Chapter 3458 Fire Ship and Cupping Pot
Zhou Yu could not only rely on his own ships to fight, but now he had to step up and bear the main firepower output to prevent Jiangdong Army from being ravaged unilaterally in long-range firepower.
These shortcomings of Jiangdong Navy are not very obvious in short-term or small-scale battles, and they even have advantages in certain local battles.
This is because the smaller the scale of the battle, the more obvious the role of the quality and combat ability of individual soldiers.
But once it enters the stage of full-scale combat, the effectiveness of individual soldiers is shared.
Although the soldiers of Jiangdong Army are still very capable in combat, their shortcomings in equipment have offset this advantage of Jiangdong Army. As the duration of the battle prolongs, the physical strength of the soldiers decreases. Various small tools that can help the soldiers save physical strength, such as the string puller that helps the crossbow arrows to be stringed, allow the Sichuan-Shu Army to overtake in corners.
Due to long-term shooting, the physical strength of Jiangdong Navy soldiers decreased, and many crossbowmen did not even have the strength to pull the string. This resulted in both the quantity and quality of shooting of the Jiangdong Navy''s crossbowmen. In the end, they could only They were forced to bear the constant barrage of arrows, crossbows, crossbows and rockets from the Sichuan and Sichuan naval forces.
"Turn!" 』
"Prepare the fire ship!" 』
Zhou Yu, who discovered that the long-range firepower was suppressed, had to use the last resort.
In a fire attack, of course you cannot let your own ship be burned, so you must turn. On the one hand, it is to make way for the fire ship hidden behind the building ship to attack, and on the other hand, it is to take the opportunity to seize the upper reaches, or to move to the flanks to avoid the fire ship''s flame attack range.
The fire boat thing is really a timeless trick that has been passed down through the ages.
The fire ship tactic can be said to be a tactic that is loved by almost all generals in the history of water warfare around the world.
Of course, what you like is to see the other person being burned. It would be a bit sad if you were burned instead...
Unlike what most people in later generations thought of naval warfare, fighting on the water in ancient times can actually be regarded as an extension of the fighting on land.
If Fei Qian hadn''t brought out a killer weapon like artillery, then ordinary soldiers would have been difficult to destroy the carrier of the opponent''s soldiers in a short time, whether on land or on the water.
This kind of soldier carrier is a city on land and a ship on water.
Because there was no breakthrough in science and technology, the development line of the Jiangdong navy was very small in history.
Bigger boats carry more people.
In the absence of effective hull destruction and the low speed of warships making it difficult to maneuver quickly, large ships often serve as combat platforms for infantry, or as a mobile wooden fortress on the water.
And in the process of surface combat, there is still no way to get rid of the thinking mode of land combat. Most navy generals follow the habit of fighting on land, just like there must be small fortress defense lines of various sizes outside the pass city. When these large warships are in battle, they will inevitably be accompanied by a variety of small warships. On the one hand, their role is to conduct reconnaissance, warning, transmitting information, rescuing drowned crew members, etc. among ships. In war, they will also be used Mobility assists attack and defense.
Therefore, using fire ships to destroy the opponent''s hull is as effective as capturing the opponent''s city wall in land warfare.
If you want to use fire ships to burn enemy ships, the first problem has already arisen. A fire ship loaded with fuel cannot carry enough combatants like a normal warship. Therefore, once it is intercepted by a small ship of the enemy fleet halfway, If intercepted, the fire attack will most likely be aborted.
Even if there is a way to break through this obstacle, how the fire ignited by the fire ship can spread to the entire enemy fleet is a huge problem. Moreover, once a fire breaks out in the enemy fleet, how to prevent the scattered enemy ships from drawing the fire to one''s own side is also a general problem. Issues that must be considered.
Zhou Yu dared to use fire attacks on a large scale in history, and changed the general trend of Jiangdong in one fell swoop. It can be said that he established the situation of the Three Kingdoms in one fell swoop. Unfortunately, in Mr. Luo''s writing, he became Xiao Liangliang''s supporting role and completely disappeared. In real history, the majesty and courage of one person to rule the country and save Jiangdong from water and fire turned into a petty and careless clown.
However, Mr. Luo still hit the key point of the Battle of Chibi, and that was "luck".
In the Battle of Chibi, Huang Gai''s fire attack was able to achieve the glory of defeating Cao''s navy. The process itself can be said to be achieved by stacking multiple layers of BUFF. During the confrontation between the two sides, Cao Jun "encountered an epidemic in Baqiu", which caused the physical strength and reaction ability of the soldiers to decline. At the same time, when Cao Jun arranged the naval formation, he "manned the warships end to end", which also gave Zhou Yu fire After the attack, the fire quickly spread throughout the fleet, creating favorable conditions.
