"Six Days in October" -- Rules Clarification

Started by Cyrano, October 01, 2016, 10:09:04 PM

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Cyrano

Jason and others came up with some very fine rules questions.  I will post the answers to them here:

1.) Do we know their lines of communication, and do they know ours? My tentative guess is not (except generally northward for them).

You do not know the location of the LoC.

2.) The briefing says some area in the southeast is out of bounds as neutral (Bohemian?) territory. From what I vaguely recall of European geography in this area, the 'print' orientation of the map has the top of it basically being northward, so southeast would be right-bottom, but how far does the no-march area extend? There aren't any roads directly connecting Bayreuth to... um... {squinting at the map} Eger? Am I missing an i in that dipthong? More importantly there's no road connecting Bayreuth to the town at the pass, named... well, it's cut off and probably Slavic anyway, so we'll just call it Knarloc. (The greater Knarloc would be over in Kroot county. Even more Slavic. And/or communist. For the greater good. Whatever.)

So, would I be safe in conservatively inferring that, for our purposes, there's no point going east (rightward) off the road heading northeast through Planen, Zwickau, and Che-- ---- we'll call that Cheatem?

The Gebirge to the SE (so labelled) are the border of the Haut Palatinate and Bohemia.  They basically form an arc blocking off the SE.  Venturing too far into that "zone" would have activated the Hapsburgs and exposed Napoleon's flank.  There is a road from Bayreuth through the pass (its one of those taken in the event) but, you're right, once you hit Zwickau, you all but need to turn North.

3.) How the blinkety blank are we supposed to tell what counts as what kind of terrain on this map (other than 'road' and 'mountain)? How do YOU even tell?! Is yours colored?

Nope, uncolored.  The march and combat system abstracts terrain dramatically.  Just about everything you're going to be marching through is going to qualify as either difficult or (more commonly) very difficult ground if you leave the road.  This is, after all, the Thuringian Forest...with mountains.

4.) Exit routes to Berlin: based on clues given in the briefing, are those the two roads wending northeast (more or less) from Vittenberg and Madgebourg? (I would try looking on Mapquest or Google, but the road network might not be same enough to tell.)

Them's are the roads to Berlin.  As the briefing states, however, the first goal is defeating the army which leaves those roads open as a consequence.  After all, you don't want an intact army wandering in your rear.

5, Are we required to start generally where the briefings say, or can we deploy differently and if so within what area? I presume if so, the area would be the southwest quadrant, below the ridge and its two passes. The third pass is in the lower right (southeast) and so (as far as I understand so far) essentially offmap, thus not a viable option. But if we're allowed to start some corps down there and move north, that would be important to know! -- the tradeoff being that since there are no roads directly back to Bayreuth, any corps starting there would be waaayy out of communication for a while until when-if-ever they link up again farther north.

Your armies are where the briefings say they are.  You can orient the divisions within the corps as you like, but I will be taking the basic location as writ.

6.  There's an 8th corps forming somewhere (using Rhine Confed detachments??) under Mortier. Does this thing get activated as a reinforcement eventually by bringing in a reserve commander from our pool? Or do we just ignore it? I don't recall its information being italicized (unlike the arty park information for example).

The Big Mortar is ignored.

7.  How will Napoleon be represented on the map? Does he travel with the Imperial Guard corps (so I'm always in direct contact with that player at least), or does he get his own corps (seems like there's yet one more corps or something in the list, the Cav Reserve)? Or does he stay back at French HQ (doesn't seem likely since that would screw with his ability to coordinate couriers)?

His Corsicanship is the 800-pound gorilla and can act in any way he wants.  He should likely not be given his own corps as its inefficient from a coordination perspective.  Most of the time I've seen this done, he does, indeed hang with the Guard.

8.   Relatedly, there's a whole dang short-corps of two types of cav, the Cavalry Reserve, 19K troops, who haven't been assigned to a player. If that isn't Nappy's corps, how does it operate? Also, the briefing lists it as 7 divisions, but only lists 6. (I'm not where I can cross-ref with the corps/div/brig order of battle spreadsheet, so I don't recall how or even if it's represented there.) Also, what are the differences between the dragoons and the coursers?

The first bit was an error on my part since corrected -- the reserve is commanded by Murat.  As to the distinction, the cavalry distinctions are for a later iteration of the system as well as for linking with the tactical system -- The Eagle Fights.


Sergeant at Arms of La Fraternite des Boutons Carres

One mustachioed, cigar-chomping, bespectacled deity, entirely at your service.

