Musings of a Canadian Nierite. . .

It seems to me that the “ghost” could have been nothing of the like, since a very powerful Kurenthe curse had gone off in the area. If a small little Kurenthe curse had been called down, I might almost believe it, but this was a biggy that to this day appears to be expanding and corrupting a holy forest.

Remember, the power for the curse comes from the Elorii spirit. My understanding is that it is used up by the curse and there is no spirit left to go to the Orumar – or to be left behind as a ghost. So Elorii are all like nuclear bombs wrapped in flesh to anyone who knows how to detonate them. Scary really.

I can see how an Elorii spirit could be trapped by a Kurenthe cast by another Elorii (like Eric mentioned), but it seems like the spirit of the Kurenthe caster themself should be gone.

In general it seems to me that the size of the Kurenthe curse one Elorii can create is related to the efficiency of the fission process. The really big Kurenthe curses are usually done by casters who really know what they are doing, and thus they achieve maximum spirit to curse conversion, while some joe-schmoo Elorii might achieve a Kurenthe curse if they are really angry, but lacking real know-how, they barely achieve fission and get a very low grade payout for their spirit.

That could be wrong though, maybe an Elorii with a powerful spirit could pull off a low-grade Kurenthe with spirit “left over” to be a ghost or to go onto the Orumar, but that seems to be against the idea of the curse, to try to hold something back. So I am disinclined to believe that the “ghost” seen then could have been the spirit of the Kurenthe caster.

So, if not him, that what? I’m inclined to say it is something benign, since it doesn’t hurt the party and tries to prevent them from doing something suicidal. So what benign forces could be at work there? The two most likely are gods- Belisarda and Saluwe (or their servants). Another option would be the Ancient Elorii who hired them projecting an illusion to try and deter them. My bet would be on the latter, but that is just a guess.

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Don’t necessarily want to start a new topic but I’m curious about the entry on PP. 62-63 of the ARG core book. The section is on the Pirate Isles and concerns the for lack of a better term “Giant Invasion.” Has there been any follow up in this? Can’t recall any mod dealing with this. Basically I’m curious what motivated the Giants to do this and if it’s tied into a larger story line/arc. Since it’s right there in the book I don’t think I’m putting out any spoilers.

Cool. Thanks for the quick reply! This would be a great hook for a home campaign since it could be tied into a number of events such as the release of the Dragon back in the old campaign, or the Crusade against the Infernals, or even perhaps the Coming of the Destroyer arc. I think I know the answer to this, but is there any hope Henry that at some point we’d be able to get back to Freeport?

Another question related to the Blessed Lands. Are there any towns or cities besides the First city? I realize the issues involved what with the harsh climate/terrain/flooding etc. I just wonder if there are additional places to call home or visit. Besides scattered villages of which I assume there are some. My memory may be faulty and I’m at work and can’t check sources, but I thought there was some sort of port/town on the coast of the Sea of Lanterns.

Piscinium, wasn’t that the place we started from in the mod The Banished (about Rivan Tindal–if I got the name right). I thought there was some sort of settlement there on the coast. If that’s the one, I would not mind revisiting that area again.

Piscinium is in the Blessed Lands right? Any chance we’ll get more details on the place in the new book Henry. Actually since the Blessed Lands book is the first time we’ve had a fully developed region of Onara to play with, we might just see an uptick on Home games. Maybe.

I’m not sure about the cardinal point (source?), but Anshar is more-or-less south-east of the Blessed Lands, Illiir is more-or-less north of the Blessed Lands (though the History Chapter suggests that Saluwe’ is more directly north between Elonbe’ and the First City), and Yarris/Pisenium is pretty much due west and it DOESN’T have a known portal.

Battlefield tactics among the Known Lands

If there is one thing constant in any world and with any race, it is war. However, while all races—from the Ssethrics to the Elorii to the Humans to the Singarthan Trolls—use this most ancient and direct way of settling disputes, the way they prosecute war varies differently across all the various nations of the Known Lands. In our world, different nations have developed widely different tactics to suit the needs of their own people, based on terrain, resources available, and cultural stigmas. For example, the Greeks held phalanx and cavalry tactics in high esteem with one group acting as a check against another, but rarely used missile weapons like bows because they were viewed as cowardly. On the other hand, the English loved their archers, which they used to devastating effect on their foes for centuries in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. As this is true in our world, so it is true on Arcanis.

The most commonly talked about military unit type in Arcanis is the Coryani Legion. This unit type is based on the Roman unit of the same name and consists of primarily (but not exclusively) heavy foot infantry with large shields and (generally) short swords. These infantry march together in shield walls, turtling up before incoming missile combat, and steadily advancing like a tide of death upon their foes. In the Roman world, the Legion would have assigned to its infantry (which was a uniform unit of infantry) auxiliary forces of Equestian light cavalry, archers (usually mercenaries as the Romans also detested archery), slingers, and other support troops to support the core of the foot soldiers. Coryani legions differ from this in that the Legions often have these specialist units built into the Legion itself, with scouts and equestrians forming their own subunit within the 1,000 to 5,000 soldiers. Auxiliary units in Coryan also seem to form a similar, though not as regimented, role as they do in the Roman world. These troops would likely consist of regional militia-type units, Patrician private armies, or foreign mercenaries attached to the Legion as needed to bulk out their forces rather than to fulfill tactical niches.

