Logistics, logistics, logistics

[Imperial Dave]

Mentioned in many other forum posts but not sure if ever given a thread of its own...? How do we view logistics in terms of historical armies and also in wargaming? Do we prefer to acknowledge the historical aspect of logistics and putting an army in the field and especially for a campaign but not necessarily want this to 'intrude' upon our wargaming?

To take the historical aspect first, are logistics a major or minor consideration in determining the outcome of a battle over say weapons and training or morale? Also do we (logically) acknowledge the increasingly important part that logistics have to play in campaigns? Is the best fed and supplied army always the best?

To take the wargaming aspect secondly, are logistics required or even wanted at the table? One off battles are too restricted in terms of a timeframe to be affected by logistics in the wargame....or not? Does anyone make modifications to the set up or gameplay to reflect good or bad logistics? Obviously campaign games normally do have an element of supply (even if its just missile replenishment) in their mechanism but not all.

Thoughts?

[Duncan Head]

Just reading Sawyer's Zhuge Liang, and the main impact of logistics seems to be in affecting whether there is a battle or not, or whether one army either breaks up or simply goes home because it can't be fed any more.

[Imperial Dave]

I remember reading John Peddie's 'Invasion' many years ago and was struck by the sheer scale of the logistics involved for the Claudian campaign in Britain

[Jim Webster]

Not just logistics in the campaign setting but in the wider economic sense

Just reading 'Legions in Crisis by Paul Elliot. Early on he goes through the enemies, (I paraphrase) Germans, metal poor not much armour, Goths, sort of metal poor, some armour but not that much. Sarmations, 'Cataphracts, horse and man completely covered in ring mail or scale armour'

Hang on a minute, where'd the chuffing iron come from and how come nobody else found it?

Jim

[Imperial Dave]

Hang on a minute, where'd the chuffing iron come from and how come nobody else found it?

Jim

Interesting though in all seriousness. Iron was a much sought after commodity so are we saying that those people that didnt have alot of it was because of lack of deposits or lack of knowledge on how to find it??? Or are the conclusions in the book you are reading a bit superficial and not taking into account other factors. ie were those tribes poor in metal because they werent set up to make such things as armour on a wide scale preferring to concentrate on other stuff and barter (or steal) for stuff like that?

[Andreas Johansson]

Acc'd to AEIR, most Sarmatian armour was of horn or other organic materials.

[Erpingham]

Iron supply is in the field of strategic logistics - availability of raw materials and manufacturing capacity.  The only way of building this into a game I can think of is through the army selection process - troops with plentiful iron would either be restricted or greatly more expensive than there equivalents on the iron-rich side.  So, the German might be restricted to 5% of his force with iron armour against the Romans up to 100%.  Or an unarmoured German or Roman might cost 1pt, an armoured Roman 2pts and an armoured German 10pts.

Then you have more operational logistics, like keeping the army in supply while in enemy territory.  Operational logistics can have clear battlefield impacts - an army short of supplies may be forced to fight a battle that it would otherwise have avoided.  Battles can take place around supply activities e.g. The Battle of the Herrings and Caesar I'm sure ends up in an action against the British in connection with sending his legions out foraging.

Then there are battlefield logistics, which have a direct effect but are usually abstracted out e.g. arrow supplies, spare horses, hunger and thirst.

[Jim Webster]

Hang on a minute, where'd the chuffing iron come from and how come nobody else found it?

Jim

Interesting though in all seriousness. Iron was a much sought after commodity so are we saying that those people that didnt have alot of it was because of lack of deposits or lack of knowledge on how to find it??? Or are the conclusions in the book you are reading a bit superficial and not taking into account other factors. ie were those tribes poor in metal because they werent set up to make such things as armour on a wide scale preferring to concentrate on other stuff and barter (or steal) for stuff like that?

To be fair to the book I've paraphrased a section which was meant to be a brief summary of something peripheral to the book's main thrust. So it isn't fair to judge the book on this

I agree with Andreas, it was traditionally assumed by wargamers that Sarmations used horn and leather. Which is actually more believable to be honest

Also with regard to strategic logistics, WRG points values used to make armoured 'barbarians' far more expensive than armoured regulars to try and cover this. This meant that Sassanid armies were small and somewhat select 

This all changed with the last great change in points values which brought in the new system which was geared more to table top effectiveness


Jim

[Erpingham]

Also with regard to strategic logistics, WRG points values used to make armoured 'barbarians' far more expensive than armoured regulars to try and cover this. This meant that Sassanid armies were small and somewhat select 

This all changed with the last great change in points values which brought in the new system which was geared more to table top effectiveness

An interesting debate in terms of points systems, which might fit with the discussions on gaming and simulation.   The % model can get round this but it does have issues around the scale of the game.  If we are representing 20,000 Germans, 5% might be right.  But what if the army scales up to only 5,000?  It could be the vanguard of the 20,000 and those 1,000 armoured men might be concentrated in it, so should we allow 20%?

