Friday: The Battle

Of all the things we did two years ago, the battle was the most disappointing for me personally, and was the thing I probably learned the most from as a result. In 2023 we had scheduled the battle for Sunday, the last day, and my vision was of two armies starting at opposite ends of Feldlager’s huge play area, using scouts to find each other, skirmishes to lure the opponent into a chosen field of battle, and then a large force-on-force engagement in conditions that were determined entirely by the decisions that the commanders had made over the preceding hour or two I imagined it would take to bring the two armies together.

2023’s Combined Cavalry Charge

It’s a glorious vision, and still one I hope to accomplish one day. In 2023, however, that didn’t happen at all. People were tired and, more impactfully, huge parts of the play area were off limits due to plowing. I underestimated the amount of time it would take for the infantry of both sides to get into any kind of position and especially underestimated the communication challenges of getting the cavalry to understand the infantry was ready to play (and vice-versa, as the cavalry had just recorded their epic charge for the cameras.

As a result, the battle was rushed, fought on terrain I never would have chosen as a commander, and we didn’t really get to do any of the things I had hoped for.

The one shining light for me in that engagement came toward the end of the battle, when I managed to arrange blue forces into a left echelon, a tactic recommended in Vegetius’ De Re Militari for facing a superior opponent (which Tomas Trsek and Rattenschwanz 1476 certainly were).

It worked. Suddenly we weren’t losing, we were winning. The line started to turn, and Tomas later told me in that moment his troops almost broke…and then I got killed and I routed, as per my casualty card (1HP Rout…rough draw for a commander). Blue forces, unaware of what the tactic was, broke right behind me and soon the whole army was running for its life. But I learned how to use an Echelon and I learned to stand in a safer place if I was going to be in command.

2025 Needed to Be Different

We decided to solve many of the problems we faced in 2023 all together in 2025. By putting the battle up front, everyone would be fresh. We’d also have everyone together for the first major event of the weekend so that we could calibrate force levels and safety in a group environment, allowing the white cell to work together at the same time and learn from each other so that we’d have a relatively consistent approach to safety and force levels. We scripted the first half of the battle to ensure that the action got started right away and especially so that we could get all the photos of a giant cavalry charge combined with all 200 infantry on the field all at the same time.

Commanders on both sides were briefed on the plan 3 weeks before the event, then refreshed (for those that could make it) a week before the event, then again the day before the battle.

Unfortunately, it didn’t work. Perhaps the right information didn’t make it down from Captains and Lieutenants to Rottmeisters? Perhaps some of Red’s commanders didn’t understand or didn’t like that they were walking into an ambush, even though the purpose of the ambush was to get the coolest photo opportunity of all time? I dunno, but whatever the case, humans humaned and as a result the opening half of the opening battle didn’t follow the script and we lost our golden photo and film op.

Despite that, we had a hell of a bash and the opening engagement was compelling. Red started strong and gave hell to the Blue units we had set out for bait. Blue’s ambushing battalions arrived to the party too late due to mixed signals and Red being a bit out of position, which meant that by the time half of Blue’s forces had arrived the first engagement was already winding down. The game called for a second engagement, however, and Red reformed and marched back up the hill.

My plan for the second engagement had always been to try and form up as close as possible to Philipp Von Seldenneck’s formation. We did our best (though still quite poor) imitation of it and moved out to engage with Red while trying to maintain some of the terrain advantage we had on top of the hill.

Towards the end, I was sure we’d have another Blue defeat. Red had driven us back from our position, more than half our forces were either at the rally point or wounded and dead on the field. As Blue commander, I had called a fighting withdrawal in hopes that some of our respawns would join us and we might have a chance to rally and re-attack.

At this point, two of my lieutenants, Mitch Lawrence and Oskar Ter Mors of the 21st English Companie and the Zwarte Garde (Black Guard) respectively withdrew just far enough to over-extend the remaining red troops and then began a methodical, disciplined counter-attack. Suddenly we’d gone from losing to winning, and moments later the acting Red Commander Pavel Haufman came forward to yield the field.

If you’re on Facebook, Kaos Historical Media has a great reel capturing the battle: https://www.facebook.com/share/v/17DvXmcQ7N/

Scoring

As a Wargame, each of Feldlager’s main events was scored based on the objectives completed by each side. The scoring system was intentionally left vague to participants (but was clearly set out in the “secret” White Cell book) both to prevent meta-gaming and because the whole system was a bit experimental and it was more important to me as a designer to see how it worked rather than to get the players too invested in it. As a result, commanders were told what their objectives were and that the event was being scored based on how they did on those objectives, but that was about it.

