Report 1 102nd Regiment of Madras Fusiliers

Overview
During the battle, only a single Commissioned Officer was present in the form of the Colonel
himself, this is unavoidable since as the regiment stands there is only a single Commissioned
Officer, and therefore lacks the moral and tactical support of a Lieutenant Colonel and
Major. Indeed we have to go all the way down to Sergeant Major to find the second in
command. This bridge in ranks is in part due to the smaller size of the regiment, where it
cannot afford to have 3 dedicated COs.

For the purpose of this report, Sergeant Major Ronald who is technically an NCO, will be
considered a Commissioned Officer, in part because he acted more like a CO, than an NCO.

During the battle the Colonel and the Sergeant Major rotated command, and neither held a
firm grasp of the battle, and resorted to reusing the same tactics of seeking out the enemy
line, attempting to shoot said enemy line (and for the most part failing) and then engaging
the enemy line in melee (which also failed).

Neither officer had the ability to change the tactics used by the regiment for 3 reasons:

1. The lack of mainstream and playtime experience within the regiment meant 90% of
the enlisted infantry would have failed to fully comprehend a more complex order of
battle.

2. The complete lack of any NCO taking part, this itself had several contributing factors,
which will be detailed below. However the entire purpose of an NCO ranking
between Lance Corporal and Lieutenant is to, first and foremost, ensure discipline
within a line, and stop any excessive trolling (jumping in line, head banging at
inopportune moments, shooting out of line, lack of cohesion in melee (which will
also be detailed below))
a. The regiment in its current form lacks any rank between Corporal and
Sergeant Major, and even then employs only 2 Lance Corporals of
inconsistent quality and attendance.
b. The Sargeant Major does not currently employ the job a SgtMjr should (to
oversee NCO activity), and is instead relegated to leading the rear of the line,
a job that should be given to someone closer to Sargeant.
c. The NCOs, or in this case Lance Corporals, should be the one to dispense
Disciplinary justice, in the form of telling enlisted line to reform the line, keep
order in a charge, not to break the rules and to stop trolling.
 3. After the battle began to go against the regiment, the Colonel turned to blaming the
privates in large part due to lack of training and experience, though that is true, and
half a dozen Privates and Private First Class did preform significantly below standard,
it did little to improve moral and may have negatively contributed to the outcome of
the battle.

Melee
Throughout the battle, it was apparent that the regiment severely missed not only its Lance
Corporals, but also all 3 of it fusiliers, who are theoretically the most experienced and most
competent members of the company. The regiment also suffers from an apparent split in
personality, with different people employing different styles of melee combat. For example
Private First Class Murray employs a manner of fighting that relies mainly on chambering,
while Private George relies on a combat style that kills opponents while they are engaged,
while Private Lamb employs a combat style that attempts to draw away private from the
larger block. This is not a common trait amongst many regiments, who will train to fight
melee is a specific way, so everybody knows there way. Because melee training in the
regiment is limited to 2v1 or 5v5 melee fights, no strict code of melee fighting is applied,
and much less enforced by the NCOs.

Shooting
I think we can all agree that it needs improvement.

Commissioned Officers
Did the best they could without NCO support, I suspect even if both Lance Corporals had
been active and present, and I suspect that neither would have offered to correct
disciplinary action that would be required to win the line battle.

Non-Commissioned Officers
Completely non present, in which case higher ranking Private First Classes or Fusiliers should
take an active role in proving they could cope with a promotion, however no Fusiliers were
present and the only Enlisted Linesmen who showed any interest in the matter was Goerge,
however his only intention was to lead, which is not the place of an NCO, who should not be
leading unless higher ranks are killed or unless they are being groomed for a CO rank.

Enlisted Line
Performed below expected standards, however were genuinely outmatched when it came
to all range shooting, and then lacked the sufficient numbers and discipline to make the
melee count, however despite being completely disorganised in a charge, and often
outnumbered 2 to 1, they still performed well, and frequently whittled the opposition down
to only thrice there original numbers.

Suggestions
Get the Lance Corporals promoted to Corporal as soon as possible, the time required to, in
my own opinion, make them competent enough NCOs is not worth it, and I believe the best
way of teaching them is to thrust the responsibility unto them and let that be the main
source of learning.

Now that you have more Privates, Private First Class and Fusiliers, you can more easily
identify who you believe would make better NCOs, and start grooming them for the roles,
this is the job that should be employed by the Regimental Sergeant Major, and Company
Colour Sergeant respectively (or in this case, just Sergeant Major).

Make the Recruit rank a thing, its very strange coming in and going straight to Private, I
would suggest making it youre a Recruit until you turn up to one linebattle, then you can go
to Private thats just me though, and my mother once had me tested for aids after I spent
a weekend with my uncle.