Topic: The Tactical Journal

[Jörgen Andreasson]

The Tactical Journal



Hi and welcome to my tactical corner of the Warhammer world of fantasy warfare. I'm in no way either a genius or the best general in the world but I have been playing strategy games for over thirty years and Warhammer for at least 25+ years. Truthfully, I really don't remember when I played my first real miniature figure wargame, but I think it was Warhammer Fantasy 1st edition.
I was probably not more than ten years old when I made up my own rules for playing with plastic toy soldiers and using the dice from our families RISK game.
I'm no longer a gamer that get the opportunity to play so much these days, perhaps a dozen games a year or so. This do, however, not stop me from thinking about the game (and others) quite allot and one of the reasons I would like to start this article series on this Forum.

If I have the stamina I will try and write many small and/or long articles about strategy in general, many will be specific to Empire in particular. Most of my insights do NOT come from this game alone but from strategy games in general, so, many tips and tricks will be things that can be used in any strategy game. I will, however, keep these articles with focus on how these theories work in the world of Warhammer Fantasy.

The articles will target both strategy (army wide manoeuvring), tactics (multiple unit manoeuvring) and individual army elements (the units). I will also include my thoughts on army list creation and try to describe how I think when I create a list.

Another part of this series will be visual aids in the form of diagrams of units in action. Some of the scenarios will be completely fictitious, some will be from my experiences of previous games of 8th edition. I will try and keep these diagrams simple and descriptive to show how different tactics should or should not be used.

And remember, these are only my thoughts and opinions based on my experiences. Do not take them as pure fact even though I might sometimes declare something as logical and factual in my articles.

Part 1 "Combined arms warfare"



What really is combined arms warfare?

Most people immediately think of German World War II Blitz Krieg, but in fact,  the notion of combined arms warfare is as old as war itself. Anyone who study military history can attest to how each historical era have their own distinctly different types of army components.
These different components of an army cooperates to form a cohesive army that makes it far stronger than any of the individual components. The balance between different components could often vary and usually did so for good reasons.

As an example, the Early Roman army relied on a heavy core of well trained infantry while a smaller part where light skirmishing infantry and even a smaller part was their cavalry. Romans did not use a small cavalry force because they thought it best to do so, but rather because they could not muster that many great riders. Nevertheless, the cavalry did still play a key role to their battle success.



If we were to put things in a more logical perspective you could say that a standard Roman Legion is at 100% capacity. It had about, say, 10% cavalry. If you were to remove these 10% and replace them with infantry that same Legion as a whole might have dropped to maybe 75% capacity. These numbers are, of course, just taken out of thin air and are just meant to convey the importance army composition and efficiency in general.

It should also be perfectly clear that the role of different components must be understood and used properly, otherwise you will not benefit of the unique synergy effects between them. This includes getting over the notion that every single element in an army must provide equal killing power (or the famous earn its points back phrase). It is not every components role to actually combat the main part (or even any particular part) of an enemy army.



To demonstrate I would like to give an example of army composition.

If you take two components of an army called component A and component B. Component A has a points cost of 1000p and component B has a points cost of 500p. Lets say that together they are made stronger because of some synergy effect between their abilities (I will extrapolate on these in later articles) and together they will destroy about 1000p of the enemy while retaining 1000p of their own. If you would replace either of these components with either component A or B you would very likely get the reverse effect, that is, you have 1000p destroyed while 1000p of the enemy remains.

My point is, that, just because a specific unit is there to die or just to speed bump the enemy they might still make your other units more effective and will more than enough make up their points cost in the end.

I will, of course, also disclaim the notion that I think GW is the best company in the world to set points cost for units, but in general they do a good job.

So... how do we use this knowledge in Warhammer Fantasy?



Ok... first we have to look at what type of components we have. When we look at the BRB I would probably divide them up into the different unit Troop Types, in addition to this we also have weapon groups such as Melee, Missile and Artillery and last but not least Magic.

In short the components are Infantry, Cavalry, Missile, Artillery, Monstrous and Magic.

Note 1
I don't list characters here, I basically view characters as force multipliers (will discuss this in-depth at a later article) and have to be categorized into the category in which they support.

Note 2
The term infantry could be both melee and missile infantry while the term missile could be both cavalry and infantry etc.. In these cases you would rate them into one or several categories, there is no reason a single element can not be part of different components.

Note 3
Melee is not in itself a component type but rather it is any unit that is NOT a missile or an artillery type. So you could say that an archer is either Melee Infantry and Missile unit, so I just skipp the Melee part and call it Infantry.

As you can understand fantasy offers many more options than we could ever dream of in real life, that is also why I love fantasy over purely historical settings. History are pretty stale in comparison with the deep tactical mesh of army composition in fantasy battles. Real life medieval (or late medieval) warfare were pretty much restricted to infantry, missile infantry, cavalry, light cavalry and artillery.

