[Icelander]

Originally Posted by safisher

They could do it 3-4 days, sure, but you will lose a % of the weaker horses. Some will get a stone bruises on the hoof, or come up lame for any number of reasons. Roll HT and lose X number any time you beyond their normal range, and increase that likelihood with extended movement. The limiting factor is how many you want to lose. The top % will stay with you for incredible distances.

Hmmm....

A loss of 10% of mostly the weakest animals wouldn't be disastrous at all, as the most important part of the herd are the 25% of the best horses, the ones who are potential endurance racing champions or, in other words, extremely fine quality scouting and outriding cavalry mounts.

Basically, any horse that wouldn't make a prime cavalry service mount isn't one that it is important to steal at that particular time.

Originally Posted by safisher

That's a huge herd, and would need equally large amounts of grass and water. Those coming after it will be in big trouble, just from the grass the animals will consume.

The hugeness of the number of animals is the reason they are being driven along riverbanks and in wet country, during the part of year while the grasses are the most lush.

Even so, it's an interesting point that any pursuers will be riding over grasslands eaten bare, as well as the organisational skills of the PCs can manage. They'll probably divide into several columns and leave a decent route of uneaten grass for a column or two of stragglers, but for pursuers behind those, they'll leave no choice but to leave the route with the good watering holes in order to find uneaten grass.

If it forces pursuers to have to send for a supply column of oats and carried water, that's a nice bonus. Even if it only forces them to waste some extra time per day in finding grazing, it still means that the pursuing cavalry won't catch up as easily as I had imaginated.

I had thought that a thousand horses could easily catch ten thousand, going by analogy with marching armies, where adding numbers adds the time it takes to get anywhere. But maybe I was too pessimistic, as a thousand ridden horses that will be going over already grazed trails eaten dry by ten thousand horses might not make such good time.

It all depends on whether 10-20 horses per man slows the larger group of horses down, because they have to be constantly driving them back to the group and stopping to take care of them, or it speeds them up, because it means an effectively endless stream of remounts, meaning that most of the horses are without any encumbrance for the vast majority of the day's travel.

Originally Posted by safisher

There will always be sick horses, as horses are notoriously likely to get sick at the most inconvenient moment!

Given 10,000 horses, even if they've all recently been passed as fit for cavalry service (and the ones with any signs of sickness, lameness, weakness or flaws sent back as unsuitable tribute), I expect the occasional malady will pop up.

But my WAG, based on nothing more than the expectation that the experts who certified the animals ready for a 2,000 mile long drive knew what they were about, is that this will be a rare occurance. Basically, it's a combination of a HT 12-13 horse failing a HT check and a skill 14-16 expert failing to see the signs of it during the passing process.

Originally Posted by safisher

It depends on what you are testing. Are you testing the management of a remuda, or the management of an overland journey for a caravan? Those aren't the same thing.

But while you could probably manage a 100 horses over a known trail without having much in the way of Administration or Navigation, you probably can't even begin to manage more than a thousand men taking care of ten thousand horses with only Animal Handling.

The best horse wrangler in the world isn't necessarily going to know how to command a thousand other wranglers, organise an extremely complex system of watches, feedings, waterings, routes and collection points or be able to stymie and outguess pursuers by denying them forage along the route.

Originally Posted by safisher

Whatever happens, the Animal Handling will be the determining factor for making it to the end with the horses in good shape.

Yes, but can the Animal Handling skill of one overall commander really make all the difference, or is it more important how much skill each individual wrangler has?

And how many horses can each one reasonably take care off without suffering penalties to Animal Handling?

For example, with these ten thousand horses, how many of the 1,200 men with them are truly necessary as full-time wranglers for the remuda and how many of them can serve as outriding cavalry, only coming back to the main herd (or likely one of several columns of it) to change horses?

Originally Posted by safisher

If you are worrying about them knowing the route, keeping force cohesion, or forgetting important details, of course that's not anything to do with Animal Handling per se. I'd roll the other skills as complimentary rolls on the final Animal Handling skill roll, if you were worried about them.

I'll do something similar. I'll make succeeding on all the organisational and navigational skills a prerequisite for the final skill roll, because otherwise, a lot of the animals won't have competent wranglers assigned to them.