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3 wars that were directed by politicans and not Generals.

Avatar 720 wrote:
By attacking where the enemy expects you to come, you draw him into a false sense of victory; by making an unexpected action in addition, you force him to act against it, possibly weakening his defense to the expected; you force him to keep dealing with what he expected; and you force him to think about further unexpected actions. An enemy who has had certain victory pulled from his hands will be confused; an enemy who must deal with the expected and the unexpected will be torn between tactics and strategies; an enemy who is confused and indecisive is unprepared and prone to mistakes; an enemy who is unprepared and error-prone is defeated.

I think you just answered your own question. If your put a few guants and Hive Guard in the lane he expects you to come from, that will be your distraction (not your attack) I come out from everywhere, Genestealers outflanking, Mawlocs deepstiking,etc. When you attack from multiple angles you create disorder and panic.

The problem with this is that there is no fog of war in 40k. If you have three huge units of genestealers, I know in advance that you're going to be outflanking with three huge units of genestealers. Likewise, I can always see everything on the board in perfect detail. There is no way that you can catch your opponent off guard in 40k like you can in the real world.

I mean, I guess your opponent can underestimate things they haven't had first-hand experience with, but that works like once. Nobody forgets an al'rahem outflank or a combi-melta sternguard in a drop pod once they see it once.

broodstar wrote:

Avatar 720 wrote:
By attacking where the enemy expects you to come, you draw him into a false sense of victory; by making an unexpected action in addition, you force him to act against it, possibly weakening his defense to the expected; you force him to keep dealing with what he expected; and you force him to think about further unexpected actions. An enemy who has had certain victory pulled from his hands will be confused; an enemy who must deal with the expected and the unexpected will be torn between tactics and strategies; an enemy who is confused and indecisive is unprepared and prone to mistakes; an enemy who is unprepared and error-prone is defeated.

I think you just answered your own question. If your put a few guants and Hive Guard in the lane he expects you to come from, that will be your distraction (not your attack) I come out from everywhere, Genestealers outflanking, Mawlocs deepstiking,etc. When you attack from multiple angles you create disorder and panic.

I don't recall asking a question...

Also, your post just proves my point in that the quote telling you to never attack where you are expected to is not always true. In order to function as a successful distraction, some attacking must be done, otherwise the bait will not be fully taken. If you just hang back and do nothing, it won't work effectively.

"Therefore no plan of operations extends with any certainty beyond the first contact with the main hostile force." (often paraphrased as "No battle plan survives contact with the enemy.")
On Strategy (1871)

Field Marshall Helmuth Carl Bernard Graf von Moltke



It reminds me that no matter how well I think I've built my army or how solid my strategy is... there are variables in play that I can not control. What it leads me to do is build more balanced, flexible lists that can adjust their tactics on-the-fly as the unfolding scenario demands... rather than one-trick-pony or gimmick armies that are very effective at one thing but rather inept at others.

"I am not afraid of an army of lions lead by sheep, but an army of sheep lead by a lion." Alexander the Great.

In 40k, your HQ choice is the most important choice.

Mr Nobody wrote:"I am not afraid of an army of lions lead by sheep, but an army of sheep lead by a lion." Alexander the Great.

In 40k, your HQ choice is the most important choice.

Unless you're Tau; Crisis Commanders don't really add all that much, but they're mandatory, so I guess they could be seen as important - just not in any sort of strategic way.

Mr Nobody wrote:"I am not afraid of an army of lions lead by sheep, but an army of sheep lead by a lion." Alexander the Great.

In 40k, your HQ choice is the most important choice.

Reading that quote I'd consider the player the general, not the HQ.

"Klotzen, nicht Kleckern!" -- Heinz Guderian.
the rough translation is "boot them, don't spatter them." It's his way of emphasizing one solid, tight thrust of attack with support, as opposed to every unit doing what they want to do.