It should also be noted that any individual element in a game can belong to several components , you should always decide what their primary role is during the deployment of your forces. Having an element that performs dual roles give you a good advantage in flexibility but it also means they cost more in points than units who is more specialized. This issue is a whole other concept that I will not touch in this article.

In Warhammer you should NOT strive to include all components that are available to you. The most important thing is that your components form a base for different synergy effects that make each of your individual components stronger. I will touch more of this in later articles.

In my experience you should always bring THREE different MAIN components in any of your army lists. That is, they should each make up at least 20% of your armies total points allocation. I don't see a problem with taking four main components but that is in my experience stretching it, try to keep it at three. In military history the number three and five has always been important for many reasons. In this case it is three components that each must be at least one fifth of the army total.
Try to make the split somewhere at 60/40 with the three components, so, one component is the Major component, the other make up the two Minor components. The Major component should be between 60-40% of the total worth of these three components combined while the two Minor ones should be split between the other part. You could, therefore, have a Major component of say 40%, one Minor or 35% and another at 25%.

In case of the Empire, an army could have three Main components that is Infantry, Artillery and Magic. I think this is the most common approach of playing an Empire army today. Though, it is far from the only way to play a game of Warhammer Fantasy with Empire. In my opinion any options that are available to the Empire is a viable one (such as Missile, Cavalry, Artillery) as long as there are options in the army books that make such a list viable. With the new rules in 8th edition we are no longer as restrained in our choices of units and should be able to create more varied types of armies that all is competitive.

Army Example (Infantry, Artillery, Magic) 2000p

Arch Lector                                                                       200p   (Infantry / Magic)
BsB                                                                                   100p   (Infantry)

Battle Wizard                                                                   125p   (Magic)
Warrior Priest                                                                   100p   (Infantry, Magic)
Engineer                                                                           75p     (Artillery)

Infantry regiment (with detachment)                               300p   (Infantry, 20% Missile)
Infantry regiment (with detachment)                               300p   (Infantry, 20% Missile)
Infantry regiment (with detachment)                               300p   (Infantry, 20% Missile)

2 Cannon                                                                         200p   (Artillery)

Steam tank*                                                                     300p   (Monster, Artillery)

* If you never use the Cannon on the Steam tank for fear of a misfire then just count it as a monster. Technically it is a chariot but it is more a monster than anything else. I otherwise categorise chariots into the cavalry/monster/beast component. A more fair points allocation might be 300p as monster and 150p as artillery, I will explain this further at a later date.

This brings us to about 2000p of which we have  65% infantry, 33% artillery, 22% magic and 9% missile. There is a split between the major components of  55% infantry, 27% artillery and 18% magic.

Now, this component business is not an exact science, but it is my experience how you create a durable and strong army. This does, however, not tell you anything about how to use the forces to make it actually work on the battlefield, but now you at least have a clue as of what to take and in what proportions.

In later articles I will go over each component and how they should be used, their different strengths and weaknesses and how they can be used in a conceptual way together with other components of your army. Following this I will also go into more tactical discussions about tactical elements (how to form and manoeuvre) and how they all work into your overall strategy of a game.

Until next time...

[Jörgen Andreasson]

Part 2 “Army component overview”

This will be a shorter article (more of a continuation of the last one) where I give an introductory overview of how I deal with categorizing the different elements (units) and characters in an army. Sometimes you have to make a subjective decision on how big a part of a model should be categorized into what category, but in most cases you just give the whole cost of the model into one or more categories.

And remember, this is NOT science and only guidelines. Components are suppose to guide you in how parts of your army interacts with each other. They are not there to restrict you but to help you see the bigger picture.

Also, note that you should not have to do this every time you play a game. This is only a tool to help you understand how important the balance between components really is in the grand scheme of things.

Characters



All characters are force multipliers and as such are not directly units but rather they support other units in some way. How and into what component category you classify a character depends on the characters ability and how they are equipped.

As one example, a General of the Empire that is mounted on a barded warhorse will come out of the Cavalry component category. Even if he is armed with a pistol or handgun I would probably never categorize him into the Missile category unless I intend for him to personally lead a big main unit of Handgunners for some reason.
I would rate this general as Cavalry even if I had no other Cavalry in the game except him. The reason for this is that he will not be able to benefit from look out sir rolls and as such will be more vulnerable and should not be counted towards the infantry portion of the army.

A Wizard is an infantry model but he is not a melee oriented character and his primary job is NOT to lead units, even if his Leadership characteristic might be slightly higher than average. The higher Leadership is more for his own benefit than that of the unit, as soon as a unit is in danger of being run down or similar Wizards tend to bail rather then fight anyway. Thus, Wizards will in general be counted towards the Magic component category only.
Some Wizards are of course different such as Beastmen Great Bray Shaman and Vampires who certainly could belong to both the Melee (Infantry/Cavalry) and Magic category.
An extremely combat oriented Vampire with a single magic level could perhaps count 25% of its cost as Magic and 100% as Infantry (or Cavalry), this is up to you to decide based on how you actually use the model.

