Campaign battle screenshots and videos

[Geoffrey of Villehardouin]

Battle of Sirmium

In 1167 AD, Byzantine emperor Manuel proposed to his son in law, Bela, the heir to the Hungarian throne, that he might also be the heir to the Roman throne. Alarmed at the prospect of Hungary being governed from Constantinople, the Hungarian king Stephan opposed the plan so strongly that war immediately broke out.

The Great Duke and Imperial Admiral Andronicos Kontostephanos was appointed in overall command of the Byzantine army at the war council in Sardica. The Hungarian army was led by Denes, count of Bacs, who the Byzantines called Dionysius. The two armies met near the city of Sirmium in July of that year.

The battle was described by two Byzantine historians, Ioannes Kinnamos and Niketas Choniates.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Ioannes Kinnamos

The emperor sent many Roman generals with their armies against the Hungarians who had come to Sirmium and appointed in overall command Andronicos Kontostephanos. He sent to him instructions as to how he should deploy his army and how he should fight this battle, inscribed on a tablet.

Kontostephanos, after crossing the river Sava, having come close to the Hungarian camp, did the following. He sent scouts to spy upon the enemy camp, to gain the best possible knowledge about their army. He also commanded that they should attempt to take prisoners some among the Hungarian soldiers. The scouts indeed returned with one such captive and he was questioned by Kontostephanos about the force the Hungarians have near Sirmium and what their plans may be.

“There are 37 generals commanding this army” said the prisoner, “and Dionysius {Denes] is in overall command. The army numbers 15,000 in total, made up of heavily armoured horsemen, archers and peltasts. They are in great spirits, in the knowledge this would not be the first time they will have defeated the Romans”.

Kontostephanos sent back the captive with this message, that the emperor will not tolerate their transgression against the Romans and soon will deliver upon them his judgement.

Kontostephanos ordered the army out of the camp and deployed in this fashion: The Skythikon and most of the Persian cavalry [Turks are called Persians by Kinnamos] were placed at the front, accompanied by lancers with directions to only engage the enemy in the briefest fashion.
Next, on either wing there was a phalanx (foot spearmen), on one side under the command of Kokkobasileios and Philokales and on the other side under Taticius so called Aspietes. The cavalry itself was followed by yet more infantry together with archers and a phalanx of Turkish spearmen with shields. Next, on either side were four generals: Joseph Bryennius, Georgios Branas, his brother Demetrius Branas, and Constantinos Aspietes a well-respected man. Next followed the Chartoularios Andronicos Lampardas with the elite Roman and German units and some Persians (again presumably Turkish mounted archers). Next was Andronicos Kontostephanos with men of the greatest renown, the Imperial guard [presumably the Varangians and Heteriae] and a body of Italian mercenaries. Behind them was a body of Serb spearmen with long shields. Deployed in this manner the Romans marched to battle. When the arrived at the place where Dionysius had made a tomb, the dismounted and gave an oath that they are ready to die for their people and for their families.

Seeing the approaching Romans, Dionysius has overtaken with boldness and with a sense of irony ordered his men to drink to the health of the Romans, then deploy for battle. The Hungarians having drunk so, rushed into battle, deployed as it was usual for them. At the front were placed the most heavily armoured, “as was their custom” and their army was stretched along the length of the front.

Once the two armies had come close to each other, Kontostephanos ordered the front units to open fire at the Hungarians. When the Hungarians counterattacked, the mounted archers had instructions to withdraw not so much to the rear but to the sides, in the hope that the Hungarians in chasing after them would split their forces and open up a gap in the centre of their line. But the mounted archers when counterattacked turned and fled instead directly to the rear and towards the river Sava. The Hungarians then fell upon the main battle line.

On the left two of the taxiarchies held up (those under Kokkobasileios and Taticius) while the rest retreated. Demetrius Branas was left with only 80 of his companions but fought on heroically until he was seriously injured in the face and fell and was taken prisoner. His brother Georgios retreated with his taxiarchy, unable to resist the more numerous opponents. But as the left wing was retreating, the right wing defeated decisively the Hungarians on that side.

Dionysius seeing this, resolved to attack Kontostephanos but many among his horsemen were overtaken with fear and wished to turn back. Dionysius rebuked them for their cowardice and urged them to stay in place at least, so that the Romans may not perceive their weakened resolve. Dionysius then moved towards Andronicus Kontostephanos when Andronicos Lampardas, not daunted by the large host of Dionysius fell upon him and there was a great crash, as lances broke against the shields and fell to the ground. Yet, though Georgios Branas came up with his taxiarchy to help Lampardas, the right wing began to waver. Seeing the danger that if those under Lampardas are defeated he will have to fight the battle on his own, Kontostephanos surged up with the men in his command (Imperial Guard, Italian mercenaries and the Serb spearmen). There was a great clash and at first 80 Romans fell but many more were slain among the Hungarians. The Romans fought with unseen courage and superior discipline until at last the tide of battle turned. With their spears being already broken and their swords blunted, the warriors resorted to their maces and there was such a murderous fight that the plain was covered with the dead. Finally the flag of Dionysius that had been raised high above his army came down from its mast. The horse and armour of Dionysius were captured, though he himself escaped. Some of the fleeing Hungarians were taken prisoner when they retreated towards the river where the Roman ships were, namely five generals and 800 men. Many thousands fell in the field of battle. By nightfall the Romans had collected two thousand breastplates and such a number of helmets and shields that no one was able to count. Next morning they armed themselves again and marched to the Hungarian camp. But it was found deserted. So ended the war against the Hungarians.

Niketas Choniates

The generals at the war council in Sardica considered whether the emperor himself ought to lead the campaign but the opinion prevailed that the emperor should remain in Sardica and the campaign should be led by some among the generals. The future of this war was uncertain and a defeat would hurt the emperor’s image. On the other hand, should there be victory, it would only be the more remarkable by the fact that the emperor was not even present in the battle. It was decided that the general in overall command should be the Imperial Admiral and Megas Doux (Great Duke), Andronicos Kontostephanos.

Then before the assembly of the generals was disbanded, the emperor recommended to Kontostephanos, not only the tactical methods for the conduct of the battle but also of the right time of the attack, the type of armament and the battle formations. He roused the vice-generals and the cavalry commanders and all other officers to battle, bringing to their memory not only former triumphs in battle but also asking them to consider what might the future bring should this war be lost. Finally he commended them to God and told them it would be a glory to himself should they return with trophies of war and that should they prevail in battle they would be handsomely rewarded.

