Ashland Tactical Challenge Event

The results are in. The winner is HuldricFranconian! View the rest of the results in the posts below. There will be more rounds to come and with better gift cards.

Greetings Elyrians! In the interests of community building and general fun Ashland will be hosting an ongoing event for the next four months!

For starters the winner of this round of the contest will receive a $10 Gift Card from the Elyria merchandise store.

The premise and rules are simple. Every month, or thereabouts, a scenario for a battle will be posted to the forums. These battle scenarios will all be based on historical battles. Each scenario will be presented in such a way as to most accurately represent the historical situation.

Only the situation leading up to the battle such as the general strategic situation, disposition of the commanders, composition of the armies, and other relevant information will be provided. The historical battle the scenario is based on and the historical participants will be omitted. Further, the scenario will be presented from the point of view of the historical winner.

Each round the battle scenario presented will become progressively more difficult, but also more rewarding with increasingly better gift cards. The side presented to the contestants will always be the side of the historical winner. There are by definition no unwinnable scenarios despite how difficult the third and final scenarios may be.

In this contest every contestant will submit at least one page and no more than three pages explaining their plan to win the battle scenario presented. Submissions ought to be in Times New Roman 12 pt font and double spaced, or similarly formatted.

These rules are meant to keep the review process flowing smoothly so that everyone’s proposals are fairly judged, so please be concise. If a submission is deemed to exceed these parameters too much it will be disqualified. Please be considerate of the reviewer’s time.

At the end of two weeks all the submissions will be reviewed and an overall winner selected. The winner’s proposal will be posted in the first of the reserved comments below that round’s post, they will receive their $10 gift card at that time. The second reserved comment will then present the historical outcome of the battle, its name, date, location, and the participants. The third reserved comment will be for an honorable mention of the runner up, and, if applicable, the most out–of–the–box solution presented even if it wasn’t really practical.

Ashland Tactical Challenge: Round 1

The enemy has penetrated deep into the territory of your nation. However, they have out run their supply lines and the proximity of your army and your raids against their camp are preventing them from foraging. Wracked by dysentery and facing starvation the enemy is now hunting down your army in the hope of forcing a decisive engagement before they lose the strength to fight. Given this reality the exact site of the battle is largely in your control.

The enemy commander is an experienced soldier with a good reputation as a general. He has led armies to victory before and understands the battlefield. It shouldn’t be expected that he will fall for noticeably obvious traps.

The enemy force consists of 20,000 men mostly infantry. Their army consists of veteran warriors with good fighting experience. As for equipment the enemy troops are not using body armor or greaves and most go without helmets, they use large shields only for protection. They have no archers or other skirmishing or ranged units. Most are armed with a combination of medium length spears (which may double as javelins) and axes. These weapons are used in combination, to great effect.

Your army consists of about 18,000 men. Your army is a tough experienced force which has fought in many battles before under your leadership. You have a variety of units of cavalry including cavalry armed with javelins and bows and heavy cavalry armed with two–handed lances. Your elite infantry is heavily armored with long mail–coats and spiked shields. The rest are lightly armored. Your line infantry has integrated units of javelinmen, archers, and slingers which are trained to support the line in battle with direct fire. You have a number of auxiliary units of fierce and experienced heavy cavalry and cavalry archers. Lastly you have some auxiliary infantry with similar experience and equipment to the enemy’s infantry.

Closing Details

It is your job to formulate a strategic and tactical plan for defeating the enemy force without permitting their army to escape intact. Only the forces mentioned in the scenario should be taken into consideration; it is assumed that neither side will receive reinforcements in the foreseeable future. Neither should you expect to have the time or resources to retrain portions of your own army in order to create other troop types.

In your submission please be as detailed as you can. If you have any questions please post them in the comments below.

Due to the fact that the scenario is based on a real–world battle exact numbers for army elements may not available for every battle. As such a certain amount of leeway will be given as regards interpretation of exact army compositions. Please be reasonable and use your best judgment.

All submissions should be sent via e–mail to: [email protected] by May 6th. Submissions after this date will not be accepted. The winner and historical battle will be ready on the 13th. Round 2 starts on the 20th.

After the winner has been chosen all submissions will be available to be viewed on Google Drives at: Ashland Tactical Challenge Round 1

Special thanks to Barleyman for putting this all together.