Kriegsspeil is a game of Decisions. This is a great example of the types of things you run into from a real game. These are the types of things you don’t see in regular wargames but you see them all the time Kriegsspiel, as well as in real life!
Situation: The enemy is somewhere on the lower / southern half of the map. They trace supply off the southern edge of the map along the main road that runs down the center.
Your side is on the offensive. The main effort will be to march down this main road, entering from the north to attack the enemy. Your side’s overall goal is to defeat the enemy army and drive them south and off the map.
Your command is small wing. It is made up of militia brigade and couple of light detachments. You’ve been marching south, down this road on the east side of the map since 7:00am. As you arrived at this crossing, a heavy fog settled into the area.
These are your orders: General, you will take your Pennsylvanians and two detachments down Rowan Hill Road and continue to where the Wissahickon empties into the Schuylkill river, and cross the Wissahickon there, to the mill, follow back up the East side of the Wissahickon and attack the British from the rear while we occupy their front. Use the detachments to expand your frontage when entering battle.
Decision: You continue to march north east along the Wissahickon as ordered. The fog has gotten very bad now. Visibility is down to only 10 paces. You have arrived at this point on the map. Suddenly, you hear the sounds of combat. It seems to be coming from the area circled on the map. There is a large volley of cannon fire in this area that seems to be firing north. After that a moderate exchange of musket fire.
What do you do now?
You’ve been ordered to attack the enemy’s rear. Where is that? South of the combat just heard? Arguably but you’ve also been ordered to “follow back up the east side of the river”.
With the dense fog, can you even successfully navigate further south to find the enemy’s rear before it’s too late? Sounds like the battle is already starting. If you continue north east along this road as ordered, you could reunite with your main army and commander. However, with the dense fog, will your approach be mistaken as the enemy! Will you cause a friendly fire incident?
Maybe they won’t fire on you but will divert troops away from the attack at the critical moment to investigate your approach. That could easily cause the attack to fail.
Should you sit and wait? Waste time at a critical moment while you send a messenger ahead to get confirmation from your commander? What if the enemy army is ahead along this road? What if your messenger gets captured and then the enemy is tipped off that you are there on their flank?
This is quite the conundrum. Whatever you do, you better do it quick. This battle is happening in real time. You have about 2 minutes to make your decision!
THIS is Kriegsspiel.
I would try to reach the parallel path further south and advance along it. I think the importance of the order is to get the flank attack and surprise is essential.
It would make me doubt the fact of time, although it does not seem the difference to arrive by the way we are now and the parallel is much.
But finally my decision would be that.
This is a real catch 22. You follow the stated route and you could disrupt the attack and cause a friendly fire incident. If you do as you suggest, you could get lost and never bring your force to bear in the battle. What if by the time you get there, the enemy has advanced north? Lives are at stake. So is your career!! Can you defend that decision in a courts martial after the battle?
Here is another question: How can you write orders as the commander so that problems like this don’t come up?
Certainly this question you are asking is very interesting. One of my favorite games is GCACW, an ACW hex & counters game for initiatives and when we play multiplayer we can only talk at the end of the day. During the turn (one day) each player must act taking into account the orders and what is happening. In most cases the orders do not make sense after the 4th or 5th activation, so it is important that the players know the objective of the confrontation, in addition to the specific orders that at a given moment cease to make sense. There is a general strategy that must be transmitted in general meetings, because in the close confrontation the events that can happen are unpredictable. Orders how to move to such a hex may not make sense if the enemy arrives earlier. Each incommunicated command must be able to make decisions that are adapted to what is happening and that try to achieve a general purpose.
It really is very difficult to interpret. We are now trying to apply our multiplayer rules to PB. to see how it turns out. I will comment you.
Yes!!!! This is fascinating material.
What the commander has done here is given conflicting orders: Go to this place and attack the enemy’s rear. Ok but what if the enemy isn’t at that location? Then you have a problem.
This is the same thing Napoleon did before Waterloo. After Ligny, to ordered Grouchy to march to Gembloux and pursue the Prussians. The problem was, the Prussians didn’t go to Gembloux. So now where does Grouchy go? He went to Gembloux as ordered but that’s what put him 1 step behind and resulted in him not being at Waterloo OR keeping the Prussians tied down. This was really Napoleon’s fault: Bad order.
General Patton’s advice was: Tell them WHAT to do, not HOW to do it. Leave that part up to them.
So at Waterloo, you tell Grouchy to pursue the Prussians and keep them tied down. Who knows where they will go. That’s his problem to figure out. It’s also clearly his failure if he can’t stay on top of them. Grouchy has no excuses then. He can’t blame it on conflicting orders.
In this case, the orders should have been: Maneuver around the enemy and attack them in the flank or rear. You don’t say where. Let them ascertain that when they get there.
That’s Patton’s advice anyways.
I’ve seen that game: GCACW. We love that campaign scale. It is perfectly suited to team play, orders and KS. We’ve been working with it. We have several design approaches to it. Not sure which way to go yet… Should it be hex / area movement or should it be mini style movement like Pub Battles?
We have one system that is perfect for a two player game. It simulates written orders for all the commands with a quick, easy system. We have another that is would be geared more towards real multi players and real written orders. Which should we use?
These are the main areas we are stuck on. Now that I’m thinking of it, I wonder if we could make it a multi player game and then use the system we have for 2 player as a set of optional rules you can add on, if you want to. I’ll have to ponder that some.