Was there a single military tactic in history more wasteful and

those tactics were the best given the weapons at the time. mass volley fire.

>>1927438
Not massing your infantry to compensate for wildly inaccurate weapons and expending ammunition for little/no effect is wasteful too.

>>1927438
Zhukov's unarmed human waves come to mind

>>1927438
t. watched patriot now thinks he is expert on musket warfare

>>1927451
>wildly inaccurate weapons

This is a Hollywood meme. Muskets aren't that inaccurate, they are not rifles for sure but they are accurate enough to shoot a man at 200 yards consistently. The reason why they were massed was because it takes a lot of time to reload them and are vulnerable during that time, not because they were inaccurate.

>>1927464
>The reason why they were massed was because it takes a lot of time to reload them and are vulnerable during that time, not because they were inaccurate.

Also cavalry

>>1927438
USSR in WW2

>>1927438
If you are so clever then how would infantry of the era in open order be able to adequately defend against cavalry?

>>1927438
>stupid

No widely used military tactic was stupid, those who used stupid ones got crushed. They only became stupid and wastefull when becoming obsolete.

>>1927464
>200 yards

It's more like 50 pre-industrial replication.

>A soldier’s musket, if not exceedingly ill-bored as many are, will strike the figure of a man at 80 yards; it may even at a hundred, but a soldier must be very unfortunate indeed who shall be wounded by a common musket at 150 yards, provided his antagonist aims at him, and as to firing at a man at 200 yards with a common musket, you may as well fire at the moon and have the same hope of hitting your oject. I do maintain and will prove that no man was ever killed at 200 yards, by a common musket, by the person who aimed at him. - Col. George Hanger, 4th Baron Coleraine, 1814

>>1927487
Not OP, but the only thing I can think of is by using cavalry of their own. Not sure if the benefits of being in open order would be enough to outweigh the risks of your cavalry screen failing though.

>>1927499
There are also a lot of records where people say a man an unarmoured person can be killed at 200 yards and an ill armoured one at 100. People who shoot with blackpowder weapons today report that they have 100% accuracy at 100 yards.

>>1927510

black powder weapon is a pretty broad term spanning hundreds of years - it could be a matchlock or a Sharps rifle

>>1927438
There were multiple reasons why line infantry tactics made a lot of sense.

1. Muskets were relatively inaccurate and you could achieve greater effectiveness by lining up lots of men to fire at the same target.

2. Cavalry was still a relevant threat and sticking together allowed people to defend more easily against cavalry attacks.

3. Muskets had to be reloaded while standing upright so you couldn't really operate them like modern firearms, where you can lay low while reloading. Sticking together in multiple lines of fire-ready men provided a better defence than trying to run around on your own.

4. The armies of the day were mercenary armies with bad morale, that recruited from the dregs of society. Having them stick together made them easier to manage and actually hold the line due to peer pressure.

These reasons combined made line infantry a very reasonable tactic.

>>1927438
Infantry charges were still regularly used and not getting fucked by cavalry.

>>1927510

That it can be lethal at 200 yards says nothing about its accuracy.

>Modern tests under laboratory conditions on actual eighteenth-century muskets have shown 60 percent hits on target at 75 yards, 50 percent hits on target at 100 yards. - Bert S. Hall 'Weapons and Warfare in Renaissance Europe'

Modern powder is also considerably better quality.

>The hydroscopic nature of gunpowder was obviously a major contributory factor, and flint wear also played a part, with each flint being good for about sixty firings. As many as one in four discharge attempts were unsuccessful. - Colonel Arcadi Gluckman, 'United States Muskets, Rifles and Carbines'

>>1927526
>The armies of the day were mercenary armies with bad morale, that recruited from the dregs of society. Having them stick together made them easier to manage and actually hold the line due to peer pressure.

That's really a thing before and during 30-years war. 18th century has seen rise of standing armies in Swedish and Prussian model. Even as far back as in 16th century there were disciplined soldiers such as tercios.

>>1927525
The examples were mainly flintlock muskets. Arquebus were much more inaccurate due shorter and wider barrels.

>>1927451

They weren't innacurate. But even if they were and the bullet goes astray, it'd surely still hit someone in that tightly packed mass of cucks standing in the open. It's the perfect target.

I would hit them in bushy or rocky terrain with dispersed soldiers covering behind trees or rocks and shooting at them from multiple flanks. No intention of gaining the field, but to decimate them.

I would also love to use set up tactics on them, like oiling the field where the packed mass of cucks is meant to walk upon, then light it up on fire and watch them burn while hitting at them with dispersed troops from all flanks, snipers and hidden catapults launching massive grenades at those tight pussy ranks. It'd be like one big grenade hit = 50 cucks rekt. Would be awesome.

I wonder if anyone ever did something like this.

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>>1928169
Sure, if they were operating own, which they almost never did.

In real life their skirmishers (who, like you, would be dressed in earthy colors and moving stealthily) would spot you beforehand, report to those tightly packed cuck's camp, and their cavalry would then run you and your spread out riflemen down, since you can't group well enough to repel cavalry and your rate of fire wouldn't be enough to stop them.

Or, alternately, they walk around your carefully set up ambush and attack whatever encampment/town they were en route to, because irregulars/skirmishers can't hold ground for shit.

>>1928169
You have a 12 year old child's understanding of how battles in the post bayonet pre rifling era were fought

>>1928169
Fancy traps and irregular ambushes = getting rekt by cavalry and having your forces bypassed as laughable nuciances

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>>1928169
Another thing not mentioned is that elaborately distributed large-scale ambushes are even less flexible than packed infantry.

In a line formation, you'd have a standard bearer holding up your unit's flag, an officer and a drummer/fifer to coordinate your troops. If you need order sent to that formation, a rider can easily find that standard and expect to find an officer there, who can give orders that are communicated by the unit musician.

So let's say your ambush is going well, you've got these cucks pinned down. But an outlying town is now under attack, or you're being flanked. How will the messenger find you, among your spread-out infantry formation? You clearly don't have your standard hoisted if you don't want to give these cucks an obvious target to march towards. So, among all these camouflaged riflemen, how is the messenger going to find you? Even when he finds you, how are you going to communicate new orders to your spread-out riflemen over the sound of battle, on the other side of the woods? If a flank of your ambush is being overrun, there's a possibility you won't find out until the messenger runs all the way through the woods to where he thinks you are.

Line formations aren't just about efficiency, it was also about command and control. A spread-out, camouflages ambush is particularly vulnerable to unexpected changes, because you may not be able to communicate or coordinate an effective response to the entire formation.

>>1928221

So it all boils down to cucking their scouts and there you have the decissive advantage.

>>1928273

Like I said, I wouldn't have the intention of holding/gaining any ground whatsoever but to rekt the enemy. Thus there's no need to communicate anything to any particular detachment of soldiers once they understand this and are capable of acting of their own initiative as per requested in the flow of events. I.e if one specific flank is being attacked by an important fraction of the cuck army, they don't HAVE to hold the ground but simply move back or to a different position. Also, the rest of the troops would see that the cucks are weakening one of their flanks in a desperate attempt to outnumber and engage in cuck warfare one of our flanks,so they too can read the situation and act accordingly of their own initiative if an advantageous occasion is blatantly present.

>>1927476
They won didn't they?

>>1928477
>>1928169
>>1928169
And then that tightly packed mass of men will run at you screaming for blood.

You, being armed with fucking muskets, get two additional shots at them.. if they're marching and not charging. They will charge skirmishers. Most of your men would start running immediately.

They then hit your retarded ass skirmish line and EVERYONE who didn't flee either dies in the volley they give you at close range, or dies when several men with bayonets catch them.

>>1928477
>Like I said, I wouldn't have the intention of holding/gaining any ground whatsoever but to rekt the enemy.
That isn't how war works you stupid fucking faggot.

>>1928169
>>1928477
Excuse me if I'm wrong, but wouldn't something like this get raped by dragoons?

>>1928477
You're assuming superiority of initiative among your own troops, which is facile. Always assume parity of troops if you want to talk about tactics in the bayonet/scum era

>>1928477
>Like I said, I wouldn't have the intention of holding/gaining any ground whatsoever but to rekt the enemy
If you're not holding ground, and you're not going out to meet the enemy, couldn't they just bypass you?

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>>1927438
it was needed at the time to be sure men wouldn't flee at the first shots, to protect themselves from cavalry attacks and to be better coordenated with the rest of the army in terms of positioning

now if you want stupidy, you can go back to WWI where people stood in pools mud, feces, blood, puke and gore day and night as sitting ducks for artillery attacks... you'll die just like some sorry bloke in a line but without ever seeing the face of the one who killed you and without any honor or glory if those even exist in war.

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>>1928477
>So it all boils down to cucking their scouts and there you have the decissive advantage.
I assume you must be fighting an enemy commander with down's syndrome if the disappearance of their scouts doesn't arouse any sort of suspicion.

>Thus there's no need to communicate anything to any particular detachment of soldiers once they understand this and are capable of acting of their own initiative as per requested in the flow of events.
>I.e if one specific flank is being attacked by an important fraction of the cuck army, they don't HAVE to hold the ground but simply move back or to a different position.
In real life, when divisions on the flanks retreat without command knowing, disaster tends to ensue. Say the two flanks move back to fallback positions, and it's just you. But let's freeze frame for a second and move onto the next little piece of stupidity you said.

>Also, the rest of the troops would see that the cucks are weakening one of their flanks
Do you have any idea how warfare in the age of black powder worked? Neither you or they WOULDN'T be able to see it. Firstly, you're all blending in with the trees for your fancy ambush, so you're not easy to spot to begin with if you don't have a standard flying. Secondly, your whole field of fire is filled with smoke. This is one of the advantages of firing in volleys; smoke dissipates around the same time, so your forces have a clear line of sight on their next volley. If your men are firing at will from the treeline, all you and they are going to see is one big cloud of smoke.

So, you in command at the center are shooting at these guys. You hear shouting and running, but you can't see through the clouds of smoke while everyone is busy shooting. When the smoke clears, it's just you and the center, while your flanks have moved to fallback positions. They couldn't contact you because they couldn't even find you in the cloud of smoke and trees. Now you're dead. Good job.

