Strategy/ Tactic Technique: Seige Warfare

[hal]

Suppose you wanted an individual who was expert at Siege Warfare, but not all that good at regular strategy and tactics per se. Would one be advised to treat it as a technique of Strategy and/or Tactics and treat it as a technique that can be no better than the underlying skill by 4 levels?

[RobKamm]

I'd probably treat it as an Optional Specialty (B 169). Depending on the game I might even break it down further: Strategy (Open Field, Seige Artillery, Seige Engineering, Seige Storming, etc).

I wouldn't treat it as a Technique because I'm pretty sure that Seiges are considered to be a regular use of the skill.

[nik1979]

Doesn't a higher Combat Engineer than Strategy enough to create siege warfare "average"?


IQ-12
Combat Engineer (TL3) -12 and Strategy (Land) -10 = Siege Warfare-11 ?

Someone with just Strategy will have to Average out with his Retainer Engineer with a penalty (-2 for stuff lost in communication)
Engineer-12-2 + Commander Strategy-12 = Siege Warfare-11

Intuitive mathematician can do all the calculations in his head, and start draft the commands like he had a working 3d model in his head. Probably x2 the speed (for a 5cp advantage, but given its supposed to be like a personal computer in one's head it should be a +5 or +10 bonus IMO).

[jason taylor]

Originally Posted by nik1979

Doesn't a higher Combat Engineer than Strategy enough to create siege warfare "average"?


IQ-12
Combat Engineer (TL3) -12 and Strategy (Land) -10 = Siege Warfare-11 ?

Someone with just Strategy will have to Average out with his Retainer Engineer with a penalty (-2 for stuff lost in communication)
Engineer-12-2 + Commander Strategy-12 = Siege Warfare-11

Intuitive mathematician can do all the calculations in his head, and start draft the commands like he had a working 3d model in his head. Probably x2 the speed (for a 5cp advantage, but given its supposed to be like a personal computer in one's head it should be a +5 or +10 bonus IMO).

Conceivably he could. But there is no particular reason to with plenty of pencils and paper and the ability to build mock-ups in the headquarters tent, carry books written by Vauban or whatever strikes his fancy. Sieges took lots of time, and mobility was not a question so they probably spared no expense in making sure the chief engineer got the stuff he wanted. Siege guns are after all far more of a nuisance then any of that stuff.

[Figleaf23]

I'd break it down like this:

Engineer (Combat) covers the trenching, digging, scaffolding, technical side of the seige doings. These activities would be profitably supplemented by use of Architecture skill too.

Tactics (Seige) covers the fighting side, where sallies will come from, where to make assaults, which walls/gates are easier to approach or harder to defend, where to go inside once a breach is made, etc.

I'm not sure I'd give Strategy skill any particular role in a seige, though it would be involved in deciding whether and when to bring or raise a seige.

[makke]

Originally Posted by Figleaf23

Tactics (Seige) covers the fighting side, where sallies will come from, where to make assaults, which walls/gates are easier to approach or harder to defend, where to go inside once a breach is made, etc.

That's more or less exactly what Strategy is about (at least as far as I can see). Tactics is about small Unit combat and not about the grand theme.

Originally Posted by Basic Set p.222

StrategyThis is the ability to plan military
actions and predict the actions of the
enemy.[...]

Originally Posted by Basic Set p.224

This is the ability to outguess and
outmaneuver the enemy in small-unit
or personal combat. In most settings,
only the military teaches this skill.

[Figleaf23]

Originally Posted by makke

That's more or less exactly what Strategy is about (at least as far as I can see). Tactics is about small Unit combat and not about the grand theme.

I guess it's a question of where you draw the line. A seige 'feels' tactical to me because of the significance of local conditions and features.

[nik1979]

Originally Posted by jason taylor

Conceivably he could. But there is no particular reason to with plenty of pencils and paper and the ability to build mock-ups in the headquarters tent, carry books written by Vauban or whatever strikes his fancy. Sieges took lots of time, and mobility was not a question so they probably spared no expense in making sure the chief engineer got the stuff he wanted. Siege guns are after all far more of a nuisance then any of that stuff.

Actually I compare sieges to any time sensitive opportunity based project, that have a long time budget. The time to assemble all the material necessary to make informed decisions is something that can take days, especially when there are sophisticated measurements and calculations that need to be made with abacus, lamplight, and limitations of clay, wax or chalk boards.

For a leader to juggle tons of numbers in their head with intuitive mathematician is just too awesome for a TL3, even if it is just limited to TL3 mathematics (Geometry, Trigonometry, some Calculus and of course Accounting).


Armies and organizations don't immediately have complete information. The side that can collect and collate the information first has initiative and can dictate the pace of battle. Part of Strategy and Tactics are the Rules of Thumb regarding Forces: 3:1 cavalry vs infantry, 3:1 capturing fortified position etc. A general going through those datum like water through a sieve, along with army logistics and all those rules of thumb, is pretty scary. On shear initiative alone, he can upset the entire equilibrium of warfar (how rare is a general with intuitive mathematician?).

[The Colonel]

I seem to recall that siege warfare in the early modern period came to be regarded as more a matter of engineering than warfare ... the whole job, allegedly, could be done 'by the numbers' and was alleged not to require much in the way of talent.
Whether this was true in practice or not is far more debatable.

[jason taylor]

Originally Posted by The Colonel

I seem to recall that siege warfare in the early modern period came to be regarded as more a matter of engineering than warfare ... the whole job, allegedly, could be done 'by the numbers' and was alleged not to require much in the way of talent.
Whether this was true in practice or not is far more debatable.

Yes and no. This wasn't until the eighteenth century. The really interesting sieges were in the Dutch Wars of Independence(once you qualify the term interesting by the realization that it was an eighty year long version of World War I fought in the same place Siegfried Sassoon fought, of course). There they had fascinating experimentation. After Vauban's time it was pretty well reduced to formula. However one must remember that the stakes were lower in the eighteenth century as the loser expected to change tax collectors rather then being ruthlessly persecuted. Naturally there would be a more frivolous attitude to war on the part of soldiers and that would tempt enginneers to be less rigorous.

There was for a long time a rivalry between Horse and Foot(esp horse) which attracted officers that often seem like a barely modified version of Middle Age knights, and sapper and gunner which were more Burgher-like in there ethos. At the same time siege warfare was considered the highest intellectual attainment in the craft of arms, to such degree that aristocrats sometimes had a geek wanna-be attitude and studied poliorcentrics as a hobby. There was also a sort of rivalry between horse/foot and sapper/gunner that resembled the rivalry between the army and the town of Eureka.

A side note to all of this is that European cultures have long seemed to have an unusually high military participation ratio for settled cultures, as compared to the great eastern river empires for instance. Participation in warfare was often transclass rather then being centered as it so often is on the aristocratic class. Because of this the leaders of armies were more apt to pay attention to the efficiency of the army as a whole and less apt to have the army degrade into aristocrat warriors with a lot of spectators the way Xerxes' army did. What effect this had on siege warfare is hard to place; Chinese and Islamics were probably better then any Medieval Europeans except Byzantines at this until the sixteenth century having more access to technology and being closer to trade routes. However having a middle class with a warlike instinct was useful in diverting intellectual energies in a military direction.