Encircle enemy before battle

[benF86]

Right. Phaps it has been written be4, I dunno, but I think they should make the battles more realistic by taking into account the side where you attack from.I mean if I surround a province by all sides and attack, I'd expect my army to be AROUND the center not just at one side of the map. It'd be great to have such fights where the enemy is encircled, especial when their army is big too. Like Stalingrad in WW2, just in RTW times.

[rasoforos]

its not that realistic...i mean ..the different armies will march from different locations towards the battlefield but it is not a good strategy to keep them seperated and in different locations once they are near the army of the defender. In this case a good defender would engage the dispached armies one by one and it would be easy for him to avoid a battle against the whole army. If the defender gets a couple of victories this way then the morale of the remaining units will collapse.
To conclude , i think that to encircle in the battlefield is a great strategy but it is not the same as to have your army march from different locations ( which gives you the dissadvantage of smaller numbers than the enemy in a territory that the enemy knows best)

[clovenhoof]

I disagree with the idea that splitting an army up and attacking the enemy with it from multiple sides is unrealistic or impractical. I would think that the point would be to move your armies in a coordinated way so that while the defenders were engaged with one, a second could attack from the rear. Being surrounded is perhaps the worst state of affairs in of any military unit of any time and not just because supply lines are cut and the option to retreat is taken, but because you may be attacked from all directions simultaneously. Haven't you ever put a few units of heavy calv in some out of the way woods so they can hit the enemt flanks and rear while the foot-soldiers engage them? I think this is the same idea.

[Crash]

There have been many real-life battles, where the one army completely or almost completely surrounded another army. The battle of the Little Bighorn (Custer's Last Stand), several Mongol battles, Zulu battles, in the British colonies, just to name a few. The Mongols, in fact, used to surround a nearly defeated but stubborn enemy, then show them a little gap that they could run through. They let a few enemy soldiers through, to tempt the others to try to run away as well. When the enemy soldiers start flooding through the gap, the Mongols attacked and slaughterted everyone.

In a RTW game, a massive army of of 20 units should be able to attack a small army of 5 or 6 units from every direction at once. If the attackers fail to coordinate their assault, then the small defending force can defeat each small group of attackers in detail. Since the RTW map will consist of 9x9 Km mini-maps, then it will be natural for armies to converge on a singe mini-map from any of the adjacent mini-maps.

[Hakonarson]

Yeah but in most of those cases teh "suurrounding" was pretty much done on the battlefield - not by the approach of armies from different directions.

Co-ordination of such a manouvre would be almost impossible, however there was 1 occasion wher it happened - the Gauls weer surrounded by Roman armies at Telamon in 225 - including the remnants of an army they'd already defeated.

But then they were invading, and were "surrounded" by defending armies hurrying back to save Rome

On the whole ancient generals preferred to have their troops under their immediate control.

Much more common was small parties in ambush off to one side, such as at Trebia River.

[Catiline]

As Hak says even Telamon wasn't intentional, and the fact the Roman armies surrounded the Gauls was an Accident of the terrain in which they came across each other more than anything else.

All the colonial and American example cited aren't really appropraite, the reason the British at Rorke's Drift for example were surrounded was the fact that they were a tiny outpost. THe Romans and indeed most Ancient armies weren't often heavily outnumbered, at least not by enough to make the sort of approach your talking about possible.

Ancient armies struggled with command and control at anything much beyond the strategic level. It wasn't impossible but on the operational and tactical level they had to rely on the skill of their junior officers and their ability to follow commands. It simply wasn't possible to coordinate the sort of attack you're describing.

Tactically on the battle field itself if you can acheive this so much the better. But the coordination of seperate armies was far too difficult.

[rasoforos]

Quote[/b] (clovenhoof @ July 19 2003,19:04)]I disagree with the idea that splitting an army up and attacking the enemy with it from multiple sides is unrealistic or impractical. I would think that the point would be to move your armies in a coordinated way so that while the defenders were engaged with one, a second could attack from the rear. Being surrounded is perhaps the worst state of affairs in of any military unit of any time and not just because supply lines are cut and the option to retreat is taken, but because you may be attacked from all directions simultaneously. Haven't you ever put a few units of heavy calv in some out of the way woods so they can hit the enemt flanks and rear while the foot-soldiers engage them? I think this is the same idea.
again you are talking about a case where the different army parts can communicate and meet each other in a matter of hours , this is battlefield surrounding. However when the units converge and they are like 5 days away from each other then it is not a good idea to keep em seperated inside an enemy territory that you dont know well and the enemy can engage the partial armies at will. This is the reason that such a split in enemy territory ( but not the battlefield) is not a good idea.

[Crash]

There is a difference what is a good idea, and what you are allowed to do even though it's risky. Granted it's not a good idea to divide your forces and approach from different directions unless you have radios and walkie-talkies, but that doesn't mean that you should not be allowed to try it in the game. The Mongols were often successful at splitting their forces and converging from different directions due to their extensive experience and discipline. If you try it and fail, too bad, but the game should allow you to make your own mistakes. In any case, it looks RTW will allow to do that anyway with it's matrix map of 9x9 Km battlefields.

[RisingSun]

I DO believe that I read something about if you order two armies to the same battle, one from the rear an the other from the front, then you will see your othr army emerging onto the battlfield from the enemies rear during the course of the battle, providing that they were atad farther away from he enemy.

