Musings on Warfare [Brumaire]

 As I’m running three campaigns currently (organising online in these times of plague is easier than physically coordinating my players who live across the stretches of England and work a multitude of different careers….) and in two of them (Brumaire and Sea Wolves) the players have reached the ‘domain game’ level, possessing NPC retainers, armed forces and titled power themselves.

I spent a lot of time working on a stripped down war-game style of play for working on battles, but I think it runs up against the problem that D&D is a team game and some players simply do not enjoy this kind of play, and any strict set of rules will run up against the boundless power of player imagination. How does Hypnotic Pattern or Fog Cloud effect warfare? It’s easier to adjudicate this on a case-by-case basis that aim at a systematising philosophy, especially if I want warfare to retain a cinematic, personal tone. The clash is between the Player Characters and their NPC enemies, with personal stakes, not the impersonal struggle of square abstract units. I want to zoom the camera in to a personal experience of the battlefield: I want my players to stop and smell the gunpowder and entrails.

War has erupted in Brumaire, and I want to ponder what warfare is like in this setting and that of Sea Wolves, in order to better plan out the battles to come.  Whilst both steal liberally from historical inspirations, the fantastical elements have to be accommodated: this is not medieval stasis.

Brumaire

The armies of Brumaire are grounded in their social structure. Warfare is primarily – and traditionally - fought with a mix of forces:

The Marmelukes – genetically modified slave-soldiers, granted limited language and capacity to feel – form the professional core of most militaries. They spend their lives in drill and train greatly, and having been bred stronger, fitter and more enduring than humans, they are a formidable force in melee combat. They also take on the professional soldiering roles of guardsmen, sappers, foragers and the like.A century before the campaign, the victor would often be the force that would arm and breed an ample force of Marmelukes. This expense was considerable, and greatly favoured powerful magnates with extensive estates and centralised power around the king. 

With the expansion of cheaper and more dependable firearms, militia-units have become more integral to warfare, especially as conscripting vast numbers of ordinary humans with firearms can swell the size of an army considerably and cheaply. This has lead to a rapid expansion of the power of cities and their rulers, and feeds directly into Brumaire’s current political context: a popular revolution has stuttered into civil war between the Faith-Directorate and various aristocratic forces. Professional human soldiers are increasingly important for the maintenance and firing of large artillery and cannonry – this is considered more expensive and more fallible than magical armaments, and is mainly used by the Faith-Directorate who lack magical support. 

The Greatest Estate – Brumaire’s aristocracy – offer both leadership and magical support to these other forces. Whilst many bear the title of ‘Knight’, they often rely heavily on sorcerous might as strength of arms – and it is this education in magical combat that underlies their power. This is expensive and exclusive to that social class. Often, groups of the Greatest Estate will convoke  extremely powerful magic to devastate the battlefield. As a result, skirmishing infantry with firearms and cavalry will often seek to harry and kill the enemies’ aristocratic forces. Due to the sheer danger of magically-capable individuals, they are essentially given no quarter on the battlefields – something that has made war between Brumaire’s aristocrats rare – defeated families are often enough massacred without ceremony on the field of battle. Those means those with extensive families – such as the House of Vallingford – have a considerable resource to draw upon. 

The Courts of the Fey fight seldom in human wars (although they are often their victims) and fight in a multitude of styles – a different post will go into this. They rely much more on individual prowess and skill and tend to see warfare as a means of bringing many champions to each other – a battle is a multitude of duels. To this end, they often see strategic aims (the conquest of a territory, or the capture of a river ford, or the destruction of farmland) as essentially meaningless if the great champions of their enemy were beaten. Thus, even whilst they have lost great swathes of land to human colonisation, they tend to see many of these wars as Fey victories. The Court of Winter,  currently involved in war alongside the PCs, fights in a way similar to Steppe people’s – massive mobility organised on tribal lines, with the addition of extensive supernatural help (where Winter’s army rides, Winter follows…). This makes them extremely formidable on campaign, and it is only their extremely modest numbers and perpetual internal internecine struggles that weaken them.  They have little interest in siege craft, and will seek to force pitched battle. 

