Chapter 216 Battlefield Initiative
Richard sent out a lot of reconnaissance cavalry. After several days of reconnaissance, and cooperating with Zachli's troops, the enemy situation in Platos Valley has been clearly investigated.
The orcs on this route are indeed relatively strong, with a total of five brigades, totaling about tens of thousands of people.
Richard personally went to Platos Castle and discussed the distribution of the battle lines with Zachary. The defense of the Platos Valley Passage is still dominated by Zacli's troops.
After the orc army approached, Zachary had mobilized three brigades of the Atonement Legion to the Platos fortress group.
Since yesterday, the orcs have launched a tentative attack. Heavy trebuchets were erected, and the trebuchets from both sides began to bombard each other.
Because the Platos Fortress Group has a geographical advantage, the trebuchets are all on the mountainside, and their range and power are much farther than those of the orc trebuchets.
The orc siege troops suffered some hardships, and the heavy trebuchets would also destroy a few.
There are three thousand people guarding here. The orcs want to break through the defense line. In a short time, the ten thousand troops are still slightly insufficient.
Although he did not know the specific battle plan of the orcs, since the intelligence gradually became clear that the main force of the orcs was not in the northern part of the Gedda Province, Richard decided to take the initiative and eat the three orc brigades in the northern part of the military station, and then cooperate with Viscount Luomen to surround and annihilate them. Two orc brigades on the road.
Nowadays, the Haaland Territory has strong troops and horses, and its strength is far beyond what it was three years ago.
Only when you know yourself and the enemy can you fight without danger.
Although the orcs have good intelligence capabilities, they have placed spies in Black River Fort. However, the Haaland territory restricts population migration, and the efficiency of information transmission is very low. The orcs have not yet placed intelligence personnel in the Harland Territory, and they have not yet figured out the strength of the Harland Territory.
The orcs overestimated their combat effectiveness and paid no attention to the development of Harland's territory.
Therefore, the plan was made very rashly, thinking that three large groups of orcs could contain the army in Harland's territory.
If we look at the strength of the two sides in the last battle, there is certainly no problem with the orcs' arrangement, and there is even a lot of room left.
The combat power of three orc brigades is enough to deal with Harland's territory.
However, in three years, the strength of Harland's territory has doubled. According to Richard's assessment, a frontal field battle is enough to defeat three orc brigades.
Early the next morning, Richard called all his subordinates together, glanced at each person's face one by one, and then said: "The fighter plane has appeared. It's time to give the orcs a hard blow. Send the order to assemble the troops. Follow me and kick the orc's ass!"
Richard's voice was very strong and his attitude was very firm. Now that he had made a decision, even though some conservative officers liked to use the most defensive counterattack tactics. But his prestige was too high, and all the officers could only follow Richard's opinion.
The conservative officers in the territory are mainly Richard's uncle Soros. Although Soros had different opinions in his heart, the military commander made up his mind and he could only keep his opinions in mind.
At this time, the following cannot easily interfere with the commander's determination.
Soros has been in the military for many years and has rich experience, and he knows this very well.
"The orcs have the advantage of detection. Many times the information we detect is deliberately discovered by the orcs. Is it too risky to launch an attack rashly?
What if the orcs lure me out of the castle and set up an ambush outside the depot?
We are a private army of nobles. If we defend our territory, we have completed our mission. Why should we take the initiative to provoke a decisive battle with the main force of the orcs? Once too many soldiers are lost, it will be difficult to replace them with veterans and officers with many years of experience. I wonder if Richard has considered this clearly? "Soros was thinking secretly. He wanted to talk to Richard, but he was afraid of affecting his determination.
When leading an army in battle, the most taboo thing is that the command authority is not unified.
Although superiors can promote military democracy and let subordinates provide opinions, once the superiors make up their minds, subordinates must complete the task to the letter.
Soros hesitated for a while and decided to believe Richard.
Judging from the results of several battles, Richard felt that he was much better than him on the battlefield.
Since Richard believed the scout's judgment and felt that it was necessary to fight this battle, Soros could not hold back and kept his words of persuasion in his heart.
There is a third battalion in the military station, plus an auxiliary squadron to garrison it.
The orc camp was stationed in the north of the military station fort. This time the orc commander was very cautious and did not rush to send troops to attack the military station fort.
