Playing Austrians in 1805 - Some Notes

Toward the end of the Battle of Babensham, Robert as the Austrian commander was heard to exclaim "How can you win with this army?  How can you attack?".  Later, when the post-battle dispositions had been completed at operational level, he was dismayed again.  The French, having the initiative, moved first in the following pulse, and piled straight into his rearguard.  Feeling obliged, for reasons I will not go into here, to accept battle, the pulse ended immediately.  Despite knowing that that would be the consequence of the decision to fight, he nevertheless opined that "this sucks", for it meant that his forces elsewhere would not get to move, nor the Inn valley force even to re-construct brigades broken in the previous day's fighting.  The same could be said, mind you, for all of the other French and Bavarian forces - they did not get to continue their advance, either.

Naturally I do not like my players to be unhappy, but this is after all a simulation of war, and in war a good deal of excrement occurs.  Some of the Austrians' current predicament is simply down to that, but some of it is a reflection of the fact that the Austrian army in 1805 was pushing 'it uphill in facing Napoleon at the height of his powers, leading arguably the best French army that ever existed.  That is, this is not a balanced tournament scenario, but a simulation of an historical situation that was deliberately set up, historically, to be unfair.  In that context the French were certainly more successful than the Austrians, but it was not a foregone conclusion, I think, and it is still not one in the campaign.

While trying, as usual, not to give any intelligence away that is not already public knowledge, I want to offer a few notes on the situation at Babensham in the campaign, and also (of more general interest) on the Austrian Imperial army at this date and how this is reflected in the rules.

Bad Generals

That Austrian generals of this period are a fairly lacklustre lot is a commonplace observation.  The Archduke Charles is the only one who showed any outstanding talent at this date.  Although Mack is in my view unjustly under-rated, nobody would number him among the great captains.  Schwarzenberg made a decent showing later on.  The way this is reflected in the rules is that all of the generals in Germany are given a zero tactical rating.  What this means when it comes to the battlefield is that they are each randomly assigned two personal traits from the two dozen listed in the rules, and whatever is rolled is what they have.  Some will be good, some bad, and some combinations can be difficult to work with.  In this case, Robert was unlucky.  FML Werneck commanded four of the seven divisions at Babensham, and he rolled the traits:

Inept: This general lacks the experience or skill to co-ordinate troops at corps level.  Divisions under this general may never have the same priority rating, unless that rating is 0.

Unreliable: Whether because of temporary illness, senility, conducting a feud, or some other reason, this general is not fully dependable.  Before issuing PPs, roll a d6.  On a roll of 1 he may distribute no PPs this turn.

I trust that earlier articles have given enough idea of how the command system works that these descriptions will be intelligable, or that they are in themselves clear enough to give the idea.  Each of these qualities is a weakness in a general - the combination of the two is a rather great steaming pile.  

It happens.  Neither Emperor Francis, having recently taken personal command of the army, nor FML Klenau, were as bad as Werneck, but nor was either any great shakes.  Riesch was pretty good (Hard-driving and Shrewd Tactician) but the course of the battle did not allow him to make much impact with his one division.

In the blue corner was Napoleon himself (with the extraordinary tactical rating of 2) and Marshals Bernadotte, Davout and Soult, two of whom have ratings of 1.  I am not sure that the Marshalate in general were fabulous commanders either, but Davout and Soult were notably good.  This was part of the Austrians' misfortune.  What this means on the tabletop is that Davout and Soult initially roll for each personal trait not once but twice, and keep the better result, so while they might have a bad day it would be extraordinarily (rather than only ordinarily) unlucky to get a combination like Werneck's.  Napoleon has one characteristic (Revered) fixed by the campaign rules, and for his second characteristic makes three rolls, selecting the best of them.  On the other hand, being the control-freak that he was, he always takes more than his fair share of Priority Points from the army's pool.  Because of these ratings the Austrians can count, then (leaving aside the skill of the players), on being out-generalled on the tabletop.  Unfair?  Yes, I daresay.  History is like that.

I should say, though, that in campaign time we are almost at the end of October.  True, the action is on the Inn rather than on the Iller, but historically some forty thousand Austrians had been killed, wounded or captured a week earlier than this point.  Robert has carefully and successfully avoided that fate, not to mention drawing the French in so as to set up a Russian victory against the flank of the Grande Armée, so he is ahead of Mack on points so far.  His army is largely intact, and his Russian allies are engaged in Bavaria, rather than falling back to Moravia following his catastrophic collapse.

Bad Tactical Doctrine

I noted in an earlier article that Anglophone historians, at least, tend to disparage Austria before 1809 for clinging to linear firepower tactics such as had dominated the eighteenth century, even as they praise the success of British lines.

I will not revisit that question here, but another aspect of tactics less frequently commented on is that the Austrians had not yet developed much idea of combined arms tactics, or even of mutual support above the regimental level.  I am thinking of occasions such as Haslach-Jungingen, on 11 October 1805, where GdD Dupont was able to hold off a vastly superior (in numbers) Austrian force, largely because of their inability to properly support attacks on the village of Haslach (also because of differences of views and consequent lack of co-ordination between the left wing, commanded by Mack, who was trying to break the army out of the trap, and the right, commanded by Archduke Ferdinand, who just wanted to escape the trap personally - and soon after, did).  Three days later, FML Riesch allowed Marshal Ney to force a crossing of the Danube at Elchingen, despite having superior numbers on the field, again apparently due in part to an inability to co-ordinate counter-attacks.

