HFQ Official Snippet #9

n7axw wrote:

PeterZ wrote:I am not so sure. The hulls required to support the war effort has been huge. That demand and the demand for trading with the member nations and Siddermark suggests that the Charisian merchant marine is as busy if not more so than pre jihad. That might not be true indefinitely, but certainly true right now.

Impressment will limit merchant capacity and exacerbate the issues Rock Point is considering in his internal monologue.

I'm not so sure... I can agree that their galleon carrying capacity might be pretty tight.

But schooners? I know that some schooners have been purchased for dealing with scouting and such... But they are not really cargo bearing vessels and up to this business with the Desnarian commerce raiders, what would they have been doing?

As for manpower, I was presuming that those unemployed seamen, if there are any, might be willing to volunteer. After all, it does sound better than unemployment.

Just thinking a bit further, the manpower crisis for armed forces in the mainland seems to be over. It would be a far more efficient use of recruits for Charis at this point to shunt their recruits over into the navy. 10,000 men added to the army would be a mere drop in the bucket in terms of what happens on the mainland. 10,000 men would make a huge difference for those light combatants that the navy needs.

Don

oh, I don't know: scouting, coastal patrols, carrying dispatches, picketing major enemy ports, acting as signal relays for the main fleet . . . little things like that.

By the height of the Napoleonic Wars, the Royal Navy had expanded to over 600 ships, only 175 of which were ships-of-the-line, and that represented a drop of around 20% of its peak line-of-battle strength. In effect, the RN had effectively defeated the French battle fleet — rather the position Charis is in right now vis-à-vis the Church — but had been forced into an enormous expansion of lighter vessels because of all the hundreds of things navies do beyond simply fighting battles.

Taking the ratio between British ships-of-the-line (the equivalent of the Charisians' "galleons") and their lighter units, you get a ratio of roughly 2.5 frigates, brigs, sloops, et cetera to every ship-of-the-line. In the Imperial Charisian Navy, effectively all of those functions "below the line" are carried out by schooners, and at the moment the Charisians have multiple hundreds of them in service.

Trust me, they been finding things to keep themselves busy doing, but if it turns into a matter of providing convoy escorts against a serious threat to the Empire, they're available for that, too.

PeterZ wrote:But Charisian tech supremacy must erode or the stories become military porn.

I believe that South Harchong and Desnair might confront some stark realization upon examining that cargo.

1-neither nation can duplicate the percision of these designs.
2-that the captured ships weren't better protected suggests the other cargo ships carried similar weapons and ammo. Neither Desnair nor South Harchong can produce those quantities at anything like affordable costs.
3-when the ICA and RSA are all armed with these weapons, they will cut through the jihadi forces like a hot knife through butter.
4-if commerce raiding does not stop these weapons from getting into Siddermark, fighting the heretics will be suicide.

These realizations might lead to a couple of conclusions.
1-If the heretics are unbeatable, might that not mean God DOES support their cause?
2-This possibility might be enough rationale to encourage Mahris to back away from the Jihad.
3-If there are further setbacks in the war, the Howard nations have to consider the possibilities.

InvisibleBison wrote:Aside from steam engines (or more precise information about how to make them than was in that briefcase the Church got in LaMA), the only specific idea I had was some industrial information intended for Siddarmarkians, though I don't know how likely it would be for such info to be shipping on an army cargo ship, if it was shipping at all. My comment was more expressing vague apprehensions about the erosion of Charis's tech supremacy.

Hi Peter,

I don't agree. What was said is that without standardization of measurements, the parts from one "manufactory" would not fit with another. With 5,000 M96 rifles, they can use actual working parts as templates. If they spread the parts to suppliers, and require the manufactured parts to be identical within the margin of difference that Zhwaigair measured with the earlier rifles, they probably can make their own rifles.

As for cartridges, the only thing that was new technology with the cartridges, was the design and the creation of machinery to do the manufacturing process.

If they captured a steam engine then they will be able to bypass, design steps, stress calculation, testing, and go straight to manufacturing. They already captured the Charis' current steel making process.

James

While burning out the entire Desniarian coast is a way to stop the raiders, it's not something you would need those ironclads for. The ironclads are more something you would use to assault a well defended position, like say Desnair the city

Something that has been nagging at me for the last day or two since I read this: Why would a Charisan merchant ship allow themself to be boarded?