>>1928477
Is this guy's use of cucks really bothering anybody else?

>>1928549
Yes but this is /pol/ lite, what were you expecting.

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>>1928169
>I wonder if anyone ever did something like this.

yes, read up on the Indian Wars in Eastern North America. it worked in terms of winning some pretty major victories, but was strategically terrible because holding ground is required to defend stuff.

I love how these threads always start with the assumption that the leaders of yore didn't know what they were doing and some faggot on a Cambodian throat yodeling bulletin-board does.

>>1928273
this guy.

plus before the wireless you're going to at most be able to organize a few hundred fighters in such an asymmetrical fashion.

>>1928553
I know I'm used to it. But there's something about this strain of autism that's rustling me

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>>1928558
That or too much of The Patriot (which, mind you, still made clear that it was Continental Regulars and the French that won the war, even if skirmishers and irregulars helped).

Throughout primary school Americans were taught how stupid the British were for wearing bright clothing and standing in lines and how terrible Bunker Hill was on the British (the fact that they won non-withstanding). It's understandably shocking when they subsequently find out that the reason the Americans won was because Germans and Frenchmen fought and taught them to fight as men standing in line formation and brightly colored uniforms.

>>1928558
To be fair a decent portion of officers pre or during the napoleonic wars didn't know what they were doing. I forgot who it was, but I know during the Pennisular campaign Wesley begged one of the spanish commanders to bring his troops behind the fortified British position behind a river when the commander insisted on putting his troops on the same side of the river as the attacking French

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>>1927438
The morons who ran head first into a pike phalanx?

>>1927464
It wasn't the rifle that was inaccurate it was the soldiers. They were never trained in marksmanship but just taught to level and fire ahead, plus in combat every soldier becomes much less accurate, when combined with less accurate muskets and men not trained for accuracy you get a package that cant hit a barn door.

>>1928549

It's just the meme of the day, most of the time the overuse of the word is helpful at choosing wich opinions to disregard, and the rest of the time I just tend to tune it out as white noise.

>>1928607
It's both.

>they were never trained in marksmanship but just taught to level and fire ahead,
Training marksmanship is rather difficult with guns that do not have sights.

>>1928169
>cuck cuck cuckity cuck

.... you just watched Braveheart and the Patriot and used those to form this brilliant battlefield tactic, didn't you?

>>1928501

I'm spread out all over the bushes in what can be called an impromptu entrench terrain with no intention of holding it anyway, but to have 300 cucks dead while we have 2 or 3 casualties. Go on killing cucks for as long as we have the tactic advantage/leave the field if no longer the case.

Assuming the cucks throw their cavalry at me in some place, like I said we're spread out in the bushes behind logs and stuff so I doubt they'd be able to charge in formation. They'd also have to spread out and each one of them cucks on horse presents a much clear target than we do.

>>1928645
Your use of the word cuck makes you sound retarded. The fact that you don't understand that irregulars were a niche unit and that hydroplane tacts were tactics used out of desperation (not to win wars) confirms your idiocy.

>>1928645
I'm impressed with the patience and sincerity these other anons have been answering you.

>>1928645
Because you're fucking autistic

>>1928658
Guerilla* not hydroplane tactics

>>1928574
>how terrible Bunker Hill was on the British (the fact that they won non-withstanding)
Maybe it's because I was a Special Child©, but I was always taught that Bunker Hill was a pyrrhic British victory.

>>1928645
Like I said earlier, wouldn't this get rekt by dragoons? They're just as good at skirmishing, but are better at the maneuver.

>>1928630
Don't quote me on this but I read somewhere that soldiers didn't even have that many live practice shots to begin with.

>>1928688
>Like I said earlier, wouldn't this get rekt by dragoons? They're just as good at skirmishing, but are better at the maneuver.

Didn't you read what he wrote? He's got guys behind bushes. Behind the fucking bushes! That's game over man.

>>1928630
Exactly, but as the light infantry who did focus on aiming proved, it was possible.
>>1928707
Yes depending on the army, French soldiers fired like 3 shots in training, it was the British who were lucky enough to have about 30 rounds to fire during training.

>>1928711
You can't maneuver as well because they have standards, musicians and easy to see uniforms. Your ragged formation would have to disperse to avoid a counter strike, rendering it extremely vulnerable to cavalry (yes even in a forest).

>>1928711
...

You DO realize that if everything is obscured by smoke, that means you lost the ONE thing where you had an advantage? The enemy infantry just charged your disorganized skirmishers. Since you have prevented any organized structure through autistic insistence on skirmishing, you cannot retreat in order. Your army is broken and subsequently massacred.

GG.

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>>1928645
>no way of stopping large masses of infantry due to low fire concentration
>can be outmaneuvered by cavalry of the light & heavy varieties, with light dragoons being able to dismount and engage in skirmish formation
>no way of quick communication due to dispersion
>can be easily surrounded on a strategic level
So this is the doctrine of a """""military genius"""".

>>1928715
Jesus Christ man it's the fucking bushes holy hell.

>>1928711
>le cuck le xdd
Instead of basing your knowledge off of the bullshit you were taught in High School and what little you surmised from watching the Patriot, why dont you read a book on the subject instead of acting like an autistic armchair general?

I love how this idiot thinks they will just run ahead. Youre ambushing them, and they would find this out since theyll use scouts which will see your preparations and "hidden catapults". What exactly are you planning to do when the enemy army just turns and only attacks your left flank? Or when they cavalry just runs around your retarded ambush and attacks you in the rear, rendering your skirmishers useless and oushing them towards their main army and easily shooting them down?
Also, your skirmishers simply wouldnt be able to kill enough men before they reach your formation, even when theyd just charge head on which you seem to believe theyd do for some reason

>>1927464
I see no meme here .
Wellington told his men to "aim at their shoelaces" for a reason.

>>1928711
Master troll? Or master autist? Cause I'm mad

>>1928603
kek

>>1928603
Is it wrong that I find pike formations extremely arousing?

>>1928773
Hi Freud

>>1928688

>cavalry men with sword/pistol charging through a deep forest against an unknown enemy that doesn't keep a formation or concentrates on an specific location
>me and my highly mobile mates spread out, cowering behind trees with our muskets ready to fire

Bet on us, lad. Even if they were on tanks.

t. Finland's Winter War.

>>1928645
I'm glad he was dumb enough to post his genius battle plan so I could actually learn something about why Napoleon-era battles were fought the way they were

>>1928797
Finland lost the winter war, irregular tactics were tactics of desperation. The revolutionary, napoleonic, peninsular, Indian, and eastern wars of the bayonet-musket era were won by conventional line tactics.

What makes you think that your ideas are anything but one trick niche tactics

>>1927438

Those tactics were god-tier for the time though.

>>1928791
you maek me sad
pls no bully

>>1928169
lol i chuckled

>>1928711
>having superior firepower
how do you rationalize that? Also why would a "cuck" formation be attacking a forest in the first place instead of just taking the road?

>>1928806

They "lost" they winter war because they couldn't fall back anymore as the russians were throwing hordes at them through the entire front.

So yes, it was a Russian victory with 200k ruskis dead in the process. Nice victory.

>>1928645
>guys all of those generals for the past 5,000 years who spent thousands of hours studying strategy and commanding armies were retards and I'm not

So in this theoretical battle where the cuck army HAS to go through the forest, why not just bombard with artillery? Its not like skirmishers had any to counter with.

>>1928833

>hiw do you rationalize that?

Because I'm in an under cover position and the cuck is standing grouped in the open, therefore I hit x10 cucks for each hit I get.

>why would they attack the forest

Because they're standing grouped in the open and getting hit x10 for each hit I got. At best. They could also pull back out of range and disengage though. But so can I.

>>1928871
It doesn't work that way. You have to come out of cover in order to fire, at which point 10 men fire at you, killing you. In fact you're being hit x10 for each hit you do to someone.

>>1928851

For the same reason there were duels between gentlemen and officers were supposed not be shot. Because le honorability and shit.

These whole thing started off as Royal Armies commanded by stupendous aristocrats. So posing > efficiency, and as the opposite aristocrat also plays by the same rules with his own mass of sheeple cucks... why change? Just have our cucks form in lines and shoot at each other in the open lol

>>1928871
How do you counter light cannon you dumbass

>>1928797
>cavalry men with sword/pistol
Do you know what a dragoon is?

>>1927438
>it's an uneducated American NEET doesn't understand history nor military science thread

>>1928645
>leave the field if no longer the case
So your infantry will just walk away from a cavalry charge?

>>1927526
>The armies of the day were mercenary armies with bad morale
Lolno. Hardly anyone was ever mercenary in 18th Century European armies

They're either professional standing armies or conscripts.

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>>1927476
>>1927454

>>1928169
t. 14 year old COD player

>>1928558
Many people like to think they know better than others.

>>1927464
smoothbore muskets were accurate enough to hit a 7 ft by 100 ft target at 200 yards - i.e., the size of a line of enemy infantry. Hitting a specific person would have been almost impossible. Smoothbore muskets were relatively quick to reload (compared to rifled muskets), so they did have an advantage in that respect.

>>1928834
>because they couldn't fall back anymore

So they lost.

>>1928558
hindsight is 20/20. after WWI the failure of trench warfare and 'bleeding out' the enemy was acknowledged.

>>1929947
This is one of the reasons why Napoleon favored muskets despite advances in Rifle-making.

>>1929955
Except the trench warfare in WW1 was the first and last instance of its kind, and it lasted less than 5 years. Line Infantry was utilized from the 17th century all the way to the 19th century. To think that the people of the time were too stupid to recognize the inefficiency of a military tactic over the course of 200 years of warfare is really retarded.

>>1927438
what about doing a cavalry charge with sabers.

"On 12 August 1914 at Halen (in the province of Limburg) Uhlans of the German cavalry (light cavalry armed with lances) attempted to charge a strong Belgian position with naked swords."

