Numbers?
What features might we assign to pre-industrial warfare?
Numbers:
Where state coercion was weak or irregularly applied and where tax bases were small armies were either small or subject to consensus. This meant a degree of lack of uniformity that could result in campaigns failing to even start within the campaigning season. Like forgetful housewives discovering they have left the shopping list at home the various contingents arrive early or late, in the wrong place and without the ‘correct’ equipment. Prime territory for random draws and card-driven systems.
Numbers 2:
Having assembled our army/navy, and having sent a few trusted hard cases to bully the bolshie non-attendees, we should encountered two problems to do with numbers. Firstly, how many has the other chap got. Secondly how many troops do we have? If the host is gathered in one place then you might have a chance of getting close on numbers by using experienced officers. You will not of course trust the returns of your nobles. But since even 100 Years War English armies were too big to move in one column the problem was that, ultimately, those returns were all you had (the limited number of clerks to the Wardrobe would not be enough to mount major internal audits).
If you are operating not in a single area (albeit in several columns) but over a much greater distance then the problem compounds. Could King Philippe at Bouvines know what forces Prince Louis had in the West? The Cardinal de Richelieu regularly groused about paying for large armies only to find they were small. His difficulties were not however those of feeling short-changed they were difficulties of defeat. Where an army was deployed against what proved to be a larger enemy army it was defeated. Had the Cardinal known it was small he would have increased it, combat therefore had additional elements of a lottery to it. In real life the Columbia blocks were deployed face down, rather than facing the owning player.
Numbers 3:
With armies of 20,000 where later armies would deploy 2 million there are bound to be gaps in the line. An army can deploy at a key location, perhaps a fortress or an agricultural area. An army can position itself between the perceived position of an enemy army and a key location, seeking to interpose itself betwixt the two. What no army can do is guarantee to protect an entire zone as in our frontal wars. You might argue it can protect only its immediate environs (though see below).
Food and fodder:
Where agriculture was close to subsistence and surpluses small then war had to feed war or starve. This meant forces had to be dispersed, and hanging around an area to defend it (unless you had a good market available) was a good method to destroy the area. Where one side had the advantage of numbers it might not be able to use this if the local supply situation forced it to divide. Boringly for gamers withdrawing and letting the invader eat an area clear might be a good tactic (though better if you could get him to do it to his own land). Since collecting food was a major task armies had to consider whether they were ready for battle or for plunder/forage. Each mode required different types of troops (and armies required those for both). English 100 Year War Armies required not only gallant knights and doughty archers, but skilled servants and Irish plunderers, without whom the others would starve.
Command as a political function:
Was it Pascal who cheekily noted that one would not entrust a ship to someone because his father was a captain? In so doing he questioned obliquely the right of hereditary command. But questioned or not in this era the “best” commander might be one fitted by birth to command, or the wealth to finance, rather than a skilled commander. A feudal army was an army united in service of its commander, not of his Marshal or one of his routiers. Armies were thus limited by who might command them. The ruler, his immediate family yes, but who else? Command was not just a military matter – it was political. The tendency was therefore to reduce the number of main armies. The German Empire (for all its strength) frequently fought only in one area with one army, led by the Emperor.
Movement as a political function:
The defeat of the opposing army or of the opposing army’s aims usually required one to close with it and either defeat it or render its position unsupportable so it would retreat. Clearly the best military plan would be to try to pull an enemy army deep into your own territory where it could be cut off from reinforcements and (if scorched earth was possible) starved or ambushed (the Welsh approach). However, the conduct of armies was not merely military but political. Edward III answered the challenge by France by raiding deep into France. Philip VI had to balance the difficulty of leaving his people unprotected (which goes to the heart of medieval kingship) and the military risk of defeat. The political side was important enough to mean he risked battle a number of times. King Harold II felt obliged to march forward to meet Duke William at Senlac because William was ravaging his (Harold’s) lands. The defeat of Harold and his brothers left Anglo-Saxon England without proven war leaders (Gate Fulford having finished Edwin and Morcar) – and the state collapsed.
