Chapter 30
“Not now, Fern,” I said and pushed the timberwolf to the side. He whined and then settled down on the floor next to me.
I looked across the table to my guests. Sunset Shimmer was the one I knew best. The rest were guard ponies.
Sergeant Bronze Shield was an older earth pony with light bronze color coat and of the Solar Guard as it officially was called.
Sergeant Night Wind was younger and a pegasus of the Lunar Guard. He had a dark, almost black coat and even darker mane.
Lieutenant Flarefire was the last one, a unicorn of the Solar Guard. Being of the same colour of Sunset, his mane was a bright red.
All these three ponies had one thing I common. Their main job in the guard was training ponies not to get themselves killed and to work together.
“Okay, so here it is,” I said and looked between them, “I need a plan for training my guard and the normal one for day or night won’t work.”
“May I ask why, Lord Page?” Flarefire asked.
I nodded, “For one thing, they will be doing very little guarding. I plan to have them be a bit more proactive in their defence of Equestria. Forget about threats like Tirek and Sombra, very few ponies can do something about that, but there are smaller threats. Like Starlight Glimmer.”
Sunset frowned at me, “You are going to turn them into a replacement of the Warmages?”
“Not at all,” I said and shook my head, “Just a different kind of defence. The day and night guards are focused on keeping ponies safe. I want my guard to focus on making the threat go away. Not sure it’ll work as I don’t plan for the group to get that big, but still.”
Night Wind frowned in thought, “Offense to our defence?”
“Just as so,” I agreed, “So as you see, the normal guard doctrine wouldn’t work.”
Flarefire didn’t look overly enthusiastic, “I’m still not convinced about the idea of mare guards, but we should be able to work something out.”
“My first idea is to continue on the normal guards tendency to work in pairs with unicorns,” I said, “One defending and one attacking. My idea is to split everypony into teams of three, each with a unicorn, earth pony and pegasi.”
Sunset slowly nodded, “To cover each other’s weaknesses.”
“More or less,” I agreed, “Thoughts?”
“Could work,” Bronze Shield said and looked thoughtful, “Training would need to be quite different though. I would recommend doing the teaming up of the groups early to build friendships and bonds among the group.”
“Sunset?” I asked her, “How does the ratio of the ponies left stand?”
She checked her list, “The ones that finished training is actually pretty even split. There is enough for eight teams and one extra pegasus.”
Flarefire nodded, “We’ll figure it out.”
Sunset nodded with a smile, “I have some ideas. We’ll go through the current books on guard training and see what we can find and give you a summary report, Lord Page.”
It was really, really weird hearing Sunset calling me that. But she did for really official business.
“Sounds good to me,” I agreed, “How soon do you think it can be done?”
“Week or so?” Sunset said with a frown, “I have already read most of them, we just need to agree on what parts work with the new direction and what need to be scrapped.”
I nodded, “Anything else for today?”
Flarefire spoke up, “I think we have everything we need for now, Lord Page. We’ll get back to you as soon as we have the material ready.”
“Very well, dismissed,” I said with a smile, “And thank you.”
All three filed up, giving their goodbyes while Sunset stayed behind. The door closed behind them and I sighed and smiled at her, “So… how many of these have you had?”
“At least one a day,” she admitted, “Could have been worse, most of them are short like this.”
“Thanks again for handling this for me.”
“You owe me big, wingboy,” she said and got up to stretch, rubbing her neck, “Speaking of which, I could use a spa visit.”
I just chuckled, “Have fun and have them send me the bill.”
That caused her to light up in a happy smile, “Awesome. Thanks,” then looked at me, “Wanna come?”
“Never been to a spa before,” I admitted, “But some other time I think, I have a lot of stuff to do. Ask again next week.”
“Will do. Have fun.”
“Yes. Fun.”
Sunset winked and gathered up her papers and left, leaving me and Fern alone in the meeting room. Sighing, I looked down at the chlorofiend, “Now then, let’s get you that walk you wanted,” I told him, “We can go to the garden and you can soak some sunlight while I read the papers I’m sure Velvet have waiting for me outside that door. Sound good?”
The pet/houseplant surged to his paws with a mruf.
Walk. Yes, that’s a word he knew. A dog is a dog, no matter what it was made of.
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*shipping intensifies*
I can't help but wonder if Page's guard will have visual enchantment to look like batpony mares.
Its been awhile since we've seen Fern. I had missed the little guy. As for Page's guard I do like that he's thinking more attack than defense and I especially like the group system he's putting into place.
"An earth pony to shoulder the burdens, a pegasus to protect, and a unicorn to light the way." (I couldn't find the exact quote, let me know if you know of it.)
