Upon This Sword of Fire (CKII Quest)

[Akritedes]

Okay, you have a point. It makes sense if we want to invade, say, three turns from now. I still think it doesn't make sense if we invade immediatly, which may be what Valda will want us to do.

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That really depends on what Valda wants from us. Logistically and militarily, Illona is not in a position to make any kind of major impact in an invasion. That's part of what the Long Road to Hastrijian (Intrigue) is rectifying, because right now the only invasion plan for Väljad's army is "Hastrijian is thataway, MARCH!".

In as little as a year or two, Illona can rectify this, but right now she simply isn't prepared for offensive actions. She needs that time to muster the various military units into a proper invasion force, prepare the logistics and stockpile supplies, ensure a viable home guard remains, and go through all the other exhaustive minutiae of actually preparing for a war. If she was capable of invading now, we'd have a Martial option to launch an invasion already, instead of "only" assassination or support for one or more parties in the civil war.

And that, of course, assumes that what Valda wants is as straightforward as a second invasion front. It's entirely possible she wants something else, although I wouldn't consider it likely. She might be asking Illona to teach her magic, for all we know, and it could just as easily be asking for a loan of troops so she can invade, or permission to pass through Illona's territory so that the invasion she's launching comes from an unexpected direction.

 

[veekie]

...ooooorrr you could interpret it as back the "weakest" contender, to draw out the current conflict and allow it to bleed as much of Hastrijian's strength as possible, while preparing both defenses and future staging areas on the border for an invasion in the near-future.

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That's one possible angle. The weakest party allows our actions to have the most effect, he's potentially the biggest group, if you know, they were more than really angry farmers. An influx of gear and training, as well as food and intelligence goes a longer way. Whereas with the Twins, backing them would basically require direct military action to hire mercenaries if nothing else, they already have skilled troops and while supplies would help, it doesn't turn the tables.

I mean, your impression isn't necessarily wrong, and we could be doing that. But building up the border fortifications is not a solely defensive move, it's also staging more troops on the border for any potential aggression on our part, and expanding the existing border infrastructure to better supply any military actions in that area. Having bigger supply dumps and more logistics trains headed in that direction is significant, especially when it comes to pushing an army across a desert. 30,000+ men drink a lot of water, and they would need to carry it all with them, and carry enough for days or weeks of desert travel. And all the other necessities, like food and other expendables.

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There is also the possibility of allowing the rebels to move their families over the border as refugees so that they don't need to worry as much about noncombatants. And of course 'stolen' supplies makes a nice excuse for their getting shit, at least initially.

Okay, you have a point. It makes sense if we want to invade, say, three turns from now. I still think it doesn't make sense if we invade immediatly, which may be what Valda will want us to do.

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Assuming Valda is as competent a commander as she has been demonstrated to be, that's never going to be what she asks for.

She knows we are not the best commander. We are merely adequate, even now. With Simurgh and Ashite, we're a supercombatant, but supercombatants don't win wars on their own.
Our entire force is largely unblooded, and while we're rich, we lack a deep treasury, or a fully raised standing army to deploy immediately, in fact, half our force is locked up in garrison duty along the road and mountains, and even more will be manning the southern forts.

If she wanted our help NOW, then it won't be to invade, it'd be for our financial or magical contribution. Or maybe she just wants some of that Illona luck doing for her what it did for Elita
If she wanted us to invade we need at least 2 years of raising armies to actually reach the ability to engage in an offensive war. And she'd give it to us, the war is far from conclusive yet, and time only serves us as the aggressors while they run lower and lower on supplies.

 

[drake_azathoth]

That really depends on what Valda wants from us. Logistically and militarily, Illona is not in a position to make any kind of major impact in an invasion. That's part of what the Long Road to Hastrijian (Intrigue) is rectifying, because right now the only invasion plan for Väljad's army is "Hastrijian is thataway, MARCH!".

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I think that's a bit of a dubious position to take. Yes, some of the stationed military are doing important work, but 90% of them Illona could free up if absolutely necessary given she's not facing a civil war or the like. Seven Legions, three horse archer brigades, and two flame guard regiments are nothing to turn your nose up at.

