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[Stirk]

Not these elves

And Stirk, the Terra arma have one GLARING weakness: The lack of armour. Any blow against one would be more or less lethal, and the ballista could skewer several at a time. That, and charging into a full hedge of long pikes isn't going to be good for one's health either.

And if the ballistae have a hundred rounds each, and are able to fire all of them at the mob, that's a VERY large portion of it GONE, especially if it's piercing through bodies.

Some wear armor, if they feel like it and have it. Mostly just thick cloths, or linothorax style treated battle wear. Nothing impressive or wide spread, of course. It isn't like it will do much to stop fatal blows anyway, heavy knight-like armor would be impossible without horses that we simply lack.

But the ballista can't skewer multiple at the same time, well no more than a few. Like I said, to be able to hit you would have to be from high ground, which means you would end up hitting at an angle severely limiting the amount of damage you could do. And that is if you get to choose the battle field in the first place, and not counting my own artillery. Fiery grape-shot to your artillery over the heads of my men would put a ballista out of commission easily.

Also-ballista where usually used to defend positions, to my knowlage. A 10k strong hoard can mess up all your land while you hide behind a wall, we are close enough that a protracted siege would be easy. I can beat you without even getting into ballista range. And like I said before, we still have more men than you have ballista bolts. They arn't the kind of weapon you can rely on.

[Taricus]

Two full brigades would have roughly around 600 ballistas. That's a few thousand per volley. Add to that that catapults don't have as far as effective range, and would likely be marked for destruction early on in a battle.

And even on level ground the artillery would still be devastating. And With onyl ten thousand against half that number against better led, and better equipped forces would only end in disaster for the horde.

[Stirk]

Two full brigades would have roughly around 600 ballistas. That's a few thousand per volley. Add to that that catapults don't have as far as effective range, and would likely be marked for destruction early on in a battle.

And even on level ground the artillery would still be devastating. And With onyl ten thousand against half that number against better led, and better equipped forces would only end in disaster for the horde.

No they aren't ballista fire in a straight line, which means you would have to have them in front of your troops. Besides that, ever source I see says that both catapults and ballista have the same effective range, about 400m. Not counting the magic priests subtly messing with my ammo.

[Taricus]

Or on the flanks, and benefiting from enfilading fire. And furthermore, while they both have the same rage, the catapult would be far less accurate due to the method of firing.

[Andres]

Two full brigades would have roughly around 600 ballistas. That's a few thousand per volley. Add to that that catapults don't have as far as effective range, and would likely be marked for destruction early on in a battle.

And even on level ground the artillery would still be devastating. And With onyl ten thousand against half that number against better led, and better equipped forces would only end in disaster for the horde.

*punches in a few numbers*
Alright so that's 2,400 killed in a single volley assuming the absolute best. Artillery takes a long time to reload so only expect one more volley. That brings down their numbers to 30,200 - a very respectable amount killed. But in all actuality there won't be as many kills - especially in the first volley - since the longer the range the less damage is done - which means less penetration - and less accuracy so some of them will miss outright and not kill anyone or not penetrate as much as possible. Assuming that 2/3 bolts hit and that average penetration is 3/4 people then you've got 1,206 people killed per volley with a remainder of 32,588 people left in the horde.

As for your plan for Terra Arma's artillery, well, artillery isn't very accurate. It would be very difficult to target their spread-outedness with ballistas (the only thing available with the range and power to destroy them) and that would mean using bolts that could instead be used to kill hordsemen. All the while, their catapults are lobbing anti-infantry rounds on your infantry and wounding/killing/maiming a bunch of your guys.

It's also well-known that the best way to kill lightly-armored infantry hordes is to use mass archer volleys rather than artillery fire. Artillery is best used against tightly-packed heavily-armored troops that would normally be able to resist arrows very well. You would be using Anti-Heavy on light troops and they'd be using Anti-Heavy on your... heavy troops.

Face it: if they weren't so pacifistic you'd need to get into an alliance just to hold out against them.

[Stirk]

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Or on the flanks, and benefiting from enfilading fire. And furthermore, while they both have the same rage, the catapult would be far less accurate due to the method of firing.

It has grapeshot and magic, meaning it doesn't have to be accurate. As long as the shooter can get one of the lead balls to hit, it is down.