Friday’s battle was the first of the scored events in the Feldlager Wargame. Originally the plan had been for 5 points to go to the winner of the first engagement, followed by 5 points to the winner of the second engagement.

Afterwards, however, in discussion with the Orga and senior White Cell members, we decided to not score the first engagement as it was intentionally scripted to be heavily weighted against Red and it was clear that the script hadn’t been followed anyway. As a result, Blue was awarded 5 points for winning the second engagement only.

Observations & Lessons Learned

As I mentioned in the last entry, no experiment is complete without publishing Observations and no military exercise is complete without Lesson Learned. The lists below aren’t comprehensive, but I do hope they spark discussion. Even more than that, I hope that other participants will come forward with their observations as well, and that we can update this list as we go.

Observations

The observations here are mine alone, from the perspective of the overall Blue Commander rather than those of an event organizer or impartial observer. In conversations with other participants it’s also clear that each person had a very different idea of where things even were on the battlefield. So some of my description of what happened, where it happened, and when it happened are probably wrong.

The Role of Terrain on the Field

As a commander and tactician, I find no aspect of pre-modern warfare more interesting than the use of terrain. As a teenage Boy Scout I walked the US Civil War battlefield of Gettysburg with my father, a graduate of the US Military Academy at West Point, who explained to me at the time that that incredibly well-preserved battlefield was still a training site for teaching the use of terrain in battle to cadets. Later, as a US Army Officer myself, I would teach my own lieutenants in the same way on the battlefields of Antietam and Manassas.

Feldlager’s play area, a few square kilometers including and mostly to the south of the Burgruine Brandenburg in Lauchröden, Germany, is a hilly mixture of woods, farmland, and meadows. There may not be a proper flat plain anywhere in the play area (at least none that aren’t plowed and therefore off-limits), and even the areas that look relatively level (or at least uniformly sloped) are actually full of slight rises and falls that allow large numbers of troops to be completely hidden from sight-lines even 10 meters away.

In the scripted opening of the battle, we had placed almost 50 cavalry in a low spot that was perfectly visible from anywhere on the chosen battlefield except for the path of advance into the battlefield from the north (which was the way into the battlefield that the Red Army was scripted to take). Further to the west I hid two banners (about 40 troops) in a low spot just past a ridge that made them completely invisible to anyone not within about 10 meters.

All of this meadow, however, is on a fairly dramatic slope that seems to rise in every direction you walk. Red’s attackers had to climb to get to the 21st English Companie, situated at the highest point. The cavalry charge was up-hill (which, I am told by the cavalry, is preferable to a down-hill charge for safety reasons if nothing else). And our ambush from the west was actually a nearly 100-meter slog uphill and through knee-high grass.

When people ask “what should I do to train for Feldlager?” the best single thing I can tell them is “Practice going uphill, in armor, in your socks. Over and over.”

Google Earth image of the Battlefield’s elevation. Friday’s battle took place on the slope in the middle, from the pale corner on the left up to the wooded area on the right.

Combined arms

Despite mistiming, misplacement, and other effects of planning to a script that didn’t quite get followed, Friday’s battle was an effective display of the benefits working with “Combined Arms,” by which here I mean Pike Infantry, Poleaxe/Halberd/Bill Infantry, Missile Infantry, and Light and Heavy Cavalry all operating together.

As the Red Army approached and began climbing the hill toward Blue’s Verlorene Schuzen (Crossbow Infantry) and the 21st English Companie (primarily bills and a few longbows), they arrayed out with the German Rota von de Redliche Gesellen’s Crossbows on their left, the Polish Infantry and its front of pavises on the right, and Rattenschwanz’s pikes and mixed infantry trailing as a center/reinforcement force. Through use of terrain and distraction (e.g., the Verlorene Schutzen’s bounding withdrawal), the Red Army was largely unaware of the nearly 50 cavalry riding them down from the rear. The Rota was dispersed immediately (and, had it not been for safety reasons, would have been completely trampled by the cavalry); Rattenschwanz quickly turtled up to prevent the same happening to them; and the Poles first hesitated, then attacked (but without the rear support from Rattenschwanz).

