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think you can beat Alexander?

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Arn de Gothia View Drop Down
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  Quote Arn de Gothia Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Topic: think you can beat Alexander?
    Posted: 28-Jul-2005 at 10:43
Ok so lets say you are Dharius (not sure how to spell his name) at Gaugamela and you command the persian army to fight Alexander.
What would you have done and do you think you could have beaten him?
Me and two of my mates went on talking about his for hours hehe.
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  Quote Arn de Gothia Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 28-Jul-2005 at 10:56
might as well add my way to defeat him. 

me and my mates all agreed that the only way to defeat him is to make him attack and stay on the defensive.
Seeing as Alexanders army is mainly based on phalanxes once archers have to do alot of work. First mass all cavarly behind your army, all archers infront and spread out the huge mob of infantry in a line with the elite guards on the right, behind the levies.

Keep harrasing Alexander untill he has to move against you. Attacking straight on is suicide so the slowmoving phalanx must be bombarded with as much arrows as possible. As far as I know, Alexander hardly had any archers right?

Anyway, to break the phalanx you have to outflank it so once the phalanx is close, move the army backwards in the same speed as the enemy and once Alexander attack with cavalry, you send all your horse on your left and then the whole army moves right and alittle forward so the phalanx only gets attacked on its left part and then the elite guards swing around on your right flank.

My friend, a huge military nerd just said that Alexander would send cav. on both flanks but whole issue then brakes down to, would Alexanders cav. be able to win on both flanks if its divided into two groups?

anyway, what do you all think?
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  Quote Belisarius Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 28-Jul-2005 at 12:46
I will have to disagree with your analysis. It is suicide to go line for line with the phalanx, especially Alexander's phalanx. As for archers, it is true he had more slingers than archers, but he did have many archers. To move the army backwards as you suggest would require a great deal of discipline. This is very hard to do when most of the Persian army is composed of levies.

I always believed Hannibal's tactics could have won Gaugamela. Use your superior cavalry to draw Alexander and his cavalry away from the battle. I believe that the Persians had 40,000 to Alexander's 7,000, more than enough to make this work. Arrange your line with the poorest quality infantry in the center, the heavy and elite units on the flanks. When the lines meet, the center will fold and the flanks will envelop the phalanx. Alexander will return after undoubtedly wiping out the Persian cavalry somehow to find his infantry wiped out to the man, and would be forced to withdraw.
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  Quote Constantine XI Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 28-Jul-2005 at 20:50
I quite like what Caesar did at Pharsalus. Tempt Alexander into attacking your cavalry with his own (which would include Alexander himself). Behind this screen of cavalry position some of your best infantry and when your cavalry breaks the infantry can smash into Alexander and his companions, who now have no momentum owing to them being engaged in fighting. While your other forces distract the phalanx for just that little while your entrapment of Alexander and his main punching force destroy them, the legendary leader and his offensive arm are destroyed. Lacking their offensive arm, unable to protect their flanks and rear, and heavily demoralized by the loss of their leader, the phallanx can be readily encircled and crushed.
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  Quote Arn de Gothia Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 29-Jul-2005 at 04:42
agreed, I guess it is to hard to move such an army backwards.... if it was possible tho, it would be a perfect tactic against phalanxes.

As for the line to line fight, I didnt really mean to attack alexander straight on at his phalanxes but to move stright forward and right so the army swings around to the right and incircles the left flank of alexander. And where ever Alexander chooses to use his cavalry you have all your cavalry ready in the back.
If Alexanders cav. doesn move, you just support the swing to the right and come stright at him.
My weaknes would be my left flank wich have to be very mobile and just move with the right flank in the swing or just keep the greeks/macedonians bussy.
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  Quote Belisarius Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 29-Jul-2005 at 14:18
I see what you mean. You would try to use something of a sickle tactic? You would have an extremely difficult time doing this against Alexander's phalanx, however. His phalanx was much more mobile and responsive than the phalanx of the diadochi. Come to think of it, you would have trouble using any tactic against Alexander's phalanx.