The next day, one of the most terrible slaughters of German cavalry occurred at Haelen, a town lying directly on the path between Brussels and Liege. In an attempt to outflank the Belgian army by by-passing Tirlemont, a German force, mainly consisting of cavalry, horse artillery and infantry support, wheeled against the town. Under heavy Belgian artillery fire, German Uhlans, Dragoons, Hussars and Kurassiers tried to force their way down the Steevorn-Haelen road but met with only shrapnel and shell fire. Undaunted, they tried again, this time actually reaching the Belgian barricades, only to be beaten back at the last breath by sustained infantry rifle fire. Having regrouped, the massed German cavalry then charged the Belgian defences even more forcibly. This prompted an equally brutal counter-charge by the Belgian cavalry (notably the Lancers and Chasseurs a Cheval) which resulted in a savage hand-to-hand combat. Again, the Germans were forced to retire. However, they resolved to make a final, all or nothing charge against what they, presumably, believed was the weakest point in the Belgian defences. It turned out to be the costliest decision yet in the battle for Haelen, as the point they chose was bristling with Belgian machine-gunners. The inevitable conclusion was a pitiful carnage of horses and men and was as courageous as it was disastrous. Their casualty figures at Haelen amounted to almost a thousand. One German cavalry officer, in a letter to his wife, recalled that '...our retreat was ...paralysed by the number of riderless horses roaming about, and by the stragglers of the 2nd Kurassiers and 9th Uhlans who had been cut up by machine-guns.' [ Attr.letter, p.146, N. Flower, History of the Great War, 1917]

Thanks to the theoretical fight between the Bush Bros. and the Cuck Army, I have earned a metric shit ton of stuff about tactics, weapons, and warfare in general from the Infantry Square time period.

Thanks a lot, dumbass. You made the smart ones on /his/ to teach me stuff. Great job, everyone!

Any book to study this formations or tactics?

>>1929955
that's ridiculous. trench warfare didn't "fail." What do you think it would have looked like if the central powers decided not to do trench warfare anymore?

>>1929974
for more position warfare, see the Normandy and Italian campaigns in ww2 and most of the Korean War.

>>1929973
yes, the French continued to you smoothbores even for their light infantry - they were quite effective.

>>1930019
Not really a book, but the website Napolun is an amazing resource on the armies and tactics of the Napoleonic era.

For earlier stuff (Seven Years War, War of the Austrian Succession) I don't rightly know. Maybe The Army of Frederick the Great, by Christopher Duffy?

>>1930019
For the Napoleonic era, there's Paddy Griffith's Forward into Battle.

>>1930019
Mount and Blade : Napoleonic Wars

>>1930032
>>1930037
Thanks, ill check them out or at least try to get that book.

>>1930039
Kek, I don't think they had timer to charge the enemy.

>>1930050
Waterloo (1970) is pretty decent for showing formations in motion. The bayonet squares and cavalry charges in the movie are decently accurate.

>>1928630
Muskets usually had at least front sights. Aiming with only a front sight is easier than it sounds. Given the length of the barrel that's all you need.

>>1930015

I advocate for mobility, flexibility and surprise. You advocate for slow ass, rigid doctrine and predictability of a meme tighly packed line of cucks.

On my side, Liddell Hart.
On your side, some austrian general of the XVIII.

You're welcome.

>>1930386
>I advocate for mobility, flexibility and surprise.
You advocated for an extremely elaborate set-piece ambush with the mistaken belief that the enemy must feel obligated to walk directly into it. Scattered irregular infantry can't match cavalry in mobility.
>flexibility
Your set-piece ambush is the literal opposite of flexibility, because individual elements are incapable of communicating to each other, or even reliably discerning the relative positions of your allies.
>surprise
The only surprise you could ever attain would be due to poor reconnaissance by the enemy, which testifies more to its incompetence than any tactical brilliance on your part.

>On my side, Liddell Hart.
Liddell Hart would have easily discerned the right way to completely invalidate your massive ambush, by moving around it with mounted infantry such as dragoons and attacking actual relevant targets, such as the towns that supply you or the camps that feed you, until you're forced to engage them in field battle. Your elaborate ambush only works if people are willing to engage you in that singular location.

>>1928711
>So that also applies to them as well or is it only us the ones that cannot into see?
Didn't you read the previous post? Part of the advantage of coordinated volley fire was that the smoke would clear for everyone in the battle line at roughly the same time, since they fired at roughly the same time. If your skirmishers are firing at will, there'll be new clouds of smoke coming up regularly even as the previous puffs dissipate. Meaning they will almost always know your general position by the residual smoke, invalidating your concealment in the first place.

>Furthermore, lack of visibility in the action would, if anything, be to our advantage as we just need to aim at & follow the big cuck mass
See above. They would have visibility every time they fired a volley, since they only need to fire a wall of bullets at the last cloud of smoke.
>while each one of us is it's in own unit and target.
None of which can actually communicate with each other properly.

>>1928665
We're aware that other, less retarded people will read our answers and learn something.

This is why people who are interested in weapons and warfare so happily answer trollposts.

We know trolls and retards when we see them, and we know that good anons still lurk even the trolliest of threads.

Hey bush dude can you draw a hidden catapult for us? Im not shitting on you, I genuinly want to know what you mean by it and what it looks like

>>1930121
Brown Bess had no sights at all, and is pretty much THE arch-typical musket. Front sight only is shit. Even shotguns tend to come with rear sights now, either mounted standard or on a spare barrel-shooting slugs with just a bead is shit tier.

>>1930427

>Your elaborate ambush only works if people are willing to engage you in that singular location

Just like all plans only work if certain criteria is met. What if the Franco-British Army hadn't taken the bait and march into Belgium right after the German offensive. Would have the german masterplan in the Ardennes worked out well then?

There are a thousand ways that cuck army could be bait into attacking where I want when I want. Say, f.i, I place a similar cuck-of-the-line formation in the open only that much smaller as a decoy.

The Cuck Army would advance. Ofc the would. Right where I want them to.

>>1930470
>There are a thousand ways that cuck army could be bait into attacking where I want when I want. Say, f.i, I place a similar cuck-of-the-line formation in the open only that much smaller as a decoy.
They go around it because wars are fought over strategic objectives, which are almost never forests.

>>1930477
not him, but they might actually have to fight the forest fighters though. While they could just go around since the forest fighters have no controlling presence, allowing a force to potentially cut your line of communication and supplies like gunpowder and replacement parts. Now if the "cuck" army went far around and left a few formations to pin the forest fighters down than ya.

>>1930470
>What if the Franco-British Army hadn't taken the bait and march into Belgium right after the German offensive.
The intention of the Maginot line was to force the war of maneuver to be fought in Belgium, the Germans knew that and the French knew that. The Germans had not put out bait and the Anglo-French had not taken it.
>Would have the german masterplan in the Ardennes worked out well then?
Your premise is already flawed, as stated above. The German operation inherently tried to avoid a set-piece battle, striking at the French forces where they were weakest, while you are trying to forcibly pressure a set-piece battle where you are at your strongest.

>Say, f.i, I place a similar cuck-of-the-line formation in the open only that much smaller as a decoy.
And there a thousand ways said cuck army could neutralize such a small force without ever having to engage you at your killing field. i.e. attacking a more vital strategic location and forcing those forces to withdraw.

>>1928532
>without any honor or glory if those even exist in war
If they ever existed, they certainly ceased to exist when arty came about.

>>1928745
I thought that was due to an innate reaction I keep reading about where they would raise their muskets higher just before firing, meaning many untrained volleys would often fly over the enemie's heads

>>1930477

>they bypass me and deliberately allow a fighting force to operate in their rear to freely ravage on their communication lines, supply camps and towns

>inb4 oh but there are also multiple cuck armies guarding the communication lines, supply lines, towns and etc.

>>1930496
>not him, but they might actually have to fight the forest fighters though.
Yes, but they wouldn't have to fight those forest fighters with line infantry. There are a great number of things they could do to take out entrenched skirmishers without having to commit the infantry.

They could send in their own skirmishers and forest fighters (the British had Riflemen, the Loyalist Americans had Rangers, and the Prussians had Jagers) to engage them.

They could shell the position with artillery and force them to withdraw.

They could send in mounted infantry to flank them, or charge their spread-out position with lancers or hussars or shock cavalry, which would make his "catapults" largely useless.

They could go full chevauchée and pillage the towns that these forest fighters draw their munitions and provisions from and starve them out, or force them otherwise to vacate their position to defend their homes.

And, just as his original poster mused when he said
>I would also love to use set up tactics on them, like oiling the field where the packed mass of cucks is meant to walk upon, then light it up on fire and watch them burn
They could straight up just burn the whole forest down with all his forest fighters living there.

>>1930518
Guess what? They can patrol that roue with their own skirmishers and cavalry while the main body marches on to burn or conquer your homeland.

>>1930518
>they bypass me and deliberately allow a fighting force to operate in their rear to freely ravage on their communication lines, supply camps and towns
Or they can pull a Napoleon and freely ravage your communciation lines, supply camps and towns while you wait for them to attack you in your forest. Now you're starving and you don't have supply lines to cut. Your men will start to chafe and rebel too. Why are you waiting for a set-piece battle in a forest when their homes are being burned, their daughters and wives are being raped and their fields being burned? Whether you starve to death, your men mutiny or the enemy runs you down, you're not going to get your beautiful ambush.
>inb4 oh but there are also multiple cuck armies guarding the communication lines, supply lines, towns and etc.
Are you really going to consider it unfair that a remotely competent army might defend its supply lines?

>>1930531

So the main body is now advancing into enemy territory without cavalry, skirmishers and recon units?

That goes against cuck doctrine.

>>1930541
Seeing as the bulk of the enemy force is camping out in some forest with no strategic value waiting to be attacked, it's not like they need that many of them.

>>1930541
They don't need all of them. That's the fun thing about horse and light foot, they're rather adept at detached duty.

>>1930019
If you visit /tg/'s historical wargaming general /hwg/, they've got an archive with a lot of Ospreys and other publishings about the period

>not even the gunpowder Total War were this stupid
Is this a meme in development? Is he going to start tripfagging soon?

>>1928169
>I would also love to use set up tactics on them, like oiling the field where the packed mass of cucks is meant to walk upon, then light it up on fire and watch them burn
They'll never see the oil coming, no sir.