Where is the Invincible Armada?
The difficulties facing Santa Cruz and Medina-Sidonia in launching the Great and Invincible Armada were compounded by the difficulties of knowing what roadsteads they would find and the impossibility of communicating with the Duke of Parma. Because their fleet could not carry enough men because it lacked vessels the Armada had to depend on tooling around for a while as contact was made with the Duke. In the event it was not made and circumstances, tides and winds moved them onwards. The marvels of co-ordinated movement and the old double-turn may appeal to gamers but they lack much in the way of historical support.
Playing Pre-Industrial Games
Undoubtedly the biggest problem for the PIG is that its limitations and frustrations are not the stuff of good games and that a game shorn of these is not good history. The classic problem (and one to which we shall return) is the Daudin Effect, first noted by the French polymath Dr Guillaume Daudin who pointed out that in many games you shuffle around in stacks, make the largest one possible, beat the other chap and that’s it. Empilement, c’est tous! Yet as noted above this objective is more easily done in games than in history. Your big stack might require waiting so long for the forces to arrive that everyone gives up and goes home. You might not have quite as big a stack as you fondly imagine. Your stack may starve and collapse and be harried by smaller forces. A single force may cause ructions between political leaders. And finally the so obvious move from Air Force One might never have occurred to anyone on the ground in 1314. There is further the real difficulty of understanding which strategy was a winner in the real thing. Sometimes the raiding force was chased off in other cases it harassed an area and weakened it for next year. Count Philippe of Flanders advises an attritional policy against Henry II but Henry’s own father Geoffroi le Bel’s Angevins were driven off when they did the same thing in Normandy without intervention by King Stephen.
Without this infrastructure of risks and rewards the answer is as le loi Daudin states, a big army, a climactic battle, and a few sieges. I think my first experience of the PIG problem was in Cromwell from SDC in which the Royalists did an end-run for London (against which the supine Godly could do little) and the King once again enjoyed his own. The realities of this strategy (which was actually defeated at Turnham Green, the Valmy of the ECW) were that such an advance would have stretched the supply-lines tight, that local armies would not have joined it, but that it could equally have succeeded or have been crushed by the London militias. The key here is the political restraints under which the King and Parliament worked. Did not the same choice face Bonnie Prince Charlie at Derby? This was not just a military decision it was woven into the fabric of politics. Could a Stuart have taken London and established a Government? There was little support but did this matter, was active enmity or support all that mattered with anything else just abstentions? The answer is that we don’t know but can guess. Unfortunately without these realities most wargamers will plunge towards London – after all who cares? Of course there are plenty of those who will tell you he had no chance, but few of them were in London in 1745. In 1688 William III had no chance either.
I remember playing solitaire the Crusades game from Vae Victis. The game has some marvellous counters and lots of atmosphere but essentially one big army against another. Does Saladin defeat Guy before Richard and Philip arrive? Do we need much detail, isn’t this just a paragraph game, almost a matter of a few die-rolls and then move on?
I sensed it again recently with Plutôt Mort Que Perse [Better Dead Than Persian] the game of the first two Persian wars. [It also covers the Ionian Revolt].The map is an area map with nice clear regions. There are not, however, many regions for Greece is a small country. The Armies are of different quality forces (rated for combat and morale). The Persians have larger armies although requiring many more counters than the manly but less numerous Greeks. The Persians either march full tilt to Athens (where they fight or win) or sail there and endeavour to do the same. They have the numbers and the odds are they will win.
There is some fog or war (dummy counters) but given the reduced number of areas in which activity occurs this may not be as important as it might be. The designer, Frédéric Bey, has endeavoured to stir the mix with chit draws. (Will there be a Palace Revolution in Susa forcing the return of Xerxes and the Immortals?). He also has a combat system that can cause both sides to miss each other (an area might be the size of Attica for example), or which can produce not battles but ambushes. An ambush may leave the ambushed side badly damaged. Nevertheless with all this it remains a game with limited choices. There is an argument that this limitation was how much as the real thing, but I do wonder if the careful recreation of what were unknowns then puts us in the shoes (or sandals) of the historical generals.
