To fix bayonets or not to fix...

[Adar]

OK, so we are talking about the early years of the 18th century, a time of tactical transition. In fact the bayonet, as you point out, was only just being introduced. Before this time the pike was a better was definitely useful.

This is what you were talking about

I know that Gustav re-introduced the notiuon of charging home and using "cold steel". However, that was a little (!) while earlier and the assumption that Polish armies (only one of several enemies in the game surely) would in some way be too "backward" to take advantage of this should be punished in the game.

If there was such a tactical decision made then this should be reflected in the game to the detriment of Sweden.

Sweden used pikemen to great effect up until 1721 (that is, until the army ran out of suitable soldiers...). They where used for 20 years in the ETW time frame (not a little(!) while earlier) and they where used to great effect against Danes, Saxons, Poles, Russians and the reformed Russian army (which also used pikes, every 2nd man in the front line was armed with a pike). Considering that the Swedish army went up against numerically superior armies and won would it be quite silly to punish the army for using pikes, they apparently worked. Especially the French shared Swedens view on musket fire and prefered the a prest attack (fancy name for human wave) but also some British generals like Charles Grey prefered a charge rather than exchanging fire. Charhing with cold steel was apparently a tactic used not only be the Swedes.

The difference between these armies and the Swedish army was that they had a larger tactical flexibility than the Swedish army. The Swedish army basicly traded tactical flexibility for a superior shock attack. Remember, this is an age where armour and shields had been abandoned. Getting charged by an enemy with a pike just isn't healthy when standing in closed formation without armour.

The reason that the pike disappeared is that it was uneconomic. Musket armed soldiers are of much more use when fighting in a fortified position, on sentry duty and it also helps each soldier to protect himself from harassment (since they can return fire). Adding pikes to the a battalion of musketers ment that they became superior for offensive manouvers during a field battle. Generalship during the 19th century was alot about avoiding field battles and still beat the enemy, therefor the musket was prefered over the pike in most armies while some highly organised and offensive armies retained it.

So to summarise:
Cold steel charges where still an effective strategy during the 18th century as shown by the French, the Swedes, the Russians and the British.

Having pikemen in the formation ment that you lost some firepower but greatly enhanced the shock effect, this ment that armies relying on offensive tactics benefited from using pikes.

The pike was very useful in field battles where offensive battalion level manouvering was possible and was combined with musket fire for a devestating charge. The pike lost becuase the musket was more useful in non-field battle situations

Therefor a unit with mixed equipment shouldn't be punished for having pikes. The pike was an offensive weapon used to break the enemy lines.

A soldier's musket, if not exceedingly ill bored, will strike the figure of a man at 80 yards; it may even at 100; but a soldier must be very unfortunate indeed who shall be wounded...at 150 yards, provided his antagonist aims at him; I do maintain...no man was ever killed at 200 yards, by a common soldier's musket by the person who aimed at him.¹

- British Col. George Hanger, 1814

Source

[Sh3rpa]

If you are calling the English idiots I suppose you are saying that 'Idiots' built the biggest empire the world has ever seen. Are you American? if so please explain to your troops In Iraq what the phrase friendly fire means and explain how it is not a good thing to do. If you are not American pass the message on anyway. ty

Wow, I take offense to this. Please STFU next time you feel like arm-chair generalin' or calling troops fighting for their lives idiots (that is in fact what you are implying).

Your tragic lashing out against the United States is hilarious, yet very telling.

I believe the post your responding to was simply calling non-military leaders who get involved with technical warfare decisions, idiots.

You seem very angry with America. We're pretty normal over here. No orders to "secretly kill the brits".

Take the kindergarten insults that way---------------------->


ON TOPIC:

I remember learning somewhere that until much later innovations to the bayonet, once fixed they made a weapon EXTREMELY inaccurate.

There should be a button for loading (load once, fire at will mode, or stand down. Three switch buttom seems easy enough). If there is no button for loading, an earlier post pointed out, your troops may stop and load after charging a distance, right in front of the enemy. A "loading when in range" system would be terrible.

Furthermore, they should definitely make bayonets reduce accuracy a lot, and firing rate somewhat. Therefore they must be attachable by button. If I want my men to stand there ground and fire their weapons, its my call. If bayonets were equipable, they could change the way units act when activated or not. It would probably enhance the realism of the engine, and the AI.

And just like the loading button, make it a "triple switch" with "Attach bayonets", "Auto attach when in range", and "Normal, no bayonet". They gotta program triple switch buttons, it would make all scenarios possible.


Finally, some have said this would complicate things. Are you serious?!?!? Without buttons for loading and bayonets, there wouldn't be much else micro!

