Inheritance Cycle Battles Tactical Analysis Part 2 - The Battle of Carvahall
Welcome to the second analysis of the battles in the Inheritance Cycle by Christopher Paolini, alleged child prodigy but terrible tactician. This one is about the battle of Carvahall, when the Empire soldiers come to the village in search for Roran and, after some unfortunate incidents, the people find themselves compelled to fight for their lives. Enjoy the read and remember that these analysises can also be found on my website at www.kris-norge.com along with works of my own, including some fan fics that mock the Inheritance Cycle, sure to please the good people of antishurtugal. So shall we begin?
Battle walkthrough
This, althought it is a siege, pits common villagers against the Empire soldiers and Ra'zac. Now considering that these are the villagers of Carvahall with no experience of warfare, I won't be too picky with regards to tactics used. But there are still some errors that defy even common sense and then impossible feats of commoners besting trained soldiers.
I suppose things begin when the Empire soldiers arrive at the village. Here we get a description of their apparel. Underneath their red tunics they wear leather brigandines, mail shirts, and then padded gambesons. Most of them carry broadswoards, though half a dozen are archers and another half dozen carry "wicked-looking" halberds. Two things can be said about this. Firstly, technically, a broadsword is a basket-hilted sword that was developped in the 16th century and called such as opposed to the rapier of the time which was a very slim sword (actually it was mentioned that Jeod carried a rapier, also a sword of the 16th century), making it rather advanced for a pseudo-medieval society. Broad-bladed sword would have been a more correct term but that's just a technicality. Secondly, the standard weapon of any soldier of any pre-firearm period is not the sword, it is the spear. This is a very common mistake among fantasy writers. Understand that swords are far longer, more complicated, and more expensive to make than any other weapon and they require real steel for their making. A spearhead can be mostly iron, making it far cheaper. The soldiers are accompanied by two strangers called Ra'zac.
Anyway after a moment of temporary madness, Roran and his friend Baldor flee to warn the villagers. Horst, the village blacksmith, tells Roran to grab some food and his horse and flee to the foothills. He does this and then one of Horst's sons brings him food and blankets.After some drunken behaviour on the soldiers' part, some quarrels, and an unfortunate accident that lead to a death, the villagers decide to drive the soldiers out. There are eleven of them to do this. Now let's compare, shall we. These people are in fact peasants. Peasants have no armour, no understanding of warfare, no skill with weapons apart from the tools they use every day, and have never tried to kill before. Soldiers, on the other hand, have armour and proper weapons that they have been trained to use, their officers at the very least will have an understanding of warfare, and it is possible that they will have killed before. Also they have the Ra'zac with them and these guys are elites, stronger and faster than humans. Even in the worst strategy games this doesn't play out well, it only does in an RPG where your characters have names. Nameless units are so much easier to kill.
Keeping that in mind, let's take a look at the way things play out. The villagers are able to approach the soldiers' camp silently and ambush the sentries on patrol. Yup! Villagers with no fighting experience are able to ambush sentries whose very job is to be on the lookout. Having done a little guard duty myself in military school (nighttime watch duty at the base's gate), I'll admit it is very tiring and attention wavers but generally, when you know what's depending on you, you snap to attention at the slightest sound or sign of movement. I'll grant car lights are a much clearer sign, but I was just a recruit at the time, these are confirmed soldiers.
STRIKE I: The villagers ambush the sentries and start wreaking havoc, making a lot of noise and bashing whatever they can. The soldiers are unable to resist and flee in terror. Let me make something clear. Regardless of whether or not they're on the evil side, soldiers worthy of the name are not cowards. Out of thirty soldiers, you can assume that at least a few are veterans who won't be easily frightened. And these are the backbone of any army as the younger and stronger soldiers will trust them and stay by them. There is a reason the pre-reform Romans kept the veterans in the back of the maniples. And those veterans can rally the other soldiers and, with the advantage in BOTH numbers and weapons, the soldiers will slaughter the villagers.
