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Message: <blockquote data-quote="argo" data-source="post: 1635255" data-attributes="member: 5752">Bad idea.  There is no way you can possibly control all that real estate so don't even try.  Tiny picket posts are nothing but snacks waiting to be gobbled up.  If you did have enough troops to effectievly guard 50 miles of winding river front then you wouldn't be in the position of being unable to storm the keep in the first place.  2 or 3 medium sized border forts along the length of the river should do it.I think you're just a little bit off base here.  Although draft animals were often used for river travel (the famous Erie canal) they were not always avaliable or practical.  Matter of fact I would venture to guess that for the majority of human history river travel has been by sail, oar or pole (think the ohio, missouri or mississippi rivers).  And travel upriver, assuming you don't have to worry about a lot of cataracts etc, will almost always still be easier than travel overland.Espically when you have to build a road out of a dense forest.Espically when said forest is holtile enemy controled territory. Probably the best bet here is to use flat bottomed, shallow draft pole barges.  A pole barge can make prety good time even against the current plus they have some major banefits in that they can stop on a dime and have fairly good manuverability.  It should be fairly easy to turn these things into floating fortresses, with roofs and palisades to protect the pole-orcs.  10 pole-orcs per barge and another 10 or so archers with flame arrows, pitch catapults and so forth.  Have the barges travel in convoys of 6 or 8, maybe with the point barge nothing but a lot of troops, and the convoy should be prety impervious against simple snipers in the trees.  And with 120-160 orcs in the convoy they won't be too vulneurable to boarding tactics either.  I don't imagine that the pansy elves will be able to haul big siege engines into ambush position so they will have to rely on magic or big creatures to make a dent in the convoys and that sounds like a major expenditure of resources that the tree-hugging elves just don't have (are you playing Midnight?).I also like the idea of rails that sweep back under the keel to protect the rudder from entanglements but I think an even better (and easier to fashion) idea is a metal rail that slopes forward at an angle with a sharpened trap up above the water line like this:_//\_\__\___\____\this would cut any vines and anything it didn't cut it would lift up out of the water to where a few orcs could run foward (under cover) and hack it up.  Plus if you run into any underwater obstructions (sunken boats etc) it will bring you to a stop rather than beaching you on it.  In the event a convoy hits an obstruction the response is to immedieatly hold position and hunker down while unloading everything flamiable they have into the surrounding forest (pop smoke too if you got it) while some ple orcs in heavy armor and with shield bearers (the tower shield is your freind) move up front to sound out the river.  If nesicarry the convoy can beach itself and while half the orcs set up a defensive perimiter the other half will wade into the river and clear the obstacle.  Explosives may be expensive but if you can swing it you may consider equiping each convoy with a few bombs for just such an event.  This isn't foolproof but it should protect the orcs against simple sniping tactics meaning that if the elves want to hit them they will have to close to melee.  You may still loose some convoys this way but you will make the cowardly elves pay for it and that is good enough in our long-term strategy.  Remember, every elven ambush is not an attack on you, it is a chance to do battle with the enemy.So keeping the supply lines open will be a major pain and require a lot of effort but shouldn't be imposible and if there is anything orcs have an excess of it is numbers and muscle-power. As for the fortress.  It sounds even more well-defended than I origionally thought.  I absouetly recomend that you simply contain it and ignore it for now.  Assuming you can more or less isolate it from supplies you will do much better to keep a lid on it, starve them, and worry about them after you secure the surrounding contryside.  Maybe harass them with flaming catapult attacks or something but otherwise don't worry about it.  You have succeded in establishing a base deep in enemy territory and nutralizing an important enemy stronghold's control of the area.  Focus on consolidating your gains and slowly encroaching on the forest.  If you make enough of a nussicance of yourself and remain resolute in the face of the weak elves' cowardly hit and run tactics they will eventually have no choice but to come at you or abandon the theater.  Either way you win.  Remember your Art of War: first place yourself beyond the posibility of defeat and then wait for the enemy to defeat himself.  Turtle up and stay strong.  You can outlast them.</blockquote>

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