Ripped Banners

Profile¶

Also known as: Rypes
Kind: Mercenary tradition of independent companies
Purpose: Sell disciplined infantry service to any employer who pays
Founded: Centuries ago, before Jorgen
Organizational state: Active
Scale: Each company musters approximately 300–500 soldiers. A major muster may unite 8–12 companies and 3 000–5 000 soldiers. No reliable total exists across the different realms, and each company has its own baggage train.
Reach: Algeron and neighboring realms, including overseas assignments
Influence: Notable among soldiers, nobles, and the Algeronian Crown
Stability: Contested but steady. Companies change with each muster, while the royal-contracted minority and shared customs preserve continuity.
Headquarters or seat: No central headquarters. Companies use seasonal mustering grounds in Algeron.
Leader: No single leader. Each company has its own Captain. Clyden von Mortborg is one prominent present Captain among many.
Reputation: Initially held in little regard, the Ripped Banners became famous after several victories. Nobles now send their offspring to prove themselves among them.
Symbol or identifying mark: The stolen banner with which the tradition began
Motto: Paid Together, Buried Together

Purpose and Agenda¶

Their companies exist to fight for pay. Shared law and custom let them remuster under the same tradition whenever employment appears.

Current objective: Survive and find employment for their independent companies.
If unopposed: Enough companies find work to remuster at full strength and form decisive field armies.

Organization¶

The Ripped Banners are a shared mercenary tradition made up of independent companies, not a single cohesive unit. Each company has its own Captain, Ring, judges, roster, seasonal mustering ground, and baggage train.

The Captain controls contracts, marches, and battle. The Ring decides company-wide rules and major internal matters. Internal judges resolve ordinary disputes. The Captain judges military crimes before the assembly.

The Ring is a meeting where everyone comes close together to make decisions. People seeking to join enter with spear in hand. Members know one another and make decisions together.

Membership and Culture¶

Recruitment and Muster¶

Recruiters travel to invite people to the place of recruitment. They may also pay for their journey.

At the place of recruitment, prospective recruits are assessed one at a time.

Each contract creates one or more newly mustered companies under the Ripped Banners' shared customs.

After wars, infantrymen can settle in other cities and often want to be enlisted again.

They use tricks to receive more money or appear more numerous. A company's Captain receives more money this way, but may share some of it:

They pass the same armor among themselves.
They present themselves at multiple recruitment desks under different names.
They present non-soldiers, such as boys.

With their first payment, they become members of a Ripped Banners company and fall under the tradition's shared military law. Their letter of hire specifies that they answer only to Ripped Banners law.

They call one another "Brother Devil," using brother in the sense used by monks or friars.

Shovelers¶

Shovelers work as military engineers. They also repair roads to assist marches, but they are despised and are rejected as soldiers either during recruitment or after some time in service. Other soldiers refuse to perform these duties because of honor.

Operations and Practices¶

Contracts and Pay¶

Soldiers receive double pay for experience, a dangerous role, better equipment, or a poorly regarded role.

Those receiving double pay include:

The executioner. The King of Algeron protects him because otherwise everyone would kill him. He may have assistants and, in addition to carrying out sentences, must dispose of the bodies.
Police personnel, who are despised.
Soldiers with better armor or better equipment.
Nobles, who often receive double pay.

They want a bonus payment for battle. Their monthly pay covers only marching and being present.

Captains conceal dead soldiers on the payroll and inherit their equipment. The practice is widely suspected but rarely proven.

Law and Assemblies¶

Unauthorized assemblies are forbidden. They are held anyway when commanders do not respect the rules, such as when pay arrives late or provisions are insufficient.

Justice is administered by the commander before the assembly. In theory, everyone is equal and there are no privileges.

They are supposed to be equals, but nobles are often privileged.

Doctrine and Battlefield Customs¶

Captains who keep infantrymen out of excessively dangerous battles are greatly loved.

Captains and officers also fight in the front line.

They kiss the ground before battle.