[Hakonarson]

Quote[/b] (Crash @ July 23 2003,13:12)]There is a difference what is a good idea, and what you are allowed to do even though it's risky. Granted it's not a good idea to divide your forces and approach from different directions unless you have radios and walkie-talkies, but that doesn't mean that you should not be allowed to try it in the game. The Mongols were often successful at splitting their forces and converging from different directions due to their extensive experience and discipline. If you try it and fail, too bad, but the game should allow you to make your own mistakes. In any case, it looks RTW will allow to do that anyway with it's matrix map of 9x9 Km battlefields.
Yeh but Mongol armies that did this did it on the day of the battle, or a day or 2 erarlier, in order to have a force arrive in the enemies rear. Lots of armies did soemthign like this, erlatively speaking. Eg the Persians at Thermopylae sending troops around to teh Greek rear by way of a mountain pass.

Althuogh it's at a much alrger scale it is effectively the general ordering the outflanking "on the battlefield" much as we do in MTW already.

On several occasions the Mongols would invade with several armies from different directions - but the idea wasn't to meet all in hte same place on the same day, it was to overwhelm the enemies defences in several places at once, to force him to divide his armies, to confuse and paralyse effective ersistance.

[Cooperman]

Encircling an enemy on the battlefield can work well but having armies march from different territories to meet up is a dangerous strategy. Probably the best example is the battle of Waterloo, by beating the Prussians and then turning on the English Napoleon came very close to beating both armies.

[lonewolf371]

OK, let's put this in perspective of what a general could do if attacked on 3 points. What I believe I would do would be to leave a heavy rear guard where my army was initially positioned and attack the most vulnerable army first while my rear guard held the line, then proceed back to where the rear guard is fighting and throw momentum into my arrival to punch a hole in the remaining enemy line and win, of course this basic tactic could be altered in hundreds of ways depending on terrain, moral, logistics, troops, and other such factors, but the concept would remaint the same.

Towards Napolean, he probably would have won, but his army was still in horrible condition and the fabled British infantry held all that came their way.

[Oaty]

Quote[/b] ]Encircling an enemy on the battlefield can work well but having armies march from different territories to meet up is a dangerous strategy. Probably the best example is the battle of Waterloo, by beating the Prussians and then turning on the English Napoleon came very close to beating both armies.

Not that its that big of a differance I think you might be thinking of 1 of the battles previous to Waterloo where Napolean won the battle. As far as I can remember at Waterloo Wellington (the English) held off Napolean during the early day and was still there when Bloucher (sp?)(Prussians) arrived and basically decided the fate for Napolean

[Oaty]

Quote[/b] ]As far as I can remember at Waterloo Wellington (the English)

Oops need to correct myself there Sir Arthur wellesley (SP?) with the title of Duke of Wellington

[Kraxis]

oaty, as far as I know Waterloo was not just the british fighting until the Prussians came. Napoleon saw that the allied forces were not joined completely and attacked the Prussians giving them a very bloody nose but a subordinate failed to completely annihilate them (I think). Then he turned on the English but failed to dislodge them until the Prussians reformed and entered the battle again.

Lonewolf, what you discribe there is almost what Uesugi Kenshin did when he squared off with Takeda Shingen at the 4th Kawanagajima. Shingen had seen that Kenshin sat on a hill and devided his forces to attack from the front and rear at the same time. This was during the night. But Kenshin saw through this and left a small force to appear as his main force while he savagely attacked Shingens force in a gorge. It was mayhem and the two generals actually traded blows until a retainer of Shingen saved him by giving his life.
Unfortunately for Kenshin (who was winning by now) the other Takeda army had engaged the small detachment too early and beaten them, tehy then fell on the Uesugi forces in the gorge and the battle turned very bloody for both sides.

[Hakonarson]

Quote[/b] (Cooperman @ July 24 2003,00:20)]Encircling an enemy on the battlefield can work well but having armies march from different territories to meet up is a dangerous strategy. Probably the best example is the battle of Waterloo, by beating the Prussians and then turning on the English Napoleon came very close to beating both armies.
Waterloo campaign - the British/allied and Prussian forces were actualy trying to meet and form a single army.

Napoleon deliberately struck them seperately - trying to defeat them in detail before they could join.

There were several actions - the British were forced out of Quatre Bras mainly because of the defeat of the Prussians at Ligny some miles down the road

Napoleon had told off 2 infantry and 2 reserve cavalry corps under Grouchy to pursue the Prussians and prevent them from joining the British - he fought another battle at Wavre, but that was only against a Prussian rear guard - the remainder of the Prussian army had marched off to join the field of battle at Waterloo.

so hat actualy happened here was a commander invading the enemy deliberately put himself in a central position to attempt to defeat his enemies befoer they could join up.

It's really got nothing at all to do with deliberately invading from several directions in order to surround anyone.

[Shahed]

Quote[/b] (Kraxis @ July 29 2003,20:56)]4th Kawanagajima.
Each army was said to have lost up to 70% of it's forces, Shingen lost some of his best men.

Personally I would like to be able to perform such a maneuver as Shingen's (hopefully yo a better effect) in RTW.

[Kraxis]

Quote[/b] (SeljukSinan @ July 29 2003,18:33)]Personally I would like to be able to perform such a maneuver as Shingen's
Haha... http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif Personally I would rather have the skill to see through the deception like Kenshin did. So Let me guess you like Shingen over Kenshin? It is the other way with me... Seems like that all over, especially in Japan where the country is almost devided in two over who was the best. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/rolleyes.gif

Yeah I have heard about those figures too but I have also seen much more convincing figures (not because they are lower but because of the research) of about 66% of Kenshin forces and about 58% of Shingens, which in total numbers was a massive advantage for Kenshin.

But think about it... Such heavy losses on both sides have I never heard about anywhere else.