Adrian XXIV
Average User, from Poland
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[X] Try to rally the humans and press on, using the Lightfangs and Elementals to fend off the Wolf Riders.
Mercenary Mage Quest: Asur Dogs of War in Warhammer Fantasy
- Thread starter Blackout
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- Fantasy
[X] Write in - Try to rally the humans and press on, reforming to fend off the Wolf Riders each time they approach. Deploy Elementals to harry the Wolf Riders (Fanriel should use her judgement to determine which kind would be best) in the hopes that denying the Wolf Riders any safe ground will force them away and allow the column to march on unimpeded and at pace.
-[X] Take up Van de Rijder's marching song to encourage and show solidarity with the troops.
Put my intent a few posts back into plan form! Also throws in a little extra tidbit that crossed my mind - maybe the sheer novelty of the severe elven commander singing a Westerland marching song will help to shake the humans of their fear (and possibly do a little to take the edge off that howling)! I trust Fanriel's Diplomacy bonus.
...
I trust Fanriel's Diplomacy bonus.
[X] Try to rally the humans and press on, using the Lightfangs and Elementals to fend off the Wolf Riders.
-[X] Take up Van de Rijder's marching song to encourage and show solidarity with the troops.
And throwing the same tidbit into the default plan for an approval vote.
-[X] Take up Van de Rijder's marching song to encourage and show solidarity with the troops.
Put my intent a few posts back into plan form! Also throws in a little extra tidbit that crossed my mind - maybe the sheer novelty of the severe elven commander singing a Westerland marching song will help to shake the humans of their fear (and possibly do a little to take the edge off that howling)! I trust Fanriel's Diplomacy bonus.
...
I trust Fanriel's Diplomacy bonus.
[X] Try to rally the humans and press on, using the Lightfangs and Elementals to fend off the Wolf Riders.
-[X] Take up Van de Rijder's marching song to encourage and show solidarity with the troops.
And throwing the same tidbit into the default plan for an approval vote.
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[X] Write in - Try to rally the humans and press on, reforming to fend off the Wolf Riders each time they approach. Deploy Elementals to harry the Wolf Riders (Fanriel should use her judgement to determine which kind would be best) in the hopes that denying the Wolf Riders any safe ground will force them away and allow the column to march on unimpeded and at pace.
-[X] Take up Van de Rijder's marching song to encourage and show solidarity with the troops.
[X] Try to rally the humans and press on, using the Lightfangs and Elementals to fend off the Wolf Riders.
-[X] Take up Van de Rijder's marching song to encourage and show solidarity with the troops.
Hell, why not?
Not words i would have ever expected to read.
Just read again and remembered this part.
Fanriel lack of self-awareness strikes again!
-[X] Take up Van de Rijder's marching song to encourage and show solidarity with the troops.
[X] Try to rally the humans and press on, using the Lightfangs and Elementals to fend off the Wolf Riders.
-[X] Take up Van de Rijder's marching song to encourage and show solidarity with the troops.
Hell, why not?
Not words i would have ever expected to read.
Just read again and remembered this part.
Fanriel lack of self-awareness strikes again!
Imperious
Without the sun of my life
We were told that while elven veterans could manage a manoeuvre like this the human troops we have don't have the discipline to both continue the march in normal fashion and be able to adopt a defensive formation against attacks by the wolf riders. That's why we're made to choose between either adopting a defensive formation but slowing down immensely or marching without a defensive formation. This vote seems to be for marching in normal fashion but also adopting a defensive formation in battle, which is something we've been told our troops can't do.
I will put an approval vote for adopting the marching song though:
[X] Try to rally the humans and press on, using the Lightfangs and Elementals to fend off the Wolf Riders.
[X] Try to rally the humans and press on, using the Lightfangs and Elementals to fend off the Wolf Riders.
-[X] Take up Van de Rijder's marching song to encourage and show solidarity with the troops
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The idea, for clarity, is to drive the Wolf Riders off (making the column too hard a target to strike and using Elemental harassment to deny them the ability to just wear us down, leaving 'go away' as their only meaningful option) so that they don't threaten the column any longer, rendering the defence unnecessary afterwards. I realise now that 'force them away' isn't quite as clear on that!
It has to come good at some point, right? Right?
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Imperious
Without the sun of my life
How are we doing that while sticking with the column? The pre made option for getting rid of the wolf riders entirely involves Fanriel going in for the purpose of trying an assassination strike. Without us heading there by ourselves the elementals won't have fine coordination or our combat prowess, which will also mean that we'll need a lot more of them in order to overwhelm the wolf riders. We can't just summon an army of elementals that can overwhelm the wolf riders with sheer numbers, particularly since as light cavalry they can deny them a fight. Better if we're summoning elementals to do so in defense of the column so the elementals will also be fighting while supported by our Lightfangs.
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Ulgu Elementals, in theory, would do well at that - even a few goblins and wolves being struck down from the shadows may put fear into the rest of them - but I do take your point. Certainly, it wouldn't be so effective at banishing the goblins as Fanriel leaving the column herself, though that has its own downsides... Basically my own concern with the concept a few posts back about trying a little of everything and not enough of one thing.
Ah, well. Still think the plan makes enough sense to leave up for people to evaluate as they see fit - every option at the moment comes with some fairly significant dangers - but there's a reason I'm approval voting right now!
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Imperious
Without the sun of my life
The way I see it is that if we're not heading to try an assassination strike then we're a lot better of using the elementals in defense of the column instead. That way they'll be fighting with support, which means we won't need as many of them to win a fight with the wolf riders. Remember, we've already started rolling for casting fatigue, we can't start throwing around an army of elementals, a tier 3 spell, around. As is the suggested plan does come across as just trying to do everything at once despite the limitations set on us. It calls for marching at normal speed, but also for reforming into a defensive formation when attacked, but also to try to eliminate the wolf riders wholesale, but also to have Fanriel stay with the column.
