Sunday 20 January 2019

Role of Corps Commander


Second French Army with four corps


Current Role
Carry out the objective and role ordered by the army commander

Issue orders to each of the brigades in his corps.

To do so they must remain within 8” of him


Command Points (CP)
At the start of his turn he receives 1CP for each Formed brigade under his command.
He also receives 1CP if he if Poor, 2CP if Average and 3CP if Gifted
He gets no CP for Unformed, Shaken or Routed brigades

He can move a maximum of 16”, and must use 1CP to do so

Each CP allows him to issue one order to a brigade
These include move, change formation, skirmish, volley fire or hand to hand combat

He can use 2CP to issue orders to a brigade
Half move and change formation
Half move to limber and move, or move and unlimber

Problem
He must wait for orders from the army commander to change from Move to Engage, or Engage to Attack.   This greatly restricts how he can fight his battle.   For example a brigade on engage cannot move forward to hand to hand combat.


New Role
He will be allowed to change his corps role from Move to Engage, Engage to Combat and vice versa.

He will not be allowed to order his corps to Retreat or to Move or Engage from Hold

This will allow him to increase, or decrease, the tempo of his battle. 

But the army commander will still control the increase from a defensive Hold to an aggressive Engage.   He will also have to issue orders for a corps to Retreat.





8 comments:

  1. Surely a corps commander would work with his direct subordinates - the division commanders rather than bypass them and go direct to the brigades?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thistlebarrow,

    A very interesting blog entry. I have spent some time comparing your rules with the C&C rules in my PNW rules ... and yours are a lot more detailed (and probably much more realistic) than my rather simplistic ones.

    All the best,

    Bob

    ReplyDelete
  3. Hi Mike

    Thanks for your comments

    There are only two command levels in my rules, that is Army Commander and Corps Commander. There is no command at division level because I do not have divisions in my order of battle.

    The rules were designed to allow multi corps battles of up to four corps per side with only 40 28mm figures per corps. Each corps commander has 6 brigades to control, which creates priority problems. If there were three commanders per corps each would only command two brigades, so there would be no such command problem.

    regards

    Paul

    ReplyDelete
  4. Hi Bob

    Thanks for your comment

    I have not received you rules yet, so I have not had a chance to read them. But I suspect that the main difference is that yours are written as a commercial set, and must be acceptable to a wide range of wargamers with differing opinions of what should happen. Mine were written to suit my own personal prejudices and aspirations. I could make them as complicated or simple as I required, and can change them at will to adjust to changing circumstances.

    My rules suit us very well, but have a much more limited appeal. Yours have a much wider appeal and would appear to be very successful.

    Personally I have never worried too much how realistic a set of rules may be, providing that I can have an enjoyable game with them. And I have always felt that simple is best.

    best regards

    Paul

    ReplyDelete
  5. "because I do not have divisions in my order of battle."

    That seems rather artificial. The division was an important command level in the Napoleonic period. Just read any description of a historical Napoleonic battle and the orders of battle. A corps of only 6 brigades doesn't make much sense.

    Perhaps you could regard your "brigades" as divisions. That way you would preserve the historical command structure.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Hi Mike

    I do not try to justify my orders of battle on historical grounds. They form part of a long running fictional 1813 campaign which is designed to produce battles to wargame. If youn would like to know more about the campaign you will find a blog here http://1813pbemcampaigndiary.blogspot.com.es/

    I agree that they could be called divisions rather than brigades. It would not make any difference to the rules or the wargames. However an eight figure division might offend even more than an eight figure brigade.

    regards

    Paul

    ReplyDelete
  7. "However an eight figure division might offend even more than an eight figure brigade."

    Why?

    ReplyDelete
  8. Mike

    The present system and order of battle has suited me well for many years. The current subject is dealing with the problem of command and control. What I call the eight elements of each corps does not make any difference to that problem.

    I don't see much value in any more discussion about whether each element is called a brigade or a division.

    regards

    Paul

    ReplyDelete

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