They're not going to conquer Hastrijan by themselves, but to say they can't make an impact on any invasion is dubious as hell. Especially if said invasion isn't intended to actually conquer the entire country. I don't think Valda wants to invade Hastrijan next turn, but if she's not intent on conquering the entire country there are probably much worse times to take a strategic chokepoint or three. That opportunity isn't going to last, even if we'd probably do better to pass it up.

That said, again, gonna have to wait and see what she says. I'm wildly curious as to what she'll think of Illona's diving into the whole 'divinity and magecraft' thing headfirst as well. But just because Illona hasn't already scouted Hastrijan doesn't mean that Valda hasn't been watching them relentlessly like a bitter ex-girlfriend.

 

[Akritedes]

I think that's a bit of a dubious position to take. Yes, some of the stationed military are doing important work, but 90% of them Illona could free up if absolutely necessary given she's not facing a civil war or the like. Seven Legions, three horse archer brigades, and two flame guard regiments are nothing to turn your nose up at.

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While I would agree that they can be freed up without immediate crisis, I would point out that leaving your homeland undefended to mount an invasion is widely considered to be a bad idea(tm). The standing forces Väljad has already could be considered "barely enough" to place a legion on every border and maintain patrols, training, and rest rotations. One legion at each of three borders, three legions patrolling or guarding dangerous resource sites, and two legions "free".

If we assume she leaves a quarter of the forces available behind, although I personally would leave more, that gives her six Legions, three Horse Archer Brigades, and both the Flame Guard and Lancers. Less perhaps one, if she leaves Flame Guard to guard the capital (not an unreasonable decision). That's not an inconsiderable force, but it's still only ~40,000 soldiers. We simply do not know enough about Hastrijian or Valda's standing forces to know how that compares, and it doesn't include any major engineering or siege forces, leaving it fit primarily for open battle or maneuver. We do know that Väljad did not receive the lion's share of military forces in the distribution, and it is likely that even the built up military Illona has now is far less than what Valda has, let alone what the Scarlet Empire wielded when it last fought Hastrijian.

And, again, there exist no plans currently to leverage any of that military force.

If she wanted us to invade we need at least 2 years of raising armies to actually reach the ability to engage in an offensive war.

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To counter point, at 0.5% of the total population as standing military, Väljad can afford to have ~70,600 men under arms at this time. At present, there are ~51,000 men under arms, not counting the newly recruited Lancers, levies, or mercenaries. A single year of military recruitment could gather as much as 15,000 legionnaires, with two actions and a split-focus, bringing that number to ~66,000 or so. Balanced recruitment would take more than two years, yes, and considerably more expense.

 

[mr_stibbons]

Valda also doesn't have perfect intelligence on the state of our armies. It wouldn't be impossible for her to have overestimated how much we should have in the way of troops. We have been recruiting a more cavalry heavy force than is traditional, for example.

 

[drake_azathoth]

While I would agree that they can be freed up without immediate crisis, I would point out that leaving your homeland undefended to mount an invasion is widely considered to be a bad idea(tm). The standing forces Väljad has already could be considered "barely enough" to place a legion on every border and maintain patrols, training, and rest rotations. One legion at each of three borders, three legions patrolling or guarding dangerous resource sites, and two legions "free".

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...I'm not sure how familiar you are with military history, but this strikes me as not so much 'barely enough' as 'an embarassment of riches'. I mean, economic reprecussions, sure. But it is not typical for a medieval-era country to have a large enough standing army as to post a large force on every single border AND do patrols of their infrastructure AND have 'rest rotations'. Hell, it's not very typical for a modern-era country. Especially when the native terrain is 'Bordered by nigh-impassable desert and a mountain range and countries we have a military alliance with' i.e. 'a living hell to invade'.

 

[Skjadir]

If we assume she leaves a quarter of the forces available behind, although I personally would leave more, that gives her six Legions, three Horse Archer Brigades, and both the Flame Guard and Lancers. Less perhaps one, if she leaves Flame Guard to guard the capital (not an unreasonable decision). That's not an inconsiderable force, but it's still only ~40,000 soldiers.

