Reasons NOT to refight historical battles

Started by Chris Pringle, 12 October 2021, 08:41:40 AM

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toxicpixie

What Chris said - the challenge with a historical scenario is not picking an "equal" one where either side can acheive a "wargames win" (there's bloody few of those about, tbh), but to pick and interesting battle, where you can look at the fight, and see where and what might have gone differently, and then assign victory conditions to each side to try and just do better than history.

Did they hold an extra hour? Did they extricate significantly more of the army when the trap's jaws closed and it changed from a glorious attack/hard fought defense into an encirclement? Was it still the glorious win, but quite so much a Pyrrhic Victory Etc. Etc.

Balaclava - the Light Brigade gets the chop every time - usually to better result/purpose to reality, but in the scope of the whole battle - what else can you do?!
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Westmarcher

To Paul/T13A and Mike/Ithoriel.

You appear to have this pessimistic view that if you set up using historic deployments you're going to lose.  No.  It doesn't stop you or your opponent adopting a different plan, giving different orders or experiencing different combat results. And, if your opponent is playing Wellington and knows anything about Waterloo, he will also know what you know has failed, so it's equally hard, if not harder, for him to win the battle as his real life counter-part did because he will not be expecting you to make the same mistakes. 

I'm also not aware anyone else has said you "have to" use historic deployments (as both of you have stated). It's a choice and if that's what you want to do, go ahead.

Some of us remember the Henry Cooper vs. Cassius Clay boxing match. What would the result have been if our 'enery hadn't had a cut eyebrow or if the bell hadn't saved Clay after 'enery knocked him down? That's why I re-fight historical battles; to explore the "what ifs," to see if I can succeed as others have or where others have failed. I actually like starting off with historic deployments. As also said by others, it gives me some insight into the problems faced by the generals and adds to the challenge - to do otherwise, somehow dilutes the impression that I'm re-fighting that actual battle.

So if was to re-fight the Cooper vs, Clay match, I wouldn't have the fighters starting off the first round in adjacent corners .... although it might be fun to see the outcome.   ;)
I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be.

Ariete



The moment Jerome takes Hougoumont at the first attempt or the first wave at Sword Beach are wiped out in their landing craft by accurate German artillery fire or the Nervii kill Caesar and his bodyguard and his blood flows into the river Selle or whatever we are into fantasy territory as firmly as any game with dragons, unicorns and elves.

If you refight a battle and it doesn't follow the historical path you, or your rules, have missed something.

NO NO NO

If you are fighting a battle and slavishly following the exact order of the day then the result should be similar. Some rules will allow variation in the outcome because nothing is guaranteed.

If you use the same set up but allow the players to write their own orders thats not a refight but a what if this happened.

The third option is to use the original OOB but let each side create their own deployment.

Drew


If it does, why bother?

Chad

Drew

Agree. A 'What If' replay of historical actions is to me, at least,  the most interesting/enjoyable method of playing such a game. This allows greater freedom of players to exercise their 'skills' , offsets the possibility that the rules you use/prefer do not facilitate the tabletop recreation of the actual events that occurred and to some extent minimises the numerous and often opposing views of 'experts'  that can and do create a true 'fog of war'.

Chad




Ithoriel

Quote from: Westmarcher on 20 October 2021, 11:41:21 AM
To Paul/T13A and Mike/Ithoriel.

You appear to have this pessimistic view that if you set up using historic deployments you're going to lose. 


Not only do I not believe it means inevitable defeat but even if it did, providing the victory conditions were fair (e.g. lose less badly than your historical alter ego) I'd have no problem with inevitable defeat.

But if you are going to play fast and loose with the rest of the battle why is deployment suddenly a sacred cow?