The Hungarians were not daunted by the arrival of the Roman army, rather they gathered their own cavalry and an allied army made up of their neighbouring nations [presumably Szekely, Slav, Transylvanian, Vlach, etc] including some Germans under a general named Dionysius [Denes, Count of Bacs], a brave man who had previously achieved several victories in battle. This Dionysius, as soon as he heard that a Roman army had crossed the Danube, emboldened by his previous victories over the Romans, bragged that he would make a trophy in the form of a pillar from the bones of the dead Romans as he had done before, when he had defeated Branas and Gabras in battle.

So on the day of the feast of Procopius the martyr, Konstostephanos deployed his army for battle. After putting on his armour, he ordered everyone to do the same and each one went to take charge of their own regiment and to deploy it in good order. And he took himself command of the main phalanx front and appointed Andronicos Lampardas in command of the right wing and other taxiarchs in command of the left wing. He also placed a second line of auxiliary phalanx formations behind the first at the two wings, so that they might aid those in front should they waver in the course of battle.

Just as the army was ready for battle, there arrived a messenger bringing a letter from the emperor instructing that the battle should be postponed for a more propitious day (presumably a recommendation from an astrologer). The general put the message under his arm and said nothing to the other officers, neither what the message was nor what the plan shall be, rather wisely he began to deal with other matters. In this way the day passed as it might have been a fateful day, quite unsuitable for joining battle. For the wisdom of God is written even upon the stars and astrologers claim they can read the decision of God in their positions and movements as if from a book on a desk.

Finally, on the morning of the appointed day for the battle, Kontostephanos gave a speech saying “Romans, remember your renown in battle and consider no glory or fortune impossible. We are not alone mortals nor is our foe made of iron. They are not dressed in steel and we are naked. Nor are they well trained and we retired from war. Rather we have the same armament and moreover a better education, we have a long experience and superior strategic and tactical methods in the conduct of battle. We have prevailed against them before. So men, soldiers, remember your sons and fellow countrymen. See that the deep flowing Danube will carry in his swirling waves the cries of our foe through the lands it passes through, announcing everywhere the Paeonians’ defeat and the victory of the Romans”.

Having spoken so, the general led the army onto a wide and open plain. Dionysius in response brought out his own men from the camp, with a joyful complexion, clapping and happy as if he had come not to a battle but to a game. As if not knowing what to do, he did not divide his army into a left and right wing, nor into cavalry and infantry but he spread his army into a single formation mixing the cavalry with the infantry along the entire front, as if driven by raw contempt for his foe.
He raised, too, a flag on a high mast on a cart drawn by four bulls. This army made for a frightening sight, difficult to countenance, with horsemen armed with lances all along the front. Nor were the soldiers alone heavily armoured and expensively arrayed but even the horses’ heads were crowned with plumes and covered with armour, as was their sternum (chest) to protect them from missiles. And the neighing of the horses and the shine of the armour against the sun, for the two armies had come close against each other, made the sight even more impressive and caused fear and wonder.

The day being at noon, the time was now right to join battle. Kontostephanos, leaving the wings to watch the foe on either side, ordered the mounted archers [hippotoxotae] to come forward and engage the enemy. The general’s plan was to shake and disrupt the continuity of the enemy line. The two armies clashed shield to shield, head to head, spear to spear and horse against horse, in the Homeric fashion. There was a terrifying battle, devouring the men, and the two armies rippled as waves, moving like a dragonsnake shaking its scales.

Dionysius like an unmoving wall marched against Kontostephanos and the army under him. As soon as the Romans received his attack there where strikes and couterstrikes with spears as the warriors sparred at each other and pushed and heaved. The lances or spears were soon broken and the men on the two sides drew out their swords and fell upon each other fighting on. These were blunted at last against the copper and iron armour of the armies on both sides and the Hungarians wondered how to continue fighting with the Romans. Yet the Romans drew out their iron maces, which they always carried with them. With these they could strike deadly blows at the faces and heads of their foe. Those among the Hungarians who were dazed by these blows withdrew to the rear. Many received serious wounds and the continuous Hungarian front was finally broken, nor was there one among the Romans who did not overcome an adversary or did not ride a horse after vanquishing its rider.

The day was full and the trumpet was calling the end of the battle when the flag came down from the chariot of Dionysius. So were the Hungarians defeated.

In short, the Byzantines sent in first mounted skirmishers to entice the Hungarians into battle, then received the cavalry charges with their spearment (long speared phalanx of Contaratoi, fronted by the so-called promachoi, the Menavlatoi, Byzantine anti-cavalry specialists). These two types of units were the so-called defensores and were backed up by cursores - mounted skirmishers as well as javelinners and archers. Behind this first line of defense was a second line of phalanx, the cavalry and the Imperial Guard under the general in command, Andronikos Kontostephanos. The Hungarians managed to turn temporarily the Byzantine left flank but were defeated on the other side, probably with the help of the Byzantine heavy cavalry under Lampardas. The battle came to critical point when the Hungarian general Denes attacked with the Hungarian reserves and Kontostephanos in response ordered forward the Imperial Guard.

The battle is in two videoclips, about 16 minutes each, annotated with subtitles from the histories of Ioannes Kinnamos and Niketas Choniates.

[Geoffrey of Villehardouin]

A shorter version of the battle of Sirmium, with most of the narrative but on a video only half as long.

[Geoffrey of Villehardouin]

Times full of Distemper, part I

This is the first of a couple of videos from a campaign. For King or Country mod of the English Civil War. I have made a few modifications to achieve bigger battles with a slightly improved battle AI (more merciful to enemy cavalry and generals). The videoclip was a few snippets from the first four battles from September-October 1642.