You're a master of bait. Have another (You).

>>1930653
fots was fun

i still want a victorian era tw, would be pretty sick

>>1928169

10/10 bait, a true master. Take my (You)

>>1930695
>i still want a victorian era tw, would be pretty sick
Not much happening in 19th Century Europe desu. There's a reason why they were dumbdumbs in fighting each other in WWI

>>1930736
>Not much happening in 19th Century Europe desu.
American education.
>Tail end of Napoleonic Wars.
>1848.
>Italian & Austrian Wars.
>French revolts and Second Empire Wars
>Crimean War.
>Prussian Wars in Germany, Denmark, and vs. Austria
>Franco-Prussian War.
>Morrocan Crisis.
Plenty of TW material.

>>1929974
WW1 didn't use Napoleonic tactics... why do people keep saying this.

They used the tactics of the era, there was just no effective counter to highly accurate rifles, machine guns and artillery invented yet.

>>1929974
Napoleon used trenches though. It's just that trenches weren't as near impenetrable as they were in WWI.

line infantry battles weren't really that bad at all, for the most part armies would fire, advance and continue to reload and fire and eventually charge, it was a decisive manoeuvre that usually saw battles over and done with fairly quickly with one army gaining ground and another retreating. The reason the US civil war was so devastating was because there wasn't a fire and advance tactic, it was just 2 armies near each other shooting non stop until one side were dead, i think there's a foreign observer maybe from Britain that commented on how fucking insane and stupid it was that he would just watch these two armies standing in a line and shooting each other without ever charging.

>>1930019
Clausewitz

i hope this one retard here is baiting because otherwise this is some sonic the hedgehog OC donut steel edgemaster tryhardiness never seen before on /his/

>>1930653
Total war napoleon is enjoyable with few mods.

>>1928603
In my elementary school i read that those pikes put at an angle were used to defend against arrows. How plausible is that? It never made much sense for me.

>>1930883
it could probably deflect a few arrows here and there but unless if the 4th-last row of pikes are all in the same small area there would be plenty that slip through and kill people

>Scouting report sir!
>There seem to be a bunch of soldiers hiding in the bushes 5 miles north.
>There are also, what appear to be, medieval catapults poorly hidden in the trees.
>They don't have a clear line to fire them and would just hit the trees but I am just reporting sir.
>Tell the men to go west and go around them. We will have our light cavarly keep an eye out.
>We head towards the nearest largest town and occupy it. Who cares about some trees and bushes.


Meanwhile in the bushes over yonder.

>Sir its been 10 days. We haven't heard anything from home and have nought to eat.
>Silence private! I have rehearsed this in my head a hundred times!
>The cuck army will charge head on into my glorious ambush. You will see!
>But sir the men are deserting.
>I said wait!

Once WW1 hit it was remarkable how many people became willing to argue that linear tactics NEVER EVER worked and literally every commander for several hundred years were DUMB POOPY HEADS. Like the guy in this thread for example. Also I don't think issues of command and control have come up enough times for even more reasons to form neat units.

>>1927438

you had decent odds of not actually being shot to death though, battles in that era had pretty low casualties normally.

the "muskets were inaccurate" is a fucking meme though, they were generally going to go where you fired them.

>>1927544
>60 percent hits on target at 75 yards, 50 percent hits on target at 100 yards

that's actually pretty fucking good desu, for guns made before 1800

>>1928169
>>1928477

holy fuck this is the most autism I've read on /his/ in years

>keep saying "cuck"

EBIN XD

>>1928169
>hidden catapults launching massive grenades

hahahahah what the fuck

>>1928745

I think musket volleys often went too high or some bullshit?

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>>1930506
yeah fuck that shit... the only thing even more cancerous than that it's its next evolutionary stage: airstrikes.

>>1930742
>there was just no effective counter to highly accurate rifles, machine guns and artillery invented yet.
still, telling your men to charge well entrenched MG nests is probably the most ridiculous way to counter those weapons

>>1929977

the opening year of WW1 was fucking amazing

>>1927464
muskets were pretty inaccurate but it would be possible to hit a target at 200 yards consistently - problem is: you would need a lot of training for that.

and there were a lot of conscripts with little training most armies, specially if they weren't neither french or english - but even the french used a lot of untrained soldiers in the end.
and this is why chasseurs in the french army and let's say, caçadores in the anglo-portuguese army were mostly used as skirmishers even though their rifles were identical to the rest of the troops. because they were crackshots due to their past as hunters.

>>1928549
It does have a certain obsessive quality

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>this thread.
It's like /his/ is in a competition with /pol/ and /k/ as to who is the most easily b8able board in 4chan.

>Just spread out

How to get fucked up by calavary 101

>>1931329
>battles in that era had pretty low casualties normally

Rolf
If you're talking about the US Revolution sure, but look at casualties rate in Napoleonic Wars

>>1930436
You are a gentleman anon

>>1931422

See
>>1930436

>>1931337

But that's in a scientific setting and ignores human elements, not to mention battlefield conditions.

>The Prussians at Chotusitz (1742) loosed off about 650,000 rounds to make 2,500 kills and about the same number of wounded. Some of those fatalities (perhaps as many as half) would have been caused by artillery and some (probably only a very small number), by bayonet. Assuming, therefore, that about 1,200 men were killed by musketry, it took approximately 540 balls or roughly 33 pounds of lead to extinguish one Austrian soldier’s life.
Bert S. Hall 'Weapons and Warfare in Renaissance Europe'

>At the battle of Vitoria (1813) during the Peninsular War, contemporaries estimated that the British fired 60 rounds per man (usually the total allocation) for an expenditure of 3.5 million rounds or 450 per French casualty.
Gunther E. Rothenberg, The Art of Warfare in the Age of Napoleon

>...powder is not as terrible as believed. Few men in these affairs are killed from the front while fighting. I have seen whole salvoes fail to kill four men.
General Maurice de Saxe, Reveries on the Art of War (1757)

>>1930455
>Brown Bess had no sights at all,
Wrong.
https://allthingsliberty.com/2013/08/the-aim-of-british-soldiers/

>Front sight only is shit.
From personal experience with muskets, it's perfectly sufficient. Long weapons are easier to aim than short weapons, and muskets are *very* long.

And for perspective, keep in mind that the bows and crossbows muskets replaced truly had no sights at all and were much much harder to aim accurately.

>>1928603
Wouldn't the phalanx be very vulnerable to lightly armored skirmishers that could vault over the phalanx and attack them in the rear?

>>1927447
No. They weren't.

Shooting a mass of enemy from covered and concealed positions while they are fixed in position by obstacles is far more effective, and far less moronic.

The only reason they charged each other in the open is because idiots, like you, existed back then too...

>>1927464
I have a musket from the 1830s and it literally can't hit a car from 60-70 yards. I get a hit maybe once in five tries

>>1931877
>I know better than the best general know to mankind.
>I believe that kill people is the goal of war.
>I don't understand the concept of horse.
>I believe that my 100% perfect tactic will not be conter by some asshole who go directly to the strategical objectif.

t. edgelord armchair general.
See
>>1931190

>>1931902
>>I have never engaged in actual combat but will post stupid shit anyway

t. dipshit

>>1931926
but thats exactly what anon was doing with his Patriot hydroplane style military musing

>>1931877
>Hey guy, waht about.... sending guy who will sccot ambush and other shit like that

>>1928477
>if one specific flank is being attacked by an important fraction of the cuck army, they don't HAVE to hold the ground
then why bother at all? if you aren't going to hold ground, you might as well not bother meeting them in battle at all. You're also failing to take into account that your musket volleys will be much less effective than the enemy's.

I know I'm responding to shitposting, but firearm warfare is primarily based on manouevre and weight of shot.
The aims of a successful infantry attack are thus:
1. Win the firefight while maintaining the ability to manouevre (this can be delegated to cavalry in the musket era).
2. Fix the enemy (prevent them from manouevre)
3. Manouevre into a position from which the enemy can be destroyed or removed from a position
4. Destroy the enemy (in this period usually done by bayonet charge or overwhelming rate of fire)

>>1931853
Don't you know that's how olympic pole vaulting started as a sport?

>>1932007
No... Did the romanes started it?

>>1928645
>what can be called an impromptu entrench terrain with no intention of holding it anyway,
how long do you think you have to prepare all this terrain? And then just abandon it anyway?

>>1932121
you need therapy little dude

>>1932121
Freud was right.

>>1932121
>doctrinal rigidity
your plan is incredibly rigid though, and leaves several key questions unanswered
1. How do you effectively manouevre?
2. How do you respond to superior firepower (bushes don't count)?
3. How do you expect to maintain cohesion when you have dogshit C2?
4. How can you break contact if your position becomes untenable without it turning into a rout?
There is a place for dispersed small units in musket-based infantry combat, which is why skirmishers and light role troops existed, but as the basis of an entire doctrine it's fucking stupid, and would remain so until modern weaponry

>>1932138

Don't forget modern communications.

>>1932121
You're deranged.

>>1932139
yep, sorry
If you can't reliably get comms at all levels you're fucked

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>>1932121
People aren't arguing "we don't fall for baits," or "my cuck army wouldn't make mistakes." They're arguing as proxies for the doctrine of the time.

It's not us, the /his/ collective, telling you that you're wrong. We're paraphrasing sources and literal centuries of doctrine and understanding of warfare. We're not arguing for how this general is better or that general is better in this instance, we're literally trying to tell you that the people of the era had thought processes similar to yours, and these are the counter-arguments.

It's not even like your ideas are totally unfounded. Skirmishers did exist at the time. Dragoons, who basically acted as skirmishers that rode their horses to the battlefield, also fought in a similar fashion. But these entities fought as a cog in a machine, as an arm in a combined arms force. Because the thinking has flaws, and we're using the doctrine of the time to illustrate those flaws to you.

Don't listen to reply, listen to understand. Do better, you petulant fuck.

>>1928645
Are you forgetting cannons are a thing?

this is it
this is the stupidest thread on /his/ yet
truyl a wonder to witness

>>1932484

Nah man, this one doesn't have a patch on the guy who claimed that Sardinia was uninhabited until the renaissance and that ships are impossible for premodern people to operate.

