Given the medieval/ancients nature of ME combat, this is actually
reasonable. Armies tended to be held together by force of will and
dedication to the commander. Once the commander was gone (killed or fled),
the army did tend to disband (often at very high speed and sometimes in
mid-battle). Being the commander was quite a risky business: you had to be
at the front of the line in order for your troops to see you fighting, but
that put you right smack in the thick of the action. It's really only
since
Marlborough's time that commanders have tended to stay away from the
battle
itself, using subordinates to execute their orders and battle plans while
they watched from a nearby hill.
RD: Marlborough would be insulted! At the battle of Ramillies, he LED his
men though the hottest fire, had his horse shot under him by a musket ball,
and as he mounted up again on his aide-de-camp's horse, the aide-de-camp
fell. At least that's according to the ballad sung by Maddy Prior on Arthur
the King (yes it's got ballads about King Arthur on it too. Recommended!).
Back to early medieval combat: at Hastings, King Harold had two of his
brothers with him. Both fell before he did. But if Harold had been killed
first, Gurth would have taken command, then if Gurth fell, Leofwin. When
Harold was finally slain, the remanants of his housecarls fought on under
his Marshal Ednoth (I think?) but a chain of command certainly existed, and
an army of the period would not disband simply because its commander fell.
Earlier in 1066 at Stamford Bridge, Harald Hardrada of Norway was slain
early in the battle, but his troops, even though taken by surprise and many
of them without their armour, fought on (under his Marshal Styrkar and the
English traitor the former Earl Tostig) till most had been killed.
Perhaps we should draw a distinction between 'professional' warriors, like
Harold's housecarls, and Harald's, and levies. The warriors of a warband
were honour-bound to defend their lord with their lives, and if he were
slain, to die with him. Admittedly not all warriors lived up to this heroic
ideal. At the Battle of Clontarf, the saga tells with perhaps unintentional
humour how two standard-bearers of the viking banner Landwaster were killed
in quick succession. When the viking leader (sorry forget his name) gave it
to a third man, the warrior retorted, 'carry the devil yourself.' Not
surprisingly the vikings lost!
My point is that there was a chain of command even in barbarian armies. If
the commander was slain his brother, or nearest adult male relative,
immediately succeeded him. If there was no relative then the Marshal,
Steward, Staller or captain of the warband would take charge. The levies
might run at a leader's death (indeed in the ME game, this accounts for how
you can recruit a fresh batch of recruits at a pop every fortnight - they
are the guys who ran away from the last battle!) but -some- might rally
around the warband.
Defeated armies should NOT be automatically destroyed/routed. They must
have a commander to rally them, obviously. Therefore, first look to see if
the nation has a free character slot. If it has not, then there is no
suitable commander and the army disbands as now. However, if the nation
DOES have a free character slot, the defeated army should be forced to
retreat before the advancing enemy, and a new C10-C40 automatically succeeds
to the command. The rank of the new commander depends on a random factor
with a bonus if the nation gets a SNA for commanders. How many troops rally
to the new commander should be a minimum of 100 plus a random factor, plus a
better com would be able to rally more fleeing troops than a poor one.
If an army com is assassinated, then he should automatically be succeeded by
a new C10-40 as above if a slot is available, but few if any troops would
desert, say 0-20% of the total. If the army was a mixed bag then the worst
troops would go first, ie the men-at-arms, then the li and ar, and only if
there were no others would the army lose lc hi or hc.
Richard.
As for assassinating the commander being difficult because he would be
well-known to the troops: I'm in two minds on this one. He would be known
and recognisable to his close associates, making assassination difficult,
but not by most of the troops, making infiltration easy. The run of the
mill
soldiers would recognise him by his standard or by some other highly
visible
sign. Get an army camp of five thousand men milling around and one more
unknown face isn't going to stand out.
Gavin
Steve Prindeville wrote:
> The other thing I have not liked about army commander assassinations is
the
> army disbanding. How likely is it that an army would break apart and go
home
···
----- Original Message -----
From: "Gavinwj" <gavinwj@compuserve.com>
To: <mepbmlist@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Tuesday, October 26, 2004 4:06 PM
Subject: Re: [mepbmlist] Army disbands
> when a commander is killed. Wouldn't their be lower level
> commanders(non-coms) in the army?
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