Ailaros wrote:The problem with this is that there is no fog of war in 40k. If you have three huge units of genestealers, I know in advance that you're going to be outflanking with three huge units of genestealers. Likewise, I can always see everything on the board in perfect detail. There is no way that you can catch your opponent off guard in 40k like you can in the real world.

I mean, I guess your opponent can underestimate things they haven't had first-hand experience with, but that works like once. Nobody forgets an al'rahem outflank or a combi-melta sternguard in a drop pod once they see it once.

analogies to chess and other games of strategy with no fow are probably more useful in general.
often times assaults and close-range fire fights play out like exchanges of pieces in chess. units tend to wipe, and get wiped in return, unless, as in chess, you can achieve overwhelming local superiority. The tactics are alot simpler and direct in 40k but the principle still holds.

jbunny wrote:3 wars that were directed by politicans and not Generals.

And the art of war warns that generals must remain free to conduct the war without interference.

labmouse42 wrote:Honestly a lot of Sun Tsu's teachings don't apply to a minature game. Take the following example.

Corrupt his morals by insidious gifts leading him into excess. Disturb and unsettle his mind by presenting him with lovely women.

Well, ok, maybe that's not such a bad idea. Its a shame that most players don't have an abundance of lovely women they can throw at their 40k opponent.

har har, sun tsu means bait him and then counter attack.

people need to stop taking an idea down to the word and then say suntsu is over-rated *cough joey

schadenfreude wrote:

jbunny wrote:3 wars that were directed by politicans and not Generals.

And the art of war warns that generals must remain free to conduct the war without interference.

I agree, I was just pointing out that the reason for those "losses" was not the generals, but rather the people in Washington.

Not sure if its a quote or paraphrasing, I had it written in my book after a lecture on the C-man (Clausewitz). 'the play of chance and probability within which the creative spirit is free to roam' is on of his 3 aspects of war. And suits this well. Not as an actual strategy, but more as how you can look at the game. A game of chance and probability in which the creative spirit (me!) is free to roam. Like a sheep or duck. That last bit isn't Clausewitz.

Blitzkreig tatics i have found help when playing mech forces

Some good points I've seen so far:

- Sun Tsu talked more strategy than tactics, but strategy goes just as far as tactics to win a battle.
- The nature of 40K takes much of the deception from Sun Tsu out of the picture
- Know your army, know your opponents army
- Have a battle plan that can adapt to unforeseen events

Something I haven't seen before is Sun Tsu's focus on choosing the terrain of the battlefield. I won't try to direct quote because I won't get it right, but he stressed the importance of choosing the terrain to suit your army. This translates perfectly into 40K. Guard and other shooty armies need open maps with open fire lanes so they can set up kill zones. On the other hand assault armies need a lot of cover and breaks in LOS so they can close in to assault closely. Unlike real life where you are limited by what terrain you can march an army to, 40K let's you have a hand in creating the terrain. This is advice that I've really taken to heart in many ways.

Avatar 720 wrote:In order to function as a successful distraction, some attacking must be done, otherwise the bait will not be fully taken. If you just hang back and do nothing, it won't work effectively.

Good point. Reminds me of the Allies using Patton as a decoy early in the Normandy campaign during WW2. They set up a fake army in England and trumped up radio traffic and paraded Patton around the area. They had Hitler so convinced that another army would make a true invasion near Calais that Hitler refused to let Rommel move entire divisions to reinforce the fighting in Normandy, preventing counter-attacks that possibly could have pushed the Allies back into the sea. from the allies perspective Patton was the decoy. From Hitler's perspective, who believed Normandy was a decoy, was even more convinced because of the resources dedicated to the invasion. Coupled with some deception, he believed an invasion was coming until it was far too late to pull a victory out of the Normandy campaign. While the deception part is hard to include in 40K, the general idea holds water: dangle a convincing, but false, show of force to convince the enemy you plan to attack Point A, then attack Point B. If it works you'll at least make your opponent hesitate. If you're lucky, they'll be so convinced you're still planning to attack Point A that they won't release they've been had until it's too late.

