Logistics and Flower of Battle

[toli]

A thought and question.  

The blub in the back of TROS says that the Flower of Battle will have mass combat rules.  Will these rules include something about the logistics of running and army?  I'd quite like to see something like this.  Historically many (if not most) campaigns were controlled by logistical considerations.  I think it would add an interesting angle ot any large scale campaign.

Just a thought.

[Jake Norwood]

It's a great idea, and a valid point. If we can fit it in, it'll be there. (It would be crucial to running a military campain in TROS).

Jake, who's spending all of his time of OBAM right now, but who *will* be working on the Flower afterwards. Really.

[toli]

I've got some information on daily food and water requirements for horses and men if you like.  Also, things like movement rates, food value of an oxen etc.  I do not have the references anymore, but I could send you the info.

NT

[Jake Norwood]

I've got some information on daily food and water requirements for horses and men if you like.  Also, things like movement rates, food value of an oxen etc.  I do not have the references anymore, but I could send you the info.

NT

I would *love* that info, but I would need references.

Jake

[toli]

I'll pass along the info and see if I can remember where I got it.  A lot of it was from a book about Alexander the Great, strangely enough.   It was a very interesting book that examined the strategy of his campaigns from the point of view of logistics.   It wasn't specifically medieval, obviously, but probably close.  Some of the other information comes from US Army data from WW1 on fodder etc for horses and caloric requirements for men.  

When you begin to think about how much crap one had to supply for even a small army it becomes staggaring...NT

[Brian Leybourne]

When you begin to think about how much crap one had to supply for even a small army it becomes staggaring...NT

Oh, I don't know. I'm quite sure most armies provide their own crap :-)

Brian

[toli]

Actually I read an article one by Bernard Bachrach  (I think) in which he calculated the amount of urine and horse dung that would have been produced in a camp.  Scary.  No wonder they were always dying of disease..NT

[Bankuei]

I guess the phrase, "Blood makes the grass grow" was only partially correct. :)

Chris

[toli]

Jake & others,

Here is that information I told you about.  I've collected over the years so I'm not totally sure from where the information came.  I've included reference where I could remember them.


(1) From:  The Reader's Companion to Military History.  Robert Couley & Geoffory Parker eds, HKoughton Mifflin CO. NYC 1996.

Daily food ration of Roman soldier 1.5 - 2.0 lbs bread or hard tack + meat & oil (3lbs total)

17th Centry soldier's rations 1.5 - 2.0 lbs bread, 0.5 lbs meat, 1pt wine, 1 pot(?) beer

(2) From Keegan J (1993) A history of warfare.  Alfred A Knopf NYC.

Max soldiers normal load 70lbs.

3lbs food per day = minimum.  Most foot soldiers could carry equipment plus 10 - 11 days food.

20 miles/day best average movement rate for trained infantry (like Romans)

Alexander the Great stockpiled 52,000 tons of food for 87k foot, 18k horse and 52k followers…for 4 months….

(3) Alexander the Great and the Logistics of the Macedonian Army by Donald EnglesUniversity of California Press; ISBN: 0520042727; (February 1981).  

I think most of the following came from this source which relied on a number of other sources including US army manuals from WW1.  I just ordered this off of Amazon.com.  They have some used copies for ~$5.00.  

Food Requirements:

Person 3-5 lbs of food per day…3lbs grain + other (meat, oil etc)
Horse 22lbs of feed.  11 lbs grain, 11 lbs fodder (hay)
Mule 18 lbs of feed.  5 lbs grain, 13 lbs fodder
Oxen 44 lbs feed all foder
Camel 35 lbs feed.  10 lb grain, 25 lbs straw

Water requirements

Person 2L or 5 lbs
Horse 8 gal or 80 lb
Mule ?
Oxen 8 gal or 80 lb
Camel ?

Water requirements double in the desert or hot weather.

Food Value

Ox 600-1600 lbs live yields 800 lbs food
Sheep 60-100 lbs yields 70lbs
Pig 100-250 live yields 172 lbs


Transport & travel.

Pack horse total load 220 lbs = pack saddle 48 lbs + 152 lbs cargo travel speed 3-3.5 mph
Mule same
Bullock (oxen) =harness & pack 60-60 lbs + 100-170 load travel speed max 2 mph
Camel harness and pack 114 lbs, load 300-480, speed 3 mph

2 wheeled cart with horses 1100lbs 30 km/day
2wheeled cart with oxen 1100lbs 15 km/day
4wheeled wagon & horses 1430 lbs 30km/day
4wheeled wagon & oxen 1430 lbs 15 km/day

horses can travel 30-40 km per day
cavalry 'ready to fight' 30km
cavalry top speed 50km

oxen and horses must rest one day a week.  Oxen require good roads.

(4) The following was from a book on life in the 13th and 14th century.  I do not remember the name or author but some may find the information interesting.

Diet of

Medieval man had a daily caloric intake of ~5000 Calories.

Aristocrat: 2-3lbs wheat breat, 2-3lbs meat or fish + 1 gallon of beer
Prosperous peasant: 2-3lbs bread, 8oz meat, fish or cheese, 2-3pints ale
Poor peasant: 2-3lbs bread, plus some butter lard and beans

(5) The following is from a book on warfare in the classical age and a second on greek and roman warfare.  Again I do not remember the titles.

