Re: Siege of Whitewall

From: jorganos <joe_at_...>
Date: Tue, 02 Mar 2004 11:46:20 -0000


John Hughes" <nysalor_at_i...> wrote:
> I think OID explains it. Yes, as Jane suggests, Broyan was 'holed
> up' in Whitewall previously.

> The following is from the 'Timeline of the Sartar campaign, OID pp 8-9.

> 1613 Kallyr escapes to Whitewall. [after her failed rebellion]

> 1616 Kethaela... is destroyed by the Lunar Empire.

> 1617 Kethaela is at war with itself. Malkioni mercenaries seize
> control of Heortland; only King Broyan holds out.

> [Where? one answer really.. at the seat of the High King].

And surrounding lands, presumably. Getting in harvests, trade, etc.

> 1618 Kethaela is in anarchy, but King Broyan continues to hold out
> in Whitewall. [UH Huh... confirmation. He's not the Liberator
> though, he's just a naughty boy].

Read: Broyan maintains a royal order in Volsaxar despite border skirmishes north and south.

> 1619 The Lunar Empire invades northern Heortland, and the Lunars
> besiege King Broyan inside Whitewall.

Enter the Bat. Fall of the Bat. Enter siege equipment.

> 1620 The Lunar Empire invades southern Heortland. Whitewall is the
> only unconquered part of the land.

Lunar field engineers build up counter ditches, prepare the great magical ramp, mount missile throwers... Famine somehow never enters the city in a serious way. With all those Lunar-friendly Volsaxi tribes nearby, I keep wondering how and why. Nightjumpers with food bags?

> 1621... [Lots of tall tales and true from the siege of Whitewall]

The Seven of Vistur drain several Lunar regiments building the magical ramp up the astonishingly tough (gallic drystone) walls after conventional siege engines found the construction easy to maintain but hard to dismantle.

IMO the point of hill forts is that they are fairly impregnable to direct ground force assault. Heortling warfare has no track of record of prolonged sieges - storm (as in "fly in and open the gates") or call off seems to be the rule. Famine as a weapon hits those troops outside the walls first if they are Heortling barbarians.

Rikard's Kingdom of Malkonwal might have attempted a siege, but: as a rule, for siege warfare you need a significant numerical advantage. Holing up some 300 warriors of Broyan's along with some 1500 citizens would require a force of several thousand warriors. I doubt that Malkonwal had these to spare.

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