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Witches exist at all levels of society, including the top echelons. These individuals summon the orgone within themselves to perform various feats of magic through invocations. One brand of magic revolves around battle. These attacks can be very powerful, and consist of magical attacks and defenses. Some are designed to focus on a particular opponent, such as fireballs and beams of energy. Others are geared toward an entire area, such as lightning storms or small tornadoes, which can kill dozens if not hundreds of people. Still others focus completely on defending the user, such as magically generated shields or protective spells. Battle magic is powerful, and can turn the tide in war. However, they have some limitations which can effect their success.

  1. Invocations can last anywhere from 30 seconds to 5 minutes depending on the type and Power of the attack. They last for various durations. Some can be used repeatedly with the mage keeping the spell active by using a shorter version of the incantation (energy blasts, fireballs, etc). Others are one-shots, and the mage must start over from the beginning to use a second time.

  2. Battle magic requires a certain amount of orgone from the witch. The cost is determined by the power or length of the spell. Orgone replenishes over time at different rates depending on the user.

  3. Mages must be relatively close to the area they wish to target. They can be separated only by a few dozen feet in order to be in range, or the attack won't hit.

Basically, witches can be walking, fleshy tanks, and are very valuable to their societies. However, they can also be targets for assassination or sabotage by other rival covens or states. Therefore, they are often heavily protected by shield guards. The job of these guards is to keep their witch alive, and protect them while they are performing their invocations. They can range from one to several, depending on the importance and wealth of the witch.

It would be common sense for witches to use other witches to guard them, as one can focus on defense while the other on attacks. This would provide for an impenetrable combination. However, shield guards are always magic less. Instead, they use regular weapons to protect their wards.

Why would witches not use lower-tier witches to defend them and entrust their safety to non-magic users?

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    $\begingroup$ Basically, witches can be walking, fleshy tanks, and are very valuable to their societies. However, they can also be targets for assassination or sabotage by other rival covens or states. Therefore, they are often heavily protected by shield guards. The job of these guards is to keep their witch alive at all costs, and protect them while they are performing their invocations. They can range from one to several, depending on the importance and wealth of the witch. $\endgroup$
    – nzaman
    Dec 30, 2018 at 8:55
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    $\begingroup$ Why don't politicians, celebrities, and other bodyguard-using people in current society use other politicians, celebrities, &c as bodyguards? $\endgroup$
    – jamesqf
    Dec 30, 2018 at 19:16
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    $\begingroup$ @jamesqf Because politicians, celebrities, etc. aren't usually good in weapons use and hand-to-hand combat. A more appropriate question is: do professional wrestlers and prizefighters have bodyguards, and if so, why? $\endgroup$ Dec 30, 2018 at 21:07
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    $\begingroup$ @Shawn V. Wilson: No, it's not because the others are not good in weapons use &c. As the comment makes clear, some are. The first problem is that even if they were good, they have more profitable things to do. Why would you pay their astronomical salaries when you can hire perfectly competent non-celebrities for much less. Second, there are only a limited number of them: if they're doing bodyguard work, they can't be doing their day jobs. $\endgroup$
    – jamesqf
    Dec 31, 2018 at 4:21
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    $\begingroup$ To reflect @WillK's answer (which I honestly don't understand why it was deleted), no self-respecting witch would ever play second-fiddle to another witch. It's simply unheard of. Witches always see themselves individually as the top of the pyramid and no-one is their equal. They're witches for crying out loud. $\endgroup$
    – JBH
    Jan 1, 2019 at 8:49

6 Answers 6

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Body guards are supposed to cover the weak points of the target.

Invocations can last anywhere from 30 seconds to 5 minutes depending on the type and Power of the attack.

Mages must be relatively close to the area they wish to target. They can be separated only by a few dozen feet in order to be in range, or the attack won't hit.

Imagine how nice would it be that while the primary target is busy buzzing the main invocation, also the bodyguards start buzzing some other invocations. This would leave at least 5 seconds of vulnerability to a non magic attacker, or, even worse, would be totally useless against a ranged attack (an arrow takes less than 5 seconds to hit).

Therefore the bodyguards need to make a living testudo around their protegee, protecting the openings which are not well protected by magic.

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3 factors:

Range

Range of regular 9mm pistol: from 50 (effective) to 100 meters, according to Wikipedia. A rifle can do a few hundred meters for effective range, and kilometers for maximum range.

Range of a mage:

Mages must be relatively close to the area they wish to target. They can be separated only by a few dozen feet in order to be in range, or the attack won't hit.

I don't know how much "a few dozen feet" is for most people, but for example five dozen feet are a little less than 19 meters.

People in your world probably say things like "Don't bring spells to a gunfight".

Ammo

Ammo for guns is only ever spent when you fire the gun. The ammo for spells, though, is mana (called orgone in your world), which is spent when you cast. A mage may find theirself out of mana to cast a fireball because they had been repeatedly casting non-combat spells, such as Mine Manacoin or Naruto's spell Sexy no Jutsu.

Cost

Witches exist at the top echelons of society.

But regular bodyguards don't. I am quite sure the salary of a gun-bearing goon is orders of magnitude smaller than that of a witch.