>>1932194

The whole thing revolves around provoking a situation in which you have your flanks under attack and I have a tactical advantage in firepower because you are exposed in the open (and in a pack, which makes you a much easier target -not to mention the effect of grenades) while I am concealed, spread out and under cover. Common sense dictates that in a fire exchange you are are gonna get x10 more than I will.

You walk up right into it?. Could happen. Just like others walk up into the reverse slope and hidden units behind hills of Wellington only to be rekt, ss common sense dictates, by the tactical advantage and superior firepower situation of those units. Every time.

But hey, the Cuck Army fanbois would save the day with 300 dragoons and 20 cannons firing at the line of trees of the entire forest in both flanks. Or say that ambushes can't happen.

Lmao

>>1931934
What language translates guerilla as hydroplane?

>>1932527
Or go directly to the town, win and let the guerrila cuck in the forest. Now i got the town and the ambush cuck can't do anything against me. What the guerrilia cukc do now? Hide in mud? Too bad cause i got the tatical avantage because you go directly like all the ambush cuck into my much superior line formation, i got horse and a city. Have fun in winter cuck ambush fanboy.

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>>1932527
>the whole thing revolves around provoking a situation
Indeed it does. We are agreed. What I'm trying to tell you--what a lot of us are trying to tell you--is that a great deal of the warfare of this period and of the periods that this one learned from ignored a great deal of the situation you're trying to provoke, or had countermeasures.

For example, you're arguing for a very specific tactical situation where the enemy you're fighting has the strategic and operational goal of killing you and your guys directly. Of fighting you in your own home territory that is explicitly made to benefit your scenario.

But what if the enemy task force doesn't want to fight you in your very special safe space? What if they have an objective--say, a city or nearby town--that means they could completely ignore your skirmishers set up in their tree line? Cut off your means of supply, starve you out of your great green fortress? But what if they DO decide their objective is to kill you and yours? Well, my above example still works.

See, you're in a great green fortress. Like many fortresses, you can be starved out of it by cutting off your supply chain. You might argue that living off the land will make the siege take too long to consider, but what's to stop them from setting your great fortress on fire with bombardment? Or charging heavy cavalry through your skirmisher lines where you're too spread out to properly respond? Muskets aren't fast enough to repel cavalry like an LMG. The technology doesn't support your mentality.

In your very narrow-minded scenario of line marching at dug-in skirmishers, you would cause horrendous casualties. But that's what we're trying to say. Doing exactly that would be stupid. That's why the generals had other options. Other skirmishers, cavalry, artillery. Combined arms.

>>1932527
>>1932589
Setting fire to the forest, if the meteo is right, is an answer to your ambush.

What was the deleted comment?! I need to know for entertainment.

I was going to suggest someone screencap this retarded autist, but maybe it's better forgotten.

>>1932589

I didn't say it would work every time. What I said is that it can work. Which depends on the flow of events.

If I have you in the open with lines of trees to your flanks, where we're standing, that's it. You may not be routed but you"ll be sustaining very significant casualties and i can disengage whenever the fuck I want to.

>>1932595

Basically the >greentext the Cuck Army fanbois mentioned, plus Cannae, which the cuckbois conveniently ignored.

>>1932662
>if I have you pinned between two areas of cover you didn't send scouts into with the line of retreat cut off and you don't move I'll win
wew

>>1931877

>Shooting a mass of enemy

How do you mass them assuming that both sides intend to use your strategy?

>from covered and concealed positions

So you need to count on a successful ambush. What if you can't ambush them? What if they know you're there? What if they ambush you instead?

> while they are fixed in position by obstacles

So not only do you need to ambush them, you need to trick your opponent into marching through terrain this disadvantageous and ripe for ambush, or create this terrain yourself (how do you do this quickly and effectively without being noticed)?
What if you are attacking enemy territory rather than defending your own?

Basically your """""""strategy"""""""" relies on every single battle being fought under optimal conditions for your side while assuming your enemy are fucking stupid. What are your contingencies? How do you arrange your soldiers when this tactical perfect storm does not occur?

Keeping in mind they've got muskets and bayonets. Riflemen did do what you suggest almost as soon as it was feasible.

>>1932661
it's a shame not only for this entire board, but also for the human race.

>>1932687
wait isn't that exactly what happened at the battle of lake Trasimene?

>>1932741

I think he's mocking the fact that it's a very "no shit, sherlock" statement and that it's far easier to hypothetically say "if I got you into this position" than to actually get any non-retarded general to walk into it.

>>1932741
Yes, but a strategy that relies on gross incompetence on the other side as a means of discrediting the enemy tactic or way of waging war is a pretty bad one. Yes, a six year old with no training will crash an airplane if put at the helm and there are cases where actual pilots put their children on the controls of planes, but that doesn't really discredit airplanes as a reasonably safe means of transportation.

>>1932527
>I have a tactical advantage in firepower because you are exposed in the open (and in a pack, which makes you a much easier target -not to mention the effect of grenades) while I am concealed, spread out and under cover
How does a spread out force that is firing from concealment have even local superiority over a massed musket volley? Although having said that, you're seriously overestimating how concealed you'll be. Even light protection is really fucking obvious if it's in the corner of a wood block, and any concealment is useless past the first shots because of the smoke and muzzle flash. Your first volley will do some damage to the column, but after that you'll be shredded. Even if you yourself are not seen, the column/line will fire into likely cover and fuck up anything in its path.

>>1932662
What does Cannae have to do with it? It's a completely different scenario

>>1932797
>Liddell Hart
>Fall of France
>Waterloo
>Cannae
>Winter War
He randomly brings up historical battles or individuals that have nothing to do with his scenario as some kind of appeal to authority.

>>1932013
That was a joke senpai. you can't vault over a pike phalanx, it's like 10 feet deep to the first rank, and the pikes are Hella high

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>>1932662
>I didn't say it would work every time
And now you're moving goalposts.

>[theoretical ambush]
This isn't perfect. You really underestimate the size of armies of the era and their doctrine. Stop playing Total War and assuming it gives you all the history lessons you need.

There are a few things that undoes your mighty ambush: proper scouting from the cavalry ahead of the vanguard itself, the size of armies of the era and what that means for your ambush, and failure to understand both cavalry and doctrinal response to ambush.

Regarding scouts: want to ambush them instead? Well you've spoiled your plan upon a scouting unit AND let the entire enemy force know if even a single horseman gets away. Decide to let the scouts go? Well you can't really afford to, because the will report your position; ruining your ambush.

For sake of conversation though, let's assume that they don't notice you. The vanguard and various segments of the column will all have cavalry nearby, if not immediately there, the same kind of cavalry that will run your ass down. Cavalry are the hard counter to skirmishers in most situations.

Assuming no horse, you have a group of skirmishers trying to assault an entire column of line infantry. What's to stop them from charging and giving you the cold steel? Line infantry travel en masse. That's a lot of guys. Like, a LOT. You'd need to pick that mass apart one bit at a time--Teutoburg Forest style--to get them to rout, and you can't really do that without them responding, especially in a task force that large and well-equipped compared to the Romans in Teutoberg.

You seem to be forgetting our entire point that strategically your plan cannot work, as it cannot hold or properly defend objectives, focusing instead on the tactical situation. What you fail to realize is that your tactical situation--even in what you claim are ideal engagement positions--is also doomed. You need to diversify to win.

>>1932961

Don't forget all the communication issues he's just skipping over. One of the primary reasons you had infantry bunching together in the era of line battles was the difficulty of actually cohesively maneuvering or shooting with a bunch of men once they're out of shouting range and/or visible distance.

This spread out ambush can easily be ruined by any number of communication failures, such as if one part of the ambushing force starts shooting because hey, the enemy's in front of them ,while at the other end of this brush, the guys there aren't ready yet.

>>1931353
Except the part where offensives inflicted worse casualties on the defenders countless times.

>>1932560
I don't know, but "Hydroplane Tactics" is now going into my vocabulary for stupid shit.

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Formation has no influence on weapons accuracy. Just think this through for a moment.

The actual reason for massed formation was the same than 2,000 years ago : melee defense. The group that has a spread out formation will be charged and defeated at close range by the group that has a denser formation. Hence why pikemen, and then musketeers fought in dense formation : to repeal cavalry and infantry charges.

And if you adopt a dense formation, you might as well form a line because it brings more barrels to the front.

But not all infantry at the time fought this way : Light Infantry (which comprised skirmishers, scouts, sharpshooters, guerrilla...) fought in loose formations in the same fashion as today's soldiers, and they used cover in the same fashion (for example, one alleged advantage of the Dragoons was that they could use their speed to occupy covered positions before the enemy did, so they would fight behind cover all the time.)

War is a serious business, they wouldn't have used tactics for that long if those didn't work .

>>1933131
>Formation has no influence on weapons accuracy. Just think this through for a moment.


It doesn't affect accuracy, but it does affect fields of fire. A guy can't shoot at anywhere in the enemy formation equally easily. Especially in the musket era, you're restricted to targets about 70-100 yards away if you want to hit anything, and that will go down as black powder fills the air and visibility gets worse.

Packing your men tightly might not improve their accuracy, but it does improve their ability to have everyone shoot at one point and knock out a (hopefully critical) portion of the enemy forces.

>>1932484
Cuck dude is stupid, but a lot of us are learning about things that we hadn't considered before. it's interesting.

>>1933153
Honestly, someone was bound to take this line of thought sometime. Shit like the Patriot basically tells people that you have either Line or guerillas, and one is obviously better than the others because that's where the main character is.

It's a really interesting era of military history, but unfortunately no one knows about it except for the memes.

>>1932961

Right, I have 700 guys concealed in the forests at your flanks, just within musket range.

You have 3 times that infantry, packed, exposed in the open in between, oblivious of my presence, plus say 200 cavalry.

