Historians! Gamers! Armchair Gamer Historians! Gather for the arcane revolution!

[MonsterMash]

The Crusades is a broad period historically (1st crusade 1099, Frankish kingdoms in Outremer lasted to 1291).

The inital players at the time of the first crusade were
The Byzantine Empire - requested help from the Western Christians to help repel the Seldjuk turks and recover their territory in Anatolia
The Western Christians or Franks A mixture of motives the normans like Bohemond were largely looking to seize land to set up their own states, but others had religious motives to reclaim Jerusalem from the Muslims
Seljuk Turks Building an empire in Anatolia
Fatamid Empire Rulers of Egypt and much of the Middle east

Also you have to consider the Spanish Reconquista (El Cid and all that) as simultaneous events.

With Magic in the period it would be fairly discreet I think, but the arabian knights has things like flesh to stone and polymorph spells mentioned and I think divination spells could be used subtly.

 

[Stormborn]

Based on the Ranger's initial post I think that magic would have to be a recent event. If magic is real for a great part of human history then that history would be so unrecognizable as to be meaningless as an "alternate reality war" game. Better yet to say that around the time of the first crusade both sides began to learn magic, perhaps due to some trigger event. As the crusades progress their control over magic increases. So that the first waves are only slightly different than in our own history, although with less death perhaps. Later crusades become radically different as seasoned warriors are still around and magic level increases. Now they know things like not to leave a wounded enemey on the field, the value of stealth and buff spells, and what it means to have a prolliferation of magic weapons. Tradition, fear, and pure habit will keep things somewhat similar to our history socially speaking at least. People will still build castles because thats what you do. Besides castels impress the rabble and are still defendable against mundane or even magical weapons, it the mages in them that will protect them from teleporting strike forces. Other aspects of warfare will be different. If a few people, like the Templars, are willing to adapt quickly to the new powers, warfare will be a much more moder affair. ANd the group that adapts the quickest will come out on top. Perhaps by the end Demolay will rule over a new empire supported by his templars and HQ'd in a Jerusalem turned into a Arcane Fortress.

And thus in the second cycle of this reality we have PCs as bands of disodents, of any religion, fighting against the Templar Dynasty which is seen in the west as the Anti-Christ.

 

[RangerWickett]

Yes. I was thinking that magic would be a new force.

The Pope would probably have presented the case as something like, 'The evil men of the east have recently been reported to use strange powers from the devil, creating fire from their hands and moving with the speed of demons. The Lord, however, has armed us to face these threats to the church, and with the blessings of the Almighty, priests of the holy church have learned to recreate the miracles of our savior, and to strike at evil with pure divine energy. We have been charged by the Lord to use this power to reclaim the Holy Land. It will be a grand campaign, a great crusade, this war, the War of Saints."

Can low-level magic spells change military tactics much? Magic missile? Cure light wounds? Burning hands, expeditious retreat, bull's strength, levitation, protection from arrows?

 

[Stormborn]

I think low level spells would have minimal impact on standard warfare of the period, but if you are talking about small skirmishes or guerilla tactics that would be somethign else entirely. Thats what I was thinking of when I said that tactics and behavior would change.

 

[Kaleon Moonshae]

Yes. I was thinking that magic would be a new force.

The Pope would probably have presented the case as something like, 'The evil men of the east have recently been reported to use strange powers from the devil, creating fire from their hands and moving with the speed of demons. The Lord, however, has armed us to face these threats to the church, and with the blessings of the Almighty, priests of the holy church have learned to recreate the miracles of our savior, and to strike at evil with pure divine energy. We have been charged by the Lord to use this power to reclaim the Holy Land. It will be a grand campaign, a great crusade, this war, the War of Saints."

Can low-level magic spells change military tactics much? Magic missile? Cure light wounds? Burning hands, expeditious retreat, bull's strength, levitation, protection from arrows?

Well it all depends on how widespread the use of low level magic is in any given crusade. Let's look at each of those examples and how they would effect war, in general, at high or low saturation.

Magic missile
low sat: Not much affect really. You might have some awe effect but not really anything more than say a good archer can do.
high Sat: A whole different matter. A company of 'archers' who fire magic missiles instead of arrows could lay waste to fast arabian horsemen, which were one of the arabians' greatest assets.