But even so, in order to complete the fire ship attack, Huang Gai also "reported to Duke Cao first and bullied him into surrender" to lower the vigilance of Cao Jun. Then he took advantage of the "strong southeast wind" to break through Cao Jun''s defense and complete the fire attack. Even so, during the fire attack, Huang Gai, as the commander of the fire ship, was "hit by a stray arrow" and almost died after falling into the water...
But now, the Sichuan-Shu Army has not been equipped with so many layers of DEBUFF, and the fire ship tactics used by Zhou Yu are not so easy.
Jiangdong''s fireships, or in other words, all the current fireships in Han Dynasty, are actually similar in configuration. In addition to some manpower to drive the ship, they carry sulfur, dry firewood, asphalt, kerosene and other materials. The proportions may be slightly different. But the composition won''t be much different, and there won''t be the high-energy combustion materials of later generations, or the light metals potassium, sodium, and magnesium...
Therefore, the most critical issue for Zhou Yu at the moment, or the only way to ensure that the disadvantage can be restored, is to successfully send these fire ships into the Sichuan and Shu fleets, and then ignite and destroy the Sichuan and Shu ships to establish victory!
This is Zhou Yu''s last resort and also his sharpest move!
But this is not Chibi after all!
If you want to successfully attack with fire when both sides are fighting on the move, you can only let other warships conduct diversion and cover operations!
This is why Zhou Yu still stepped forward despite the arrows and crossbows!
In this battle, Zhou Yu has no chance!
He doesn''t have much time left. Neither God nor Jiang Dong will give him enough time.
In this battle, Zhou Yu gave up the geographical advantage!
Because he is not willing to accept the fate of failure, he must take the initiative to fight for the chance of victory.
In this battle, Zhou Yu missed the harmony!
The Jiangdong nobles did not support him, and Sun Quan could not take a firm stand as in the Battle of Chibi. Even his soldiers felt that it would be good to withdraw their troops and did not want to continue the fight.
If Zhou Yu wanted to, he could be like Zhang Zhao, who would throw away the stall at every turn and claim to be sick at home, forcing Sun Quan to have to go to his door again and again to invite him in person before he came forward to wipe Sun Quan''s butt, and he only wiped half of it!
If he gives up, he can definitely say that he has sweated and bled for the Sun family''s foundation for so many years, and he should take a good rest and enjoy himself. Even if he doesn''t go to Chang''an Baiyi Medical Center for treatment, at least he can cultivate at Chaisang''s place, and others I can’t tell you that I’m not here at all!
But Zhou Yu just came. Even though he knew that this battle was not going to be easy, he still came...
Although it can be said that Zhou Yu was lucky and dreamed of conquering Sichuan, but at least he never said that it was too difficult, too far, or too hard, so he simply gave up.
As a series of orders were conveyed, Jiangdong''s fleet began to turn to make way for the fire ships to attack.
However, when the two sides are at war, it does not mean that if one side wants to turn, it will be able to turn smoothly. Even if the Jiangdong navy has a high level of skill in boat maneuvering and is proficient in movements, there are still several Jiangdong ships that have failed. Those who were able to successfully complete the turning movement were either entangled by the Sichuan-Shu Army and unable to move, or the flaws exposed during the turning process were too great, and the collision battleship seized the opportunity and struck a fatal blow.
The soldiers of Jiangdong Navy fell into the water, floating up and down, and many people began to cry out for help.
But no one has time to care about them...
Of course, these Jiangdong naval forces all have good swimming abilities, but it does not mean that they can still swim long distances in armor and clothing to save themselves despite great physical exertion.
It would be great if there were quick-removal armor and equipment, but most of the robes of the Han Dynasty are now made of linen!
This thing is super absorbent!
Those water ghosts who specialize in building ships may still have a chance to escape by swimming across the river, but ordinary Jiangdong naval soldiers are too far away from the water village. Even if they go down the river, they will often sink into the river halfway. Bottom, it becomes a snack for fish and shrimp.
Jiangdong''s fire ships went upstream, slanting along the flesh-and-blood passage that Jiangdong''s navy had finally made, and pounced on the Sichuan-Shu fleet!
At this moment, Xu Huang and Zhuge Liang, who were in the Sichuan-Shu fleet, also discovered the unusual behavior of the Jiangdong navy.
"Koto is going to attack with fire!" 』
Zhuge Liang reacted almost immediately, pointed at the Jiangdong fire ships and shouted, "Those are fire ships!" 』
Zhuge Liang is still very young, and his eyesight has not been damaged by years of document work, so he can see far and clearly.