Infantry component category



This would probably be any model/unit that benefit from the Infantry rule and that has a movement value of six or less. So anything from Ogres to Goblins would fall under this category.
The basis of this category is mainly derived from how they function on the field in regards of manoeuvrability. I also think it is important that a unit that is regarded as infantry do NOT benefit from he Swiftstride rule.

You do not consider lone models with a movement of six or less as Infantry, the reason for this is their increased movement capabilities. Infantry must be units of at least three models and does include Skirmishers as well.

So, if you have the possibility of taking a lone Troll as a single choice I would ONLY rate it as Monstrous and not as Infantry.

I would, in general, count any missile infantry unit that is armoured with none or light armour and hand-weapon has half their cost as infantry. They can be used to fight, but in general that is not what they do.

Cavalry component category



This category do not only include mounted individuals, it includes any model that has at least a movement of seven and the Swiftstride rule. I don't know if there really are models that have the Swiftstride rule and a movement lower than seven, other than flyers but they have the fly ability instead and are therefore also counted as Cavalry.

In essence, the Cavalry category are the general use of cavalry on the field where manoeuvring and speed is the major contributor and makes them differ significantly from Infantry.

In general all models that are either Cavalry, Monstrous Cavalry, War Beasts, Monstrous Beasts, Fliers and Chariots counts as a Cavalry component.

Monstrous component category



This would be any type of multiple wound model with at least three wounds mounted on either 40*40mm or larger bases. This also includes Chariots.

The reason for this component is that these troop types usually have rules like Stomp/Impact hits and interact with Missile, Infantry, Cavalry and Artillery components in much a different way than other component types do. Therefore, they are an important part of any army as its own component.

You should, in general, include all Monstrous Infantry, Monstrous Cavalry, Monstrous Beasts, Monsters and Chariots into this category. Whether they are in units or as lone models is not important.

Missile component category



This is basically any troop type that is equipped and using any type of Ballistic Skill type weapon such as a bow or a thrown weapon. These troops will be used much a different way than other troop types and therefore warrant their own inclusion into you armies component listing.

Types such as a Bolt Thrower that also uses the Ballistic skill of its crew is also included into the Missile component part of your list.

Also, remember that practically all missile units also belong to at least one other category. An archer is both an infantry and a missile component. A Bolt Thrower is both a missile and an Artillery component.


Artillery component category



Artillery is every piece of equipment or creature that lob ammunition using either the scatter and/or the artillery dice, is using a template or has a range above 36”.

The main reason to differentiate between the Missile and the Artillery category is how they are used on the battlefield. Almost all artillery either has great range or the possibility to kill lots of tightly packed models (or both). It also, in general, have very high strength and can do multiple wounds. These are the major traits of artillery weapons.

Do not include creatures that only has one single template attack into this category.


Magic component category



Well, this does not actually have to mean spells. I would say that any equipment or ability that could be perceived as a magical effect or equivalent should be included into this category. Things like Screaming Bells, War Altar and Chaos War Shrines are things that directly comes to my attention as belonging to this category. Basically, any equipment that has some sort of battle wide effects, such as bound items, is a part of the Magic category.

If you use magical equipment with bound spells only take the points cost of the individual equipment, not the whole model.

Any individual model that may cast spells should pay its cost or part of it as a Magic component. In general you pay the whole models cost, but in certain cases this might not be the case, such as in the case of Vampires geared for close combat etc... you make the judgement...


What about other complex models?

You be the judge about this. I don't know every strange contraption that can be used in a game and their individual rules. The most important thing when you categorise something into a component is how you use it on the battlefield.

One example could be the Skaven Screaming Bell, this thing is pulled by the infantry and give the unit some increased combat performance, so it would not be illogical to allocate at least part of its cost as Infantry and perhaps the whole model into Magic. So it could be 100% Magic and 50% Infantry.
A Night Goblin Fanatic is easier, they are just built into whatever unit they are in and calculated with it.

In my next following articles I will expand on each and every component category and how they interact on a broad perspective with the other component categories. I will probably do one article for every category. This way I can explore their particular influence when they are either the Major Component (largest main component), Minor Component (a main component but not the largest one) or a Supportive Component (not a main component) or not present at all.

[Jörgen Andreasson]

Part 2.5 "Presenting the Armies"

Ok, I will now present two armies of an internal feud between Nuln and Talabecland...

From Talabecland we have general Günther Weiss, a deeply religious scared veteran with a firm hand who believe in whipping his soldiers into action. He has mustered a strong infantry force and will field the two stolen Steam Tanks from Nuln, now turning their own contraptions against them. 