[Agent Provocateur]

I still can not see any serious army of the period actually entering action without their bayonets attached. Infantry would be constantly in danger of either cavalry or enemy infantry closing with them, the only reliable way of repelling them would the bayonet, they wouldn't have wanted to waste time attaching bayonets. At any point a commander might decide to advance and charge, no time to stop and attach bayonets there either. Nowadays the order to attach bayonets has as much a morale effect as a practical one, it signal to your troops that this is a serious engagement where you might have to come to close quarters, it's a statement of intent. I think this aspect of it is a much more modern aspect, back in the days of the game I think getting up close and personal in a fight was taken for granted.

As for accuracy, I think that would've been a moot point for the vast majority of troops. Muskets didn't have sights, the effective range was short anyway, most troops were simply told to aim at the middle of a target irrespective of range, many didn't train with live ammo (and so had little practical experience of the effects of range and aiming point ) and most if they were disciplined waited for an order to open fire. That order was given on the basis of average casualties infilcted at different ranges. An officer or NCO would have an idea how much damage his troops would inflict. Of course if they only ever trained with blanks and aimed at the middle of targets that estimate might be completely wrong.

At no point in all this would the marginal benefits of accuracy have outweighed the advantages of having bayonets attached.

Reload rates, I think we have a re-enactor's word here somewhere to testify that that a bayonet does not impede reloading in any meaningful way. You might stab youhand if you are careless, but I believe forgetting the ram rod in the barrel was much more common.

I still haven't seen a compelling reason to over-complicate and have to micro-manage a standard procedure like that.

Specialist troops wouldn't have wanted to be impeded by a bayonet and should maybe have an "auto attach" bayonets if the enemy get within a certain range.

I' m just trying to think of the balance between what is an interesting facet of 18th c tatics and what becomes cumbersome in a game.

[Gorrrrrn]

Infantry were armed with a long smoothbore musket, fired by a lump of flint striking against a serrated steel face. This was accompanied by a socket bayonet which would be attached to the muzzle for close combat. Guidelines varied between the armies but there were anything up to 20 separate steps involved in loading and firing a musket. In the heat of battle, an average infantryman could reasonably be expected to fire one or two shots per minute. Since the effective range was about 60 yards and anything further than 100 yards was completely safe from harm, this did not afford a great deal of opportunity for the extended fire fights so popular in films. More reasonably, an infantry unit would fire at most two volleys and then prepare to accept a charge with bayonets. An attacking infantry unit would very rarely fire at all.

http://www.battlefile.info/Waterloo/weapons1.php

Suggests that infantry ordered to stand would rarely get off more than 1 or 2 shots before closing, and attacking infantry would advance with fixed bayonets, that is, would fix bayonets on the order to advance.

Just how many infantry would attempt to load a musket with a bayonet attached I don't know, but given the low level of training of line regiments (As opposed to light or guards) I suspect it was safer to load without the bayonet fixed, but if in doubt and about to be attacked, not to bother loading at all and fix bayonet and stand ready to receive an attack.

(Would be nice to have programmable standing orders for units - the AI will I presume have something similar but the human player could be given the option to vary distance at which bayonets are fixed, volleys fired etc.)

[worm00]

On whether bayonets where fixed from the beginning of a battle:

I think I read somewhere that in the American Civil War bayonets weren't fixed until the order was given, i.e. when melee was imminent. If that's the case, then surely it must be assumed to be the same throughout the timeframe of ETW.

Can someone confirm/look-up the bayonet use in the American Civil War?

[schoenkoenig]

Well, no, troops wouldn't always have their bayonets fixed on the day of battle. If, however, the enemy was within 3-400 yards, bayonets would most certainly be fixed. Troops tended to advance with leveled bayonets, rather than arms at port, since it looked a bit more intimidating if a line of enemy infantry was pointing their bayonets at you rather than the sky.

I don't imagine that Total War battles are going to have us deploying a mile out from the enemy line, so to not have automatically fixed bayonets seems a little moot. Troops could, and did, load their weapons with bayonets fixed - it was what they were trained to do, as opposed to firing accurately, which they were not trained to do.

[Condottiere SOG]

From 'The Art of Warfare in the Age of Napoleon' by Gunther E. Rothenberg;

annotated by myself in bold

(this book is used as reference and curriculum at military schools all over the U.S.)