It's like Jason Momoa and his bodyguards:

Khal Drogo and his Dothraki

Sure, they are less muscle than Momoa himself in a fight. But I bet their salary is less than, say, Terry Crews's and The Rock's.

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    $\begingroup$ Does Momoa require his bodyguard to wear his beard? And to be shorter to make him look bigger? (Or is it the case that most people are shorter than Jason Momoa?) $\endgroup$ Dec 30, 2018 at 21:09
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    $\begingroup$ @ShawnV.Wilson at 1.93m, I believe he is one or two standard deviations above the average human height. $\endgroup$ Dec 30, 2018 at 21:31
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    $\begingroup$ That's 6'4" for my fellow Americans. $\endgroup$ Jan 1, 2019 at 4:33
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Two witches performing magic in very close proximity to each other cause interference to each others magical "field".
This causes spells to have reduced effect or even total misfires (possibly causing harm to their own side or even themselves).
Additionally the witches have to pour more orgone into each spell to overcome the disturbance. This in turn causes more interference, etc. It also means the witch gets exhausted quicker.

So it is best to use non-magical guards as body-guard/flesh-shields. Especially as (non-magical) flesh also serves as a damper on the interference itself. This allows for some cooperation between witches, but doesn't let them work closely enough together that they can be effectively be guarding each other.

If a witch can draw orgone from other people (non-magical) the body-guard can also serve as an additional power-source for the witch.

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    $\begingroup$ And governments don't allow high value targets to be near each other on a predictable basis. A loss of more than one at a time would be devastating for their defense. $\endgroup$
    – Jammin4CO
    Dec 31, 2018 at 14:52
  • $\begingroup$ @Jammin4CO Didn't even think of that one. Good addition :-) $\endgroup$
    – Tonny
    Dec 31, 2018 at 16:44
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Magic disturb magic

If two witches are casting spells one near the other, their magical energies start disturbing and causing an error in their spells. This disturbing in the magical field can increase the casting time, decrease the power of the spell, their accuracy or even make them untestable and explode. That is why witches use non-magical bodyguards.

They are "very valuable" for society. Too much

As you said, they are very valuable, that means expensive. Hire a witch as a bodyguard is very expensive, you could hire a dozen magicless bodyguards.

Witches envy

Witches use to envy and hate other witches, all of them want to be the most famous and powerful, and so they can't have another witch as a friend, one of them would backstab the other at some time.

To counteract weakness

Magics takes time and energy to cast. If two witches were casting a spell at the same time, during a few seconds they would be vulnerable. Magicless bodyguards don't cast magic, and so they can protect witches while they cast magic.

Even more, what if a powerful rival witch cast anti-magic? Both the witch and his witch bodyguard would be useless. Having a bodyguard which doesn't relieve on magic is can literally save your life.

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Witches coordinating and protecting each other

While it is not plausible to have Witches protecting each other outside of battlefield, coordinating Witches IS a plausible battlefield tactic. One Witch could shield against attacks, while another is summoning up a powerful lightning bolt. And each Witch could take turns attacking and defending, without any of them being of a lower rank.

  • Magical shields may be impervious to magical attacks from the inside. And the guarding Witch will have to time the summoning and destruction of these shields.
  • This by no means replaces the regular Shield guards. Regular Shield guards have higher agility and can react faster to attacks and reduce the impact reaching the Valuable Witches.

Why this tactic is rarely used

  • Increased vulnerability. While the coordinating Witches can hold ground for longer, they aren't really an impenetrable combination. Stronger Witches or well-planned distributed attacks can bring them down. The enemy now gets to concentrate their attack on a single area and kill two Witches instead of one.
  • Reduced agility. The defending Witch reduces the agility of the troops. The non-magical shields are very agile and can track and attack quickly. You can consider this analogous to attacking from the sea Vs from the land in real-world.
  • In general distributed attacks are more effective than concentrated defences. While a Witch launches an attack from one direction, they are effectively defending the other Witches in other locations.
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Note: some of this answer is based on more recent developments in your magic system, that do not appear to have been established at the time this question was asked.

Limited resources
Eventually the defensive and offensive casters will run out of orgone, and then they're toast. A non-magical body-guard is able to continue fighting and protecting for much longer than the casters orgone supply will last. When they run out, their body-guard will keep them save until they can get to a safe place to recharge.

Additional resources
If the caster's body-guard is capable of storing orgone and allowing the caster to channel it, they not only gain protection, but also access to far more resources. This greatly extends their spell casting ability in ways that another caster cannot.

Vulnerability while defending another
It may be possible to target multiple entities simultaneously, but it is extremely difficult and requires immense focus. This is especially prominent when channeling defensive magic because the effects are only active while being channeled. You cannot just put a shield around someone and go back to other things, you must actively maintain the shield without losing focus. This means the caster can effectively focus on defending them self OR another, but not both (at least not with significant weakening of the effects). So, if they are focused on defending another caster, they are left extremely vulnerable themselves. This tactic is not uncommon, with certain casters specializing in defense magic, but it is only workable if there is also a body-guard (or multiple in some cases), trained in advanced physical combat, as it is not possible for them to defend the caster without also defending them self.

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