On the other side we have general Karl Meier. He is another veteran who recently fielded his army numerous times against an Orc incursion. Though, his forces has been severely diminished and most of the infantry has not been able to reach the battlefield. Only two gun regiments and most of his artillery has been hurried into service.
Though, unknown to the enemy, Karl Meier has been joined by a large contingent of Reiksguard Knights led by 2nd Captain Valdemar Hoss. Together with Meiers own personal knights guard they now command an impressive force of both light and heavy cavalry in addition to Meiers artillery and infantry.

I will use these two armies and a completely fictitious battle between them in this article series. I will use their forces pitted against each other in a type of special battle report and in a few other circumstances to show different tactical manoeuvres.


Talabecland Army (about 2500p)



Lords

General of Talabecland "Günther Veiss"
Equipment: plate armour, hand-weapon, shield
Magic: Sword of Might, Enchanted Shield, Luck Stone, Iron Curse Icon

Jade Wizard Lord "Leopold Zimmerman"
Equipment: hand-weapon
Magic: Lv 4 Lore of Life, Dispel Scroll, Shroud of Magnus      
Spells: Earth Blood, Flesh to Stone, Thrown of Vines, Regrowth

Heroes

Captain of Talabecland "Jhan Von Khol"
Equipment: plate armour, hand-weapon
Magic: Armour of Meteoric Iron, Dawn Stone
Other: Battle Standard

Warrior Priest of Sigmar "Gregor the Stout"
Equipment: heavy armour, great weapon
Magic: None

Warrior Priest of Sigmar "Ivan the Strong"
Equipment: heavy armour, hand weapon, shield
Magic: None


Core troops

1st Infantry Regiment   
40 Halbardiers (light armour, halberd)
Command: Champion, Standard, Musician

Sword detachment detachment
15 Swordsmen (light armour, hand-weapon, shield)

Gun detachment detachment
10 Handgunners (hand-weapon, handgun)

2nd Infantry Regiment   
40 Halbardiers (light armour, halberd)
Command: Champion, Standard, Musician

Sword detachment detachment
15 Swordsmen (light armour, hand-weapon, shield)

Gun detachment detachment
10 Handgunners (hand-weapon, handgun)


Special troops

Greatswords Regiment   
20 Greatswords (plate armour, great weapon)
Command: Champion, Standard, Musician

Mortar
Mortar


Rare troops

Steam Tank
Steam Tank



Nuln army (about 2500p)



Lords

General of Nuln "Karl Meier"
Equipment: plate armour, hand-weapon, shield, barded warhorse
Magic: Iron Curse Icon


Heroes

Captain of Nuln "Patrik Von Joost"
Equipment: plate armour, hand-weapon, barded warhorse
Magic: Dragon Helm, Dawn Stone
Other: Battle Standard

2nd Captain of the Reiksguard "Valdemar Hoss"
Equipment: plate armour, shield, barded warhorse
Magic: Sword of Might, Luck Stone



Amber Battle Wizard "Contessa Felicia Von Klausman"
Equipment: hand-weapon, barded warhorse
Magic: Lv 2 Lore of The Beast, Rod of Power
Spells: Wyssan's Wildform, Savage Beast of Horrors

Master Engineer "Artillery master Magnus Hoch"
Equipment: light armour, hand-weapon
Magic: None


Core troops

1st Infantry Regiment   
20 Handgunners (handgun, hand-weapon)
Command: Musician, Champion (brace-of-pistols)

Archer detachment
5 Archers (hand-weapon, bow)

Archer detachment
5 Archers (hand-weapon, bow)

2nd Infantry Regiment   
20 Handgunners (handgun, hand-weapon)
Command: Musician, Champion (brace-of-pistols)

Archer detachment
5 Archers (hand-weapon, bow)

Archer detachment
5 Archers (hand-weapon, bow)

2nd Heavy Cavalry Regiment
8 Knights (plate armour, lance, shield, barded warhorse)
Command: Standard, Musician

3rd Heavy Cavalry Regiment
8 Knights (plate armour, lance, shield, barded warhorse)
Command: Standard, Musician


Special troops

1st Light Cavalry Regiment
5 pistoleers (light armour, brace of pistols, hand-weapon, warhorse)
Command: Champion, Musician

2nd Light Cavalry Regiment
5 pistoleers (light armour, brace of pistols, hand-weapon, warhorse)
Command: Champion, Musician

1st Heavy Cavalry Regiment
7 Knights (plate armour, lance, shield, barded warhorse)
Command: Champion, Standard, Musician

Generals Knights Guard
6 Knights (plate armour, lance, shield, barded warhorse)
Command: Champion, Musician

Great cannon
Great cannon
Great cannon
Mortar
Mortar


Ok, so these are two fairly contrasting armies. The army of Talebecland have much fewer manoeuvring element but more powerful if brought to force while the army of Nuln have more numerous, smaller and more manoeuvrable elements.

