Sunday 12 September 2021

Review of Lubeck Campaign Phase

Campaign Phases

 

This is our current campaign map of Europe.  

Each square is a military district, the area of a campaign phase

Each red square is a military region.

Each star shows the location of a campaign phase

The colour of the star indicates who won.

There are 79 stars

This map records the history of the campaign since it started in April 2009

Battles fought during Lubeck campaign phase

Lubeck was the 36th campaign phase in the sixth revision of the campaign.

This was the last time the campaign was redesigned in June 2020.

It was also the 15th phase fought in northern Germany since 2009

It was the sixth time that Napoleon defeated Blucher

However it is a reminder that Blucher beat Napoleon seven times

So it has not all be entirely one sided.

 

Napoleon won five of the six battles fought in this current phase

This would appear to indicate that the campaign was very one sided

However many of those wargames were very close, and either side could have won

It is also significant that the only battle the Prussians won was against the Imperial Garde.

 

There have been 403 battles fought since 2009.

At one time I did keep track of how many were won by each side in each campaign area

That has long since become too complicated, and I now just record who won each campaign.

But I do recall that when I did keep those results both sides were more or less equal

And the fact that the Prussians won more campaign phases indicates that they also won more battles

 

At the end of each campaign phase I update the campaign records

And this helps me to review the progress of the whole campaign

This process has resulted in many changes to the campaign over the years

Initial deployment for Lubeck campaign phase

This map shows the campaign area

Each square is a 2x2 foot scenic square on the wargames table

Nine of them (3x3) are a wargames table, and one days march in the campaign

You will note that the map is four tables wide and three tables deep

 

The map shows the initial deployment of each corps and depot

You will see that each side has three armies each of two corps

Each army is deployed in an area covered by a wargames table

 

This map and deployment results in three separate army engagements

Top, centre and bottom.   Each with two corps per side

 

This major change in the organisation of the campaign armies has worked well

It allows for one battle to be fought each campaign day

For example 2nd French and 1st Prussian armies (top of map)

They fight on day one, regroup on day two and resupply on day three

On day two the centre army fights and on day three the bottom one.

On day four 2nd French and 1st Prussian armies can fight again.


The main question raised by this campaign phase is relative strengths of corps

The uneven result of five French wins to one Prussian one has raised this question

On the surface it would appear that the French are too strong

However earlier comparison of total battles throughout the campaign do not support this


It is all too easy to jump to conclusions and upset the balance

However it has given me something to work on for future campaigns


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