Johime Three Kingdoms

Chapter 556 Countermeasures
Three thousand versus ten thousand, the result was "0:3000"...

With this kind of result, if it were another person, Yan Yan would definitely feel that he was instigated by Chu State to rebel!
"So, the cost of that kind of crossbow...magazine is terrifying?" Yan Yan said with a frown.

Because it was Zhang Ren, Yan Yan listened carefully to his thoughts on this battle.

When Yan Yan heard that Zhang Renyi's initial investigation showed that the Chu army only had 3000 people here, he decided to attack. However... when the battle started, he discovered that these 3000 people were actually armed with "crossbows" that seemed to never stop. "After that, the first reaction in my heart was that Chu State was so well prepared in Badong?
In fact, this idea is not wrong.

Simply talking about power and performance, the current Qi bullet crossbows actually do not surpass the repeating crossbows!

If you optimize the speed of changing the arrow boxes of the repeating crossbow and prepare "infinitely many" arrow boxes, you can actually achieve a similar effect, but...

Not to mention that the cost of a repeating crossbow is dozens of times that of an infuriating crossbow. A crossbow arrow is also a wooden shaft, a bird feather, and an arrow. Compared with a simple and unpretentious small projectile, it costs more in terms of manpower and material resources. It is said that consumption is much more wasteful.

More importantly, the difficulty of preserving and transporting several bullets and a magazine is even more difficult!

The magazine of the repeating crossbow was even disposable in the early days. Although it can be filled multiple times now,... after filling, it must be used within a short period of time. Otherwise, if it is kept in a wound state for a long time, the machine will be damaged more quickly, and it will be transported. On the way, if one sack after another of projectiles falls to the ground, you only need to pick it up. As for the crossbow box... the more bumpy the road is, the more serious the bumps will be, and there will be transportation damage.

In comparison, Qi bullet crossbows are cheap and durable!
Only the energy-charged part is more precise, but you must know that in close combat, it can be used as a hammer head, and it is not "pretentious" at all.

And in addition to the well-prepared spare boxes full of zhenqi, all the grassroots officers of Chu State also have zhenqi and are still charging at any time!
However, from a tactical perspective, Yan Yan's idea that Badong County had thousands of repeating crossbows and "infinitely many" repeating crossbow boxes was not wrong.

"Is Chu State so rich? Or...the cost of this kind of bullet crossbow is much lower than the previous repeating crossbow?" Yan Yan said, taking a collected bullet and muttering.

"That should be the case. Otherwise, let alone thousands of repeating crossbows, would it be possible to prepare tens of thousands of crossbow boxes?" Zhang Ren also judged in the same way.

"If there are so many quivers that they can shoot continuously, no ordinary military formation will be able to match it..." Although Yan Yan is old, his brain is not slow in this regard.

"Actually, if it's just Badong County, I have a plan in mind, but... if the Chu State is really so wealthy, the situation in Hanzhong may be even more unclear, and even in the future..." Zhang Ren is very leisurely and still worried. "future".

Yan Yan's expression changed when he heard what he said, but then he forced out a smile and said: "Don't bother with justice. No matter what happens to Hanzhong or what will happen in the future, we must first capture Badong County and take back Kuimen." As long as we regain control of Kuimen, even with some ingenuity, we can preserve Xichuan...for ten years."

"That's right, I was overthinking it. Maybe the Chu thieves don't play crossbows that much." Zhang Ren also rounded off the sentence to refresh himself.

only……

If the crossbow is really rare, they don't take it from Hanzhong, which is more important, but end up using it for defense in Badong County?
is it possible?
But as Yan Yan said, you don't need to think about that now. You must first take back Badong and reoccupy Kuimen before you can be qualified to "close the door".

"The strategy mentioned before by Zhengyi..." Yan Yan took advantage of the situation and asked.

At this time, Zhang Ren pulled the sand table aside and said: "It can't be calculated as a strategy, it can only be said as a countermeasure! To put it bluntly, it means imagining that the opponent's crossbowmen are ten times or twenty times as many as they are taking turns to shoot arrows to block the attack. If you consider When it comes to projectile damage, this amount will be doubled again...

As a result, we faced the enemy in a conventional military formation, with soldiers lined up in dense columns, but it was easy to cause huge casualties in a short period of time.

However, the opponent's weakness is that as long as they get close, they will immediately 'return to their original shape', so we only need to make some small changes in the formation..."

As Zhang Ren spoke, he arranged the flags of his military formation sparsely on the sand table.

And these flags are not enough!

Zhang Ren's so-called "countermeasure" was to replace the dense military formation with a sparse formation similar to the "sparse formation" variant, so as to avoid being shot by the Chu army and maximize his numerical advantage.

This is actually a change that occurred on the battlefield after the breech-loading gun tactic was perfected. In the West, it is called skirmisher line tactics, but in the East, it is similar to "sparse formation".

It's just that the sparse array was before, and it was more of a choice when it was a "suspect strategy"...

As for "in the future", if the era of cold weapons continues to develop, there will be a tactic of doing the opposite and using sparse infantry and adding swords to fight against cavalry. However, it seems that there is no chance to continue to deepen the development of cold weapons. tactics.

Yan Yan watched Zhang Ren gesticulating and nagging, and he was amazed in his heart - Zhang Ren was indeed the "back wave" of Xichuan. He was defeated miserably before, but in the end he was just "surprised", and now he is So quickly, there is a countermeasure!
At this time, both of them subconsciously ignored it. This countermeasure is only useful when there is an absolute advantage in numbers, otherwise there is no way to fight.

If you want to truly protect yourself, you must advise the Marquis of Shu to immediately develop equivalent weapons after retaking Kuimen, while it can be closed for a few years!

And at this moment, another scout came to report...

"Come in, what do you need to know?" Yan Yan called.

"Reporting to the two generals, the defenders of the Chu thieves have retreated and have closed the battle line and returned to the direction of Zhicheng." The scout came in and reported.

When Yan Yan heard this, his expression was not very happy. After asking the scouts to retreat, he regretfully said to Zhang Ren: "It seems that this general of the Chu army is not just a brainless barbarian. When he saw our large army, As soon as I came, I retreated."

"Guo Huai... It seems that he had underestimated him before! Although I don't know whether this tactic of digging trenches on the spot was taught by the Privy Council of Chu State or he figured it out by himself, but it is a brand-new tactic after all. Guo Huai can He is indeed a rare general who can master it in actual combat so quickly." Zhang Ren changed his previous impression.

What Zhang Ren said is indeed reasonable. The transition from cold weapons to hot weapons is not just as simple as hardware.

In particular, the technology of Chu State has jumped a generation. If the software, that is, the tactical thinking, cannot keep up, and only use a set of cold weapons to control hot weapons, if it is just regarded as a weapon upgrade, I am afraid it will not be so big. improvement.

"Now is not the time to praise him! What if the thief retreats back into the city and defends the city wall..." Yan Yan said worriedly.

However, Zhang Ren interrupted: "General Yan, don't worry. If they stick to one city, the worst we can do is clean up the outside of the city, leaving most of the troops and horses to trap them to death. The remaining small part will be enough to pacify the few." The defenders of Badong and Kuimen...

After all, this Badong was invaded by the Chu State just a few years ago. How can the people of Xichuan be loyal to me? If they shrink into the city, what will be left except an empty city? "

Yan Yan hesitated to speak, but finally nodded and did not refute Zhang Ren's words...

(End of this chapter)