The army of Talabecland has Infantry as their "Major component" and Monster, Magic as their "Minor components"

The army of Nuln has Cavalry as their "Major component" and Artillery, Missile as their "Minor components"

These are two clearly very different armies... of curse created by me so I have something to showcase while I rambling along with my thoughts on strategy.

[Jörgen Andreasson]

Part 3 "The Infantry"



The Infantry has always been the cornerstone of almost all armies in history, and is even today. The Roman army is probably the most famous example who used a well disciplined heavy infantry component, especially during the Imperial Roman era.

So, why was the Roman army so successful where others failed?

First of all, they were not actually that successful in the beginning, their main strength were their determination of never surrender coupled with the fact that they had a huge base of population and resources of which to raise their legions, and fast. Their success stemmed more from great logistics and being able to attrition the enemy into submission.

In the early Roman republic there was the Pyrrhic war (280-275BC) between the Roman republic and the Kingdom of Epirus (today's north-western part of Greece). The king Pyrrhus came to the protection of the Greek settlements in southern Italy and mustered a huge army of 3000 cavalry, 2000 archers, 500 slingers, 20.000 infantry and 20 war elephants.
Pyrrhus battled the Roman several times over the next five years and he didn't loose a single battle. The last battle fought at Beneventum in 275BC was technically a draw but the victory is still given to the Romans because by then Pyrrhus army was so worn down he simply had to end the campaign.
The fact was, that in this time period, the Romans had been able to raise their two Consolar armies (two legions each) not just once but three times, the Greeks were just severely outnumbered.

Pyrrhus is actually considered one of the greatest military tacticians and he was in particular revered by the later Hannibal that used much the same tactics as Pyrrhus had earlier practised.

So, why did the Romans loose to the Greeks, despite their armies being roughly equal in size?
The Romans were beaten many times over in this war. Most of this can be attested to the composition of the Greek army versus the Roman army, as well as to the competent commander that wielded it. The Romans practically had one one real main component at this time, and this was their infantry.
The Roman army actually were in a transitional phase between the early- and mid-republican army composition. And it is broadly thought that they used the early era army against the Greek. Each Legion had about 6000 heavy infantry (Hoplites), 2400 light infantry and 600 cavalry. Their skirmisher screen that consisted mainly of javelin armed light infantry were not as effective as the Greek slingers and archers, neither was the Roman cavalry that strong in comparison with the much more elite (and well equipped) cavalry fielded by the Greeks. 
The composition of the Roman army where basically a Main component of Infantry and one Minor component of Missile and one Supportive component of Cavalry.
The Greek on the other hand had a Main component of Infantry, two Minor components of Cavalry and Missile and a Supportive component of Monsters (elephants). This was pretty much the exact same type of formations that both Hannibal and Alexander the Great used in their conquests and they both got their strategies from the early Greek strategists.

So, what does all this mean in Warhammer?



I claim that it says allot, the rules in Warhammer support the same type of tactical thinking in respect to army composition.

I also claim that you should NOT cling to the "meta-game" as people like to call it, that is why people tend to loose their games, or it is often down to luck. If you have the models you should simply create varied lists so people have no clue what you will bring and what tactics will be useful this time. Just brake the chains of the "meta-game".

With all this said we need to take a look at what infantry really is and what to do with this component.

The main characteristics of infantry is slow movement and many ranks, thus they are able to hold their ground far longer than any other component category. Infantry are in general not impeded by terrain in the same way that, for example, cavalry is. This is something infantry can use as one advantage. But, it is, a dual edged sword because infantry don't get their benefit of ranks when they fight inside dangerous terrain such as a forest (unless they are skirmishers, then they are simply counted as stubborn).

First off, you must get rid of the notion that infantry are the holy grail of unit type in Warhammer, it does NOT have to be the main component of every game. But, you will likely find it hard to enter a battle without any infantry in support of your other army assets. Most army books will probably not even allow you to tailor an army without at least a medium amount of infantry in support.

Infantry as a Major component
If you have the infantry as you Main component you will need to think hard and long how you want to support that army. One other aspect is, of course, if you know what type of opponent you will be facing. I will mostly concentrate on the fact that we don't really know the opponent. A general rarely have the luxury to choose his force based on the opposition. Army composition are in real terms as much a result of politics as it is of strategy.

The strength of the Infantry is that it is usually cheap enough to provide both ranks and width, which will provide a solid long nice wall for the enemy to face. It is always important that you think about how to protect your infantry flanks while they push forward, especially when you are the aggressor. This is where it is important what other type of components your army brings to support the infantry. The best components as support for your infantry will always be Missile and/or Cavalry, selected either as a Support or Minor component. In certain armies you could also use a Monstrous component to support you Main Infantry component. Though, Monstrous components usually have other better uses than as protection of a Main Infantry component.

