Wyvern communication relays for Empire of Charis

JeffEngel wrote:

DrakBibliophile wrote:First of all, the Charis-Emerald sea gap isn't that large so use of Wyverns isn't that hard.

The "problem" IMO with your idea is that its so obvious that if it was possible, the Church would have been doing it already.

So IMO, either there are problems that we aren't seeing with your idea or your idea is already in use.

Also, IMO an aspect with Wyvern communications is that the message size is small because it has to be written on the amount of paper that a Wyvern can carry.

While use of "code groups" can cut down on the size, "code groups" depend on the sender and receiver setting up the meanings of the "code groups" before hand.

It's plausible that the Church didn't feel the need to bother with wyvern links to the Out Islands before things went poorly at Armageddon Reef and Darcos Sound. Courier ships making the same connections wouldn't suffer the message size limit - they just suffer from much lower speed and the need to use ports and wind and water currents instead of just flying from A to B. I can believe that that satisfied the Church, and the sacrosanct Temple courier galleys certainly represent a stronger statement of power than a wyvern.

For a politically united Out Island Empire though, and one at war with the whole mainland, having wyverns to cross those gaps too could be a lot handier. Message length is certainly a limiting factor, but then, the semaphore imposes some of that as well. I wouldn't see wyvern connections between the semaphore links replacing courier ships entirely - just being an important supplement.

runsforcelery wrote:Charis hasn't set up a messenger wyvern chain for a couple of reasons. One is the set of logistics issues I mentioned above. Another is that even with Nahrmahn's long-range wyverns, covering the water gap between somewhere like Old Charis and Corisande or Chisholm would be impractical. And yet another is that they don't really want to advertise the operating radius of Nahrmahn's wyverns. The fact that no one knew a messenger wyvern could get from Delferahk back to Tellesberg was a major factor in the inner circle's ability to engineer Irys and Daivyn's rescue, and it's quite possible that advantage will be needed again before things are over. It's true that having a plausible high-speed (relatively speaking) means of passing messages might cover some of the inner circle's ability to communicate near-instantly over long distances, but the truth is that it would offer very little in situations where they don't already have contacts — or, for that matter, the "unseen, invisible seijin network" to transmit messages for them — in place.

SYED wrote:I am wondering, suing their increased steel and iron making ability, to produce platforms in the oceans at the right places, to transmit the semaphor. SOrt of like those oild drilling platforms, but dedicated to a light house and semaphore. not all away accross oceans, but the short gaps between island.

Ramhawkfan wrote:

SYED wrote:I am wondering, suing their increased steel and iron making ability, to produce platforms in the oceans at the right places, to transmit the semaphor. SOrt of like those oild drilling platforms, but dedicated to a light house and semaphore. not all away accross oceans, but the short gaps between island.

I see 2 problems with that idea. One, from the descriptions of the sea life on Safehold , and the ferocity of the weather, building and maintaining platforms would be difficult, if not impossible. Two, they have a lot more dire need for steel elsewhere for the foreseeable future. By the time they could build platforms, the war might be over, and they could just build radios, comms, whatever.

DennisLee wrote:Have you considered a relay of wyverns? For water crossings you select two ports where there is already steady traffic and just ship the wyverns that way. On each side you set up wyvern stations at reasonable distances along trade routes. Rather than having to ship a wyvern from the heart of Charis to the center of Siddermark, as an example, you have several wyverns that each just need to be sent back to the relay post they came from.

DrakBibliophile wrote:First of all, the Charis-Emerald sea gap isn't that large so use of Wyverns isn't that hard.

The "problem" IMO with your idea is that its so obvious that if it was possible, the Church would have been doing it already.

So IMO, either there are problems that we aren't seeing with your idea or your idea is already in use.

Also, IMO an aspect with Wyvern communications is that the message size is small because it has to be written on the amount of paper that a Wyvern can carry.

While use of "code groups" can cut down on the size, "code groups" depend on the sender and receiver setting up the meanings of the "code groups" before hand.

JeffEngel wrote:I was re-reading HFAF and the information on wyvern ranges and speeds made me think about communications using them for the Empire of Charis.

Granted, the Empire's communications are already secretly linked by Owl and SNARC's much of the time, among the inner circle, but that still needs at least cover stories for "officially" finding things out. Semaphore chains handle things overland quickly, but the Empire consists of seven main islands/continents (Tarot, Old Charis [including Margaret's Land], Silverlode, Emerald, Chisholm, Zebediah, and Corisande) and lots of smaller ones, connected only by courier ships.

Wyvern's, however, are a lot faster, and you can get a two-way relay with each of two stations keeping wyverns that home in on the other station. Range may be something of an issue, but the sea crossing distances (Tarot-Margaret's Land, Charis-Silverlode-Emerald, Zebediah-Silverlode [including an intermediary island], Zebediah-Chisholm [also including an intermediary island], and Zebediah-Corisande [possibly including intermediary islands, but those are very small ones]) are none of them all that great, so one or another of the wyvern breeds ought to suffice to make those crossings. I had some concern about how well they would take to making those crossings in terms of how well they may be able to hunt for food or go without it at sea, but then Nahrmahn was using them for Charis-Emerald communications without trouble and that's a sea gap as long as any of them.

This does assume also a good semaphore network across northern Silverlode, which may be overly optimistic. But in a pinch, more wyvern relays could work there, or possibly a longer distance Zebediah-Emerald one.

So - is there any reason they can't set up stations to use wyverns to make those crossings for (granted, low-bandwidth) communications? Should we assume they do by now?

Incidentally, the Tarot-Siddermark sea gap is also not much longer than some of the rest of these, but the southern Siddermark semaphore communications themselves are a hash by now. The Chisholm-Trellheim and Tarot-Fallos gaps are also modest, in case of future Charisian expansion, or at least making inroads for better relations with those parties than the Temple would care for. (The Temple has not much ability to prevent Charisian contacts with Fallos, Trellheim, or the handful of people on the Barren Lands, though Charis hasn't the spare means to do too much coercion in those parts either.)