1. A battle at Cropredy bridge between Prince Rupert and Colonel Laurence. Laurence got trounced. There had been an actual historical battle at Powick bridge at around this time, with Prince Rupert a protagonist - and he had won. There was also a historical battle at Cropredy bridge later in the war.
2. A battle in Hampshire between Parliamentarian William Waller and Royalist Marmaduke Rawdon. Rawdon and Waller were indeed in that part of the country at that part of the year. Waller took a defensive position on a high ground but despite his advantageous position he nearly lost the battle. Just like in real life.
3. A battle between Parliamentarian Baron Brooke and Royalists Earl of Northampton and Charles Gerard in Worcesterrshire. Indeed such a battle took place at that time near Warwick. Baron Brooke won and Northampton was killed. In actual history he was killed in a battle in that part of the country six months later.
4. A massive battle east of Oxford, near Thame, involving 14000 combatants. Thame was a Parliamentarian HQ in 1643 and a small battle indeed took place there. However, at this time of the year an epic battle had taken place northwest of Oxford at Edgehill with much the same participants as in this one.

On the Royalist side, overall command was with the king. The infantry was under Lord Astley in the centre, the Earl of Forth on the left and Rupert on the right. Rupert also had his own regiment of horse on the far right and the Earl of Forth a regiment of horse on the far left. Prince Maurice had a regiment of horse in reserve. This is not far off how things were in the actual battle at Edgehill. On the Parliament side, overall command was under the Earl of Essex. Skippon with some of the London trayned bands and an assortment of other infantry was on the left, Essex in the centre and the Eastern Association under the Earl of Machester on the right. On the far right was the Eastern Association's cavalry under Oliver Cromwell. On the far left Haselrig's regiment and other cavalry and dragoons under Haselrig's command.

The battle started with Oliver Cromwell on the right routing the Earl of Forth's cavalry. Prince Maurice counterattacked with his reserve cavalry regiment and with help from the Earl of Forth's infantry put Oliver Cromwell's cavalry to flight. Manchester and Essex pushed forward and turned back Maurice whose cavalry run into the Royalist infantry, being hard-pressed by Manchester and Essex, that was routed. King Charles watched from the distance, saw the rout and abandoned the battlefield. Lord Astley was still fighting, engaged with Essex's infantry and on the left Philip Skippon was holding back Prince Rupert's cavalry. Rupert, rather than paying some attention to Haselrig's cavalry, had idiotically (and despite even using the Stainless Steel 6.1 battle AI) charged headlong without waiting for his infantry to catch up. Haselrig nicely took his cavalry to the prince's rear and Rupert's cavalry broke and fled. At that point Rupert's infantry were still trudging forward, the musketeers had become separated from the pikemen and the whole lot was annihilated leaving Astley in cold water. His bluecoats fought the longest, holding back and avoiding the crazy antics of Rupert. Nonetheless, here too the pikemen had been separated from the musketeers and became gradually scattered as they marched forward into the arms of Essex's foot. Oliver Cromwell's cavalry and Manchester with his lifeguard then charged into Astley's musketeers and Astley threw down his hat, after losing his entire lifeguard, and the last of the Royalist army called it a day.

It was a most glorious day, a truly massive battle.



------------------------------------------------
[MT2W FKoC AAR] Times full of Distemper http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=495533

[Geoffrey of Villehardouin]

Times full of Distemper part II: The winter months of the campaign (1642-1643).

The first winter of the war was a time of taking chances. Lincoln was besieged by the Royalists, unsuccessfully. The Earl of Stamford and Robartes ganged up and managed to defeat Hopton in Cornwall, but sadly the Earl of Stamford rebelled and abandoned the Parliament cause after that. That was not too unreasonable as there was a peace party in Parliament and besides, historically Stamford did not fight again in the actual war after his first battle anyway.

The longest battle was at a bridge between Leeds and York. Leeds at this timepoint became the base of Thomas Fairfax and his father Ferdinando Lord Fairfax. Thomas Fairfax was more actively campaigning and had laid siege on York. That was not going to be successful, however as York had a large garrison. So he retreated to a bridge over the river Aire where he joined battle with the Earl of Newcastle. The Royalists attacked over the bridge. It was suicidal. A winter battle did indeed take place that year. During a blizzard, in the winter of 1642-43, Thomas Fairfax crossed the Aire and attacked the Royalist army in Leeds, capturing the city.

The last battle was a raid by the Royalists across the Severn that was turned back by Edward Massie.



Most of the music in this and subsequent videos in this series is by William Lawes, a musician who fought in the Lifeguard of Charles I

------------------------------------------------
[MT2W FKoC AAR] Times full of Distemper http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=495533

[Geoffrey of Villehardouin]

Times full of Distemper part III

March and April of 1643 were dominated by two series of several battles in the West Midlands, with Baron Broooke a protagonist, and in the north around Leeds and York, with Thomas Fairfax a protagonist.

Baron Brooke took Lichfield after a battle with Charles Gerard and made some fortifications (a fort). He was besieged for a month by Prince Rupert and though he sallied out and won the battle, he retreated to Warwick to refit his army. There he was attacked while most of his army was outside the castle. The battle took place under very dramatic heavily clouded skies at the outskirts of the town. The Royalists were badly led and were beaten back.

In the north, the Royalists were building up their armies and George Goring had also assembled an impressive cavalry force. Fairfax made a feint towards York and near the bridge over the Wharfe, near Tadcaster in Branham Moor, he attacked a Royalist regiment and completely destroyed it. On his way back to Leeds he encountered a force of cavalry and dragoons under George Goring. They had the high ground (similar to the historical battle at Seacroft Moor) and Fairfax was in the open, so he moved quickly into a flanking position in a wood and his pikemen attempted to make space there for the musketeers to take refuge. In the historical battle at Seacroft Moor, Fairfax had no pikemen and most of his infantry were militia of local peasants. In this case, his better trained and equipped infantry held back Goring's attack. Two cavalry troops hidden in a wood finally charged up the back of the hill and fell upon the rear of some dragoons who broke and fled, precipitating a general Royalist rout.



------------------------------------------------
[MT2W FKoC AAR] Times full of Distemper http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=495533

[Geoffrey of Villehardouin]

Times full of Distemper part IV

Warwick was besieged again from May to June but Baron Brooke used cunning and his superb cavalry to see the Royalist armies off.



------------------------------------------------
[MT2W FKoC AAR] Times full of Distemper http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=495533

[Geoffrey of Villehardouin]

Battle of Lansdown, 5th July 1643

A relatively historically accurate re-enactment of the Battle of Lansdown.

William Waller, the Commander of the Southwestern Association had 3000 Foot arrayed on the brow of Lansdown Hill, with some dragoons in the flanks. It was a strong position in friendly territory. The Royalists were under the overall command of the Marquiss of Hertford but on the ground Ralph Hopton commanded at least 5000 Foote while Prince Maurice was the most prominent Royalist cavalry commander and, in his own view at least, overall commander of the approximately 3000-strong Horse.