You didn't know? My Corps has already sailed to Berlin. We got there 3 days ago and we've been in the Tiergarten on the piss ever since. -- Marshal Soult, October 1806

Cyrano

Sergeant at Arms of La Fraternite des Boutons Carres

One mustachioed, cigar-chomping, bespectacled deity, entirely at your service.

You didn't know? My Corps has already sailed to Berlin. We got there 3 days ago and we've been in the Tiergarten on the piss ever since. -- Marshal Soult, October 1806

Cyrano

Based on a question from L'Empereur:  The only major river on the map is the Elbe.  All others should be taken as minor, i.e., they cost 1 hour to cross but do not require bridging or the location of a city/town/village on the river which would imply a bridge.

Sergeant at Arms of La Fraternite des Boutons Carres

One mustachioed, cigar-chomping, bespectacled deity, entirely at your service.

You didn't know? My Corps has already sailed to Berlin. We got there 3 days ago and we've been in the Tiergarten on the piss ever since. -- Marshal Soult, October 1806

Cyrano

Based on another good inquiry from His Bonapartitude:

Encampment in this game is abstracted.  Corps encamp by divisions and "shrink" to a space one kilometer square for every 10 strength points.  This allows for very snug, relatively speaking, encampments as one km on the map is actually quite small.
Sergeant at Arms of La Fraternite des Boutons Carres

One mustachioed, cigar-chomping, bespectacled deity, entirely at your service.

You didn't know? My Corps has already sailed to Berlin. We got there 3 days ago and we've been in the Tiergarten on the piss ever since. -- Marshal Soult, October 1806

JasonPratt

That answers the question of whether they encamp strung out in column (by brigades or whatever). I guess you're also saying the divisions encamp wherever the head of the divisional column is at the end of the assigned work/march day?


So if the column looks like this (marching leftward <--- that way):

Ccccccaaaaaaavvvvvvv..........Innnnnnnnffffffff

Then unless specific orders are given, the cav don't stop with time enough for the infantry to catch up, and/or the infantry don't keep marching to catch up with where the cav got to, they both just make camp where the capital letters are in that line.
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Dawn of Armageddon -- narrative AAR for Dawn of War: Soulstorm: Ultimate Apocalypse
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Cyrano

Some commanders have directed that their corps cover distances rather than march over time and that cavalry march with the slower infantry.

Other commanders have directed their cavalry to march as far as it can over, say, 10 hours, and then the infantry encamps wherever it is after the same period meaning they'll be some kms behind.

Other commanders have directed the cavalry march as far as it can over a period of time and have left the infantry to catch up "over night".  This is, of course, a bit rough on the foot sloggers.

Sergeant at Arms of La Fraternite des Boutons Carres

One mustachioed, cigar-chomping, bespectacled deity, entirely at your service.

You didn't know? My Corps has already sailed to Berlin. We got there 3 days ago and we've been in the Tiergarten on the piss ever since. -- Marshal Soult, October 1806

JasonPratt

And then we have the Prussians, whose divisions are all a mix of cav and inf, so at the divisional level (thus also at the corps level) they're necessarily going to march at inf speed. (There are Pruss/Russ cav speeds mentioned in the brief rules, but I take it those are for later battles with different corps organizations among the allies, and/or for battles where there are divisional commanders of brigades.)
ICEBREAKER THESIS CHRONOLOGY! -- Victor Suvorov's Stalin Grand Strategy theory, in lots and lots of chronological order...
Dawn of Armageddon -- narrative AAR for Dawn of War: Soulstorm: Ultimate Apocalypse
Survive Harder! -- Two season narrative AAR, an Amazon Blood Bowl career.
PanzOrc Corpz Generals -- Fantasy Wars narrative AAR, half a combined campaign.
Khazâd du-bekâr! -- narrative dwarf AAR for LotR BfME2 RotWK campaign.
RobO Q Campaign Generator -- archived classic CMBB/CMAK tool!

Cyrano

This is correct.  It's one of the great strengths of having cavalry like Murat's.

That said, they do not want to be caught alone in combat.

Jim
Sergeant at Arms of La Fraternite des Boutons Carres

One mustachioed, cigar-chomping, bespectacled deity, entirely at your service.

You didn't know? My Corps has already sailed to Berlin. We got there 3 days ago and we've been in the Tiergarten on the piss ever since. -- Marshal Soult, October 1806

Cyrano

Sergeant at Arms of La Fraternite des Boutons Carres

One mustachioed, cigar-chomping, bespectacled deity, entirely at your service.

You didn't know? My Corps has already sailed to Berlin. We got there 3 days ago and we've been in the Tiergarten on the piss ever since. -- Marshal Soult, October 1806