The primary enemy of the PC, King Fredegar of the House of Vallingford, resembles a normal aristocratic army except in that he also commands a considerable number of auxiliary forces and Fey mercenaries – these are often used as skirmishers and not part of the professional core of his armies. He also possesses, and makes use of, extensive artillery. Whilst his forces are formidable, he is used to drawn-out, lengthy war, and tends towards a cautious approach - borne of his endless campaigns against Winter. 

A Humoural Theory of the Undead - Sanguine and Melancholic Undead

In the world of Sea Wolves undead are classified according to the science of the Four Humours. An Imperial scholar explains below:

 Any Imperial Scholar of note must be familiar with the prevailing Humoural Theory of the Undead. Whilst less civilised peoples may believe in such discredited theories as 'negative energy' or 'spontaneous generation' as their means of explaining the existence of the Undead, it is simple reason that the a serious excess or deficit in any one humour will lead to the rising or transformation into an undead creature. Whilst the animating humour determines much of the nature of the creature risen, all undead are united in that they recoil in horror from articles of the faith, and flee before the Eye of the Authority. Thus does the Authority mark them as anathema, to be cast down and destroyed.

Undead can, of course, be animated by sorcery, independent of these types. Mostly they are Melancholic or Choleric Undead, trapped in their remains by sorcery to do the bidding of apostate magi.


The Sanguine Undead - Undead of Blood. 
Known also as ghouls or vampirii sanguinis, sanguine undead arise from an excess of blood in the body. This malady can arise piecemeal - excessive unclean and lustful thoughts or the consumption of too much rich food over a life time - or through one horrifying act, such as the consumption of human flesh or blood.

They are characterised by being of the body. Even in their undead state, they will desire to despoil maidens, empty wine cellars and devour their enemies. Those of the labouring classes will become ghouls: hideous, bloated, grasping and corpulent, whose one joy is the heady devouring of human flesh, either fresh or rotten. Those of the gentry become sanguine vampires,  more elegantly drinking only the blood of their prey. Just as the gentry might command the labourer, oft the genteel sanguine vampire might enjoy the homage of several ghouls.

Being of flesh and blood, Sanguine undead can be vanquished like any mortal man by sword and shot and they have no specific weaknesses. However, their rapacious appetites  also grant them increased strength. As a ghoul gluts himself on flesh, his corpulent and vast body becomes ever more physically strong, until he can catch and tear open his victim with sheer might: breaking through sturdy doors and dragging some unfortunate out into the night in a single action. A sanguine vampire who has sampled a variety of vintages will take something from each: a thought, a memory, a quart-taste of their sorcerous bloodline. A well-fed sanguine vampire is the truest Renaissance man: a swordsman, poet, lover, sorcerer, rapist, cannibal and fiend.

Sanguine undead are not immortal and the Authority has marked them to expire like any mortal man, but the constant infusion of new vitae can keep them roving and hunting for spans of centuries. Troublingly, they can often conceal themselves among the human flock and prey from such a secluded position on all society.

The Melancholic Undead - Undead of Black BileWhen a figure with an excess of black bile passes, they can sometimes rise as Melancholic Undead. This can happen in minutes, weeks or centuries, and none can say what causes the disparity. Some posit that all will one day rise as Melancholic Undead. They are the silent and sure guardians of  forgotten tombs and in the ruins of lost cities. Some are animated bone, treading on calcified feet the perimeter of diminutive tombs. Others are mere spirit, their temporal remains now simply dust, drifting like leaves on the winds around the black and silent depths of their resting-place. We may posit that many thousands such undead occupy their dark, quiet sanctums, awaiting the Eschaton with the same silent patience as stone.

Despite their sure pensivity and seeming passivity, tomb-raiders, gentleman-archaeologists and the occasional desperate body-snatcher may find themselves the victim of Melancholic Undead. When disturbed they will make sure and silent war on interlopers, dragging antique weaponry after them in the dark to drive them from their resting-places. Truly, these undead are not unquiet until man makes them so.
Melancholic undead are hardy and difficult to destroy. Many have noted the broken and shattered remains of vanquished Melancholic undead dragging themselves together to renew their struggle with the living. Holy magic can cast them down, and destruction of the remains by fire or pulverising can end them permanently. Those with no mortal remains are oft anchored to an object of sentiment or importance: destroying this can scatter the apparition permanently.