How might things be different though? The Greeks certainly behaved as if the Persians had bigger armies and navies so we may accept this as a given. The obvious strategies certainly tended to cluster around Euboea and Attica. The Greeks were (in the end) better soldiers delivering a charge in full panoply at Marathon but were they always so certain of themselves, did they know greater fear at Plataea? There do remain some opportunities (and some of these Frédéric has used).
- Not only hidden movement (rather than just disguised movement) but variable start positions, numbers and arrival schedules.
- Rating forces as they encounter battle so that one cannot be certain how much better your hoplites might be than his foot.
- Building force modifiers on the basis of activity (marching well, eating poorly) all of which adjust your final total but which your opponent can only guess.
- The range of tricks used by the Blessed Joseph Miranda in his Imperial Games: table-adjusting chits, variable move length, involuntary moves, variable supply.
- Looking at history you can have variable weather – I think here of Louis le Hutin’s Mud March into Flanders that got no where fast or variable victory conditions (the original Flight of the Goeben covering the possibility that the Germans were not heading for Istanbul).
- Examining the world as it looked then, not as it looks now. History is (as Wedgwood tells us) written in retrospect and knowing what happened it is hard to imagine what it was once like for it not to be known. We need to do this imagining if the gamer is to taste the campaign even in the abstracted fashion we have here.
- Considering the number of, and circumstances surrounding, battles in this era. Is the game really showing us the advantages and disadvantages perceived by the real combatants (read Froissart to see the daily hopes and fears)? Is the risk really there (I particularly admire the Columbia system where a flurry of sixes can soon cure one’s complacency).
- The use of card-driven systems can help to introduce the correct level of ineffectiveness and unpredictability without descending to total randomness. It can be particularly effective at smashing up the sort of coordinated plan that gamers can easily develop.
Plutôt Mort Que Perse uses chits and the unpredictability of combat and contact to introduce some randomness but in opting for a simpler approach in other areas (victory conditions, numbers, strengths, and unit quality) not to mention a limited number of areas it pegs this back. It does, however, unlike many PIGs have a great clarity about what you are doing. As Persian you march and hope to avoid ambushes, as Greeks you defend and dodge. Because the two sides are asymmetrical it is much clearer what is to be done than perhaps in Croisades though even there the early advantage to the Moslems assists in deciding the best strategy.
However, where forces are more placed in a more limitation-rich environment the result though more potentially historical can be dreadful if both players are unable to fathom what they should do. In working on my Unhappy King Charles I was often surprised by how many gamers found it difficult to know what to do. This was particularly so where a number of rival armies had occupied strong supporting positions. Player notes can help here as can an account of the original campaign (often an unknown in an era where the battles are more popular but the campaigns less well known).
All of which takes us to one of the more interesting game to come out recently – Iberos. The problem with reviewing Iberos is I must be frank that its rules are not easily assimilated and its range of PIG opportunities so considerable that a lot of playing would be needed and I have not done that playing beyond two games. So please regard all I say here with a questioning air. Iberos is a game from Ludopress (the main Spanish boardgame company). It covers the ancient campaigns in the Peninsula from 237 BC with the arrival of Hamilcar Barca to Augustus’ campaigns. It uses a map divided into areas covering everything south of the Pyrenees. Each EC unit (Civilised Army – the counters are in Spanish but the rules and map are in English and Spanish) is up to 2,000 men whereas the LT (tribal) counters can go up to 8,000 men. Each turn is one year in length and scenarios can cover many years.