To be honest, Winston Churchill has probably at least pushed how I play my game to some extent, and I usually try to change up when things don't work out like I had hoped, even with rolls in mind.


"However beautiful the strategy, you should occasionally look at the results. "

That being said, I grew up on Fire Emblem and various TBS games including Risk, and to be honest, I think it's fair to say that while I've had influences, I've developed tactics of my own. It does bother me though when a lot of people claim that they follow exactly whatever historical figure they can google quickly and then quickly insert a quote. I'm not trying to knock anybody, but chances are that instead of emulating a brilliant leader from the past, they're more likely to adapt to how the game progresses.

Also, I've tried a sort of 40k parallel to the Schlieffen Plan. Interestingly enough, it worked, took out a swarmlord pretty handily (he's a pretty strange metaphor for Belgium, come to think of it), it essentially it allowed me passage into his lines, although I made some mistakes later on, and ended up tying the game. To be honest, if anything, I'll use the quote earlier in this post as my great, ominous quote of strategy, but if anything I might attempt similar wartime plans in-game, to an extent.

...Atlas out.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also, another reason why I quote Churchill:

I've made up plans for games before, and while they sound awesome on paper, sometimes all it takes is forgetting to account for the risk factor. I was pretty viciously beaten in kill points, my first loss so far in that mission type, and with a plan that I thought for sure would rack up kill points. While it very well could have, I ended up getting my ass handed to me because I didn't consider the opponent would be preparing an unorthodox, unusual but successful anti-BA list.

While he is not a famous general or any other sort of military figure, Kelly Johnson (lead engineer of Lockheed's Skunkworks) came up with (imo) the best advice anyone can ever be given for any situation: Keep. It. Simple. Stupid!

The simpler the plan, the less likely it is to fail by the mere fact that there's less things that could go wrong.

The big thing to keep in mind is that Sun Tsu teaches how to win a War, but wargaming is a series of battles. You fight the 2 very differently. Plus with warhammer you can't really think to far outside the box. You can't apply tactics such as making your enemy face the sun when you attack, or luring them into brush soaked with oil and lighting it on fire.

My best advice to win at Warhammer is to play the terrain to your advantage.

King Crow wrote:The big thing to keep in mind is that Sun Tsu teaches how to win a War, but wargaming is a series of battles. You fight the 2 very differently.

I agree. How much differently would 40K (and fantasy) would be played if the casualties from the battle were not available in the next one? Pyrrhus said "One more victory will utterly undo me", and I think this sums it up pretty neatly.

Even though I have the Clausewitz quote in my sig (I put it in there during 4th edition when it was more true of 40K and I'm just too lazy to change it out), 5th edition is more about Moltke.

Especially because Moltke was the first to perceive that, in early 19th century warfare, artillery and breechloading longarms made defensive fighting much stronger than offensive fighting. Because an attacking force has to move, which means they can't shoot effectively, whereas the defending force can just sit and fire continuously, he saw correctly that you needed a 2-1 or 3-1 numerical superiority in numbers to be able to successfully attack a static defensive position.

So Moltke's tactical solution was to attack by setting up defensive positions in places where the enemy couldn't just bypass them. Force the enemy to attack your strong defensive position at a disadvantage.

Since 40K, like early 19th century warfare, has the same dynamic of either move or shoot, (and because in 5th edition, shooting is more effective than assault) Moltke's tactics work similarly--with transport vehicles taking the role of defensive fortifications.

Sun Tzu did say something like

"So it is said that if you know your enemies and know yourself, you can win a hundred battles without a single loss.
If you only know yourself, but not your opponent, you may win or may lose.
If you know neither yourself nor your enemy, you will always endanger yourself."

Which does make sense- if you don't know what your own army is capable of, you can't win, if you don't know what your enemy is capable of, you're at a disadvantage, but if you know both then you can play well.