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Just as an info that number is huge for most armys hell the were figths between armys (that were considered huge for their time) that had an lower overall amount of soldiers.

 

[10ebbor10]

Yup, medieval countries relied on armies that were called up when wars happened. Standing armies weren't that big.

But I'm not sure how usefull the comparison. We're very much not a typical medieval nation.

 

[PoptartProdigy]

Yup, medieval countries relied on armies that were called up when wars happened. Standing armies weren't that big.

But I'm not sure how usefull the comparison. We're very much not a typical medieval nation.

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I'll second this. Ask not how our fictional army created with monopoly money and dice rolls stacks up to historical hosts. Ask instead, "The united empire didn't take Hastrijan, so why do we think we can, short of our army cap, without having raised said army cap even once, and with a large slice of our forces totally green?"

 

[Nevill]

The answer to which, of course, is 'Deus Vult!', followed by five criticals.

 

[Akritedes]

I'll second this. Ask not how our fictional army created with monopoly money and dice rolls stacks up to historical hosts. Ask instead, "The united empire didn't take Hastrijan, so why do we think we can, short of our army cap, without having raised said army cap even once, and with a large slice of our forces totally green?"

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I'm generally assuming that the Scarlet Empire and Hastrijian are broadly equivalent to the historical Roman or Persian Empires in terms of numbers and land controlled. I have no idea how accurate this actually is, lacking a map or more detailed description. This is likely intentional.

 

[PoptartProdigy]

The answer to which, of course, is 'Deus Vult!', followed by five criticals.

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...point.

I'm generally assuming that the Scarlet Empire and Hastrijian are broadly equivalent to the historical Roman or Persian Empires in terms of numbers and land controlled. I have no idea how accurate this actually is, lacking a map or more detailed description. This is likely intentional.

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I mean, I get why you'd draw that comparison, I'm just reluctant to put much faith in it without QM intervention.

 

[Omegahugger]

Ask instead, "The united empire didn't take Hastrijan, so why do we think we can, short of our army cap, without having raised said army cap even once, and with a large slice of our forces totally green?"

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Isn't the answer "because there's a civil war going on"? That usually tends to reduce a country's fighting prowess quite a bit, especially if we could ally with one of the factions.

EDIT: Alternatively, dragon.

 

[notthepenguins]

I'm generally assuming that the Scarlet Empire and Hastrijian are broadly equivalent to the historical Roman or Persian Empires in terms of numbers and land controlled. I have no idea how accurate this actually is, lacking a map or more detailed description. This is likely intentional.

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I'm hardly well-educated on historical warfare, but what I do know says that our army size and population figures are fuckhuge compared to IRL ones. Trying to map in that manner is probably not a good idea.

 

[Kipeci]

Let's not be so hasty about taking the size of our armies and comparing them to medieval Europe. Our queendom is regarded as a relatively underpopulated one, but our population is on the order of that of fourteenth century France which had an absurd number of people relative to other European states at the time. Other states likely have even larger populations, which means more ridiculous armies.

Edit: Ninja'd

 

[10ebbor10]

I'm generally assuming that the Scarlet Empire and Hastrijian are broadly equivalent to the historical Roman or Persian Empires in terms of numbers and land controlled. I have no idea how accurate this actually is, lacking a map or more detailed description. This is likely intentional.

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The Roman empire spend 80% of it's budget on army maintenance. We spend far less.

Applying economics from real life won't work.

On a side note. At the time of August, the Roman empire as a whole had about 250 000 soldiers.

 

[PoptartProdigy]

Isn't the answer "because there's a civil war going on"? That usually tends to reduce a country's fighting prowess quite a bit, especially if we could ally with one of the factions.

EDIT: Alternatively, dragon.

