Things Better Left Unvisited:
Exactly What It Sounds Like, Mates.
I imagine trying to write a story of archaic, pre-medeval style battles and adventures may be a bit of a challenge for the human born in modern times, where swords go on walls or in display cases--not on belts or lodged in the still-beating hearts of your enemies.
But some things are just plain common sense.
Case in point, a la Lucky Revieweur, Guosim shrews.
For two seconds in one or two books, their fabled battle tactic was to press themselves back to back to back to back, ffoursquare, fighting off numerous enemies that had surrounded them by slashing about with their tiny little rapiers at usually armored foes. If you ignore the honest fact that an undersized rapier would be inefficient at dealing with chainmailed foes, not to mention useless against any amount of platemail, this "strategy" is very dumb.
Not only is it liable to get all four shrews killed, it doesn't even work.
Go on, get three friends. Now get a gang of bikers to cooperate and be your "enemies". Try to press all four of your backs together and stay that way (even standing still this should be difficult) for the course of the next step: I'm going to give you lot the best possible chance and give you all spathas instead of shrunken rapiers designed for something the size of a hobbit compared to you. While continuously spinning in place, keep the bikers from mauling you. Go on, try. It won't work, I assure you. I have the field test research. What with all the shifting and movement of battle, one of you WILL OVERBALANCE, FALL ON YOUR ASS, AND DOOM YOUR COMRADES.
*The Guosim Windmill Strikes Again*
"Wait, what's a windmill?" A shrew asked, having never heard of such a thing as one doesn't seem to exist in the Redwallverse. Another shrew smacked him to shut him up and keep him from breaking the fourth wall.
"Let's do it, mates!" the lead shrew grinned fearlessly, facing off with the surrounding vermin and being happy to kill something in a rather douchebaggy manner. His fellow shrew knew what to do, and assumed the position. The leader of their attackers, a big stoat, looked suddenly aghast.
"Is that wot I think it is?!" he stammered, recoiling in fear. Several weasels and rats began to shake. Not the Guosim Windmill, the scourge of creatures that tried to surround shrews, even though being completely surrounded is one of the greatest "Oh shit" moments in all of war history.
Then the shrews began their attack (preemptively, but screw it, they're the heroes)! Spinning rapidly, the four creatures pressed up against each other as the deadly whirl of blades came closer to the stoat and his creatures.
"NOOOOOO!" the vermin leader shrieked, covering his face and convinced he was about to die. There was an odd thumping and clattering sound, which caused the stoat to look up. The shrews, dizzy from spinning and unbalanced from being thrown off by their own fellows counter-balancing themselves, had tripped and fallen over hilariously in a heap, their pathetic undersized rapiers cast aside in the chaos.
The weasels and rats were too busy laughing their asses off to even follow through with their plans of capturing the shrews for ransom. Everywhere myurid rodents and skinny mustelids fell about, some driven to tears and breathless. So THIS was the great Guosim Windmill, eh?
Another point I have to make: There is never any strategy employed in hardly any of the goodbeasts or Redwallers, or even most of the Long Patrollers, battle plans. There's plenty of useful battle TACTICS, but no strategy. Strategy is the long-term planning of the method of war, not the tricks in smaller-scale scuffles that help individual soldiers survive. A good tactic would be to never hide behind the same boulder when avoiding arrows twice. A good strategy would be to employ the use of phalanx and cavalry units to drive the foe into a cornered area where they cannot defend themselves and are therefore forced to either surrender or retreat and yield a valuable asset to your side.
Most of the Redwallverse's war involve two sides finding each other wherever they may be and furiously charging at each other in a loose mob.
Most of the fighting groups in Redwall's world are too specialized in their weaponry to be of much use on a true battlefield. The shrews JUST have rapiers, slings, maybe bows, not a whisper of an axe, mace, shield, or even a FRICKIN' POLEARM variety. Otters and squirrels almost never seem to have anything on them but ranged weapons (except that one time at the veeeeeeery end of Taggerung where a "longblade" is mentioned, but I don't know what the heck that's supposed to be). How do they end up faring so well in close combat? They ought to be getting hacked to pieces by weasels and ferrets wielding halberds and shields and longswords and flails. Doubly odd when you remember the bit from the second installment, about the armor...
But the most irritating thing for me is the fact that the only groups that ever employ a phalanx, bar none THE most effective and lethal element of ancient armies' success in the history of large armies, end up being portrayed as a bumbling, hapless, undisciplined rabble that isn't even smart enough to remember that the helmet goes on the HEAD. And they always lose. Guess which groups these are yet?
Yep. Vermin groups. Kotir's army especially. They run drills every other week, and in those drills they never muss it up. Yet somehow in a real scrap their brains turn to mush and their spears, shields, and extensive phalanx training is about as useful as grape Jello.
*How Long Patrol Got Beat All To Hell So Very Very Easily*
Alexander the Great, by far the most successful conqueror that ever lived thus far, stood victorious over the cowering surrendering army of these unusual large rabbits his armies had encountered on their march north. The idiotic lagomorphs were obviously unskilled in the art of war, as their first move in the war had been to charge out from their mountain fortress's gates, a big berserk badger at their head. None of them appeared to even be wearing armor, and their weapons were truly ill-equipped for fighting his phalanx infantry. Though they HAD used pikes, they had used them ALL WRONG, sort of running willy-nilly with them spread out throughout the horde. Not very effective--a real army would have massed the pikes at the front. The rest had a hodge-podge of light swords, daggers, and a few axes and other blade varieties, none of them long enough to pass the FREAKIN' FIFTEEN FOOT TO TWENTY ONE FOOT IMPALING IMPLEMENTS OF DOOM his phalanx utilized. The badger had been so easy too: He merely commanded his beasts to side-step him and he ran heedless into the ocean and drowned himself, probably believing the whole time that he was winning.
"You northerners," Alexander chuckled. The hares scowled, "Such barbarians. Anyways, now that you are utterly defeated...Wanna join my global trade nation? You can govern your own shores!" He winked, "And if you direct me to some handsome leverets, I'll let you keep half the taxes too."
The hares stood slack-jawed, not learned enough in Greek culture to even know they were supposed to either blush or snicker.
"What kind o' beast is he?" one hare whispered. The one who received the message shrugged.
"I dunno. I don't bother to learn stuff from outside th' country, wot. The Great Jakes dislikes foreigners, remember?"
"Oh, yeah. Wot."
More may follow. If you like, you may leave an as-of-yet unanswered bit of unusual Redwall yore as a suggestion, but it is more than likely I'll cover the grand majority of oddness and unmentioned unmentionableness.