>I do not believe the Rathori would fight in such a manner as
>they fight as hit-and-run skirmishers rather than Agincourt
>archers.
I'm not suggesting parade ground formations here. The Welsh archer certainly didn't do that, but they could draw and fire as a group and I see no reason why the Rathori could not do this. I concur that they would prefer hit and run to a degree but would contend that the Longbow is NOT the weapon to do this with. The tactical use of the longbow by the Rathori would seen to be a reaction to the heavy armour of their oft mounted foes in the Janube valley. The bow has range and penetrative power.
>Secondly the Rathori have bad memories of Carmanian
>brutality that precipitated the White Bear wars (and many
>veterans of those wars are still alive thanks to the Ban).
Sure, but given that we know that the Rathori are not one state or mind, There would be many who would not serve the Carmanians, but there would be those who would. Orlanthi have served the Lunar Empire, even after brutal conquest. I think that some clans of the Rathori probably have a long history of serving Sweet Sea states as mercenaries.
>(5). Heavy knights. During the campaigns of the Nadar the Avenger,
>the Carmanians were exposed to the developed Fronelan knight and
>re-integrated some of the tactics that were being learnt in the West.
>It depends on what you mean by 'heavy'. The modern Loskalmi
>knight is a very recent development again as a result of the
>Ban.
Heavy knights, as in those wearing better armour than the Carmanians - given that they were distant from the center of such armour developments, it seems likely that they were inferior in quality of armour by the time they made war upon them. Also their style of combat would be different, shock action being a more directed, considered weapon and less prevalent than among the Janubians.
>It was during this time that the Carmanian use of combined arms,
>infantry, cavalry and light forces, gave them ten years of
>campaign victories in Fronela. No-one could stand against them.
>I think domestic troubles within the Loskalmi Empire had
>much more to do with the Carmanian success than combined
>arms innovations. And we only have the Carmanians' word
>that they were unbeatable.
Sure, but they campaigned for ten years and returned largely intact and loaded with loot. I think thats pretty successful. They probably did suffer many tactical reverses but it seem that operationally and strategically they did very well indeed.
Nick writes:
Me:
> The dualism of the Carmanian faith is somewhat Persian, but this is a
product
> of their integration of Pelandan and Spolite culture into their own as
well
> as a rejection of the Malkioni "god learnerish" faith they escaped from in
> their long journey.
>I would merely add the obvious impact of "Dark" Stygian/Arkati and "Light"
>Talorian influences on the Malkionism of early Second Age Fronela. This is,
>I believe, where a lot of the Carmanian Duality is rooted. They see Nysalor
>as a Bright Shining Lie, and Arkat as a Dark Truth.
Agreed, they have a lot of sources, but the church was only formalised as dualistic by Karmanos after he came from the lake and much of his faith was based on the Romanakrin wisdom which defined Idovanus.
>Of course, there is plenty of later accretion (including direct lifts from
>Dara Happan cosmology, of course). But IMO Syranthir was a Dualist (of some
>kind) long before his army arrived in Pelanda and fought the Spolites. The
>particularly tasty "fit" between his Akemite army's modus operandi and the
>Pelandan situation is what made their advent so fortuitous.
I would agree that there were dualistic edges to their thinking but Karmanos was the founder of the faith and the resulting interactions with the Pelandans, Spolites, DHs etc were more formative that Syranthirs experiences IMO. It was only _after_ the arrival of the prophet that the Viziers accepted gods into the Idovanic system and clarified the nature of sorcery. It was only after Karmanos that the Magi were founded and the vulnerability of sorcery to the Lie was revealed that the basic blocks of the Carmanian church were laid.
> The conflict with the Pentans during the height of their rule of Peloria
and
> the following long struggle with the Char-un, which still simmers
occasionally,
> has led to the Carmanians developing strong tactics for dealing with horse
archers.
>I don't know that the Carmanians see this as a "long struggle", more a
>persistant irritation. (If it were a "struggle", they'd make more of an
>effort to take the war to the Char-Un, I believe).
What I mean by "struggle" is that they locked horns for many years. During this time the Carmanians would have had to adapt to their tactics somewhat.
>As it is, the border
>defences of Carmania are being built against the sealed frontier with Charg,
>not the intermittent raiding from Erigia. Simmering sounds right to me.
The river is the greatest barrier, backed by significant numbers of Hazars in Spol, Bindle and Jhor. There will be raiding, but nothing serious. However, this constant raiding is often the source of tactical change. The borders with Erigia will be well used to this kind of action and the knights there will have centuries old methods of dealing with the Char-un. The people there will be much like the Grenzers of Austria after decades of having the Ottomans as neighbours.