When you go on the offensive you should always try to rely on either a stronger Magic or Artillery component. I really don't think that using two Minor components of both Magic and Artillery is all that useful because they do pretty much the same. I would rather look at having either Magic or Artillery as a Minor component and the other as a Support component. You really need some other Minor component as a close direct support such as Missile or Cavalry.

Infantry as a Minor component
So, you have chosen to bring infantry as a medium support force. I would think that many Bretonian players use this strategy with rather good success. Now, most armies can do this equally well if you sit down and think about it.

When you use infantry as a Minor component you must first ask the question, what are they suppose to do? What are they there to protect?
You then tailor the tactical composition of the component with these goals in mind.

Infantry work equally well as a close support component for Main components of all the other categories. In general, I suppose, that most Minor Infantry components are defensive in nature. I would also suggest to think really hard before you use any type of elite infantry or otherwise expensive elements in any Minor Infantry component. In games of 3000+ points you could become slightly more generous, but not in more standard games.

Infantry as a Support component
Ok, you have now decided to bring a minimum number of infantry to the table. This mean that you probably will only field your infantry in smaller formations with more specialized goals in mind. Here I don't see much of a problem of taking a small elite force of a single or more element of infantry. They should however be kept within reasonable cost even in large games.

The whole point with any Support component is that they must do something very special. For infantry this could be to act as a flank denier, protect a battery of artillery or an important character model.

The question is now, rather, what your other components are. This will quickly guide you to how you use the infantry as a small support component.

One use of an Infantry Support component could be such as in a Wood Elf list who mainly bring Glade Guards and Glade Riders and a few Treeman. They have no other infantry such as Dryads. This means that all their infantry are distributed into the fighting power of many smaller Glade Guard units. This way, the role of the infantry is to absorb the enemy in close combat after it has been whittled down by archer fire, or perhaps only be as a last defensive resort when they get cornered by the enemy.



Conclusion
This was the broad aspect of the Infantry component. I have yet to speak about how to compose your units and what to think about when you actually create your individual elements. In order to convey my experiences about this I will first have to explain more about the tactical manoeuvring of the game, this is a section I will cover after the army component category has been covered.


Battle of the Bloody Rose Valley
The armies of Talabecland and Nuln met a few mile south of the Stir river inside Stirland domains.

Karl had both his cavalry and huntsmen out scouting the area, he knew that Günther and his army had crossed the river just a few days ago. He had also received the word that BOTH Steam Tanks were operational and in Günthers possession. This had him worried, greatly!
Luckily, Karls cavalry had forced a Talabecland scouting party to retreat, he was now forcing Günthers hand into a pitched battle. Just a few days later both armies were only a few miles apart and Günther had no choice but marching on to the battlefield the next morning, it was up Karl to accept the challenge, and so he did.

Basically... Nuln won the roll-of who would start placing a unit and they choose that Talabecland should march on to the field first and thereby also get to choose the direction and they choose the north side.

Now, this decision was made because of the fact that the Talabecland army only have a total of seven drops on the board while the Nuln army has a total of ten drops. By allowing Talabecland to place one of their units first the Nuln army could be sure to place four drops after the Talabecland placed his entire army. This meant that the Nuln army could withhold their entire heavy cavalry section until the whole Talabecland army deployed all their units.

Talabecland choose the North side because it had a large commanding hill with some prepared defences, this hill is also deemed as a Scree Slope and has some rocky outcroppings as impassable terrain as well.
On both sides of the battlefield are some forests, this make the battlefield feel like a real valley. In the valley itself there are some smaller trees and bushes, acting as small forests as well.
In the south-western part of the battlefield there is a small village with some defensive objects and in the south-eastern part there is a small hill that is also deemed as a Scree Sloped hill.

Battle of the Bloody Rose Valley Battlefield

Next is army deployment...

[Kissing]

if I can, most of armies in our History were infantry based simply because horses were really costly and weren't as reliable as men speaking of "Morale", plus it's easier to teach a man to fight shoulder to shoulder (Hoplites are a perfect example) than to ride a horse and fight from it.

(PS: Romans didn't only win Pyrrhus and most of their foes only with sheer numbers but with the capacity of Roman generals and politicians to change something if it didn't work and learn from their foes / mistakes, it's not only the army fault if you loose, you have to question yourself "did I do all what I could and did I play well?"…Romans lost a lot…Samnites wars are a great example of that. Sadly we can't really "compare" History with Warhammer, History were campaign and Warhammer are battles.

I think you forget one important thing in your "three points" "mobility" you "need" to be able to delay threats, answer to them, and force your opponent to do what you want him to do, in short, take the Initiative and make him play your game  (and hope dices remains stats eh).
 You speak of it but shall make it more important, Warhammer is about getting the good unit in the good place in the good time, and mobility is the key for that, keeping yours and denying opponents one.

