Iron Lore: Malhavoc's Surprise?

[Plane Sailing]

No way man, there is nothing dorky about making a ladder with ranged weapons. How else do you get the berserker up the cliff to fight the boss? Now I just need to make a character who can do it with silverware. Perhaps with an effete british accent....

I so loved that movie

 

[Dr. Strangemonkey]

That all comes down to definitions and concepts. I'm guessing that your schema for a knight would be a chivalric, arthurian guy. I was using knight in the sense of one holding that title within the feudal system, be it historically or in other tales besides those arthurian. Besides which, remember that in arthurian mythology, Mordred was a knight...

As to the idea of a cavalier class, the core problem comes down to this: Is your cavalier more powerful than other classes if he gets to use his horse and about as powerful if not, or is he comparably balanced to other classes while in his forte and feeble from limited options outside his forte? A good example would be the rogue, who's really good under optimal circumstances but badly hosed in tight quarters or in fights where sneak attack doesn't apply.

Well, I don't think we are that far off on what a knight is, but for me the core issue is that a knight, by his very title, identifies himself as a mounted warrior. And a knight is that regardless of whether he is wealthy, landed, or has any sort of complicated feudal obligation. For me, it's perfectly appropriate for Mordred to be a knight as well as Galahad or the meanest freerider in the service of Frederick Barbarosa. That we see an ethos of honor and authority associated with such a fighter is a symptom of how he fights. Getting a horse to go into combat with you requires character in a way that other fighting styles do not. And where they do it is a different character. An archer may be thought of as sneaky and crafty and that's a symptom of his fighting style. Same with a horseman.

Iron Lore makes classes that are more powerful in their specialized area. An archer is way better at ranged combat than non-archers. So a knight or cavalier should be better at mounted combat than non-knights or cavaliers. Both classes should have ways of dealing with other scenarios that are reflective of their specialty and effective, but their focus should be clear. Other classes should be good enough at those classes specialties so that you don't have to have them, but they shouldn't have that same level of uber-competence.

That's not the only core problem, IMO. Another big problem is that "horse-mounted combatant" isn't really that strong an archetype. You could make a heavily armored knight on a heavy warhorse who charges in formation with a lance, a lightly armored mongol on a pony who darts back and forth sniping with a bow or making lightning fast raids, a mounted leader who rides into battle leading his troops, and so on.

Since IL's classes are all based on archetypal combat styles, just take the combat class you want, put him on a horse, and take mounted combat feats. Heavy knight? Armiger on a horse. Lighting fast raider? Harrier on a horse. Cavalary bowman? Archer on a horse. Cavalry commander? Hunter on a horse.

See I can't disagree that horse-riding should be something everyone is capable of doing. But at the same time I couldn't disagree that ranged combat, multiple attacks, and wearing armor are things that most people should have some capacity or potential capacity to achieve.

But I think that being a mounted fighter, in both fiction and real life, has an ethos to it that is at least as strong as that of an archer. If riding a horse is your real focus than it forces tactics and behavior on you in the same way that recognizing the skills and tactics of a focus in ranged combat will.

I think I've already done some work to differentiate the personal ethos of a horseman versus that of other fighters, but I think it's also important to differentiate the combat ethos.

An armiger on a horse is there to get extra speed to go into where he can take blows and give them without being at the mercy of arrows.

A harrier on a horse is there get extra speed and power to go into where he give out his huge number of blows.

An archer on a horse is there get extra speed and power so that he can avoid taking blows.

A horseman is there not just for the extra speed and power but also the sense, strength, and endurance of the horse itself. Where the above classes use the horse to lengthen the range of their initial tactics, the range of the horse encapsulates the tactics of the horseman. Rather than charging in and getting stuck in, as the armiger or harrier would, the horseman charges in strikes using the power of the horse and then rushes out or through his enemies to look for the next best striking point. Rather than aiming and avoiding blows, as the archer would, the horseman uses the speed of his mount and the range of his weapon to limit the tactics of his enemy and to strike at him indiscriminately but strategicly ensuring that his opponents are properly herded and baited.

And that's the horseman's power off of a horse as well. The hunter uses his knowledge of the enemy to draw them into traps, the horseman uses his knowledge of timing, battlefield psychology, and movement to herd his enemies and strike for maximum effect to adapt not the battlefield but his enemies tactics. Where many classes understand the value of shock in a charge the horseman understands the value of movement. Melee battles between horseman on foot are long periods of maneuvering and positioning punctuated by fast sharp powerful exchanges broken as quickly as they were engaged and ending with both men cut in a thousand places but one man's head lying beside the other.

