[center][color=#ff8c00][h2]Cadmon Demet[/h2][/color][/center]
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[color=#ff8c00]"Perhaps I'm expecting too much intelligence from our target,"[/color] Cadmon started slowly, turning from Guillaume back to the wider discussion. [color=#ff8c00]"But this seems a bit too transparent, unless we intend to put our helpful merchant in harm's way. If they're even remotely competent—and given the success they've been having, we've no reason to assume they aren't—they'll have some clue that they've been watched. Tracked. Some clue that we're [i]here."[/i][/color] It would be utterly ridiculous if this cult thought otherwise, given that Velvetica's band was not exactly [i]small.[/i]

If they somehow weren't aware, he'd execute their leader himself given the chance for the sheer stupidity of it. [color=#ff8c00]"For a strategy like that, we'd be better off waiting for an actual supply train to use as unwitting bait. Let them lull themselves into a false sense of security, thinking that we're giving them time to work, prepare, or simply remove themselves. Otherwise, I imagine they're expecting us to commit full force like a band of holy warriors seeking to...I don't know, stamp out their blight from the land or some such.[/color]

[color=#ff8c00]"I suggest we do something they wouldn't expect, but would put their trust in, and treat them as a genuine military target."[/color] He sweeped his hand to encompass the two next to him, his knuckles rapping against István's breastplate at the end of the gesture as he pointed to Urden with the other. [color=#ff8c00]"Send out our own smaller raiding parties. Skirmishers from the vanguard, testing their defences. Lighter groups, but still tantalizing targets. They'll think they can fairly safely hunt down and kill these raiders we send to test their mettle, add their corpses and any of their own fallen to their forces, and that we'll be waiting for the return of any survivors and their word—giving these cultists time to fortify, or perhaps to achieve their goal and vacate the area."[/color]

All standard, by the book tactics, up to that point. Send out the expendables to determine the strength of the enemy force, wait and draw up a new plan if they turn out to be stronger than initially estimated. [color=#ff8c00]"Instead, [i]against[/i] common practice, we'll populate these raiding parties with some of our best, who can make sure to draw these brigands out, make them commit more than they otherwise might have. Not expecting that we'll be far closer than they expect, and after they've spread their lines thin we can mount our full assault: Our main can envelop their extended parties sent chasing our raiders, cleaning them up quickly as we all recombine and push into them. Accelerating the course of the battle, rather than attempting a deception which seems—to me—too likely to be caught on."[/color]