Spartan hoplite: 11 gallons of barley groats for 20 days (includes servant)
Roman infantry: 35L corn (wheat) per month
Roman infantry: 3lbs bread, 1lb meat, 1L wine 0.1pt oil/day
Roman cavalry: 100L wheat, 350L barley per month
Allied infantry: 35L corn per month
Allied Cavalry: 70L wheat, 250L barley per month

(6) Other interesting bits

Weigh of armor:

Normal chainmail 20-30lbs
Mail shirt worn under 15th century armor 12-14lbs
Gothic Plate Armor (1480) 56lbs + mail shirt
Italian Plate armor (1480) 57 lbs + mail shirt
Maximillian Plate (1500+) 65lbs + arming doublet
German Tilting armor 74lbs
Tilting armor 90lbs
Plate Barding (gothic) 72lbs


Bye..NT

[Jake Norwood]

Thanks! That's cool stuff.

Jake

[Lyrax]

Spartan hoplite: 11 gallons of barley groats for 20 days (includes servant)

Includes Servant...  Yum!

[Mike Holmes]

These details are interesting. But I'd be careful how they were used in play. No single person in an army is solely responsible for seeing that the army is supplied. Nor should a player be saddled with the logistics in play.

What I'd do, is to have regular rolls of some skill to figure this stuff out. That is, depending on the size of the unit, you should roll, daily, weekly, monthly, whatever, to see what the supply situation is like. The person makng the roll should be the "quartermaster" assigned to it. As opposed to the leader, who is never the same person, unless the unit is very small. Instead the leader should make a leadership roll and roll his successes into the Quartermaster's. Who may then delegate further if the army is large enough and you want to play it out. TN modifiers for being far afield, or in a well supplied area, freindly territory, or hostile, etc. Those are the pertinent facts.

Then, look at the successes produced. For every success, reduce the number of "logistics problems" that occur that period by one from, oh, say, 6 (or perhaps the result of an opposing commander's supply interdiction roll?). This seems harsh, but realistically, logistics problems occur constantly in armies. Just a fact of life. And a fun one in play.

Anyhow, the GM should look at the "problems" left, and select one or more ideas that cover the remaining amount, using the sort of information above. For example, with three remaining problems this week, the GM can determine that one of them is a rash going around due to lack of shade and humidity, and the other two represent the fact that the previous plan for human waste disposal (using a nearby river), has been nixed by a local lord who gets his fish from that river.

Now the players may get the fun tasks of finding a cure for the rash, or talking to the lord, or figuring out an alternate waste disposal solution, etc. All sorts of potential advanture hooks that you've never seen before. The idea is to look at the potentially "fun" parts of playing logistics, as opposed to just the "lifelike" parts.

Anyhow, all else that does not become a "problem" is being handled in an effective manner by somebody "offscreen", thus relieving anybody from the dread dull duty of recording number of biscuits being eaten each day.

Does this methodology make sense with everyone? Otherwise I see logistics getting ignored a lot.

Mike

[toli]

It all really comes down to how you want to play and what you like to include.  If you want to make logistics an integral part of a military campaign...good.  If not...good.   However, the ability to starve out a garrison or army by cutting their supplies is (to me) in and of itself and interesting.  It adds more than just 'lets have a battle' to the campaign.  An inferior force could (and historically have) prevent an invader from gaining a foothold without actually engaging the invader in a major battle.

I agree that it would be worth while to have a more abstract way of dealing with the logistics.  For example, one would not want to have to calculate the availability of carts in an area.  But some "State of land" value might be useful for indicating how much food
is available in an area...that type of thing....I don't think it would be too hard to include both an abstract system and a more explicit one.

In general, I'm for several levels of complexity in a game system.  I like to have a choice between  (1) ignoring a rule (who needs food anyway), (2) dealing with it in some abstract way (I have a 50% of successfully supplying my army,  and (3) calculating it more specifically if I feel like it (3lbs food per man...that means my garrison can hold out 10 weeks before supplies become a problem....).

NT

[contracycle]

I'd reccomend: From Sumer to Rome
Richard A. Gabriel, Karen S. Metz (Contributor)

This discusses, famously, the capacity of ox-drawn wagons to feed selves and troops etc over distance.

[Mike Holmes]

It all really comes down to how you want to play and what you like to include.  If you want to make logistics an integral part of a military campaign...good.  If not...good.   However, the ability to starve out a garrison or army by cutting their supplies is (to me) in and of itself and interesting.  It adds more than just 'lets have a battle' to the campaign.  An inferior force could (and historically have) prevent an invader from gaining a foothold without actually engaging the invader in a major battle.

I agree, this is great stuff. But it still makes sense, IMO, to handle it abstractly. That is, if I want to starve the enemies, that just means that they have increasing penalties to their logistics roll each week. Or as a leader of the siege, I can roll a check on my abilities to see if I can make their situation worse. This is a great way to protagonize the leader in describing the action, and realistically displays the leader's effect on the situation.

My biggest point is, I guess, that there is no way of making a system that can realistically allow for all of the problems that an army can have, or details all the things that need detailing (unless one wanted to spend as much or more time than the campaign game time in real time detailing it). As you have to abstract anyhow, my point is my not do it from the top down view. Which is the players anyhow.

This allows social stuff to com into play that people don't calculate when playing wargames. For example, if a leader is too harsh with his subordinates, he might engender a fear of reprisal, at which point subordinates might decide not to report problems, or to under-report them. Thus exacerbating them, potentially.

Anyhow, as I've said, you can see how, realistically, this gets to be ridiculously complicated. Best to abstract from the character's view rather than an omniscient view like you get in some wargames. Interesting how many wargames of late are moving to a more "first person" sort of view. Makes for a much better simulation from the player's POV.

Mike