Adventurer's Guild [AGSA] Adventurer's Guild Sky Archipelago - OOC Room

ohko

ohko

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Ah, on the comment of Duke Grogar's title being general vs admiral, that would depending on how you saw the majority of the Archipelago's military engagements.

For instance, if the archipelago were to invade a regular country (on the surface), they would still need to land an army on the ground. The ground battle would probably be decisive for any invasion, in the sense that the Archipelago could reasonably be expected to always have air superiority. Probably no other nation in the entirety of the Old World possessed as many airships as the Archipelago.

Defending the the Archipelago, on the other hand, could probably rely 100% on a navy.
 
The_Everdistant_Utopia

The_Everdistant_Utopia

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ohko said:
Ah, on the comment of Duke Grogar's title being general vs admiral, that would depending on how you saw the majority of the Archipelago's military engagements.

For instance, if the archipelago were to invade a regular country (on the surface), they would still need to land an army on the ground. The ground battle would probably be decisive for any invasion, in the sense that the Archipelago could reasonably be expected to always have air superiority. Probably no other nation in the entirety of the Old World possessed as many airships as the Archipelago.

Defending the the Archipelago, on the other hand, could probably rely 100% on a navy.
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That was what I was thinking, mostly. I was going to mention that the navy would probably play a role defensively and probably as pirate patrol within the isles;

However, I do think fielding the navy offensively could be a thing, specially light bombarding vessels to rundown the enemy lines, though that would expose them to ground based attacks by war machines (like scorpions).

And in general, the navy would play an integral role as transports for troops (and said transports probably would need some degree of protection by other ships).
 
The_Everdistant_Utopia

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GenEriko said:
Wait do these magical ships run on some magic steam engine to propel themselves?
Or it is just pure magic
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Short answer:


Long answer:

There are probably two or more kinds of way to make those airships, given the fluidity of the canon. I could easily see airships running on magic engines and also airships that run on magic arrays on the entire ship. Maybe there are advantages and disadvantages on both approaches!
Maybe there are more ways to make an airship!
The sky (heh) is the limit!
 
Way

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fyrre said:
Yall are so smart, I don't think my brain can handle it though.
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It's never too late to learn, shoujo!

Anyway, while the Archipelago's mainstay is obviously airpower, I'm going to focus more on conventional warfare as a landbound nation would wage since it can be applied to more situations.

That being said, any recommendations on topics I should have Duke Grogar cover?
 
Way

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The_Everdistant_Utopia said:
Short answer:


Long answer:

There are probably two or more kinds of way to make those airships, given the fluidity of the canon. I could easily see airships running on magic engines and also airships that run on magic arrays on the entire ship. Maybe there are advantages and disadvantages on both approaches!
Maybe there are more ways to make an airship!
The sky (heh) is the limit!
Click to expand...
Shit, this reminds me of that airship lore I cooked up for that other RP...I could import that here, though it would be lazy.
 
BouncyCactus

BouncyCactus

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The_Everdistant_Utopia said:
Late medieval armies weren't exactly at the point where muskets or hand cannons would be the standard, to be honest. By the late medieval, they were mostly used defensibly from the inside of walls (mostly because of the impracticality of fielding them by that time). There was, of course, some variation on the use given the size and diversity of Europe.

I think muskets would only begin to make entry on the battlefield by the 16th century, so mid to late Renaissance and beginning of the Early Modern period, since by that time they had been developed enough for those kind of weapons to be fielded in a battlefield. Yet, they were mostly used in a skirmishing role until the Spanish developed their pike and shot tactics that brought firearms to the forefront of the combat at the time.

On the topic of tactics and navy, depends on what kind of style of 'naval' combat we're looking at, to be honest. The main tactics before the age of gunships were basically either boarding or ramming, but that's because they were basically just grandfathering the same tactics that had been used since the time of the Romans and it was basically a product of the conditions they usually found themselves.