"Rocket! Ballista! Focus on shooting! 』
Xu Huang also immediately ordered the soldiers to turn around and attack the Jiangdong fire ships.
However, the problem of insufficient training of the Sichuan-Sichuan navy is clearly reflected.
Covering the shooting of buildings, ships, or a certain designated area, if you don''t seek special accuracy, then ordinary Sichuan and Shu archers and crossbowmen can complete it almost equally well, but when it comes to the current emergency, precise shooting is needed At that time, the archers and crossbowmen in the Sichuan-Sichuan naval army were powerless, and their accuracy could not be maintained at a comparable level despite the considerable physical exertion.
Although the accuracy of the crossbows is relatively high, compared with the Koto ships and fighting ships, these Koto fire ships are small targets. A slight deviation may result in failure.
If it is an ordinary Koto boat, then even if it cannot be solved remotely, the problem is not big. After all, the closer you get, the shooting accuracy will naturally improve, and the building ship has the advantage of height difference compared to ordinary small boats. Shooting from top to bottom is often similar to shooting from the city wall on land. If the boats can still break through the defense lines at medium and short range, then there are still rackets waiting for them...
But these are fire ships!
Never let these fire ships get too close!
what to do?
"set fire! ” Zhuge Liang got wise in his haste, passed Xu Huang, and directly ordered, “Throw the fire oil can out!” Throw in the kerosene! Shoot the fire oil can! Let''s set fire first! 』
The messenger looked at Xu Huang. Xu Huang shouted, "Why don''t you go and deliver the order!" 』
There are not many fire oil tanks left.
Neither kerosene nor jars can be generated automatically, so this counterattack can be regarded as Zhuge Liang''s last resort!
"Poof!" 』
Amidst the continuous sound of water, the fire oil can was thrown out.
"Set up arrows!" Get angry! 』
The leader of the archers at the parapet of the ship shouted.
Arrows one by one were wrapped with strips of cloth and all landed on the brazier.
In the blink of an eye, the cloth strips on the arrows were ignited, and flames and black smoke erupted.
"Prepare! Aim—" The archers waved their arms and said, "Shoot! 』
The arrows roared out and then headed towards the position of the fire oil tank.
The rocket popped into the water, but did not immediately break the kerosene tank and ignite the fire.
The Jiangdong steamship is still approaching, and it is about to approach the inner circle of the Sichuan-Shu ship!
"Quick, quick, quick!" Why are you standing there? Set up arrows! Get angry! 』
"shoot! Shoot, shoot, shoot! 』
The rocket roared down from the building ship again!
The second wave of rockets, the third wave of rockets pounced...
The cupping jar breaks.
The flame finally rose!
When the Sichuan-Shu Army threw the fire oil cans, it did not attract the attention of the Jiangdong soldiers who were driving fire boats to attack.
On the one hand, in order to avoid arrows, these Jiangdong soldiers buried their bodies as much as possible under the cover of the ship, and not many people would show their heads to see. Even an occasional glance is to adjust the direction of the ship.
On the other hand, these Jiangdong soldiers can almost be regarded as death squads on the water. There is no concept of delayed ignition these days, and Jiangdong''s attitude towards soldiers is actually similar to that of the Central Plains. They are all treated as consumables, and it is impossible to equip them with any new ignition equipment. Other Jiangdong soldiers rowing boats still had a slight possibility of jumping off the boat and escaping, but the soldier responsible for lighting the fire often had no time to fire and was directly killed in the sea of ????fire. Therefore, these Jiangdong soldiers are all highly nervous. In their eyes and hearts, they only have the Sichuan-Shu Tower ship and their own ignition timing. How can they care about anything else?
Therefore, when the Sichuan and Sichuan navy fired the first and second waves of rockets, these Jiangdong navy were still rejoicing, or laughing at the Sichuan and Sichuan navy, who were in a hurry and lacked training, and all the rockets were shot into the water...
Suddenly, when flames rose from the water, these Jiangdong fire ships realized that the Sichuan-Shu Army''s previous rocket attack was not shooting at them, but at fire oil tanks!
"Turn!" Turn quickly! 』
"rush! Rush over! 』
Seeing that some fire oil tanks were lit, these Jiangdong fire ships immediately had two different options.
Obviously, some people feel that there are flames on the route of travel, so they naturally choose to turn as quickly as possible, while others feel that there are no flames spreading in front of them and there is still a chance, so they want to rush over as soon as possible.
But when these two different response strategies of Koto Fire Boat are mixed together, problems arise...