On most points I agree with you, combined forces is the way to go, putting all eggs in the same chest is taking a risk,  the risk that your opponent find the chest and crush your eggs while you only crush his eggs one by one.

Will red you with interest and curiosity.  I apologize if you didn't want anyone message and I don't mind if you want it erased.

[Lord Zignus]

I disagree, yes we can compare History with Warhammer. Campaign and battles are obviously different but battles are always planned as well as armies composition. I disagree too on training infantry and cavalry, we cant compare both since they are completely different components, both in resources and uses. About History per se we could always discuss as academics do, Jörgen is doing a great work and I dont see the purpose of your post.

[MarcoRossolini]

I agree Zignus,
Warhammer (and a great deal of fantasy in general) is often based on history so we can draw a lot from it, I like to think of the Romans as a sort of version of empire in fact.
Thanks, very interesting and I'll certainly keep on reading and rereading this.

[Jörgen Andreasson]

if I can, most of armies in our History were infantry based simply because horses were really costly and weren't as reliable as men speaking of "Morale", plus it's easier to teach a man to fight shoulder to shoulder (Hoplites are a perfect example) than to ride a horse and fight from it.

Completely true, I also pointed this out as one of the problems for the Romans...

(PS: Romans didn't only win Pyrrhus and most of their foes only with sheer numbers but with the capacity of Roman generals and politicians to change something if it didn't work and learn from their foes / mistakes, it's not only the army fault if you loose, you have to question yourself "did I do all what I could and did I play well?"…Romans lost a lot…Samnites wars are a great example of that.

Yes, Romans lost allot and if you read the eraly Roman history they prevail mainly because they had a good political system and a huge population base and plenty of base raw material to replenish their forces over and over. Their army were not starting to appear that superior until the mid republican era when they introduced the Manipular system which they did not use against Pyrrhus. Pyrrhus didn't loose any battles against the Romans.

Sadly we can't really "compare" History with Warhammer, History were campaign and Warhammer are battles.

Sadly, I beg to differ, we can learn and use much from history. The rules of Warhammer are written with historical battles as the prime source of reference.

I think you forget one important thing in your "three points" "mobility" you "need" to be able to delay threats, answer to them, and force your opponent to do what you want him to do, in short, take the Initiative and make him play your game  (and hope dices remains stats eh).
 You speak of it but shall make it more important, Warhammer is about getting the good unit in the good place in the good time, and mobility is the key for that, keeping yours and denying opponents one.

Well, I am currently only writing about he BROAD aspect of army composition and how these component integrate into making each component stronger by using them as one cohesive army. I'm NOT talking about tactical battle manoeuvres... yet...

On most points I agree with you, combined forces is the way to go, putting all eggs in the same chest is taking a risk,  the risk that your opponent find the chest and crush your eggs while you only crush his eggs one by one.

Will red you with interest and curiosity.  I apologize if you didn't want anyone message and I don't mind if you want it erased.

It is probably good to keep this thread clean of answers for those that like to read this, please take any conversation and post them in the thread here... http://warhammer-empire.com/theforum/index.php?topic=40941.0

[Jörgen Andreasson]

Part 4 "The Cavalry"



Throughout history, from the charioteers of the ancient Egypt to the Polish Hussar, cavalry has been a very important part of military doctrine.

The role of cavalry on the battlefield has pretty much remained the same through time, which has been speed and manoeuvrability. The ability to apply the right amount of force in the right place when it is as most needed, this is one of the strength of cavalry.

In classical terms, if both sides had cavalry, the cavalry would fight each other first while the infantry advanced toward each other. Once one side had cleared the other side of their cavalry forces they would turn on the enemy flanks. Alexander the Great was famous for his usage of cavalry shock techniques, where he would lead the charge of his heavy elite cavalry into cracks (weak points) in the enemy army and break their morale, thereby routing the enemy.

The notion of cavalry performing frontal charges, as a general rule, against good order infantry is a rare usage of cavalry throughout history, usually with bad results. Cavalry could break up infantry forces if they charged demoralised and/or disorganized infantry or managed to flank an otherwise engaged enemy, or if the cavalry managed to charge light infantry or mainly missile armed infantry.



There are basically two types of cavalry, the heavy cavalry and the light cavalry. Heavy cavalry were those equipped with good armour and some protection for their horses and usually some form of long spears to reach their enemy in close combat. The other type of cavalry was mainly armed with some form of missile weapon and often some type of cavalry melee (spear or sword) weapon for close combat.

In history there has been some very great cavalry armies such as the Mongol horde or the Parthians.



One of the more famous cavalry victories were the one over a Roman army in 53BC at the battle of Carrhae. Here, an army of 9.000 horse archers and 1.000 cataphracts utterly defeated a Roman army of 35.000 legionary, 4.000 light infantry and 4.000 cavalry. The Parthians lived with their horses and could more or less be considered an elite cavalry force.