That's the scenario.

a) Count your casualties during the first 5 mins.
b) your 200 cavalry can't do shit except attack one very specific sector of either side of the forest and get local superiority there. But what purpose would that serve?. They would have to attack, scattered, all along the bush line. Good luck with that.
3) There's literally nothing stopping us from disengaging and pull back whenever we want to unless some of your infantry cucks under fire from the flanks run like Usain Bolt and get around and behind me to block my retreat. So they'd have to charge ahead against one both flanks. And I retreat right before engaging in close combat when they get to the forest. The End.
4. Time's been ticking away since the first discharge. Count your casualties.
>

>>1927464
While I'm not a super historian, nor a super soldier but I am currently serving with a reserve regiment (any reg force can laugh at me now) and I think it has a lot less to do with weapons than the men themselves.

Even when you're only trying to move with a section of 10 men its difficult as fuck under gunfire and your in command belching orders around. The fact that we have some responsibility in how far we move or take cover can drastically change a firefight. If you're moving 250 guys around, most of them with little army training and experience, you'd want to keep them close together. Not only does the responsibility fall on to a few experienced individuals and not 250 tools the troops will have higher morale. Being beside guys, whether friends or not, is a great incentive to remain on the battlefield when they'd normally run instead.
I'd also agree with your point on vulnerability, since the nature of warfare at this point would have exposed guys just get runned/gunned down without a buddy protecting him with additional fire.
I'd probably say though that most commanders would have preferred to fight from defensive positions if possible. exploiting cover, but more often then not they just don't have the luxury.


In hindsight I don't know how much of a response this is to your post.

>>1931877
You're a fucking idiot.
If Clausewitz couldn't think of anything better, you certainly can't.
Learn how muskets work you fucking cunt.

Basically :
>shoot
>gun now has to be reloaded
>enemy heavy cavalry is charging in
wat do now ?

>>1933222
It's true that average soldier during time of flintlock muskets were not very well trained. In fact, it regressed from time of arquebus and matchlock muskets because back then the soldiers were often either semi-standing or mercenaries with a lot of experience.

However in the time period we are talking, I.E post-tercio which means post 30-years war, average soldier with a flintlock in a line would just "aim" in the general direction of enemy and shoot. However this does not make muskets inaccurate, considering in 18th century and Napoleonic warfare, you had light infantry and skirmishers who also used muskets but fought in more loose formations and with greater mobility and at longer ranges, because when properly trained they could achieve great deal of accuracy and firepower.

I think it's a multi-faceted issue, I think that just accuracy of muskets didn't matter much in a line formation because it was a bit if a problem that solves itself. Men had to be in line so they could be better ordered, controlled and had higher morale, they also could defend better against cavalry and any melee charge, bayonet charges are very common during this period and caroleans also focused on melee combat. So the training and accuracy just didn't matter for the average line infantry, all they had to do was aim and shoot in general direction of the enemy at the same time as rest of their line and then reload as fast as possible. While aiming would mainly be a concern of light infantry and skirmishers.

>>1933257
le RUN TO forest XD cabalry spears cant into break mighty rock amirite

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>>1933195
>b
You have a severe misunderstanding of how cavalry work. Could you move entire battalions of horse through a forest in swift order? No, but only 200 is quite a mobile force. At no point can you reliably argue that they're stuck in the tree-line or bush-line unless you explicitly trapped it. Since your scenario does not specify traps ahead of time, you're shit out of luck.

For sake of argument, let's assume that the horse can only take a third or quarter of your 700 men as the "very specific sector," in the first five minutes. That's perfectly fine. No matter how good skirmishers of the era are--and their poor lines of communication guarantee sub-par organization at best at anything above squad level--they will break and run when charged by horse. They aren't fearless soldiers who stay and fight to the death, and are now overrun by cavalry; who are about the woods hunting for more skirmishers.

All the while thrice your number in line infantry are charging the forest line with bayonet in hand; which those line infantry will do, because they're trained that the only way to respond to an ambush is to assault into it lest you be caught on the back foot and destroyed.

Those skirmishers are going to run, and it won't be organized.

>3
Yes, something is keeping you from disengaging: horse. One of the most common uses of cavalry was to kill/capture fleeing men, as yours are. Not mounting a defense, not gathering into square formation to repel cavalry, and not taking a defensive position like a house or chapel. They're going to die.

>a and 4
This is retarded. At best your skirmishers are firing two to three rounds a minute. On the range, not in combat. All the while horsemen and line are charging them. Your plan needs work, and it's not going to work even this well half the time. It's too specific, relies on too many variables, and can easily be bypassed if killing your men is not the objective of the enemy; which it will usually not be.

>>1933195
700 guys
5% have misfires
50% don't shoot to kill because they haven't been trained enough and their spread-out position makes it hard for NCOs to exert control
Of the remaining 45% actually shooting at the enemy, maybe 50% knock out an enemy.
Therefore you're getting, at most 175 of the enemy, and that's being optimistic.

Now there's smoke everywhere, the soldiers' ears are ringing from the noise, your ability to control is reduced. Every man is reloading and once those cavalry charge they're going to bolt immediately. You now have very little ability to control the battle so now your cuck ambush is putting out a piddling and ineffectual fire that is spread all over the place because you can't direct fire at the critical points, and the NCOs and officers are too spread out to motivate them. You try to sound the retreat but only half the men get the signal, the others either die in place or get dispersed throughout the countryside. With your forces in disarray the enemy goes on to steal your supplies and cuck your menfolk who are now in no position to do anything about it.

You are completely overlooking the command and control aspect, battles aren't commanded by an omniscient big metal hand in the sky that telepathically transmits orders to specific units. They're commanded by a guy on a horse, who is either close to the battle with limited visibility, or on a big hill minutes away from the battle. People these days have enough trouble controlling a platoon-sized ambush with well-drilled soldiers and radio comms, trying to do it with hundreds with radio would be a nightmare.

Of course surprise and use of ground is massively important, but to say that the dense formations were inferior to dispersed skirmishers in all scenarios is just silly.

>>1928595
The actual spanish army was completely crushed by Napoleon before any brit landed on the country. It's simply obvious that the loss of prepared officers and commanders is gonna harm the command of an army. Freshmen and armed civilians will not make good decisions.

>>1931853
Alexander and Philip made extensive use of cavalry and skirmishers. Pikes weren't the only thing they had.

>>1927438
Chaining the infantry together before doing that

>>1933297

>200 happy dragoon man, split 100 to the right flank 100 to left flank, charge over an area ~2km long each flank, ~fuckton km deep of bushy forest, and hunt down, one by one, the spread out veteran infantrymen until there's none left. Like Predator in the movie Predator. Only that in much less time, 10 mins at most since receiving the first volley fire and react right away without panicking, getting confused, missing shots and etc unlike the panicked and confused, unprofessional soldiers firing at will fromconcealed positions at the exposed targets.


Hmmmmmmm

No.

>>1933888
where did you get this 2km long flank from? How are you firing at a length that takes cavalry 10 minutes to reach and actually hitting stuff with enough force and precision to cause panic? While cavalry certainly aren't suited for forests they are still capable enough to fight scattered infantry men. You make it sound like this forest is fucking huge and your men are scattered all around it, so the cavalry could just pick them off one by one while the infantry men are unable to support due to reload times on muskets and distance between them.

>>1933888
At no point had I suggested such. A simple focused cavalry charge of 200 horse across about 100-200 meters into a small portion of a formation of only 700 skirmishers--who are busy trying to kill thrice their number in line foot--is quite likely to go in the horse's favor.

Realistically speaking, all they have to do is get there, kill about double-digits of those men, and the rest nearby are like to break and run. Considering how shitty communication is for those skirmishers in this scenario, the horse are free to lather, rinse, repeat to their heart's content so long as they are led by a competent officer with his wits about him.

Will they take casualties? Yes, absolutely. But they alone are probably enough to convince a fair deal of those 700 skirmishers that discretion is better part of valor; killing isn't really necessary. Nevermind the near-battalion-level 2100 line foot coming up behind them.

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>>1933888
>2 dragoons ride to the nearest cloud of smoke
>cut him down
>ride to the next cloud of smoke because they're all firing at will
>cut him down or shoot him, whichever is easier.
>rinse and repeat because horses are way faster than men
2ez.

>200 happy dragoon man, split 100 to the right flank 100 to left flank,
Or they'll go down center and cut you and your command staff down, because that's where you're going to be unless you want your messengers to travel 4km to deliver new orders to the far flank.
>~fuckton km deep of bushy forest
I'd give you a good single km or two before the horses catch up to you.
>and hunt down, one by one
No need, only need to get rid of the ones who run and fight back. The ones who are hiding can be mopped up by allied skirmishers or the regular infantry.
>10 mins at most since receiving the first volley fire and react right away without panicking,
Are you for some reason assuming your veterans won't panic when faced with charging cavalry and sporadic gunfire, but the cavalry are going to panic from sporadic gunfire?
>getting confused, missing shots
lmao just ride towards the nearest muzzle flash. Your "veteran infantrymen" won't have run far, and they won't even be able to hide if they have to reload their rifles or muskets (which, mind you, can only be done standing).

>unlike the panicked and confused, unprofessional soldiers firing at will fromconcealed positions
I don't think you realize how pointless "concealment" is in the musket era when your gun emits a massive cloud of "I'm right here" smoke have stand to reload anything bigger than a carbine. Like you would literally be better off using crossbows if you wanted to try to be stealthy.

>tfw everyone takes a break from ETERAL-posting and religious autism to shit on a retard
I love you /his/

>>1931877
All that is required is that you are in a concealed position and they are fixed by obstacles
So, what's the plan for getting them into this position every time you engage?

>>1933928

Ok I give you that. But that's one sector of one flank. That leaves the guys in the opposite flank free to keep cucking the panicked and confused Cuck Army infantry in the middle.

So, Dragonfags concentrating on one sector and attacking deep beyond the line of trees, eh?. Ok, but what if my men aren't peasants but veteran soldiers that orderly regroup back to make up numbers and face the dragonfags deep behind the tree lines, in the forest, among logs and plants andshit?. Obviously, the cuck infantry has zero visibility of whats going on behind the tree line and offers zero support to the dragonfags because it'd getting shot and grenade'd by the guys at the opposite flank.