William Waller had superiority in cavalry, that included his own Regiment of Horse and Arthur Haselrig's formiddable Cuirassiers that the Royalists had dubbed the "London lobsters". The latter were the most highly vaunted cavalry on the Parliamentarian side, at least during that period in the war, and this was the battle where they saw most of their action. To draw the Royalists into battle up against his advantageous position, Waller sent Haselrig and much of the rest of his cavalry (plus some dragoons) on attacks against a Royalist position on Togg Hill and on skirmishes at the Royalist rearguard when they attempted to abandon the field.

At one point it seems the Cornish Foot decided more or less by popular demand to go on the offensive, seeing the Parliament Horse running off, and cried out to Ralph Hopton "Let us fetch that cannon!" referring to William Waller's cannon at the top of Lansdown Hill. So an all-out battle ensued with the Cornish pikemen in the centre marching directly up the hill under the command of Bevil Grenville. Musketeers advanced mostly on their left and the Royalist cavalry that had regrouped advanced on the right where the ground was more open. So at least the Royalists did not seem to have deployed in one of the standard tactical formations of the time.

There were at least three charges of the Cuirassiers and two charges of Waller's Regiment of Horse in addition to charges by the other Parliamentarian cavalry regiments. The Cornish Foot had heavy casualties and Colonel Bevil Grenville died in action - but they pushed on. The musketeers on the left wing made it to the top of the hill first, after pushing back the Parliamentarian dragoons on that side. Under their cover, the Cornish pikemen managed to reach the brow of the hill and captured some of the Parliamentarian cannon. They were joined by 1600 Horse, all that remained of the initial 3000 strong cavalry of the Royalists. Waller at that point being numerically disadvantaged despite the casualties he had inflicted, gave orders to his Foot to retreat further back on the hill to some stone walls where the Foot was barricaded for the rest of the day. Both sides had spent most of their gunpowder and were tired so there were no further moves. At night, William Waller's Foot stole away after firing off a barrage that failed to shake their opponents.

In my actual campaign battle, at that point the Royalists had been sufficiently weakened that they actually lost the fight and retreated but in Medieval II Total War there are relatively less serious issues with ammunition supply plus no stone walls to take cover behind them. Also the computer player never stops or retreats unless completely crushed.

Parliament has red flags, Royalists blue. Parliament Horse wear a dark orange shash, Royalist Horse a red shash. Parliament infantry wear red or dark blue coats with red trousers, or purple while the trayned bands wear country tones (greenish, brownish, dark red) and the dragoons grey occasionally with brimmed hats. Royalist foot are mostly Cornish regiments in pale blue-grey or light blue and some units wear black. Royalist trayned bands also wear a mix of earthy tones including some blue (rather than red) coats. Parliament generals wear black japaned armour, while the Royalist commanders wear a blue and white-plummed helmet and a breastplate over a green coat. All cannon shown are Parliamentarian but the Royalists also had some cannon.

My custom made AI makes the computer player spread his forces out more and there are fewer direct attacks of cavalry on infantry. Rather there is more of a tendency for cavalry to attack enemy cavalry as in the actual battles of the English Civil War. When cavalry attacks infantry, it will more often attack musketeers rather than pikemen, which you can see Haserig's cavalry doing under AI control in the later stages of the battle.




The actual historical battle developed approximately as in this videoclip. There were some differences, caused by the terrain, which were practically impossible to replicate. One was that there were hedgerows between Lansdown and Freezing Hill/Tog Hill, that allowed the Parliament dragoons good cover in the early part of the fighting. Much more importantly, because of the hedges there seemed to be only three way to access Lansdown: from a lane down the middle and two areas on the side. However, based on the description from Edward Hyde, the sides were lined with woods where Waller had also placed dragoons. So that the Royalist Foote was being chanelled into three zones were Waller could concentrate his musket and cannon shot. The one thing that was most difficult to replicate was that because of numerical inferiority, the Parliament Foote had dug thenselves in behind earthworks that they had made at the top of the hill. This was a very unusual thing for that period, more the style of 20th Century than 17th Century warfare. The result was tat the Royalists are estimated to have lost some 600 Foote against Waller's losses of about 20. So it was a heroic draw, to have held back an infantry force nearly three times his own and to have caused such heavy casualties. Of course the Parliament Horse played no small role in achieving that result.

It is also perplexing how William Waller fought so uninspiringly shortly afterwards at Roundway Hill, considering his inspirational defense at Lansdown.
------------------------------------------------
[MT2W FKoC AAR] Times full of Distemper http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=495533

[Geoffrey of Villehardouin]

Besieged in Byzantium
Chivalry II - the Sicilian Vespers
with the Complete Byzantine Unit Roster project skins

A break from the English Civil War: a custom battle of a Turkish attack on a Byzantine fortress. Chivalry II flame throwers are not as effective as in some other mods. Despite the siege being on normal difficulty with equal florins both sides, it was only a lucky win.

[Geoffrey of Villehardouin]

Besieged in Byzantium
Stainless Steel
with the Complete Byzantine Unit Roster project skins

Same siege as in the previous video but with Stainless Steel. This time it was much easier to win. The Greek fire was devastating and the stakes killed off most of the enemy cavalry.

I should apologize for the slow frame rate due to a combination of making these videoclips on a laptop and using FRAPS. Hopefully, if you play on a laptop, it is familiar enough that it is not too annoying. My aim is to show some interesting battles from a tactical viewpoint, certainly not to make professional-looking machinima videos.

[Geoffrey of Villehardouin]

Funny things the AI does

Despite the continual efforts of modders and the variety of battle AIs used in the various mods, and even though the currently available AIs are much improved compared to the original, the battle AI still has a knack for getting things wrong. Here are some funny things they AI does. They are funny in a painful sort of way, like when you are watching someone making bad things worse.

This videoclip is from retakes of the previous custom battle (most scenes are from a single retake), while I focused in on the mistakes the AI did. The first mistake was that it moved unnecessarily close to my pike and shot formation. They could have started firing from much much further away. Then there were nine other incredible things the AI did. Watch them here:

You can watch the videoclip in high definition by setting the resolution to 720p or 1080p depending on the speed of your connection, by clicking on the gear icon at the bottom of the YouTube videoclip window.