Teams of three are too small to be tactically viable. With that few individuals there aren't enough bodies to watch each others backs effectively, and that's without considering the fact that the pegasus is going to be in the air most of the time, it violates the sensible unicorn pairs thing you mentioned, and instantly collapses if there is even one casualty. I would say groups of six are the minimum viable size so that's probably what you want to go for with such a small unit (9 would be much better), but even there one casualty will basically bring down the unit so you really want to be deploying those in pairs so one can pull the other out if it gets in trouble. That would give you 4 squads of 6 grouped into 2 deployable platoons of 12 (plus a courier since you have an extra pegasus, although she can also be folded in to reinforce a squad if you want) in the short term, and as you add more ponies it can be reinforced to squads of 9 and platoons of 18 which will make the units much more survivable on the battlefield because they will have some level of tolerance for casualties. Modern military organization would break those squads down into fireteams of 3~4, but without firearms you won't have the fire and maneuver doctrine that drives that split so it doesn't make sense to use it in this context.
8709650
No, of anything the visual enchantment would make them look... dreamy.
*badum tish*
News of the guard! Very interesting development. Have to say I'm intrigued to see what form Page's guard will take.
8709690
Wow...[nods in respect] That is very well explained. Play chess or are you just knowledgeable?
8709810
Thanks, and to answer your question it's mostly the latter. I like to keep an eye on military stuff in general because it's interesting and tends to be one of the most important factors in how things play out no matter what the economists tell themselves, and I have spent a stupid amount of time on Wikipedia which is always a good way to learn tons of stuff about all kinds of things.
I'm still surprised he's actually going through with the mare only guard though.
Some designs for the Page Guard\Dream Guard
camo.derpicdn.net/cca43f3891a6fd8b62da1b58474a7a10e988c116?url=https%3A%2F%2Fpre00.deviantart.net%2Fa50b%2Fth%2Fpre%2Ff%2F2018%2F032%2Fd%2Fc%2Fdreamguard_by_aprion-dc1v6hu.jpg by Aprion
camo.derpicdn.net/44f7a9ba0a796e137faf68a3b3b9f61ee0f5c587?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.imgur.com%2FqFOs130.jpg by Archerstern
8709878
I'm thinking more silver and blue personally.
camo.derpicdn.net/19f6815a735d8bef1209ae4987fa6ccd461ec2db?url=https%3A%2F%2Forig00.deviantart.net%2Fc6bd%2Ff%2F2018%2F033%2F1%2F5%2Fdream_guard_by_sipioc-dc203us.jpg by me.
Side note: I Imagine the armor being enchanted to turn all Predator Invisable like.
Those of you want to do your own here the template - camo.derpicdn.net/447f9b032ccae70af5b90cb723d2b67c64570f32?url=https%3A%2F%2Forig00.deviantart.net%2F9415%2Ff%2F2018%2F032%2F2%2Fa%2Fthe_dream_guard__template__by_sipioc-dc1ucs5.jpg
8709880
Okay. Maybe more Archer’s design then?
8709931
I like both, really. But I can't help but the colours are a bit too strong. They don't feel like they fit Page.
8710102
Noted. I will tinker
8710077
That would be entertaining.
Aw, my guess at them being social workers, therapists, and etcetera, was wrong!
A proactive guard, eh? Let me guess, this fic. is building towards something? Like the Season 6 finale, maybe?
8710417
Chyrsallis gave her crown to Skitter, Starlight is likely still in prison crying herself to sleep, and Discord is fearing for his life; so nothing bad should happen for season six.
8711088
Huh. So.... what kind of threat would a proactive guard be good for then? Hmmmmm.
...are we going to have more Dresden Files references? :)
8711088
Chrysalis is still around, Starlight Glimmer is Twilight Sparkle's friendship student (granted, it was a one comment throwaway line thus far), and Blank Page was told Discord was hiding at Fluttershy's and basically said he didn't care last story after Twilight Sparkle brought it up, so long as he doesn't abuse his powers.
8709680
Ayyyy thats from kudzuhaikus fic right? I love that line
D’aawww! Little Fern just wants to be walked!
8713491
You mean 'The Chase'?
8711359
Well, Chrysalis is old and is soon to be dead so I don't think she can't do lot and I'd she did well, her race is fucked
Don't you mean "chlorofriend"?
Puppy Timberwolf
The Warmages are going to be awesome
in
Assassin creed like offensive agents for Blank Page military?
I know that I'm 6 years too late to offer a suggestion, but Page's guard should have black uniforms, so they can be the Mares in Black. 'Questria defenders! Here come the Mares in Black!
I'll just show myself out....
