Military Strategies

[Mr_Praetorian]

[Zanaikin]

[Mr_Praetorian]

Alright then. We can say that at least my character tried.

[Squall255]

um marty, what was wrong with all of the elemental creatures suggested? with a few of them, including Trillochs for some of our earlier strikes, we should be able to wreck some havack before any of our troops have to deal with the enemy forces.

Drew: you're right, we don't have to rely on magic. however, Judson and I are trying ot optimise the magic that we have, and imporve the numbers of our army. we are also trying to find ways of weakening the enemy as a whole. We do need to think of mechanical traps, and we will get there. As for troops, and what to do with them, that is more of your area, and I'm perfectly willing to hear what you have to say and your justification for it. So far, I'm slightly confused as to how you plan on switching out old troops for new troops, as well as where our troops will be placed. right now I see a plethora of death points down on the ground, so I'm cautious of meeting the enemy anywhere but on the walls. Also, marty knows how Dai runs his economy (to some extent anyway) a lot better than I do, and better than I believe you do. I don't know if this is true, but if Marty says that a country doesn't have resources of a particular kind, I normally trust him, unless Dai says otherwise. most of the time he is right. It was a good idea though.

[Mr_Praetorian]

I know, I was just trying to bring everyone back to basics for a moment.

[TheDude51]

Another thought: use mirage arcana or similar effects to move the apparent location of the bridges. Then use the various wall effects to make it more difficult to move from the bridges' apparent locations to their actual ones. The enemy charges into where the bridges are, some run right into the water, the rest get stuck right in range of our walls. Unable to go forward or to the sides, possibly also pressed from behind by allies still trying to charge forward, they would be easy meat.

For mechanical traps, the good old standby of spiked pit would probably be best. Placed liberally around the bridge areas, they should be able to at least slow the enemy advance.

Also: is it possible to make razorwire, or its equivalent? A couple bales of barbed wire scattered across all approaches, hopefully firmly attached to the ground and with a ravid near each section, would greatly inconvenience he enemy. Would be best placed a fair distance away from the walls, just barely at the outside of our firing range. Hopefully also concealed with illusions, such as illusory terrain. If they throw all their berserkers into the front line like they did before this would hopefully trigger their frenzy while they are still out of range of the walls. Any magic they use to bypass this would deplete the amount that they have access to when they are assaulting the walls.

On mobility: once we are pinned down in the city, we will be unable to effectively utilize the Archeronians mobility. While unfortunate, this is an undeniable fact. Therefore, we need to get as much use out of it as is possible while the enemy is still on the march towards us. Surgical guerrilla attacks on the enemy column would be the perfect way to make full use of mobile attack units.

[Sajuuk]

The hill that dai has just informed me and drew about must be taken. We must hold the high ground. Unlike the confederates at Gettysburg.

[Sajuuk]

Drew has suggested more symbol of insanity fun. I am throwing in some explosive runes as well.

Possibly put them onto the hill.

Or on the gate.

Or at chokepoints.

Maybe some Symbols of Fear too.

Transmute Rock to Mud is a permanent duration spell usable for slowing down advancing troops.

Web would also be good.

Dream could be cast to fuck with the opposing leader's head.

Once we know where the enemy will be camping before the battle, we should poison their water supply, trap the locations, and possibly drop a few symbols of insanity on their camps.

[TheDude51]

I really dont see the advantage of holding the hills around the city...

Symbols of insanity are always good. Perhaps scribe them onto catapult stones?

Symbols of Fear, unfortunately, are necromancy, and therefore not available.

Transmute rock to mud would be a great spell to cast on the bridges once the enemy begins to cross them.

Web is good, a longer duration impedance effect than things like caustic mire. Downside is that it is, like all spell effects, vulnerable to dispelling.

Enemy food: if we have some time to prepare, a Field of Ruin would be perfect for destroying enemy supplies, ruining all enemy food and drink in its one-square-mile area of effect.

Also, while reading the description of dispel magic, I noticed something. In order to dispel a spell, the dispel magic must target the spell's point of origin. It can suppress it within its 20-ft radius area of effect, but cannot end the spell completely unless the dispel hits the point of origin.

This gave me an idea: Cloudkill vapors sink to the lowest place possible within their area of effect. The point of origin, however, remains at the level at which it was cast, simply moving forward a bit each round. We could load the tactical spell squad onto the sky galleon, fly them 5 miles above the enemy, and cast a tactical cloudkill. It would be nearly impossible to find the point of origin to dispel it, and meanwhile the cloudkill would be wreaking havoc with the enemy's forces.

[Squall255]

Also as a note : My infusions can only be dispelled by a TARGETED dispell on THE ITEM INTO WHICH THE INFUSION IS CAST. with the one minute cast time, and the decent durations, I believe using artificer infusions to buff our men might be a good idea. or at least to buff ourselves. this probably isn't a good army tactic, but I figured i should not it to the party due to the large amount of dispells that seem to be thrown about during battle.

I also started a thread on Wizards, searching for good defense tactics.


They had a few good ideas, especially using low level wizards as invisible buffers for our units.

[Sajuuk]

Judson: the hill overlooks the city. We can't let them get control of it lest they set up siege machines on it, they would have a clear shot of the entire city from that hill. Not something you want happening. Drew and I came up with an idea of putting Symbols of Insanity and such on the hill to impeded their progress in gaining control of it. Symbol of Fear we do have access to, because the person who can cast the symbols is not from Misalin. Transmute Rock to Mud would also destroy the bridges, while that does prevent them from getting in, I don't think its the best idea. Web is also vulnerable to fire, so we could use it just not in the trenches. Using Field of Ruin to destroy enemy supplies is also a good idea, but we first have to find out where they are camping. I like the cloudkill idea, especially if we combine it with a Control Weather to prevent any prevailing winds from blowing it into the city.

[TheDude51]

Overlooking the city? O_O in that case, yes, it should definitely be secured. Smybols are good, and also we could place some summoned ravids just under the surface of the hilltop. It would be hilarious to have to orcs finally take the hill and set up seige engines, only to have their own seige equipment animate and attack them.

Transmute rock to mud on the bridges should be saved until the enemy has breached the gates and is crossing into the city. In that situation, I think destruction of said bridges would be by far the best option.

Speaking of gates, we should probably reinforce the gates with multiple walls of stone right before the enemy attacks. This would make them impossible to open, but it would also increase their durability somewhat. Allowing a small layer of air between each wall would reduce physical durability, but would prevent a single disintigrate from taking out the entire thing. With that, a separate disintigration would be required for each layer.

And, as I have said before, gathering intelligence on enemy movements should be our NUMBER ONE priority at this point. Knowledge is power, and if we can locate the enemy we can dish out massive damage while they are still far from the city.

[Sajuuk]

[Zanaikin]

a few things:

Drew: swap some of your ranks in... random whatever knowledges, into Know[Arcana]. I think you need at least 6-8 ranks in that.

Judson: switch like 2-3 ranks into Knowledge[Military Tactics], you get involved in that too much a bit too.

If I hear about or see you guys asking WOTC forum for draft up defense ideas/plans for you, I'm gonna start deducting EXP for EXCESSIVELY metagaming, there is a degree of how much that can be tolerated. You already have the advantage of 6 heads thinking against the planning of 1. <_<

anyone who wants to figure out what to summon better have some ranks in know[the planes]

what you think those skills are there just to look nice?

[Sajuuk]

Crap, whose got the surplus ranks to put into Know(Planes)?