Regardless of that, the Ra'zac who are in command prove to be absolutely terrible officers as they make no attempt to rally the soldiers but are instead swept away by the rout. The villagers just intended to frighten them which isn't very smart. That just gives the soldiers a chance to regroup and retaliate in force. And they WILL, regardless of whether or not the villagers killed anyone because no decent ruler can afford to let something like that go unpunished. As the saying goes "One unpunished offence encourages the comission of many others". Plus, the villagers did kill someone. Or rather, a thirteen-year-old boy goes into a blood frenzy and stabs a soldier to death. The word "methodically" is used to describe the stabbing which isn't likely, assuming that this boy has (hopefully) never killed before. Methoically implies skill and practice. Savagely, frantically or crazily would be much closer to the mark unless this boy is a budding psychopath and has already practiced on animals. But that's my criminology studies speaking for me
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STRIKE II The Empire strikes back (pun very much intended): The villagers have now branded themselves as traitors and go about trying to make Carvahall impenetrable, and impossible task in a village that doesn't even have a wall but defendable is closer to the mark. The Ra'zac appear and toss some sort of explosive vial (nitroglycerin seems possible though it was only used for such purpose as from the 18 hundreds) that blows away the barricade. They then race into Carvahall and slaughter three before being halted in their charge by two guys with pitchforks, literally. Though long tools like pitchforks are the most useful thing they have for fighting riders, there are only two of them. A rider that's any good could wheel around them, get past the pitchforks, and kill them with little difficulty. Or, since these Ra'zac have superhuman speed and strength, they can catch the tools (pitchforks aren't all that sharp) and yank them away or at least pull the man within sword reach.
The soldiers pour in and this is the begining of Roran's incredible warrior skills. His first kill isn't so bad as he catches the man by surprise. But at the next soldier, he parries a sword thrust with a shield and swings his hammer, catching the man in the chin. Apparently training and experience don't make you quick enough to avoid a heavy weapon swung by a man who's only at his second kill. Roran arrives to challenge one of the Ra'zac but has a moment of dizziness caused by the black breath but recovers when a stone flies over him and the Ra'zac twitches. Then there is a rather interesting feat of physics.Roran drops his shield, raises his hammer with both hands, stands on the tips of his toes, and swings downwards, catching the Ra'zac's shield and leaves a formidable dent. Ignoring the fact that no shields are made entirely of metal and that wood doesn't dent, it breaks (although the Ra'zac are super strong and fast so could perhaps carry all-metal shields), this is impossible.
You never hit a rider with a downwards strike, even when standing on tiptoe, and that would reduce your balance and footing and therefore the force of the blow. That Roran was able to do this means that either he's a giant or the Ra'zac are sitting astride ponies. And since, in their position as royal officers, they would have destriers or at least coursers, that can only mean that Roran's a giant (which would make many of his later feats much more plausible). A two-handed blow angled upwards would have been far more plausible and more effective against a rider. But somehow a dent in his shield makes the Ra'zac decide that it would be best to retreat. I'll only accept this outcome because there were a hundred villagers against twenty-nine soldiers and women behind pelting them with stones and the soldiers killed ten villagers and lost only three of theirs. This is, I suppose, a reasonable outcome. The Ra'zac offer terms that basically leave the villagers no choice but to fight since their options are death or slavery.
STRIKE III: The prominent villagers take council and decide to stay and fight the soldiers. Roran is charged with overseeing Carvahall's defences for no reason other than that he is the main character, otherwise he is just a farm boy with a smith's and miller's apprenticeship. Wouldn't one of the more seasoned men be more practical? Perhaps if possible someone with even slight military experience or who has some understanding of defences even if he heard about it in stories? It is mentioned earlier that Roran never cared for Brom's stories so clearly wouldn't have learned anything from them.
Roran's plan is to fell fifty or sixty trees with branches all along the trunks and use them for makeshift fortifications with branches all along the trunk to be sharpened. To me, the branches will serve very little purpose apart from handholds the enemies can use to climb over. One man suggests draping brambles over the trees, which seems a fair idea to me except that the sharpened branches will serve no purpose then. Then Roran works on a second line of defence. He plans to dig a trench inside the ring of trees and perhaps put spikes at the bottom. They do this and the loose dirt is piled on the inside edge of the trench to make it more difficult to climb out of. While this trench is pretty standard defence there is one thing very wrong. Why on earth are they digging it inside the wall of tree trunks? I challenge anyone to find a single instance fictious or otherwise outside this book where the moat, dike, or trench, is behind the walls. Why is this very wrong? Because it will slow the villagers because they will have a harder time reaching and leaving their own fortifications. They will be hindered by their own bloody defences!!!! Whereas outside, the trench will slow the soldiers, leaving the villagers time to pelt them with projectiles, and it will make it harder to climb the trunk wall, making the defenders' job easier. This is not a question of knowledge in warfare, this is a breach of common sense.