Cure light wounds
low sat: Could have some real effect as generals and holy knights could be saved from death to fight again and again.
high sat: Major affect. If you have, say, the entire hospitaler host able to cast multiple cure light wounds and armed with wands of cure light wounds you have a great advantage.

burning hands
low sat: Not really that big of effect, more a monicker of certain generals and gimmicks.
high sat: Could really fuel those archers with burning arrows pretty quickly and pitch catapult loads.

expeditious retreat
low sat: Even with low saturation this could be a make or break spell for crusader calvary if you cast it on your war horse.
high sat: All of a sudden the fast arabians aren't such a threat OR they are much more of a threat.

bull's strength: Really this is the least effecting spell in this list. Most of the deaths in the crusades were not from straight out kills as from disease and bad sanitation. Making your soldiers stronger really isn't going to have a sweeping affect either on the low scale or the high scale.

levitation: Not familiar enough witht eh dnd version of this spell to talk bout it.

protection from arrows
low sat: You can protect your generals and 'soft targets' with this spells, so even at low levels it is useful.
high sat: Having entire companies protected from arrows could really be a boon. No matter how much magic is in the world there are still going to be more archers during war.

 

[mythusmage]

Bull's Strength: Really this is the least affecting spell in this list. Most of the deaths in the crusades were not from straight out kills as from disease and bad sanitation. Making your soldiers stronger really isn't going to have a sweeping affect either on the low scale or the high scale.

And outside of combat?

 

[Kaleon Moonshae]

And outside of combat?

Still not huge impact unless you can field enough spells to cast it on an entire slave or peasant workforce helping you keep the crusades in working order. Bulls strength is great help in small encounters with enemies, doors, chains and the like but outside of combat it has even less of an effect considering +2 to a str check isn't that big of a bonus usually with DCs so hard to do anything you'd normally not be able to do. Also witht he much shorter duration long terms applications (workloads, transport, etc) become more cumbersome. Remember that Bull's Str only lasts a few seconds now (a couple minutes at the most).

 

[Khayman]

Ah excellent, someone finally found the Notary Wisdom of Solomon beneath the Temple, decoded it, and learned of magic...

At least initially, I feel that the most marked improvements to warfare would be in ancillary areas --- areas like medicine (Remove Disease; Cure Light Wounds), logistics (Create Food and Water; Gentle Repose cast on animals for meat), sanitation (Purify Food & Water; Gentle Repose; Prestdigitation cantrips), and engineering (Bull's Strength on labourers and beasts of burden). Communicating on a battlefield with Whispering Wind or Animal Messenger would greatly affect the co-ordination of troops. All of these are low-level spells which offer great utility.

Aside from the application of magic to aid mundane tasks, it might also affect morale. A few castings of Animate Dead or Summon Monster spells could demoralize the enemy, until people came to deal with it by modifying their behaviour. Positive effects on morale could be effected by very low level spells --- a cantrip to freshen stale food, minor curative magics, Bless spells, Remove Fear, and so forth.

The question becomes, how steep is the learning curve for magical newbies? Initially, commanders might think only in terms of offensive and defensive applications. An inventive commander would apply magic in other ways, and perhaps within a generation or two a battlefield might have its own tried-and-true magical body of knowledge.

As experience with magic increases, checks and balances will occur. Counterspell agents. Magekillers. Mobile anti-magic items, like siege engines, could be designed to dampen spellcasting in a given area. You might eventually see an arms race, culminating in catastrophic battlefield summonings. Scary thought --- this version of the Manhattan Project might involve gating in extraplanar troops...

 

[Kaleon Moonshae]

Ah excellent, someone finally found the Notary Wisdom of Solomon beneath the Temple, decoded it, and learned of magic...

...snip...

and engineering (Bull's Strength on labourers and beasts of burden).

...snip...

I thought so too until I thought about it. How is Bull's Strnegth going to help laborers? It has a duration of rounds. Even minutes would be questionable for labor benefits. Unles you have enough knowledge to create rings and such that permantently increase Strength (later down the road than 2nd level spell limit) the effects of BS really aren't that helpful (and yeah, the pun was kinda intended).

Edit: I was going to fix the spelling in this post, but I giv eup... I think I butchered it beyond help. My middle school english teacher would be disgusted.

 

[Khayman]

I thought so too until I thought about it. How is Bull's Strnegth going to help laborers? It has a duration of rounds. Even minutes would be questionable for labor benefits. Unles you have enough knowledge to create rings and such that permantently increase Strength (later down the road than 2nd level spell limit) the effects of BS really aren't that helpful (and yeah, the pun was kinda intended).

Good point --- sorry, in our campaign we still use the 3.0 durations for buff spells.

Edit: I was going to fix the spelling in this post, but I giv eup... I think I butchered it beyond help. My middle school english teacher would be disgusted.

It's all right --- hopefully your teacher isn't reading!