While generally less uniform than a Roman Legion, the Coryani Legion still has more-or-less the same tactical strengths and weaknesses of its real historical counterpart. The Roman Legions were renowned for their ability to basically roll over any foe which they came across. The Coryani Legions are a disciplined, professional military force in a world where feudal levies (Milandir) and slave armies (Myrantians) are not uncommon. The Coryani Legions are a uniform military force, with each soldier (more or less) identically outfitted which means they are a UNIT, and not a band of armed hooligans. Lastly, the Coryani Legions are far more numerous than any of their opposition (outside of Khitan), which means that no matter how much you wear against their legions, there are more troops where those came from. On the flip side, the Coryani Legions (less so than Roman Legions) suffer from their general immobility. While trained for hard marches, they can only move as fast as their feet allow. This means that they can be outmanoeuvred by mounted troops, and are vulnerable to widespread missile combat use.

The next of the primary fighting cultures is that of Milandir. This nation—as appropriate to its medieval feel—does not make use of professional soldiers like Coryan does, instead focusing on the nobility and a fraternity of elite warriors in the forms of the Knights of Milandir, who are in turn supported by their private retainers (armsmen, men-at-arms, etc). This means that Milandir has a relatively small armed force compared to Coryan, though these numbers are deceiving. Unlike Coryan, Milandir does make use of Feudal levies to bulk out their forces in times of war, with these recruited peasants (who do it for oath of honour rather than necessarily fear) acting as archers, pikemen, and general military filler to support the primarily mounted Knights and their forces. This style of army formation is advantageous because it is relatively inexpensive to maintain. After all, the lord only has to worry about a small group of a couple hundred ‘real warriors’, outfitting your levies (cantons in Milandir) with fairly cheap weapons and armour. Additionally, the typical ‘cheap’ weapons given to Milandesian cantons include polearms like pikes and halberds, which are actually extremely useful weapons against cavalry forces, which means they form a balance to the mounted knights which make up the balance. Unfortunately, unlike Coryan, Milandesian soldiers are (for the most part) unprofessional and less disciplined than Legionnaires, which means they are more likely to break under pressure.

When compared to each other, the Coryani and Milandesian forces are almost a comparison of opposites. Milandir prefers shock tactics, with their mounted units acting as the hammer against the anvil of their cantons, while Coryan prefers infantry formations which simply roll over their targets while having substantially less cavalry. When it comes to field engagements between these two powers, my read of tactics would suggest that a Coryani shield wall would not stand up to repeated heavy cavalry charges from the Milandesian forces (especially since pikes are not standard Coryani kit). It should be noted that one of the major reasons I have seen for why the Romans began losing territory at the end of their empire was that their forces and legions were not up to the task of defending against mounted steppe raiders (such as the Huns), for this very reason. That said, if the Legions manage to get their enemies into range and hold them there, the legion blocks would make mincemeat of the less disciplined, lightly armoured, pike-wielding cantons.

Other nations or groups in the Known Lands of Onara are a little bit harder to analyze due to lack of information. For example, we know that the Altharen Shining Patrol makes heavy use of less-heavily armoured troops and extensive use of rifles. Using our world as an example, this would suggest that they would focus on large field armies with multiple ranks of rifle-armed infantry firing in volleys at their targets. However, what we have seen of the Shining Patrol is that they actually tend to focus on smaller-unit tactics, with no more than a couple hundred being around except in major bases such as Semar. This could actually make sense given the terrain of the Altheran Plateau and the Kraldjurr Morass, which consists of mountainous regions and jungle which makes large field armies very difficult—if not impossible—to manage. Instead, the Shining Patrolmen would probably act more like Irregular troops, employed in raids and guerrilla type missions against smaller targets rather than thousands and troops marching in an open field. Additionally, the Altherans still make use of their Skyships (what few are left) as gunboats, which fit well with the hit-and-fade irregular tactics that have come up I adventures.

Speaking of the Altharens, we also know a reasonable amount (but nothing definitive) about preferred Ssethric battle tactics. For example, we know that the Black Talon make use of their own Heavy Infantry in the form of the Milliarius warriors, heavily armoured troops wielding bearded axes, similar to Coryani Legionnaires but relying more on heavy weapons and armour rather than a shield wall for protection. We also know that the Ssethregoran Empire—historically, at least—makes extensive use of slave legions and heavy war beasts (ranging from horse-analogs to creatures similar to war elephants to flying creatures) as force multipliers. Their tactics, however, do seem quite crude as they seem more interested in attrition warfare than advanced tactics. I should note, however, that this is based on a very small canon sample size of data.

