Miko's mini campaign - Kevin vs Pat (Russians vs French)

reinforcement rule update

newly created or reinforced units must be within size limits:

for line infantry battalions min is 400, max is 800
for light infantry min is 350, max is 650
for all cavalry min is 350, max is 750

The only time when the unit can be below the limit is after the 1st day in 2 days battles - there will be no reinforcements there, just routed units returned and 1/3 of wounded back into the unit... but after the 2nd part of the battle all units would have to be reinforced/merged so they are within unit size limits

Comte de Patt has hastily ordered his Army reinforced and is eager to meet his adversary on the battlefield...
Prince Kevinsky however takes his time and so far just ordered his artillerymen to polish their cannons... "soon, this Patt, ughm... will eat some canister from these nice pieces" he says...

His Royal Highness is still recovering from the shock of being out maneuvered on the field of battle Friday. The grand halls of Moscow are remorseful and silent. Meanwhile Paris erupts with celebration and laughter

Prince Kevinsky wasn't stingy this time and spent generously on the new reinforcements.

The next scenario will be semi-interactive - the CinCs will be given options where to deploy their divisions. Map with given deployment zones will be presented soon.

The prices charged are blatant price gouging if you ask me. Serfs should be free! We have an infinite supply of them.

Your Highness, do I understand well that you want to free your serfs? Your income might drop drastically if you do so

Witnessing His Royal Highness apologize to me a few weeks back for wrongful accusation of not downloading the latest mod was PRICELESS and therefore I have no need to comment further on any financial related discussions about serfs and such. That will last me at least another year regardless of serf pricing.

So, after both sides reinforced their armies it's time for a battle (I hope this time).

Comte de Patt's army tries to hit his adversary's agriculture province. The map provided below:



Anticipating the move, Prince Kevinsky has already placed a division in the region and evacuated towns of Rovno, Ostrog and Kromenetz...
de Patt is certain of success and therefore he's starting with initial penalty of -1 prestige before the battle...
each of the towns would provide de Patt with 1 prestige point
additionally towns of Hulcza, Zaslav, Hrytzow if lost then each would mean 4 gold and 100 men income, and a prestige point lost for Prince Kevinsky... if conquered they would provide 2 gold income for de Patt...
The town of Brykul is the main in the region and provides 6 gold and 150 men income for the Prince... so this would be lost if conquered along with 2 prestige points and the Comte would gain 3 income...  

The CinC's can deploy in chosen entry zones which are also the exit zones (maximum 1 division per zone with exception of French Zone B that allowes 2 divisions to be placed).

The update to the retreat rule: if the exit zones are used then 2 prestige points are lost.

Additional or specified rules:

Cavalry won't count for claiming the objectives.
In order for town to be claimed by attacker it must be occupied by 3 battalions of infantry and no enemy around the town in 300 yards radius.
For the western towns it would be enough to march through it with infantry and with no enemy around - undisputed (behind the friendly lines).
The last 15 minutes race for the objective won't work as there will be second day of the battle - so defending side can recapture the town.
The defender doesn't have to garrison objectives to claim ownership.

what map is that? Is it in the pool?

of course - all the maps I use for campaign are from the mod - this one is Nap_Rus_RandomMaps6L_4

While Prince Kevinsky was debating with his staff about how the position is untenable to hold against the French hordes, the peasants form towns of Rovno and Hulcza took the matters in their own hands and acted proactively... namely, they heard that "scorched earth" is the right thing to do against the invaders.. so they burned their towns to the ground and moved to Brykul. Prince Kevinsky was so delighted that he granted each of the peasants a free 10 years vacation in Siberia. In result these two towns are not objectives of any worth to any side now.

Back to the map - only the roads marked with bold red are considered as supply/communication lines and all advance must go along them.

The battle will last up to 2 days
at the end of the first day both sides will be asked about their intention. possible choices are:

A) attack - you want to attack and gain more objectives so battle will go on for another day unless the other side chooses to withdraw
B) defend if attacked - means you're happy with your gain and if both sides choose this stance the battle is over and gains/loses are calculated
C) withdraw over night - you lose only one prestige point for withdrawal over night and of course any gained objectives are lost (unless both sides withdraw then the defender keeps the objectives)

The local constabulary of Ronvo and Hulczo is investigating the fire for possible insurance fraud. Seeing as no one seems to know what 'insurance' is, the case is growing cold quickly.

Oh NOW I can see the roads. Thanks for coloring them in, Miko. Hopefully they are red on the actual map too with little “road closed” signs in spots we cannot traverse. My corps always prefers to adhere to local ordinances and other directions when it comes to right of way, noise complaints and scorched earth detours.

The road network on these random maps is far too dense. You can use "in between" not marked roads for marching fine - they would just not count as being connected with your entry point. The only road that should not be used for marching is far northern one (Shosse Donbno) - just consider the road and area north of it plagued with mosquitoes

The positions before the 2nd Day of what turns to be battle of Zaslav. The CinCs will receive map with division names and their updated OOB, soon.

Zaslav has several excellent Air B&Bs that my staff finds to be most excellent in quality. We chose to make early reservations and secure them with a couple divisions. The presence of godless Russian vermin in the vicinity is rather unfortunate and reduces property values for those officers considering long term residence here.

So, after the "little setback" in Count de Pat's plan of conquering Prince Kevinsky's Duchy, the French army was in full retreat west.
However after couple days of forced march and even using captured Russian horses to speed up the retreat of few remaining infantrymen, the Count received letter from his cousin, earlier mentioned Baron von Mediocre.
Baron was concerned about his holdings that provided recruit and coin for De Pat's war effort are now in danger to be looted by Russian barbaric hordes, thus he insisted that De Pat stop his retreat and defend these holdings.
Count had no choice but to comply to cousin's request. The new recruits were hastily drafted to fill up the ranks of the battered army, supplies and new cannons in place. De Pat is ready to defend.




