[Glorantha] More Sartarite cavalry

>The occupations in "Thunder Rebels" are focussed on clansmen. IMO the
>"Cavalry Soldier" equivalent in Sartar is an advanced occupation, and
>implies leaving the clan behind (joining a king's warband, or similar) for
>considerable time spans. Since the Lunar occupation, only on the tribal
>level and no longer on city confederation or principality level. Prior to
>the occupation, the keyword may have been more accessible...

True, but even if a tribal king's warband are all mounted (which I agree they very well might be, and perfectly capable of fighting that way), I doubt there will be 500 of them, unless the king's warband is larger than an entire clan's fyrd. I don't really conceive of Orlanthi culture as being that top-heavy, somehow.

>Sartarite history still has those cavalry moments in King of Sartar, and
>the one or two Orlanth battle myths in that book have Orlanth and his
>followers charging into battle, too.
>
Absolutely -- I'm not saying that Sartarite warriors don't fight on horseback, or that their mythical progenitors didn't (although they were probably charging in the air or whatever). Let me use an example. Let's say you have 5,000 Lunar infantry and 500 Lunar cavalry. The Lunars might very well field those as a single 500-man cavalry regiment and five 1,000-man infantry regiments. In everyday practice, they probably work in small vexillations including both, but in a big pitched battle they fight with their units in their specified roles as cavalry and infantry.

Now, let's say you have 5,500 Orlanthi. A small proportion of them will be absolutely expert horsemen, members of horse-riding cults like Beren, or maybe Pol Joni exiles who've sworn loyalty to a particular chief. Others will be wealthy weaponthanes or nobles who own horses and have equal skill fighting at horseback or on foot. Some of these will prefer to fight on foot and some on horseback. Some will ride past and throw javelins, while others will charge fiercely with swords and spears. Some will prefer to fly, or use movement magic to run alongside the horses. But I think you're very likely to have one largish group of horsemen around the tribal king, and then lots of little groups of about 1-200 men on foot, some of whom might also own horses, and 10-50 horsemen, some of whom might be ready to fight on foot at a moment's notice. Now, in wargame terms it might be easier to represent this as "these guys are infantry and those guys are cavalry," but I think that's an abstraction for the sake of convenience. A Sartarite army is not an army in the same sense that a Lunar army is -- it's a much looser, more changeable thing. In some ways, it's much less versatile -- a Sartarite general can't, on the spur of the moment, order all his fliers to one point, for instance -- but in some ways it's more versatile, because most clans, faced with a particular threat, will have at least someone who understands how to deal with it.

>One of the first implications of the Lunar occupation was to disband all
>those regimental structures. I suspect that many standards of the city
>militias are hidden away, along with a barely tended guardian.
>
That's a cool and exciting image, and I think it would make an excellent scenario, hiding the precious standard from the Lunars, or desperately trying to find it. I think it's also interesting that a lot of people have postulated a role for Sartar's magic in organizing the army -- Sartar was basically the hero who civilized the region, after all, and it's in his vision that a viable Orlanthi civilization can be found; an alternative to either feuding barbarism or Lunar domination.

-- 
James Holloway