old general army

[steph]

What skills i need for a character who was in the past a general for the dark lord army. I make a game in the Turakian age 275 years after the death of Kal-Turak and one of the player want to play a kind of half-infernal and half-elf with a great longivity who in the Black War ( Kal_turak vs the world) he was a general............and now he is a mercenary in a ravaged world divided in city state............i need help for the basic skills of a standard general

excuse my english

not my first language

stef

[assault]

Re: old general army

 

What skills i need for a character who was in the past a general for the dark lord army.

 

How sophisticated is the army? Is it capable of doing anything more sophisticated than "form a line, then charge the enemy"?

 

In any case, I would tend to build a character who was a combination of warrior and politician. I wouldn't go for much in the way of technical skills - Tactics would be about it. Most of what he would be able to do would be to lead troops, and convince subordinates to cooperate, rather than compete.

[steph]

Re: old general army

 

humm yes is army is sophisticated the player in question thing is character like this: half spawn and half maximus ( gladiator movie) for sure the army of kal-turak is sophisticated and organised with tehnical weapon like catapult and also some war black magic.........

hope i am clear stef

[assault]

Re: old general army

 

the army of kal-turak is sophisticated and organised with tehnical weapon like catapult and also some war black magic.........

 

Fair enough.

 

I still probably wouldn't get too carried away with the skills. PS: General and KS: Warfare would probably do. The rest would be "normal" stuff like Tactics, Oratory and so on.

 

Alternatively, you could take a look at the Packages for military characters in, say, Pulp Hero. (Checking quickly myself...) They're nothing special: KSs and PSs, plus some Perks (Rank, Contacts...).

 

Or just go with a couple of the various noble warrior packages and options from FH.

 

Whatever floats your boat.

[Lawnmower Boy]

Re: old general army

 

Operating heavy weapons is a more likely skill for a general than, say, specialist weapons. More importantly, running an army is the same as running any large enterprise, so the basic package of managerial skills are required. How about PS: Accounting, Civil Engineering; Persuasion, Seduction, System Operation (large agricultural estate. The list can be extended. What do you think a successful manager should be able to do?

[CourtFool]

Re: old general army

 

I would probably just go with PS: Army General and KS: Darklord's Army just to keep things simple.

[assault]

Re: old general army

 

Operating heavy weapons is a more likely skill for a general than' date=' say, specialist weapons. More importantly, running an army is the same as running any large enterprise, so the basic package of managerial skills are required. How about PS: Accounting, Civil Engineering; Persuasion, Seduction, System Operation (large agricultural estate. The list can be extended. What do you think a successful manager should be able to do?[/quote']

 

I think it is unlikely that he would know much about heavy weapons, accounting or civil engineering. Those are lower class skills.

[Markdoc]

Re: old general army

 

I think it is unlikely that he would know much about heavy weapons' date=' accounting or civil engineering. Those are lower class skills.[/quote']

 

Yep. They're the sort of thing you hire or shanghai specialists for.

 

What he is likely to have are good skills in tactics, strategy, combat (even if he doesn't fight much himself anymore) and KS's for other generals, royal/noble families, historical battles, famous heroes and AK: for the lands where he (or famous generals of the past) operated. In addition, a solid KS for his own army and/or armies of his area ("See those pointy helmets on the cavalry over there? Lancers from Arusha. Good fighters, but undisciplined. Send some archers out to see if you can tempt them into charging over that swampy ground") Oh, and a good score in PS: General, plus decent PRE-based skills (oratory, persuasion, etc).

 

cheers, Mark

[Vestnik]

Re: old general army

 

Maybe some superskills to rally troops? A small Aid to Presence and maybe OCV and DCV, Area Effect, Incantations, No Range? I like that sort of thing for building Legendary General types.

[sbarron]

Re: old general army

 

I've always liked HERO because we could get so specific in situations like this. To me, PS: General 14- seems soooo bland. Here's the kind of things I'd be willing to blow some points on if it were my character...

 

KS: Seige Warfare

KS: Seige Engines

KS: Cavalry Warfare

KS: Military Formations

KS: Biological Warfare

KS: Guerilla Warfare

KS: Military Logistics

etc...