As to Clay and Cooper, how about deployment "au mouchoir". Make 'em hold an end each of a handkerchief and give 'em a dagger :)
There are 100 types of people in the world, those who understand binary and those who can work from incomplete data

Westmarcher

OK, Mike. Sit down with your favourite 'elf drink and imagine you are Dr. Sam Beckett and you have just stepped into the Quantum Leap Accelerator. Suddenly you awake and find yourself dozing in a chair with your feet resting on a drum and a vast array of soldiers are marching past shouting your name. Yes, you are Napoleon .... and your piles are giving you gyp. You're in Belgium and it's the morning of the 18th June 1815 and you have already issued your orders.

There. Does that help?

:)
I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be.

John Cook

The armed forces wargame historical operations professionally in order to inform future warfighting.   They do it to understand a potential enemy's doctrine and how to counter it.  They also wargame previous operations in order to understand where mistakes had been made, why they were made, how to avoid them in future and what might have been a better solution. 

Recreational wargamers are probably less interested in this kind of operational analysis, but refighting a historical battle, as it was fought, is as good a method as any to understanding the methods of the protagonists and in order to do this you need to adhere to historical precedent.  So it is a learning process and, as I have said already, it is also method of testing rules, which if they are any good, within in the bounds of aberrational random results, should reflect historical precedent or something very like it. 

But, this is neither mandatory nor does it reflect, in my experience, the majority of historical wargames, which tend to be 'freestyle' in nature, within a historical context. 

It is also really not necessary for people who don't understand why others might want to refight a historical battle, as it was fought, to understand why they get satisfaction, entertainment, or learn from doing so, or any have any other motivation that I haven't thought of.

I, for example, don't understand the attraction of fantasy or science fiction in either wargames, literature or film.  I just accept that some people are weird ;D

pierre the shy

Having designed quite a few historical scenarios with various rulesets l agree with all the aforementioned points about using historical deployments.
The thing you have to accept as a designer is that you can almost guarantee that the plyers will NOT follow the same course as the actual battle. Any similarity  tends to end once the actual game starts.....so when designing scenarios expect the unexpected!
Though much is taken, much abides; and though
we are not now that strength which in old days
moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are.

Ben Waterhouse

And never mind trying to get subordinate players in multiplayer games to obey orders from the C-in-C...
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Ithoriel

Quote from: Westmarcher on 20 October 2021, 01:09:24 PM
OK, Mike. Sit down with your favourite 'elf drink and imagine you are Dr. Sam Beckett and you have just stepped into the Quantum Leap Accelerator. Suddenly you awake and find yourself dozing in a chair with your feet resting on a drum and a vast array of soldiers are marching past shouting your name. Yes, you are Napoleon .... and your piles are giving you gyp. You're in Belgium and it's the morning of the 18th June 1815 and you have already issued your orders.

There. Does that help?

:)

Ohh! Brilliant! Marengo! :P
There are 100 types of people in the world, those who understand binary and those who can work from incomplete data

pierre the shy

Though much is taken, much abides; and though
we are not now that strength which in old days
moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are.

Duke Speedy of Leighton

You may refer to me as: Your Grace, Duke Speedy of Leighton.
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Last Hussar

The biggest problem with fighting a historical battle is you can't.

We don't have the accurate orbats for both sides.
We may know (minus the ones who were ill on the morning, etc) make up of the Market Garden forces, but German numbers and deployment are best guess. The Wehrmacht didn't know what they had, how can we?

How many Prussians actually arrived at Plaicenot?

And the further back you go, the less we know. An Orbat for Bosworth is impossible.
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Ithoriel


QuoteThe biggest problem with fighting a historical battle is you can't.

We don't have the accurate orbats for both sides.
We may know (minus the ones who were ill on the morning, etc) make up of the Market Garden forces, but German numbers and deployment are best guess. The Wehrmacht didn't know what they had, how can we?

How many Prussians actually arrived at Plaicenot?

And the further back you go, the less we know. An Orbat for Bosworth is impossible.


Ah, yes! The 3D effect ..... Disease, Desertion and Detachments. :)
There are 100 types of people in the world, those who understand binary and those who can work from incomplete data

FierceKitty

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