Awakened light artillery... the ultimate war machine pre gunpowder?

[DoctaDajman]

I know that there are some pretty fantastical powers in the cosmere, but I always want to give a shout out to awakening when I can... because it is awesome. 

This mornings shower thought had me thinking of the use of Mastiffs through history as wardogs. Large and strong. Historical claims of being armored and sent into the thick of battles. A nearly 200lb dog that is set on destroying you is a terrifying thought.  

I imagine some obedience training from puppy to adulthood would be helpful as they should understand the commands to an extent. But even the best trained dogs can go off script... 

But how much more terrifying if they are lifeless? Perfectly obedient. They feel no pain and have to have their ability to move destroyed to stop them.

A lifeless 200lb dog is terrifying. What if you up it beyond that. An awakened sling with a pouch of lead projectiles harnessed on the back of the lifeless. A large rope awakened to grapple anything the dog is attacking. 

Why not both? 

I believe I read once that the dogs would be sent at a group of enemies while the archers would shoot at the same group forcing a conundrum upon the enemy forces. Use your shields to stop the wave of dogs or the wave of arrows. 

Now your wave of dogs is also sending volleys of lead projectiles and once they hit your front line their awakened ropes will start entangling and wrestling weapons and shields away from your fighters.  

 

Perhaps it is a colossal waste of breaths when talking large scale and the dogs could break a leg or something more irreparable. 

Maybe it is a better thought in more modern days. A law enforcement k9 that will never disobey, will never grow tired, and can still function for whatever task you give it?  Armed with ropes awakened to restrain resisting persons. The officer never has to put himself in danger. 

Anyways. Shower rant over. 

[king of nowhere]

awakening a dog costs 1 breath. cost effective, that works. do notice that dogs are still vulnerable to being skewered and sliced as much as anyone else on the battlefield. if they were all that effective, they'd have been used a lot more often.

awakening a rope costs dozens and dozens of breath. that's very expensive, and the rope can be cut. not effective.

putting the rope on the back of a running dog.... what kind of accuracy can you reach that way? if you want to convert breath into artillery fire, it's much more effective to use one single breath to awaken an archer. if you want to awaken a rope contraption to toss stuff, you can do it, but you certainly don't want to send it in the middle of the fray where it's easily destroied.

[DoctaDajman]

16 minutes ago, king of nowhere said:

awakening a dog costs 1 breath. cost effective, that works. do notice that dogs are still vulnerable to being skewered and sliced as much as anyone else on the battlefield. if they were all that effective, they'd have been used a lot more often.

awakening a rope costs dozens and dozens of breath. that's very expensive, and the rope can be cut. not effective.

putting the rope on the back of a running dog.... what kind of accuracy can you reach that way? if you want to convert breath into artillery fire, it's much more effective to use one single breath to awaken an archer. if you want to awaken a rope contraption to toss stuff, you can do it, but you certainly don't want to send it in the middle of the fray where it's easily destroied.

A lifeless in armor, and I did specify some light armoring for the dogs, is a total menace. They feel no pain and until completely bled out of their ichor alcohol or shattered to the point of not having any mobility, they will continue their attempts to follow commands. 

We know that awakened ropes have been used as siege weapons slinging massive rocks. This will be on a smaller scale. We also see awakened objects catch arrows which requires more timing and accuracy than 99.9999% of humans would ever be capable of... for that reason I dont think that having a rope sling a projectile from a moving animal to a moving target would be as impossible as you make it sound. 

Despite what it may look like in chopping competitions and forged in fire... awakened ropes are not being held taught nor are they set against a solid cutting board background to chop through. I dont think the average foot soldier would be able to effortlessly cut through ropes in a struggle. 

You still have a densely packed 200lb ACL tearing machine running at you somewhere in the range of 25-30mph slinging lead and a rope with minds of their own set on taking you out. They probably weigh more with armor on as well. 

This is absolutely not an easy thing to escape from.  Your only hope is survive the slinging lead, bypass the ropes, destroy enough legs to stop the dog from running, and then leg it before being grabbed and pulled in to the animal.