I have tinkered with the AI myself and impressive as it is in making battles happen, it nevertheless seems impossible to stop from taking some really awful decisions. They keyword here is "stop". You really cannot stop things easily, when it comes to the battle AI. Most script seems to be about its priorities in what to attack, attack, attack.

[Geoffrey of Villehardouin]

Battle tactics tests

One instinctively expects to see the battle AI fighting in some cohesive way, like a real army would. Most of the time, however, any semblance to a disciplined army disappears as soon as the computer player advances to join battle. By frustrating that advance by placing various advance parties or a few units close to its flanks, the AI army is delayed and the more it is delayed the more it has a chance to fall apart into a random mass or for its units to run off in random directions. In these two videoclips, two small groups of infantry were sent forward one on each flank of the advancing AI army. Watch the AI army disintegrate.

I tested vanilla and several mainstream mods covering the medieval period. As usual, in these battles both armies had close to 20 units. You can see at the start the battle order for the human army. The computer player had a very similar army, well balanced, but with slightly heavier units. So in both cases the AI army was at least as strong in all sectors. Other than for the general's bodyguard, each army had only one heavy cavalry unit. I wanted to test how well could the AI fight what would be an infantry-heavy battle.

The first example is in vanilla. In fact in this battle I gave relatively few commands other than for the three units on the right wing "forlorn hope" - two infantry and one cavalry unit. The AI basically lost fighting a stationary army.

At first it sent its strongest cavalry into a suicide charge on the right "forlorn hope". Once pinned down, they were charged in the rear by my own single unit of heavy cavalry and were routed. Subsequently, that single unit of heavy cavalry had a free rein to charge a couple of AI infantry on that side. At that point (minute 1:35), with only just a couple of units routed, the AI army, that was already scattered, milling around with little sense of direction, simply panicked and ran.

The second example is from a Stainless Steel custom battle, fantasy late Byzantines vs fantasy late Sicilians/Normans. At the start you can see the deployment, and what I mean by forlorn hopes - the two forward placed groups on the flanks. With the SS AI, battles are tougher, and so I gave more commands to the units at the two flanks. The centre remained stationary. The main cavalry unit, with my apologies, was a mercenary Sicilian cavalry unit and looks like the Sicilian units the AI commands, other than that it has a Byzantine flag. Placing the two forlorn hopes at the flanks caused a complete and utter disintegration of the Sicilian/Norman lineup. Units wandered off in random directions. Subsequently, that one mercenary cavalry unit routed the entire AI army.

You can see the loss in cohesion already at 0:55 and by 2:15 many AI units seem bunched up on the upper right-hand corner but not in any kind of proper formation. By minute 2:30 those that have not been routed are milling around in random directions.

Cases like these make me wonder if, had the AI army done nothing - if they had not moved or marched anywhere, just sat somewhere in a defensive stance with their flanks protected and did not move at all - you might then get a more balanced battle.

The battle AI has no apparent code for how to keep the army together and no code for assessing the overall situation on the battlefield. As someone in the Shogun 2 section commented, the paper-rock-scissors model for who to attack causes the AI to fight as in a game of chess, with units moving in every direction. wherever you put for them a target for attack, rather than as in real armies. I find this most apparent in vanilla and Stainless Steel. Of course battles become a little unrealistic when you put spearmen in the forlorn hopes, the AI sends swordsmen, who you can then run down with cavalry kept on reserve. Or you can put also some swordsmen in the flanks, as in the demonstrations above, and send the enemy spearmen into a mary-go-round. Or if their army is mainly swordsmen, you can send some cavalry in the flanks and they will disintegrate. The worst of it is that the AI having zero, absolute zero code available to help it use pike and shot formations in the late periods and indeed it is a swine to even get the AI to use firearm units effectively. They get in each other's way and behind the pikemen, as if they were archers and could shoot overhead. The code seems to be inherited from Rome and AI armies fight rather too much like complete barbarians. The unit spacing code on deployment does not work once the battle has started and deployment is anyway useless, if the AI units cannot keept it during the battle.

Of the various mods I have tried, Deus lo Vult and Rusichi Total War performed best in infantry battles such as the ones demonstraed above. The tactic of the forlorn hopes on the two wings did not work at all in Rusichi Total War. They were attacked, but the AI kept its centre in relative cohesion. In fact, I could not get the Rusichi TW infantry to scatter as much, so this disintegration of the AI army is not completely inevitable.

[Geoffrey of Villehardouin]

Greek fire again

Greek fire works best in sieges. However, unlike in real history, Greek fire units cannot fire well from walls at those below. They can only fire at units at the same level as they are, which is maybe not completely historical and makes their use very risky.

These are three tests of using Greek fire in gate defense. In the first two tests, they are protected by pikemen who help keep the enemy horsemen at a distance. It usually worked. In the third case, they are only supported by militia SS6.4 Contaratoi. The odds were 1:5 against them. But it was still possible to win, as long as the enemy cavalry did not charge straight at them.

In all these tests, the defenders had two units of flamethrowers, however, in the first two tests the second unit, which was kept on reserve, did not see any action.

You can watch them in high definition by clicking on the gear icon and selecting 720p or 1080p, depending on your internet connection speed.

This tactic would not probably work in most other mods, where flamethrowers are firing more slowly.

[Geoffrey of Villehardouin]

Two short throwaway battle videos with some quasi-atmospheric scenes from battles in the Po valley in the early part of a late Venice campaign (Stainless Steel 6.4). The Gracul AI throws no end of armies at you in interesting locations and makes sure you have to attack them.

A battle near Mantova against some very unusual rebels



Fourth Genoese attack on the fort of Pavia

[Geoffrey of Villehardouin]

The graphics are probably part of what make Total War battles addictive. Here are some atmospheric views of Stainless Steel Adana, with apologies for the slow frame rate.

The Seljuk Turks saw a relatively small garrison and decided to declare war over Adana. Unfortunately for them there was a strong army in Cyprus that was ferried over in good time. The computer player must have regretted starting a war so inauspiciously.