The Empire soldiers prove to be either blind or dull-witted as it is mentioned that some have been posted on hills overlooking the Anora River and the valley and therefore would have seen the activity of the village as they built fortifications and reported in, yet we see a soldier who "gaped with amazement at Carvahall's new fortifications" . Either the watchmen are blind or they were dull-witted enough to not report what they saw, which is technically standard operational procedure for any army at any period of time.
Roran wishes he had his bow but he had left it indoors to protect it from the elements. He is comforted with knowledge that the soldiers would have an even harder time keeping their weapons dry. For the record, battles have been fought in the rain before. The elements give weapons problems only over the long term and even then, if their owners maintain them well, there shouldn't be any problems. There isn't really an excuse for Roran to not have had his bow with him, especially since it's about the most useful weapon a watchman or scout can have.
The Ra'zac and soldiers attack and after some taunting, spears start flying over the trunk walls. Never before was there ever a mention of these soldiers carrying spears at all, just swords, halberds, and bows. The Ra'zac then once again use a nitroglycerin vial and blast open the fortifications on the northern end of the village. Roran and Sloan go to deal with this. Why no one else goes with them when there are at least ninety able villagers is a mystery, as is the absence of any watchman on that side to give the alarm before the vial was thrown.
As far as I can tell, six soldiers are there. The first apparently has no shield as Roran is able to stab him in the hip with a spear and then go for his throat. As for Sloan, he throws a cleaver which splits a helm and crushes the skull beneath. Cleavers aren't throwing weapons or bludgeoning weapons (so wouldn't "crush" the skull) and helms exist for a reason. The butcher then kills another soldier with impossible ease since soldiers are trained to cut living people and butchers are trained to cut already dead meat or, at the most, cut the throat of a dangling animal.
Roran loses his spear to the next two soldiers, which is reasonable. . . until the part where a soldier throws it at him, he catches it in mid-air before it reaches his chest (even Spartacus never did that and that series was pretty far-out choreography-wise), and kills the man with it. If Roran was that close, what was the need to throw it in the first place? And how did he catch it in mid-air if it was headed straight for his chest? Roran is now weaponless even though it was specified that he "drove" the spear into the soldier and therefore still has it in his hands. Apparently pulling it out isn't an option but I won't count that since they can be hard to pull out and when an enemy is just next to you, it's too late for that. But Roran had previously dropped his hammer to perform his unnecessary defiance of physics (catching a thrown spear when he could have avoided it). But he finds a sword in the mud and slashes at the soldier's hand. Instead of reacting like a human and screaming in pain at losing his thumb or trying to protect himself, the soldier says "This is what comes from not shielding myself". Why would anyone say that? But Roran agrees and beheads him. The last soldier flees and is killed by the Ra'zac who have been sitting on their horses and watching all this time. Why they have been doing that, when they could easily have charged in and killed Roran and the butcher, is never made clear.
Sloan drags a tree back into position all by himself and they rejoin the rest of the villagers, Roran wondering why no one came to help them. Apparently two soldiers were killed in the fighting elsewhere along with a ten-year-old boy. This begs the question of why a ten-year-old boy was near the melee at all. He ought to have been told to run and hide when the fighting starts. Either his parents are to blame for not telling him, or he is to blame for disobeying them, or the entire village is to blame for allowing him to try his hand at killing soldiers.
STRIKE IV: The Empire soldiers do nothing for the next five or six days because they have lost a third of their number so they have withdrawn further down the road but kept watchmen. Roran is being called Roran Stronghammer because of his kills and enjoys the title. The villagers are again taking council and trying to decide whether to fight or flee. The choice seems quite clear to me since the soldiers intend to call up reinforcements. But some are too stubborn to leave their homes. Then Roran suggests taking refuge in the Spine. Many call this out as a terrible idea and since the mountains are superstitiously considered dangerous, I won't call that out. But they begin to agree to send the women and children up there.
