Campaign Attrition Rules and Research

[Whirlwind]

Does anyone know of any real-life research into pre-C20 campaign attrition rates?  And which campaign rules (including boardgame rules) do you think handle non-comat attrition the best?

[Not Connard Sage]

This is a bit of a non-answer, but Quarrie’s ‘Napoleon’s Campaigns in Miniature’ has much minutiae  including attrition.

Obvious contrarian and passive aggressive old prat, who is taken far too seriously by some and not seriously enough by others.

[Lagartija Mike]

Oddly, I was just reading a monograph by Wayne Farris addressing attrition in the forces during the Late Heian in Japan (Sacred Papers). For the sake of argument a small provincial force of about 500 mounted samurai and elite retainers and perhaps 1200 chugen (poor retainers and opportunistic followers) could expect to shrink (under non-optimal conditions) about 0.3%\8% for every half-month outside their home province. This is not inclusive of combat casualties.

For a ruleset that addresses various forms and intensities of attrition see the forthcoming BELLA HORRIDA BELLA.

[MartinR]

I always thought the mechanisms used in AHGCs War and Peace worked well, both for modelling strategic consumption, attrition from disease and straggling.

Attrition rates increase exponentially with force concentration though, it isn’t a simple linear relationship. Excessive force concentration also reduces mobility. Both of which make Benedeks manoeuvres in 1866 even more incomprehensible…

"Mistakes in the initial deployment cannot be rectified" - Helmuth von Moltke

[Whirlwind]

Thanks for the replies.

Martin, what are the key features of the system in War and Peace? I don’t own that game.

[Phil Dutré]

MartinR wrote:

Attrition rates increase exponentially with force concentration though, it isn’t a simple linear relationship. Excessive force concentration also reduces mobility. Both of which make Benedeks manoeuvres in 1866 even more incomprehensible…

An eye-opener for me was reading about the concentration of units when assembling the Grande Armée before crossing the Niemen in 1812. The density of soldiers in a very wide area was huge, and combined with the “living of the land” doctrine, this meant attrition started right then and there.

[MartinR]

Whirlwind wrote:

Thanks for the replies. Martin, what are the key features of the system in War and Peace? I don’t own that game.

It is quite a high level game, manouvre units are Corps, individual strength points are divisions (or cavalry Corps). The core of it is the attrition table, essentially just a dice roll on a able which determines losses per turn, but these go up exponentially with force strength. Forces of 25,00 or less are largely immune to losses, but stick 200,000 men in a hex (such as you might at e.g. Leipzig) and they die like flies.

Attrition is modified by whether you force march or not, supply state, season, theatre etc. Supply is handled very elegantly, you don’t need to operate with formal supply lines, but there are attrition penalties if you are out of supply, so it helps if you are. Supply lines are maintained by having a chain if strength points (divisions) one move apart, so as armies advance they drop SP off and of course their strength erodes. This is a good use for your Neapolitans:)

Really you need to try and have a look at a copy of the attrition table, maybe via Board Game Geek as W&P is long oop? Here is the relevant link, looks like there is a VASSAL module for it which might help.

https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/626/war-and-peace

Cheers

Martin

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

"Mistakes in the initial deployment cannot be rectified" - Helmuth von Moltke

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