It is worth noticing a couple of ergonomic problem early on. Although the map is very smart and colourful, as are the counters, the result is too much of a riot of colour for me. The small counters with their Azure Wish Hispania style illustrations are very smart but very small. The map is not large and has a lot of areas. There are also a lot of units, colonies and cities to set up (and I am not certain all are there). This razzle-dazzle effect is bad enough in one way but it is exacerbated by long set-up times caused by the use of double sided counters. This obviously makes the game cheaper but as a counter can have entirely another “nation” on its other side it makes searching and stacking absolutely no fun. You will end up turning over many counters many times. This will piss you off no end (and I still cannot find all the Lusitanians for Viriatus).
The rules come in two booklets: rules and scenarios. The rules are thirty pages long, but the first 16 are useful historical notes. The main body of rules is, therefore, quite short although in labouring to brief it can become obscure. This economy of language (rather reminiscent of a Don Greenwood game) is not helped by the system’s lack of an obvious ancestor. You will not find it possible to learn much from any previous games that you have played. Although the system in scale could be that in Britannia, it is actually much more complex than this. I have seldom found a game where so few people have felt like expressing an opinion. Even with the rule book vaguely under control you must remember that there are a lot of rules in the scenario book. I also do wonder if there has been much testing by outsiders as some of the notes are a bit opaque.
Each Turn is a year and uses a non-interactive activation system. The turn begins with Random Events for that year. Each Scenario has its own Random Events and the design team have definitely attempted to make each scenario feel different. Both players then run the Mutual Administration Phase collecting Treasury Points, paying for civilised troops, raising mercenary tribesmen, buying kit and then reorganising their forces. Forces are important as they are the currency of activation.
Player A now commences operations. He selects a force and activates it by drawing an Ops Marker. This plus the Force’s leader’s value gives his activation total for that force. Some Leaders have negative values (the Praetor Spurious for example). These points are spent to move, fight, assault, diplome in fact everything. The chits add an element of randomness but the leader values pull this back a bit towards ability. All this completed Player B now completes his operations. You will note that as Forces activate one-by-one there is no possibility of combined operations. It should be possible to use alternating activation if you wished. Forces of the non-phasing player can intercept during their opponent’s movement
Operations over both sides test for Attrition. This is driven by dice and number of troops with an important area modifier. My Lusitanians seemed to particularly enjoy being caught in winter highlands.
Units come in two varieties: the civilised armies are the proper heavy infantry of the Poeni and the Romans who require a leader to activate, and the Tribal Forces that are much less tough in battle but do not need leaders and have powerful ambush capabilities. An EC unit might be an 8-1 (eight points in formed battle but one in open-style combat) but the various tribes will be much more mixed. Some will be good at both, others are very close to formed armies, and others are javelin men. The key to combat is to try to attack because the attacker chooses the CRT. This may sound a bit odd, and indeed it would be except that any non-phasing force can attempt interception before the moving force can make its attack. If you fail to intercept then we may assume that the attacker catches you unawares. The key point here is that there is a very great deal of variance in strengths and CRT results depending on who gets to attack and this may be influenced by good leadership. Although tribal forces do not need a leader they can use one if available (and there are lots to give the real heroes of Spanish history an outing).
Biffing around fighting and capturing cities is not just done for honour or for love. To control and area you must control all its cities (including mountain redoubts). In combats and assaults (as well as pillage and assassination) you may gain (and your opponent lose) Prestige Points. These can then be traded in during assaults, diplomacy and assassination as modifiers. In Iberos nothing succeeds like success, until of course it goes wrong.
The system attempts to seduce you into error of course. Years of marching and fighting will eventually conqueror the enemy but why not use diplomacy? Entire tribes will change sides. Of course the problem is that they may well change sides again. Killing them at least delays their return, but killing them also takes time and one has victory conditions to consider. The macho world of threat, diplomacy, assassination, fiery and frequent rebellions gives a real feel of the hispanic campaigns.
Another features of these long wars is sieges and assaults. You can purchase siege engines, dig circumvallations and launch assaults. One scenario features the siege of Numantia.
