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[Roboson]

The enemy already has spears. So we wouldn't be gaining an advantage if we made them too. They'd help us in the plains, and help with Calvary, but that doesn't solve our other issues (like how the enemy is avoiding our traps, and escaping from us, and all that sort of thing).

My official vote is for shadows, just because I think we can get more out of them right now.

[RAM]

Fine, I wll go back to conjure individual. Shadow seems just barely conjuration, although perhaps we should not overspecialise, and is, umm, well, I figure countermeasures will be a bit too easy in the long term. Offensively, conjure individual seems very dubious, but we can probably rig up a preset aiming system to move our own wizards around more quickly to focus our forces more effectively. And hey, maybe it will just work, we roll brilliantly and can whisk the enemy sultan out of his harem...

[10ebbor10]

I think shadows are a bad idea. They leave our wizards (which are extremely valuable), extremely vulnerable to the fast moving Moskurgians, and all for what I suspect will not offer much more benefit than a simple Divination spell. In addition, the spell tries to do too many different things, and has to take crippling drawbacks as a balancing effect.

Anyway, I don't understand how we are suffering such big losses on the plains. Our cavalry has larger and less nimble horses than the enemy, and our longbows have greater range. By all accounts, our forces should benefit, not suffer from this open terrain. We should be the ones benefitting from formation tactics allowed by the open terrain, as it allows us to deploy our heavy infantry to maximum effect. We're the ones who can bombard the enemy from afar with arrows. We're the ones who can smash our heavy cavalry in their formations.

There's no reason to try and attempt ambush tactics, as neither the terrain nor our forces are suited for that.

Anyway, my proposed action.

Design : The Stirrup

This should enormously improve the effectiveness of our cavalry. Being able to charge the enemy lines with heavy cavalry as a way to break their forces before battle relies on being able to remain on your horse, and with a long sword and heavy armor this is rather hard. With stirrups however, we can smash straight into their forces.

Now, you'll say, aren't their spears dangerous. To which I'll say, no they aren't. They're described as daggers on a stick. True anti-cavalry spears are far larger and would be unsuited for infantry fighting. It's with good reason that cavalry dominated the European battlefields for so long.



Oh, and remember :

If you have multiple spells at a price tier, wizards will pick the most suitable for their situation.

Your shadow spell would replace one of our current spells in battle, not supplement them. As such, I consider it even less useful than I thought it was.

[Iituem]

For clarification, having multiple spells at a tier of expense isn't a bad thing, it just determines situational choices.  If you had two common spells say, hypothetically, magic missile and acid splash, then both would be used but acid splash would take priority in close range combat and magic missile would be used at distance.  New spells will generally open up options for troops, rather than pigeonholing them.

[10ebbor10]

Thanks for the clarification, but that merely reinforces my idea that the shadow spell is useless. After all, a design effect is that it incapacitates whoever uses it, thus preventing from using any more spells until one spell is done. Other spells may be used appropriately, but the summon shadow thing is not.


Let's go over the uses this spell is supposed to have.

1) Spying. They will be very hard to spot and can be used to spy on enemies movements and even on leader meetings.

Assumes the spell can be used at long range, otherwise it'll quickly kill of our wizards as they get discovered and stabbed.

2) Assasinations: If we can send a shadow or two into an enemy camp, then then can kill the enemy leaders and wizards.

Assumes the spell creates shadows that are far stronger than human. Also assumes they're stealthy.

3) Ambushes: Small groups of wizards can pilot shadows as ambushes without risking troups or being seen. Especially at night.

Assumes that the Shadows are cheap, or a spell that all our apprentices can do.

4) Combat: During the heat of combat use shadows to infiltrate the back line, killing wizards and archers.

Assumes that the shadows are cheap, stealthy and stronger than human.

5) Guards: We can utilize shadows to guard our leaders and generals (and thanes). Especially because something is going on between our thanes and enemy wizards.

Assumes that the shadows are stronger than human and cheap.

6: Theivery: We could use shadows to steal enemy spells from camps. Either by stealing notes on the spells, on simply by observing the enemies cast them.

Assumes they're long range and stealthy.


I mean, this is quite clearly a severe incidence of feature overreach. You need a spell that is cheap, long ranged, stealthy ,creates stronger than human creatures.

We're not going to get that.

[Playergamer]

I didn't get to say this before we abandoned spears, but no spears. The reason our troops have axes and their troops have spears is that they have light cavalry. They aren't charging our infantry, they're skirmishing with our archers and chasing down routing troops.

[Roboson]

Yikes, that sure is a long and aggressive post.

The idea is that our wizards would use the spell from a distance, that shadows are as strong as a person (or strong enough to hold a dagger, which is all is really needed to assasinate enemies) and that shadows look like like actual shadows when intangible. That hardly seems like overreach.

So yeah, if the shadow can only go ten feet, then it's useless, but so is any spell that can only go a short range. If that was an issue then we couldn't research things like magic missile. A ten foot magic missile range is not as strong as a 100 foot magic missile range.

And if shadows aren't stealthy or able to be used for combat, then it's usefulness is also decreased, but again, we take similar risks with any spell. To use the magic missile as an example again: its components are range and damage. If it lost one of those, it would be a bad spell. Shadows components are range, damage, and stealth. So sure, it's more complex than a basic spell, but you're blowing it way way way out of proportion here. It doesn't even need to be a low level spell, it could be a mid level spell and still be useful as it would only take one shadow to sneak into an enemy camp with a dagger, kill their leaders and wizards in their sleep, grab the enemy spellbook, and return home.

The same effect could be achieved with a spell of stealth or invisibility.


Our issue on the plains seems to be manuverability. According to the OP, our army is a loose collection of bands of fighters with low mobility. The enemy has highly mobile troops and Calvary, as well as better formations. So we're at a severe disadvantage there.