[Patrick Waterson]

And would those armoured men anyway largely be chieftains and select bodyguards if chieftains?  One remembers that at Argentoratum (AD 357) Chnodomar led a contingent of Alemannii nobility and their retinues and bodyguards against Julian's line, where the German elite came to grief via the swords of the Primani.

This might have been in effect the '5%' concentrated in a single unit, particularly as many if not all of the nobles had been mounted at the outset of the action.

On the broader logistical front, I recall an Ancmed discussion about Carthaginian supply arrangements in Italy.  To cut a long story short, it looks as if Hannibal's standard practice when on the move was to sweep the locality for supplies about once a week for a week's supplies, which seems to have been his army transport's carrying capacity, and when over-wintering in an area to sweep a rather larger locality and stock a nearby and convenient town with up to six months' supplies, then use it as a depot.  He even had a principal supply officer whose job was to keep the foodstuffs coming in and being issued.

Caesar relied upon his Gallic allies for corn, and only went foraging himself when he lacked allies in close proximity.  In Greece, he tried to persuade or imitate towns to supply him; in Spain he seems to have alternated foraging, reliance on friendly communities and receiving convoys by road and river.

[Justin Swanton]

Taking Anthony's point that there are three zoom levels in war: strategic level, operational level and battlefield level, my take is that for a wargame that focusses on a battle the strategic level logistics is decided by the army lists and points system, as it is way too complex and long to simulate unless you are playing Warcraft.

On the battlefield level logistics is also abstracted out. Hungry armies can suffer 'fatigue' negative modifiers in combat, or perhaps start out with a lower quality combat/morale rating.

It is on the operational level that one has the chance to actually see logistics at work. Operational warfare - the pre-battle marching and countermarching with the aim of picking up allies, supplies, and finding a good battlefield or laying an ambush - is to my knowledge completely ignored as a necessary preparation for the battle itself, and yet it is half the battle. To play an operational game followed by a battle once the two armies meet up might double playing time, sure, but it would give a totally different gaming experience.

A pre-battle operational game can be fairly abstract, simple and quick. It might even decide the battle before it is fought, in the way Caesar defeated the Pompeians in his Ilerda campaign.

[Erpingham]

Perhaps time to mention the role of water transport in pre-industrial logistics.  In a world of poor roads, supplying an army with an accompanying fleet was always a popular option.  Fleet logistics themselves were significant, especially for galley fleets. Galleys were thirsty and hungry and needed to resupply regularly.  Rivers, lake and lagoon transport was also very important in many areas and could provide the background to all sorts of skirmishes (e.g. Flanders, the Baltic coast, the Venetian Lagoon).

[Jim Webster]

Perhaps time to mention the role of water transport in pre-industrial logistics.  In a world of poor roads, supplying an army with an accompanying fleet was always a popular option.  Fleet logistics themselves were significant, especially for galley fleets. Galleys were thirsty and hungry and needed to resupply regularly.  Rivers, lake and lagoon transport was also very important in many areas and could provide the background to all sorts of skirmishes (e.g. Flanders, the Baltic coast, the Venetian Lagoon).

Indeed hence a Rhine and Danube frontier, huge supply bases in South Shields etc
Indeed it is difficult to find a city in the ancient world that is not on a coast or a navigable river
Jim

[Andreas Johansson]

And would those armoured men anyway largely be chieftains and select bodyguards if chieftains?  One remembers that at Argentoratum (AD 357) Chnodomar led a contingent of Alemannii nobility and their retinues and bodyguards against Julian's line, where the German elite came to grief via the swords of the Primani.

This might have been in effect the '5%' concentrated in a single unit, particularly as many if not all of the nobles had been mounted at the outset of the action.

If early Germanic armies (and those of sundry other barbarians) consisted of a core of chieftain's retinues of "professional" warriors bulked out by a more-or-less general levy of freemen, one might expect that the proportion of armour would be in rough inverse proportion to army size. A raiding force of 200 may be a retinue all in armour, while an army of 20k would be very largely of less well-equipped and less skilled fighters.

[Jim Webster]

Effectively then the army list mechanism of allowing x men in armour (no matter how large the army) is  a reasonable way of showing this (provided we get x right)

Jim