A peasant militia is not a complex foe to route, but the layout of the village makes boxing them in for a charnel slaughter difficult. Truth be told, had they not been so eager to throw their lot in with the Thornlands and waited until their defenses finished construction, it would have saved you a major headache. The curtain wall erected around the Bright Springs stands a mere ten feet tall. More than most villages can boast, but hardly enough to keep your forces from routing a force of disorganized peasants.

The problem comes with the fact that the wall is half finished. The village's east end is as naked as the sows sentenced to work the stables of the Pit for a fortnight, and it presents a target that's nearly as tempting. With four companies of runecarved skeletons, you could amass your forces at the east to give them a right good pounding, shatter their spirits and raze the village to the ground.

Like a sow in the stables, the village would get wrecked.

But also like a sow in the stables, the work would be sloppy.

Realistically you won't be able to kill them all. Even in a proper siege, taking the walls and turning them against the people within the village, some of the people you've been sent to punish would make it out alive. You push in from the east with your full force and they'll slip out of the village on the north and south roads. Sending skeletons to control the roads would still leave the western wall uncontested. Another avenue for the vermin to escape.

After staring down at the battlemap for a little while longer, you nod to yourself and place your pieces on the board, letting your mind's eye envision the proceedings. You will not claim to be a tactical genius, but you know the game well enough to understand how the battle ought to go.

"A company to each side?" Dormandal looks over your battle plan with the purple flames that flicker in his eyes. "Hmmm... and how do you plan to use your forces? Surely you don't intend to try for an encirclement?"

"No," you say with a shake of your head. "The company at the western wall will attack first. I want them spread out, making enough noise to draw as much of the militia as possible... and to have the rest begin the evacuation. I doubt they've drilled it well, but if I were a rebel I'd have more of a plan to flee than scatter and get cut down. They know our camp is to the south, so they'll push the northern road and the openings to the east. The first and second companies will be waiting meet them before they can flee."

You smile to yourself. Not as sloppy a job as the stables, but still as messy as your old mum after she worked a wild party. That's acceptable.

"A company to distract, a company to threaten, and two companies to slaughter them as they retreat," Dormandal nods at your proposal. "Not a bad use of your forces at all. What is your fallback position if they manage to break through on the north and the eastern ends?"