So, what is cavalry and how can it be used in Warhammer?

Well, I classify any unit type with a movement of 7+ and using the Swiftstride rule as cavalry. The main trait and purpose of cavalry is manoeuvrability. I also include flyers into this category since they are more or less treated as any other unit except the fact that they can fly over intervening models which makes them even more manoeuvrable than normal cavalry, but they are usually less well armoured and suited for combat other than very light opposition.

The biggest gripe that I have, when I watch battle reports, is that people tend to cram 3000p battles into 6 by 4 feet battle boards which basically make cavalry null and void. Cavalry need to pay a hefty price for their manoeuvrability which make them less cost effective in attrition combat.
If you just increase the playing field slightly you will suddenly find that cavalry (and many other units) actually is a very useful tool to wield. If you look at historical records you will also find that cavalry was quite useless in confined battlefields, if you bring large components of cavalry in such circumstances will make life very difficult for you.

Note: My recommendation is, if you want to see more varied armies, to increase the size of your battlefields slightly. We generally play on 4*4, 6*5 or 8*5. The smaller 4*4 are for anything below 1000p, 6*5 for 1000-2000p and 8*5 for 2000-3000. I would then add perhaps another feet for every 1000p added to the armies. It is entirely up to you and your playing community to decide, do you want infantry vs infantry battles only, or play with more varied and interesting armies? Not to mention, all the boring painting you have to do!!!

If you are the organizer of a tournament, surprise everyone with 7*5 size boards (which should be conveyed before the tournament so people can tailor their armies accordingly) and see what reaction you get. Armies will play vastly different in that setting.

Also, remember, the BRB never specify any sizes of your battlefield. It just assumes you are using any appropriate size for the armies you play with. Using 6*4 boards is just an old habit by many that is difficult to break. 

Remember, cavalry need support in the form of artillery and/or magic in the same way that infantry need it to be truly effective. I will go into more detail of how to deploy and use cavalry in further articles.

Cavalry as a Major component
In my opinion cavalry can be a great force, under the right circumstances, if they are supported correctly. I would strongly advice using either Magic or Artillery as a minor component to support a major cavalry component. You would at least need a support component of infantry to safeguard any artillery and/or to simply hold ground. Monsters can be useful as a support for cavalry because monsters can be great at holding large enemy units in combat until your cavalry can be deployed to the best effect.

The main drawback of cavalry is their lack for attrition warfare. Any battle that involve a major component of cavalry means that you will need to pressure the enemy hard so you don't get bogged down. In my opinion, it takes some skill and experience to fully play with an army who has it's major component made up of cavalry. I don't think, however, that it is less competitive if you know how to use it properly and you don't play on very small battlefields using large amounts of points.

Cavalry as a Minor component
Using your cavalry as a minor component is probably a quite common use of cavalry in many armies. Cavalry is very useful for supporting a major component of infantry, missile or artillery/magic. Their main goal are usually to safeguard the flanks, or even to attack on your flanks, and later support your central forces in combat.

I would not advice deploying your cavalry in the centre, they will not be able to capitalize on their main strength which is speed and manoeuvrability.

When you deploy cavalry in a minor component role you should, perhaps, restrict their unit sizes to small and medium (more on unit size later in this series). There are no point in taking large units unless you plan to actually smash them in the face of the opponent, this is a role not suited to cavalry when deployed as a minor component. I will talk more in-depth about component composition later on.

Cavalry as a support component
I assume this is the most regular use of cavalry in the game at the moment, given the dislike of cavalry in general. It is, however, still a very effective use of cavalry, where it's main job are to simply harass the enemy and/or take out weak units such as artillery or any redirector units.

As I said before, when you take anything as support, each unit most be tailored to a specific purpose and you need to pursue these tactics vigorously and thus you will make very good use of them.

Personally, I like, any cavalry who has the fast cavalry rule. These units are truly useful when employed correctly. I will dedicate a whole article on fast cavalry tactics further down the line.



Conclusion
Cavalry is a very useful supporting choice for your major component. It will take skill and experience to do well with a major component of cavalry, which also is very dependent on battlefield conditions such as enough space to manoeuvre in.

Don't expect cavalry to be as efficient as infantry in attrition warfare, they never were in history and neither is in this game. They are, however, a competitive choice in any army if used and employed skilfully.

In my opinion, it takes more skill and experience to use cavalry to it's full potential. This is, also, why cavalry get such negative flak in the community. That, and the change of the core rule system, which before made cavalry something they never were in history. With the continuing release of the new army books I think that we will see a general boost of cavalry stats or a slight drop in points cost.
I will make a better and more in-depth analyses of cavalry tactics versus infantry tactics later on in this article series.