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Horses can probably also be trained to not freak out to the wolves, but it's specific and these horses haven't been since our dragoons are not experienced anti-goblin specialists. That's basically how it works with gunpowder...horses panic at the sound of gunfire as a rule (or, at least, the sound of really loud really nearby gunfire), but you can train it out of them, hence the existence of dragoons.
Blackout
Fed By Comments
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The better of the Empire State Armies have the discipline to pull off the coordination to constantly reform without slowing down massively. Otherwise they use Demigryphs, their own Giant Wolves, artillery or huntsmen to fend them off, or try to train their horses to not panic so easily. Massed blackpowder can be used to try to spook the wolves in turn. A Priest of Taal could bolster the horses against fear, or they (or a Priest of Ulric) could try to mess with the wolves. Or if they have wizards they could do wizardly nonsense, which is what Fanriel assumes the Ostlanders assumed you would do if you ran into Wolf Riders.
Bretonnian warhorses can usually manage better so they just use knights, or Damsels if they have them. Pegasus and Hippogryphs Knights are especially useful.
Kislev uses expendable skirmisher infantry or Ungol Horse Archers who don't need to get so close so the horse isn't under as much stress. And of course Witches might be able to manage something, and Bear Riders have no trouble from Giant Wolves.
Cathay has discipline (Well, the Jade Warriors at least), black powder and magic, and Araby has horse archers, black powder, war elephants and magic.
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Sertorius
Rebellious Legate
- Location
- Roma Invicta
Exactly how Western armies have dealt with the Parthians, Huns, Mongols, Tatars and other skirmisher cavalry in real life. With your own skirmishers and light cavalry. When you have none, you grind your teeth, maintain formation, think of England and simply power through regardless of harassment and losses. Like wolves, horse archers were relentless and relied on the enemy breaking ranks for whatever reason to pounce on the poor sods.
blinks
Might we assume that the Westerlanders and Tileans are also expecting us, at least to some extent, to do wizardly nonsense in the face of these Wolf Riders? I grant that deploying Elementals is that, to a degree, but this makes me realise that Fanriel not intervening personally may be a blow to morale as much as leaving the column to do so would be.
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Imperious
Without the sun of my life
I doubt morale is going to collapse because we didn't fight off the force assailing us singlehandedly. Between all that our spells have done to stop an enemy ambush and using elementals to fight off assaults on the caravan that will be a fair amount of wizard nonsense in its own right, while not leaving the caravan without our supervision.
Sertorius
Rebellious Legate
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- Roma Invicta
Personally, I find the debacle kind of funny.
We have ranged superiority and that alone should protect us from any harassment. Any Giant Wolf, that comes near us will be turned into a pincushion. They know it, we know it and that should be the end of the whole affair. They can only shadow us from a distance to look for any signs of weakness and report our position further up the chain, without any threat of a direct attack. Unfortunately our little band is getting unnerved by the constant howling, like poor quality levies.
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Blackout
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They are expecting you to do something about it, whether that's wizardly nonsense or something else. It's more that the Ostlanders didn't deliberately send out a force that had no counter to Wolf Riders, they did include one; you.
No, the real issue is that time is on their side, there is a real possibility that if we play the waiting game more green skins will come out to play.
Sertorius
Rebellious Legate
- Location
- Roma Invicta
That is why I don't want to play said waiting game. Move onwards and ignore the Wolves as much as possible, letting the Asur deal with any brave and suicidal ones that try their luck against our unit. We have enough spears and crossbows marching in formation to deter basically any real attack.
I am going to direct both of you to this quote below;
Are you complaining about the difficulties of maneuvering? You're going to have a lot more of that if you're trying to just march in our current formation all the way to the work site and hope Fanriel's a good enough twitch gamer to manage the whole mess.
There is no complicated maneuvering in my plan - one part splits and moves up the sides, the other (the best and most disciplined) moves back to cover the rear. If the goblins come in, they come in on either the thickest lines where they will be stopped, or against the trap that's laid for them.
Nimbus, I want the elementals because they are T2 and the Blizzard is T3, Fanriel is approaching exhaustion, and they last longer.
Just for clarity, Conjure Lesser Wind Elemental is also Tier 3, if I'm reading the spell list correctly! (Will come back to the rest later; need to get on with some writing of my own.)
I mean,yeah. There is no perxect solution. We have to choose what negative to take. My option has the negative of exhausted spellcaster,but we are far from alone.
Noted.
Then the question is whether a burst or a DoT AoE is better. Your thoughts?
Blackout
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The basic tactical problem you are facing is this: yes, you can kill them if you turn around to shoot at them, but the moment you stop and start turning a hundred crossbowmen in their direction they are going to run away, and the moment you arrange those crossbowmen to start moving again they come back.
The first plan presented in the update is that you don't even try to play that game and just rely on elves and elementals to fend off the Wolf Riders while the humans just keep marching, whereas the second plan accepts that you will be slowed down by constantly having to stop and reform to fend off the Wolf Riders, then continue because they ran away while you were reforming, then reform again when they come back.
The first plan presented in the update is that you don't even try to play that game and just rely on elves and elementals to fend off the Wolf Riders while the humans just keep marching, whereas the second plan accepts that you will be slowed down by constantly having to stop and reform to fend off the Wolf Riders, then continue because they ran away while you were reforming, then reform again when they come back.
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