Another one was

"The victorious strategist only seeks battle after the victory has been won," which sums up the Alpha Legion for me.

For the record it is spelled Sun Tzu But I have read the "Art of War" and I try to follow its doctrines when I play. In all honesty I should probably reread it with the intention of using it for 40k...because well I read it for pleasure.

I dont know the quote or who said it, but somewhere, someone said something about victory being achieved the moment you can get in your opponents head.

If you know exactly what to say at the start of a game, or what not to say, and when, you've already won.

Sometimes I talk up my toughest units, saying how much I love them or how they never die, and when the enemy targets them with the brunt of their firepower, my glass cannons move in.

In the same way, I've scarred players (nicely) into not charging full throttle at me, knowing full well they would easily wipe me out. A tyranid army advancing cautiously from cover to cover towards the guns of my guard is always a satisfying sight

I pull my tactics from three places:

Starcraft
-Getting a good "concave" to maximize the amount of units you have firing while minimizing the amount of units your opponents have firing
-Staying in formation, not so much a Protoss deathball, but in formation nontheless to prevent your stray units from getting picked off at no cost to the enemy. Kind of goes along with the first principle

Chess
-Plan ahead. Then based on those plans, make future plans. Then when your opponent moves (hopefully in the way that you planned for), change all your plans to match that if you planned wrong.
-Using your forces for controlling area. Similar to the controlling the middle ground of chess. Each 40k unit has a threat radius. Concentrate your threat radii.

Magic: The Gathering
-If something has a CMC of 5 or greater, it better win you the game. Basically if you've invested lots of points in something, it must be game breaking like Draigo, Paladins, TH/SS terminators, etc. Something cute won't cut it.
-Combo strategies only work with simplistic combos and redundancy. 2-3 card combos with different cards being able to function as the same combo piece are really the only way to make it work. Doing intricate 40k strategies are more along the lines of "cute," but doing something like Shrike and TH/SS Terminators is simple, effective, the units are good on their own, and difficult to stop.
-Focus on the goals, and don't be afraid to expend your resources. If you win the game at 4 life, you won the game.

curran12 wrote:I prefer Moltke.

"No plan survives contact with the enemy."

That's because Moltke was an idiot who didn't understand the Schlieffen Plan and did exactly what he shouldn't have done, leading to four years of stalemate in trenches. Of course, a Clausewitzian approach to the whole thing, from both sides, didn't help either.

Here are some of my favourite quotes:

"War is an art and as such is not susceptible of explanation by fixed formula"
- General George Patton Jr

It doesn't matter how many threads on tactics you read, either you'll get it, or you won't. There is no one rule that applies at all times, so be flexible. And have an army that allows you to be flexible.


"Fools say that they learn by experience. I prefer to profit by others experience"
- Otto Von Bismarck

Still, reading battle reports is worth it. Watching good players play is worth it.

"The general who wins a battle makes many calculations in his temple ere the battle is fought. The general who loses a battle makes but few calculations beforehand. Thus do many calculations lead to victory, and few calculations to defeat: how much more no calculation at all! It is by attention to this point that I can foresee who is likely to win or lose. "
-Sun Tzu, the Art of War

Mathhammer isn't dumb.


"Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake."
- Napoleon Bonaparte

The time for discussion of your opponent's moves is after the game, not during it.


"Players win games, teams win championships."
- Bill Taylor

When making your army list, don't concentrate on what units are best, concentrate on what units work best with what other units. Look for synergies before raw power, and the whole will be stronger.

"Battles are won by slaughter and maneuver. The greater the general, the more he contributes in maneuver, the less he demands in slaughter."
- Winston Churchill

Paying points for the ability to maneuver is almost always a good idea. Being able to pick where engagements will happen has value.