But I'm not sure we don't already have stirrups. We couldn't really have Calvary without them as they're an integral part of horse riding. And if they haven't been invented yet, we should be knocking enemies off their horses left and right (which isn't the case). But if the case is that stirrups haven't been invented in this universe, then sure, that's a pretty useful invention.



Of all the ideas discussed here, perhaps RAMs summon spear wall would be the most useful. Or even a variation on that that's just a straightforward summon magic lance which is basically the same thing, but probably easier to use and more flexible (a good wizard can summon a spear wall to stop a charge, verses several weak wizards conjuring lances to stop charges and skewer enemies in open combat too). Having a straightforward "Kill the Bad Guys" kind of spell like that wouldn't hurt. Even if it's close range, it should be fairly devastating against their lightly armored men and horses.

So I guess I'm changing my vote again: Magic lance spell, final answer.

[stabbymcstabstab]

I'll vote for the Magic Lance Spell.
but I have a question on the conjure person spell, couldn't we set it up so that we could summon and send out messengers from our armies and fortication pratical instantly? That could be increbiably useful later on.

[Playergamer]

Magic lance.

[Roboson]

Ok, so who has ideas for propaganda? We need a great description of our master wizard. The fact that he's burning whole platoons alive should make this easy.

[10ebbor10]

Yikes, that sure is a long and aggressive post.

The idea is that our wizards would use the spell from a distance, that shadows are as strong as a person (or strong enough to hold a dagger, which is all is really needed to assasinate enemies) and that shadows look like like actual shadows when intangible. That hardly seems like overreach.

So yeah, if the shadow can only go ten feet, then it's useless, but so is any spell that can only go a short range. If that was an issue then we couldn't research things like magic missile. A ten foot magic missile range is not as strong as a 100 foot magic missile range.

And if shadows aren't stealthy or able to be used for combat, then it's usefulness is also decreased, but again, we take similar risks with any spell. To use the magic missile as an example again: its components are range and damage. If it lost one of those, it would be a bad spell. Shadows components are range, damage, and stealth. So sure, it's more complex than a basic spell, but you're blowing it way way way out of proportion here. It doesn't even need to be a low level spell, it could be a mid level spell and still be useful as it would only take one shadow to sneak into an enemy camp with a dagger, kill their leaders and wizards in their sleep, grab the enemy spellbook, and return home.

The same effect could be achieved with a spell of stealth or invisibility.

Your shadow spell does more than range, damage and stealth. It's also invincibility and intangibility.

To stay with your magic missile example. Magic missile does one thing (blowing stuff up) and does it well. Your shadow spell is supposed to do everything :

- It's supposed to boost spying
- It's supposed to boost recon
- It's supposed to boost reinforce our combat lines
- It's supposed to outflank enemies
- It's supposed to protect wizards and commanders
- It's supposed to attack the enemy wizards and commanders

The only thing it doesn't do is kill retreating enemies. Your opinion of the strength of magic is way too great. Remember how little the wasps and webs did.

[Roboson]

And so it continues. You're beating a dead horse at this point. Shadows are off the table.

As for my opinion of magic, I think it's more likely the enemy has some sort of defensive magic than our magic is particularly weak. They're able to find our traps more easily, and it stated in the update that our losses cannot be explained by the apparent circumstances. Which means magic. It also likely has something to do with the enemy wizards trying to get close to our leaders.

[10ebbor10]

And so it continues. You're beating a dead horse at this point. Shadows are off the table.

Just ensuring they stay off the table.

As for my opinion of magic, I think it's more likely the enemy has some sort of defensive magic than our magic is particularly weak

.

They got the divination spellbook and what is either the Wand of Vampirism or the Wand of heroism.

Neither includes any protection against wasps and webs, which were tge examples I brought up.

Divination Spellbook
Detect Ambush:  Reveals non-magical ambushes prepared by enemy troops or physical traps.
Lucky Strike:  Magical guidance makes a squad shoot or strike true far more often than usual.  Expensive.
Detect Thoughts:  Read the mind of an enemy commander to determine their tactics ahead of time.  Very Expensive.

[Roboson]

And so it continues. You're beating a dead horse at this point. Shadows are off the table.

Just ensuring they stay off the table.

Just overly rude.

They got the divination spellbook and what is either the Wand of Vampirism or the Wand of heroism.

Neither includes any protection against wasps and webs, which were tge examples I brought up.

Divination Spellbook
Detect Ambush:  Reveals non-magical ambushes prepared by enemy troops or physical traps.
Lucky Strike:  Magical guidance makes a squad shoot or strike true far more often than usual.  Expensive.
Detect Thoughts:  Read the mind of an enemy commander to determine their tactics ahead of time.  Very Expensive.

Yeah except how that's OOC knowledge. Our wizards, who never read the enemy textbook, wouldn't have any idea of it's contents. To use that information would be metagaming.

[Iituem]

Given that I made both teams aware of the possibilities of magic in a mechanical sense at start, I'll handwave your ability to reason that the enemy might be using divinatory magic, just as I would handwave the Moskurgers potentially figuring out your use of conjuration based off the effects observed.  This is an advantage that will last exactly one round and can work for both parties anyway, since neither party is privy to future information on the enemy team's designs for equipment or spells.  Perhaps your scholars found a description in lost books of magic that seems similar, or legendary wands matching those descriptions.  Either way, it won't matter for long.

Edit:  Regarding overambitious efforts; if you want to try for something really powerful or complex, you can try.  You just might not get it in a single turn, since I apply complexity penalties to rolls.  If it's flat out impossible, you will find that out as a course of your research.

Edit 2:  Also, do be gentlemanly (or ladylike) with one another.  You are, after all, on the same team.  Disputes can be had without aggravation.