This is like an ancient real-time strategy game. Due to a problem with the path-finding system''s AI, there are more than a dozen tanks. It seems that every tank is working hard to find the road, but as long as one of them turns inexplicably at the intersection, , which caused the entire team of tanks to get stuck at that intersection and circle wildly together. No matter how frantically they clicked the mouse, these tanks were like being hit by a ghost and couldn''t go any further!
Jiangdong Fire Ship also encountered similar problems.
Originally, in order to avoid stray arrows and crossbows, these fire ships were almost right next to each other, hidden behind the Jiangdong navy''s building ships, so when they rushed out, the distance between them was not very large. , now some want to rush forward, some want to face Turning left, some wanted to turn right. Without a unified frontline commander, these fireships affected each other, causing several ships to collide with each other, and the other several ships had to disperse further when they saw this. Open, the steering will be greater, causing the speed to drop...
In the Battle of Chibi, it was Huang Gai who led the fire ship attack and narrowly escaped death. Even though he was rescued by other Jiangdong ships, he almost drowned in the toilet pit. This shows that this kind of death squad leader is not such an easy and pleasant job. . But now for Zhou Yu, he did not have a second Huang Gai to serve as the captain of this death squad, which caused uncontrollable chaos after the Jiangdong Fire Ship encountered temporary changes after the attack.
Some fire ships crashed into the sea of ????fire on the water, and then were contaminated by the flames. The sulfur, asphalt and other items on the ship were ignited, and in a blink of an eye they turned into a huge torch, spreading out into a larger sea of ????fire.
Some fireships also temporarily changed direction, which not only caused the speed to drop, but also exposed the side of the ship, which invisibly increased the area to be hit. They were immediately hit by crossbow guns on the side of the ship''s string, broke into pieces, leaked, and sank into the river. middle.
There were only a few fire ships. Although they successfully broke out of the fire belt on the water, unfortunately, due to the insufficient number, they could not cause effective fire damage. A few Sichuan and Sichuan ships were ignited, but for the entire Sichuan and Sichuan ships, The team''s fire damage stack is not enough!
The Sichuan-Sichuan naval forces have still implemented the most basic fire prevention measures. If large-scale flames cannot be ignited in a short period of time, sporadic small fires will be extinguished quickly.
At the same time, because the Jiangdong navy turned around under Zhou Yu''s order, a large amount of belly on the side of the ship was exposed!
Even Xu Huang and Zhuge Liang, who did not have much experience in large-scale naval battles, almost instinctively directed artillery and ballistae to bombard!
The shooting angle and hull armor are undoubtedly enemies that love each other and kill each other.
Zhou Yu''s building ship naturally became the focus of many firepower points.
At this moment, Zhou Yu saw that the fireship attack did not achieve the expected effect, and was doing everything possible to command and mobilize the remaining troops, preparing to reorganize the formation and fight the Sichuan-Shu navy again, when a shell hit the boat of Zhou Yu''s ship. The side of the string smashed the female wall on the middle floor of the building to a pulp!
Amidst the roar, the entire ship Zhou Yu was on suddenly tilted to one side. Some Jiangdong soldiers on the other side of the ship became unstable and fell into the river.
Zhou Yu reacted quickly and grabbed the railing in front of him, but he still couldn''t control his center of gravity immediately, and he hit the pillar hard!
"Captain!" Not injured? ! ” the guard shouted eagerly.
Zhou Yu originally wanted to say that it was okay, but when he opened his mouth, a mouthful of blood spurted out. He did not know whether it was because of the impact or for some other reason. His whole body became soft because of the spurt of blood. Go down!
"Captain!" 』
"Captain!" 』
The guards and soldiers on the side all screamed.
The guards rushed forward and protected Zhou Yu.
The ordering soldiers on the side were at a loss. After a long while, they asked indifferently: "The other battleships are...asking for instructions...how to fight..."
The guards saw that Zhou Yu was vomiting blood and was already in a state of despair. After hearing the order, the soldiers asked about the battle, so they shouted angrily, "The governor is like this, why are you asking for orders?" ! How else to fight? ! withdraw troops! retreat! Governor! Governor! 』
Zhou Yu was in a semi-conscious state. He might have heard the shouts of the guards, or he might have lost consciousness, but his eyes still stayed on the swaying battle flag with the word "Zhou" on the ship...
He wanted to say something, but nothing came out...
White clouds linger.
Qingshan Daidai.
The river is surging.
Blood and fire, debris and black smoke.
The Jiangdong navy fled in panic, and the Sichuan-Sichuan fleet excitedly pursued them.
A picture was constructed in the middle of the river, using life and blood as paint.