"Find the enemy and shoot him down. Anything else is nonsense"
- Captain Manfred von Richthofen ("The Red Baron"), 1917

On the other hand, shut up and roll the dice


"A ship in port is safe, but that's not what ships are built for."
- Rear adm. Grace Murray Hopper

Don't deploy so defensively that your units don't affect the game.


"The best luck of all is the luck you make for yourself."
- General Douglas MacArthur

Know how to create engagements that favour you.

"Take calculated risks."
- General George S. Patton, Jr

Know the odds of success/failure when deciding what to do. And don't do things with high risk of failure.

"An army should always be so distributed that its parts can aid each other and combine to produce the maximum possible concentration of force at one place, while the minimum force necessary is used elsewhere to prepare the success of the concentration.
- Sir Basil H. Liddel-Hart

For all the talk that Sun Tsu and Clausewitz get, I think that Liddel-Hart is probably a better read than either of them, especially in regards to strategy (less tactics) in the modern world. While perhaps not as quotable, I highly recommend his books to anyone interested in military history and strategy.


"If your sword is too short, take one step forward"
- Admiral Marquis Heihachiro Togo

Pay attention to ranges. Advance only as far as you need to start taking shots on your opponent. There's no need to take two steps forward and expose yourself to additional threats.

"If you entrench yourself behind strong fortifications, you compel the enemy seek a solution elsewhere."
- Karl von Clausewitz

I'm usually not a fan of Clausewitz, though this may be because of how his works were misinterpreted by others. But this one, seemingly missed by everyone during WWI, is about as true as it gets. You can deploy as defensively as you want. But, if you do so, a smart opponent will simply not engage you on your terms and will force the game's decision somewhere else. By being too defensive, you invite a game prone to draws and inaction (at best) or loss without action (at worst).

"Frederick [the Great of Prussia] liked to say that three men behind the enemy were worth fifty in front of him."
- Colonel Ardant du Picq

Don't be afraid to deep strike boldly, as it can throw your opponent off-balance out of proportion to what you've invested in the move.

"Nothing is so exhilarating in life as to be shot at with no result."
- Winston Churchill

Sometimes, your opponent will roll ones. Sometimes you will too...

"In war, only the simple succeeds."
-Field Marshal Paul Von Hindenburg

Don't bother planning too many turns ahead, there are a lot of dice to roll. Focus on what you can do now.

"Fixed fortifications are monuments to the stupidity of man."
- General George Patton Jr

Patton summarizes Clausewitz's earlier quote.

"In the absence of orders, go find something and kill it."
- Field Marshal Erwin Rommel

Play orks, it's easier


"Being powerful is like being a lady. If you have to tell people you are, you aren't."
- Margareth Thatcher

People who feel the need to talk about how awesome their army is are usually wrong.

"A bold general may be lucky, but no general can be lucky unless he is bold."
- Field Marshal Archibald Percival Wavell

If you don't roll the dice, they can't possibly hit.

"Strategy is the art of making use of time and space. I am less concerned about the later than the former. Space we can recover, lost time never."
- Napoleon Bonaparte

Don't forget that the game ends on turn 5...

"Winning is not a sometime thing; its an all the time thing. You don't win once in a while; you don't do things right once in a while; you do them right all the time. Winning is a habit."
- Vince Lombardi

Don't settle into sloppy habits when you think they don't matter. Do it right all the time, even in casual games. Learn the rules, and apply them correctly, even in casual games, because it will pay off when you're playing more competitively.

i remember this simple satement from a great philospher: WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!
this is why orks should not be allowed to used tactics and instead should always have to take the most driect route to the enemy

Though I don't go with direct quotes, and I have (sadly) not read much more than Machiavelli's Art of War (which deals mostly with Roman formations) I'll have to put in my own pithy statements.

Take the center, and hold it. I don't worry, early on, about flanks or getting in the backfield- but I do like to have control of the center of the board. By definition, it is the closest location to everything else compared to anywhere else. If I have the center, I can target anything in the full 360 degrees around me, making it harder for my opponent to avoid being shot or assaulted when I wish to do so.