In a regular conflict, sure. The merchant ship is taken as a prize and the crew is held till either exchanged or until the war ends. But this war is not a regular conflict where the rules of war are being observed. This is a holy war in which all Charisans have been declared as heretics. Right now, the best outcome for Charisan seamen in the event of being captured is a quick execution (which is what the snippet says happened to the crews of the captured ships). The other possible fate is being put to the question and dying slowly and with great pain.

So, if your possible outcomes are either 1. A summary execution or 2. Slow death by torture, then why surrender at all? If your merchant ship is armed, then fight to the death. If unarmed, why not scuttle your ship to prevent capture?
*edited once

Henry Brown wrote:Something I have been nagging at me for the last day or two since I read this: Why would a Charisan merchant ship allow themself to be boarded?

In a regular conflict, sure. The merchant ship is taken as a prize and the crew is held till either exchanged or until the war ends. But this war is not a regular conflict where the rules of war are being observed. This is a holy war in which all Charisans have been declared as heretics. Right now, the best outcome for Charisan seamen in the event of being captured is a quick execution (which is what the snippet says happened to the crews of the captured ships). The other possible fate is being put to the question and dying slowly and with great pain.

So, if your possible outcomes are either 1. A summary execution or 2. Slow death by torture, then why surrender at all? If your merchant ship is armed, then fight to the death. If unarmed, why not scuttle your ship to prevent capture?

Or set a scuttling charge big enough to take out your attacker. (Scuttling a sailing ship without bilge penetrations for an engine or toilet involves hacking a hole in the bottom with a chisel - a couple of hours work at best, or a sizable explosive charge).

Well James, the bolt actions can be copied. The problem is even using the parts from the captured M96's as templates, many multiples of different human hands cannot quickly those pieces. The time required to copy those pieces without powered stamping tools would make the finished product an expensive rich man's toy.

Making ammo runs into the same problem. Muscle powered presses and drawing tools can only work so fast. The amount of labor required to make 1 round of ammo would make creating useful volumes cost prohibitive. Given the labor requirements, I hope the CoGA does try to replicate the weapons. The small but non- trivial variations in both rounds and the rifle will cause jams and misfires. The amount labor, money and most importantly time needed to manufacture the required numbers would mean very little else is produced.

JRM wrote:
Hi Peter,

I don't agree. What was said is that without standardization of measurements, the parts from one "manufactory" would not fit with another. With 5,000 M96 rifles, they can use actual working parts as templates. If they spread the parts to suppliers, and require the manufactured parts to be identical within the margin of difference that Zhwaigair measured with the earlier rifles, they probably can make their own rifles.

As for cartridges, the only thing that was new technology with the cartridges, was the design and the creation of machinery to do the manufacturing process.

If they captured a steam engine then they will be able to bypass, design steps, stress calculation, testing, and go straight to manufacturing. They already captured the Charis' current steel making process.

James

Hi Peter,

Go back and read what Zhwaigair had to say. He said, they could create the machinery, jigs, and stamps, but that they couldn't standardize with other factories. With this many samples, they don't need standardized measuring units, because if they duplicate a template and the shop down the street duplicates an identical template then they can create interchangeable parts.

If they can create machinery to create rifle parts, they can create machinery to make cartridges.

They don't have to go through the research and development to build a new industrial base. All they need to do is copy what Charis has already done. If they don't have spies in Charis, they do have spies in Siddarmark.

James

PeterZ wrote:Well James, the bolt actions can be copied. The problem is even using the parts from the captured M96's as templates, many multiples of different human hands cannot quickly those pieces. The time required to copy those pieces without powered stamping tools would make the finished product an expensive rich man's toy.

Making ammo runs into the same problem. Muscle powered presses and drawing tools can only work so fast. The amount of labor required to make 1 round of ammo would make creating useful volumes cost prohibitive. Given the labor requirements, I hope the CoGA does try to replicate the weapons. The small but non- trivial variations in both rounds and the rifle will cause jams and misfires. The amount labor, money and most importantly time needed to manufacture the required numbers would mean very little else is produced.

JRM wrote:
Hi Peter,

I don't agree. What was said is that without standardization of measurements, the parts from one "manufactory" would not fit with another. With 5,000 M96 rifles, they can use actual working parts as templates. If they spread the parts to suppliers, and require the manufactured parts to be identical within the margin of difference that Zhwaigair measured with the earlier rifles, they probably can make their own rifles.