 

Most likely these skills would never matter in play. But, for me, having a list of actually skills for the character is way more helpful for my roleplaying than PS: General and KS: Warfare. And it will only cost 5-10 points.

 

It encourages me to think up stuff like...

 

"Ah yes, I remember the city of Helfig well. See that tower? During our seige of this city in the spring of '43...you know, during the Tordjor uprisings...the Helfigers put a Drakine wizard up there that raked our seige engines for weeks. One of our archers finally winged him, which allowed us breach the gate. Lucky for him I never found him."

 

"Funny, I can never remember his name..."

[CourtFool]

Get your Background Skills here

 

Exactly why I am planning on using Skill Multipliers from The Ultimate Skill in my next campaign and forcing the players to take 10-15 points worth of Background Skills.

[Markdoc]

Re: Get your Background Skills here

 

Exactly why I am planning on using Skill Multipliers from The Ultimate Skill in my next campaign and forcing the players to take 10-15 points worth of Background Skills.

 

What are skill multipliers?

 

cheers, Mark

[Lawnmower Boy]

Re: old general army

 

"Lower class skills." Okay, that's it, I'm opening a can of spam:)

Ever been to Vienna and seen the Maria Theresa Memorial? The Empress-Queen is supported by the various generals who supported her in her great wars. Two of them are from a single campaign, Ludwig Khevenhuller [blah blah noble titles] and Count Traun. This was the big campaign, the one where the French, backing the Bavarians who were fighting to annex the Austrian crown lands and take over the Imperial title, were pushed right back out of Germany temporarily in 1743/44. Eventually Paris had to beg Frederick the Great to come back into the war, getting its hands thoroughly dirty and guaranteeing that Maria Theresa's husband would be elected the next Holy Roman Emperor, which mattered a whole lot more at the time than you might realise.

Never heard of the campaign? Not surprising given how it played out.

What did they do? Simple: Khevenhuller materialised an army out of thin air and trumped the Bavarians by suddenly appearing with it in the middle of Bavaria in a winter campaign.Then he went on to the bank of the Rhine and posed in a threatening way. And died, so Traun got to finish the campaign.

Traun's problem was simple: he had to make Paris, then pursuing its own strategic objectives, pay attention and get Louis XV down to French Lorraine with his army, thereby putting _political_ pressure on Paris. So he had to cross the Rhine. But it is a wide river with plenty of fortifications on the French side and a small covering army. He could hardly dislocate French foreign policy by "leaking" across. He had to land like a thunderbolt.

Which he did. Traun's generalship consisted of organising one heck of a floating bridge across the Rhine and getting his army across quickly. And then, when the French army did come down on him from the front and the Prussians (in a general sense) from behind, he astonished military observers further by recrossing back to Germany quickly enough to save the day.

That's right. These great generals made their names by finding uniforms, recruits and money, feeding an army through a winter march, building a big bridge, and marching an army across said bridge faster than anyone expected. By doing so they forced the political resolution to the war that Vienna was looking for.

That's it. While there was plenty of fighting, there was not a single battle, not a single moment when Traun or Khevenhuller were asked to do "aristocratic," or "high class" things like identify some heraldry or lead a cavalry charge.

I know you might say that there must have been some anonymous lower class people doing all the work, but if you go through the Vienna war archives, you will find the documents and letters these men wrote and read. They were _not_ figureheads.

[Gawain]

Re: old general army

 

"Lower class skills." Okay, that's it, I'm opening a can of spam:)

Ever been to Vienna and seen the Maria Theresa Memorial? The Empress-Queen is supported by the various generals who supported her in her great wars. Two of them are from a single campaign, Ludwig Khevenhuller [blah blah noble titles] and Count Traun. This was the big campaign, the one where the French, backing the Bavarians who were fighting to annex the Austrian crown lands and take over the Imperial title, were pushed right back out of Germany temporarily in 1743/44. Eventually Paris had to beg Frederick the Great to come back into the war, getting its hands thoroughly dirty and guaranteeing that Maria Theresa's husband would be elected the next Holy Roman Emperor, which mattered a whole lot more at the time than you might realise.

