User:Nightstar The Bright

Hello everyone, I am Nightstar The Bright. I really enjoy reading Brandon Sanderson’s books, sometime after I read them all I began editing the Coppermind.

Notable pages I reworked

• Court of Gods
• Iridescent Tones
• Listener
• Duladel
• Pahn Kahl
• Jah Keved
• Fjorden
• T'Telir
• Hallandren
• Idris
• Final Empire

! The following text is a collection of the information about the Alethi military !

The modern Alethi military is one of the strongest armed forces on Roshar with well over 100,000 troops and over thirty Shardbearers. The army employs most of its troops as spearmen and archers, as well as a very small amount of cavalry due to the rarity of horses on Roshar; Soldiers are usually trained in one or two additional Skills, i.e. horse grooms. It is extremely rare for a darkeyed soldier to rise higher than the rank of squadleader. Lighteyed officers that have the command of a branch of the army are usually referred by their duties (e.g. cavalrylord, infantrylord).

Despite Alethkar being a monarchy, the king has very little actual say in how the military is run and does not directly command any force other than the 250-strong King's Guard. The troops are sworn to and led by their individual highprinces. In that sense, Alethkar army is not truly a unified army, but a loose coalition between ten smaller armies. Indeed, even in wartime, there is constant in-fighting between the highprinces' armies, and cooperation between the highprinces themselves is seen as a weakness; this is bolstered by the tenets of Vorinism that say the purpose of life is to prepare in order to join the Heralds in the fight to regain the Tranquiline Halls and Alethi belief that everything is a competition in life.

Because of the immense size of the army and the difficulty of travel, compounded by the poor supply line infrastructure of Alethkar, Soulcasting plays a vital role in supplying the army with wood, metal, food, and many other necessities, as well as being used in building fortifications. The king controls most of the Soulcaster ardents; in fact, manipulating the highprinces with his Soulcasters is one of the ways that the king maintains a control over them.

Recently, in an effort to truly unify the kingdom, Dalinar Kholin has been appointed as the Highprince of War by the king. This title was used in Alethkar before being fragmented into ten princedoms when each highprince was given the ultimate authority over one aspect of the governing of the kingdom. On paper, this gives Kholin authority over all war-related activities.

The Alethi military is currently one of the major military forces fighting against the Fused Invasion, most notably during the Battle of Thaylen Field and the Emuli Campaign. Although many more battles and skirmishes were fought between the two armies between 1173 and 1175.^{[citation needed]} They also led the Evacuation of Hearthstone in early 1175. They are currently centered around and stationed in Urithiru.

Wages

Wages are based upon ones military rank and caste. The average darkeyed soldier is payed five clearmarks a day. Military slaves are paid less than half that of a darkeyed soldier, around one clearmark a day.

Shards

According to official records, Alethkar possesses more Shardblades than any other nation on Roshar, with only Jah Keved coming anywhere close. These Shards are used effectively in combat to overwhelm non-Shardbearer armies.

During the War of Reckoning, their Shardblades were used in order to cut through chasmfiend chrysalises in order to harvest gemhearts.

Knights Radiant

Following the start of the True Desolation, a notably large amount of their army is made up of Knights Radiant, primarily those of the Order of Windrunners and the Order of Edgedancers, with a smaller but still notable number in the Order of Lightweavers. They are used effectively as a means of transport and combat against the Fused and Regals.^{[citation needed]}

by Ben McSweeney

Bridge Crews

For more information, see Bridge crew.

Bridge Crews were a very important part of the army during the War of Reckoning, serving as an expendable workforce that carried bridges to help soldiers cross over the large chasms between plateaus. They also acted as canon fodder for Parshendi bowmen, as to direct attention away from more trained and valued soldiers. Due to this, bridgemen had a very high mortality rate, with around half a crew dying per run.

Each Bridge Crew was made up of 35-40 men, which were lead by a Bridge sergeant, who reports directly to the Brightlord in charge of the crews. Each crew has an internal leader elected amongst themselves known as the bridge leader, who has no official authority outside of that which his crewmembers choose to give him. Members of bridge crews were typically payed five clearmarks a week, given on the third day of every week.

The bridges used by Torol Sadeas's army are typically eight feet wide and two feet thick, with supports on both sides extending its width to sixteen feet. They are also thirty feet long, and allowed one to set up 8 men per column and 5 men per row.

While not on bridge runs, they are typically used as cheap manpower to perform undesirable duties at war camps, such as chasm or latrine duty.