The good butcher from before doesn't approve and gets enraged at the sight of his daughter heading up there (his wife died in the Spine) and Roran, in a display of relationship genius, chooses this moment to announce that he and Katrina got engaged without his consent. When you're under siege is the worst moment to start making enemies and stealing a man's daughter is one of the best ways to make one, especially when you punch him when he's mad at you for doing it. For that reason, I'm calling this out as a tactical error as well as a social one because having your daughter get engaged behind your back is a great dishonour, so large that he likely won't care about betraying others to get back at the one who shamed him in front of the entire village, especially since everyone just stands and watches an no one tries to defend Sloan's besmirched honour. Sloan sulks and Roran takes the villagers into the Spine. He then returns to Carvahall and goes to bed. Katrina joins him in his room and, because of later events, it is most definately sure that they had sex.
That night Roran awakes to see a hole blasted through his bedroom door. Why they blasted through it when they could have simply opened it is a mystery. Though how they even reached the house unseen and unheard is a mystery as well. Six soldiers come in and they put a sword at Roran's neck and order him up. Then Katrina jumps the soldiers and bites and claws them and they are unable to subdue her. . . six armed trained soldiers are unable to subdue a girl, something a blow with an armoured fist would have done just fine. Roran gets his hammer and, with Katrina in danger, apparently becomes invincible.
I'm sorry but in this case I have to refer to Spartacus, the first episode of the first season back when Andy Whitfield was playing Spartacus (May the gods rain shit on cancer). After Spartacus accidentally causes the Thracian auxiliary's desertion, he camps with his wife, Sura. When he wakes up, they are surrounded by seriously pissed off Romans. He reaches for his sword but is punched in the face and subdued in seconds while his wife is grabbed and carried off. Though I'm sure Spartacus loved Sura as much as Roran loves Katrina, THAT is what happens when you're suddenly roused from sleep, even if you're a trained warrior.
Roran still kills the soldiers and charges after the Ra'zac who, instead of killing him or subduing him with their supernatural strength and speed, grab Katrina and flee. Roran catches up with them and one grabs his wrist and tries to pull him out the window, though why they didn't try to catch him to start with is questionable. They struggle and the Ra'zac loses its hood, turning out to be ugly. Roran nearly gets taken but Horst the smith holds him back. The Ra'zac then bites him and disappears.
The villagers attempt to give pursuit and, although wounded, Roran insists on going with them and the smith agrees to this. They go outside and find that a watchman has been stabbed. Not only is Roran with the pursuers, but he is leading them. They continue to the soldiers' encampment and get to watch the Ra'zac kill one of their men. The Ra'zac then summon flying steeds of theirs. A bound Katrina is loaded onto them and Sloan comes, walking freely, having apparently betrayed the villagers. Considering that Roran humiliated him in front of the entire village and no one did squat about it, I say it's no wonder he decided to make a pact with what is, after all, the current government. But their agreement takes a bad turn and the Ra'zac knock him out and fly away with the butcher and his daughter. Roran decides he wants to charge and kill the soldiers but collapses and that's pretty much it until he decides to lead the villagers into the spine.
Major Tactical Errors (also called the recipe for the 3 Ds: Death, Defeat, and Disaster)
1- Taking armed resistance against the soldiers = Branding themselves as traitors
2- Striking to frighten = Giving the soldiers a chance to retaliate
3- Leaving branches on the tree trunks = Allowing the enemy potential handholds to climb
4- Digging the trench inside the tree wall = Hindering themselves more than the enemy
5- Not having a bow when on watch = Poorly equipped watchman
6- No watchman on the northern side = Poor surveillance
7- Roran and Sloan charging alone = Forced numerical inferiority
8- Roran dropping his hammer = Leaving himself weaponless
9- Announcing his engament to Katrina and punching Sloan = Making himself enemies inside his walls
10- Taking wounded Roran with them = Potential liability
My strategy
As a person of legal integrity and of great concern for the upholding of the law, I would have given Roran to the Empire. Galbatorix has not done a thing to prove is alleged evilness and therefore can be considered a good king. I would have handed him over and perhaps made some requests with regards to his welfare. But this might just be me thinking of the modern justice system which is surprisingly laxist in my opinion.
Now if I had to defend the village from enemy soldiers who are causing trouble, for a starters, I would try and gather as many of the villagers as possible on my side. At the very least, I would make sure to have as many men as the soldiers. I would have those who are proven hunters and know how to handle a bow take out the sentries when I charge.