Never heard of the campaign? Not surprising given how it played out.

What did they do? Simple: Khevenhuller materialised an army out of thin air and trumped the Bavarians by suddenly appearing with it in the middle of Bavaria in a winter campaign.Then he went on to the bank of the Rhine and posed in a threatening way. And died, so Traun got to finish the campaign.

Traun's problem was simple: he had to make Paris, then pursuing its own strategic objectives, pay attention and get Louis XV down to French Lorraine with his army, thereby putting _political_ pressure on Paris. So he had to cross the Rhine. But it is a wide river with plenty of fortifications on the French side and a small covering army. He could hardly dislocate French foreign policy by "leaking" across. He had to land like a thunderbolt.

Which he did. Traun's generalship consisted of organising one heck of a floating bridge across the Rhine and getting his army across quickly. And then, when the French army did come down on him from the front and the Prussians (in a general sense) from behind, he astonished military observers further by recrossing back to Germany quickly enough to save the day.

That's right. These great generals made their names by finding uniforms, recruits and money, feeding an army through a winter march, building a big bridge, and marching an army across said bridge faster than anyone expected. By doing so they forced the political resolution to the war that Vienna was looking for.

That's it. While there was plenty of fighting, there was not a single battle, not a single moment when Traun or Khevenhuller were asked to do "aristocratic," or "high class" things like identify some heraldry or lead a cavalry charge.

I know you might say that there must have been some anonymous lower class people doing all the work, but if you go through the Vienna war archives, you will find the documents and letters these men wrote and read. They were _not_ figureheads.

 

Rep'd for knowing your history.

[Markdoc]

Re: old general army

 

I know you might say that there must have been some anonymous lower class people doing all the work' date=' but if you go through the Vienna war archives, you will find the documents and letters these men wrote and read. They were _not_ figureheads.[/quote']

 

All fair enough, and what we would expect for a good general. But when you look at the skills for which the comment was made, it's appropriate. I could be wrong, but I doubt that Khevenhuller or Traun knew how to cast a cannon or cut a tree up into planks. It's even reasonable to suppose that they knew little about accounting (a common enough failing among the landed gentry of the time). An aristocratic general is likely instead to have gunners, engineers and a secretary on staff precisely to handle those things.

 

What you describe is brilliant tactics and strategy, combined with a shrewd knowledge of politics and geography and (most likely) a good knowledge of their own and opposing forces. You don't need to know how to build a bridge to know that a bridge *here* will enable you to cross without immediate opposition - nor will knowing how to build a bridge, tell you anything about where to build it for maximum military effect.

 

cheers, Mark

[CourtFool]

Re: Get your Background Skills here

 

What are skill multipliers?

 

 

Essentially, a cost break for buying more background skills. The more skills you buy, the cheaper they are.

[Markdoc]

Re: Get your Background Skills here

 

Essentially' date=' a cost break for buying more background skills. The more skills you buy, the cheaper they are.[/quote']

 

Hmm. Intriguing. Tell me more.

 

To encourage skill purchases I've used what I call "professional skill modifiers" for years - basically the equivalent of skill modifiers like JoT or Linguist. You could for example buy "Knight" as a skill modifier in a feudal setting and get a -1 on the cost of all knightly skills. It wouldn't help you learn Stealth, which is not a knightly skill, but it would help with heraldry, geneology, riding, dancing etc. Likewise a member of an organised thieves' guild could buy the "Thief" skill modifier to learn guild skills like lockpicking, forgery, climbing, AK: sewers, etc.

 

cheers, Mark

[CourtFool]

Re: old general army

 

I can not recommend The Ultimate Skill enough.

[Lawnmower Boy]

Re: old general army

 

I'm going to dwell on this "building a bridge" thing just a little bit more here. They can be pretty important to war. Heck, the great Austro-Hungarian war song the "Prinz Eugenlied" (sort of an Austro-Hungarian "British Grenadiers" or "Marlbruck") specifically says that "Eugene launched a bridge." That is, his great victory at Belgrade would have been impossible without building some remarkable bridges.

