Toulmore Mortar Team. Two Models!
The 5cm Mark 2 Infantry Mortar is a weapon with an unusual heritage—it was originally created as a device for throwing lifesaving lines aboard ships that had grounded near shore. The design languished in a museum until a Tokish naval artillery officer rediscovered it and copied the design as a flare projector. Not long after, Alykinder himself deployed the Mark 1 mortar in his early Lake Morandi campaign. These early mortars were little more than the naval flare projectors dismounted from ships and remounted on simple metal plates. The Mark 2, with its improved mounting and recoil systems, became the standard light mortar of the Crusader infantry. The two-Quar crew can quickly bring fragmenting, smoke, or illumination rounds to bear in combat, and the mortar itself is easily packed and transported, in keeping with the philosophy of the Crusader Light Infantry.
Crusader doctrine has evolved, and now the venerable Mark 2 Infantry Mortar is mostly found in Toulmorese line catrawds. The joke among Crusader infantry is that even Crusader GHQ in Tok found arguing with the Toulmorese syrnols to turn in their brigades’ mortars to be too exhausting to be worth the effort. This joke is seldom told in earshot of the Toulmorese, though.