I would strongly advise against keeping your cavalry in the back. The Persian army numbered in the hundred thousands and keeping the cavalry in the back would mean that you would waste preicous minutes and stamina riding around the infantry. Perhaps keep them on flanks?
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  Quote Constantine XI Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 29-Jul-2005 at 21:50
The phallanx always had the weakness of having incredibly long pikes with laughably small daggers for close combat should the pike barrier fail.

Launching a massive attack on one sector of the phallanx to cause it to direct its efforts in stopping that may be one way of opening up a gap in the pike wall, into which close combat soldiers could rush and make short work of the helpless phalangites. Again I would advise luring the companion cavalry into a trap and destroying them first, so as to give the Persian army total mobility and flexibility in what sectors of the phallanx it can attack.
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  Quote Belisarius Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 30-Jul-2005 at 01:53
I believe that the individual phalangite soldier was defended by a small buckler. A buckler, which I believe is strapped to the arm, is effective in fending off arrows, but the purpose of this is somewhat diminished as both hands were used to hold the sarissa. It is almost useless in melee combat. Also, the military tradition started by Philip of Macedon had only the first line of the phalangites fully armored, the rest barely or not at all. The phalanx was really in trouble when not heavily supported by other troop types.
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  Quote poirot Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 30-Jul-2005 at 04:55

Here is my strategy:

Send an assassin to Alexander's camp and end your woes.

Never fails!

AAAAAAAAAA
"The crisis of yesterday is the joke of tomorrow.�   ~ HG Wells
           
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  Quote Belisarius Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 30-Jul-2005 at 11:28
You just killed all of our fun, poirot.

An assassin may end Alexander's threat, but then again, there were many capable generals in Alexander's retinue that would have taken over.
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  Quote poirot Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 30-Jul-2005 at 21:36
LOL I know... apologies
AAAAAAAAAA
"The crisis of yesterday is the joke of tomorrow.�   ~ HG Wells
           
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Arn de Gothia View Drop Down
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  Quote Arn de Gothia Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 07-Aug-2005 at 12:57
Just played some RTW and came to think, did the persians have any light cavalry archers?
If so, why not keep all footmen far far away and send cav. to keep harras Alexander for as long as possible, that should reduce the greek forces a bit.
Allso, by forcing Alexander to march in battle-formation for a long long time should atleast put his non-elites in chaos enough to harm.
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  Quote Belisarius Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 07-Aug-2005 at 18:47
The 'Persians' per se of the Achaemenid Empire did not have the cavalry tradition of later years. They took advantage of their hearty population for the benefit of their mass levy armies to create very large armies of light infantry. Whatever special cavalry units they had were native-raised forces of certain satrapies. It was only after they were so easily conquered by the heavy infantry of the Macedonians that they realized the effectiveness of cavalry.

If they had cavalry archers, I still do not think they would be effective against Alexander. His marksmen could easily pick them off, and no army, however immobile, stays still to take heavy bombardment long enough for a serious dent in their numbers. Unless of course, the number of archers greatly exceed the number of targets, then it would only take a few volleys. Lastly, I doubt any cavalry force of the time could stand up to, or escape eradication for long, by Alexander's Companion Cavalry.
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  Quote rider Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 09-Aug-2005 at 02:11
I believe that it would be possible, just take some forces hiding and wait for the phalanx to outcircle you men and then ambush the other flank which would be destroyed in seconds. And for the last let your cavalry kill of the Companions and then charge straightly into the phalangites from the back.
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  Quote strategos Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 09-Aug-2005 at 02:23
i know the some hoplites before alexander had the ability to charge the last 100 meters or so into enemy lines. Could alexanders phallanx do the same, because this run would help lessen the ability to flank the army in my opinionm.
http://theforgotten.org/intro.html
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  Quote Belisarius Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 09-Aug-2005 at 02:32
I believe it is a Spartan tactic to 'stutter march' and then charge the last 100 meters.

The phalanx could theoretically do something similar, but you would need some extremely well-trained and naturally gifted phalangites.

I agree with rider. Alexander can not win the battle with just his Companions, regardless of how good they are. Destroy the infantry, and you can at least force Alexander to withdraw.
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