What do you need to know to build a bridge? I could summarise, but if you really care to know, there are some great nineteenth century manuals. They're not exactly easy to get hold of, but a major univeristy library should have something. (I like William Douglas, _Military Bridges_ for its completeness, but most surveys of military engineering will have a discussion). In short, you need to know the geography of the river, and the resources. Besides any boats that might be available ready made, you have to consider lumber, cordage, work boats and ironmongery on the material side, skilled rivermen, carpenters and other artisans on the human side.

Material, geography and strategy will determine design. There are many options, and the more detailed the design, the more options emerge. Clearly individual decisions about how to fix the chess to a give boat bottom are beyond the purview of a general. But the guy at the top _is_ going to have to decide how many decks there will be fairly early in the assembly/construction process. These are the same kind of "high level management decisions" that result in modern major engineering project having engineer managers. Only in the frustrated fantasies of cubicle drones does the pointy-haired big cheese spend his day playing golf at management retreats. And there is _no-one_ other than the big cheese general who can do this. That is why Prince Eugene is the guy who launched the bridge, and not any of the 25 or so engineer officers ranked colonel or higher in the Belgrade campaign, many of whom were aristocrats, and several of whom went on to be well-regarded field-marshals in one army or another.

I know I hear you saying, "But old Generals didn't _start_ as cubicle slaves. They started as upper class twits!" It is okay to be jealous of the rich and privileged. It motivates the rest of us to work harder. But we are _all_ privileged compared to some poor Third World slum dweller. That doesn't stop us from competing with our peers. Merit does not always rise to the top, but that's why I am focussing on an unquestionably good general like Khevenhuller. (Who was very good at military accounting by the way. It is why he was appointed governor of Vienna and was in a position to save the monarchy.)

[Markdoc]

Re: old general army

 

SNIP

 

There are many options, and the more detailed the design, the more options emerge. Clearly individual decisions about how to fix the chess to a give boat bottom are beyond the purview of a general. But the guy at the top _is_ going to have to decide how many decks there will be fairly early in the assembly/construction process. These are the same kind of "high level management decisions" that result in modern major engineering project having engineer managers.

 

I think we re talking past each other here - because to me, what you are saying is "No, such a general should not have KS: civil engineering" - essentially the same as the previous posters. He knows the importance of bridges, and how they relate to his troops, but not necessarily the technical details of building them.

 

I've made decisions on similar matters - where to place a footbridge (and what to build it out of), where to place a clinic (and what to build it out of), how many floors the office building should have, how many generators we should have, etc. But I suffer no delusions about having a KS: in civil engineering. I don't need it. That's what I have civil engineers for. What I am good at doing is resource management - we have so much money, we have so much time and this is what we need to do - how do we best deploy those resources, in that time, to get the result we need?

 

Only in the frustrated fantasies of cubicle drones does the pointy-haired big cheese spend his day playing golf at management retreats. And there is _no-one_ other than the big cheese general who can do this.

 

Though speaking as someone who has climbed to near the top of his particular tree, the big cheeses do spend more time doing enjoyable time than the drones ("after all, we deserve it!") - I'm looking forward to having dinner at the Reichstag next week, for example, which will be only one of several splendid dinners on Bill Gate's dime. However, I don't think this has much to do with competence - even when (for example) going sailing on the company's (or someone else's) dime, we talk shop. That's networking - part of the management skill set, and it doesn't actually come naturally. It's a learned skill (even if some people are naturally better at it than others).

 

That is why Prince Eugene is the guy who launched the bridge' date=' and not any of the 25 or so engineer officers ranked colonel or higher in the Belgrade campaign, many of whom were aristocrats, and several of whom went on to be well-regarded field-marshals in one army or another.[/quote']

 

Or perhaps, it was because he was in charge - after all, we frequently read that Darius built a bridge across the Hellespont for his army. He didn't, of course - he hadn't even seen the Hellespont at the time. But he was in charge and he gave the order that it be done.