Their combat formations are the Points, Squares, and Hedgehogs. Points are deep attacking columns with a narrow triangular front, used to break a chosen part of the enemy line. Squares are compact pike blocks that advance while archers and crossbowmen screen their flanks. Hedgehogs are defensive squares whose outer ranks brace their weapons outward on every side against cavalry.

A company's banner and its veteran guard lead parades, followed by the Captain and officers, the main body, recruits, and the baggage train.

They have double-pay infantrymen.

Pike formations made cavalry charges increasingly dangerous, so nobles left the cavalry to join the prestigious front ranks of the infantry.

They remain on a battlefield for three days, with the associated looting and destruction.

Artillerymen maintain a common fund to support their members. Infantrymen do not.

Life Between Contracts¶

During peacetime, 5–10% of all active Ripped Banners remain under the standing royal contract. The rest are without a contract.

When they have no contract, they travel with wanderers, circuses, and similar groups. They also commit arson and other crimes on request. Powerful people declare them outlaws, while rural innkeepers assist them, partly under threat.

They die far more often from disease when they remain in one place for too long.

Safe Conduct¶

At the end of a war, a Captain often grants safe-conduct so mercenaries who have violated their home country's prohibition against mercenary service can return home. After further acts of valor, they can enter the standing royal contingent, which places them under the protection and jurisdiction of the King of Algeron.

Baggage Trains¶

Each company has its own baggage train, whose members are selected during the muster.

The commander of a baggage train is called the Sergeant of the Wagons or Sergeant of the Women. This position is often held by an old or disabled soldier. It requires military organizational skills, including managing marches and encampments.

The provost maintains cleanliness and order and prevents fraud. Everyone owes the provost a tax. The provost also establishes weights and maximum prices.

Some traders leave the camp to conduct illicit sales and avoid paying the provost.

Enemy spies, disguised soldiers, hostile merchants, and known opponents can all be encountered within a baggage train. It is an excellent place for espionage.

The provost often abuses the position. Infantrymen are cheated twice over because the sutlers pass the provost's costs on to them.

Members of a baggage train often refuse to help during attacks, such as by making fascines. Those who break the refusal are denied the right to loot. Infantrymen who sympathize with those helpers defend them as their own.

It is not feasible for a company to eliminate or reduce its baggage train.
Each company requires its baggage train for multiple reasons:
- Provides supplies and assistance to soldiers.
- Offers soldiers opportunities to buy, sell, and trade.
- Serves as a place for leisure and private life for soldiers.
- Cares for sick and wounded soldiers through medical stations and hospitals.
- Handles hygienic tasks and certain military duties.
- Each infantry group trains selected baggage-train youths and helpers as future members, following the idea that "war feeds war."
Leading the procession: the commander of the baggage train on horseback, holding a command staff.
- Behind the commander, a tired horse carrying two well-dressed and attractive women sharing the same horse.
- Following them is the entire population of the baggage train, without any order:
  - People on foot and carts.
  - Pack animals and wagons.
  - People carrying baskets, crates, bundles, and sacks.
  - The group includes children, women, men, young and old.
  - A chaplain cheerfully drinking.
  - The standard-bearer of the baggage train, surrounded by girls.
  - A shoe seller with a load of shoes.
It is also used for planning and organizing by the commander and Captain.
Authorities recognize the military usefulness of the baggage train.
From the Ripped Banners' earliest musters, members of the baggage train have performed tasks like digging ditches and fortifying camps.
They fill gabions for the trenches and weave brushwood bundles.
Men in each baggage train are civilians under the Ripped Banners' shared military law.
Key members of the baggage train include butchers and cooks with numerous helpers, men and women.
Nothing from the animals slaughtered by the butchers goes to waste in the army kitchens.

Reach and Assets¶

Holdings: No fixed holdings. Each company's banner, wagons, stores, and equipment are mobile assets.
People: Independent companies of approximately 300–500 soldiers, each accompanied by its own baggage train and specialists
Resources: Military equipment, the standing royal contract, legal protection, and seasonal mustering grounds
Notable assets: Experienced double-pay soldiers, trained formations, the original stolen banner, and multiple baggage trains
Sources of power: Military strength and battlefield reputation
Vulnerabilities: Most members lack employment during peace and may fragment into outlaw bands. They depend on regular pay and supplies, and unpaid soldiers prey on employers and civilians. Disease, accumulated wounds, and veteran losses weaken their formations.