My apologies again for the slow frame rate. Hopefully it does not ruin too much the atmosphere. Imagine watching events back in time through a revolving gyroscope. Below are some screenshots from this battle.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

[Geoffrey of Villehardouin]

Chivalry II - the Sicilian Vespers Byzantine campaign, early period

The Chivalry II mod has in my view the most historically accurate Kontaratoi (with relatively long spears), Scoutatoi and Menavlatoi (armed with a short pike-like menavlon). They are available fairly early on, as they should, since they had been standard units since the 6th century or so. Their skins are also quite nice in my opinion and with the additional units from the CBUR project make the Byzantines a very attractive faction. Unfortunately, Chivalry II is meant only for the high period, so the starting positions in the early period are a little strange and involve the Normans already in Greece in 1098 but more strangely also the Moravians (?) and Franks. Also strangely, the Mongols are already in Caucasus and Anatolia. But the temptation of playing the Byzantines with what seemed potentially a historically accurate roster was irresistible.

For this campaign, their leaders have been modded so as to have not only Ioannes Ducas and Nikephoros Bryennios but more importantly Georgios Palaeologus among their generals and Anna Comnena as a princess. Georgios Palaeologus was probably the first well known member of that family which was later to produce so many Byzantine emperors and was the best known general of Alexius Comnenus, so indeed it was a bit of a surprise he was not in the initial roster and I had to mod him in.

The starting position of the Byzantines was not what one would expect for this period, as they only controlled Constantinople, Adrianople, Thessalonica and Mistra. Not only that but the rest of the Byzantine lands were controlled by no less than 8 other factions - Seljuks, Genoa, Venice, Moravians, Latin Empire (Franks), Normans, Serbs and Bulgarians, almost in all cases unhistorically. Making a start at recovering the starting position of the historical Byzantines in the 11th Century would have involved going to war against 8 factions. I took the more conservative option of allying with the Serbs, allowing the Bulgarians, Venetians and Genoese to keep their settlements and going to war with the other factions but only one at a time, starting naturally with the Normans who controlled Athens. Having started something, one begins to think about finishing it, which led to a landing of Georgios Palaeologus in Southern Italy to recover the Byzantine lands there and bring the fight to the Normans, as the Comneni attempted to do on two occasions. Palaeologus captured Cusenza which provoked several counterattacks and sieges by the Normans. One of these is shown in the next video.

Historically, Palaeologus had been charged with the defense of Durrhachium against the Normans, which he accomplished successfully for about a year. In that time he placed catapults and ballistae on the ramparts to defend against the Normans, built a siege tower inside the city to oppose the siege tower the Normans built outside, equipped the men on the ramparts with naphtha incendiary grenades to hold back the attackers and made several sallies in one of which he fought apparently with an arrow embedded in his head, finally succeeding in setting the Norman siege tower alight.

In this siege, his men sallied out with catapults, since they could not be placed on the ramparts, and bombarded the Normans who mysteriously, having first laid siege on Cusenza, hesitated now to attack. Indeed they only attacked after they had been harassed by the Byzantine mounted archers. Their attack turned out a complete debacle, attacking as they did piecemeal with only some cavalry and a unit of dismounted knights ever making it to the Byzantine lines, were they were every time quickly routed. The Byzantine position was unassailable with spearmen supported by swordsemen and several units of archers and javelinners offering support from the bastions. The light cavalry picked up the routers.



Screenshots from the siege of Cusenza

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

But the Normans did not give up and indeed succeeded once in retaking a fort in Southern Italy, in the approximate location of Byzantine Skyllicion (Squillace), that the Byzantines had captured after a successful siege.

Screenshots from the Norman siege of Skyllicion

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

They also laid again siege on Cusenza, which was lifted by the appearance of another Byzantine general, Andronicos Agiopantites, who landed with reinforcements from Greece. Indeed for the entire campaign on Italy the Byzantines had to depend on line infantry to be ferried over from the east because it seemed impossible to raise decent units locally, save from rare occasions of some rather expensive crossbowmen, heavy spearmen and mounted milites becoming available in Southern Italy or Sicily mostly as mercenaries.

In any case the combination of Menavlatoi, Contaratoi and Scoutatoi ferried in from Arta combined with ranged units from Cusenza, that included some modded naphtha grenade throwers, allowed Andronicus Agiopantites to use time honoured cursores-defensores Byzantine tactics to defeat the Normans in an open battle. The Normans, as expected being controlled as they were by the AI, fought with little coordination but surprisingly at first avoided attacking and when eventually were persuaded to attack, succeeded at one point to bring most infantry into the battle, while their cavalry sensibly avoided to attack the Menavlatoi. Nonetheless, the AI as usual failed to maintain its initial deployment, or to use guard mode or allow a field of fire for its crossbowmen, and seemed to pay little regard to the fact that it was usually locally outnumbered due to the depth of the Byzantine deployment and the support of Byzantine spearmen by ranged units. The result was a crashing victory for Agiopantites.



Screenshots from the battle

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

The Normans withdrew to a defensive stance around Messina, and never regained the initiative in Italy.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[FKoC AAR] Times full of Distemper
Reviewed by robinzx at the Critic's Quill, Issue 31
[BC AAR] The Maharajah and the Guild of Thieves – a Chauhan Rajput AAR
[1648] Thirty Years' War
[Kingdoms AAR] Antioch Crusaders Mod campaign

[Geoffrey of Villehardouin]

Roundaway Hill

This is another battle from my AAR, Times full of Distemper. It is the equivalent of the Battle at Roundway, fought at approximately that time in a nearby location by approximately the same generals.

In the campaign battle, Alexander Hopton's Foote marched out of Devizes, where they had barricaded themselves, and joined up with the Horse that had arrived from Oxford. The Royalist Foote attacked first, sending the musketeers forward in the usual ill-advised AI tactic. The centre was under the command of William Waller. Under AI control was the Parliament Horse on the left and Robartes with the reserves in the rear.

William Waller had little besides his own bodyguard for cavalry, so when the Royalist musketeers skirmished forward, he made a few charges with his bodyguard and spread havoc in those companies. Because of the losses at Lansdown, there were only two and a half companies of Parliamentarian pikemen. Somehow the AI decided to concentrate the attack against the location where Waller stood, near some of the pikemen. There was so much Royalist Horse the Parliamentarian pikemen were overran and with them the musketeers. Robartes and Haselrig, being under AI control, took forever to enter the battle. How was this battle won, it was a miracle. Had Haslerig and Robartes delayed half a minute longer it would have been a dead loss.