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I'm more making the point that we can't really make real-world comparisons in an obviously unrealistic fantasy situation and conclude, "so obviously, we're a world-domination machine waiting to land on a target." We need to make in-universe comparisons, which aren't much more helpful. The civil war is handy, yeah, but we know bugger all about how many folks are involved on each side. For all we know we are but a grain of sand in comparison to even the meanest competitor. And Simurgh is awesome, but we also don't actually have firm numbers on how insurmountable an advantage he presents.

Not that you make bad points. I would just like some data before going all Leeroy on these people.

 

[Random Member]

Isn't the answer "because there's a civil war going on"? That usually tends to reduce a country's fighting prowess quite a bit, especially if we could ally with one of the factions.

EDIT: Alternatively, dragon.

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I don't think our dragon will be a major game breaker. It's only just gotten large enough to ride on and I doubt Simurgh will ever become on par with, say, the dragons from A Song of Ice and Fire that could defeat entire armies on their own.

 

[Crilltic]

Let's not be so hasty about taking the size of our armies and comparing them to medieval Europe. Our queendom is regarded as a relatively underpopulated one, but our population is on the order of that of fourteenth century France which had an absurd number of people relative to other European states at the time. Other states likely have even larger populations, which means more ridiculous armies.

Edit: Ninja'd

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I actually used medieval populaton estimates for the rough analogues of the territory you control to get your populaton figures.

 

[10ebbor10]

On a side note, is it possible the upkeep is wrong?

According to my math, it adds up to 3160, not 2960.

 

[Kipeci]

I actually used medieval populaton estimates for the rough analogues of the territory you control to get your populaton figures.

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What for if you don't mind my asking, entities in Central Asia? Elsewhere? I know that there were a lot more strong urban centers in Central Asia than we tend to give credit for before the Mongols sacked the place.

 

[Crilltic]

What for if you don't mind my asking, entities in Central Asia? Elsewhere? I know that there were a lot more strong urban centers in Central Asia than we tend to give credit for before the Mongols sacked the place.

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Muscovy and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania mostly. Qur-dalan was based off the population figures for Samarkand

 

[Akritedes]

On a side note. At the time of August, the Roman empire as a whole had about 250 000 soldiers.

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And that number peaked at around 450,000, but Rome also controlled vastly more territory than we do. We simply don't have enough information to judge the size of the Scarlet Empire and Hastrijian, pre-Heiress Queens or otherwise.

I mean, we can guess rough numbers. Stuff like:

- Assume each Scarlet Empire province has roughly equal population
- Set average sustainable standing army to X%. Go with 1% for easy numbers.
- Crunch numbers.

From that, we'd get stuff like a pre-Heiress Queens Scarlet Empire with a population of ~56.5M and a sustainable standing army of 565k, or a little over 140k for each province. Which is, notably, a little better than Rome circa ~400AD. But that's all largely supposition and (possibly reasonable) guesstimates.

We just don't have enough information to make reasonable assumptions and evaluations. All we do know is that Valjad's military is supposed to be (or was) on the weaker side.

 

[Andres]

She knows we are not the best commander. We are merely adequate, even now.

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Not true. At 19, the stat description says "You are an experienced fighter and a competent, inspiring leader of men". 19 is also the upper edge of 'Good', just under 'Great'. 10-14 is what's considered "merely adequate" as you put it.

 

[drake_azathoth]

Muscovy and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania mostly. Qur-dalan was based off the population figures for Samarkand

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That is indicative, for sure. Tamerlame was an absurdly successful conqueror of the late 14th century in that area. Timur's army varied drastically in size from his origin as a mercenary captain in Persia to his eventual doomed attempt at invading China. His final attempt at China constituted 200,000 men including allies and was perhaps an example of the issues of logistics faced by armies of that size.

More relevantly- our situation rather closely mirrors Timur's invasion of India after the death of Sultan Firaz Shah Tughluq of the Delhi Sultanate in 1388 split the country into three warring rivals to the throne. Timur crossed the Indus river with 90,000 men and sacked the heart of India, then turned west and conquered Syria, destroyed Baghdad, and captured Ottoman Turkey and forced Egypt to pay him tribute.

So yeah. 61,000 men is very, very far from an insubstantial force by the standards of that time.