 

I know I hear you saying' date=' "But old Generals didn't _start_ as cubicle slaves. They started as upper class twits!" It is okay to be jealous of the rich and privileged. It motivates the rest of us to work harder. But we are _all_ privileged compared to some poor Third World slum dweller. That doesn't stop us from competing with our peers. Merit does not always rise to the top, but that's why I am focussing on an unquestionably good general like Khevenhuller. (Who was very good at military accounting by the way. It is why he was appointed governor of Vienna and was in a position to save the monarchy.)[/quote']

 

I don't think anybody was arguing that generals (good ones, anyway) are necessarily just upper class fops. Being a good general is clearly not something most people can do - and it requires a specific set of skills. It's just that that skillset does not necessarily need to duplicate those of your underlings.

 

To take your last example, I have an analogy. I found out today the NIH wants me to help run a largish trial project on child health in South Africa. It's not because I am an expert on child health (I'm not) nor on South Africa (I've been there precisely once so far). However, I do have reputation of being a good project manager for developing countries and especially for running projects that are completed on budget (unusual in the field). And that's not because I'm a good accountant (I'm not). I don't need to be, I have accountants for that work. It's because I am good at *managing* accountants (and other necessary workers) that my budgets are strong. I may not be an accountant, but I do know how much things cost (in real life, as opposed to off the shelf) and I know what things we need.

 

So in that light, it really *isn't* necessary for a general to have detailed technical knowledge. It is necessary for him to have knowledgeable staff in the areas where he is deficient and to know how to use them. It's also useful to have command-specific knowledge and (if you are smart) good political knowledge too.

 

cheers, Mark

[Badger]

Re: old general army

 

I didnt see anyone mention it before so here goes: How about Detect Weakness.

 

 

I am thinking. With 275 years of battle experience. He has seen it all. He could probably glance at what is going on the battlefield (formations, troop movement, etc) and vitually predict what his enemy is about to do almost immediately and flawlessly.

 

 

Or alternately some kind of Limited Precognition, to predict what will happen on the field in the immediate future based on what is happening, to model this ability.

 

Basically what I am saying is: Hey you might beat him but it will be because of superior manpower/weaponry not because of outmaneuver (at least very, very unlikely)

 

Also I might give him a very high PRE. Because, his troops know this guy is great. And they know if victory is possible he will lead them to it. Though I think someone mentioned some kind of Aid to PRE. (hey, morale can be a very important thing in a battle)

[Lawnmower Boy]

Re: old general army

 

I think we re talking past each other here - because to me, what you are saying is "No, such a general should not have KS: civil engineering" - essentially the same as the previous posters. He knows the importance of bridges, and how they relate to his troops, but not necessarily the technical details of building them.

 

Fair enough. I know there's a range of debate over what exactly a KS gives you in Hero, and 15 points in skills is a lot for a Heroic character. A given general could have KS: civil engineering. I'll throw out Marchese Gianluca Pallavicini, ship's captain-turned-admiral-turned bridging specialist before being promoted to governor of Milan. He's clearly a skilled naval architect, and designing boats seems to have been a hobby for him.

Others, like Khevenhuller, are not going to have this KS. They'll whip out a textbook and fumble through. Call this a Familiarity. On the other hand, K. had to make his name doing something, and that was a massive restructuring of the army budget in 1739. Granted that even the best accountants in 1739 were pretty awful. I would pretty much have to give him a KS: accounting. He might not wander around the boatyard schooling the lads, but he's definitely going to take a personal interest in budget documents that come across his desk.

[Markdoc]

Re: old general army

 

I didnt see anyone mention it before so here goes: How about Detect Weakness.

 

I am thinking. With 275 years of battle experience. He has seen it all. He could probably glance at what is going on the battlefield (formations, troop movement, etc) and vitually predict what his enemy is about to do almost immediately and flawlessly.

 

I don't think Detect Weakness applies - that has a specific meaning in Hero system and discerning your enemy's battle plans ain't it. However a very high skill in Tactics would do the trick and is certainly appropriate. A high roll in Strategy is also appropriate so that he can do the same thing on an abstract level.

 

Those two between them, probably cover most of what he *has* to know. You can flavor with other skills as seems appropriate.

 

cheers, Mark