The Battle of Harken Field began at the ninth hour with the thundermakers.
The barbarian batteries opened from the ridgeline positions that every previous engagement had taught them to occupy, heavy weapons firing in the staggered sequence that sustained continuous bombardment. The dwarven-forged balls struck the Threian formation's center at eight hundred paces, each impact a concussive event that scattered soldiers and cratered the ground and produced the psychological effect that thundermaker fire imposed on infantry formations: the knowledge that the weapon firing at them could not be silenced because the weapon's ammunition was supplied by forges that never stopped producing.
