In my research on designing the 426-1087 A.D. English invasions game, I've found innumerable references to the fact that during the Dark Ages, troops, no matter what their quality, were unlikely to break and rout if within sight of their general, King or commander as long as he was in good shape (alive and not running away!) Only when command control had broken down and/or units became isolated and were witnessing bad (to them) events would their morale seriously drop. As long as they remained within a certain range of their leader though, even severe loss of strength would not hurt their morale too much, Witness Hastings, with the Norman flank units in rout, thinking William dead, his whole army was folding, but upon showing himself, he not only saved his own troops and rallied them, but the rest of his army as well.

As far as local personal guards or retinue, it was almost an unbroken law that they would die with their leader rather than leave the field without him, a Teutonic notion. Many fight to the last stands were made while less reliable troops sought to save their skins by outrunning their pursuers if they saw their leader fall. Even when totally surrounded, as the Vikings sometimes found themselves, the general and his closer thegns would not give up and break, but rather accepted terms of cessation of combat or simply died to a man (Leonidas and his 300 Spartans are a classical example of this same situation at Thermopylae

The opposite side of this coin of being in sight of the general also had some not so good consequences at times. It seems that since commanders often gave monetary as well as promotions in rank awards for conspicuous bravery in battle, many upwardly mobile ancient warriors very quickly found the battlefield situation an excellent expedient for speedy advancement. Julius Caesar had problems with overly enthusiastic troops in his Gallic wars as they disobeyed him trying to impress him with their elan. Harold Godwinson certainly had problems at Hastings as time and again his excited levies trooped off in futile pursuit of retiring Norman and Bretons only to be cut to pieces in their stupidity.

Inspiration by Example

The general himself, often enough, sought to inspire his troops by example (Darius being a blatant exception to this many times) like Alexander, by riding at the head of a picked body of troops who would smash into the enemy ranks at a crucial point of the battle. To modern man, this seems foolish to stake an empire, dynasty and life on a wild charge to possible glory, but we must reorient our thinking.

In the above example, at Gaugamala, Darius hid in the midst of his vast army, totally uninspiring until he felt in danger and then turned and fled the field ... his whole army falling apart around his dusty trail.

Alexander, though, led a charge that smashed into the massive ranks of Persian levies and his inspired troops followed suit, though terribly outnumbered on a field of the enemies choosing. He won most of the known world by this form of risk-taking, or was it so risky? He had confidence in his men as they did in him. Do we, as wargame generals attempt to inspire the same confidence by believing in our miniature armies capabilities and in ourselves? Do our rules reflect the intricate morale problems discussed here? We'll address the rules situation in the next issue.

Part 2
Part 3