There is more I could say on the particular skills and general character that are more or less unique to horseman or cavaliers, but I shall leave it at this.

I certainly don't mean to be hijacking the thread, but, again, it is the very specificity and content of Iron Lore that provokes in me the desire to see this archetype done right. If all goes well I look forward to building such a class or seeing such a prestige class shipped with the game.

 

[Dr. Strangemonkey]

I so loved that movie

That's what it was! I was reading that bit I kept thinking I've seen that done before, just not with arrows...

 

[SixFootGnome]

Well, I don't think we are that far off on what a knight is, but for me the core issue is that a knight, by his very title, identifies himself as a mounted warrior.

I understand that this is your schema, but it simply isn't objectively true:

knight
O.E. cniht "boy, youth, servant," common W.Gmc. (cf. O.Fris. kniucht, Du. knecht, M.H.G. kneht "boy, youth, lad," Ger. Knecht "servant, bondsman, vassal"), of unknown origin. Meaning "military follower of a king or other superior" is from c.1100. Began to be used in a specific military sense in Hundred Years War, and gradually rose in importance through M.E. period until it became a rank in the nobility 16c. The verb meaning "to make a knight of (someone)" is from c.1300. Knighthood is O.E. cnihthad "the period between childhood and manhood;" sense of "rank or dignity of a knight" is from c.1300. The chess piece so called from c.1440. Knight in shining armor is from 1965. Knights of Columbus, society of Catholic men, founded 1882 in New Haven; Knights of Labor, trade union association, founded in Philadelphia, 1869; Knights of Pythias, secret order, founded in Washington, 1864.

Service to royalty is the fundamental defining attribute of a knight, regardless of chess or fantasy genre usage having given a different impression. There are a wide array of dudes who make their living on horseback whom it would be completely inappropriate to label 'Knight.' Similarly, a knight with no horse is definitely still a knight. A knight who never learned to ride is even still a knight, because knight is a title conferred upon him by his liege in return for an obligation of service.

Let's move past the definitional issue and just call our hypothetical archetype 'horseman'. As Michael Tree pointed out, what does a horseman do? You seem to be focusing on a lance-toting cavalryman implementation, but there are numerous people who might want a horseman class but want a completely different mechanical effect. While you're trying to say that you define any other use of a horse in battle out of your true 'horseman' archetype, that definition is ideosyncratic, not universal.

The guy who wants a mongol warrior who *never* leaves the saddle would say that your archetype is the 'reach-monkey' type on a horse, and not nearly so true a horseman as his idea. Similarly the heavy horseman who wants a gigantic mount with loads of armor and wants to ride in and trample the snot out of people while whacking them from above...

Ultimately, I don't see a single coherent archetype 'horseman' that would satisfy any broad array of people coming into the class. That's the problem.

 

[Michael Tree]

A horseman is there not just for the extra speed and power but also the sense, strength, and endurance of the horse itself. Where the above classes use the horse to lengthen the range of their initial tactics, the range of the horse encapsulates the tactics of the horseman. Rather than charging in and getting stuck in, as the armiger or harrier would, the horseman charges in strikes using the power of the horse and then rushes out or through his enemies to look for the next best striking point. Rather than aiming and avoiding blows, as the archer would, the horseman uses the speed of his mount and the range of his weapon to limit the tactics of his enemy and to strike at him indiscriminately but strategicly ensuring that his opponents are properly herded and baited.

And that's the horseman's power off of a horse as well. The hunter uses his knowledge of the enemy to draw them into traps, the horseman uses his knowledge of timing, battlefield psychology, and movement to herd his enemies and strike for maximum effect to adapt not the battlefield but his enemies tactics. Where many classes understand the value of shock in a charge the horseman understands the value of movement. Melee battles between horseman on foot are long periods of maneuvering and positioning punctuated by fast sharp powerful exchanges broken as quickly as they were engaged and ending with both men cut in a thousand places but one man's head lying beside the other.

A lot of what you're describing is ethos-based, not game mechanics based. IL classes aren't based on ethos, they're based on combat roles. And I see horsemen as fulfilling a variety of combat roles, and using their extra training in horsemanship to enhance those roles and give them entirely new perks. If a horseman is all about use of speed and manevering, making lighting fast raids and then retreating to strike somewhere else, that sounds a lot like what the harrier does. If he does so to bait targets into following and making unwise movement, then surely there's some feat or Bluff stunt that can take care of that. If a horseman strategically controls the battlefield, ensuring that their enemies are properly herded and baited, or moving into strategicaly beneficial positions themselves (ie. giving their own group a tactical benefit, either way), part of that is just roleplaying, and the rest is what the hunter does.