Some of this, to be fair, may be laid not at the door of sticking to eighteenth-century tactics, but precisely of trying to move away from them.  In early 1805 the Austrian army embarked on a large-scale reform project, with new formations being introduced and battalions being radically re-structured.  If the troops sent into the field in September while still trying to get to grips with the new SOPs were having difficulty following thier cheat sheets, who is to blame them?

This is reflected in the rules by restricting certain nations at certain dates (and Austria in 1805 is one such) from allowing brigades to offer mutual support in attack or defence.  Each may be supported by a single artillery, but otherwise each must stand alone.  This allows the more flexible French a great advantage if they can bring superior force to bear on an isolated unit - at the recent battle of Babensham the village itself was loopholed and barricaded, and garrisoned by a brigade of Austrian grenadiers.  They could not hold in the end, though, against no fewer than seven mutually-supporting French brigades flung against them.  The Austrians simply could not match such a feat, and I think this reflects fairly the relative historical strengths of the respective armies.

So What is the Good News?

Is Robert's wail justified, then?  Are the Austrians doomed to defeat on every occasion in this campaign?  No, I don't think so, for reasons both strategic and structural.

Strategy

The nature of this campaign requires that the French go on the strategic offensive.  The Austrians can pick up some points early by raiding into Germany, perhaps as far as the Rhine.  That was their original historical objective, so the victory point awards encourage them to give it a go, but that strategy assumed that the Grande Armée was busy elsewhere.  In the game as in reality, it cannot last.

Once it became clear that they had attracted Napoleon's entire focused attention it had to be abandoned, and reliance placed on delaying the French advance and surviving until the eventual Russian arrival.  The French, on the other hand, must defeat the Coalition armies in detail before they can unite, for an Austerlitz with the Austrian army intact and three Russian armies in-theatre is suicide.  

This in turn means that the Austrians, when they must fight, can and must choose when and where to do so, and can generally maintain the tactical, as well as the strategic, defensive.  As Robert observed, this is not a good attacking army - the lack of mutual support at brigade level as well as a likely unevenness of competence at leadership level make it a challenge to put in co-ordinated assaults.  In defence that is much less of an issue.  If a solid infantry line can be formed (or better, two lines), especially in the hilly wooded country that covers much of the theatre, they can happily allow the French to come on in the same old way, as Wellesley was later to remark.  

As defenders they have access to two additional advantages.  

John discovered at Ottenhoven, and recommended to Robert for the defence of Babensham, that an effective technique for breaking up supported French attacks is to use reactive artillery fire as they approach to throw back supporting brigades before they arrive, or perhaps even the intended primary attacker so that a weaker compatriot must be substituted.  A single unit of artillery can thus reduce the strength of the attack by one or more points, and if it is contact with the defenders can then still add its support to the ensuing close combat.

In addition the infantry have access to the "Defence against Infantry" stance.  This represents the disciplined volley firepower of traditional lines - something the Austrians were very good at (quite as good as the French, and possibly better).  Although the French get the same ability, it is lost when troops move, and must be paid for again, whereas a largely static defensive line can, given time, set every brigade in such a stance and wait for the enemy to bring it on.  The French can counter it by using the "Assault" stance, representing their attacking vigour with the bayonet, but interestingly the French did not use this during the last battle, even though they had explicitly asked beforehand about its availability.

Army Structure

Given time to prepare a defence, the Austrians' using "Defence against Infantry" should give them a slight advantage over the French "Assault".  This will be more than made up for by the French ability to support an attack with additional brigades, but only if the defender is isolated.  A solid line with secure flanks can only be attacked head-on, in which case each attacker can only get support from directly behind, for +1, or a maximum of +2 if artillery and/or generals are used.  The Austrian army structure largely nullifies this, for although they cannot get support from other infantry or cavalry (they still can from artillery and generals) the numerical strength of their brigades has much the same effect.

In T&A, an average-sized brigade has a strength rating (used as a modified to combat rolls) of 0.  Notably stronger or weaker units have ratings between -3 and +3.  Importantly, the average and distribution of unit sizes are calculated across all infantry and cavalry brigades of all armies involved in the campaign, not per army nor per arm of service.  

The average strength rating of a French infantry brigade in this campaign is 0.2 (~2,450 men), and that of a cavalry brigade -1.6 (850 men).  The corresponding figures for Austrian brigades are 0.7 (2,950) and -0.8 (1,450).  Very often, then, when a French unit attacks a corresponding Austrian one, it will find its support bonus cancelled out by the inherent numerical strength of the opposing brigade.

What this amounts to is that the Austrians need to look for certain kinds of battles.  They ought to avoid swirling fights of maneuver, but should seek instead to be on the defensive with well-prepared lines of infantry (perhaps multiple lines, so that if the front line becomes fragmented it can fall back through its friends).  Their flanks should be secured, and artillery should be placed either interspersed between the infantry (for reactive fire followed by support) or immediately behind (for support only).  Their cavalry can more than take care of itself one-on-one, but must beware of being isolated without support - operating in large blocks is inflexible, but frustrates the inherent French flexibility to gang up with multiple attacking brigades.