The terrain of the military station is very dangerous, and the tentative attack is of no use except increasing casualties.
Through harpy reconnaissance, the orcs have figured out that the castle defenders number over a thousand.
The trebuchets of the defenders of Harland Territory are very accurate, and the soldiers' archery skills are accurate and ruthless. They will also throw alchemy bombs at critical moments. Even if a thousand soldiers defend the city, three large groups of orcs are not sure of taking down the stronghold of the military station. .
The task given to them by the orc army is to contain the Harland Territory army, and they are not allowed to fight hard with the Harland Territory.
The reason why the orcs camped outside the military station fort was entirely to compete for geographical advantages. There was a three-way intersection outside the military station fort. If they guarded this three-way intersection, they would be able to guard the back roads of the east and west passages.
By noon, the First Brigade, the Second Brigade, the Fourth Brigade, the Warcraft Cavalry Brigade, the two headquarters reconnaissance squadrons, the Guard Squadron, and the Mage Squad had all gathered at Fort William, with a total number of about 3,600 people.
Fort William is thirty kilometers away from Fort Depot. If we speed up, according to the quality of the troops in the Harland Territory, they will be able to appear on the battlefield before evening.
After resting for an hour or two, you can launch a surprise attack late at night.
In famous battles in history, almost all famous generals would mobilize the troops before the battle to boost morale and gain stronger combat effectiveness.
Zachli, the former commander of the Northern Army, was very good at pre-war mobilization, and even William was an expert in this area.
Richard also had to conduct a mobilization speech before the battle.
"Soldiers, we are going to fight tonight. Many of you are veterans and have participated in many battles. But there are still many new recruits. Although they have been trained for three years, they do not have much war experience.
I can see tension, anxiety, and even fear and terror on many people's faces.
But I tell you, we are people from the northern border and live on this land. No matter whether we are nobles or serfs, no one can refuse to fight.
If we fail, the orcs will break through the castle of the territory, and your parents and children will become prisoners of the orcs.
Many people in the territory have been prisoners of the orcs, and even many soldiers have been prisoners of the orcs. They will tell you what kind of life it is? Our relatives will become the same fate as pigs and sheep, and they will be slaughtered at any time and become food for the orcs.
For the fate of our relatives, we must overcome the fear of death and overcome our psychological 's weakness and fought desperately with the orcs.
Many recruits are still indentured slaves and have no freedom in life. They envy the high military pay and good treatment of veterans.
I tell you today that you don't need to envy these. As long as you can kill an orc today and make military achievements, the recruits can also get freedom in advance.
If you die in battle, your family will be pardoned, and the whole family will be free people, with good pensions and subsidies.
In war, blood and death are inevitable, but please supervise each other. I, Richard Harland, will never abandon you. If I take a step back, please ask the soldiers to cut off my head.
I will not retreat, and none of you can take a step back. Whoever dares to retreat, no matter how senior or how big or small the official position is, I will also cut off his head. "
After the mobilization, the soldiers had lunch, took a small amount of dry food, left Fort William, and headed towards the military station.
Just a few kilometers out of the city, I found that the eagle was scouting from a high altitude.
Richard estimated the distance and found that it was beyond the range of the enchanted bow and arrow, and shook his head in annoyance.
He had planned to launch a surprise attack, but he was unlucky and was exposed just after leaving the city.
Since the surprise attack has failed, he can only fight with real swords and guns.
After the harpy detected the intelligence, he immediately sent the news back to the orc camp.
The officer commanding the three orc battalions was an eighth-level boar man named Duram.
Duram was the deputy commander of the orc army, responsible for commanding five battalions of orcs, and his status was equivalent to Richard's old rival Gunderson.
After receiving the intelligence detected by the harpy, Duram said in disbelief: "Is the human commander a fool? Does he want to launch a surprise attack again?"
In the last orc invasion war, the commander of the Northern Army, Zakri, achieved a brilliant victory through two wonderful night surprise attacks.
After receiving the intelligence from the harpy, the orcs immediately thought that Richard was going to repeat the same trick and launch a night surprise attack.
"Pass on my order. Tonight, each squadron should send more sentries to let the soldiers take turns to rest and guard against the night attack of humans."
In the evening, Richard led the soldiers to the military station fort. He personally climbed the watchtower and observed the orc camp. He found that the orcs were prepared and were digging trenches.