Things that may affect how ship combat works in a sky context that I haven't seen mentioned are as follows:
  • The fact that we're working with a more three dimensional battlefield. The fact that you don't need to stand at the same height as the enemy ship may open some strategies, either by under or over the enemy ship;
    • As an example of strategy from bellow, the use of harpoons to pin down ships;
    • As an example of strategy from above, dropping blazing tar jars or hot oil from overboard;
  • The fact that there are no waves to roll the ship, making it a much more stable shooting platform would make the use of bows and small firearms more viable onboard;
  • The fact that there is no water to help counterbalance the ship makes both any heavy war machines that may be placed on warships (for example, a trebuchet could be installed on ships and in some occasions it was) or cannons a functional impossibility as the recoil without a way to counter balance would be just a hazard at best and just plain lunatic at worse.
In my opinion, I would probably see a couple types of ship arising; I'm going to assume by magic airship you mean either an airship with magic users or with magic equipment, so I'm going off from this premise. (Note: all names are tentative)

  • Blockers - Those would serve as the main type of ship to be fielded, which would serve as basically a means to provide suppressive fire to try and tie down enemies and keep them away as the magic ship did its job. They would mostly be shooting platforms for archers, musketmen and to light war engines. There would probably be variations focusing either on providing defensive fire to keep enemies away or provide active support by enveloping and making projectiles rain around the enemies.
  • Bombers - Those would probably be small and fast ships used to make runs on the enemy to drop down shit on them. Probably will have their bottom reinforced and probably would operate in groups and in conjunction to a supply ship filled with more things to drop when they come back.
  • Lockers - Basically ships made to go under or parallel to ships with the intention of either tying them down with harpoons from beneath or with hooks from the side. Probably fast ships and probably made with boarding in mind.
  • Runners - Those would be the main offensive type of ship, basically fast ships made with either ramming or boarding enemy ships. Their role would be basically to be blockade runners, focused on getting past the enemy's firing field and destroying their ships from behind the lines. Mostly focused on rushing down the main ship.
Though those are only my two cents in the matter, which aren't that credible~
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Sorry, I mean High Medieval, not late. ALWAY get those confused.

anyway, ya bring up a good point. Totally forgot about these being in the sky. With the air current up high being while violence, we could forgo the dial design, and went for a more steam punk design with copters as a propulsion method. Then, due to the lack of water, I.e buoyancy, how what are the weight limit of each ship? Does the ppl of SA can harnesses whatever magic that causes the island, and ultizied them in ship design?

And, as for heavy weoponries, I imagined that with how sky bound their civilization are, they would have developed a way to counter act the recoil of heavier weaponr, or a way to reduced the recoil of cannons, like putting them on a sliding rail that can absorbed the shocks, or synchronized the recoil with the engine, allowing the copters blades on one side to spin faster, and generated enough lift to counter act it.

I do like your proposed ship classification those. Maybe one way to sink a ship is simply added enough weight to one so that it exceeded the lift limit of the engine/copters?
 
The_Everdistant_Utopia

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BouncyCactus said:
Sorry, I mean High Medieval, not late. ALWAY get those confused.

anyway, ya bring up a good point. Totally forgot about these being in the sky. With the air current up high being while violence, we could forgo the dial design, and went for a more steam punk design with copters as a propulsion method. Then, due to the lack of water, I.e buoyancy, how what are the weight limit of each ship? Does the ppl of SA can harnesses whatever magic that causes the island, and ultizied them in ship design?

And, as for heavy weoponries, I imagined that with how sky bound their civilization are, they would have developed a way to counter act the recoil of heavier weaponr, or a way to reduced the recoil of cannons, like putting them on a sliding rail that can absorbed the shocks, or synchronized the recoil with the engine, allowing the copters blades on one side to spin faster, and generated enough lift to counter act it.
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Yeah, there is the silver lining that they would probably have devised some way of absorbing the shock through magic, making my point kind of moot~

The synchronized recoil with the engine is actually a nice idea, though I'd be worried about the integrity of the ship with the forces acting on it from the engine and the cannons.

Another idea would be using 'magical cannons' that don't have recoil since they shoot some predefined spell.

BouncyCactus said:
I do like your proposed ship classification those. Maybe one way to sink a ship is simply added enough weight to one so that it exceeded the lift limit of the engine/copters?
Click to expand...
Oh, that's a nice strategy! Maybe making harpoons tied to heavy anchors, shooting at ships and throwing the anchor overboard.
 
BouncyCactus

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The_Everdistant_Utopia said:
That was what I was thinking, mostly. I was going to mention that the navy would probably play a role defensively and probably as pirate patrol within the isles;

However, I do think fielding the navy offensively could be a thing, specially light bombarding vessels to rundown the enemy lines, though that would expose them to ground based attacks by war machines (like scorpions).