The cavalry charge bought time for the Zwarte Garde and the Harlequins to engage from blue left / red right, against the remnants of the Rota and all of Rattenschwanz’s pikes. Afterwards, the mega-charge split into red and blue cavalry, wheeled around, and then turned on one another. By keeping red cavalry occupied the rest of the battle, blue cavalry bought the blue infantry the space and time to work that they needed to use maneuver against the red infantry.

This continued into the second main engagement, after red reformed and came back up the hill at blue. Here, we in blue took on our best imitation of Philip von Seldenneck’s formation for Infantry, Pikes (or spears), and Crossbows (or guns).

The Harlequins get a little help from the blue cavalry

Philip von Seldeneck’s Formation

In the second engagement--which was the “real” engagement of the battle--the Blue Army attempted to form up into Philip von Seldenck’s formation from his Kriegsbuch, written in the late XVth century. In reality, our poor imitation looked a little more like this [image], with our right side protected from flanking by the forest at the top of the hill.

Despite the weakness of our imitation, it worked. The Verlorene Schutzen created and maintained a flexible, extended area denial. In the center, Jack Edwards’ Sausages (later rebranded as the Harlequins) drew in Red’s main attack. On the right, the infantry and longbows of the 21st English Companie kept Red in lower ground and, like our left wing (de Zwarte Garde), was able to exploit any overextension in Red attacks with a quick hit to the enemy flank.

Philipp von Seldeneck’s Infantry Formation

Speaking of Flanking...

The real strength in our application of the formation was in the ability for one of the wings to quickly hit the flanks of any Red banner that pushed a little too far out. Blue was outnumbered and, in the case of Rattenschanz, “out gunned” with longer pikes, more shields, and a very cohesive, well-trained group of fighters. It was these quick flanking maneuvers, executed primarily by Oskar and Mitch in moments of their own design, that most strongly contributed to Blue’s successes on the open field.

The challenge with flanking just one unit when facing many is that the flanking unit becomes itself vulnerable to flanking by a non-committed enemy unit. Here the Verlorene Schutzen’s area denial became so important. Their skirmishing forced enemy forces on their right to advance more carefully and while distracted, delaying or preventing the counter-flanking maneuver on Blue’s flankers.

Arne Koet’s drawing of how the initial engagement went down. Definitely not quite what happened, but as good as anyone’s version is going to be.

The Role of Unit Cohesion and Discipline

Blue’s forces this year were more cohesive than two years ago, and featured two units that had spent the year specifically training for Feldlager (the Verlorene Schutzen and the Zwarte Garde) and one that trained together normally anyway (the 21st English Companie). Where last time we were all crushed by Rattenschwanz’s comparatively well-trained block, this year our commanders’ ability to read the field and get their troops to follow their commands made all the difference.

On one occasion, a red banner closed and drew the 21st English Companie into an engagement. Oskar, leading the Zwarte Garde, called for his unit to raise their pikes, turn right, double-time into a new position, turn left, and then level pikes and attack. The movement was quick, purposeful, and perfectly timed, leading to the defeat of that red banner and saving an otherwise overwhelmed 21st English Company.

On another occasion, at the very end of the battle, the remnants of the 21st and the Zwarte Garde were in a fighting withdrawal. Both units kept aligned with each other, fought on the back-step carefully and purposefully, and then halted when it was clear the enemy had become overextended and tired…and then both commanders counter-attacked. This required no commands and seemed to happen as if by magic; in reality it was two units with good command and control and good internal discipline.

The opposite was sometimes true as well. Jack Edwards led the “Sausages” (later rebranded the “Harlequins”), a unit made up of all participants who had come in ones and twos and threes. The Harlequins were brave, enthusiastic, and functioned like most of the previous edition’s blue team units who committed early, had a commander consistently in the fray, and were difficult to use for anything other than a committed attack. [Side-note: The harlequins developed quickly over the course of the weekend, and by Sunday’s siege felt like a different unit altogether.]

Red’s Polish Banner assaults Blue’s 21st English Companie during the second engagement. On the right, the Zwarte Garde holds the Blue center.

The Role and Position of the Commander on the Field

In 2023 I led from the front as often as possible, generating tactics on the fly and personally running to other commanders to get them to act when they couldn’t hear me yelling (and they almost never hear you yelling). As a result I was frequently exposed to danger, and while I suppose in theory my men might have found this inspiring, it became quickly apparent that it was stupid. I died (or routed, actually, given my Casualty Card draw) repeatedly in every engagement over the weekend; and when I did, my troops were left without guidance and we suffered.

