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Message: <blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 8264377" data-attributes="member: 82106">Not to pick a fight, but I don't buy that "it's fairly obvious" argument. If our study of the real world has taught us ANYTHING at all it is that almost nothing is 'obvious' except at a very superficial level, and mostly not even then. The problem here is simply that it doesn't even work well, even on your terms. Most of the possibilities are a vast array of poorly, or not at all, invented aspects of the setting. Can you defeat the orcs by slaughtering the prey animals they use for food? Who knows? The players don't know, they cannot know. The GM doesn't know either, and if someone wants to try it, he makes up an answer and it isn't based on anything except "do I want this to be the answer or not?" Even if I was a master ecologist I wouldn't be able to answer that question, not until I knew the primary productivity of each area of land, the flow of energy in the ecosystem, limiting factors, etc. Heck, I don't even know enough to list the factors! Neither do you! I could go on for 100 pages and give you ideas of ways to fight 'total war' (and 90% would be drawn from history if I cared to go look). EVERY ONE OF THEM would require the GM to make up some very hard to 'just know a good value for that' facts. If the world did NOT work like that, then we would have become the kings of creation long long ago! Yeah, he sent Grouchy with the Right Wing of the army after Blucher, but Grouchy was slouchy and neither pinned down the Prussians, NOR did he rejoin Napoleon in time. OTOH had Napoleon been less pig-headed and not pressed the attack when he had reason to believe he was likely to end up facing the combined forces of his opponents, he could have simply withdrawn. The fundamental problem was asymmetry in strategic position. Both Blucher and Wellington had little to lose. If they were defeated AGAIN (they had both just lost battles to the French) there were plenty more armies which could be brought in later by the Seventh Coalition. Napoleon OTOH had to WIN WIN WIN. His advantage was fleeting, and his power was uncertain and based on a reputation of victory, which he needed to reestablish. Strategically France was short of manpower and logistically isolated. Wellington knew this, that is why he picked favorable ground and forced Napoleon to attack him. It really wasn't possible for Napoleon to REALLY win, even just making him suffer losses was enough for the British. It was very similar to Lee's position at Gettysburg 40 years later, not a good situation to be in.So, as you can see, and my analysis is barely scraping the surface, even this famous 'even odds battle' is a small part of a very complex overall picture with 1000's of factors, including a good bit of sheer chance, playing a significant part. Obviously in an RPG you can tell a story which SOUNDS like this, but fundamentally it works in a way completely different from the real thing. Calling it 'CAW' and imagining it has some level of realism just doesn't hold water. I totally accept that 'CAW' is a style of play, with certain strictures and conventions which is intended to produce a certain tone in an encounter/adventure/campaign. Even then I'm not at all convinced there is some sort of binary set of only 2 possible polar opposite values for this dimension of tone, but that's kind of another argument.</blockquote>

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