I would also use torches and set fire to the tents. That will confuse and frighten the soldiers more and I would make sure to surround them so that not a soul escapes. The Ra'zac may take down some of my people but they will be overwhelmed by sheer numbers. With the Ra'zac and all the soldiers dead, it will be some time before anyone finds out about this and I can take time to make plans to leave the village before the Empire realizes something is up and sends more men.
Battle walkthrough
This, althought it is a siege, pits common villagers against the Empire soldiers and Ra'zac. Now considering that these are the villagers of Carvahall with no experience of warfare, I won't be too picky with regards to tactics used. But there are still some errors that defy even common sense and then impossible feats of commoners besting trained soldiers.
I suppose things begin when the Empire soldiers arrive at the village. Here we get a description of their apparel. Underneath their red tunics they wear leather brigandines, mail shirts, and then padded gambesons. Most of them carry broadswoards, though half a dozen are archers and another half dozen carry "wicked-looking" halberds. Two things can be said about this. Firstly, technically, a broadsword is a basket-hilted sword that was developped in the 16th century and called such as opposed to the rapier of the time which was a very slim sword (actually it was mentioned that Jeod carried a rapier, also a sword of the 16th century), making it rather advanced for a pseudo-medieval society. Broad-bladed sword would have been a more correct term but that's just a technicality. Secondly, the standard weapon of any soldier of any pre-firearm period is not the sword, it is the spear. This is a very common mistake among fantasy writers. Understand that swords are far longer, more complicated, and more expensive to make than any other weapon and they require real steel for their making. A spearhead can be mostly iron, making it far cheaper. The soldiers are accompanied by two strangers called Ra'zac.
Anyway after a moment of temporary madness, Roran and his friend Baldor flee to warn the villagers. Horst, the village blacksmith, tells Roran to grab some food and his horse and flee to the foothills. He does this and then one of Horst's sons brings him food and blankets.After some drunken behaviour on the soldiers' part, some quarrels, and an unfortunate accident that lead to a death, the villagers decide to drive the soldiers out. There are eleven of them to do this. Now let's compare, shall we. These people are in fact peasants. Peasants have no armour, no understanding of warfare, no skill with weapons apart from the tools they use every day, and have never tried to kill before. Soldiers, on the other hand, have armour and proper weapons that they have been trained to use, their officers at the very least will have an understanding of warfare, and it is possible that they will have killed before. Also they have the Ra'zac with them and these guys are elites, stronger and faster than humans. Even in the worst strategy games this doesn't play out well, it only does in an RPG where your characters have names. Nameless units are so much easier to kill.
Keeping that in mind, let's take a look at the way things play out. The villagers are able to approach the soldiers' camp silently and ambush the sentries on patrol. Yup! Villagers with no fighting experience are able to ambush sentries whose very job is to be on the lookout. Having done a little guard duty myself in military school (nighttime watch duty at the base's gate), I'll admit it is very tiring and attention wavers but generally, when you know what's depending on you, you snap to attention at the slightest sound or sign of movement. I'll grant car lights are a much clearer sign, but I was just a recruit at the time, these are confirmed soldiers.
STRIKE I: The villagers ambush the sentries and start wreaking havoc, making a lot of noise and bashing whatever they can. The soldiers are unable to resist and flee in terror. Let me make something clear. Regardless of whether or not they're on the evil side, soldiers worthy of the name are not cowards. Out of thirty soldiers, you can assume that at least a few are veterans who won't be easily frightened. And these are the backbone of any army as the younger and stronger soldiers will trust them and stay by them. There is a reason the pre-reform Romans kept the veterans in the back of the maniples. And those veterans can rally the other soldiers and, with the advantage in BOTH numbers and weapons, the soldiers will slaughter the villagers.