> I think some Carmanians might use the bow, but it is not a weapon they
> consider "manly".
>I think this is incorrect. The Dara Happan period of the Carmanian Empire
>(Golden Lion Shahs) brought the idea of an aristocracy of mounted archers
>dealing death from afar with their bowshots.
The DH aristocracy was more likely to use the bow, even with their heavy cavalry, but their heavy cavalry was never a shock cavalry which relied on the weight of the charge alone. The Carmanians are of this tradition. For them to change to a bow wielding cavalry force would require not just a tactical change but a huge cultural change too. This is not to say some didn't use the bow, but mounted horse archery is not something one "picks up". The Pentans practice it from childhood, its part of their culture, which is one reason why they have poor heavy cavalry.
The Carmanians would in effect have had to become a culture of horse bow nomads to effect that large a change. One could argue that they built a regiment using such weapons but the Carmanian nobility was not a regular force and thus they wouldn't have the inclination to do this.
>The Persian model is intentional.
The Persians were a nomadic people on the Fars plateau long before they ruled Mesopotamia. They were capable of surviving in the Transoxiana region, against some of the toughest steppe peoples in history. Their traditions were of horse archers, though they integrated the Clibinarii after contact with Parthia and other heavy cavalry users.
The Carmanians on the other hand were never from a nomadic culture, never mastered the horse bow and never needed to. Culturally they are far more akin to the Levant Crusaders after they integrated many local customs and concepts than they are to the Persians. If one looks at the Crusaders in the 1200s you can see that they have Turcopoles and other light forces to give them combined arms at a operational level. At the tactical level, the knight is still a shock cavalryman. This is the model I use for the Carmanians.
>Yanafal Tarnils is stated as mastering the traditional Carmanian weapons of
sword, >lance and bow in my Tales #17 cult writeup.
Tarnils was born in Rinliddi, a place with traditional influences from the
Pentans. In SGU, our cult write up on Tarnils specifies that he learnt both
from his Carmanian heritage and from his Rinliddi heritage (his mother was a
Yuthuppan). He learnt to fight with lance, sword and shield AND to wield the
bow, but in this he was unusual. He served the Shah in his border wars in
Vethil and was adept at defeating the nomads, using tried and tested Rinliddi
tactics. It is this combination of skills from different cultural outlooks
combined with his Sedenyic vision that gives Tarnils his inclusion magics for
differing units
- -
>This seems a good point to recall Herodotus' account of the education of
>Persian boys, who are taught three things only: to ride, to shoot the bow,
>and to tell the truth.
Carmanians are not Persian. Consider the nature of their source. They were Knights. Knights in the RW were around in the 9th century, were in contact with countless nomad cultures, from the Turks, the Mamelukes, the Mongols etc yet at no point, till their eclipse in the 15th century were the Knights ever bow users. In 5-600 years of RW history they stuck to their ways, refined them, found better armour etc but still used shock. I cannot see why the Carmanians would be any different. I think their dualistic religion has Perisan tinges, but their military is pure Crusader state in composition and style with difference due to contact with heavy infantry cultures.
Me:
>However, the military side of the Carmanian heritage is
>best though of by using the Crusader states analogy. They maintain
>their>ways of combat but are influenced by the cultures they contact.
Gian:
>Possibly. Iranian Knights are another analogy, IMO, since Saladin used them
>to counter the Crusaders and so they (the westerners) had to evolve a
>similar tactical force (mounted chargers _and_ bowmen and footmen) else they
>were operationally overwhelmed by the Saracens.
Yes, the Crusaders used light troops and horse archers, as do the Carmanians, but the difference between a Persian nobleman and a Crusader is that the Persian wielded bow and lance at the individual level and then formed grouped tactical bodies. The Crusaders formed tactical bodies around weapons classes, rather than integrating them. The Carmanians are like that.
>Yes, the Carmanian knighhood may be conservative by Lunar standards,
>but>compared to its Western brethren it is cosmopolitan in the extreme.
>Their>assumptions about what is militarily expedient would shock the
>Western knight>as being unholy and outlandish.
>Interesting. Hypothetically, then, the Lunar Army (stronger than the
>Carmanian one) should crush the western armies of Fronela or Seshnela
>easily, provided they come in contact. Is that true?
Nothing is certain in battle, but yes, the combined arms army should win, all things being equal. (That is the caveat of course, in war all things are never equal)
Martin Laurie
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