Just because the character is, game mechanically, another character class who also chooses to take advantage of a horse, that doesn't mean that that's how the character thinks about it. An armiger horseman doesn't think of himself as a heavily armored combatant who chooses to rides a horse to make up for his poor foot speed, he thinks of himself as a heavy cavalry charger.

 

[Particle_Man]

When it says on the archer that you can spend tokens on a deadly shot ability and a sniper shot ability at the same time, does a single token to "Double duty", paying for both a deadly shot ability and a sniper shot ability, or does the ability to spend tokens on a deadly shot and a sniper shot on the same attack merely mean that you can spend X tokens on the deadly shot ability, and Y tokens on the sniper shot ability, if you have X + Y tokens, and have the deadly shot ability and sniper shot ability apply to the same (token-expensive) attack? I think it is the latter, myself.

 

[Erekose13]

No double duty, you have to spend aim tokens for whatever abilities you want to use.

 

[Dr. Strangemonkey]

A lot of what you're describing is ethos-based, not game mechanics based. IL classes aren't based on ethos, they're based on combat roles. And I see horsemen as fulfilling a variety of combat roles, and using their extra training in horsemanship to enhance those roles and give them entirely new perks. If a horseman is all about use of speed and manevering, making lighting fast raids and then retreating to strike somewhere else, that sounds a lot like what the harrier does. If he does so to bait targets into following and making unwise movement, then surely there's some feat or Bluff stunt that can take care of that. If a horseman strategically controls the battlefield, ensuring that their enemies are properly herded and baited, or moving into strategicaly beneficial positions themselves (ie. giving their own group a tactical benefit, either way), part of that is just roleplaying, and the rest is what the hunter does.

Just because the character is, game mechanically, another character class who also chooses to take advantage of a horse, that doesn't mean that that's how the character thinks about it. An armiger horseman doesn't think of himself as a heavily armored combatant who chooses to rides a horse to make up for his poor foot speed, he thinks of himself as a heavy cavalry charger.

Fair enough. I'm not arguing that other classes don't deserve to be on horseback. But just as any class can use a sword or any weapon really, that doesn't discount the viability and legitimacy of a dedicated weapon master class. I doubt sincerely that the rest of the classes think of themselves as weapon neophytes.

So start from that premise, are their archetypes for whom the mastery of horsemanship and the skills related to that are essential in the same way that mastery of a weapon can result in a weapon master style class. I would argue yes, and am more than willing to go into that further.

Let's for the sake of argument give me that for the moment, however, and figure out how a horseman would look rules-wise. Well, obviously, the horesman would be better than other combatants at mounted combat. Or at least those portions of mounted combat that pertain specifically to mastery of a horse. An armiger may be better at getting stuck in from horseback due to his mastery of armor and durability. Probably true of a berserker in many ways as well. A lance weilding weapons master might be better at jousting if you accept that jousting is a duel that's mostly about lances. An archer would be better at aiming arrows off of a horse. A harrier, in many ways, strikes me as the least useful horse-rider in that his schtick is multiple attacks and given the archers schtick protection they are probably at short range. Still, harrier better at multiple attacks from horseback than the horseman.

Well, what does that leave the horseman? Three things:

First, the horse itself. Presumably the horseman is better at actually using a horse in combat. Overrun maneuvers, trample attacks, getting coordinated strikes between horse and rider, using the horse as cover, and all that sort of thing. Not too mention getting more speed or durability out of a horse, and other more ancilliary benefits like increased intelligence out of the horse and awareness of what the horse is sensing or reacting to.

Second, those advantages which a horse generally confers. This is in parallel to an archers use of the bow. Everyone gets increased range out of a bow, the archer gets more range or more out of that range than everyone else. Everyone gets increased speed, power, and full attack options from horseback. Presumably a horseman gets more or more out of the speed, power, and full attack options that come from horseback than everyone else.

Thirdly, the horseman gets those advantages that come from the effort that actually has to go into mastering the above advantages. To get more out of a horse you have to be able to master, in several very literal senses, the horse itself. This isn't simply a case of physical control, but also of character and empathy. Further, the labor of becoming a horseman is one of tremendous stamina and persistence. Those have practical applications for an Iron Lore character, where the Hunter is a creature of intelligence the horseman is one of charisma. Where the Berzerker specializes in the toughness that enables one to survive a blow the Horseman focuses on the endurance necessary to ride across a desert without sleeping. The effects would not be without overlap, I'm certain that a horseman would have some buff skills and high hitpoints, but they would be distinct.

