Discussion What do saurus do outside of battle?

[aidanlynch]

I want to write a fluff piece for my army but I find the GW portrayal of saurus as mindless killing machines a bit restrictive.

So I'm putting these questions to the ildbloods of lustria-online; what do saurus do outside of battle? Do saurus have guard/patrol duties? Do they hunt for food? Is a fist bump a valid greeting? Basically do saurus have any personality or will I just have to invent it all?

 

[n810]

Probaly similar to what other profesional warrios do when not fighting,
(Knights, Samuri, ect..) mostly training, patroling, and guarding I would imagine.
I think skinks do most of the hunting, IRC.

 

[VampTeddy]

I imagine a very strict routine of guarding, guarding and some more guarding, when not resting or eating they probably guard as well.

I like to look at my Saurus as inhumane fighting machines directed towards the enemies of the Old ones, killing without emotion and a proffesional instinct but the savagery of a beast when "activated" otherwise protecting the race as a whole as well as maintaining their own bodily function.

I feel a saurus should be Dumb in all aspects aside of war and strategy - i like the fluff GW wrote for saurus and as such, i follow it (or so i believe) to a great extent

 

[Centurion]

They are lizards, I suspect they spend a lot of their time basking in the sun.

I imagine a slow fist bump would be an appropriate saurus greeting, perhaps showing a closed fist instead of open claws is a sign of trust, representing being unarmed.

 

[Lizardmatt]

I picture them eating the fallen foes, then just basking in the sun, and standing in a tonic immobility until called on to kill again.

-Matt

 

[VampTeddy]

since the latter posts tend to disagree in humanising them for you as well let me point you towards scalenex who has a nasty habit of making his Saurus do silly stuff like think, using more than 100ish different words.

He has written some fluff pieces that represent Saurus in another manner. Intelligent manners as well.

TBH you can also just have your saurus train. I feel it's a waste of perfectly good guarding time, where you could guard important stuff or quickly eat to get back to guarding, maybe resting since they're born ready for battle and it is coded into their instinct, but if you're gonna change them, at least have them try and hold up some training, and some standard of life.

Consider to yourself how social your saurii are.

 

[NexS1]

I imagine a very strict routine of guarding, guarding and some more guarding, when not resting or eating they probably guard as well.

I like to look at my Saurus as inhumane fighting machines directed towards the enemies of the Old ones, killing without emotion and a proffesional instinct but the savagery of a beast when "activated" otherwise protecting the race as a whole as well as maintaining their own bodily function.

I feel a saurus should be Dumb in all aspects aside of war and strategy - i like the fluff GW wrote for saurus and as such, i follow it (or so i believe) to a great extent

This is my thougths as well. Seeing that the whole temple city is dictated by the telepathic directions from the slann in accordance with the Great Plan, I imagine that saurus would either be guarding as stated above or scouting support for the throwaway skinks.

 

[Scalenex]

Shameless self promotion powers: Activate! VampTeddy is right. I do try to give Saurus Warriors depth in all of my fluff pieces. This one is particular is primarily told from a Saurus' view.

The Lizardmen of a temple city are in disarray when all their Slann are missing.
The Orphaned Temple City

Note that Kaitar, the main character of this story, is somewhat of a prodigy by Saurus standards.

I try to keep the warrior mindset in mind, but I figure Sauri wouldn't be single minded killing machines like robots or monsters. I figure they'd have the depth of humans. They'd have the depth of simple humans, but not totally beyond our understanding.

I figure Sauri in smaller Temple Cities would have more room to grow in depth, being incorporated into patrols and the labor force during peace time. Larger temple cities wouldn't need to use Sauri in that way so they'd be pretty much ignored during peace time apart from occasional training. I figure all Sauri would have a sense of piety and religious devotion to the Old Ones.