That would be an interesting fight; dragonfags deep in bushy forest vs a similar number of infantry guys in consolidated defensive positions.

>>1934113
Next time you write is going to be related with late XVII guns

>>1928688
>Maybe it's because I was a Special Child©, but I was always taught that Bunker Hill was a pyrrhic British victory.

You do know what a pyrrhic victory means, right?

>>1934128

I'd rather not, lad. That's exactly when all this faggy cuckoldry started. Only that with shitter weapons and mercenaries now being dildo-pressed into the cuck line.

No wonder it all led to the golden age of Sweden.

>>1934113
And if your infantry consolidates, the dragoons just disengage and wait for the regular line to arrive. That is, of course, assuming that consolidation of light infantry spread out over hundreds of meters is orderly, simple and efficient. Especially after part of that infantry just withstood a cavalry charge and probably one or two dozen casualties.

>>1934225
Retard confirmed.

>>1934113
You cannot regroup because you gutted your communications. That's what we've been telling you for the last day or so. If a part of your forces starts retreating (your morale is significantly lower because your men are spread around with no officers in sight and unable to communicate), and they will, they go into a full, unorganized rout. You have no option to disengage and withdraw, which is catastrophic for any sort of armed force (because, you know, that's how you get away from disadvantageous engagements). You also seem to think that muskets are HMGs (spoiler: they're not, especially not after the 2nd volley, when everything is filled with smoke), and that your ambush would not be ruined by some impetuous young man shooting prematurely (again: you have no way of establishing communication and keeping your men disciplined if they are randomly spread out across a forest). AND in addition to that, you require a very specific (read: ideal) situation to even attempt anything like this. How do you go on offensive with your brilliant plan? What if the enemy commander actually sends scouts (as was standard procedure)? What if he chooses not to walk into a field surrounded by a forrest from three sides (because it's the most obvious terrain for an ambush that's not a canyon)? What would he even be trying to accomplish? Occupy a forrest? Battles are fought for strategic objectives. What is strategically important about a damn forrest?

>>1933404
But what if the “vaulters” were equipped with a pike or spear to push back a calvary charge? And if they shot shields across the phalanx that the “vaulters” could use to stop javelins and such? Or maybe they could catapult armor across?

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Why didn't napoleon era soldiers carry bulletproof shields?

>>1934725
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuirassier
The chance of you getting hit was minor, and the cost of equipping the first line of every line battalion with heavy steel shields would be enormous and impractical (it would have significantly slowed their marching speed and inhibited maneuvering). It's much more cost-effective to make more guns and draft more men, and the steel is much better used in artillery.

>>1927548
>>1929897
The Prussian army was commanded by Prussian aristocracy but the soldiers consisted of the dregs of society from all kinds of nations.

>>1934742
but wouldn't it create a high morality boost?
Even if you are marching slower, if your men dont get hit while enemies die left and right, i am sure it would be a great advantage.
Also, you would only need shields for the first line, so it wouldn't even be that many shields per battalion

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>>1932496
That was a good time

>>1934753
I just told you, the cost would be enormous. It ensures you having A LOT less men and cannons, because you put all that steel&production into something... less than useful. And, as I said, the chance of actually getting hit is minimal. The enemy wouldn't be "dying left and right". You get maybe 2-3 deaths/volley. The heat was quite literally a bigger issue than the enemy shooting at you. And look up Napoleon if you want to see the significance of artillery you sacrificed by making shields.

Just wanna say that this post is the /his/ i dream.
Lot of information, extended, well-written posts on intersting subjects, educated (even in front of trolling or le ebig military genuz) answers.

>>1934770
If only the front row had shields, and they used bigger, artillery proof shield (with holes to poke your musket through) held up by the front row? The artillery advantage of others would've been lost!

>>1934856
Aside from those shields being incredibly expensive sink-holes for steel, they would be nigh-impossible to carry and would have made maneuvering and repositioning impossible (maneuver was the single most important aspect of Napoleonic warfare (officers constantly had to reposition their lines to concentrate fire or defend flanks, withdraw from disadvantageous engagements etc.), and marching speed was about as important (reinforcements)). And how do you defend against cavalry? It's not like you can easily form a square with the first line hauling shields as heavy as themselves. Moreover, there is nothing that can stop a cannonball because the momentum MUST go somewhere. Therefore, when the cannonball hits the shield, the momentum transmits normally to the man behind it, crushing him behind a heavy-ass shield. And what happens when you withdraw? You have to leave a huge amount of extremely expensive materiel behind. It's just an incredibly poor idea.

>>1934871
Couldn't you just use cotton as a dampener between shield and man? Also, it's not necessary to leave the shield behind. The first row could walk backwards while taking pot shots at the enemy. Cavalry would be defended against by taking a square while not moving the front row.

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>>1934856
>artillery proof shield

>>1933131
>Formation has no influence on weapons accuracy
You've got the wrong end of the stick. To effectively suppress an enemy a round has to go within 1m of them every 5 seconds. You are far, far more likely to achieve that with a massed volley of musketry, especially firing in ranks or platoons. It's nothing to do with the precision of the shooter or the weapon, it's to do with weight of shot

>>1933195
>That's the scenario.
You've just described an ambush
however, you have no idea how an ambush actually works. You NEED to get out of there quickly if you don't have the strength to actually destroy the enemy, and if they have cavalry they can roll up your blocking/killing group with the horses and turn the full weight of fire onto their other flank.

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>>1935310
this.
>>1933131
line battles were more about moral than casualities.
many engagements would even before they started - with a mass volley from one of the sides. and even veteran units would break under a medium~close range of fire... and if you consider that the core of the army was built around conscripted or poorly trained infantry, you would understand that this probably happened a lot.

>pic very related: it could be this or like someone pointed before, the pikemen's "bad war". sometimes, you're supposed to route and flee - if you don't the result is absolute destruction and carnage for one or both sides.

>>1927476
Don't need a complex strategy when you have millions of troops and a blatant disregard for the value of human life. Zerg rush that bitch.

>>1933335
>5% misfires
that would be a very low value even after percussion cap.
during the napoleonic warfare and depending on the weather and the training of the soldier firing, the percentage of fuck ups would be way higher than that.

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>>1934742
>tfw "i'm wearing a cuirass, i'm fucking invincible"
then this happens
fucking jelly turds hating on literal knights in shinny armor

>>1935540
Why not both tho

>>1934856
>artillery proof shield
you mean pocket bunkers?

>>1935555
Because the leaders who showed initiative were killed
USSR was retarded like that, it was more politics than war

>>1935556
You could call them that, but it's like a wide shield with holes for muskets that is carried by the front row, while the rows behind fire.

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>>1935572
i think you're understimating the power of artillery
remember vessels with several tons being sinked and huge stone walls being destroyed? yeah, that was all artillery...
also, when we're talking about cannons for example, you could die just with the "wind" (carring debris) of it, without the cannonball actually hit you; which says a lot about cannons in general. add an extra layer of destruction and a bigger blast radious and you'll have an howitzer so there's really no way to counter artillery by infantry except not being there when it arrives.

>>1935587
Yeah, good point on their fearsome power, but I gotta ask, would the wind really go through the shield?

>>1935591
no idea since it's an hypothetical shield
but if used defensively you could probably have some degree of success in protecting yourself but if used offensively (to charge cannon positions for example) you would probably get utterly destroyed by caninster shot.

>>1935596
If you don't mind, what would be the better way to deal with artillery, assuming you have little manpower but plenty of resources and industrial power?

>>1935602

Not him, but lots and lots of your own artillery.

>>1935602
horses

>>1930883
I think I read in Herodotas that they would swing the nonhorizontal pikes back and forth to help deflect arrows, which might work considering for the most part the only thing putting energy into the arrows at that point is gravity.

I mean I read that even puffy padded wool stopped arrows pretty well.

>>1934113
Realistically? In any fight like that simply driving off the skirmishers is more than enough. Now you're getting into the arena of "what would X commander do?"

Personally, I'd send a runner to the Dragoons commander and order a withdrawal after seeing the skirmishers off. It'll take them time to regroup, count their dead and missing, and decide whether or not to attack again. All the while the column continues on, going to take the town where your womenfolk are praying for your victory.

If the Dragoon commander chased the skirmishers down? They'd likely lose him, yeah, but it'd be dumb to chase them into their own territory anyways. Chase them off and go fuck their women. No need to go kill them all. If they decide to do this same shit again--which is all they can do, since they're skirmishers and not a combined arms force--then just lather, rinse, repeat.

That ambush was your ideal situation, and there's genuinely enough of an argument that it would fail. I hope by now you have some understanding of why combined arms was important in the era.

>>1935618

Wasn't artillery a meme anyway?. As in only useful to make some noise and create some confusion, but nit really have much of an actual lethal effect during a pitched battle?

>>1935928
You underestimate the effect "some noise and smoke" can have on morale. Plus you gotta understand that most battles were not fought to the annihilation of the enemy, they were fought until one side routs or withdraws. You're right, cannon don't kill many, but their function is still important.

They might not kill a lot of people, but a cannonball smashing through three ranks of your buddies, leaving watermelon sized holes where their chests used to be is horrifying and usually pretty detrimental to morale. Sure, the volley only killed three people in the entire battalion, but the guys around the dead guys are now pretty shaken up. A further few volleys by infantry lines or a charge may well break a disheartened foe. Nothing a commander can do when the men are pissing their pants and running.

The effect of cannon can also be measureable on horse.

FUrthermore, at closer ranges, cannons firing flechette shells, which were common, could have devastating effect on incoming enemy. There are many accounts of battalions of cavalry being turned away before they've even reached the enemy line due to a single well timed volley of flechette. Youre not gonna kill an entire cavalry charge, but you'll inflict enough damage that the formation thinks twice about charging further, especially when artillery is (and it always is) backed up and protected by infantry.

>>1929955
>trench warfare
>failure
Nigger trench warfare was necessary. Prior to the trenches you had unbelievably bloody massacres with tens of thousands dying in each battle on each side. The bloodshed was so catastrophic it made both sides take stock and adopt more cautious, conservative tactics to preserve the lives of their men. True, life in the trenches was hell, but at least they were fucking alive instead of blown to bits by artillery or cut down by machineguns in suicide charges.