Not all highprinces made use of bridge crews, with Dalinar notably refusing to make direct use of them. He instead makes use of bridges on wheels, pulled by chulls. Due to being heavier and pulled by chulls instead of people, movement is significantly slower, but Dalinar makes use of it regardless as it results in a major reduction of casualties during plateau runs.

During the True Desolation, warfare began to change. There are far fewer large scale formations, those are far to easy to disrupt. Instead men spend their time in protected warcamps, occasionally making a sudden surge to claim ground and shove away the enemy. During this time battles changed from decisive engagements to several month long fights. The Alethi quickly adapted to warfare against the Fused and Regals. When there is an abundance of Shanay-Im the humans lock their shields together into a canopy, protecting from lances and spears, aside from that the humans have learned to use water to render the stormforms power unusable. Kings guard: blue and gold. Also from the Kholin army. The old campaign conundrums: did one choose the best position to weather storms, or did one seize the high ground. Most men choose the former. The Alethi military is over a hundred fifty thousand troops strong.

The Alethi army adapted to the listener strategies by increasing the flexibility of their armies, making them able to respond quickly to the uncanny way the listeners fought. Low ranking men in the armies are often susceptible to bribes. Soldiers can pay their brightlord’s scribes to send a message via spanreed, although this is considered extremely expensive, with even a terse note costing roughly a week’s wages for a common spearman, which translates to about forty clearmarks. Army surgeons: the apprentices are almost all men who have some incapacitation, preventing them from fighting. Stealing from the dead is strictly prohibited, although this doesn’t stop some soldiers from doing it. If regular soldiers killed a noteworthy target, usually an important brightlord, they can send for their captainlord, who will confirm the kill, to earn a reward. A shardbearer will almost never give up his shards, the only time he might is when he is to weak to use them. Generally, a man in the personal guard of a lighteyes earns thrice as much as the wage of a standard spearman, so about 15 clearmarks each day. A proper salute is moving a hand to your breast. Several hundred cavalry, darkeyed spearmen, lighteyed heavy foot have large maces, square steel shields and thick armour.

Military

Enlistment

Any man, lighteyed or darkeyed, can volunteer to join the military. Most of the volunteers are boys, their head full of ideas about glory and Shards. When needed, conscription can also used to gain more men.

It is seen as a citylord’s duty to handpick men to conscript into the army. There are limitations to this system however, a citylord isn’t allowed to conscript someone who provides an essential service to the community, such as a surgeon. Recruits may bring two changes of clothing and three stoneweights of other possessions with them.

Each enlistment lasts four years, after which a soldier can choose to enlist for another four years. Upon completion of his time in the army, he will receive a war bonus, equal to one tenth of his total wages. If a darkeyed soldier manages to distinguish himself and rise to a high rank, he could also rise in nahn.

Command structure

Chain of command
Unit	Soldiers	Typical Commander
subsquad	6–8	sergeant
squad	~25	squadleader
platoon	~50	captain/captainlord
company	~100	companylord
battalion	~1000	battalionlord
division	~2000	general
army	—	highprince
In companies made solely of lighteyes, the rank "lieutenant" is used as the equivalent of sergeant.

Ranks

Highmarshals, infantrylord, rearguard. If a commander, like a captain, isn’t in place to give commands, the most senior of his officers has command.

Leadership

The Alethi have excellent leadership. This is mostly due to how for the Alethi, being a leader essentially the same is as being a general. Alethi officers, be it low ranking or high ranking officers, learn how to properly and effectively boost the morale of their troops.

Equipment

Uniforms

Although uniforms differ between armies, most Alethi wear something very similar. Uniforms are usually coloured with the colours of their wearer’s highprince.

Uniforms are generally comprised of stiff trousers, a jacket, which often comes down to the waist and buttons closed beneath the belt, a shirt and boots. Uniforms, both the ones of common soldiers and the ones of high ranking lighteyed officers, always have a patch to indicate the duty and unit of the wearer. Some men choose to further personalize their uniforms by adding embrodiery or colourful scarfs. When it rains soldiers may choose to wear a stormcoat over their uniform, and there are often umbrellas ready for officers.

An officer’s uniform is usually comprised of a waistcoat and a double breasted longcoat, sometimes decorated with embroidery or precious metals. These longcoats, called officer’s coats, are approximately waistlength and are supposed to hang unbuttoned. Army surgeons wear white clothing. Messenger women often wear travelling dresses of a particular fashion. These dresses have the front and back slit open, all the way to the waist, to allow for greater mobility. They, and likely messenger boys as well, also wear something called a runner’s sash.