Naval force is handled easily as a transport and supply facility. This can be very important for the Romans, and will force the tribes away from the coast.
As befits its topic leaders also can be involved in recruiting mercenaries and in establishing cities and colonies. This may explain the number of Colonia Foppingtania in recent campaigns. The recruiting is still open to certain questions. You can only recruit units in the tribal boxes, but I am not sure that the scenarios always instruct you to put your units there in the first place.
Optional rules permit tribal rivalries, reprisals, rampaging elephants, mountain redoubts, troop training, force coordination, leader assassination and Troop recovery to be undertaken. These are all useful rules and add a lot of history but would complicate the central platform of Iberos: operations-interception-combat types-prestige-diplomacy-random events attrition supply.
All of the above is not badly explained in the rules but I do think it could have been sharper and rather clearer, I suspect many gamers will find the rules a bit scattered – I played it with John Carroll who is a very good reader and rationaliser of rules. I have suggested a Living Rules might usefully be prepared. (my questions on this area elicited no response and I think the publishers may have abandoned the game).
Scenarios
On then the scenarios. There are nine of these each with map of playing area (not all of the Peninsula is involved), set-ups, and special rules:
Scenario 1 is 17 turns long and covers the Barcas in Iberia. The Punic forces are civilised armies and are faced wit (and likely to crush) the semi-civilised forces of the Turd alliance, as I fear we call it, (the Turdetani, Turduli and others). This is a big scenario with some large Punic forces and a lot of recruiting to do.
Scenario 2 is the Second Punic War (to 207 BC) at 12 turns rather shorter than the first scenario and fought in the south and east. Himilico, Hasdrubal, Indiblis and the two Scipios (father and son) engage in combat to control Spain and cut the silver tribute to Carthage.
Scenario 3 is the Prelude to the Celtiberian wars 17 turns to 178 BC and covering all but Galicia. M Porcius Cato starts off aiming to defeat or ally up the various tribes supported by randomly picked praetors of widely ranging quality.
Scenario 4 is the Campaigns of Viriatus a six turn scenario which I recommend to start as small armies led by dodgy Praetors are sent to find Viriatus and the Lusitanians. The Roman numbers are not all conquering but with their fleet the two sides have a game on their hands.
Scenario 5 is the De Bellum Numantinium covering the great siege of this city in Navarre and Castile. 10 turns.
Scenario 6 combines the Celtiberian and Lusitanian wars for a 17 turn game which will be of reasonable length.
Scenario 7 is the Sertorian War (one I would like to try) an 8 turn scenario fought over most of Spain between Romans and tribesmen. Sertorius is interesting in being able to bridge the two combat styles.
Scenario 8 is much smaller the Roman Civil War, three turns in El-Andalus but without treasure, diplomacy or prestige I do not think that it is quite as good an introduction as it suggests.
Scenario 9 is the campaigns of Augustus 5 turns in Galicia.
Iberos is certainly a very gallant attempt at taming the PIG. Its use of operations as a common currency for much more than campaigning is certainly of a piece with Joe Miranda’s excellent work. The asymmetry of the two types of combat and the nerve-wracking qualities of who intercepts whom and (even worse) the fear of ambush all help. The random events also help in stirring the pot. I was reminded of Joe’s Sun Never Sets game where each playing could be very different. In some scenarios the use of randomly selected praetors is very effective at spoiling perfect plans. Combat and attrition are such that stacks will regularly suffer loss and this will generate opportunities to escape the limits of the “know-all” strategy. The game’s weakness are that it is not likely to be accessed by many unless it improves its rule a bit, addresses the multi-sided counters and gets some buzz behind the product. Even in its unfinished state (much of that because we had missed rules) there was an exciting game here, the historicity is top-class put together by really enthusiastic Spanish designers. It deserves a better reputation (or perhaps reputacion).
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© Copyright 2004 by Charles and Teresa Vasey.
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