>>1935800

In the first surprise discharge, assuming an incredibly generous 50% fail at hitting a fucking column of troops standing in the open because meme reasons, you still have 350 cucks down.

Confusion will ensue and since cucks don't operate of there own initiative they'll stop, stand where they are and wait for the orders, most likely to reposition to face the tree lines. Meanwhile, I'm shooting a second discharge. That's another 350 cucks down.

Once they're finally in position they'll probably shoot. Shoot not at will, but at the command voice of fire. A mass volley against guys behind the tree lines that can take cover. Being extremely generous, the cucks will have a 5% success rate at hitting anybody. That's 30 guys down.

My turn. 300 cucks down.

Meanwhile dragonfags have manouvered to attack one specific sector of one of the two flanks. I deal with that situation as stated before.

The cucks, now down to ~1200 of the original 2100, best case scenario now advance against one of the flanks, probably the opposite to where the dragoons are. I'll shoot a final discharge there and disengage before they reach the tree line. Worst case scenario for them, they still stand there in the open shooting at the trees, so the carnage goes on.

In the other flank, dragonfags vs my regrouping and reposition men I 'll sustain some casualties first, but not much since I'm spread out. Once I consolidate they fight will be even. Since they don't count with infantry support and are already sustaining casualties as well, they won't be in a position to pursue my orderly retreat in that flank through the forest.

End of the 'battle'.

Cuck Army casualties; ~1200.
Ambushers casualties; less than 100.

>>1936039
Hahaha holy shit, you're back.>>1936039

>>1936038
That is not exactly how trench warfare (the kind that happened on the western front) came about - it came about as a result of a strategic decision by Germany to retreat and entrench after failing in their quick strike.

Holy shit this has got to be the guy who argued that islands in the Med were not inhabited because they could not be reached by boats and ships until the modern period or something... this has got to be bait.

>>1936077
>after failing in their quick strike
You make it sound so neat and tidy with this pretty little sentence. "Oh they just failed in their quick strike is all". Meanwhile tens of thousands of dead are littered everywhere as a result of that "failure."

The human cost was real and staggering, it was enough to sober even the most bloodthirsty general.

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>Ctrl + F cuck
>17 on 73

>>1928477
>I wouldn't have the intention of holding/gaining any ground whatsoever but to rekt the enemy.
They right through your flankand burn your villages.
>Thus there's no need to communicate anything to any particular detachment of soldiers once they understand this and are capable of acting of their own initiative as per requested in the flow of events. I.e if one specific flank is being attacked by an important fraction of the cuck army, they don't HAVE to hold the ground but simply move back or to a different position.
If your flank gets overrun and it retreats a new part of your army becomes the flank, that part will get overrun too. You'll just be retreating constantly because any competent commander will move with overwhelming force on a small area.
>Also, the rest of the troops would see that the cucks are weakening one of their flanks in a desperate attempt to outnumber and engage in cuck warfare one of our flanks,so they too can read the situation and act accordingly of their own initiative if an advantageous occasion is blatantly present.
If you fire muskets in the area you chose to fight in you have a dense forest filled with smoke. Reading the battle won't be effective. You have no quick lines of communication so nobody has any oversight. If every unit fights on their own initiative you have no input from your general, you'd just have a well drilled peasant rabble attacking an organised army.

>>1936114

This board is fucking shit. At least they ban cuckshit on Krautchan.

>>1936114
I find it far stranger that people actually try to argue with an obvious retard that can't write two sentences without going cuck

>>1929882
>Just ignore them. If you don't respond to their sabres hitting you they'll get bored and stop.

>>1931877
>sir, there are reports from the townsfolk of about 10,000 men covered in shit moving through the forest, day after day, heading in what appears to random directions near the roads.
>right, have the calvery spread out a little farther than usual, report any sightings of haggard shit-covered bastards in the woods. If they decide to actually come this way. In the meantime, continue the march to their capital and remove their supplies lines.

why is there so much drama ITT

>>1936249
>KEKS

>>1936253
Huh, admins seem to have turned [cucks] into cucks.

Excuse me if I'm wrong, but wouldn't artillery be a good counter against skirmishers who are "entrenched" in a forest?

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>>1936174
As someone said before: Refuting his arguments is an excellent way to tell some other people how things actually went.

Another group of people are pic related.
The second group means that the best way to get information on the internet is to claim something that's wrong.

>>1936039
In what world do you live?

Assuming the enemy commander walks right fucking into your perfect terrain advantage in march formation with no scouts, sentries picketts or whatever, let's also assume you managed to hide like 3000 men in the woods. Your front is like 2 kilometers wide if everyone is in cover.

So you've pulled off the greatest fucking surprise ever, your enemy commander is retarded and you assume that the men will STILL stand there after theyve been ambushed? They're more likely to flee, and if their commander is in anyway competent, will rally them, regroup, and then crush the one advantage you had. Thats when calvary charges, artillery fires and yes, your hated lines of musket men will problably focus down a flank. You have 100 dudes in cover against a like of 2000 because your front is so stretched. You speak of confusion like your soldiers are immune to it; try to communicate a strategy that requires flawless execution when every single one of your soldiers and officers are hidden.

That's if the enemy decide to fight you at all. They could always not fight, and take your supply lines or whatever governing apparatus appoints a general who is so clearly retarded

*ambushes you out of a treeline*
*kills 200+ of line infantrymen for every returned shot*
hehe... nothin personell, cuck..
*disengages and walks away*

>>1936080
Or the guy who was refused to believe that nations around the world were unable to effectively deal with the Black Death in the 14th century.

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>>1936039
>50% accuracy
>even assuming rifled muskets

>>1936080
>>1936520
Are there screencaps?

>>1936535
>Screencaps
Too much to screencap.
>https://desuarchive.org/his/thread/1885884/

>>1936282

The numbers and specifics of the scenario were already posted, Cletus O'Cuck the III jr. >>1933195

Communication of the strategy is simple when everybody undestands this is just an ambush to eradicate cucks meant to last until the tactical advantage of shooting sitting ducks in the open dissapears.

I'm not really sure if that's the communication part that confuses you or is it the part 'k, guys, everyone fire at will when the guys in x sector of the tree line start shooting as the cuck vanguard reaches that point".

You cucks are thick af.

>>1936257
Assuming explosive shells : yes probably. That's the sort of things howitzers were invented for.

>>1927548
>has seen rise of standing in...
Oh hi Mr. Time Leaper, are our mangas period-accurate?

>>1936555

So, basically, your guys will shoot at the first enemy they see, and will only shoot at the vanguard of the enemy, killing a very few of them before exposing their position, at which point the enemy bypasses your position or rushes them with cavalry.


Hell, without communication, how do your men know when the "tactical advantage" has disappeared? How will they know what's going on at the other end of the line outside of their line of sight?

Were your mother and father brother and sister?

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>>1936555
>KEK

>>1936526

To say that 50% success is "way to much" when firing at an infantry column, that is, a single target +50ft long sounds like bs.

But let's assume that you guys masterbating to the infantry operations manual and arguing desperately in favour of the Cuck Army are right and that's too much. What'd be correct figure then? 20%?

And then what be the figure for hitting an INDIVIDUAL mobile target covering behind the tree lines? Something like 0'005% then.

Kek. Cucks are fucked either way.

But if that was the case (which .I don't think it was) and muskets effectively that fucking useless, your infantry line would the cuckest and gayest formation ever in History, pretty much nothing more than glorified bayonets.

>>1936693
>What'd be correct figure then? 20%?

About 5% for the initial volley, with accuracy decreasing as successive volleys are fired, mostly due to decreasing visibility.

Which is an enormously higher figure than older firearms or pre-firearm missile weapons. You look at a battle like towton and you had literally hundreds of thousands of arrows fired and probably less than 5,000 people killed by them.

>And then what be the figure for hitting an INDIVIDUAL mobile target covering behind the tree lines? Something like 0'005% then.


Extremely low, yes, which is why they'd rush in and finish things hand to hand, probably from horseback.

>But if that was the case (which .I don't think it was) and muskets effectively that fucking useless, your infantry line would the cuckest and gayest formation ever in History, pretty much nothing more than glorified bayonets.

Bayonet charging was a thing for the entire period of line battle. It usually won or lost line battles. Do you have any fucking clue what you're talking about, or do you just like to call people cucks?

>>1936729
>>1936693

And before you go claiming that my numbers are ridiculous, take a look at the Battle of Austerlitz, to just pull one famous battle of the era.

You had a combined total of about 24,000 dead and wounded between the two sides, who had armies with a combined number of about 155,000. So already, the combined dead and wounded (not county captured, they weren't shot), is about 15% of the two forces committed, well below your "corrected" figure of 20%.

And this is a battle that lasted about 8 hours, had quite a bit of cannon fire and hand to hand fighting, so not all of the dead and wounded would be shot. And of course, in an eight hour battle, people are going to be shooting more than once. Given that the Russians retired in part because most of their men were out of ammo, and that I believe a Russian infantryman of the beginning of the 19th century carried 60 shots, you can work out the math yourself for how inaccurate an individual volley would likely be.

>>1927438

Muskets were highly innaccurate. By joining soldiers together you maximize your chances by producing a "shotgun effect".

>>1936693
If I never see the word "cuck" in a /his/ thread again, it'll be too soon. You are probably the best example of dunning-kruger in action I've seen.

This is the "Black Death was done by TEH JOOS" thread all over again.

>Bushfag is sitting in his foxhole, getting flanked and bombarded to pieces, and still claiming victory

You shouldn't be trusted ordering at a drive thru, let alone companies of soldiers.

>>1936981
Foxholes? You doubt the divine power of our savior bushes and trees? HERESY

>>1936776
>Muskets were highly innaccurate.

depends on the load and range

war shot was often under caliber, so you could load quickly. The trade off is the ball is less accurate than it would be if it hugged the barrel.

I'm accurate with smooth bores at 50 yds.

>>1937039

Ever try that in bad visibility and with people shooting back?

>>1936546
>>1934769