In the historical battle, things went even worse, even though the Cornish Foot stayed in Devizes until the very end and took no part in the more crucial stage of the battle. The Royalists therefore, had only Horse and two light cannon (drakes, lighter than sakers). The battle was fought in very open fields, which clearly favoured the Royalist Horse. It was a disastrous defeat for Parliament. How could William Waller have made such a bad mistake after his successful defense at Lansdown?

To begin with, the Cornish Foot, all the army that the Royalists had West of Oxford, had been barricaded in Devizes, with their general Ralph Hopton badly wounded. If they surrendered, William Waller would have achieved a stupendous victory that could have decided the war. So understandably, he was willing to take his chances. The Cornish Foot were greater in number (about 3000-3500 compared to Waller's maybe 1500 ínfantry plus about 1000 or so Horse) but they were demoralised after the loss of Bevil Grenville and with Ralph Hopton wounded. They had begun negotiations for their surrender, whether with sincere intentions or not. Considering that they outnumbered Waller's Foote at least 2:1 and that Waller's Horse was useless in the streets of Devizes, which had been barricaded, and even more useless against the castle where Hopton had retreated, Waller understandably was prepared to accept a delay in the hope the Royalists might surrender.

The first Royalist Regiment of Horse that appeared from Oxford bringing much needed supplies was ambushed and routed. Prospects looked good and the best explanation for what followed was that William Waller did not expect that such a strong force of Royalist Horse would turn up just the day after the talks had started. The Kings Leutenant of Horse, Wilmot, had put together a scratch force of all the cavalry he could get, about 2000 strong and had ridden to relieve Hopton. William Waller, upon learning that such a cavalry force was heading his way that day, marched to intercept them before the Cornish should take courage and, even worse, sally out and attempt to unite with the Oxford Horse.

Presumably in moving on to interept them before they came close to Devizes, Waller could not find any ground that offered a good defensive position. Not only that, one has to assume there was no time to prepare man-made defenses. In fact he probably would have felt obliged to draw the Royalists to battle, because if they just rode off and united with the Cornish Foote they would have become an impossibly strong force to defeat. The prevailing view is that Waller actually deployed on a high hill, Roundway Hill, some 700 foot high, but still on relatively open ground, no tree cover, no hedges or walls or any other cover for the infantry.

What is less easy to explain is the behaviour of the Parliament Horse. Hasselrig's regiment was on the left of the Foot and Waller's with at least another regiment (presumably Popham's as he was present in the battle) was on the right of the Foot. Most estimates are that there were 6 Parliamentarian Regiments of Horse of up to 2000 men in total, but which regiments were these? Only five are mentioned in the summer battles: Waller's, Haselrig's, Popham's, Thomas Essex's and Burghill's and they had born most of the weight of the battle at Lansdown for Parliament. Richard Atkyns, who fought in the battle, talks only of Haselrig's regiment on the right wing. Each cavalry wing would have faced superior numbers. They may have been outnumbered by as much as 2:1 or more, especially Haselrig's Horse that had been so heavily involved in Lansdown.

I have no proposals of what one could have done under the circumstances but Willliam Waller seemed to have set himself up for defeat which was what happened. One advantage the Parliament Horse had was that they were more rested than the Royalist Horse that had marched from Oxford. Whether there were 3 regiments or 6 regiments, they were probably of good quality, having had recent battle experience. Despite being outnumbered, they could have drawn out their front and charged full speed the Oxford Horse. The worst that would have happened was they would have been defeated but, if so, they would have had a better chance to escape.

What actually happened was that they stood where they were, perhaps hoping to frighten the Royalists and deter them from battle, or who knows what. Worse still, they formed a small front several ranks deep, whereas Popham's (presumably) regiment had formed not to the side but behind Waller's Regiment of Horse. So on both wings the front of the Parliament Horse was very narrow. This would have been ok for a charge on infantry but the Royalists had no infantry, apparently not even dragoons. The Parliament Horse did not charge anyway, they just stood there and allowed themselves to be charged on both sides by the much more numerous Royalist Horse. Horses are herd animals and no matter what their riders intend, they have an instinct to follow the direction of movement of other galloping horses. So whenever Horse charged standing Horse, the defenders were usually routed because the overall vector of movement induced by that charge is unfavourable to the defenders. Isaac Newton did not live then and Newtonian physics had not been discovered, neither people understood much about biology and animal behaviour, but in practice whenever there were horse battles the one who charged first generally routed the defender, so that ought to tell you something.

The Parliament Horse, finding itself surrounded by the greater numbers of Royalist horsemen, was put to rout on both sides without much of a fight. The situation was worst on the right wing. The Parliament Horse fled ahead of the Royalist Horse, unwittingly in the direction of a steep cliff. If you have 1500 horses galloping behind you, you would not even think of stopping, so the herd behaviour of the horses led that entire wing of Parliament Horse down the pecipice, many of them being killed. A few appeared to have escaped to the rear of the Parliament Foot, among them Alexander Popham, William Waller and presumably also John Locke, as he survived the war, though it is not known if he was at the battle. But the majority of the Parliament Horse had been routed. Some 1000-1500 Foote were now facing 2000 Horse plus about 3000-3500 Royalist Foote that came out of Devizes to participate in the battle. The odds were now hopeless. The Parliament army was completely destroyed and it was even lucky that all the generals survived, without even one of them being taken prisoner. Actually, Arthur Haselrig's Horse had been wounded and he was about to be taken prisoner when some of his men came to his aid and he managed somehow to escape in the confusion.

William Waller had gambled everything and had lost. Instead of a great triumph, there had been a crushing defeat. Now the Southwest of England was practically in the hands of the Royalists except for a few fortified towns. Bristol was taken by the Royalists, who now had at last a big city and harbour in the South of England. This was regarded as the high point of the English Civil War for the King.


