon after crow food at the very hands of the enemy general (probably very tired after dealing with the crossbows)! Oh noo, Disaster! I thought and looked for desperate ways to save my army from this fate and desperatly waiting for the other knight formation to come for the rescue. I even pulled out my knights from the defensive line in order to remedy things. However, the knight arrived in time to charge and tie down the enemy general. Now it was the other way around and soon he was fleeing. For the first time things seemed to be hopeful for my English boys to actually save the day... I never managed to kill the general but soon thereafter the Italian army had been grinded down to smithereens and they gave up and fled the field! The day was mine...

Tactical Keys: (A few notes on what you believe was necessary in order to win, or create maximum damage. Personally I think stuff like this would be very interesting)

To me this battle is all about the mobility of cavalry and outflanking the enemy with my knights while the infantry tried to tie up enemy (especially pikes and spear) formations. It was also necessary to break off and attack elsewhere during the entire battle (due to shortage of men). It was also vital to strike at those isolated troops that moved to the hill in the beginning of the battle and destroying these before I had to fight the entire army. The fact that I was allowed the chance to choose the battleground after that were I would meet the rest of the enemy army sure helped me to secure a victory as well. Also the destruction of both crossbows formations was vital for me to continue this battle long enough to actually get a chance to win it. If I would have failed with that I would have lost the battle for sure. The losses and moral-penalty for being fired at is not affordable in battle such as this one.

Tactical Problems: (What were the most serious problems and dangers in this battle. This section could also be very interesting reading I believe)

The two primary concerns for me in this battle were moral and crossbows. Moral since I only had 0 valour “custom battle” units available and these guys are not nearly as dependable as regular campaign forces that usually have some valour and additional moral-bonuses (churches and stuff like that). So I was constantly worried that some of them would actually break into rout. Crossbows since de do add pressure and casualties to my troops as well as moral penalties and in a battle such as this one it is not viable to have any of that around. Apart from all that, are the obvious facts of being outnumbered and more importantly having fewer operational units than the enemy, that do present a very real problem. Margins for errors drops drastically in situations like that and the margins increases for the enemy accordingly, because “he” can afford to do some mistakes and still have a strong army left. With the circumstances I had in this battle I simply could not afford that. I simply could not afford to have ANY of my units to break without some serious resistance first or I would have been overwhelmed completely. The fact that my general died certainly did not help my cause, even if I was spared of the standing moral penalties that you get from such event (- 2 in morale), in this case however it was just were temporary (-8 moral), since I had only deployed elite-formations in this battle.

As for the foes my main worries was especially directed towards 6 units which really presented a threat to me and that really could do some serious damage to my forces (in general terms, in detail there are of course more troops that certainly have the potential, pikes vs. horses etc.). To me it where the 2 Feudal knights, 2 Royal infantry, 2 crossbow formations. It was critical that I somehow managed to destroy these, preferably as fast as possible without too devastating loses since I must have some men left to deal with the remaining army after that (it did not happen that way of course but I tried when I could). In most cases I tried to outflank them whenever I got the chance, thus increasing my chances of breaking them because I had not men enough to fight them the traditional way (shortage of men, valour and an able commander. After all, 0 stars and 0 valour).

Closing Remarks: (Here you can freely comment the battle in anyway you deem interesting. Impressions, lessons that sort of thing perhaps? The floor is yours and the framework on this section is less rigid so to speak...)

This battle was an open case, it could go either way and it depended heavily on how things turned out as the battle unfolded. Margins for errors on my part were very small. Also this battle shows above all the importance of equipment and perhaps the value of high quality troops when facing heavy odds. Some decent generalship from “you” is of course is also a requirement as well but none the less, with a inferior yet betterly equipped force you can still triumph over a superior force in spite the lack of valour and a good general. The troops I deployed represent well of the kind of troops I have in my kingdom and... etc. etc. stuff like that basically.

Additional Info: (This is the place to state various stuff that can be interesting and useful for the reader to know about while reading the battle-report as a whole and it don’t really fit in anywhere else. Then this is the place!)

Now since this was a solo-battle (custom battle) I had the chance and option to fight it again and again, and I did it 10 times. It was an interesting scenario and I lost 6 times and won 4 so this scenario was about 60/40 for me I’ll guess, quite fun it was!

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
End of Template… :book:

- A