The Coming Tunnel Battle [possible spoilers]

[jindra34]

One thing that comes to mind is that the concentration of forces that results from the tunnel fighting can be good or bad for either side of a particular battle.

With any bottle neck, what really matters is the strength of the plug.

It really comes down to the question of who has the tougher single stack. The tunnels will take away (or decrease) advantages of numbers, but there is still the open question of who's strongest stack of infantry is stronger.

Can Stanley build a stack of infantry tough enough to mow through the toughest stack Ansom can build? Ansom clearly has very tough infantry, and lots of leaders. I just don't see how any of Stanley's units are tougher than Ansom's "Heavies" stacked with tons of leaders. Stanley's strongest units are the dwagons, and it's unclear if they can fight in the tunnels at all. If Stanley cannot put together a defending infantry stack to beat Ansom's toughest attacking stack, then Ansom will eventually push through the defenses.

Obivous solution: One exit with Full Dwagon squad at opening... that has to take the cake for the strongets stack.

[Freederick]

Now to the meat of this discussion: why would anyone seriously entertain the thought of attacking through the tunnels? Unless you are achieving complete surprise, attacking through the tunnels is like gaining entry to the enemy's camp by allowing yourself to be imprisoned in their dungeon.
...
Would going to war against hell be any worse?

I think you're grossly exagerrating. Tunnel warfare is tough, but not unwinnable. There are plenty RL examples of the defenders setting up underground fortifications and tunnels that were then overrun. A number of defense lines in WWI and WWII consisted principally of underground installations; the Japs tried this approach in the Pacific; perhaps most notably, the Viet Cong used networks of tunnels in the Vietnam War. Most recently, tunnel and cave defenses were used in Afghanistan.

In all these cases, the tunnels were overrun by an overwhelming force of attackers. The casualties on the attacking side were high, but not more so than would be expected in reducing any fortified position. Without exception, the tunnels did not prove to be the abattoir for attackers that the defenders hoped. More often, they became a deathtrap for the defenders. Granted, the attackers used flamethrowers, grenades and hi-tech munitions, which are absent in the quasi-medieval Erfworld (on the other hand, there is magic). But then, there are no landmines and explosive boobytraps either, making things even.

Advantages for Parson:
1. Fiendish (not to mention unspeakable) boobytraps prepared in advance;
2. Fire, smoke, and gas mean a lot in tunnel warfare (enter the dwagons, stage left)
3. Knows tunnel layout and position of all forces, while Ansom is groping blindly (although realtime battlefield awareness is less useful in turn-based warfare, as we saw recently)

Advantages for Ansom:
1. Even in tunnels, numbers will tell;
2. In tunnel warfare, commando units make a difference--in Erfworld this means stacks with lots of leadership points, and the Coalition has oodles of those.
3. Initiative--Ansom hits the defending units when he wants, where he wants, and with what he wants. Parson can no longer make hit-and-run sorties in the tunnels, but must sit tight and defend.

[Vreejack]

You are forgetting that in Parson's case the defenders can tactically retreat from losing situations and simply cave the tunnels in behind them. In Okinawa, etc, the defenders had nowhere to go.

[Freederick]

You are forgetting that in Parson's case the defenders can tactically retreat from losing situations and simply cave the tunnels in behind them. In Okinawa, etc, the defenders had nowhere to go.

Collapsing the tunnels behind them, while disengaging from melee, is not as simple as you would have us believe. It takes more than snapping one's fingers to collapse a well-dug tunnel, especially in the absence of explosives. You cannot simply rig the tunnels so that they are touch-and-go: if you did, they could collapse on top of you as easily as behind you, especially with a well-placed shot/spell from the pursuing enemy.

Besides the defenders would have to somehow get separated from the enemy before blowing the tunnel, or else they would get caught in the cave-in. This is often problematic, as the attackers are not stupid, and do their best to maintain engagement. Many a castle has been lost because the besiegers followed a retreating sally in, riding on the backs of the defenders so closely that the gate could not be closed in time. And collapsing a tunnel is much trickier than closing a gate.

[Vreejack]

Collapsing the tunnels behind them, while disengaging from melee, is not as simple as you would have us believe. It takes more than snapping one's fingers to collapse a well-dug tunnel, especially in the absence of explosives. You cannot simply rig the tunnels so that they are touch-and-go: if you did, they could collapse on top of you as easily as behind you, especially with a well-placed shot/spell from the pursuing enemy.

Besides the defenders would have to somehow get separated from the enemy before blowing the tunnel, or else they would get caught in the cave-in. This is often problematic, as the attackers are not stupid, and do their best to maintain engagement. Many a castle has been lost because the besiegers followed a retreating sally in, riding on the backs of the defenders so closely that the gate could not be closed in time. And collapsing a tunnel is much trickier than closing a gate.

That's utter rubbish! Only if the defenders were truly idiots would they fail to close the gate given sufficient knowledge that the enemy was on them. The people who suffered were the defenders who did not make it back in time. A decently designed gate can be closed by knocking out a pin. If some attackers happen to get caught alone on the inside while their comrades are outside then that is a small victory for the besiegers but a very temporary one that is difficult to capitalize upon. I think the Knights Hospitaler were famous for committing that idiocy: charge in, race through the gate, chasing down your foes, then realize you were all alone and lost somewhere in the enemy city while the defenders surrounded you.

Collapsing a tunnel need not be any more difficult than closing a gate given enough time to design the trap. One of the safest ways would be to drop sturdy gates around a low point in the passage and then flood it with water. Water was a popular counter-mine strategy in the medieval period, but they did not have so much time to build entrapping gates. I think Sizemore has had all the time, skill, and motivation he needs to do exactly that, and more.

Separation? What separation? I would happily let a handful of enemies through to deal with at my leisure while the rest of the enemy forces are blocked off or smothered.