And how, exactly, do you plan to flank someone with a siege engine? You don't have horses. You push them with manpower. Besides that, the swarm tactics and lack of any real formation makes flanking us almost pointless, you will kill a few in surprise but don't gain a real advantage. The front is the same as the back.

And if you do leave the ballistas exposed, it would take three to five minutes for the swarm to charge the position-not even enough time to reload. They would just have to kill the balista men and take your weapons as our own.

Also: Ballista are SIEGE weapons, which you are over-relying on as if they where howitzers. They are made for sieges, not open warefare.

[Taricus]

And then you still have to deal with the other 600 ballistas. One lead ball isn't going to be worth much when there still far more targets.

Though logistically, I doubt the hordes will even be a problem. Stuck in the mountains with nothing to eat. Hunger isn't really conductive to warfare, and hordes aren't really organised when it comes to that sort of thing especially in environments with little to no food.

[Stirk]

Though logistically, I doubt the hordes will even be a problem. Stuck in the mountains with nothing to eat. Hunger isn't really conductive to warfare, and hordes aren't really organised when it comes to that sort of thing especially in environments with little to no food.

They bring their own food-it isn't like they have a lot less than they had at home. And aside from that, we are nahbors. If I attacked you, I have direct access to my own food supply. If you attacked me, then you would be in no position to use the ballista you are relying on effectively. And even then, I would be able to counter attack while you had your entire army fighting me. Your plan relies entirely on having a better position than me, and ballistas in those better positions. If you moved your entire army to attack me, you would have to fight my entire population in the home field. If I attacked you, you would have the tactical advantage, but couldn't do a thing to counter attack.

[Andres]

hordes aren't really organised when it comes to that sort of thing especially in environments with little to no food.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Sorry. Just had to.

[Taricus]

A few things about the mongols. First, they weren't travelling through mostly inhospitable terrain. Second, the fact they had horses means they could carry more provisions than what a man could carry Thirdly, the horses themselves were supplies. LAstly, they were mostly foragers. Thus they actually didn't need a large supply train like the Arman's do.

[Stirk]

A few things about the mongols. First, they weren't travelling through mostly inhospitable terrain. Second, the fact they had horses means they could carry more provisions than what a man could carry Thirdly, the horses themselves were supplies. LAstly, they were mostly foragers. Thus they actually didn't need a large supply train like the Arman's do.

We also don't have to go as far. Like I said, I am your neighbor. If I have to go further, we can use the river. We might not be fast on the rafts, but we can fish of them (food) and drink from it (water) meaning even then we don't have to use the supplies we bring. The fact we don't have much armor saves up a lot of room for food. And we can always raid the countryside if we get too hungry.

[Taricus]

Thing is, you can't feed 30000 people from the river, not in one day, and that there isn't much of a countryside to pillage from.

[Stirk]

Thing is, you can't feed 30000 people from the river, not in one day, and that there isn't much of a countryside to pillage from.

There doesn't have to be. They take a bunch of supply carts, with enough food for a while, at least enough to get to the destination. If it if far away, we would need a nearby ally state to feed us, and most of the far-away places have at least one or two places the horde could stop to resupply, especially if we make friends.

Besides that, it is the perfect defense. Self-sustaining, armed completely, and angry. Even if they are far away and everyone between them and there hates us, we can just stay home safe and sound. If the in-between nations are hostile, or uncooperative, we can't do much marching over them anyway. It would take multiple enemy militaries to defeat us completely, and even that would leave them defenseless as they do it.

That is an important factor to, as long as we have friends who can do all the tactical stuff, we are invincible. *nudgenudge* Just need a friendly *nudge* neighbor*nudge* to *nudge* help*nudge* (I am talking about you.). With cooperating militaries, we can get things like supply lines or counter attacks going while we do all the important mobbing and fighting.

[Andres]

You probably won't be getting much food from a mountain region city state. It's rather likely they only have a small surplus. Now, if *wink wink* you could find *wink* a friendly city state *wink* with tons of food *wink wink* in surplus, you'd be golden. On a completely unrelated note, Demestris just gained free access to the Great River.

[IamanElfCollaborator]

*stabs*
terra arma-sempai is mine
*hiss*

Hm....what to do with the CoAaS though.....maybe just try to be the diplomats via drunkenness and shared spice use?