Once more unto the breach...We few, we happy few, we band of brothers!

[Arravis]

This weekend I will be DM'ng a war in my game, and I'm looking for the ally general to make an inspiring speech. I myself am an atrocious writer, so I'm looking for something to plagiarize that isn't in the common vernacular and easily recognized. It could be something as simple as a few lines from the Dragonlance series, to something out of The Thin Red Line. Nothing too long of course, don't want to bore the players, hehe. If any of you literary folks have a suggestion, please post them . Thanks!

 

[Wil]

From VNV Nation's song Honour:

Stand your ground this is what we are fighting for.
For our spirit and laws and ways.
Cry havoc and let slip the dogs of war.
For heaven or hell we shall not wait.
Shall I think of honour as lies
or lament it's aged slow demise?
Shall I stand as a total stranger
on this day in this stone chamber?

 

[Theron]

I always liked the following from the future Richard IV in Blackadder before the Battle of Bosworth Field:

"Let blood -- Blood -- BLOOD! -- be your motto! Slit their gizzards!"

OK, perhaps it's a tad unrefined, but it does get the point across.

 

[Arravis]

Lol, I like it, but not quite fitting. The speech is to be given by a paladin of Torm before an attack on orc and ogre horde led by the Cult of the Dragon (FR setting stuff).

 

[Wil]

Dude, Honour is totally Paladin material. Haven't you ever pictured a paladin saying, "For heaven or hell we shall not wait?" ;P

 

[The Shaman]

Theoden gives several such short speeches in LotR - seems like, "Now is the hour come, Riders of the Mark, sons of Eorl! Foes and fire are before you, and your homes far behind...," from before the eoreds reached the outer wall of the Pelennor Fields, would be pretty easy to adapt to your specific needs, and perhaps not as recognizable as (and more appropriate to a paladin than), "Arise, arise Riders of Theoden! Fell deeds awake: fire and slaughter!"

 

[EricNoah]

http://poetry.about.com/od/ourpoemcollections/a/poemsofwar.htm

 

[Darth Mikey]

"Come on, you sons of bitches-do you want to live forever?"
(Attributed to Gunnery Sergeant Dan Daly, USMC, Belleau Wood, June 1918.)

"So they've got us surrounded, good! Now we can fire in any direction, those bastards won't get away this time!"
CHESTY PULLER, USMC

"Goddam it, you'll never get the Purple Heart hiding in a foxhole! Follow me!"
(Captain Henry P. "Jim" Crowe, USMC, Guadalcanal, 13 January 1943.)

You gotta love the marines...

 

[Patryn of Elvenshae]

"Now I want you to remember that no bastard ever won a war by dying for his country. He won it by making the other poor dumb bastard die for his country.

The orcs are the enemy. Make them bleed. Shoot them in the belly."

 

[The Shaman]

"So they've got us surrounded, good! Now we can fire in any direction, those bastards won't get away this time!"

I can't remember the exact quote, so please forgive my paraphrase, but I believe it was Marechal Joffre or Foch who said something along the lines of, "Men exhausted. Supplies critically low. Position indefensible. Am attacking."