>>> In fact a regiment of priests/sorcerors with >>> Illusions would make an >>> extremely effective siege train, would they not?
Having recently reread the chronicles of the Black Company, mere visual (and acoustical) illusions can throw any siegework topsy-turvy-
A damaged section of wall can be made to look like sound fortification, and vice versa. Not good if your siege ramp delivers you into a 10 foot fall down on the debris, neither good if that breach you're charging into isn't one.
>>Possibly *too* effective. We want this siege to last >>more than a week.
There are counter-tactics available. A divine gate guardian (ideally in the portal rather than in the moveable parts) would make spells fail even when cast by coteries. Huraya's scarf of mist makes magics relying on visible targets quite hopeless - that includes gates...
Dispelling: An Orlanthi way might be to send an Umbroli to blow the magic away. Spell transmutation (a Larnsti thing, or at least one displayed by Sartar) is naughty, too, especially when relying on temporary reality.
The Seven of Vistur ramp for the final assault could well be a tactile temporal reality.
> If the Lunars could field a regiment of magicians they'd
> walk into WW.
Levitate, you mean?
IMO they wouldn't. Whitewall has guardians of some magnitude - it is a holy Orlanthi place, with currently a lot of fervent worshippers at hand.
> However they have only half a dozen field
> classes from the College of Magic in the entire region.
> Each class is about a hundred strong including support
> staff and I'm not sure how well different classes work
> together. Military trained magicians are rare and valuable
> so even Tatius can only bring the Seven of Vistur and maybe
> another class to the seige.
Actually, I don't think so. Tatius appears to be doing a long term magical build-up, powered by the blood of the regular Lunar troops and allies. That has precedence e.g. in the conflicts between Carmania and Dara Happa. Learned Orlanthi might call this necromancy or blood magic, depending on their objectivity.
> Of course there are plenty of priests with the various
> regiments but they're concerned with regimental duties
> and aren't trained to work with those from other backgrounds.
> Imagine trying to get a priest of Yelm to work with a
> Char-un shaman.....
If the Yelmie is an Alkothi, it will become some sort of juvenile contest who is harder...
The art of getting magicians to cooperate rather than to indulge rivalries lies in providing a leadership which is respected rather than viewed as equal. The abstraction of the Lunar College is one such tool, although personally I don't see Tatius as an impartial leader - I'd rather expect a very Yelmic outlook from him. Quite different from Fazzur's style of managing the various parts of his troops.
Getting various magical rituals to coordinate in a battle situation sounds rather optimistic to me. As long as the magics are typical special effects of the magicians, this might work.
As for the illusionary fire: nice idea, and certainly a good way to thwart elemental air countermagic. For a fire to be taken serious, it must emit heat, though (even more so than visual effects). Stepping into or through a cold fire must be a fairly normal magical effect for initiates. Creating enough heat through an illusion (temporal reality) will drain the magicians way more than relying on their proven if mythically disadvantaged conventional elemental powers. The economics favour overkill of standard fire magics.
(for a comparison: it is possible to create synthetic cotton from glucose. making it from cotton plants creates way more cotton for the same effort...)
(A trick would be to subdue the heat of a fire for a while with a cold illusion, until people lose their fear of it. Then cancel that magic... sizzle...)
Powered by hypermail