As for cartridges, the only thing that was new technology with the cartridges, was the design and the creation of machinery to do the manufacturing process.

If they captured a steam engine then they will be able to bypass, design steps, stress calculation, testing, and go straight to manufacturing. They already captured the Charis' current steel making process.

James

PeterZ wrote:Well James, the bolt actions can be copied. The problem is even using the parts from the captured M96's as templates, many multiples of different human hands cannot quickly those pieces. The time required to copy those pieces without powered stamping tools would make the finished product an expensive rich man's toy.

Making ammo runs into the same problem. Muscle powered presses and drawing tools can only work so fast. The amount of labor required to make 1 round of ammo would make creating useful volumes cost prohibitive. Given the labor requirements, I hope the CoGA does try to replicate the weapons. The small but non- trivial variations in both rounds and the rifle will cause jams and misfires. The amount labor, money and most importantly time needed to manufacture the required numbers would mean very little else is produced.

JRM wrote:
Hi Peter,

I don't agree. What was said is that without standardization of measurements, the parts from one "manufactory" would not fit with another. With 5,000 M96 rifles, they can use actual working parts as templates. If they spread the parts to suppliers, and require the manufactured parts to be identical within the margin of difference that Zhwaigair measured with the earlier rifles, they probably can make their own rifles.

As for cartridges, the only thing that was new technology with the cartridges, was the design and the creation of machinery to do the manufacturing process.

If they captured a steam engine then they will be able to bypass, design steps, stress calculation, testing, and go straight to manufacturing. They already captured the Charis' current steel making process.

James

Peter is right on this one. The key to understanding the church's problem here has two parts, uniform measurements and precision machine work, neither of which the curch can do, both of which took Charis years to develop even with Merlin's help---the difference between a crude manufactoring capacity and a modern one that can produce such things as steam engines and the M96s.

Don

JRM wrote:Hi Peter,

Go back and read what Zhwaigair had to say. He said, they could create the machinery, jigs, and stamps, but that they couldn't standardize with other factories. With this many samples, they don't need standardized measuring units, because if they duplicate a template and the shop down the street duplicates an identical template then they can create interchangeable parts.

If they can create machinery to create rifle parts, they can create machinery to make cartridges.

They don't have to go through the research and development to build a new industrial base. All they need to do is copy what Charis has already done. If they don't have spies in Charis, they do have spies in Siddarmark.

James

In that passage, James, Zwaigair mentioned that the products from the same shop might or might not be interchangeable. That shop would use the same templates to make their jigs yet still not be interchangeable. Now toss in the brass rounds. The drawing machines for the brass have to produce nearly identical tubes. Sure they know how to make brass and copper pipe in quantity. For plumbing, tubes that don't fit exactly can be fitted together and soldered. Different enough drawing machines that produce tubes with big enough variances in their dimensions can produce cartridges that can fit in the chamber of the rifle but are different enough to jam or misfire. The more use the rifle gets the more likely these issues will come up.

Yes, these issues can be avoided with sufficient diligence and care. That takes time and money. To truly replicate the automated system of Howsmyn with the labor intensive system of the mainland, requires so much time and training that it would be a like one master gunsmith making every single piece from a common design. Even then it would take weeks or months per gun.

I agree with you that an argument might be made that the less than knowledgeable aristos of the mainland might just try to replicate the bolt action rifles. That would be such a resource suck that charis would be more helped than hindered.

n7axw wrote:
Peter is right on this one. The key to understanding the church's problem here has two parts, uniform measurements and precision machine work, neither of which the curch can do, both of which took Charis years to develop even with Merlin's help---the difference between a crude manufactoring capacity and a modern one that can produce such things as steam engines and the M96s.

Don

Hi Don,

I will add this quote from RFC:

It should be noted, however, that this same metric indicates that 12 workers in a Mainland manufactory could equal the production of one worker in a Howsmyn manufactory, and the Mainland still has a vast advantage in total manpower.

In addition, notice that both Zhwaigair and Brother Lynkyn Fultyn were capable of measuring the difference in parts that had been machined to a tolerance. At Zhwaigair's demonstration, Thirsk acknowledges the reassembled rifle's crisp action was not as silky smooth as his fowling pieces. The church's shops are capable of precision. What they had not been capable of was standardization. The captured parts become the standard.

James