>>>Ergo, my greek/roman analogy.
>>The backbone of Rome was not Greece.
>Sure, the philosphical backbone of rome was ROMAN. But where, pray, did
>they learn their military techniques? Like everyone else in the Med, from
>the GREEKS. Therefore the ROMAN military model (early Republican)
>~evolved~ from the Greek.
Now that you have finally _explained_ what you meant, I shall tell you (again) that it is _wrong_. The Lunar Empire does not fight in cohorts thus there is no difference between them and the Yelmites in terms of military tactics.
>>>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.
>I'm not sure why you're getting quite so worked up about this. To
>characterize the legions as little more than armed farmers is deliberately
>misleading.
I am not being deliberately misleading. You stated something that was flat out wrong and I corrected you. In particular, I said the cohorts were _originally_ armed farmers which confuted your notion that Cohorts required extraordinary training, leadership etc. in all ranks. Before accusing others of being misleading, you should ensure that you have gotten your facts straight.
>For the majority of Roman history, the legions were
>long-term-of-service veterans, who *might* be lucky enough to have a
>general who would pension them off with some land - usually as a
>garrison-in-place in case the natives started slitting throats.
But this came as a result of Marius's reforms, almost a century _after_ the punic wars. Before these reforms, most of the soldiers were citizen-farmers who fought in cohort tactics. Hence you are wrong to say that cohorts require exceptional attributes at all levels.
>And where would the kingdom of war have developed this fairly complicated
>bit of tactical legerdemain? The Romans came up with it after generations
>of conflict - the KoW just pulls it out of a hat because they have the
>name? That's rubbish. IMO, they are substantially more feral than that.
In a world where we have Moonboats, Dragons and Cityships, I find the notion that a magical kingdom cannot possibly be capable of cohort tactics to be rather ludicrous.
>>>Well, yeah. I was talking archetypes.
>>Stereotypes is the word you want, not archetypes.
>so it's down to semantics is it? i am *pretty* sure I understand the
>english language:
>ar-che-type n. the most typical of a group
>ster-eo-type n. 1 a person who is typical of a group; 2 a too-simple
>and often mistaken idea about a particular group
>hm...no, i MEANT archetype.
But to say that the Western Knight is the archetype of the Western Army indicates that they are the "most typical" member of the Western Army. Which is as you have previously acknowleged is _wrong_. Hence you may have meant archetype, but in fact you were using stereotypes.
>To discuss a troop type that is dominant in a force
>(either numerically or psychologically) will be useful in determining the
>things that force is not only capable of, but likely to do.
>A Loskalmi army, while probably CAPABLE of waging a guerrilla hit & run
>campaign against a foe (certainly the Loskalmi HAVE light cav, light foot,
>etc), probably WON'T given the psychological dominance of the "Knightly"
>troop type.
Are the Loskalmi capable of Siege Warfare? Can we infer this from the pyschological dominance of the knights? You see where stereotyping gets us?
>>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_.
>It tells us they fight in rather unformalized groups. It tells us they are
>impetuous. It tells us they are probably largely armed with hand- or
>short-range weapons. It tells us that they are probably structurally
>disorganized. It tells us they are typically individually brave. It tells
>us they are on foot. It tell us that they are probably primitively
>armored. It tells us that they are probably unlikely to perform any really
>complicated mass maneuver.
Stereotypes. I can name exceptions to just about everything on the list for both celts and orlanthi. There are gaullic horsemen as Hannibal hired some at the Po valley during the Second Punic War. Likewise in Glorantha, the Heortlings and the Sartarites have heavy cavalry. The Pol Joni are light cavalry with good archery. The 'probably primitively armored' is wrong as the Orlanthi have mail. And so on.
>>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.
>The Uz also use them as light troops, skirmishers, irregulars, and
>slingers. That DOES sound like Orlanthi light troops to me. They're
>just a lot more expendable.
No they don't. The majority of trained trollkin used in warfare are pike which are not used by Orlanthi light troops. And the expendability of the trollkin is alien to the Orlanthi ethos.
>>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.
>Well, thanks Peter. Now I'm clear on that. Why are you being so snide?
I'm not. I'm just pointing out that you have cobbled together a mishmash of facts, opinions and erroneous statements in an unsatisfcatory manner. I fail to see how I can make this any less unpleasant.
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