I would expect that trying to analyse all of social evolution would be a life’s task doomed to failure. Clauswitz enjoys posthumous fame (up in Valhalla) in a way that Jomini does not. I must assume that his views are now pre-eminent because few historians ever mention Jomini. Perhaps the Jominian concept of the ‘single killing blow’ was valid in wars amongst the ancients, that were never ‘total war’ and could be decided in such a way. In ‘total war’ breaking the army doesn’t necessarily break the nation. In EU only war exhaustion breaks the nation, but I don’t know if its linked to battles lost or just time elapsed - but that’s a different topic.
As much as war is an ‘art’ (a perverted one I think), for the purposes of computer simulation it must be in some way analysed scientifically. I would add that ‘frictions’ occur on all scales of warfare to an equal degree. Strategic planning has to allow for many things that may occur which tactical planning can afford to ignore. Similarly tactical planning needs to allow for many eventualities that strategic planning can ignore. Things don’t become more random the larger the scale (that’s a mathematical truth) just as every scenario has sub-elements within it that cannot be quantified.
Therefore I would say that a leader’s score should be at least two-fold, with some leaders being good at both tactical and strategic leadership, some good at just one. It is also a skill of leadership to recognise one’s weaknesses and delegate tasks to low ranks who are better at a certain aspects than you. Those who lack the ability to recognise genius in others and delegate (or like Napoleon or Hitler in their later years, who fear rivalry from below) should have to dilute their genius by the process of doing everything themselves. The great military machine that Frederick built fell apart in his dotage because it all relied on him alone. In my opinion Napoleon was a genius because, amongst other things, he had an encyclopaedic knowledge of his empire at every scale and a almost eidetic memory. However even he had his weaknesses and specialisms; e.g. he knew artillery inside out (it was his training and he brought it to the fore) but he never understood naval tactics.
I agree with Yndenwal that 'an ASL great leader has nothing to do with an Empires in Arms leader'. Personally bravery and popularity comes first at that level, cool planning at a higher level. However ASL should never be regarded as a good model of military simulation in my opinion. It sells itself as such but it is not. It’s enjoyable, but its leaders more closely resemble those in comic books than those in real life. It also confuses accretions of complexity with realism.
Midway is a hard battle to simulate in game terms, because it was largely won by code-breaking before the battle, so a Japanese player would have to conform to rigid plans if it were to correspond to reality - which wouldn’t be much fun. However I agree that every game should have ‘open-ended’ die rolls where complacent predictability is reduced but these ‘freak’ results should be rare. I agree that the worth of leaders compared to numbers men, quality of men and elements of ‘friction’ is subjective, but a reasonable consensus must exist amongst games that have leaders in them.
As much as war is an ‘art’ (a perverted one I think), for the purposes of computer simulation it must be in some way analysed scientifically. I would add that ‘frictions’ occur on all scales of warfare to an equal degree. Strategic planning has to allow for many things that may occur which tactical planning can afford to ignore. Similarly tactical planning needs to allow for many eventualities that strategic planning can ignore. Things don’t become more random the larger the scale (that’s a mathematical truth) just as every scenario has sub-elements within it that cannot be quantified.
Therefore I would say that a leader’s score should be at least two-fold, with some leaders being good at both tactical and strategic leadership, some good at just one. It is also a skill of leadership to recognise one’s weaknesses and delegate tasks to low ranks who are better at a certain aspects than you. Those who lack the ability to recognise genius in others and delegate (or like Napoleon or Hitler in their later years, who fear rivalry from below) should have to dilute their genius by the process of doing everything themselves. The great military machine that Frederick built fell apart in his dotage because it all relied on him alone. In my opinion Napoleon was a genius because, amongst other things, he had an encyclopaedic knowledge of his empire at every scale and a almost eidetic memory. However even he had his weaknesses and specialisms; e.g. he knew artillery inside out (it was his training and he brought it to the fore) but he never understood naval tactics.
I agree with Yndenwal that 'an ASL great leader has nothing to do with an Empires in Arms leader'. Personally bravery and popularity comes first at that level, cool planning at a higher level. However ASL should never be regarded as a good model of military simulation in my opinion. It sells itself as such but it is not. It’s enjoyable, but its leaders more closely resemble those in comic books than those in real life. It also confuses accretions of complexity with realism.
Midway is a hard battle to simulate in game terms, because it was largely won by code-breaking before the battle, so a Japanese player would have to conform to rigid plans if it were to correspond to reality - which wouldn’t be much fun. However I agree that every game should have ‘open-ended’ die rolls where complacent predictability is reduced but these ‘freak’ results should be rare. I agree that the worth of leaders compared to numbers men, quality of men and elements of ‘friction’ is subjective, but a reasonable consensus must exist amongst games that have leaders in them.