The shaded area of Alte Post Road marks the land owned by von Mediocre's rival who would attack whoever entered his land.
Towns of Neu Nart, Boryslau, Hochwald are evacuated but would provide Kevinsky with prestige points (max 2).
Towns of Engeldorf and Landshut are minor income towns that if captured would cost income and prestige to De Pat (100 men, 4 gold, and 1 prestige).
Town of Hundstahl is the main town in the region and would cost higher income and prestige loss (150 men, 6 gold, and 2 prestige)


The battle will take up to 3 days (after each day the CinCs would be able to choose between remain on the field defensive, attack or withdraw).

We smart French guessed right. The Russians came from the east and southeast. We set up on excellent defensive ground near the middle of the map with a division in the rear to deal with dastardly end runs to the back objective.

Lots of dead Russians in front of our guns. A defense in depth worked well. We took casualties. Lost our kitchen staff. And just in the middle of preparing a nice dinner too. And my runner Francois lost his pet rabbit to a russian 6 pounder. It pretty much disappeared upon impact. An entire battalion failed their morale check and scattered seeing the blood and gore.

It was definitely a fun game. Both sides were aware of the multi day aspect. Not everything was committed to the fight.

The fun part for me is knowing the Russian commanders on horseback are your opponents. You see their sprite on the field and know they are looking at same battle. You wonder what they are thinking. If the have seen what you wanted them to see. What their next decision will be.

And then there’s the command and control dialogue. Crosstalk to take advantage of our interior lines. Shifting batteries to meet the next threat. My most favorite message was to one of the division commanders “you know, now would be a real good time to hit this flank” and it worked out fine.

Somebody sent skirmishers after my guns. I was about to pull them back anyway and misjudged the distance owing to the tall wheat field and the angle looking down the hill. So they shot up a couple of my pieces as we withdrew by recoil wondering why the infantry assigned to guard it just sat there. My cavalry ran them down but the damage was done. It was one of those things where you say “oh crap” when you realize the best scenario is a loss of a couple guns.

The russian artillery is good and accurate. Once it came within range we adjusted back to the next hill or hit the reverse slope. Very annoying. But I am in the middle of reading yet another book on the Battle of Antietam where Lee took advantage of the undulating terrain. Helped to deny the advantage of long range Union guns. I felt same way in this battle. Looking for the locally favorable fields of fire.

All in all a real fun game.

The multi-day and casualty-sustaining aspect of the fights has definitely brought on a new layer of tactics. The ability to win the day but not the battle encourages caution and the 'victory at all costs' strategy is appropriately a decision for desperate times. Fights spread the action out in an escalating manner where positioning, force identification, conservation of force, and long term planning. Though this sometimes means little action on the first day. It raises the stakes for all actions as to over commit could throw the battle which increases the tension of all engagements a little. The pacing that comes along with these new considerations definitely reaches that bit further towards the immersion of the situations and decisions of the real officers whose pretend hats we wear.

This battle in particular seemed to display a good balance that really proves the concept. While our usual single day battles are certainly a fun and still quite challenging test of our mettle, these campaign battles bring a unique variety of a different way to play. Miko deserves plenty of kudos for taking the time and effort to make these, and of course Kevin as well for the designing of the mod and third party programs that allow it. It was very interesting how both sides of this battle were satisfied with their performance.

I was given the order to attack once the enemy disposition was determined. I didn't feel very comfortable in the avenue I was ordered to attack in, as it was over watched by several batteries. Knowing this, and having to make a small presumption about Kevin's ultimate plans, my attack was more of a probe. A test run to see if being more aggressive was viable. Though I took casualties I returned the favor, and though I managed to push the lines I was attacking back by one hilltop there wasn't enough time to fully capitalize on it and I would have likely taken a crippling amount of casualties to try it. So instead I looked for favorable trades, hoping to trade off some infantry to remove some more important pieces of my opponent's force.

It was a very interesting battle and I'm eager to see how it plays out.

To the French Commander: Now that your forces are all collected in one spot, the Russian juggernaut will soon make his appearance.

To the Russian commander: You did exactly what I expected you to do and I now know precisely where your supposed "juggernaut" is positioned. Please do come and pay us a visit. We are currently building a large prisoner holding area for the next battle aftermath and are curious whether you want your tent (as senior prisoner you will be afforded relative luxurious accommodations) to have a view of a meadow or a pretty valley.

Sorry guys but I won't have it ready by today evening - there was some glitch in OOB and the scenario generator kept crashing... I discovered that in old OOB there was an error - one Russian cavalry brigade had the same number as subsequent battery - I'm quite surprised that scenario worked at all... anyway it kept crashing until I did some random stuff so not sure what finally fixed it, but now I have updated OOB that works with the Scenario Generator but I haven't done deployment yet.

I will send the first day casualties report to CinCs and update on cannons on both sides...

update on what happened with canons

1. The French battery on the French right flank was entirely lost as Russian advanced there straight after gun capture and remained in control of the land.
2. The French battery in the French centre has recovered one of the routed cannons and the other 2 were lost due to crews being shot by Russian Jegers.


So the "Festung Mediocre" held for a day but would it survive another one?

They were poor quality guns anyway. Thats why Grog left them there. All part of the plan.

If you could leave your poor quality Muskets behind as well that would be much appreciated.