Regardless of that, the Ra'zac who are in command prove to be absolutely terrible officers as they make no attempt to rally the soldiers but are instead swept away by the rout. The villagers just intended to frighten them which isn't very smart. That just gives the soldiers a chance to regroup and retaliate in force. And they WILL, regardless of whether or not the villagers killed anyone because no decent ruler can afford to let something like that go unpunished. As the saying goes "One unpunished offence encourages the comission of many others". Plus, the villagers did kill someone. Or rather, a thirteen-year-old boy goes into a blood frenzy and stabs a soldier to death. The word "methodically" is used to describe the stabbing which isn't likely, assuming that this boy has (hopefully) never killed before. Methoically implies skill and practice. Savagely, frantically or crazily would be much closer to the mark unless this boy is a budding psychopath and has already practiced on animals. But that's my criminology studies speaking for me
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STRIKE II The Empire strikes back (pun very much intended): The villagers have now branded themselves as traitors and go about trying to make Carvahall impenetrable, and impossible task in a village that doesn't even have a wall but defendable is closer to the mark. The Ra'zac appear and toss some sort of explosive vial (nitroglycerin seems possible though it was only used for such purpose as from the 18 hundreds) that blows away the barricade. They then race into Carvahall and slaughter three before being halted in their charge by two guys with pitchforks, literally. Though long tools like pitchforks are the most useful thing they have for fighting riders, there are only two of them. A rider that's any good could wheel around them, get past the pitchforks, and kill them with little difficulty. Or, since these Ra'zac have superhuman speed and strength, they can catch the tools (pitchforks aren't all that sharp) and yank them away or at least pull the man within sword reach.
The soldiers pour in and this is the begining of Roran's incredible warrior skills. His first kill isn't so bad as he catches the man by surprise. But at the next soldier, he parries a sword thrust with a shield and swings his hammer, catching the man in the chin. Apparently training and experience don't make you quick enough to avoid a heavy weapon swung by a man who's only at his second kill. Roran arrives to challenge one of the Ra'zac but has a moment of dizziness caused by the black breath but recovers when a stone flies over him and the Ra'zac twitches. Then there is a rather interesting feat of physics.Roran drops his shield, raises his hammer with both hands, stands on the tips of his toes, and swings downwards, catching the Ra'zac's shield and leaves a formidable dent. Ignoring the fact that no shields are made entirely of metal and that wood doesn't dent, it breaks (although the Ra'zac are super strong and fast so could perhaps carry all-metal shields), this is impossible.
You never hit a rider with a downwards strike, even when standing on tiptoe, and that would reduce your balance and footing and therefore the force of the blow. That Roran was able to do this means that either he's a giant or the Ra'zac are sitting astride ponies. And since, in their position as royal officers, they would have destriers or at least coursers, that can only mean that Roran's a giant (which would make many of his later feats much more plausible). A two-handed blow angled upwards would have been far more plausible and more effective against a rider. But somehow a dent in his shield makes the Ra'zac decide that it would be best to retreat. I'll only accept this outcome because there were a hundred villagers against twenty-nine soldiers and women behind pelting them with stones and the soldiers killed ten villagers and lost only three of theirs. This is, I suppose, a reasonable outcome. The Ra'zac offer terms that basically leave the villagers no choice but to fight since their options are death or slavery.
STRIKE III: The prominent villagers take council and decide to stay and fight the soldiers. Roran is charged with overseeing Carvahall's defences for no reason other than that he is the main character, otherwise he is just a farm boy with a smith's and miller's apprenticeship. Wouldn't one of the more seasoned men be more practical? Perhaps if possible someone with even slight military experience or who has some understanding of defences even if he heard about it in stories? It is mentioned earlier that Roran never cared for Brom's stories so clearly wouldn't have learned anything from them.
Roran's plan is to fell fifty or sixty trees with branches all along the trunks and use them for makeshift fortifications with branches all along the trunk to be sharpened. To me, the branches will serve very little purpose apart from handholds the enemies can use to climb over. One man suggests draping brambles over the trees, which seems a fair idea to me except that the sharpened branches will serve no purpose then. Then Roran works on a second line of defence. He plans to dig a trench inside the ring of trees and perhaps put spikes at the bottom. They do this and the loose dirt is piled on the inside edge of the trench to make it more difficult to climb out of. While this trench is pretty standard defence there is one thing very wrong. Why on earth are they digging it inside the wall of tree trunks? I challenge anyone to find a single instance fictious or otherwise outside this book where the moat, dike, or trench, is behind the walls. Why is this very wrong? Because it will slow the villagers because they will have a harder time reaching and leaving their own fortifications. They will be hindered by their own bloody defences!!!! Whereas outside, the trench will slow the soldiers, leaving the villagers time to pelt them with projectiles, and it will make it harder to climb the trunk wall, making the defenders' job easier. This is not a question of knowledge in warfare, this is a breach of common sense.