After dinner, Richard immediately issued a combat mission to the first reconnaissance squadron.
"In the second half of the night, you will launch rockets at the orc camp in small teams to make a louder noise. Your mission today is to harass the orc camp, consume the orcs' energy, and prevent the orcs from sleeping well. There will be no combat mission for you tomorrow."
In the second half of the night, the first reconnaissance squadron made a big fanfare and harassed the orc camp several times in a row.
Although Duram quickly saw through the intentions of the reconnaissance squadron, in order to be foolproof, he still left three squadrons awake all night to prevent the human soldiers from pretending to be real and launching a surprise attack in the middle of the night.
The next morning, Richard led 4,500 soldiers out of the military station fort and approached the orc camp.
When they were 400 to 500 meters away from the orc camp, Richard began to set up camp, build fortifications, and assemble catapults.
The orcs had more than 6,000 soldiers and fortifications to help. Richard was unwilling to fight on the battlefield set by the orcs and get hurt.
Setting up camp 400 to 500 meters away from the orc camp was equivalent to pointing a sharp sword at the orcs' throats.
If the orcs ignored it, Richard installed a catapult, which could be used to calculate the trajectory and attack the orc camp at a longer range.
The orcs were very rigid in using catapults, and their accuracy was not enough. It was a humiliation for them to use catapults against the Harland Territory.
If the orcs took the initiative to attack from the camp, the battle to attack the camp would become a battle in formation.
Such a change would certainly be beneficial to the Harland Territory, which actively sought war.
Over the past three years, the Harland Magic Association has developed rapidly. Now there are many magicians who can record explosive runes. Before the war, the territory had accumulated 1,200 alchemical bombs.
Alchemical bombs weigh only a few kilograms, and using a lightweight counterweight catapult, they can be thrown 500 meters away.
And for throwing heavy stone bombs, the range of the catapult is only about 200 to 300 meters.
At a distance of 500 meters, the soldiers of Harland Territory had the initiative. When the camp was built, the orcs would suffer.
When he found that humans were building a camp outside the castle, Duram was confused. Although he was a wild boar, he was cautious and not sensitive enough to the battlefield situation. The reason why he could command five orc battalions and become the deputy commander of the orc army was mainly due to his high professional level.
Although it is not easy to fall into the enemy's trap, it is difficult to grasp the initiative on the battlefield.
Seeing Richard building a camp, Duram suppressed the opinions of the officers below and did not take the initiative to attack.
As a result, when the camp was built and the catapult was successfully assembled.
More than a dozen alchemical bombs were launched and thrown into the orc camp. In an instant, smoke billowed, and several alchemical bombs hit the orc tents.
In a blink of an eye, dozens of orcs were killed and injured.
The catapults continuously fired alchemical bombs with a very high hit rate, more than 95% of which hit the orc camp.
Such a high accuracy rate is because the magician calculated the trajectory in advance.
Although Richard submitted the blueprint of the counterweight trebuchet, he did not tell Nolan's engineers the method of calculating the trajectory.
Compared with the trebuchet blueprint, the method of calculating the trajectory is more critical. First, you need to be proficient in the principle of levers, and second, you need to understand classical physics and calculate the gravitational acceleration of the Dawn Plane. Third, you must know the parabola calculation method, which uses a lot of knowledge in algebra, geometry, and calculus.
In the Harland territory, there are only four people who can calculate the trajectory. In addition to Richard, Sofia, and Wendy, only the very smart Butler can take on the task of calculating the trajectory. Even the other two magicians in the territory, Anne and Heath, are not good at calculating the trajectory and counterweights because of insufficient mathematical knowledge.
The trebuchet kept throwing, and after more than a dozen rounds, it projected 120 alchemical bombs.
Because of the high accuracy, these 120 alchemical bombs achieved very good results.
Duram counted the casualties and found that more than 190 orcs were killed and about 500 were injured.
Seeing that the human side was still throwing alchemical bombs, Duram couldn't just watch the orcs get beaten without fighting back.
If the situation continued, the morale of the orcs would become very low. They might be defeated by humans without fighting in close combat with the Harland Territory.
In desperation, Duram could only organize his troops and take the initiative to attack the camp built by Richard, hoping to get close to the Harland Territory army and defeat the opponent in close combat.
I have something to do tonight and can't write, so I only have one update to post.