The Battle of Edessa - Battle thread

[GeneralHankerchief]

The Battle of Edessa

Background:

Ever since Basileus Ioannis Komnenos II and Caesar Methodios Tagaris both died within days of each other, the Byzantine Empire has been thrown into chaos over competing claims about who would take the throne. Officially, the new Basileus is Ioannis Tagaris. However, there are multiple competing claims to the throne, rebellions, and secession movements.

Andronikos Komnenos is leading one of them. Displeased with the choice of the new Basileus, he has taken his one vassal and plethora of lands in Asia Minor and seceded from the Byzantine Empire, attempting to create a breakoff kingdom. So far he has moved quickly, and while numbers are against him, in truth, most of his enemies have their own situations to deal with closer to home and are of no threat to the aspiring ruler. Theophylaktos Petzeas, however, is a different story.

Owner of a moderately-sized army with a lot of cavalry at his disposal, Petzeas has recently been working towards the conquest of the great Turkish city of Edessa, clearing away numerous armies. Theo expects the city to fall in a relatively short period of time, as only a token garrison remains. However, Andronikos has thrown a major wrench in his plans.

The situation:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Moving with unexpected speed, Andronikos has reached Edessa from the west before Theo could either complete his conquest or get out of the way. Theo thus finds himself sandwiched between Andronikos's numerically-superior army and Edessa, with a river to the north further complicating things. At first glance, it would appear that with very little room to retreat. Theo is doomed. However, the Turks, content to watch their enemies kill each other, are staying out of the battle. In addition, Theo's cavalry superiority could cause problems for Andronikos.

Andronikos, while having a solid line of retreat to the west in case the battle goes poorly, is in a slightly better situation. However, the bottom line is that he is a rebel, rebels always have a tougher time replacing men lost, and he is facing a very dangerous foe in Petzeas. It will be up to the commanders and the decisions they make to determine the winner of the day.

The two armies converge on a road west of Edessa with a river to the north, ready to do battle.

The map:

Rules:

The Battle of Edessa will be between Andronikos Komnenos (woad&fangs) and Theophylaktos Petzeas (Ibn-Khaldun) and will be umpired by me in the classic Throne Room tabletop style (check the other Edessa thread for links). It is expected that woad&fangs and Ibn-Khaldun will not communicate with anyone while the battle is taking place.

Since the full tabletop battle has been chosen, the battle will take place over a number of turns. At the start of each new turn, players are to draft new orders and send them to me. The turn schedule is as follows:

Turn 0: Deployment of advance guards
Turn 1: Early morning (and deployment of rear guards)
Turn 2: Mid-morning
Turn 3: Late morning
Turn 4: Early afternoon
Turn 5: Mid-afternoon
Turn 6: Late afternoon
Turn 7: Early evening

...with a night turn and additional day turns to follow as needed. However, I do not think this battle will take that long.

Divisions, deployment, and orders:

Players are to draft concise, in-character orders every turn and send them to me along with a map diagramming their movements. If orders are too complicated they run a risk of confusing the division commander and causing inaction. All divisions, unless being one of the two nearest the commanding general, are subject to an orders test (my rolling the die). 2-6, orders are executed, 1, they are not and the units are inactive for that turn.

To properly simulate medieval combat, orders will be given on a divisional level rather than a regimental one. Refer to the Word document (see below) to see a list of proposed divisions. Division commanders are generally experienced people and know how to execute operations such as wheeling, pivoting, and flanking. If you tell them to flank the left side of the line, they don’t need more information, such has how to do it in detail.

As Andronikos Komnenos (woad&fangs) has more command stars, this will be represented by allowing him command of six divisions as opposed to Theo's control of five. Speaking from experience, divisional flexibility is quite important in these battles. Divisional rearrangement is possible, although with some caveats (again, refer to the Word document below).

I sent an example of how orders could look like to both sides at the Battle of Trent, which also applies here:

BILLYBOB'S ORDERS
Infantry: Advance in line with the rest of the army and attack the enemy's infantry in front of you. We outnumber them by one regiment of DFKs so I want them to wrap around and hit them on the flank.

Archers: All fire is to be concentrated on the enemy general unit. If you are charged then fall back to the spearmen.

Spearmen: Guard the archers, but if it becomes apparent that the enemy cavalry is going to make an attack then shadow them and respond as necessary.

Cavalry: Once the enemy flank is engaged then swing around and hit the enemy's rear.

~~~~~~~~~

include the map of course as well.

Should combat arise, Zim will resolve it via playing both sides from a custom battle in M2TW and sending the results to me, where they will be implemented at my discretion. I have created a custom PvPMod for LotR that will be used in all PvP tabletop battles starting now until the end of the game that gives Egypt (a dead faction in-game) Byzantine units to make things fairer. All combat, unless it is a large infantry engagement, usually along the main battle line, will only take one turn to resolve. This includes operations that unbalance the line, such as throwing in reserves or a flank/rear attack. Losing units will be removed from the map, and victorious units, if necessary, will face a fractional reduction of their numbers.

Deployment instructions:

For Turn 0, players must inform me which two divisions (besides their general unit) will consist of the advance guard and place them on the map. In addition, if they wish to rearrange divisions, they must inform me. Any divisional rearrangements that take place after Turn 0 will have to face an orders test for each regiment.

For Turn 1, players may choose to move their Advance Guards or hold them in place. In addition, they may deploy (but not move) their Rear Guards.

For Turn 2, combat is possible between Advance Guards, but not if players did not move them. Combat is not possible between Rear Guards until Turn 3.

For Turn 3 and beyond, combat is possible between all forces, provided that players have moved them forward.

Please use a red or blue line, depending on what I put in the map, to indicate which direction your forces are facing. Refer to the various maps in any of the other battle threads to see exactly what I mean.

DEADLINE FOR DEPLOYMENTS: 24 hours after both woad&fangs and Ibn-Khaldun acknowledge in the OOC thread that they have read this post and understand it. Please use the Word document in this file to copy and paste your units to the map above.

Let me know if you have any questions, and best of luck to both players!