In terms of combat skill, the horseman is, without a doubt, a master of weapons, but the use he puts it too is distinct. A horseman needs to know how to use weapons in conjunction with the opportunities afforded to him by his horse and his opponent. Timing is his forte, the telling blow not the killing blow inflicted by the archer or the crippling blow inflicted by the executioner. The horseman's strikes are strong, yes, but their special quality is that they are disrupting. The Hunter uses infantryman's tactics, he prepares and uses the terrain. The horseman is herder, he disrups his foes directly, whether he is bursting through their lines with charges or scattering their formations through indirect fire the horseman's goal is never the blow he is landing, but the next one he, or his allies, can land. Where the harrier is an in and out style of mobility the horseman's is one of moving through or past.

The two great horsemen, in my mind, are Alexander the Great and Ghengis Khan. Where Alexander is the charismatic soul of the horseman discovering Beaucephalis's fear of his own shadow, leading men so devoted they push themselves off cliffs to defeat his enemies through initmidation alone, and pioneering the power of the perfectly timed and disruptive charge for his culture and those that followed. And Ghengis Khan is the persistent and enduring soul. Rising from the chains of slavery to lead his people through innumberable struggles from those of unification to the unending problem of securing their rights from people's who would never recognize them and triumphing over them so definitively that he becomes the greatest of world conquerors. He lead his armies through deserts thought uncrossable by the people who lived within them, he taught his enemies to fear the power of organized and strategic arrow fire, and he taught his own people the value of driving an enemy through misinformation, fear, and their own superior intelligence and knowledge of nature. Both of these men are horseman. Alexander wore no particularly heavy armor, he weilded no lance as though it were its own religion. Ghengis neither closed with his foe in a slathering rage nor took careful aim to snipe him individually. And though both of them were known as clever combatants, they lead through action and loyalty and equally important to both their legends are the generals who gave them brains and tactics to match their brilliant personalities and strategies. As different as they were from each other, they are utterly unlike any other class advertised for Iron Lore, and yet uniquely appropriate to the class construction that Iron Lore offers us. Class constructions that can allow hunters to use one of three weapon sets and enable archers to define themselves not by the bow but the ranged attack so that the same class is equally capable of using daggers, bows, and javelins though it could not be optimized for all three.

Though I chose one of two western words for knight that do not directly mean horseman, the other being Miles for professional soldier, I stand by my assertion that the horseman, the cavalier, the chevalier, the eques, the ritter, and the caballeros are all proofs of the particular power and mystique of the horseman as a defining feature of a trope or story of a hero and adventurer. It's not insignificant that the oracle that immediately foretells Achilles' moment of greatest glory is a horse, or that the Greek and Trojan heroes of the war speak so long and repeatedly on the glory and power of their horses and the degree to which they can trust them where their followers slog it out on foot.

If this class or concept does not appeal or seems not to fit your idea of how your Iron Lore game will turn out, then so be it, of the classes that appear now Mike has made it explicit that not all of those classes will be for everyone, and that very argument is the final inspiration that allows my mind to contemplate the value of a class that gains tokens for movement or for riding and handle animal checks.

As it is I am very excited to see how riding is handled in the game, what sort of feat group riding feats will fit under, how many riding and nomad themed traits there are, and what sort of pursuit rules the game will introduce. So please do not interpret my repeated arguments for the horseman or knight as anything other than a rift or rhapsodic witnessing to the flights of RPG artistry that this game drives me to, I am as certain that I will be pleased as I will be pleased to create an Iron Lore style horseman class and pimp it mercilessly and relentlessly.

 

[Dr. Strangemonkey]

And I swear this is the last time I will mention this unless I start another thread, but...

Horseman should totally be better at pursuit regardless of whether they are on horseback or on foot, unless their foe is a Monk.

Cause I'm pretty certain Jacky Chan can escape a horseman, not on a straight away mind you, but through any environment slightly less flat than a pancake.

 

[Felon]

If Iron Lore helps emulate Swords-&-Sorcery ala Conan, Fafhrd & Gray Mouser, etc. as I originally thought, this book is a must have. If this book is Fantasy Super Hero Action Hour, I'll pass.

Well, it is Fantasy Superhero Action. I think it's pretty obvious this is not a deadly game of stealthy attacks and indirect assault. Characters will do things that Conan, the Grey Mouser, and Aragorn wouldn't do in their wildest adventure. You won't just be kicking ass as a result of having surprise on your side, opponents conveniently too disorganized to attack in unison, and nobody having a handy crossbow laying around to pin you to the wall. You'll be plowing headlong into the masses, either dodging all of their blows at the same time, or just letting them hit you and just laughing it off.

It is more like Xena or Samurai Jack, who are the equivalent of fantasy superheroes.