So in 2025 I keep back, moved less, and spent more time with my subordinate commanders before the battle ever started in reviewing plans. I positioned myself generally between the center and right “battalions”, just behind the overall line, and found this to be a fairly good place from which to observe and control the battle. With a larger army, I would have rather been behind the center battalion with a full-sized reserve force, assuming I could find a more effective way to provide command and control than yelling, running around, and the occasional use of bugle calls.

C2 on the battlefield

Command and Control (C2) on the medieval battlefield appears to have been managed by a combination of musical instruments (trumpets, horns, drums, pipes, etc.), messengers, and possibly semaphores. At Feldlager we saw some attempts to use each of these methods, with particular improvement in the musical instrument department when compared to 2023.

The Red Army had a wonderful kettle drum that appeared to do a good job at keeping their units in pace and in high spirits; we on the Blue side definitely felt a twinge of anxiety and anticipation every time we heard it in the distance.

In the Blue Army we brought a proper bugler and had formulated bugle calls for just three basic commands: a tune for “Archers to the Front” and “Archers Back Into the Lines” (the Hejnał from Cracow’s Church of Saint Mary); a tune for “Attack” (Reville, a complete anachronism but at least recognizable); and a tune for “Withdraw” (the main motif from John William’s Imperial March…an egregious anachronism but again, recognizable for an Army that had no time to train to more appropriate bugle calls).

In practice, I admit I’m at a bit of a loss. Hearing on the battlefield is hard, and as overall Commander I sometimes had to run right up to a Banner’s captain, grab their helmet, and shout diagonally into the gap between their cheek and their helmet just to be heard. Bugle calls worked well to sound the attack when everyone expected it, but sounding anything once a fracas had started anywhere on the battlefield seemed an exercise in futility. Perhaps we need more bugles (to make it louder)? Certainly more training to listen for and react to bugle calls would have an impact.

Over the next two years as I work with units preparing for the next Feldlager, this is perhaps the area I want to work on the most.

“The music of the legion consists of trumpets, cornets and buccinae. The trumpet sounds the charge and the retreat. The cornets are used only to regulate the motions of the colors; the trumpets serve when the soldiers are ordered out to any work without the colors; but in time of action, the trumpets and cornets sound together. The classicum, which is a particular sound of the buccina or horn, is appropriated to the commander-in-chief and is used in the presence of the general, or at the execution of a soldier, as a mark of its being done by his authority. The ordinary guards and outposts are always mounted and relieved by the sound of trumpet, which also directs the motions of the soldiers on working parties and on field days. The cornets sound whenever the colors are to be struck or planted. These rules must be punctually observed in all exercises and reviews so that the soldiers may be ready to obey them in action without hesitation according to the general’s orders either to charge or halt, to pursue the enemy
or to retire.”

— Vegetius, De Re Militari

In the last blog in this series I mentioned several things that we learned as event organizers that I hope to improve or change next time as a result of the way things ran this time. Over the course of the battle, we learned a few more.

Scripted battles are hard…

Our intention in scripting the opening battle was manifold: (1) to create a more controlled environment to calibrate force levels under the eyes of as many gathered marshals/white cell members as possible; (2) to get the mandatory all-the-cavalry-charging-together photo op; (3) to get some video of everyone on the field all at the same time while we had a little control over what was going on.

Following the scripted portion, the battle was meant to organically shift into unscripted action, with the exception of mandating a second full engagement that was completely unscripted so that each side would have an opportunity to try out some formations and tactics of their own choosing.

As I mentioned in the last blog, we had some challenges with information cascading down from the commanders to the troops, particularly in the Red Army which had a temporary commander on the field during the battle as Tomas Trsek, the official Red Commander, hadn’t arrived yet. As a result, instead of walking into a scripted ambush (which, to be fair, had been communicated as a scripted ambush for the purposes of a photo op during the commanders meeting 3 weeks before, 1 week before, again 1 day before, and finally during the opening speech 2 hours before), the Red Army made smarter tactical decisions and didn’t mount the hill, didn’t turn their full back to the cavalry, and didn’t stand where they were supposed to stand for the photos.

This meant that they approached cautiously, and therefore slowly, so the cavalry was waiting too long. And it meant that the blue ambushers out in the west didn’t see red crest the ridge, and so didn’t start moving until too late.

Which meant, in turn, that everyone started moving too late on the blue side, and that the cavalry charged up the wrong line for where the cameras were, and that the 21st English Companie up on the hill got engaged before the Zwarte Garde and Harlequins arrived, and so on.