-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[MT2W FKoC AAR] Times full of Distemper
Reviewed by robinzx at the Critic's Quill, Issue 31
Medieval 2 Total War “For King or Country” mod: http://www.forkingorcountry.com/

[Geoffrey of Villehardouin]

The trouble with M2TW cavalry

I used to feel good about myself when I would run down a few infantry companies with my cavalry believing I had mastered a good tactic. That until I realised in some recent tests with the 1648 mod that cavalry is about 8 times as strong a unit as the same number of infantry. That means that cavalry shoots 8 times as much, has 8 times as high defense as the equivalent number for infantry and 8 times as high melee attack as the equivalent of infantry. Coupled with their charge bonus, that makes them into little short of supermen. While during the early Middle Ages heavily armoured cavalrymen were like tanks fighting poorly armed peasants, that might be ok. But during the Thirty Years War when infantry was either barricaded behind breastworks or fences (a bit as the Oda did at Nagashino) or behind pikes, attacking infantry with cavalry would have seemed about as foolish as eating soup with a fork. In 1643, Prince Rupert attempted to attack with his cavalry some poorly armed townsfolk barricaded behind some breastworks at the entrance of Birmingham and could not even get to them. It was only when he managed to get some of his men to fire at their flanks that the townsfolk decided to retreat back into town. Well, that was about the most successful cavalry action in the English Civil War against infantry. Charging at a stone wall or an earthen bank or a trench with cavalry could only gain some broken horse legs. Strictly speaking, infantry should not even be chargeable by cavalry at this period.

So take a cavalry unit, make it into 60 men, same stats as a similar infantry unit of 60 musketeers. Test them into a battle let’s say 60 horsemen vs 60 infantry musketeers. The infantry die 8 times as fast in the shootout. Change the mounted musketeers firepower to 1, keep the infantry to 8 – now they are killing each other at similar rates. You can do the same with the melee stats. Similar result. So in other words, to just balance the two in battle (forget the massive tactical superiority of cavalry commanded by the human player), you would need infantry with 8 times as high missile strength, melee attack and melee defense. That’s just to balance the strength of the units. Balancing the tactical ability of the AI to use its cavalry as well as the human player is a much bigger problem.

Here are some videos of cavalry with medieval M2TW stats (high charge, high melee strength, high missile strength) attacking infantry in the 1648 mod. First some late units with their original stats, as they appear in the game after patch 2.

That was not much of a contest ... You may say, ok, these are late units, they may do a little better, but the established doctrine at that time was to basically never attack infantry with cavalry, so why should they be able to win at all? They shouldn’t even be willing to attack, they should be routing once within musket shot range. Still, just to make my point, here is another example with early units, the Piccolomini Cuirassiers, with a morale (stat_mental in the EDU) of zero, backed up by early harquebusiers. Rather than the Cuirassiers routing in the first sign of musket shot, the infantry do ...

If you can trash infantry with the Piccolomini Curassiers, one of the weakest cavalry in the mod with stat_mental of zero, I don't know what need is there for infantry.


And here is a third example. Just two companies of early harquebusiers, supported by some mortars and some peasants. No Cuirassiers, no pike and shot units, attacking a stronger army, stronger in artillery and all its infantry being pike and shot units, including some of the best musketeers in the mod. Suicidal?

The human player wins with a convincing margin, losing only 111 peasants. The game engine is perfectly capable of turning the pike & shot period into a cuirassier & harquebusier period, even a peasant & harquebusier period, if you overlook the stats.

Basically, the only solution to this, since it is not always possible to nerf the cavalry 8 times, is to set stats of average cavalry and infantry to the same numbers, multiply infantry stats by 4 and divide cavalry stats by at least 2, to get a factor of 8 in their nominal stats – only to make cavalry as strong as infantry. Which is not even going far enough. Because most cavalry at the time would not even attempt to come close to musketeers.

Read on ...

[Geoffrey of Villehardouin]

More realistic cavalry for the pike & shot period

"If the Foote have possessed themselves of some place of advantage, as some wood, trench, or covert way, then the Horse are not to charge them, though equall or somewhat superior to them in number, in respect of such advantage."
John Cruso, “Military Instructions for the Cavallrie” (1644)

A custom battle with cavalry having nominally 8 times lower stats than infantry (missile and melee). In total 548 cavalry vs 560 infantry, an attack John Cruso would have advised against. Stat_mental for infantry was around 10-12. Stat_mental for cavalry was between 1-5 and charge was 5 for the Hussaria (which is the highest I have in the EDU), 4 for the Cuirassiers. These cavalry stats would still have allowed for an easy victory, had I not also minimised the amount of ammunition cavalry gets. Otherwise they would sit back and shoot the pikemen rather than charge them. Even so, the cavalry wins when historically it should have probably lost. The battle was at normal difficulty. Winning can be more difficult on the hard and very hard levels.

The inability of the M2TW engine to fight in formation is half the problem with M2TW battles. The other half is that the player can use what are essentially arcadish exploits, rather than historical tactics, to win battles. The computer player is handicapped against the human player in these two respects. Using high cavalry stats to win battles would seem a bit of an overkill, especially for the pike & shot period. Even nerfed 8 times compared to infantry, the cavalry is still stronger than infantry. And the musketeers are supposed to be barricaded behind breastworks not standing out in the open waiting to be run over by the cavalry.

[Geoffrey of Villehardouin]

Siege of Buzen - Ashigaru vengeance

One of the side effects of Realm Divide was the threat of naval invasions. An Oda fleet carrying an army in the Inland Sea was sunk but a Homa clan army disembarked on Kyushu. The castle of Buzen on a strategic position overlooking the Kanmo Straits was their likely target. It was only guarded by two companies of ashigaru and their retainers. Shimazu Toshihisa sailed from Suo with his bodyguard and a company of light cavalry while a company of ashigaru from Tsukushi also reinforced the castle. The invaders had a strong contingent of cavalry and a few companies of infantry, including some yari and bow samurai. Fortunately the AI keeps their cavalry back in sieges, which gave the defenders a chance of success.

The ashigaru excelled defending bravely against the first assault of the enemy infantry and also against the second assault of the dismounted cavalry. You can watch near the end of the movie a lowly bow ashigaru asking the enemy general to leave the castle and then winning the ensuing sword fight.

[Geoffrey of Villehardouin]

The Black Ship

One of the most troublesome aspects of Realm Divide surely is the threat of naval invasions. It turned out that as our army was outside Kyoto, the Ikko Ikki were sending an army by sea supported by the much feared Black Ship.

The Shimazu were fortunately controlling the western seas and the Shimazu heir, Shimazu Yoshihisa, also known by his nickname Hongo Kiyouji, was in charge of a largish fleet not far from Echiden. Time was of the essense and this was a third battle against all odds the Shimazu could simply not afford to lose.

A heroic naval battle follows, a death struggle, in which several of the Shimazu ships will go down while facing the biggest threat to Shimazu control of the western seas.