Me>> The Lunar army is very varied, has a wide variety of troop types and
>> has done so ever since the Dawn.
>I agree but....
>Just to be pedantic, the Lunar army didn't exist until 1220.
Little more than a name change IMO.
Steve Lieb:
>>The Lunars and the Yelmies are practically the same (it's like
>>distinguishing between Russia and the Soviet Union).
>I'd say there is a rather significant difference there, so I'm not sure I
>catch your point....
Not really. Tsarist Russia included Finland and Poland in addition to the territories held by the Soviet Union. All of this was included under the label of Russia. Even modern Russia includes the Chechens and the indigeneous Siberians. Calling those people Russians can cause heart attacks in your life insurers.
>> The backbone
>>of the Lunar Empire is Ye Olde Dara Happa and some peoples (like
>>Orlanthi) do not see a meaningful distinction between the two.
>Ergo, my greek/roman analogy.
The backbone of Rome was not Greece. There is no such thing as a Lunar Culture and hence it is meaningless to say that the Lunars indulge in cohorts and the Yelmies in phalanxes. They are in terms of military culture, the same people.
>The Spanish, the Huns/Avars, and the Parthians (all barbarian
>peoples at the fringes of the Empire) probably didn't see much
>difference either.
When did the Spanish and Huns/Avars encounter the Greeks?
>>Hence the lunars would be phalanxes (in addition to their peltasts,
>>slingers and assorted cavalry, avilry and artillery chariots). I
>>dunno where cohorts are in glorantha. It may be the Kingdom of
>>War or Safelster...
>Very unlikely to be either. Cohort-tactics take an extraordinary amount of
>training, professionalism, execution, and leadership at every single level
>of command. I can't see this coming from the Kingdom of War.
Rubbish. The rank and file of the cohorts were originally common farmers working parttime and their officers only slightly more educated. And the Kingdom of War is quite capable of having training, professionalism etc. It wouldn't be worthy of the name otherwise.
>>>[Western Knights] (shock Heavy Cav/Cataphracts)
>>They are not exclusively cavalry. [...]
>Well, yeah. I was talking archetypes.
Stereotypes is the word you want, not archetypes. And to concentrate on a specific trooptype in discussion of all glorantha armies is IMO rather pointless. "Hmm. The Lunars use phalanxes. Why don't I wipe them out by using cavalry to attack behind them?". "Hmm. The Westerners use Knights. Why don't I use pikes so they'll be slaughtered when they charge?".
>>The Orlanthi and Uz do not fight in the same manner. The Uz attack
>>by darkness or use ambushes and use hordes of trollkin first. The
>>Orlanthi are incapable of or shun these tactics. Furthermore
>>merely calling them celtic warbands ignores whether they have
>>infantry or cavalry.
>Well, right. OK, the trolls fight at night. So what does that have to do
>about troop classification?
Nothing. I was commenting that calling them celtic warbands tells us very little about their troop types. Do they use chariots? Shieldwalls? Do they have Beserkers? Merely uttering 'celtic warband' tells us _little_.
>I rather think the gallic warbands used ambushes (anyone recognize
>the name Teutoburger Wald?) to some good effect, as would the Orlanthi.
Uz ambush tactics are more heinous than the Orlanthi. They use tactics which would challenge Orlanthi notions of honor and bravery. "Old Man Rastagar, the bravest man in his time, used a shadow spell and cut his enemies's throats as they slept..."
>Also, warbands weren't in a vacuum - they had slingers, scouts, etc too -
>like trollkin, like Orlanthi would.
The Uz herd trollkin to attack their enemies. Most of them will be slaughtered. This doesn't sound like Orlanthi slingers and scouts to me.
>Again, talking ARCHETYPES. The warband is a band of warriors bound more by
>morale and valor than by training, who engage by the charge and generally
>seek to break a combat from unit vs. unit to man vs. man.
Before you were classifying the Praxians in terms of combat strength and armour types. Now you are talking about the Orlanthi in terms of their military culture. I do think that for a description of gloranthan armies, consistent terminology would be more useful than anything else.
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