+Carmanian animals
Loren asked about some animals from Poland.
You can make an association between the vultures and the crows.
Bisons live in Poland, so the european bison can be included among the
Carmanian woodland animals. If wholy rhinos exist, we can add mamoth to
the Carmanian bestiary.
+charge of the cataphract
I failed to see why allowing even the dead hazari to attack increases the
shock of a cavalry charge. I freely admit that I am not an historian.
I think that this spell should increase the horse damage bonus so that it
can pass through 10 ranks of infantry (like an elephant do) wether the
horse is dead or alive and should allow even a dead horseman to make his
lance attack on a footman before falling from his mount.
With this description, it should cost more than 2 POW points, but it
allows the Carmanian cavalry to break any infantry line.
+battlefield magic
John Constable asked about magic use on the battlefield.
After reading warhamster (in tales #12), Tarsh wars and Dragon Pass, here
is what I propose.
We can classify the RQ spells in 5 classes:
- -spells that increase the weapon damages(bladesharp, truesword, speedart)
or that increase the shock of an attack (charge of the cataphract)
- -spells that helps to survive an attack (protection, shield, shield wall,
shimmer)
- -spiritual attack spells (ie the POW helps in surviving the attack)
(demoralize, madness, fear, lightning))
- -physical attack spells (only your armor or your defensive spells help
you) (sunspear, thunderbolt)
- -movement spell (teleport, mobility)
Ghosts, passion spirits are spiritual magic. Elementals are physical magic because you can destroy them with your weapon before they attack you.
If you have trained magician, you can use them to support the troops, or to attack the ennemies. If the magicians use divine magic, they cannot be good in those two roles. Since almost no spells are zone spells, an attack magician unit is similar to a missile unit. Besides spirit magic range and divine magic range is less than bow range. A magician unit is as vulnerable to cavalry charges as is a missile unit. Sorcerors who can cast spell to 1km (range 7) are less vulnerable to cavalry.
Some elite units have a guardian spirit (Hellroar is an example). The
guardian spirit has a POW between 30 and 50, and no spiritual magic
(either spirits or spiritual attack spells) can attack a unit's member
before defeating the guardian.
In Dragon Pass, the Blood Spillers are such an unit.
The Kralori, the Dara Happans and maybe the Teshnan have devised a new way of doing magic with massed trained magicians.
Like Pole Star marshalled the sky armies, they marshall the magical energies. Each member links his casting to the leader, each follows a star path (ie a precise path) around the leader, and each member casts his spell simultaneously with the others. This technique requires a strict drill to work. It allows to combine the spells (4 spells for double effect, 9 for triple effect if the spell was not stackable) and to increase the range of 100m per 50 magicians. 400 Yelm priests could cast a 80d6 sunspear at 900m. The storm walkers were such an unit, before Argrath created the Sartarite magical union (since lightning is stackable, it is a 400d6 lightning at 900m with 400 Orlanth priests).
Sheng Seleris devised an even nastier trick. He created the magician
regiments as seen in the boardgame Dragon Pass. He was a shaman, so he
searched for a special type of spirit. He found a sort of guardian spirit
who could work as an allied spirit for 500 or so magicians. They cast
their spell through their agent while they are 40 km away. It is like
modern artillery.
When the lunar learned the trick, the war with the nomads turned into a
bloodbath for both sides.
A small Gloranthan battle has no such high level magic because there are not enough magicians involved.
+Lunar College of magic
I think that there are two kind of members. The first ones are military
personel who signed for 25 years of active service and 5 years of reserve
service.
The other ones are students with an imperial grant. They signed for 5
years training, 5 years of active military service and 20 years of
reserve service. The trick is that you can buy off your active military
service either with money or with a post in the civilian bureaucracy.
Peace
Jean
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