Calontir Field Tactics (Early Work)
Calontir Field Tactics
(Early work)
Calontir has a very well thought out bridge tactics at the present time, but our field tactics are still lacking. This papaer will try to rememdy that. Our requirments for a field formation are many and varied. It must be rather flexible as to handle different situations and needs. It must be mobile enough to take advantage of opportunities presented in battle. Self reliance as well as the ability to work with other units is also needed. Simplicity is a must as we have very few war trained fighters and have recently had allies that are not experienced in our tactics. And lastly it shoud be tough as Calontir draws a lot of fire. I believe I have such a formation. It does require the large shields and a well led cavalry. I'm not quite sure on what the min. and max. number of fighters for the formation is but I think an army of sixty could do it just fine.
The formatin is a layered construction. The middle of the front is formed on a Calontir shield wall. This wall is 4 -8 men long according to our numbers. This is a real shield wall with secondaries and dedicated artillery. To either side of this shield wall are 2 -4 big to med. shield with heavy polearm suport. Behind the less compact shield walls is ourcav. or the Ansteorrans (if they are available). There can be a liberal sprinkling of assassins in this too. (These are our quick striking forces.) Between the striking forces is the great unwashed masses, our reserves and untrained fighters. Behind them is another set of shield wall just like the front ones except it faces the other way. (the shield wall, not the troops, they face forward just like everyone else.) This is the basic formation.
Mobility[edit | edit source]
This formation is slow as a whole but is movable using the techniques we have used before to move bodies of fighters. The "Step! Step!" format of marching will work here. I believe that with a little work it can wheel and pivot slowly. The real mobility of this formation is in the wingt striking forces. These forces ar ecomposed of our cav., assassins, and any allies we can trust to keep their heads (like the Ansteorrans). They can hit the flanks of a force hitting our front only, they can be used as a screening force to let us set up fort Calontir, and they are a ready reinforcing force if need be.
The Fort[edit | edit source]
At Pennsic XII Calontir accidently discovered a formation we will call the fort. The field formation can become one in just a few seconds. Basically the rear shield wall turns to the rear and the four side walls form into caps for the end. If possible the front and rear bow out a little. The forces in the middle of the fort are used as reserved and rotated through the walls to supply fresh troops. The cav. and other strike forces screen the ends of the formation so that they have time to set up a curved end caps. After the caps are formed the screening forces either break out or are allowed to reenter the fort.
Tactical Figs.
Basic formation
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Key:
- - - light-med. shield and support
==== heavy Calontir shield wall with full support
#### Cav., Assassins, Good Allies
**** Reserves, Untrained troops, New Allies (great unwashed masses )
&&&& Main army we are fighting with as allies
%%%% Nasty!! Nasty!!
In Line with Good Flanks
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We break our formation into these only if we are sure of our flanks. It's basically our bridge formation. The rear shield wall moves forward and covers the flanks of front shield wall. This gives us a wider front we ccan cover. The reserves en up doing all the nasty task in this formation. They rotate in and our of the shield wall and they are used as reinforcements as needed. The cav. units are used to hit break outs as needed.
In case of a bad foe break though somewhere else in the line we fort up as best as we can.
On a Flank of a Line
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This is one of the more complicated maneuvers. It is used when we are on the flank. It's also the chance for the cav. to shine. If the foe only overlaps us by 40-50 men, the cav moves parallel to the line of battle, making sure not to get engaged, and when the foes line is about to completely fank the line, they hit. Trapping the foe between the hammer and anvil. We have some sort of shield wall on all sides so we can fort as needed. Ther reserves are rotated as usual.
Forting up!
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(a)
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(b)
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(c)
This maneuver calls for a lot of yelling by the SGTs. If each sarge has some idea of how to move his own little group and the king yells at the seargents, it should work well enough for our purposes. A) The cav. rush out to cover the flanks of the formation they fight there long enough to get the med. shields time to work. B) The med. shields pull in to form caps on the flanks, locking their shields up with the front and rear shield walls. If possible and there are plenty of big shields the caps are made ointo full shield wass too. (we must carry spare equipment) The front and rear shield walls should try to bulge the middle of thier line to give the fort an oval shape. C) When the fort is safely formed the pure cav. do a bug out to get out side of the foe's envelopment. A few assasins should try to get back in to be one of us in the fort. Any survining cav. should break into 3 - 4 man squads to harass the foe's rear and throuw them off, they should not try to get decisively engaged.
This type of formation and tactics can maintain Calontir's war supremecy for a few more years.
In Service to Calontir
Pavel
Thanks to ]\/[arcus for re-typing this for me. The Ascii graphics are close to what the original paper had.
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