Relations¶

Algeron: Patron and recurring employer. The standing royal contract protects and employs 5–10% of the Ripped Banners during peace.
Jorgen: Historical commander. He led a major muster centuries ago and secured the standing royal contract.
Coldwharf: Resentful but dependent. A Ripped Banners company guarded the village, lived off its stores, and demanded payment it could not afford.
Survivors of the disgraced company: Enemies. Scattered survivors and descendants preserve their grievance over the stolen banner and the revenge that followed Bernaz.

History¶

Founding¶

The Ripped Banners began with a mercenary company that stole the banner of an older company. The older company had fallen into disgrace after its leader abandoned it.

Centuries ago, Jorgen commanded a major muster of Ripped Banners during the fighting in Alaman, the defeat at the Pit of Bernaz, and the revenge that followed. During that revenge, Jorgen secured the standing royal contract.

Abandonment of Alaman¶

They fought inside Alaman during the Magic Plague and were evacuated by sea. When symptoms appeared, they were put ashore without receiving their pay. Alaman refused to readmit them for three days, and they began to starve. They were eventually admitted. Several hospitals were required. Soldiers died there and were left behind.

Pit of Bernaz¶

The Pit of Bernaz was where the Rypes suffered a brutal defeat against the survivors of the disgraced company whose banner they had stolen. They were slaughtered while attempting to flee across a lake.

During the following years, they hunted the surviving officers and remnants of the company.

Notable People¶

Clyden von Mortborg's Company¶

The roster below belongs to one current company within the wider Ripped Banners tradition.

Command¶

Clyden von Mortborg: Prominent present Captain, spear-and-shield fighter with amnesia.
Jorrik von Mirellason: Second Captain, megalomaniac opposed to ranged attacks.

Current Roster¶

Ingomar Leitner: Youngblood archer replacing two or three badly injured predecessors.
Constantine Leitner: Veteran champion armed with a halberd.
Ferrick Amarante: Newly recruited champion with mace and shield.
Rudiger Dressler: Mage occasionally confused in battle after head trauma.
Farthrokk Rottenfest: Blond ogre armed with an axe.
Gunnar Hoft: One-handed veteran with amnesia, founding member.
Ottmar Geldhander: Agile, heavily injured veteran, near-founding member.
Rambrecht Neubert: One-legged veteran with sword and shield, founding member.
Sander Jorg: Mercenary taken from another company, repeatedly broken jaw.
Torben Albrecht: Heavily armored soldier nearing veteran status.
Levi Holm: Injured new soldier who refuses to flee.
Wolfram the Butcher: Violent former cultist who refuses to die.
Sigmund Heidelore: Scar-free veteran archer called the Lucky One.
Helmut Wehrsteiner: Scarred crossbowman with a damaged eye.
Erdmann Volker: Newly recruited archer.
Edmund the Blessed: Wild man indebted for repeated thefts.
Thilmann "Last Cut": Late-arriving former butcher and excellent two-handed swordsman.
Theudobald "Bloods": Former miner promoted for command while bleeding heavily.
Horik "Dong" or "Dong Dong": Timid former militiaman wielding a two-handed warhammer.

Former Members¶

Hermann von Mirellason: Former Captain expelled from Clyden's company, Jorrik's brother.
Otthein Bieswag: Beloved archer who lost an arm and became a beggar.
Herman Sobolinski: Former mage who went mad.

Currents¶

Pressure: Most Ripped Banners companies are trying to survive and find employment.
Internal tension: The protected royal minority stands apart from the contractless majority.
Active move: Independent Captains seek employers and attempt to remuster their companies at full strength.
At stake: Without contracts, companies may fragment into crime and outlawry. With enough work, major musters can form again as decisive field armies.