'The myth of cold steel: bayonets in combat;
Although all armies cherished the bayonet, a triangular blade about 15 to 18 inches in long fastened to the end of the muzzle by a ring socket, it is doubtful that this weapon was very effective. Still, its use has appealed to every Republican and Imperialist(as a form of execution) in France. Carnot's instructions of february 1794 had ordered 'action with the bayonet on every occasion', and Napoleon, too, liked cold steel(nearly every political prisoner dispensed by him in this fashion)."To be killed regularly,'Captain Blaze claimed sardonically,' one had to be killed by the bayonet....the Emporer had an extreme fondness for those who perished in this manner." More importantly, official doctrine, as expounded by Guy de Vernon, at the Ecole Polytechnique, claimed that only the first volley was effective, 'after which the bayonet and the sword may charge without sustaining great losses.' For that matter, Austrian and Prussian regulations also stressed the role of the bayonet in the attack, and even the reforming Archduke Charles regarded ir as the best weapon for hand-to-hand combat. As for the Russians, General Wilson reported in 1810, that the 'bayonet is a truly russian weapon', and the 'Precepts for Infantry Officers on the Day of Battle', issued in the summer of 1812, still advocated the bayonet charge delivered in deep column formation.
Yet, few soldiers actually fought each other with cold steel. At Austerlitz, the Russian guards made a classic 300-yard charge, but were exhausted after breaking through the first French line and driven back by fire(the bane of the bayonet charge). Generally, it was the threat of the bayonet, and not the actual clash that decided the issue(as at Valmy). After studying the casualties suffered by units in a number of hand-to-hand combats, Surgeon General Larrey of the Grand Army found only five bayonet wounds and concluded that the effect of the weapon was primarily psychological. And one of Wellington's senior medical officers, George J. Guthrie, asserted that formed regiments 'charging with the bayonet never meet and struggle hand to hand and foot to foot; and this for the best possible reason, that one side turns and runs away as soon as the other comes close enough to do mischief.' The observations of the medical men are supported by experienced officers. Commenting on bayonet encounters, General Lejeune pointed pointed out that these were ' very rare in modern warfare, for as a rule one of the corps is demoralized to begin with by firing, and draws back before the enemy is near enough to cross muzzles', while Jomini declared that 'I never saw such a thing on regular field of battle.'
Though rare, hand-to-hand fighting occurred when troops were struggling for a battery or redoubt, or when rain made firing impossible. At the Katzbach, in 1813, Prussian infantry attacked in a driving rain with bayonet and musket butt(an Old Fritz tactic) inflicting heavy casualties on the French. Above all, the bayonet affixed to the musket constituted a defence against cavalry and to offset the shortness of their weapons, riflemen carried an even longer blade, in the form of a sword bayonet. However, in contrast with line infantry which carried their bayonets fixed at all times(due to Old Fritz), the Prussians even discarding the scabbard, riflemen 'fixed swords' only when forming squares or preparing to receive attack in closed formation. Rifleman Costello believed that without it the slow loading rifle-armed troops would be helpless at close quarters against bayonet -equipped infantry and cavalry.
Defence against charging horses was also one of the argumentsproduced in 1792-4 for the reintroduction of the pike in France. The shortage of firearms,Combined with Republican emphasis on the attack with cold steel, were alleged to make this ancient weapon an useful instrument of war in the hands of untrained but enthusiastic soldiers. Early in 1792, pike production began in various French cities, and in August 1792, the Legislative Assembly decreed the manufacture and distribution of a national pike, roughly 10-15 feet long. Many of the new units rushed to the threatened frontier carried these weapons and as late as the summer of 1793, General Custine of the Army of the North advised one of his subordinates that lacking muskets 'we must make up for this with pikes; you are not the only one who suffers from the arms shortage.' But despite the alleged advantages of the pike for close action, upheld among others as the supply of firearms improved. Similar sentiments were voiced from time to time throughout the next 20 years in England, Ireland, Russia and finally Prussia, but in all cases the pike was considered as a mere expedient and abandoned as soon as muskets and bayonets became available.

so ends the chapter.

In my opinion, so should it be in Empire, as I aspire to realism over graphics and pulp fiction. Others may not feel the same. I will be taking my grenadiers, Prussian grenadiers, that is, up hills to batteries and redoubts.
I'd like to mention as well that it was altogether, in this period-as tactics were not solid) too easy to sidestep a bayoneteer and crack him one with the but of your own musket. The bayonet tactic came of age later with English incursions into Asia Minor, India and Africa, American adventures in the Phillipines and finally World War One, where the qualified infantry tactic demanded hand-to-hand resolve.

fin

[Agent Provocateur]

As per Condottiere. Pike = a government accountant's excuse for a weapon.

Though his reference ignores the other main point about fixing bayonets (apart from repelling cavlry) which is the statement of intent. It is like a pirate ship raising the "no quarter" jack.

Though bayonet fighting was rare the threat of it wasn't rare at all, it is just that more often than not one side broke and ran before contact.

[hessia78]

I wish the game had an earlier start date either 1650 or 1680. It would give a better frame of transitioning from the terico pike squares of the late renaissance to the line warfare tactics of the age of enlightenment.

[Principe Alessandro]

Sorry for necroeing this thread but it is really interesting.

The fact about the cold steel tactic is that it takes advantage of the inherent weakness of the line formations to resist against charges, the tricky part is that you need exceptional soldiers with great courage to cover no man's land under musket fire.