The Empire soldiers prove to be either blind or dull-witted as it is mentioned that some have been posted on hills overlooking the Anora River and the valley and therefore would have seen the activity of the village as they built fortifications and reported in, yet we see a soldier who "gaped with amazement at Carvahall's new fortifications" . Either the watchmen are blind or they were dull-witted enough to not report what they saw, which is technically standard operational procedure for any army at any period of time.
Roran wishes he had his bow but he had left it indoors to protect it from the elements. He is comforted with knowledge that the soldiers would have an even harder time keeping their weapons dry. For the record, battles have been fought in the rain before. The elements give weapons problems only over the long term and even then, if their owners maintain them well, there shouldn't be any problems. There isn't really an excuse for Roran to not have had his bow with him, especially since it's about the most useful weapon a watchman or scout can have.
The Ra'zac and soldiers attack and after some taunting, spears start flying over the trunk walls. Never before was there ever a mention of these soldiers carrying spears at all, just swords, halberds, and bows. The Ra'zac then once again use a nitroglycerin vial and blast open the fortifications on the northern end of the village. Roran and Sloan go to deal with this. Why no one else goes with them when there are at least ninety able villagers is a mystery, as is the absence of any watchman on that side to give the alarm before the vial was thrown.
As far as I can tell, six soldiers are there. The first apparently has no shield as Roran is able to stab him in the hip with a spear and then go for his throat. As for Sloan, he throws a cleaver which splits a helm and crushes the skull beneath. Cleavers aren't throwing weapons or bludgeoning weapons (so wouldn't "crush" the skull) and helms exist for a reason. The butcher then kills another soldier with impossible ease since soldiers are trained to cut living people and butchers are trained to cut already dead meat or, at the most, cut the throat of a dangling animal.
Roran loses his spear to the next two soldiers, which is reasonable. . . until the part where a soldier throws it at him, he catches it in mid-air before it reaches his chest (even Spartacus never did that and that series was pretty far-out choreography-wise), and kills the man with it. If Roran was that close, what was the need to throw it in the first place? And how did he catch it in mid-air if it was headed straight for his chest? Roran is now weaponless even though it was specified that he "drove" the spear into the soldier and therefore still has it in his hands. Apparently pulling it out isn't an option but I won't count that since they can be hard to pull out and when an enemy is just next to you, it's too late for that. But Roran had previously dropped his hammer to perform his unnecessary defiance of physics (catching a thrown spear when he could have avoided it). But he finds a sword in the mud and slashes at the soldier's hand. Instead of reacting like a human and screaming in pain at losing his thumb or trying to protect himself, the soldier says "This is what comes from not shielding myself". Why would anyone say that? But Roran agrees and beheads him. The last soldier flees and is killed by the Ra'zac who have been sitting on their horses and watching all this time. Why they have been doing that, when they could easily have charged in and killed Roran and the butcher, is never made clear.
Sloan drags a tree back into position all by himself and they rejoin the rest of the villagers, Roran wondering why no one came to help them. Apparently two soldiers were killed in the fighting elsewhere along with a ten-year-old boy. This begs the question of why a ten-year-old boy was near the melee at all. He ought to have been told to run and hide when the fighting starts. Either his parents are to blame for not telling him, or he is to blame for disobeying them, or the entire village is to blame for allowing him to try his hand at killing soldiers.
STRIKE IV: The Empire soldiers do nothing for the next five or six days because they have lost a third of their number so they have withdrawn further down the road but kept watchmen. Roran is being called Roran Stronghammer because of his kills and enjoys the title. The villagers are again taking council and trying to decide whether to fight or flee. The choice seems quite clear to me since the soldiers intend to call up reinforcements. But some are too stubborn to leave their homes. Then Roran suggests taking refuge in the Spine. Many call this out as a terrible idea and since the mountains are superstitiously considered dangerous, I won't call that out. But they begin to agree to send the women and children up there.
The good butcher from before doesn't approve and gets enraged at the sight of his daughter heading up there (his wife died in the Spine) and Roran, in a display of relationship genius, chooses this moment to announce that he and Katrina got engaged without his consent. When you're under siege is the worst moment to start making enemies and stealing a man's daughter is one of the best ways to make one, especially when you punch him when he's mad at you for doing it. For that reason, I'm calling this out as a tactical error as well as a social one because having your daughter get engaged behind your back is a great dishonour, so large that he likely won't care about betraying others to get back at the one who shamed him in front of the entire village, especially since everyone just stands and watches an no one tries to defend Sloan's besmirched honour. Sloan sulks and Roran takes the villagers into the Spine. He then returns to Carvahall and goes to bed. Katrina joins him in his room and, because of later events, it is most definately sure that they had sex.