Armour is never wasted.

I keep my Battlewagons Closed-topped, and have a large unit of 'ard Boyz. Aside from the Tankbustas I always run, no unit in my army is protected by less than a 4+ save. Every saved wound is another 2 attacks back, another chance to win the game. Every time I ignore a result of vehicle damage, I keep that much more of my force effective.

Play mind games.

I run Tankbustas, and Flash Gits. I have a Battlewagon with a Killkannon and 4 Rokkits. I play unlike any other Orks I've ever seen, so what works on other Orks doesn't work on me. I use my Tankbustas agressively- I once was able to hold a Landraider up an entire game simply by deploying my Bustas across from it, and despite never getting a single result higher than a 1, I kept about 400-500 points out of the game for the price of around 150.

My Flash Gits draw an incredible amount of fire, simply because the enemy doesn't know what they'll end up doing. Deffdreads do the same, except in that case, it's because the enemy knows exactly what they'll do.

riverhawks32 wrote:For the record it is spelled Sun Tzu

Both spellings are correct. They're the Latinized representation of the pronunciation. Mandarin is a complicated language that is hard to romanize. For example, "fong" and "feng" should be one and the same (the "vowel" sound is somewhere between o and e), and so is "jian" and "chien".

Yeah Sun Tzu (here we also say Sun Tsu or even Sunzi...) and his comrade tacticians shouldnt be taken literally. At least not in 40k. They should be transferred and used for your own good. Then they are valuable advisors.

@Ailaros

Of course you can deceive your opponents. Not so well with units, but with the way you play them. You could also say you have to outwit your opponent.
As hybrid guard player I played once vs. mass-orks (1750p). 150 boyz I think. Should result in total annihilation of mine. Fortunately the opponent forgot to space properly so having one Manticore he could count the dead from turn 1 on. But what I also did was pretending a mistake. I outflanked a penal legion squad just outside 12" deploying them as careless as possible pretending them not to be important for me and focussing on another part of the table quickly.
The result was him being greedy and have a waaagh on turn 2 just to get his boys in with the squad. The result was an exchange of 30 boyz and 10 men. But even worse it opened his flank and I could move my army into the gap. The rest was slaughter. I think I lost 2 or 3 units and nearly wiped him out.

@redbeard

That's because Moltke was an idiot who didn't understand the Schlieffen Plan and did exactly what he shouldn't have done, leading to four years of stalemate in trenches.

The Schlieffenplan didnt work anyways because of the British. If there were only the French we had a german victory in WW1. But Germany didnt have a good position to wage war being in the middle of Europe in contact with many possible enemies with almost no natural borders...
In WW2 it worked better (Basically the same idea). Although still there were too many forces tied up against russia.

But still it is true. Moltke acted like an unexperienced General. But the main failures were: 1. That the austrians attacked a nation with overwhelming support from allies, 2. Helping them at all...

@topic

An example for a good reference is also the 3:1 force balance necessary to attack a position. 1. The enemy is fortified most of the time, so he is in cover, you are not. 2. You are advancing, the enemy already has a good position. 3. You must wipe the enemy out of his position (rout him or kill him) otherwise the attack was unsuccessful. So after 1 or 2 rounds of advancing you still have to outmatch the enemy in a way that you quickly drive him out there. The second benefit is, that you have more material to repel a counter atack when you attacked with more force.

This leads to my main quote: "If you defend everywhere, you defend nowhere." (Fredrick the Great) Transfer: Dont try to save all of your army above everything. Then it will result in you saving no part of your army at all. Or in other words: Make maximal use of local superiority.

My strengths as a general are: discipline under pressure, a bit psychological warfare, creative ideas
My weaknesses are: Laziness when not under pressure, too disciplined in maintaining the initial plan

So I will be defeated if an opponent makes me think I have won and I shine against overconfident opponents.