I imagine Saurus intellect develops slowly over time. Scar Veterans would feel a paternal sense for the younger Sauri under their command. By the time they become Oldbloods they would become a bit more drone like though having seen so many of their own kind die. They would be more single-minded on warfare than Scar Veterans and tend to take a big picture view of things.

I imagine Temple Guard would definitely seem drone-like. Their sense of duty take the fore over everything else. They would have some depth to them, but one would have dig VERY deep to find it.

 

[aidanlynch]

Thanks for all the replies! I definitely think my saurus will be spending their time doing lots of valuable guarding!


In terms of"humanising" them I think I'm leaning in a slightly different direction. In Adrian Tchaikovsky's books, certain races (Inapt) are incapable of operating or even understanding the most basic technologies (locked doors really present problem)

I want to bring an element of this to the saurus. Obviously I'm not going to bring them to skink levels of intelligence and social skills. So the saurus will be capable of basic reasoning (hungry:hunt for food, skinks: useful, big dinosaurs: dangerous) Simple things like this that will give them a small bit of character. This is necessary because my army contains lots of saurus and not so many skinks.

Outside of battle my saurus will be guarding lots of important jungle-y things (thank you vampteddy) They will also be patrolling, eating resting and engaging in contests of strength carried to ridiculous extents (who can lift the heaviest stegadon tusk/horn, who can swing the largest war club, surviving encounters with captured denizens of the jungle and lots of wrestling with saurus from different spawnings)

 

[borkbork]

Probaly similar to what other profesional warrios do when not fighting,
(Knights, Samuri, ect..) mostly training, patroling, and guarding I would imagine.
.

hmmmm? what other profesional warriors do?

Than i thiink you are totally forgetting drinking, gambling and visiting the special lady lizards.

 

[n810]

except there are no female Lizardmen and they don't use money.

 

[Scalenex]

except there are no female Lizardmen and they don't use money.

Just because the LM are androgynous doesn't mean they couldn't have genders. Unfortunately no one bit on the fluff hypothetical question I posted months ago.

I've thought of introducing a currency but I wouldn't expect non-Skinks to use it.

On the whole though the behavior of human professional soldiers is of little help for how Sauri would act. Note they can't even really train. A human who trains for 20 years can become a Captain with WS 6 or 7. It takes a Saurus CENTURIES to get to WS6. They rely on instinct over training.

 

[n810]

True, but the again Saurus come out of the spawing pool at WS4.

 

[aidanlynch]

I love the idea of a skink currency! It would have to be something that would be rare in the Lustrian jungle though

I can just see a group of skinks eagerly trading their currency while a few baffled saurus look on wondering when they should just start killing things...

 

[Lizardmatt]

I love the idea of a skink currency! It would have to be something that would be rare in the Lustrian jungle though

I can just see a group of skinks eagerly trading their currency while a few baffled saurus look on wondering when they should just start killing things...

Feathers.

-Matt

 

[VampTeddy]

I love the idea of a skink currency! It would have to be something that would be rare in the Lustrian jungle though

I can just see a group of skinks eagerly trading their currency while a few baffled saurus look on wondering when they should just start killing things...

Feathers.

-Matt

Curiosities in general is what i think when you say that.

While gold holds minimal value, stuff such as toads in bright colors, Feathers, Beast hides, or souvenirs from enemy soldiers probably have humongous humorous value to the skinks. Untill a Slann finds out and confiscates the unholy relics of the lesser races on that last part.

 

[Centurion]

One of my friends is running a WHFRP game set in Lustria. He tends to go from older versions of the fluff and also gives his characters more human aspects.

His skinks trade using small bronze pieces as currency. Also his Saurus like to drink and test themselves with feats of strength like arm wrestling.

 

[Scalenex]

True, but the again Saurus come out of the spawing pool at WS4.

WS 3 unless you mean Temple Guard.

I have yet to make up my mind whether Temple Guard are special spawning or if they make up veterans pulled from other Saurus spawnings so I left that vague in my fluff pieces.