That night Roran awakes to see a hole blasted through his bedroom door. Why they blasted through it when they could have simply opened it is a mystery. Though how they even reached the house unseen and unheard is a mystery as well. Six soldiers come in and they put a sword at Roran's neck and order him up. Then Katrina jumps the soldiers and bites and claws them and they are unable to subdue her. . . six armed trained soldiers are unable to subdue a girl, something a blow with an armoured fist would have done just fine. Roran gets his hammer and, with Katrina in danger, apparently becomes invincible.
I'm sorry but in this case I have to refer to Spartacus, the first episode of the first season back when Andy Whitfield was playing Spartacus (May the gods rain shit on cancer). After Spartacus accidentally causes the Thracian auxiliary's desertion, he camps with his wife, Sura. When he wakes up, they are surrounded by seriously pissed off Romans. He reaches for his sword but is punched in the face and subdued in seconds while his wife is grabbed and carried off. Though I'm sure Spartacus loved Sura as much as Roran loves Katrina, THAT is what happens when you're suddenly roused from sleep, even if you're a trained warrior.
Roran still kills the soldiers and charges after the Ra'zac who, instead of killing him or subduing him with their supernatural strength and speed, grab Katrina and flee. Roran catches up with them and one grabs his wrist and tries to pull him out the window, though why they didn't try to catch him to start with is questionable. They struggle and the Ra'zac loses its hood, turning out to be ugly. Roran nearly gets taken but Horst the smith holds him back. The Ra'zac then bites him and disappears.
The villagers attempt to give pursuit and, although wounded, Roran insists on going with them and the smith agrees to this. They go outside and find that a watchman has been stabbed. Not only is Roran with the pursuers, but he is leading them. They continue to the soldiers' encampment and get to watch the Ra'zac kill one of their men. The Ra'zac then summon flying steeds of theirs. A bound Katrina is loaded onto them and Sloan comes, walking freely, having apparently betrayed the villagers. Considering that Roran humiliated him in front of the entire village and no one did squat about it, I say it's no wonder he decided to make a pact with what is, after all, the current government. But their agreement takes a bad turn and the Ra'zac knock him out and fly away with the butcher and his daughter. Roran decides he wants to charge and kill the soldiers but collapses and that's pretty much it until he decides to lead the villagers into the spine.
Major Tactical Errors (also called the recipe for the 3 Ds: Death, Defeat, and Disaster)
1- Taking armed resistance against the soldiers = Branding themselves as traitors
2- Striking to frighten = Giving the soldiers a chance to retaliate
3- Leaving branches on the tree trunks = Allowing the enemy potential handholds to climb
4- Digging the trench inside the tree wall = Hindering themselves more than the enemy
5- Not having a bow when on watch = Poorly equipped watchman
6- No watchman on the northern side = Poor surveillance
7- Roran and Sloan charging alone = Forced numerical inferiority
8- Roran dropping his hammer = Leaving himself weaponless
9- Announcing his engament to Katrina and punching Sloan = Making himself enemies inside his walls
10- Taking wounded Roran with them = Potential liability
My strategy
As a person of legal integrity and of great concern for the upholding of the law, I would have given Roran to the Empire. Galbatorix has not done a thing to prove is alleged evilness and therefore can be considered a good king. I would have handed him over and perhaps made some requests with regards to his welfare. But this might just be me thinking of the modern justice system which is surprisingly laxist in my opinion.
Now if I had to defend the village from enemy soldiers who are causing trouble, for a starters, I would try and gather as many of the villagers as possible on my side. At the very least, I would make sure to have as many men as the soldiers. I would have those who are proven hunters and know how to handle a bow take out the sentries when I charge.
I would also use torches and set fire to the tents. That will confuse and frighten the soldiers more and I would make sure to surround them so that not a soul escapes. The Ra'zac may take down some of my people but they will be overwhelmed by sheer numbers. With the Ra'zac and all the soldiers dead, it will be some time before anyone finds out about this and I can take time to make plans to leave the village before the Empire realizes something is up and sends more men.