And in general, the navy would play an integral role as transports for troops (and said transports probably would need some degree of protection by other ships).
Click to expand...
The_Everdistant_Utopia said:
Yeah, there is the silver lining that they would probably have devised some way of absorbing the shock through magic, making my point kind of moot~

The synchronized recoil with the engine is actually a nice idea, though I'd be worried about the integrity of the ship with the forces acting on it from the engine and the cannons.

Another idea would be using 'magical cannons' that don't have recoil since they shoot some predefined spell.


Oh, that's a nice strategy! Maybe making harpoons tied to heavy anchors, shooting at ships and throwing the anchor overboard.
Click to expand...

Yea, heavy gunnery isn't really possible with a wooden hull ship tho, so I agree on the magic cannon.

I also think that are we talking about warfare between islands? Or is it between SA and the surface? Either way, I don't really see why the navy couldn't be the main force of SA. Why give up the air superiority and engage in a surface battle when u could just bomb the opposition to oblivion, considering SA would be the dominate air power of what ever world it is in. I believe that, with high enough altitude, the navy is simply untouchable by any pre-modern army, and their strongest type of ship in any air-surface engagement would be Bombers. I imagine the sight of an SA bombers could bring the same terror as an Nimitz -Class carrier to any oppositions.

In a pitch battle, however, SA will be at a major disadvantage due to their lack of experiences.
 
ohko

ohko

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BouncyCactus said:
Yea, heavy gunnery isn't really possible with a wooden hull ship tho, so I agree on the magic cannon.

I also think that are we talking about warfare between islands? Or is it between SA and the surface? Either way, I don't really see why the navy couldn't be the main force of SA. Why give up the air superiority and engage in a surface battle when u could just bomb the opposition to oblivion, considering SA would be the dominate air power of what ever world it is in. I believe that, with high enough altitude, the navy is simply untouchable by any pre-modern army, and their strongest type of ship in any air-surface engagement would be Bombers. I imagine the sight of an SA bombers could bring the same terror as an Nimitz -Class carrier to any oppositions.

In a pitch battle, however, SA will be at a major disadvantage due to their lack of experiences.
Click to expand...
I think from a storytelling perspective though, it's often a good idea to leave things in a state that is well-balanced between factions and sides. Magic is so loosely defined in this universe that there are a lot of ways to imagine limitations of a particular tactic.

I might call it the "anachronism rule" but at no point should any technology end up 100% "superior" than other forms of technology (rendering something obsolete or one-sided). Since we have the capacity as world-builders to make up nearly anything, it's important to keep things flexible enough for multiple different parties to have different interpretations about their city, nation, or form of technology/magic.

For instance, one faction might have machine guns, but there needs to be a narrative reason why it's not "superior" to knights on horses. Typically, from a storytelling perspective, the machine gun side either needs a hard counter or a specific limitation that ensures that knights on horses don't end up obsolete.

So yeah, I would probably reject the idea of bombing as a 100% winning strategy.
 
BouncyCactus

BouncyCactus

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ohko said:
I would probably reject the idea of bombing as a 100% winning strategy.
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Aw..... I can see the reason tho. Still it just doesn't make sense not to used it, when it is so effective. How about we make it so that the strategy of aerial bombing a pain in the ass for the logistic? Limited resources? Transport of ordinates? Weight limit of the airship? To further added, maybe the reason that SA was an empire with surface colonies in their old world was the limit of resources, as well as the overly reliant on trade, and if they do anything remotely threaten to any surface-bound nations, there will be a boycott, and thus forcing SA to stand down, as their small and limiting resources on hand couldn't win them a war fast enough????

That way, we could spin the narrative that, because of the none existent trade network in Terra Nova, as well as an urgent need f resources, the Duke decided on a more aggressive stand, and if the war really happen, all the Natives has to do is to starved SA into submission, so it is like a timed event. SA need to win fast enough, or the Native could endured and stall for long enough, and both side could has quests and missions to either assassinated the leaders on both side, disabled airship of SA, demoralized the Native of Terra Nova into giving up, destroyed the precious war resources of SA, and what not?

Those are just my brain dumps of ideas, so I dunno if that is any good to use tho......
 
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