Officers are distinguished by knots on a cord across the epaulette, with the amount of knots and their colour signifying their military rank, and their rank in the Alethi caste system. White knots indicate a citizen officer, that is a sergeant or squadleader; red knots indicate an officer of seventh dahn; and gold knots indicate second or third dahn; It can also distinguish between low captain, captain, captainlord, lieutenant, sergeant, and battalionlord. Soldiers without authority bear no knots.

Armor

The Alethi are outfitted with a large variety of armours, what a soldier wears depends on their job, wealth, and rank. Regardless of these factors however, soldiers almost always wear the colors of their highprince.

Regular spearmen wear special skirts, which are appropriately named spearmen skirts. It is forbidden for spearmen, even squadleaders, to wear trousers, although this rule isn’t taken very serious; respected soldiers won’t get into trouble for breaking it. They also wear leather caps and they don’t seem to wear any arm or leg guards. Wealthier soldiers, or those in professional armies, may wear proper steel breastplates, steel caps and chainmail. Archers generally wear leather vests, while heavy infantry wears thick steel armour.

Wealthy lighteyes often wear steel plate armour. At least some lighteyes decorate their plate armour to resemble Shardplate. Some lighteyes prefer helms with open visors to helms with closed visors. Some lighteyed soldiers also decorate their helmets with bird plumes. High ranking Brightlords may sometimes have a shieldbearer with them.

Weaponry

Most of the Alethi soldiers are equipped with spears, both longspears and sometimes shortspears, and shields. The Alethi also use maces, polearms, pikes and halberds. Pikes are often used alongside large rectangular shields. The Alethi also use truncheons when they don’t want to kill. The Alethi are skilled in the use of bows, of which most are shortbows. Despite this, longbows are also used. Most soldiers can’t choose what weapons to wield themselves; their weapons depend on their position in the army (e.g. spears for spearmen and bows for archers). Some higher ranking soldiers however, like squadleaders, are allowed to choose weapons.

Only lighteyes wield swords, although almost never as primary weapons, because according to Vorin traditions the sword is a lighteyed's weapon. These swords include both longswords and shortswords. One handed swords are often wielded with small round shields. Alethi heavy infantry, which always consists of lighteyed men, carries heavy and impact based weapons such as maces, they also often carry square steel shields. Due to Vorin cultural ideas women can’t be armed, even scouts are only allowed to wear knives.

Tactics

The Alethi have a wide range of tactics. A popular tactic is the hammer and anvil tactic. The Alethi are also practiced at executing a fake rout, often leading to an ambush. At the tail end of the Era of Solitude warfare started to include heavy cavalry more and more, although the use of heavily armoured and equipped horsemen was still a relatively new and costly strategy.

“All wars are games. The greatest kind, with the pieces lost real lives, the prizes captured making for real wealth! This is the life for which men exist. To fight, to kill, to win.”

—The Sunmaker, who shaped modern Alethi militarism

Each highprince has his own martial philosophy, and their army has it’s own strength, with the Kholin army having the best heavy infantry, the Roion army the best archers and the Sadeas army the fastest bridges. Cavalry to fight shardbearers and lighteyed heavy infantry. Wooden mobile scouting towers in the camps. Canopy from shields to protect from arrows. Middle is heavy infantry, then to the sides mobile, lightly armoured but fast, archer units is new tactics. Infantry will try to reach the sides but the heavy infantry will beat their central block. Standard spearmen blocks engage enemies as much as to position them as to do harm. also light infantry as fast harrying forces due to lack of horses. Despite their access to many soulcasters, small armies often have only one, to be used in emergencies only, this means that they still need to run supply trains. Some officers take their children with them to war, although never to the battlefield. Instead they usually stay at the town that serves as the army’s long-term command post. In recent years the Alethi also began to make use of smaller more mobile teams, which have their own tactics. There is a known symbol for a truce. The Alethi, like the other Rosharan militaries, have become incredibly dependent on spanreeds for communication. They use them to gather information about enemy movements and to spread commands. The Alethi are excellent soldiers, each individual is far better then any given Azish or Veden soldier. The Alethi infantry blocks are extremely mobile, far more so then infantry blocks from other militaries.

While highstorms are a problem, good planning prevents an army from needing to be out during a storm, except in some rare cases. If a campaign takes longer then anticipated, the army can split and retreat back to a number of towns for shelter. Due to highstorms, the Weeping is a common time for military campaigns. Sieges are rare in Alethkar, and often last only a short time. This is due to soulcasters, which make it impossible to starve a city out. Instead, the Alethi break down the walls quickly, seize the high ground to pound the city for a while or simply attack, attempting to scale and conquer the walls.