Moving away from the Ssethregorans, the Elorii have not shown that I can read any specific battlefield tactics beyond “we have a whole lot of guys!” The few references to all of them refer to their armies as “Hosts”, and they all seem to consist of warriors with swords and light to heavy armour rather than specific formations like a Coryani Legions. We do know that the main footsoldier in Elorii formations are the Marokenes, though, and that Kelekenes are also common as battle mages and as almost ‘special ops’ forces, such as the team of Kelekenes who stuck at the Grand Library in New Althare’ during the war.

Another ‘nation’ with known battlefield tactics are the Yhing Hir, although you could argue it is less battlefield tactics than raiding tactics. The Yhing Hir are a very close (though far more fractured) versions of the Mongol horsemen from the time of Genghis Khan, relying on light cavalry forces armed with sabres, lances, and most importantly horsebows when engaged in combat. This gives the Yhing Hir almost incomparable mobility on the battlefield, and the ability to literally run circles around their enemies to pepper them with arrows before charging in with blade and lance to finish their foes off. Even other horse-heavy groups like the Milandesians (likely adapting their own cavalry as a check against the Yhing Hir more than against the Coryani Legions) have trouble keeping up to these mobile attackers on their coursers and chargers. What saves most people in Onara from an invasion similar to Genghis Khan’s invasion of Eurasia, however, is that the Yhing Hir tribes are individually too weak to really damage their neighbours in the Hinterlands, Milandir, or Canceri beyond raiding the countryside. That said, we did get a good idea of what the horse-tribes could do in the form of the Auxunite Empire of some two-millennia ago. . .

On the subject of horses, it brings me to the last major area and their preferred battlefield tactics, specifically those of the Western Lands. There is not much to go on for the tactics of the Kio, the Undir, and the various human groups in the region such as the Harns, as well as the val’Baucisz. Likely the Undir do not have specific battlefield tactics as they live in tribal societies with no strong leadership among themselves, but the same is not true of the Harns and the Kio. There are two major ‘units’ of note that seem to make up the biggest forces in the region, and those are the Kio Red Dragoons and the Harn/val’Baucisz Black Hussars. We really do not have significant amounts of information about either of them, but based on the names of the units, both forces are primarily horse-mounted groups, with the Kio possibly being more focused on mobile infantry than cavalry (Dragoons being horse-mounted riflemen who mostly use the horses to get to battle than fight on them), while the Black Hussars being a more traditional light cavalry forces. Both of these groups make sense for the forces in the Western Lands where the limited population-to-apparent-wealth of the region means that smaller armies of better equipped troops are possible. After all, we know that there aren’t THAT many Kio in the world presently (no more than a million I would think) as opposed to the tens, if not hundreds of millions of humans in the Known Lands. Since the Kio form the ‘elite’ of their society, each Kio family can probably support at least a small group of armed retainers and their mounts similar to the Milandesians. However, judging by the apparent focus towards mounted infantry, it is possible they don’t have the population of levies to call upon, or that these levies (likely Undir and Humans) are considered more auxillary forces than they are in Milandir. Of the Harns and the Black Hussars, even less is known beyond that they use horses.

Anyway, I think I’ll leave this here. While I’d love to go into the tactics of other groups, I feel we have even less information about them than we do all of the above. However, when we learn more about them be sure I’ll dive deeper into their tactics.

There are references out there that say that the Cancerese Nierites use battle tactics ‘inspired’ by the Coryani Legions, but honestly they seem to have more in common with the Ss’ressen Milliarius. Their main troops are large-weapon armed, heavily armoured infantry armed with minimal missile weapons. LIke the Romans, the Nierits abhor ranged combat, preferring to get up close and personal with their enemies, and as Akira said this is a poor choice for any army (as was seen when the Romans and Greeks came across enemies with heavy archery biases). The Nierites probably balance this out with the help of the Sarishan’s and Nerothians of Canceri, which have no such hangups as far as we know, so the Nierites ‘allow’ them to ‘dishonour’ themselves in that role, much as the Romans used auxillia to fill niches they didn’t want to.

As for additional Cancerese battle tactics, we know from the Order of the Pheonix Document that the Nerothians do make use of military socieities similar to the Milandesian Knightly Orders, which means that they can also fulfill (if nothing else) the cavalry function that is essential in a nation bordering Milandir AND the Yhing Hir. Sure, summoned Infernals can do much of the scouting (especially flying ones) and both undead and infernals are great shock troops, but they are unreliable and expensive to summon and a human element would be needed most of the time.

My general view of Cancerese military tactics would be the Nierites forming the core of any given armie–they hold the line against any attacking force–while supported by Sarishan and Nerothian specialist troops like archers and slingers. Meanwhile, both those other groups would use their magics to create waves of canon fodder to smash the enemy and drive them into the pikes/swords/javalins of the Nierites, and the Nerothian Knights would battle their Milandesian equivalent, raising the dead wherever they can to sow chaos ‘behind the lines’.