The most discouraging thing about the whole debacle was that several members of the Red forces came up to me later complaining that they didn’t understand what was going on, and after explaining to them personally that it was for a photo op, there were regretful exclamations of “aaaaah! We wish we’d understood that!”

So in addition to reinforcing Preparations Lesson learned #1, I’d add that when it comes to scripting anything, we need to make sure that every single person understands that a thing is scripted, that they’re supposed to win or lose or whatever, and what the reasons are that we’re doing it. We can’t be certain that the information is successfully cascading down through commanders, or that the commanders have a clear idea of the script and its purposes without extensive back-briefing and possibly even “ROC drill” or “sand table” style rehearsals.

Rally Points and respawn, white cell, etc.

This was our first year using a new (and like all new things, experimental) approach to respawning (details in the rules [link]). In short, each army had a flag of their color where routed and wounded troops could gather and wait to be picked up by an officer, reformed into a reinforcement unit. There were pros and cons to the system, and whether some aspects of the system were considered features or flaws probably depends a bit on one’s point of view. My point of view is that of an organizer and game designer.

For Friday’s battle, the respawn points were both about 50-60 meters away from the site of the scripted engagement. Both were at the lowest points in the terrain we could find within that range. The Red respawn point was in the shade, and was clearly visible to the Red Army as it advanced into the battlefield, meaning that everyone knew where it was.

The use of respawn points and the requirement for an officer and at least 3 troops to be present meant that the points function more as a “reinforcement generator” rather than a sort of infinite life machine that kept pumping individual troops into the battle. This was a pro.
The respawn points were downhill, meaning that all troops had to go uphill (again) once they respawned. This was exhausting and sucked…which was somewhat by design. We wanted there to be a cost to being a casualty that would encourage fighters to be careful with their lives. To me, a pro, but I understand that some participants saw this as a con.
The fixed locations of the respawn points meant that as one unit was pushed back from the original site of the battle, they were inherently closer to their own respawn point. This made withdrawing an attractive option to units that were losing, but also made winning units feel like some of their success was being taken from them. As a game designer, this was intentional, but I’m not sure how important it actually is to the design so I could be argued into doing this differently.

I have additional observations about the use of static respawn points that I plan on discussing in a future entry about the Patrols on Saturday Morning, but I’ll leave that discussion for later.

In terms of what I might do differently, given more resources and time, I could envision a version of this system where a White Cell member carries a unit’s respawn banner behind them, and dynamically places it about 50m back from the line of engagement wherever it takes place. I could also envision a system where the total number of available respawns (which I would probably reframe as reinforcements) is a resource to be managed by the commanders and to set the overall size of each Army, serving to offset real-world numbers. Each of these modifications would require additional logistics and White Cell volunteers, but I think they’re worth exploring in future editions of Feldlager.

Medic vs Stop

On a few occasions there was an injury or other medical concern (such as overheating) on the battlefield. In keeping with instructions, those close to the injured party stopped fighting and began calling for the medic. In response (and also in line with instruction), everyone on the field would take up the call for medic as well as soon as they heard it. This ensured that everyone stopped fighting and gave the medic a safe environment to operate in, while also ensuring that no other injuries occurred while he was treating the first one.

In practice, however, having everyone shouting “medic!” meant that the medic didn’t immediately know where the injured party was, and therefore took a few moments longer to get to the injured party.

After the first battle this procedure was replaced with only those close to the injury shouting “medic,” while all other participants took up the cry of “stop!” until all fighting ceased.

Wrapping Up

Despite some frustrations as an event organizer and game designer, as a participant (and specifically as an army commander), Friday’s battle was my personal favorite part of this year’s Feldlager. Not including the setup and waiting time, we fought for about 2 hours. I got to use some of the formations and tactics I’ve been trying to test since first being invited ot the Feldlager Orga back in 2022. My banner captains got to really show the value of their training and got to show their stuff as battlefield leaders, which thrilled the military man and trainer in me.

At the heart of the whole Feldlager Experiment, for me, is the idea of interpreting historical works on military maneuver and then performing those actions in a non-cooperative environment. This year, even more than in 2023, we got to do that. Sounds like a success to me.

In the next AAR entry I’ll discuss Friday’s Night Ops and Saturday morning’s patrols, culminating in the assault on the Wagenburgh. But before that, we’ll have a guest blog from Charles Lin on how infantry can train for Feldlager.

~Jake

2025 After Action Review (Part II)