Shardbearer tactics

Nets, ropes. Destroy the plate and then kill them with arrows. Shardbearers generally duel with eachother, without interference, or at least, until your lighteyes is losing.

Communication on the battlefield

On the battlefield, runners are used to give orders. Many leaders give speeches to their troops, these speeches are then recorded by a number of scribes, who are always women, and repeated to the rest of the army. When it is dark stormlight may also be used to give certain signals, such as the signal to attack.

War banners are used to mark divisions, battalions and companies. This makes a battlefield easily surveyable for someone who understands the system. Most high ranking brightlords have their own personal glyphpair, which, like the name suggests, is usually made up of two glyphs. These glyphpairs are often painted on war banners, which ensures that particular brightlords are easy to find on a battlefield.

When the sound of battle is loud enough, a squadleader may decide to give his commands by banging his spear against his shield in a certain rhythm, with particular rhythms meaning particular commands. Some troops, like a lighteyes’ personal guard, are trained to recognise certain arm gestures, which mean certain commands, such as to retreat.

Formations

The Alethi make use of a wide variety of formations. They generally fight in a shield wall. However, they also have many other formations. One such formation is called ‘pincer pattern’. This formation looks, as the name suggests, like a pincer, the formation is meant to distract and then destroy an enemy target. The troops at the side generally distract the target while the troops in the middle go for the kill. Pincer pattern is meant to be used by a large number of men, like a full squad or company. Soldiers are also trained to assemble and function in pike blocks to counter heavy cavalry.

Another formation is called the trident formation, this is a small-squad battlefield formation used by spearmen. The men, or man, in the middle hold(s) the target’s attention while those on the outside attack from the flanks. There are also a number of formations which aren’t used on the battlefield. One such formation is used during an inspection, the men will stand in lines while the officer(s) check(s) their gear.

Warcamps

How a warcamp is organised and run depends greatly on the highprince. Some camps are organised and patrolled while others are chaotic and almost lawless. Alethi warcamps are generally circular, with the camp followers in a ring on the outside, the mercenaries, if there are any, in a ring next to them, the citizen soldiers in the middle and the lighteyes in the very center. inside these rings the barracks, which are placed in rows, are arranged into circular patterns, with a meeting ground and a mess hall at the center of each battalion.

Training

The way soldiers are trained depends on the Princedom they’re from. In some princedoms it is seen as the squadleader’s or sergeant’s task to train new recruits. The Alethi do make use of a number of drills to practice large scale formations and movements however.

“There hasn’t been peace since the Tranquiline Halls, Man’s life on Roshar is conflict.”

—a quotation from The Arguments

Drills

The Alethi have a large number of drills to practice certain formations, movements and fighting in general.

The ‘close order’ drill is a an essential exercise to an army’s performance, although few outside the military appreciate its importance. There is also a drill called the ‘extended order’ drill, sometimes called the ‘extended combat’ drill, this drill focuses on practicing formations and movements used on the battlefield.

Shardbearer training

The Alethi military also relies on trained Shardbearers to aid their regular soldiers. Due to their militaristic society, and the large amount of Shards they have, the Alethi have become excellent at training Shardbearers.

In most cases, lighteyed boys of appropriate rank around the age of ten are chosen by an ardent swordmaster for training. These boys typically already have at least some training with the sword. The swordmaster teaches them the ten Shardblade Stances and familiarity with plate. They train with Blades in two ways. If the trainee has no Blade of his own, they can make use of wooden practice swords that approximate the balance and weight of a real Blade. They may also borrow one of the King's Blades. This tradition is one of the reasons the Alethi have the best trained Shardbearers on Roshar. Whenever a Shardbearer is killed or dies, there is always someone prepared to bond their Blade and use it right away. A swordmaster also coaches their student on how to control the Blade with their mind, commanding it to remain in place so it can be loaned to others.

Punishments

The Alethi military also has a large number of punishments. Regular punishments, usually given by a squadleader, include menial duties and corporal punishment. A highprince can also choose to execute someone, or even leave them to the stormfather’s judgment, which includes tying them up and leaving them outside during a highstorm. Officers can put people in a stockade.

Fortifications

Many holdings, to let armies rest and wait.

Shardbearers

Ballistas, nets, both on top of the walls which are cut down and nets that can be fired at shardbearers. ropes, catapults. also Polemen to push shardbearers off.

Artillery

Ballistas and catapults. Women ofcourse.